The Skeptic (1) Taft was a skeptic. He made it an actual trait of his personality every day to question anything that came in his path, and in the end it was his skepticism that indirectly lead to his own poverty. Well, at least he thought, it had lead him to his career choice, which ended in poverty. They say that often a man will inevitably become the opposite of what his parents were, and thirty-six years earlier when Taft was born his father was a historian who made a name for himself in the academic world. He made his name by writing a biography of William Howard Taft. Hence the odd name. Not wanting to deal with the fickle nature of history, Taft went into college studying aero-space engineering (or as they called it at school sometimes, unemployment engineering) because in his mind at age eighteen he realized that people were prone to be faulty, and each one had his or her own little foibles and idiosyncrasies that made uniqueness the defining plague of mankind. Numbers were different though. Numbers were cold and faceless and always followed the rules without deviation one hundred percent of the time. One cannot be skeptical of addition or subtraction, and the innate precision of numbers appealed greatly to Taft. The irony is that although he got his degree in a hard science it was for idealistic reasons and he never considered the job market in his choices. That was typical, he told himself, of a stupid little shit who didn�t know anything yet. Taft was affectionately known as Taffy throughout his life, a name he had grown used to like so many other quirky things in his personal makeup. He used to resent it, saying it sounded too feminine but decided he could tolerate it when the girls thought it was cute. It was at least a memorable name and got him laid a lot in his twenties when it didn�t matter if a man was unlikable and could still get the attention of a young woman by just being interesting, or at least by just having an interesting name. Regardless of the fact that he called himself a prick he still had the sex drive of a man. His humble apartment in the Soulard district of St Louis was just large enough to store a bed and a few chairs. Technically the apartment was Rebecca�s. They met one Saturday a year before at the Kinko�s where Taffy earned his daily pay after the big layoff at the McDonnell Douglas aircraft corporation. She had come into the store to print out fliers for a party at her friend�s place and Taffy looked needy. �You should come check it out,� she invited. Check it out. Taffy hated women who said �check it out�. �Yeah, maybe.� She wasn�t very attractive and reminded him of Lottie, this girl in high school whom he fooled around with one night while her parent�s were at a wedding. Lottie-snotty as he had called her back in the day came to school the next week and told everyone that he had raped her, which he hadn�t, and that he stole money out of her father�s bureau, which he had. Three months later she was pregnant with someone else�s kid and left the school. Now this too tall and too skinny girl came in and invited him to this party and looked a lot like Lottie-snotty. He decided he had to go if for no other reason than to get some sort of twisted revenge. It was the type of party that anyone would get invited to by just being in the proximity of anyone else with a flyer, so he never paid much mind to the fact that she, a total stranger, had told him to come and �check it out�. Five hours later he was lying, sweaty, on top of her under a pile of coats in the bedroom of the friend�s loft. In his mind he was just putting an end to something that should have been over a long time before with a different girl. He kept her number though and called her a few times afterwards when he wasn�t in the mood to be by himself and she would come to the hotel room he stayed in. �You should get a real place.� �This is a real place. It has walls. A roof.� �You know what I mean. You should get a real place with your own mailbox.� �Is that what makes a home? Yeah, well. Taffy�s first law.� �What?� �Taffy�s first law of necessity. If you can do without it on a desert island, you don�t fucking need it here.� �Oh. A minimalist. How rare these days.� �Is that sarcasm? My my, speak of rare things and they fucking appear.� �Touch�.� He pretended to find her charming and feigned laughter at the subtle jabs she would make at his character so as not to sour any chances of their middle of the night trysts later. Eventually the hotel raised its rates and he couldn�t afford to live there and pay alimony to his ex anymore, so Becca�s place became the real place. He still answered negatively when people asked if he had a girlfriend and believed he was answering honestly. The place was a shit hole, the fire escape rattled on windy nights and there was always something running, whether it was the toilet or the mice that lived in the crawlspaces. It was rent controlled though and with Taffy�s meager paycheck on top of Rebecca�s the two of them could afford to shelter themselves and buy food to last a week each payday. It�s home, be it ever so fucking humble. The building itself sat on the northwestern part of Soulard close to the industrial district of the city, so the air was thick enough to eat by the slice and its location eliminated the need for an alarm clock. Taffy woke up every morning with the rest of the city and made his way by bus to his managerial position at one of the country�s fastest growing twenty-four hour printing shops. He had been at it about two years and in his own skeptical way rationalized his lack of motivation to leave. Rebecca tried tirelessly to get him into another job but he always said the same thing. �I am just biding time right now. I doubt there is anything out there at the moment that I�ll like any better.� �Oh that�s original.� �Jesus, you know if I hadn�t fucked you last night I�d swear you were my mother.� �Fuck you, Taffy.� And then she�d leave for work and the next week they�d repeat the same dance with the same outcome. At one point Taffy was content and he knew that at some point he would be again. A skeptic isn�t someone who looks for the bad in everything, and as a true skeptic, Taffy merely looked for the truth in things. He never considered himself a glass-is-half-empty sort of man, but more of a realist. When he was with McDonnell Douglas he could afford to live on his own and drive a reliable car. His stay at Rebecca�s was really no more than a means of survival for him, and he often admitted to himself that he was afraid of her finding this out, but he couldn�t say why. Given the choice he would sleep every night on his own and make just enough coffee for himself in the morning. More than anything he wanted to get back to a point in his life where he could leave the bathroom door open while he was using it, and to buy groceries without a list. His personality didn�t depict a man who was happiest living with the responsibility of other people under the same roof and he didn�t enjoy anything that could be described as �communal�. He hated it at work when people used that word. �Go ahead, it�s communal ketchup.� Yeah, I have a communal boot over here, you want to make a sandwich out of that or should I just stick it directly up your ass? His car had died a few months after moving in with Rebecca and there was no money to fix it. He was sure it was the alternator, and could probably fix it himself if he could lay his hands on an extra couple hundred dollars. Nevertheless, most days he didn�t mind the bus ride from the stop a few blocks away, except when it got really cold. It wasn�t the frigid waits at the corner that bothered him as much as it was the people who ended up on the bus in the cold weather. There are few other places a person can go to warm up for just a little pocket change, and the homeless in the city knew how to panhandle enough to ride a bus all day with minimal difficulty. It wasn�t the fact that they were homeless really, or even that they were particularly dirty homeless people, but he hated crowds and cringed at the thought of being near so many bodies, touching and bumping into one another, sweating�actually sweating�in the dead of winter. The job wasn�t much different than his home life. Much like his live in companion, it was something he tolerated. There was little else he would have been willing to leave home for these days and if it wasn�t for the need to make his pathetic salary he would have stayed inside his entire life and let her do all the work. His life was made up of necessary inconveniences though, and living in limbo the way he did would have destroyed a lesser man. He wasn�t a kind man and had a moodiness about him that drove Rebecca positively mad, but his one saving grace was that he was remarkably strong spirited and had a way of surviving without much comfort. Once in a while, at night, he and Rebecca would go through the motions of lovemaking and as they fumbled around in the dark with each other�s genitals he remained expressionless. Sometimes she wouldn�t say anything afterwards and go right to sleep and it was those times he preferred. Other times she�d try to make conversation and talk about how good it was even though they both knew that it was bland and unsatisfying. �Wow,� she�d gasp, �that was great.� �Yeah,� no it wasn�t, �great.� He saw it as a pittance to be paid to his landlady. At times he felt whorish but there was little else he could do to keep up the fa�ade that he wanted to be with her, and it was a fa�ade he needed to continue in order to impress upon her that he deserved to live there cheaply, which he knew in reality was a lie. Mediocre sex was the only thing he had to offer that would suffice in that capacity. Lord knows he lacked the ability to be personable and as a conversationalist he failed miserably. He didn�t see any wrong in how he was living, not like many people outside the picture would have seen. He honestly did not believe he was using her. She was getting her rent and utility bills cut in half and once a week or so would get her fill of fleshy comforts the same as he did. Even if it wasn�t an entirely happy existence, Taffy reasoned that it was at least symbiotic on some level although it was more one-sided than he let himself believe. Eventually he found himself doing math in his head every payday to determine how much he could save away to get out of the city and into a life more like the one he had before. Somehow, after deducting the amount needed for food and to be given to rent and bills, his monthly bus pass, his ex fuck, and clothing, he would always arrive at a near negative number. He found a strange humor in the irony that his love of numbers bought his old lifestyle in earlier days and now his financial shortcomings had soured that very same love. What he kept saying over and over to himself was that eventually the ship would come in, the other shoe would drop, the pot would boil, either that or the shit would hit the fan. He kept his sanity with all of these little idioms and with the thought that something extraordinary would happen to knock him out of his rut. That something appeared to arrive in the form of a letter from a law firm one afternoon as he returned from work. The law offices of Blackmun and Stein from the downtown business district had sent him a thin envelope and upon opening it he found a letter. He had been named as an heir to one of his senile and eccentric old relatives who he hadn�t seen in over twenty years. �Auntie Maggie has passed,� he said to a tired Rebecca that evening in a matter of fact voice. �What?� she turned her head to the side like a dog trying to decipher the meaning in what he was saying. �My Aunt Maggie. She died.� �Oh Taffy, I�m sorry honey.� �Yeah okay.� �What? What I�d say?� �Nothing. Look, I barely even remember what she looked like. I was named in her will though.� �Yeah?� �Yeah she was something of a weirdo toward the end. Born again and shit. She was always real miserly when I was growing up.� �No kidding? Well maybe this will be a good thing after all. Maybe we can get a better place huh?� �Um, yeah. Maybe,� no fucking way, �I don�t know if there is anything to it. I may end up with a grandfather clock or an old chair or something, there�s nothing in this letter that says what it is,� he answered while thinking that she�d never see him again if it were anything more. Pissing with the door open. That was his agenda. At work the next day he told his assistant manager Tony the news and Tony, being a pessimist, scoffed and said that he�d end up with an old piano or some dilapidated piece of furniture. Taffy liked talking to Tony. He was younger but came off as kind of hard-boiled and Taffy saw a lot of himself in the kid. �Yeah well,� he said, �it�s nice to be thought of. Especially when the old battle axe hasn�t seen me in a couple decades.� �Well best of luck with that.� Taffy knew he was probably right and that Aunt Maggie probably gave most of her valuable things to family members who actually gave a damn about her. During the last years of her life he heard that she had found religion and started to give to charities regularly. He questioned how much of her estate would in fact go to an individual whose last words to her were probably written in a thank you note his mother made him write for some miniscule gift. He tried to recall who else was around that Aunt Maggie would have remembered and could think of only his Uncle Stan, his father�s drunk brother who used to give him sips of wine at all the family gatherings. Both his mother and father had been dead for nearly three years and Uncle Stan was the only family member left on Aunt Maggie�s side. �So the old miser has dropped off the hooks and it comes down to me and Stanly,� he said to himself one morning while he was pissing with the door closed. �Huh? You say something?� �No,� he answered Rebecca, �just talking to myself.� �When is that reading anyways?� �Tomorrow. I�m gonna hafta knock off a little early from work to make it.� �Okay. I�m kind of excited. I mean not that your aunt is gone, but this is, you know, exciting.� How in the hell, he asked himself, could he have gotten mixed up with such an idiot? She was about eight years younger than he was and the age difference between a 36 and a 28 would normally not be a problem. In their case the difference in mentality was insurmountable. He looked at her as not yet hardened by life and as such, na�ve and annoying. The thought of her taking part in his life after he regained some semblance of security was appalling to him. He had been speaking to himself since reading the letter a few days previous in order to mask his excitement at the prospect of getting away from the apartment and her. Rebecca shrugged it off and never gave it a second thought. He was rather odd to begin with and nothing surprised her about him anymore. The only thing she noticed was that he had been distant since the news, almost as if plotting something. She knew he didn�t really want to live in that apartment with her, but didn�t really catch on that it was the package he wanted to get away from, not just the apartment. She also knew he wasn�t happy with his life. In some way he never really seemed unhappy either though. He never really seemed anything. Out of naivety (he was right about her in that way) she was concerned for his well being and wanted to help. She couldn�t say she loved him, at least not in the sense of what she thought love was supposed to be, but she cared enough for him to allow his laziness to infringe on her. Codependent as she was, there was hope in her mind that maybe she could relax a little if this turned out good. She made her mind up that things would be better and she�d be able to cut down on her work hours. She didn�t think Taffy would mind because he had always seemed to be content working, and she was sure that wouldn�t change. He was an asshole to her at times but such is the way with the type-A men she knew. The next day Taffy left work two hours early and got on the familiar bus with its familiar stench. He rode it past the apartment and downtown to Union Station on Market Street. In the back of his mind he kept repeating to himself that he barely knew his Aunt after so many years and that Uncle Stan, though a sad drunk, would probably end up with a majority of everything. They had at least kept in touch with each other, his aunt and uncle, and he was sure Uncle Stan would make a show of missing her although he was always jolly at everyone else�s funerals. The bottle got to him in that way. As he entered the mammoth building two blocks from the bus stop the doors whispered shut behind him. He was still clad in his Kinko�s uniform and felt horribly out of place, especially when he spotted his uncle who was wearing a three piece and a rather conspicuous toupee. The reception area of the building was tastefully decorated with very modern furniture and comfortable chairs and sofas that somehow still managed to be uncomfortable. Uncle Stan sat in one of these chairs and greeted Taffy with a pained smile. �Ah, my favorite nephew! How long has it been Taffy?� �I�m your only nephew.� �Exactly my point, boy-o,� Uncle Stan winked and took a quick pull off of a flask which he then concealed in his breast pocket. �Still at the sauce, huh?� �Oh Taffy, my boy-o, there are far worse things a man could do in this day and age.� That was the same excuse Uncle Stan had been using for thirty years. Fortunately for him, the ever-changing face of society provided an endless supply of increasingly depraved vices that made his drinking habit seem less and less sinister. Taffy knew that most of what his uncle inherited would end up being filtered through is liver. Uncle Stan knew it too and didn�t mind. �They told me we had to wait for you. We�re the only two who were named. You know, I was sorry I didn�t see you at the funeral. It was just me there.� �I�m sorry, Uncle Stan, I didn�t know she had passed until I got the letter from this place.� �Well, I guess she was a recluse toward the end, God rest her soul. I will miss her dearly.� He�d miss her less when he got fat on her savings. That�s what Taffy thought anyway. He would say the same of himself actually, except for the fact that he didn�t really miss her in the first place. A middle-aged woman walked up to them and told them everything was ready. Taffy had made sure he was a half hour late so that it would all go quickly once he got there. He didn�t like strangers and was always wary of being around them, especially the ones who had law degrees. They walked down a few hallways and into a room with dark wood paneled walls where they met an older gentleman who introduced himself as Joseph Stein. He said that he had been left in charge of Margaret Murphy�s estate in a way that made it seem that neither Taffy nor Uncle Stan had ever heard of her. �She asked,� he went on, �that the two of you make an effort to get to know each other a little more. She was very clear on that in her final wishes and said that she was leaving you as the only surviving members of the family. She wanted you both to be family again and to help each other straighten out your lives.� �Oh she was wiser than any of us,� Uncle Stan emoted in a sickening display of mock reverence that sent Taffy�s breath into a silent sigh. Taffy knew this part of the testament was really directed at Uncle Stan, whose alcoholism clashed with Aunt Maggie�s found religion in her latter years. Still, it gave him a glint of hope that perhaps he would indeed be getting a decent share. All that mumbo jumbo about him being one of the only surviving members of the family. He didn�t feel guilty for his greed, but relieved that there was a chance at something more than an odd piece of family memorabilia. A few minutes went by during which Mr. Stein went over formalities and verified that Taffy was really Taffy and Uncle Stan was really Uncle Stan. Then it was time for the reading and both Taffy and Uncle Stan grew very quiet. Taffy�s pensive air was marked by a quickened pulse and he thought to himself that he felt the way a game show contestant must feel. �I, Margaret G. Murphy, declare that ownership of my house and vehicles be left in the care of my brother Stanley C. Murphy. I further declare that any holdings or investments also be left in his charge.� As Stein read, Taffy grew impatient and in the moment after hearing this, he was still hopeful. He had expected the house to go to Uncle Stan and imagined there was some other kind of asset left over for him. �All belongings and property pertaining to said house are to be left also to my brother�� That�s okay. There has to be more. ��with the exception of my favorite chair, a reclining lounge chair with brown upholstery and my favorite piece of art, a painting by Cora Roberts dated 1900. These items are to be left to my only other living relative, my nephew Taft H. Murphy.� Shit. Uncle Stan�s face was a goulash of joy and confusion. Any sentiments he had feigned before were completely unapparent now that he had funding to buy more alcohol than even he could dream of consuming. Both of them had a hard time understanding what had just happened �A chair?� Taffy said out loud, �A chair? And a painting? Is that all it says?� The painting is the key; the painting has to be worth something. C�mon Auntie Maggie, you knew it didn�t you? You knew it was worth more than anything else in that house and left it to me on purpose. �Yes sir,� replied Mr. Stein. �What the hell am I supposed to do with a goddamned chair and a painting?� Just keep up the act a little longer Taffy, and don�t let on to that fat fuck Stanly that you know, you know it�s worth more than the shit he got. �Your inheritance is waiting at the deceased�s former residence Mr. Murphy.� Mr. Steins face remained in a textbook deadpan and was unwavering. His thirty years in such matters left him more than used to such outbursts from disappointed heirs. Taffy was keeping up the act, which was hard to do. He tried to look surprised although he wasn�t. The kernel of his personality was, after all, skepticism and so it was rare that anything surprised him.
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