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The Cotton Man In the morning a man covered in cotton knocked at my door. I answered. He stood there outside, the cotton from the trees blowing in the wind and sticking to the sweat on his skin. The air was dry and hot. The guy’s name was Paul. He didn’t mean to show up at my door. He was actually looking for some woman down the street. He didn’t care that it was me. He said, “Do you want to get pancakes?” “Pancakes?” I said. “Pancakes,” said Paul. *** We sat in a booth in the corner of the small restaurant. The place was shiny, like it had been rubbed down with the sweat of men working too hard. On the walls were license plates and maps of the Midwest, just hanging there like spiders. When the waitress came, Paul and I weren’t ready to order. It’s not that we were too busy talking. Really we were sitting there in silence, him looking out the window and sighing. He kept saying “shit” under his breath in a playful way. I looked at the placemats with the lined drawings of forests. I thought about coloring on them with the crayons next to the napkin dispenser, but didn’t. To keep the scene simple. The waitress put down our glasses of water. She started to walk away after I said that we needed a few minutes. Paul stopped her. He said, “Stay.” “You’re ready?” said the waitress. “No,” he said. “Wait here until we’re ready.” I got the blueberry pancakes, the same as Paul. I got them because Paul ordered for both of us. I didn’t refuse this, not after the way he took a full minute, the waitress standing there like she was used to, to decide on blueberry. *** It was the way he said that word “stay.” Paul asked, “What do you do?” And I said, “I’m a twin.” “That’s what you do?” “That’s what I am,” I said. *** The way he said “stay” reminded me of my sister. I wasn’t lying to Paul, I really am a twin. I’m the younger one. My sister is dead, though. Carol, she bit it hard while riding a motorcycle down a too-steep mountain highway in southern Colorado. When we were young girls, I called Carol by a different name. I called her Care, which she was not. Cared for, yes, but not careful. She was a stinker. Actually, it’s true what some people say about twins. That they can read each other on a deeper level than most siblings. That they share a mind. That they push together on the soft spots of their skulls. In the middle of the night Carol would get out of bed and eat cookies. Not long after, I would also get up craving cookies, no matter the fact that Carol had already finished what was left of them. “Stinker,” I would say to her. Carol once climbed a tree. She went too high up. Meanwhile, I was in the kitchen waiting for my tea to cool down. She fell, and when she did she knocked the wind out of herself. She couldn’t scream or make any noise without her breath. Nevertheless, I felt something rise in my stomach like heat does in a building. Outside I found her on the ground. “You fell,” I said. I cradled her in my arms. I said, “Let me get mom and dad.” Carol had breathed hard then, squeaking a little bit the way girls can. “No,” she said. “Stay. Just stay here.” I shared my tea with her later that afternoon. *** Paul went to the bathroom while we were waiting for our blueberry pancakes. He came back to the table with some water left on his arms and face where he had washed off the cotton. “So what do you do,” he said. “Really.” “I walk dogs.” “You run it like a business,” he said. “I suppose, yes,” I said. “From your little house?” “Sure.” “Why aren’t you walking any today?” “I’m eating pancakes,” I said. *** Paul and I talked. He told me that he went door to door selling renter’s insurance. The woman he was supposed to meet, the woman who was not me, was interested in signing some policies with him and whichever company he worked for. I never caught the name of that company. We made small talk until our pancakes came. We did our manners proud. We remarked on the clear weather. We talked about where I got my summer dress. The pancakes. The blueberries looked like dying stars in the cakes. They tasted all the better for it. Like relief. *** Paul finally asked about my twin. “Carol,” I told him. “She was the older one.” “By how much?” I had to think about how to answer that. “Does she live here too?” he said when I didn’t say anything. I told Paul all about the accident with the motorcycle. I told him about Carol and me as girls. I let it leave me like waste. “I don’t even know why she was in Colorado,” I said. “Who goes to Colorado in the spring, anyway?” “When did it happen?” he said. “Two weeks ago.” “Two weeks ago?” “Two weeks,” I said. “My parents didn’t call me to tell me until two days after. I don’t know why.” Hand it to Paul. He seemed interested. He said, “Who writes the obituaries for these people? Does the family do it, or someone at the paper?” “I did it,” I said. “The sister,” he said. “Is that usual?” “I don’t know.” “What did it say?” “The obituary?” “Yes. What did it say?” Paul kept eating his pancakes. I just moved them around with a fork until what was left of them mixed together into a kind of mush. On some days I can bury myself in mush like that. But not every day. Paul waited for me to answer him, then he sighed and got up. I felt dizzy with a few things. “Don’t leave me,” I said without really realizing it. The way I moved. I kind of reached out to him. “Please,” I said. “Don’t.” “I’m just getting an ashtray,” said Paul. “An ashtray, I’ll be right back.” *** The thing is, Paul wasn’t the guy’s name. We actually never got around to telling each other our names. So I just had to make it up and believe. He was, all in all, the man who bought me pancakes, then listened. And he did come back. After breakfast he came with me to walk one of my client’s dogs. There were two of those dogs. Paul picked up after them when they had to go to the bathroom. After that, he just left, but before he did, I did my best to feel integral. Again, this is not an everyday thing. See, I lied to Paul, anyway. Or, I told him what I had written for the obituary, but I didn’t tell him that I stole the life story from one I read about in an old newspaper that I found in my parents’ basement. It is my estimation that all the shit of everything is flying on the wind, waiting to stick to your skin like that cotton. Paul had washed his off at the restaurant. I say, don’t. It doesn’t do any good. Not ever. Listen to what I’m saying—when the shit comes, wear it like you know how. Do your best. Sit like you’re too goddamned pretty.
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