FICTION
At the Head of Every Street
Though she was wearing something other than that long-sleeved, silver gown flowing down to her ankles, it had to be her. Roy Patterson recollected some lines from her routine at the street festival:
“I call aloud in the street … at the gates of the city … come out from among those who hate knowledge, those who reject my advice …”
As best he could recall, her monologue had proceeded in that general direction. Now she was pulling open the door to a bar half a block ahead. Quickening his pace, Roy reached the door, reopened it, and followed her in. The place was dimly lit despite the lateness of the hour, strange environs indeed for a teetotaler. His eyes did a nervous one-eighty around the room, and then he spotted her.
Though dressed casually in jeans, T-shirt, and tennis shoes, she was an arrestingly elegant beauty. Roy had the impression that anything would look stylish on her. Wavy, auburn hair cascaded onto her shoulders and framed a face of bold lines yet soft femininity. Her nose, her chin, and her lower jaw were attractively prominent, and her cheeks were firm. The musculature of her arms was graceful, the width of her shoulders in perfect proportion. She had sensitive, long-fingered hands that skillfully cradled a glass containing some kind of clear, light brown liquid. Even on a barstool, her physique was statuesque.
He walked toward her with an uncertain gait. She turned her head at his approach and examined him with calm, skeptical eyes. An attractive hint of collarbone peeked above the neckline of her shirt.
“… I … hope I’m not inconveniencing you … but I saw your performance this afternoon. I thought it was … convincing …”
The woman seated at the bar raised her eyebrows with the air of a performer who knew her effort had been anything but that.
“… and I hoped I might …”
A brusque voice interrupted him. “You can’t loiter in here without buying something, pal. What’ll it be?”
“… That … might be a problem …” Roy answered with a conciliatory gesture. “You see … I don’t drink …”
“Then what’re you doing here?” the bartender snapped.
“It’s okay, Steve,” the woman intervened. “I’m curious. Let him buy me a drink.”
She had a wide, hungry mouth with well-formed teeth, all in perfect alignment. Roy’s heart was pounding faster and harder. Every social instinct told him to jump up and run away, but her blue-gray eyes held him like those of a python immobilizing a mouse. When she opened her mouth in a cynical smile, she appeared ready to swallow him whole.
“What’s your name?”
“Roy … Roy Patterson.”
“Roy, you can call me Wisdom, but for all you know, I’m a gold ring in the snout of a pig.”
“I … wouldn’t say …”
She leaned toward him until he flinched.
“You look like a Sunday school type, Roy. What passage did I just quote?”
“Proverbs … closer to the beginning than the end,” he estimated.
“That’s too broad a target. You don’t get any points for that.”
Motioning to the bartender, she placed her order.
“Another whiskey sour, Steve. It’s on Roy.”
Wisdom tilted her head upward and knocked back the remaining contents of her glass.
“Eleven twenty-two,” she resumed. “Specificity, Roy. It’s all in the numbers. Now what do you want?”
“… Aside from meeting you, I’m … not sure I want anything …”
“That’s another bad answer. Everybody wants something.”
“… Well,” he began indecisively, “… I suppose I could do with a good conversation.”
She pulled back, sat up straight, and appraised him through half-lowered eyelids.
“Don’t try to pick me up. I’m too much for most men to handle.”
“… You … have my assurances …”
This brought a different kind of smile to her face.
“You’re a man.”
“That doesn’t mean …”
“No, you don’t get it,” she interrupted. “It takes more than the right anatomy to be a man. There are men, and there are animals with language. The animals care only about basic needs and base desires. They have no appreciation for metaphysics. Do you like metaphysics, Roy?”
“… I, uh, do … perhaps a little too much …”
“Then that makes you a man, and I’ll talk to you. I don’t talk to animals.”
Taken aback by her assertive manner, he hedged.
“As long as I’m not intruding …”
“Nonsense. You’re buying my drinks.”
He should have thought about the impossibility of what he wanted, but he only nodded. Wisdom downed the whiskey sour Steve had brought her, and she waved her glass for a refill. Steve took it promptly and brought it back full while keeping his eyes on Roy.
“If you decide to fall off the wagon, don’t try to keep up with her.”
The sour disappeared with alarming rapidity, and Wisdom savagely slammed her glass on the bar. Somehow, it didn’t break.
“Roy, you’re an outlier, a real anachronism.”
“… I’ve … been told that …”
She gripped his forearm forcefully.
“I like anachronisms.”
Things got more ragged after that. Wisdom finally succeeded in breaking one glass by throwing it onto the floor, and then she wreaked havoc on two barstools. She was swaying on her feet with her hand on a third when Roy placed a calming hand on her shoulder.
“Wisdom … please …”
She relaxed into a slouched, swaybacked posture and swiveled to face him.
“It’s you again. You’re cute.”
Roy looked nervously at Steve. Why hadn’t the bartender or anyone else tried to stop her?
“… I’ll … pay for the damages.”
“You don’t have to do that. She always makes good once she sobers up.”
“… I’d like to,” Roy insisted.
Steve shrugged.
“I keep extra stools and glasses in the back, and we order replacements every month or so. We get paid. Manufacturers and retailers get paid. She’s good for the economy, but if it’s that important to you, go ahead.”
He paused and thought for a few seconds before continuing.
“If you’re with her the next time this happens, it’s generally safer to wait till she’s done.”
Roy nodded reflexively and reached for his wallet.
“… So … you never throw her out … never press charges?”
“What for? She’s a steady customer, and she has her principles. She stays away from the bottles and windows.”
As Roy opened his wallet, Wisdom placed her hands on either side and forced it shut. Her eyes were remarkably clear.
“I sober up quickly. The drinks are on you. The damages are on me. How much do I owe you, Steve?”
The bartender did a quick calculation and told her. In what must have been a familiar ritual, he held out his hand while she rummaged through her handbag and began dropping silver dollars—clink, clink, clink—into his upturned palm.
“Choose my instruction instead of silver, knowledge rather than choice gold, for I am more precious than rubies, and nothing you desire can compare with me.”
She cast a sharp eye on Roy.
“That’s chapter eight, verses ten and eleven, if you’re interested. Steve here cares more about the money. Steve, can I read you or what?”
“Like the proverbial book, Miss Wisdom.”
“Now that’s what I like—a complete lack of pretense—and he’s a good listener. Pay for the drinks, Roy.”
Opening his wallet again, Roy complied, and Wisdom slipped her hand through his arm and pushed him out the door. When they hit the sidewalk, she pulled him to a stop and put her hands on his shoulders.
“You’re a man, Roy.”
“… I’m … a confused one, then … why do you …”
“I do it because I’m angry,” she interrupted for the third time that evening. “Who listens anymore?”
“Well … I’m trying, but what if it had been someone else, someone with base desires, as you put it?”
She slid her hands down to his upper arms and gave them a tight squeeze.
“Then he wouldn’t have gotten this close. I already told you I don’t talk to animals.”
He lowered his head, and she released him then leaned forward in the manner of one drunk giving advice to another.
“I really am Wisdom.”
Gently, she patted his head.
“I need to go now. It’s been a long time since I tied one on with Liberty, and I need to find her.”
She turned and began walking away, steady on her feet. Almost involuntarily, he reached after her but avoided making contact.
“Will I see you again?” he called in a tone of near desperation.
“Those who seek me find me,” she replied over her shoulder. “That’s eight seventeen.”
“Where? Back there?”
He was pointing toward the bar.
“That’s not the best place, Roy,” she answered in a fading voice without turning to look. “You can find me at the head of every street, wherever the paths cross.”
She walked to the nearest corner and crossed the street. A bus passed between her and where Roy was standing, and after the few seconds it took to get out of the way, she was no longer in view. Roy walked to the corner and looked in all directions. Aside from himself, not a soul moved along the sidewalks of either street. Surely she had not gone so far as to disappear. It occurred to him that she might live in a nearby building, but he intuitively understood that this was not the case. Simply, inexplicably, she was gone.
***
Roy walks a lot these days. Now and again, he finds Wisdom, sometimes when he least expects it but always where she told him she would be. There are many streets, many intersections of many paths. When the two friends meet, they step into a quiet café—if one is nearby—for words, coffee, and whatever on the menu looks appealing. Their communication has grown easier with familiarity, and they speak of many things: ethics, metaphysics, the nature of reality, and such.
All he wants is a good conversation, something he can apply to honorable living, anything to keep him from becoming an animal. Despite or due to the maturation of their relationship, there is one respect in which it remains unchanged. Roy always buys, and that suits Wisdom just fine.
Robert L. Jones III holds a doctorate in molecular biology and is Professor Emeritus of Biology at Cottey College. His work has appeared in Sci Phi Journal, Star*Line, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and previously in Heart of Flesh.
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