Call It What You Want by Keith Lee Morris

Author:Keith Lee Morris
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tin House Books
Published: 2010-08-18T00:00:00+00:00

Visitation

These are the rules as I understand them at the outset of this story: Guests may not steal things—my houseplants, my stereo. They may not enter my house with the intention of carrying off my computer or my TV. They may not dig my coin collection, stuffed into an old sock, out of the top drawer of my dresser. Though my parakeet cage is empty, they may not appropriate it. They may not enter my home in my absence, even if they mean to do no worse than watch the tropical fish. I have valuables; they are mine, not my guests’.

While these rules are not posted in my house, are not nailed to the door or magnetized to the refrigerator, I feel they are understood, should be understood, by every person who enters here.

Then there is James. Unbeknownst to me, while I am attending church, this James decides to violate the rules. He decides to enter my house, the door of which is never locked, in order to take something that is mine—namely, fifty dollars that lies on the coffee table. He knows the fifty dollars is there, on the coffee table, because, on the previous evening, he had for the first time been a guest in my house, at a housewarming party during which I had paid for three cases of expensive beer, and had been reimbursed, partly, and had chosen to leave the money on the coffee table. In one sense, you could call this story “The Gall of James.”

I come into my new house. I have been to church. I close the door behind me. When I turn around, there is James. He is caught in the act, and, at least for a moment, the look on his face reflects this fact. His complexion is pasty. His mouth forms the shape of the letter O. The bills crinkle in his hand, as if they cry out for justice or mercy.

I am alone. My first thought is, does this James have a weapon. James does not. The look on his face makes this clear. He is not in control of the situation. I am in control. It is my house.

This James is skin and bone. I had noticed this the night before. He is refugee skinny. He is also shorter than I am. Quickly, I run through the numbers. I am six feet tall, and I weigh one hundred and ninety pounds. This James, placed on the rack, might stretch to five foot seven. With the heavy boots he wears, he might, on a good day, tip the scales at one hundred and ten. I could break him up like kindling.

Had I been in a different state of mind, had there been no extenuating circumstances, had this James begun by saying something else, we might have proceeded without violence.

I said, “What are you doing here?” I thought perhaps there was some misunderstanding.

“I came to steal this money,” he said.

These were the extenuating circumstances: 1) I had, in all

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