The sounds wouldn’t leave him. Syllables were spouted by an excited emcee; then there was the massive collective intake of breath that moment before he took the stage to screams, shouts, and capgun staccato applause strafing the darkness beyond his platform. Already sweat-soaked and hungry, he assaulted them with a whoop, a growl from a hunched rabid hound, a sweet choirboy falsetto, soaring operatic crescendos. Patent leather allowing him to slide, step, step, step, fly into a full split, glide to his feet, improvised moves from his boxing days, a young man from Detroit who loved Mario Lanza and almost shattered glass trying to imitate him.
Wiping his brow with whatever the steamy women in front threw at him, the heat from the lights, more though from within him, casually removing his jacket and flipping it over his shoulder like he owned the whole damn city. The band pumping and funking, backup singers echoing his urgent call and response, his sounds spanning every genre from gospel to soul to pop and R&B.
He closed his eyes on the ballads, voice floating through screened windows, a bedroom burglar stealing fragments of feeling, jumpstarting memories in every love-struck, lonely kid covered in cloudy, fragile vulnerability.
Mr. Excitement, they called him. Even Elvis could only shake his head, uncurl his lip and marvel at the talent.
Now he tries vainly to move a finger or turn his head to focus on anything but the ceiling in a bed that has become too comfortable. His human form cocoon in an absurd horror story. He waits confusedly for the reclusive narrator to explain how and when it will end.
He tries to coax a sigh, settles for a wheeze.
He is warm, a different warm than that on stage, a sticky, annoying, waxy warm. The door opens and the light, a different light from the arenas and clubs spreads across the room, a florescent patina that states sickness, hospital-scrubbed light. She enters and places his food on a tiny table near the bed. She smiles dutifully. He knows she must have a family somewhere and her shift is almost over. He wonders if she knows who he is.
Concentrating intently, he tries to swallow, his sounds now a gurgle, cough, gasp, smacking, his once unearthly voice now a tired, squiggly caterpillar carefully squeezing past the tasteless morsels toward a cruel, mocking freedom. – Joe Del Priore (The author is a frequent contributor to the Current. He can be reached at current@hudsonreporter.com)