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 $$$        [ HOE E-Zine #983 -- 12/23/99 -- http://www.hoe.nu ]     .,$$$
 `"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""'

	Milo's mother left us about a year ago, and we had decided to rent
 out one of the bedrooms in our house.  Cash was a bit tight, and we were
 aching for some company.  We put an ad in the local classifieds and began
 waiting.
	Milo and I always liked Saturday mornings the best.  We would eat
 a leisurely breakfast at the kitchen table (him in his Spider-Man
 pajamas, me in my bathrobe) and I'd read one section of the paper as he
 cut out faces from the other section.  Ever since his mother left, he
 spent all of his free time cutting faces out of anything he could find;  
 newspapers, magazines, promotional material I had taken home from the
 office, anything.  Sure, it definitely started to creep me out (he had
 amassed six shoe boxes full of cutouts in that year) but I certainly
 wasn't one to stifle any sort of creativity.  I grabbed a box of sausages
 out of the freezer and Milo moved on to the current issue of Time.
	"Dad, do you think anyone’s gonna come for the room today?" Milo
 asked, faithfully, looking down at the Most Influential Leaders Of The
 Century he was about to cut out.
	"I hope so, son.  Maybe."  He had asked me this same question
 every day since we placed the ad a few weeks before.  I wasn't sure
 whether our little routine of question-and-reassure was just to be cute,
 or whether Milo really had some deep wonder regarding our potential
 guest.  Probably not, I decided, as he rarely ever looked up or showed
 any signs of acknowledgement after I made the usual response.  The
 doorbell rang.  "I'll get that," I said.  Milo didn't look up.  Still in
 my robe, I opened the door.  On the doorstep stood an elderly man with a
 narrow face topped by combed-back white hair.  From what I could see, his
 entire body was covered with fine, dignified wrinkles; the parts that I
 couldn't see were covered by a single-breasted black suit with a white
 handkerchief in the breast pocket.  Stepping up to the door with what I
 noticed to be a pair of impeccably polished black wingtips, he extended
 his hand.  I tentatively extended my own.
	"Colonel Lindsay Rodemoyer," the man said in an accent that
 reminded me of Jimmy Stewart in It's a Wonderful Life.  He shook my had
 forcefully, almost painfully.
	"Brett Botts," I replied.
	"Pleased to meet you, I'm sure," the Colonel said.  "I'm here
 about the room."
	"Excellent!  Come on in."  The Colonel promptly followed me into
 the foyer.
	He inhaled deeply several times.  "This will be fine," he said.
	"Don't you want to see the room first?" I asked, befuddled.  He
 had already withdrawn a silver bill fold from his pocket.
	"No, no, that won't be necessary.  Six hundred, correct?  Here you
 are."  He handed me six crisp hundred-dollar bills and returned the
 bill fold to his pocket.
	"Thank you, Mister, uh, Rodemoyer," I said.  "I'll show you to
 your room now, if that's OK."
	"You may address me as Colonel.  And please do show me to my
 room."  We went through the family room (Milo and I were always fond of
 calling it that, perhaps trying to hold together the illusion of a
 perfect household as best we could) and up the stairs to the empty
 bedroom.  The Colonel looked around briefly, then carefully placed the
 tiny black valise he carried with him on the bed.
	"Would you like me to help you with your other bags?" I asked.
	"I have no other bags," he said, matter-of-factly, and walked
 across the hall to the bathroom.  "Expect me downstairs in ten minutes."
	I went back to the kitchen and sat down at the table with Milo.  
 "Milo, we have a guest now, and he's going to be staying in the room
 upstairs."
	"Oh, ok," Milo said, still looking down at the magazine.  I was
 disappointed in how little he seemed to care, after all the waiting.  I
 couldn't shake the feeling that he had been deceiving me every time he
 asked.
	"I could use some water, Mr. Botts," the Colonel said, sidling up
 behind me.
	I glanced up at him and then looked back at Milo, who was still
 cutting.  I don't know if he even noticed that a stranger was in the
 kitchen with us.  "Milo, this is Colonel Rodemoyer.  Could you get him a
 glass of water?"  Milo picked up a cutout of a pudgy Russian man and held
 it up to the Colonel.
	"Stalin says no way!" Milo said in his best cute little boy voice,
 only looking up for a second.  I was surprised.
	"Now, Milo, that's no way to greet--"
	The Colonel broke in.  "Mr. Botts, I will concede that your boy is
 your business.  However, I certainly won’t stand here and listen to your
 insidious red propaganda!"  Before I knew it, the Colonel had sidled back
 out of the kitchen and was on his way out the door.  "I'm going to the
 lunch counter!" he yelled back, walking out and shutting the door.  I
 felt sick.
	"What was that for?" Milo asked, as if nothing had happened.
	"I don't know.  We'll see."  My standard response.  Something
 about the whole exchange in the kitchen reminded me of how it used to be.  
 I felt very lonely.  Snip, snip, snip.  He kept cutting.

	About two weeks later, the Colonel had settled in a bit, and he
 became part of our daily routine.  Milo and I would be in the kitchen,
 preparing to leave for school and work, when he'd make his way in, take a
 seat, and begin eating hastily.  He'd manage to mumble the pledge of
 allegiance through a mouthful of breakfast, constantly checking his
 distinguished-looking gold watch.  It was like he was continuously late
 for something (not that I ever knew what, exactly).  We would all leave
 for our respective day jobs at about the same time, and I wouldn't see
 him until dinnertime.  I must've spent almost all of my daily one-hour
 commute trying to figure out where he went, until I just plain gave up.  
 Whenever I would ask what he actually did all day, he'd always change the
 subject and start mumbling something about patriotism or the price of
 corn or something.  And it wasn't as if I would figure it out on my own,
 really, I could never figure out anything the Colonel did.  One evening,
 I was working in my office when I decided to go downstairs to the kitchen
 for a snack.  When I passed the Colonel's room, the door was slightly
 a jar.  I took a quick glance inside the room--he was sitting on the bed,
 pants unzipped, with one hand stuffed firmly in his underwear.  He held
 his other hand up in the air, poised, as if at any moment, a fish was
 going to jump out of his fly and he would have to grab it or be forced to
 return home without dinner.
	"Oh, Jesus!  Can't you close the door?" I fumed, repulsed,
 slamming the door.  I walked towards the stairs to make sure that Milo
 hadn't witnessed any of this.  I was relieved to hear the familiar noises
 of page turning and scissors snipping open and shut from downstairs.
	"Hey, where ya goin', this is just getting interesting!"  The
 Colonel called to me from his room.  I didn't dignify that with a reply.  
 I quickly went down the stairs and sat on the couch next to Milo.  The
 tiny noises were calming; I could see how he could enjoy this so much.  
 Snip, snip.  "I'm really starting to hate that guy," I said in the dead
 air of the family room.
	"Why?  I think he's nice," Milo said, actually looking at me for a
 second.  "Today, he took me to the aquarium and then we played catch in
 the yard."
	"When was this?" I was a bit confused.
	"Before you came home," Milo said.
	"Well, what did he do that for?"
	"I dunno, just to be nice, I suppose," Milo said.  I felt a chill
 run down my spine and into my gut.  "We have fun."

	Over the next few weeks, Milo continued to tell me of his
 afternoons with the Colonel.  The Colonel himself was just as vague on
 this topic as he had been about his activities in the morning.  I would
 come home from work every day, stepping lightly into the foyer, half
 expecting to find something going on, but never actually seeing anything
 that would ease my sense of paranoia.  I've never been able to completely
 put my fears to rest.  The only thing that's kept me from getting rid of
 the Colonel is Milo.  He's been a lot more involved lately, and one of
 his teachers at school has even called me to talk about it.  Actually,
 she wouldn't shut up about how striking the changes were, that's how
 excited she was.  For his sake, I've kept my mouth shut and slept with
 one eye open.  Apparently, it's paid off.  The shoeboxes in Milo's room
 are gone now, but he won't tell me why or how.  They've disappeared just
 like the Colonel does, every day after breakfast.

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[ (c) !LA HOE REVOLUCION PRESS!           HOE #983, BY MR A JIM - 12/23/99 ]
