CCLaP Weekender, June 26th 2015

CCLaP Weekender

From the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography

June 26, 2015

New Fiction by Joseph G. Peterson Photography by Andreas Till Chicago Literary Events Calendar June 26, 2015 | 1

THIS WEEK’S CHICAG

For all events, visit [cclapce SATURDAY, JUNE 27

3pm Paper Machete

The Green Mill / 4802 N. Broadway / Free, 21+ thepapermacheteshow.com

A “live magazine” covering pop culture, current events, and American manners—part spoken-word show, part vaudeville review—featuring comedians, journalists, storytellers, and musical guests. Hosted by Christopher Piatt.

8pm Blackout Diaries

High Hat Club / 1920 East Irving Park / $10, 21+ blackoutdiaries.info

A comedy show about drinking stories, a “critic’s pick” at Red Eye, MetroMix, and Time Out Chicago. Comedians share the mic with “regular” people, such as cops, firefighters, and teachers, all recounting real-life tales about getting wasted. Hosted by Sean Flannery.

SUNDAY, JUNE 28 10am

Sunday Morning Stories Donny's Skybox Studio Theatre / 1608 North Wells / Free

We performers are pre-booked. We feature novice as well as seasoned storytellers. On or off paper.

7pm Uptown Poetry Slam

The Green Mill / 4802 N. Broadway / $6, 21+ greenmilljazz.com

Featuring open mike, special guests, and end-of-the-night competition.

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GO LITERARY EVENTS

enter.com/chicagocalendar] 7pm Asylum

Le Fleur de Lis / 301 E. 43rd / $10

lefleurdelischicago.com

A weekly poetry showcase with live accompaniment by the band Verzatile.

MONDAY, JUNE 29 8:30pm Kafein Espresso Bar

Kafein Espresso Bar / 1621 Chicago Ave., Evanston kafeincoffee.com

Open mic with hosts Chris and Kirill.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 1 6pm Lyricist Loft

Harold Washington Library / 400 South State / Free youmediachicago.org

“Open mic for open minds,” presented by Remix Spoken Word.

Hosted by Dimi D, Mr. Diversity, and Fatimah.

7pm

Reading Under the Influence Sheffield's / 3258 North Sheffield / $3, 21+ readingundertheinfluence.com

“Because everyone needs a literary hangover.” Original short stories plus short-short excerpts of published work related to the theme of the month, such as “Well Done,” with trivia contests that award books and other prizes. Rotating hosts.

9pm

In One Ear Heartland Cafe / 7000 N Glenwood https://www.facebook.com/pages/In-One-Ear/210844945622380

Chicago's 3rd longest-running open-mic show, hosted by Pete Wolf and Billy Tuggle.

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THURSDAY, JULY 2 7:30pm Northside Story Club

Holiday Club / 4000 North Sheridan / $10 Suggested, 21+ storyclubchicago.com

A nonfiction storytelling show that aims to “mix the spontaneity of an open mic with the experience of live theater.� At every installment, featured readers and open mic performers are each given a microphone and eight minutes. Hosted by Dana Norris.

To submit your own literary event, or to correct the information on anything you see here, please drop us a line cclapcenter@gmail.com

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CCLaP Publishing

A darkly surreal yet absurdly funny short-fiction writer, Matt Rowan has been a Chicago local secret for years; but now this latest collection of pieces, all of which originally appeared in the pages of the CCLaP Weekender in 2014 and ‘15, is set to garner him the national recognition his stories deserve, a Millennial George Saunders who is one of the most popular authors in the city’s notorious late-night literary performance community. Shocking? Thought-provoking? Strangely humorous? Uncomfortable yet insightful on a regular basis?

YES PLEASE.

Download for free at cclapcenter.com/bigvenerable

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ORIGINAL FICTION

“Behind the Window #5 - The Ghost” by Nicolas DECOOPMAN [www.flickr.com/ koopsdk/]. Used under the terms of her Creative Commons license.

JACOB'S 6 | CCLaP Weekender

Jacob Fassbinder, a rather methodical worker and practical, hardheaded thinker, doesn’t believe in ghosts.

It’s not his nature to believe in such things. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that plodding though his mind is, it nevertheless marches close to the reality. Which reality? Why, this reality! What other reality is there? On the other hand, it may have something to do with the nature of ghosts themselves—weightless, ephemeral things, shifting in the dark. Belief in them requires an imagination capable of equal graces. But not to disparage Jacob’s imagination, it should be pointed out that the ghost who visits him is the ghost of his dead brother. And it just so happens that Jacob spent the better part of his life trying to pretend that his brother, two years his senior, never existed to begin with.

S CHEEK

BY JOSEPH G. PETERSON June 26, 2015 | 7

Whatever the case, one cold, winter night, while Jacob sleeps next to his imperturbable wife, a ghost comes to him. Jacob is sleeping when the ghost arrives, and indeed, the ghost has arrived before on nights past. He has done so stealthily in the spirit of reconnaissance missions and he has come to the conclusion that Jacob is an only slightly less imperturbable sleeper than his wife, Minnie. The ghost arrives when both husband and wife are snoring in discord. The ghost, having all the time in the world, has come and gone and come again—but this night, he has something he wants to tell his younger brother and he, the ghost, waits in repose with one leg lifted against the wall and a reclining elbow laid upon the antique walnut dresser that Minnie inherited from her maternal grandmother, who in turn brought it with her on a high-ship that sailed from the Gulf of Bothnia, out across the Atlantic Ocean to the port of Manhattan and then by train and carriage to the Midwest, where her Swedish kin had taken up residence in Humboldt Park on the northwest-side of Chicago—but these details are neither here nor there. What is important is the ghost.

The ghost sort of flickers in-and-out of focus. He’s naked, but for the seaweed that wraps around his neck and hangs like a tattered cape from his shoulders. He drags a heavy, iron chain that happens to be attached to an old ship anchor. Its shape approximates the anchors that sailors of yore had been inclined to have tattooed to their shoulders or forearms. This ghost, known in life as James to his father, Jimmy to his mother, and Jimbo to the rest of the world, is, in fact, a drowned sailor of sorts—a country club sailor no doubt, but a sailor nevertheless. He himself lived a life whereby his guiding principle was, “I will not be anchored down.”

He consequently owned a thirty-two footer, the only yacht in all of Burnham Harbor to be genuinely anchorless. The yacht, affectionately and perhaps too ominously named the Edmond Fitzgerald, was tethered to the old ropes and buoys of his annual slip, which was strategically located at the very hub of that busy and festive summertime harbor.

Jim was to the everlasting memory of those who still ate sandwiches held together by toothpicks and drank gin-spiked drinks, garnished with fruit and parasols, in the clubbable space of the Chicago Yacht Club, the harbor’s greatest host. He wasn’t Irish by birth, but goddamn near Irish in spirit. Late one night, several long years ago, he’d thrown a party in his own honor. Drinks were passed around in plastic cups, but as the party progressed, the plastic cups were tossed overboard and people swigged directly from the bottle. There was fornication in the cabin and nudity on deck. Wives slapped husbands, husbands slapped wives. Scandalous behavior broke loose and several guilty parties jumped ship and swam to shore. In short, the party was a great success—and as Jim kissed his last guest goodbye that fateful night, 8 | CCLaP Weekender

he passed out right where he stood. He lay there on the wooden floor of his ketch until the early morning hours—when all of a sudden, a now infamous summer storm that caused two hundred million dollars of damage along the lakefront kicked up. Waves six feet high with foam on their heads breached the breakers. His boat became untethered—it smashed against neighboring boats, it took water, and promptly sunk. Jim, not yet thirty-seven years of age, slept as soundly as the dead man he was about to become. He never even breathed his last moments before his boat rested, its wooden hull quiet as a dream against the dark and lonely bottom of the lake.

He stands there now, in the corner of his younger brother’s bedroom, patiently smoking a cigarette—L&M’s had been his brand on Earth. He waits for his younger brother to not only stir and open his eyes, but to gain the appropriate consciousness that such an occasion, two brothers meeting after all these years, demands. He pulls his chain a little, hoping that the heavy links rattling against the wooden floorboards might bring his brother up from sleep. When this doesn’t work, he shifts his weight from one foot to another and he bellows out in a loud voice: “Do not go gentle into that dark night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”

As the ghost finishes his loud oratory, the first rays of dawn begin to sparkle through the bedroom window. They slant across the younger brother’s face and the younger brother, rubbing the back of his fists against his eyes, slowly comes awake.

Jacob, the younger brother who now opens his eyes to the vision of his drowned brother, was by nature an honest man. He was, by dint of habit, a hard worker. But this wasn’t always the case. As a child, he had been lazy, slothful, unmotivated, and a low achiever. He lacked confidence. He had poor self-esteem. In those early, formative years, his teachers never called on him because they were afraid that they might hurt his feelings. They were afraid that they might make him feel stupid by asking questions that he wouldn’t be able to answer. He was hardly noticed. He planted himself in the rear of all his classrooms. He lived a life of exile. He earned poor grades. What’s more, he was a lousy athlete. He stumbled all over himself. He was awkward. He lacked coordination. His balance was off and he didn’t keep his eye on the ball. Which ball? Both the metaphorical ball and the actual ball. As a result, he never got picked for teams. He had acne. His hair stuck up on end and it wouldn’t lay flat, no matter how much he licked his palm and pressed it down. The boys at school didn’t like him and the girls didn’t either. In high school, he couldn’t get dates. Each year, next to his picture in the yearbook, he June 26, 2015 | 9

had but his name to signify the total sum of all his accomplishments.

Failure followed him too. In college, he was lackadaisical about his studies, he wandered campus in the wee-hours, and he slept in during the day, missing classes. He came unprepared to exams. He failed to complete his homework. He was depressed, morose, and friendless. He dropped out of college not long after he realized that college would never change him and that he’d always be unmotivated, slothful, a low achiever, and so on. People, namely his mother and his father, later speculated that all of this might be the result of a middle child syndrome. But this couldn’t be true, could it?

He was, after all, only one of two. And though there had been a phantom younger brother who perished in the third trimester, he was still only one of two. There was him and there was James or Jimmy or Jimbo. Of course, Jacob referred to his brother as no one else did.

He called him Jim, and he typically said the name with as little emotion as possible. This wasn’t because he lacked emotions for his older brother.

To the contrary, it was because he wanted to draw as few of Jim’s emotions towards him as possible. He set this iron rule for himself early on in life, when one Sunday afternoon, he awoke from a nap to find himself at the center of his older brother’s less than friendly attentions. While he slept, napping on the living room floor, his mother cooked the evening stew in the kitchen and his father, one large hand upon his belly, a half-empty beer within reach, watched TV. It was then, in the obscure solitude of that forgotten afternoon, when Jacob opened his eyes and saw his older brother, Jim, peering down upon him. He had a sharp pin in his hand and he was poised to prick Jacob’s left cheek. As Jacob opened his eyes, his brother, with all the sly insinuation of a fundamentally devious, dishonest child, pressed the pin to Jacob’s cheek and whispered, point-blank, that if he made one peep, it would all be over.

“Do you hear me?”

Jacob heard and he didn’t make a peep—not because he thought silence might save him, but because his slow reflexes hadn’t yet gotten around to making him scream. It was then, in the cascading vortex of that moment, when he first voiced the monotone syllables that would not only establish the style of his discourse, but the mode of behavior with his brother for the rest of their relationship. Flatly, he said, “Jim, I won’t scream.”

“I should prick you anyways,” Jim said, pushing on him with all his weight. He got up and walked away and Jacob lay there trembling. Jacob may have only been five years old at the time, but the experience marked him.

Even now, Jacob views the great struggle of his life being nothing less than trying to get himself out from beneath the giant, smothering weight of his older brother.

Many years later, after Jacob was a grown man and honorably ensconced 10 | CCLaP Weekender

in a rather beautiful office at the headquarters of Pink Porta-Potties, he would turn away from phone calls, the computer terminal, the demands of transport that assailed his every waking moment, and the ever complicating maze of porta-potty logistics. He’d close his door and spin around in his swivel chair.

Gazing out the window at the weed lot crowded with his brainchild, Pink Porta-Potties, he would recall rather bitterly that even if Jim had poked him with the pin that afternoon, he probably would have escaped the incident without blame. Jim was never blamed for anything.

Of course, this had everything to do with the fact that James had been loved infinitely more by his parents than Jacob ever could be. James had what his mother liked to call an aristocratic face. His father often pointed out that James had the bearing of an archduke.

Comments like these pleased his mother, for she was prone to all sorts of superstitions. Besides harboring the absurd belief that she was related (albeit distantly) to Elvis Presley, she also liked to maintain that she had been a princess in one of her previous lives. She could never quite say what branch, empire, kingdom, or era she may have been a princess in, but she does remember an old country home nestled in the forest. There was a moat, turrets, gargoyled gables, squires, trumpets, fox hunts, and of course, servants. On Halloween, one of her favorite holidays, she would lovingly dress James as a prince or a king or a duke. She would invariably fashion a formless pumpkin costume for Jacob since, as she liked to observe, these costumes were more suitable for a kid with his “body profile.” The brothers would then be paraded around town, and everybody, including Jacob, would be forced to confess just how wonderful and natural James looked as a knight or an archduke or a prince.

James, of course, took all this idolization to heart, and throughout his life, he was unable to completely shake the belief that he was destined for something great. He strode around the house as if, in fact, he were the only son. He ate more than everybody else, including his father, and this fact, in turn, made his father incomprehensibly proud.

“He’s a good eater,” his father liked to say. “He’s going to grow up strong!”

James slept in a bigger bedroom than everyone else—the biggest in the house—and his bed was softer. His clothes were newer and always fit, while

Of course, this had everything to do with the fact that James had been loved infinitely more by his parents than Jacob ever could be.

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Jacob always wore James’s hand-me-downs and never looked as good in James’s clothes as James did. James had a larger fan club than everybody else too—he was worshiped and adored, though Jacob never seemed to have any fans. The aunts would dote over James. Uncles would take him hunting—but Jacob was always too small or too young or potentially too dangerous with a gun. He was, therefore, never taken on a single hunting trip. His own father, who in his day had been quite a baseball player, coached all of James’s baseball teams and James was always the pitcher. He was an outstanding pitcher with a sidearm fastball that blurred the crowd’s vision as it crossed home plate.

By contrast, Jacob’s inability to do anything well, his passiveness, and his poor grades in school were a source of perpetual gossip and worry for his mother. His father had long since moved beyond worry and into disdain and ridicule.

“Why can’t you be like your brother, James, for chrissakes? Why are you such a goddamned pansy? You’re always in the house, moping about—you of all people. What do you have to mope about? And now I see you don’t have a single friend. No wonder! Who wants to play with someone like you? You’re a wimp. You’re weak. Where I come from, we crush kids like you. I can’t believe I’ve sired one of your ilk.” And as his father uttered these horrifying words, James, the adored brother, stood next to his father, beaming.

“Come on, James,” his father said. “Let’s go play ball.”

Did it really happen like this? Was his childhood really this oppressive?

There Jacob sits in his office, the door is shut, and he stares out the window at the parking lot, mulling it over. It’s unbelievable, he thinks. It’s unbelievable the things that I went through. But I’m a success now. Look at me. I’m undaunted. I have the most successful porta-potty business in town. And the work keeps piling up. It never seems to end. A gigantic mountain of labor, but I’m game for it.

And he was. Once his brother died, Jacob discovered he had tremendous stamina for work. He methodically went to it, processing bills and invoices, checking in on clients, working the dispatcher’s phone, making sure his portapotties were where he said they were going to be. He made deals with land-fill operations and transported the waste. He had a small army of workers that needed constant attention and management. He was unflappable in the face of it all—never harried, always calm. And then there were the extracurriculars that he threw himself into. He was a respected member of the local Lions Clubs. He was a charter member of his Masons guild and recently inducted as a master mason. Jacob was on the board of the local school council. He was a fund-raiser and an all-around mover and shaker in the community. He was respected for his circumspect manner and the judiciousness of his advice.

This, in turn, opened doors for him and he became an investor in several local 12 | CCLaP Weekender

businesses that, because of Jacob’s support, had gone on to become successful.

And yet, there was that pin poised over his cheek. It loomed ever large in his memory, to the point where he questioned his memory. Did things really happen like this? Had he really lived in a house where there was such a disparity between the older, favored son and himself? That’s at least what his wife liked to ask him when he complained about it. “Surely, Jacob, you must be exaggerating. It couldn’t really have been like that in your house. Your ma and pa, I know them! They are nice people. They’re kind and generous.

They’re loving to you and to me. And your brother, Jim—even though I never knew him, the things people say of him—he seemed like a good guy. And how do you explain all the family photos your mother took of the two of you?

You always had your arms around each other. Or you were frolicking in the lawn. What I’m saying is that they don’t look like the pictures of two brothers who were mortal enemies. They look like pictures from a happy childhood.

Jesus, to be honest with you, I wish mine were half as happy as yours appear to be! But in my house, we were a bunch of monsters and I don’t mind saying so.”

At this moment, Jacob would protest. It was exasperating. My own wife, he thought. My own wife sides with that guy over me!

“Yes, Minnie,” Jacob says patiently, judiciously. “Yes, I understand. Your sister tried to drown you in the bathtub and now the two of you laugh about it as if it’s one of your happiest memories. But with me and my brother, what went on between us is no laughing matter. You simply cannot comprehend what a smothering force, what a towering weight, what a dark shadow he has cast over my life!”

And it’s true that he used that word, “comprehend.” He used it for emphasis. “You do not comprehend! I lived in Jim’s shadow for so many years, I felt paralyzed, unable to get on with my life, unable to discover who I was— who I am, despite him. I sometimes wonder if he had never existed, had I never been endlessly compared to him, had he never been there, threatening to snuff me out, literally, from the moment I was born—well, who knows what would have become of me? I might have finished college and become an astronaut.”

“The man on the moon.” Minnie laughed, then rolled over. She turned out the light and snuggled up next to him. “My old man on the moon! And yet you have your little business and all the contributions to the Lions Clubs that you make. You’ve done all right for yourself, kid. Let it go.”

Jacob tried to let it go. He tossed and turned through the night. He snored, he sobbed. He woke suddenly in grim terror to see his brother, a ghostly figure with that chain and anchor now wrapped around his neck, lying on top of him. Jacob felt pinned beneath the smothering weight of June 26, 2015 | 13

all those oppressive childhood years, bearing down right on his breastbone.

There, a small breath away, was the terrifying specter of Jim. He held in his hand a pin, and he said, ever so quietly, “If I go down, you bastard, you’re going down with me.” C

Joseph G. Peterson grew up in Wheeling, Illinois. He worked in an aluminum mill and in the masonry trade as a hod carrier to pay for his education at the University of Chicago. He is the author of four novels: Beautiful Piece, Inside the Whale, Wanted: Elevator Man and Gideonís Confession. He lives in Chicago with his wife and two daughters. His story collection Twilight of the Idiots, comprised of the pieces being published in this magazine over the next year, will be put out by CCLaP in 2015.

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CCLaP Publishing

THE PUBLISHING EVENT NINE YEARS IN THE MAKING. In 2006, celebrated author Ben Tanzer began working on a series of short stories all set in the fictional upstate New York town of Two Rivers, most of them published in various literary journals over the years and eventually collected into the three small volumes Repetition Patterns (2008), So Different Now (2011), and After the Flood (2014). Now for the first time, all 33 of these stories have been put together into one paperback edition, highlighting the long-term planning of themes and motifs that Tanzer has been building into these pieces the entire time. Featuring dark character studies of childhood, middle age, and (lack of) grace under pressure, these stories are considered by many to be among the best work of Tanzer’s career, and voracious fans of his short work will surely be pleased and satisfied to have these small masterpieces collected together into one easy-to-read volume. So take a stool at Thirsty’s, order another Yuengling, and be prepared to be transported into the black heart of the American small-town soul, as one of our nation’s best contemporary authors takes us on a journey across space and time that will not be soon forgotten.

Download for free at cclapcenter.com/nystories

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Andrea

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as Till

PHOTOGRAPHY FEATURE

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Location: Berlin, Germany Andreas Till is a German photographer. He was made, born, and educated in Heidelberg, Germany. He holds a B.A. in Photography from the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Dortmund. Being a Fulbright scholar to the Ohio University in Athens, OH, USA from 2010 to 2011, he returned to the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Dortmund to complete his M.A. degree in Photographic Studies. He lives and works in Berlin.

Sundays create a surplus value beyond working, buying and possessing.

Views of the day in documentary images.

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The CCLaP Weekender is published in electronic form only, every Friday for free download at the CCLaP website [cclapcenter.com]. Copyright 2015, Chicago Center for Literature and Photography. All rights revert back to artists upon publication. Editorin-chief: Jason Pettus. Story Editor: Behnam Riahi. Photo Editor: Melissa Jean Birckhead. Layout Editor: Wyatt Robinette. Calendar Editor: Taylor Carlile. To submit your work for possible feature, or to add a calendar item, contact us at cclapcenter@ gmail.com.

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