Fallow Fields

Mario was fond of looking at his rosemary plants on the balcony outside of his bedroom. He liked the
shape of the plants, whose leaves lifted from their stems like a multitude of arms reaching up in
indomitable optimism.
Mario would rise just before dawn. It was when the plants glowed silver-blue in the dark weal of old
maples standing tall across from the balcony railing. He would take a walk down the drive before the
light revealed the features of things. Returning, he would make coffee and eggs. He would cut bread.
Roger would come down in his robe, pour coffee with a trembling hand, cool it with milk or cream, and
sip in the corner with a manner of quiet desperation. Then, he would return to bed.
When Roger would descend the stairs again, he would measure some pills in his hand and give them to
Mario with a glass of water. Mario would take them, in personal belief that the pills were ridding him of
a cancer.
The two of them would listen to the news on the radio. One morning, reports of terrorism, plights of
refugees, and a saga of political corruption inspired Roger to describe a tragedy of monies misspent: of
massive construction projects begun and abandoned, of useless monolith structures striking steel against
the sky. Idle, they betrayed nothing of fractures rifting friendships, families, and reputations, nor of
any occasion of recovery. Years later, when the steel became concrete and glass, the new buildings
indicated pains-taking labors of perspicuous speculators and attorneys, and profit.
Mario learned for the first time of an assembly line.
Afternoon had sent successions of storm clouds over the fields. Roger and Mario were sitting at the
kitchen table when a dark shape rose and took form in the sheets of rain coating the window pane of the
door to the drive. A man knocked at the door. When he entered, as he began to strip his jacket from his
body, Roger peered at him, and left the room without speaking. He returned carrying a blanket, gave it
to the man, and asked the man to sit in his chair. He poured the man a cup of coffee.
The man had dried blood on his face. His cheek and chin were bruised, with dark welts and abrasions that
might have been a day old. He looked dazed, his eyes panning, but unseeing. Mario noticed the man had
a military haircut that had been growing out for several weeks.
The man stayed for several weeks more. At first, he regarded Mario with reservation. Then, he began to
smile at Marios wry comments to Rogers stories. On the day that he left, he asked to take a picture of
Mario in front of the grape arbor in the garden beneath Marios balcony.