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Thwack. Thwack.
Roger's sandal sent the empty can flying, bumping over loose gravel on the smooth dirt road. He grunted, jogging to catch up with it. His grey potbelly bounced under his shirt, hem blowing up in the breeze. Roger tugged it back down. Steve always said he needed to jog. Every so often, a cool wind would blow through the treetops. They'd rustle, let a ray of light peek through, sometimes two. Roger had started to notice these things, in the absence of his television and the damp haze of alcohol. On the drive to the lake, he'd read license plates as they passed the Smith's car, counted guard rails once they became sparse on the quieting road.
The sunlight through the canopy was enough to draw his eye, and Roger caught sight of an outstretched wing. The bird would startle each time the wind blew, dislodged from its perch. He hated that bird. He was convinced it was the same bird, as it seemed to be following him. It had an uncanny call, different from other birdsong by the lake. It was a pale imitation of the others in the trees. Come to think of it, the other birds seemed to be avoiding the cardinal. Maybe they could hear it too.
His aimless walk had brought him around the dirt road connecting the small docks, passing cabins and their adjacent water spigots. Roger rounded another bend. Around him, families unpacked their coolers, pulled towels from the trunks of their cars. Every time he looked up, that bird was there. At least someone was paying attention to him. Every member of the family had made a plan for their time at the lake. Francine suntanning with Haley, Klaus preoccupied with his freedom, Stan and Steve with the whole father-son circus. Roger watched Francine jog to a lawn chair and flop down next to her daughter. Sunlight glanced off of her shades, but disappeared suddenly when she straightened back up. Roger could hear a snatch of conversation before Francine doubled back to the public bathroom entrance. She'd forgotten her pocketbook.
He watched her retrieve it from a hook on the wall, shrug the strap over her shoulder. Having caught up with the empty can, Roger nudged it with the edge of his sandal. Who needs 'em.
Thwack. The can went flying into a cluster of burdock.
Roger could recall the good times. Being Jeffery's imaginary friend. He'd almost lost control of that one. Luckily, opportunities always presented themselves right when he needed them. It had been easy enough to push Jeff, in his half-stoned state. He was always just a little detached, Roger noticed. He had almost made it seem like an accident, too. But at the last minute he decided it didn't matter if he did. Haley had known Roger for years. She would assume the worst and he'd have to run damage control, keep her from convincing the family the switch-out had been orchestrated by him. Cover up one more little thing in a long line of little things. But Jeff being caught by accident in a tractor beam was not such a reach of the imagination. He often thought the boy had done it to himself.
Thwack.
Going to Jamaica and getting so drunk he couldn't even press the shutter on his camera. Bullock had wanted those photos. Roger decided Avery would have to accept the outcome of that glorious, all-expense payed fiasco. One clean shot of the alien in the cabana, then ten blurry photos of Roger's various appendages, taken by accident in the hallway of the hotel on a mad dash to avoid security. He and his entourage had stumbled back into the building, wasted, where Roger and his main girls had unceremoniously knocked over several guests of the hotel having a conversation by the bar. He had then, in full suit and tie, vomited on the billiard table during a heated game.
Parker Peters' storyline had subsequently petered out, and he'd lost Bullock's trust for good. Roger had really lost control of that one. After he'd nearly been vivisected in a windowless room, the journalist character had stopped being fun to play. Roger couldn't decide why at the time. But now, with the lake air soothing his lungs, his usual hangover long gone, it'd become clear. It was always the stakes that made the character fun to play, not the costume. Not just the costume, anyway. When their titular story came to an end, Roger would find himself looking back to the beginning. Always wanting to start over, make that stellar first impression again. Peters' had been a special thrill- Roger was so sure he'd been found out. All of those agents surrounding him in the newspaper office where he'd been swiftly apprehended. Facing Stan in his own office with the two agents holding Roger like he'd make a break for it was just too good to pass up. Stan's face had been priceless. Roger still got a laugh out of that.
The night he'd come home from the office after Peters was fired, he had wanted to fall straight into bed. No thoughts, just the lumpy bulk of his mattress to muffle the groans of his interrupted sleep. But he'd been on edge. Probably the late nights in Montego, throwing back daiquiris with his crew. Running by the infinity pool, he'd seemed to slip over the edge. He never quite hit the water, though. The ground was in two places at once, battering him from all angles as he tumbled. He hit smooth concrete, the tie around his neck growing tighter and tighter, suddenly he couldn't breathe right, and lights were wizzing by. Cars sped around him in the night air, sound rushing toward him, then leaving him behind faster than his sluggish head could turn to see the oncoming vehicles. His neck was killing him. No matter how much he loosened the tie, the pain wouldn't leave. He'd been chasing after the girl who'd failed to bring him his cocktail. She'd sidestepped just as Roger's momentum took him across the yellow line, into the right lane. Roger charged that hospital bill to his expense account.
Pawing through the VHS collection in his attic, he decided nothing already rewound was bland enough to fall asleep to. So he had disappeared behind the bar, got to work salvaging the night. One martini turned into two, which turned into four, and within half an hour Roger was passed out in his recliner to the murmur of the Langley Home Shopping Network on his grainy television. An open jar of green olives had slowly warmed during his sleep, sitting forgotten on the bar.
Roger came to a halt on the dirt road. Groaning his boredom, he gave the empty can one last halfhearted kick. The front of the can rolled into view, caked with chalky dirt from the road, dented in between the two words on the logo. Baller's Blend.
A rustle of feathers sounded in the air to his left, a pair of lithe claws coming to rest on his shoulder.