Stumptown

By Thomas Healy

With his head down and his legs crossed, Ermler sat on the three-legged stool under the blue water bucket. Already the old-fashioned strapped bathing suit he was required to wear was drenched and he had only just started his stint at the water booth.

"Hey, mister, you're not smiling."

Wearily he looked up at a scrawny guy who held one of the bean bags in his right hand.

"You should be smiling."

"Says who?"

"Me," he cackled then hurled the bag at the dinner plate-sized metal target.

He hit it right smack in the center and the bucket above Ermler tipped over and he was soaked again with ice cold water.

 

#

Two days earlier, after getting off one of the downtown municipal trains, Ermler was approached by a transit officer who asked to see his ticket.

"I don't have a ticket," he said, puzzled by the request.

"You can't ride the train if you don't have a ticket."

"I've never been to your city before, officer, but I was told by someone who has been that you can ride the trains downtown free of charge."

"That was so, sir, but the policy was changed almost five months ago and now all passengers are required to purchase a ticket regardless of what train they are riding."

"I didn't know that."

"Well, you do now."

"So, am I under arrest?"

The officer shook his dimpled chin. "No, I'll cite you for the infraction and give you a ticket and you'll have to report to the courthouse tomorrow morning at ten o'clock sharp."

"What then?"

"You'll be required to perform some sort of community service."

"For how long?"

"That's up to the judge but probably one or two Saturdays."

"But I don't live here."

"Well, you'll have to make some arrangements to be here because, if you fail to perform your service, you'll be levied a hefty fine and maybe have to spend some time behind bars."

The next day, at the hearing before a judge who wore a patch of hair beneath his lower lip, Ermler was given the option of collecting trash downtown on the next two Saturdays or working one full day at the Stumptown Festival this coming Saturday. He chose to work at the festival and, as one of the clerks handed him a form to fill out, he asked what the festival was celebrating.

"You must not be from around here."

"I'm not."

"Early on, when this town was just starting to come together, many trees were cut down to make room for streets," she said, fingering the ivory barrette in her blond hair. "And because it took quite a while to remove the stumps people began to refer to the city as Stumptown. Now, for the past few years, the festival is held as a way of remembering those early pioneer days."

Before he arrived at the fairgrounds, which stretched for three city blocks along the west side of the river, Ermler assumed he would be given a rake and a trash bag to pick up the debris. Instead, to his surprise, one of the marshals handed him a striped nineteenth century bathing suit, goggles, and a striped cap and told he would be stationed at the water both for three two-hour intervals.

"Are you serious?" he asked the marshal.

"I am."

"No one told me I'd be doing this."

"Well, sir, I'm telling you right now," the woman said sternly. "But, if you don't want to do it, you'll have to pick up trash on the street for a couple of days."
He couldn't do that because he had to get home and could not afford to miss another day of work.

"No, I'll do it."

"Good," she purred. "Now let me walk you to your station."

Ermler noticed a boy and presumably his father approach the water booth and slipped on his swim goggles.

"How much?" the father asked.

"Fifty cents a throw."

He gave two quarters to his son, who was about six years of age, and the boy dropped the quarters into a Mason jar and picked up one of the bean bags stacked beside the jar.

"Now take your time," his father cautioned him, "and throw where you're aiming."

The boy, who appeared nervous, threw the bag right away and was almost a foot short of the target which clearly annoyed his father.

"Come on, Ricky, you can throw better than that," his father insisted as he offered him two more quarters.

"I don't want to."

"Why not?"

"I just don't."

The father, more irritated than ever, picked up a bag and threw it as hard as he could and caught the bottom half of the target and the bucket of water spilled onto Ermler's head.

"See, see, that's how it's done, son."

The boy looked at Ermler for a split second, his gray eyes crinkling, and then walked away as his father again offered him some quarters. Ermler wondered if he should say anything but decided not to because he doubted if the father would listen to him or anyone else for that matter. He seemed like someone who wasn't inclined to take advice which Ermler understood because he also was reluctant to do what others suggested.

"Hey, beach boy, are you open for business?"

He looked up at a young man with a scraggly beard that made him appear as if he were covered in cobwebs.

"Yep."

The guy looked over at his girlfriend who was licking the stick of cotton candy in her right hand. "What'll you give me if I hit the target three times in a row?"

"I don't know. A razor, maybe."

"You think you're funny?"

He shrugged and put back on his goggles.

"You're going to get wet, beach boy, damn wet."

The guy hit the target the first time but his next two throws were wide of the mark.

"Better luck next time."

Angrily the guy slinked away, a couple of steps ahead of his girlfriend. Two more guys threw at the target and missed just as badly and complained that the attraction was rigged.

Ermler ignored them and leaned back on his stool and surveyed the grounds. So many people at the festival appeared on edge, more agitated than excited, as if they were somewhere they didn't want to be but for whatever reason felt obliged to be here. Ermler felt much the same way. Not only did he not want to be at the festival, sitting on a stool and getting ice cold water poured on him, but he didn't want to be in Stumptown at all.

 

The only reason why he was here was to attend the funeral of an old acquaintance from high school. Goose, who acquired the nickname because of his long neck, was killed by a hit and run driver a week earlier. According to his wife, he often went for a walk around the neighborhood after dinner and was struck crossing a street just a couple of blocks from their home. The more he studied the people at the festival the more he wondered if the hit and run driver might be among them. He assumed it was possible because there were so many people here.

"You ready to get soaked?"

He glared at the burly guy whose Angels baseball cap was turned around on his enormous bald head. "That's why I'm here."

The guy wound up his right arm like a pitcher in the Major Leagues then threw a wounded duck that fell well short of the target and Ermler could not help but smile.

"You think that's funny?"

"I do."

Angrily the guy picked up another bag and hurled it directly at Ermler and hit him in the left shoulder.

"Now that's funny."

All of a sudden Ermler wondered if the guy might be the driver who killed his old classmate and, under his breath, asked, "Is it you?"

"You say something, fella?"

"Is it you?"

"I don't know what the hell you're mumbling about," the baffled guy said as he strode off to ride the Ferris wheel.

The marshal who gave Ermler the bathing suit to wear suggested that a sure way of attracting customers to the water booth was to issue mild taunts. Nothing mean-spirited, she said, just something to get their attention. Ermler wasn't interested in doing that and kept his opinions to himself. But now, after being struck by the guy with the Angels cap, he became more and more convinced that someone here might be the one who killed Goose.

 

He believed the festival, indeed the entire town, was a very ominous place, full of people used to getting their own way regardless of the cost. So, as one person after another approached the booth, he found himself asking, "Is it you?" He supposed they thought he had become a little delirious after all the water that had been poured on him, and maybe he had, but the menace he perceived was real enough that he could not wait to get out of Stumptown.

 

T.R. Healy was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest. His stories have appeared in such publications as the Beloit Fiction Journal, Foliate Oak, and the Red Cedar Review. He is the author of the novel Cruel Earth.