Who the Man by Chris Lynch

Author:Chris Lynch [Lynch, Chris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4804-0457-1
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2013-02-19T17:22:00+00:00

Shaltnots

I WAKE UP TO the sound of gospel choir music, and that’s how I know it’s Sunday.

I hate gospel choir music. I like God and Jesus, Mother Mary and the church. I like what they have to say. I like the rules, the order of it all, and I like where I fit into it. It’s a system I can go for because I think I understand what they are talking about, and why they are talking about it. I know that it’s all about people treating each other right, and that if something like the church isn’t there to make sure that happens, then it won’t. Because people can’t manage to do that consistently without being made to.

I like the Shaltnots. The Shaltnots are the instructions that keep everything from flying apart altogether. If I were God, I’d have Shaltnots all over the place. There should be more of them.

I like heaven and hell, like them very much, in fact. I like to know that some people are going to the one, and the others to the other. Most, to the other. I like to believe that people get what they deserve. I like being in church, I like receiving sacraments like Communion and penance because when I have done it I feel better.

But I have to confess I don’t care for the music at all.

And I am not the only one. Shortly—very shortly, like two minutes shortly—after the music goes on, I hear it go off again.

So it begins.

I haven’t had enough sleep. Sleep is very important to me, and I spent much too much time last night rolling around and listening to every bit of breeze out there, but I have to get up and out of here because I don’t like this.

The music goes back on.

I step out of bed, and into my Sunday pants. They aren’t really fancy or anything, the way people used to dress up for church in their Sunday best, but I would say they are my Sunday best. They are black. They have a crease. They look more respectful than anything else I own. I put on a clean button-down white shirt to go with it, big black shoes, and I am on my way.

It is silent in the house, aside from the rising crush of the choir every time the music comes back on, and the even louder ungodly silent noise that hangs in the air after it is shut off again.

Sunday is the only day neither one of them works.

I don’t speak to anybody, and I don’t even poke my head into the living room as the contest-snaps back and forth, in both directions.

I can’t even remember which one of them wants it on and which one turns it off.

“Hey, you!” she shouts as I reach the slushy sidewalk.

Hey, you. Hey, you, is what I get. I don’t think that’s called for. I keep walking.

“I called you, Earl.”

“You didn’t call me Earl. You called me Hey, you.”

“I’ll call you a lot more than that if you don’t stop right now.

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