Short: Bottles

Bottles

I was a wise man with my bottles.

They'd come with me to the park every day, all piled together in my bag, clanking and singing as I walked. They loved coming out to play.

Usually, I'd set them on the thick stone wall by the oak tree. Its leaves made the most wonderful shadows on the bottles, dancing back and forth with the wind.

Sometimes I'd use the north wall and sometimes the east. The west wall was too bumpy and cracked so I never used that. There was no south wall. That way was open so people could get up close to the tree if they wanted to sit in the grass underneath. It was a big, friendly tree so that happened a lot. People would sit and cuddle or have a picnic. Once in a while they would watch me talk with my bottles, but mostly they let me be.

My biggest problem were grackles. Sometimes there'd be one on my wall when I'd get there, but I'd shoo him off. I tried being nice to them but that never got me anywhere. Grackles are jerks.

Most days the park smelled of roses. The big bushes nearby were thick with pink flowers, but there were some red and yellow ones scattered in there, too.

Most important was the roses were far enough away that I didn't get bothered by any bees. Bugs were okay. I liked bugs. They'd crawl on the bottles and between them like it was a large city. Bees were all work. No time for games if you're a bee.

Today a young man came up to me, excited and smiling and tugging on my coat. Happy or angry, I try to just ignore people. That tends to work the best to make them go away.

This young man, though, he wouldn't leave. He said he'd been looking for me and had found me, but I told him I wasn't lost. He asked if I remembered him, and I told him no. It was the truth. This wasn't what he wanted to hear, I guess, because the smile faded off his lips.

My bottles fill with sunshine when I put them on the wall. If it's quiet you can hear it pouring in with a soft, bubbling tinkle. Once upon a time each of these bottles gave shape to something that needed it. Maybe it was beer or soda or water, but whatever it was if you left it by itself it would just splash and drain away. It was the bottle that held things together. People never saw that, and never really cared about the bottle. They paid their money for what was inside, then threw the most important part away after the insides were used up. The good news was now the bottle didn't have to worry about what anyone else needed, and it was free to hold the sunlight.

The young man wouldn't leave. The smile faded from his eyes, which filled with tears, and just in that moment he seemed nearly familiar. It was a tug at something far back in my mind that I couldn't quite place, but the shadow of it made my stomach tighten. The young man grabbed my arm and told me I needed to come with him. That I needed to come home. I got scared and pushed his arm away. It hit one of my bottles, which fell off the wall. I was too slow and couldn't catch it. It hit the sidewalk and exploded into a million glittering little pieces.

The police came and the man kept yelling. I've met almost all of the police around the park and nearby places and mostly they're nice to me if I keep to myself. Sometimes I have to move along when someone complains but I always come back. They know I like it here and my bottles do, too.

I scooped up the glass into a newspaper I fished from a trash can. The police talked to the young man and calmed him down. I'm no good at dealing with angry people, but there are so many angry people in the world I'm sure they do it every day.

The police took him further away so I couldn't hear what they said, but the young man kept looking at me as they talked. He finally stopped yelling and just looked sad.

I emptied the broken bits into a trash can. They slid off the paper with a soft scratch and tinkled as they fell. It was my friend saying goodbye.

An officer led the man away, but he kept glancing at me over his shoulder as he went. I tried not to look back but that strange feeling in my stomach wouldn't go away. I held up one of my bottles and looked through it like a telescope. Sometimes my bottles help me make sense of things, but through the brown glass his face grew only more faded and blurry.

When a bottle breaks it doesn't just lose its own shape, it can't hold a shape for anything else either. The pieces that are left can't do what a bottle did. Any beer or soda or water will just wash away the sharp little bits. There's no fixing it. The pieces go into the trash.

Later, an officer with a bushy gray mustache came up to me and asked if I was okay. I'd met him before, but I couldn't remember his name. I can never remember any of their names. I told him yes I was okay, and he smiled and gave me a new bottle. It was Coca-Cola, but on the side it said Hencho En Mexico. It smelled sugary. Ants will love it.

I put Hencho on the wall with the rest of my family and filled it with sunlight.