Mr. Ainsley’s New Hat: A Story

“You look wonderful in that hat…”

Every morning, I step onto the balcony of my apartment with my coffee and stare at the building across the street that blocks the sunrise.

It’s probably a gorgeous sunrise, I told myself one Monday, taking a sip of coffee.

In the corner of my eye, I saw a pigeon — but it was Mr. Ainsley, my neighbor. He was standing next to the stone gargoyle on the ledge between our balconies, palms pressed flat against the wall. He was wearing a bowler hat. And a grey suit.

“Morning, Mr. Ainsley.”

He was breathing deeply.

“Nice day, isn’t it?”

He swallowed.

A gush of wind blew Mr. Ainsley’s hat off. We both watched it fall twenty-four stories to the street. A taxi drove over it.

I looked at my watch. It was 7:30.

“I have to go to work. If I’m even one minute late, Brenda will frown at me.”

I downed the rest of my coffee.

“Have a good day.”

Mr. Ainsley didn’t say anything. He was still gazing down at his hat.

On Tuesday morning, I brewed some coffee and opened the balcony door.

Mr. Ainsley was still on the ledge. He was breathing even harder, now. And rubbing the grey stubble on his chin.

“Would you like some coffee?”

I poured him a cup, reached through the balcony bars and sat it on the ledge.

I watched Mr. Ainsley meticulously step over the gargoyle … and edge closer. Several minutes later, he picked up the cup.

“It’s probably cold by now.”

Mr. Ainsley shrugged.

“I forgot to ask if you take cream and sugar.”

He seemed to be drinking it anyway.

I sat down. The sunrise was beautiful. Presumably.

“The machine got jammed yesterday when I was making copies. Brenda came into the copy room and frowned at me.”

Mr. Ainsley nodded, sipping his coffee. When he finished, he set the cup on the ledge. He shooed the pigeon off the gargoyle and maneuvered back over it.

It was close to 7:30. Dangerously close. I polished off my coffee.

“See you tomorrow.”

I was drinking from my biggest mug because it was Wednesday.

“Then I dropped the folder and pages went everywhere. One of them slid under the door of Brenda’s office and she came out frowning.”

Mr. Ainsley was half-listening. He was leaning on the gargoyle’s head, abstractedly fussing with his cufflink.

On a balcony across the street, a woman was painting a picture of something. I wondered if it was a sunrise. I stepped inside and back out with my binoculars. I focused on the painting…

It was a plain, grey rectangle.

I scanned every balcony from the top of the building to the bottom but didn’t see anything.

Then I saw a pigeon on the sidewalk and focused on that. No, it was Mr. Ainsley’s flattened bowler hat.

I sighed.

Mr. Ainsley sighed too.

“Brenda didn’t invite me to her birthday party. She invited everyone in the office except me. I gave her a pigeon pendant anyway and she frowned at me.”

Mr. Ainsley blinked. He was holding my favorite grey mug but wasn’t drinking from it. He hadn’t touched yesterday’s cup either.

I decided I wasn’t in the mood for conversation. I flipped through a book. During a sunrise, short wavelengths are scattered, leaving longer wavelengths like orange, red and yellow.

I closed the book and stared at the building across the street for a minute. Then I looked at my watch. It was 7:31.

I dropped the book and my coffee and sprinted inside.

On Friday, Mr. Ainsley was sitting on the gargoyle’s back with his eyes closed. There was a pile of dried grey pigeon shit on top of his bald head.

I nursed my coffee and told him about my dream.

“I was sitting on the balcony, drinking my coffee, when suddenly the sun rose. The building across the street was gone. I saw all the colors: orange, red, yellow. My eyes glowed orange, red, yellow. Don’t turn your head, I thought, but I did. I turned my head … and saw the gargoyle. It was frowning at me.”

I glanced at Mr. Ainsley, but he still hadn’t opened his eyes.

He must’ve been sleeping.

My alarm didn’t go off, so there was no time for coffee Saturday morning. I had one after dinner, instead. I slipped into my grey pajamas — it was a chilly night — and carried my cup outside.

As I sipped, I heard whimpering sounds. I wasn’t sure if it was pigeons or Mr. Ainsley.

I peered through the darkness at the ledge but couldn’t see anything.

I leaned over the railing and still couldn’t see anything.

“Are you there, Mr. Ainsley?”

There was no response.

I sat back down.

I was going to mention something about Brenda, but I didn’t see the point. I swallowed my coffee in silence.

The moon is superb, I told myself. I looked everywhere but couldn’t find it.

I go for a long walk alone in the park every Sunday morning. I breathe the fresh air; I feed the pigeons. I was scattering breadcrumbs when Brenda and her greyhound came bounding down the path. I hid behind a tree until they passed me.

That afternoon, I went shopping. Strolling home with a cappuccino, I passed Quinton’s Haberdashery. I stopped because there was a bowler hat in the window. I left the store twirling the hat around my finger.

The sun was setting behind my building as I approached it. I was pretty sure. I was about to look up when something landed on the ground right beside me.

It was Mr. Ainsley.

“How are you?”

Mr. Ainsley didn’t answer. So I asked him again.

Nothing.

I stared at him a minute. Then I put the new bowler hat on his head.

“You look wonderful in that hat,” said someone, walking by. Her friend nodded in agreement.

I gazed down at Mr. Ainsley…

Yes. I had to agree.

He did look good.

************

“Mr. Ainsley’s New Hat” appears in the Spring/Summer issue of Transition. Reprinted with the kind permission of the publisher.

If you enjoyed this story, please consider buying me a coffee.

You Can Tell An Ostrich Anything

When Dad died, I talked to an ostrich.

In the waiting room, an ostrich sat down.

“Who let this ostrich in?” I asked.

The janitor stared at me.

The ostrich stared at me.

The surgeon walked into the room. He tore off his white mask and put on a serious one.

“You don’t even have to say it,” I said.

The ostrich put his wing around me.

We didn’t have the greatest relationship, Dad and I. We didn’t talk. He treated me like shit. I loved him. I realized that after.

When he got sick, I walked closer to him, sat closer. We still didn’t talk, but…

Then he died.

“I could really use a friend,” I said in a letter. I mailed a copy of it to everyone I could think of.

No one got back to me.

One afternoon, there was a knock on the door.

I stepped out of bed. And got dressed.

I opened the door…

It was the ostrich.

He sat down on the sofa.

“I’ll make some coffee,” I said.

“I don’t remember Dad ever playing with me. He was always too old. Even when he wasn’t. He loved me. He never said it. I said it a lot when I was a kid, but I didn’t mean it. Not really.”

You can tell an ostrich anything.

I couldn’t get out of bed. I couldn’t open my eyes. I kept falling asleep. I kept dreaming.

I dreamed I was the last person on Earth. I felt so homesick. Even though I was home.

I crawled into bed — in my dream. I lay there.

Something touched my hair. Something tousled it. Like Dad used to.

I woke up.

I looked over.

There was something on the pillow next to me.

An ostrich feather.

One morning…

I looked out the window.

The sky was blue. I hadn’t noticed that. Not for months.

I made breakfast.

I swept the floor.

As I opened the front door, I saw something. The shadow of the ostrich. On the lawn.

Just the shadow.

Then it was gone.

Rolli’s latest book is Plumstuff. Buy him a coffee.

A Capuchin Monkey

Something happened…

Mom was talking to the guy behind the fence. I wanted to walk in the corn in the garden.

“Oswald, you’ll get dirt on your trousers, your brand new trousers. You go sit on the steps.”

Mom said damn and rubbed her hands on her pants. The phone was ringing.

I walked in between the rows and rows of corn. Looking up at the sky.

I touched the fence and ran back. Touched it and ran back.

The guy behind the fence said: “I bet you can’t guess what’s in my van.”

I guessed something. That wasn’t it.

“No, it’s a capuchin monkey. You ever seen a capuchin monkey?”

I never did. He told me about it. It was brown with some white on its face. It had a collar on that said Kiss Me. I wanted to see it.

I climbed over the fence. The guy’s van was at the end of the alley. He opened the back doors and pulled some black curtains back.

There was just a wood box in the van. Right in the middle.

“He’s in that box, there. You go on in.”

I got in the van.

“I’ll close the doors so he don’t get out.”

The guy got in the van too and closed the doors and curtains.

It was dark in there.

The guy switched a light on, a flashlight. He shined it on the wood box. He opened up the box.

Something jumped out of the box. The guy shined a light on it but it was gone. It was on me. The guy put the light on me, on my shoulder.

It was a monkey. A capuchin monkey, like he said. Brown with some white on its face. I petted it. I felt the collar that said Kiss Me.

“Why don’t you kiss him?” said the guy. He was still shining the light.

I petted the monkey’s head and down its back and its tail. It had a curled tail.

“Why don’t you?”

“Nothing to be afraid of.”

“You can kiss him, if you like.”

“So why don’t you?”

Well, I picked the monkey up. I kissed it, quick.

The monkey didn’t like that. It bit me on my lip. It screamed.

The guy laughed. When he laughed the monkey got riled. It bit me again, right on my chin.

I dropped the monkey but it jumped back up. It bit my ear and scratched on my neck and my back.

The guy laughed and laughed. That made the monkey — it was jumping all over. It was wild. The guy shined the light on the monkey, wherever it went. It climbed everywhere. It climbed on me too, sometimes, and bit me again and scratched.

I swallowed my spit. There was blood in it.

The guy laughed and laughed.

“How do you like that?”

I didn’t say nothing. I just swallowed my spit.

The monkey screamed. It climbed up the curtains, to the bar on top.

The guy slapped his leg and laughed. He laughed and laughed. He kept the light on the monkey, on top of the bar. It walked back and forth, back and forth.

After a while up there, the monkey calmed down. It climbed back down. The guy called it but it crawled back on me. It just looked at me. It sat on my lap. It curled its tail around itself, like a cat. Then it sat there, quiet.

The guy stopped laughing. He grabbed the monkey by the collar. He took it and dropped it in the box and slammed the lid. Then he opened the curtains and the doors up.

“Go.”

That’s all he said.

The van took off and I ran back. Over the fence. Through the corn. Into the house.

When Mom saw me, she hung up the phone.

“Oswald, your trousers are filthy. That new shirt of yours is ripped. How on earth did you rip your brand-new shirt?”

I didn’t say nothing.

“Been climbing that fence again, haven’t you? Scratched yourself all up. The dirt you’re tracking in! Can’t stay out of that garden, either, can you?”

I didn’t say nothing.

“You better tell me the truth, Oswald. This minute.”

Mom got down and her eyes… Everywhere I looked, there they were. So I looked right at them and I told her. I told her everything.

“Oswald, I don’t want to hear it. I don’t believe a word of it. You and your stories. That nice man, with the white trousers? You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Really, Oswald. You and your stories.”

I wanted to say…

I didn’t say nothing.

“The shirt’s a write-off. The trousers I can mend. Really, you ought to be ashamed. Spoiling your clothes. Making up lies like that. Not a bit of that happened, did it, Oswald?”

I looked at my feet. I said: “Nothing happened.”

Mom got up.

“I didn’t think so. Now you go and get changed for dinner. You’re filthy.”

I went to my room and…

It didn’t happen. That’s what I said.

It did happen. It did.

It happened.

Something happened.

“A Capuchin Monkey” was first published in Transition and reprinted in Jerry Jazz Musician. It’s from my unpublished story collection Naked in a Graveyard. If you enjoyed it, kindly consider buying me a coffee.