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A Myth |
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Marcus had been renting the house for 19 years, long before the fast food chains and big box stores had crept in to surround him. A coffee franchise was ten feet away from his bedroom window. A tall pressure-treated fence didn't stop fumes from the cars in the drive-through. The exhaust somehow found its way past the thick trail of caulking that Marcus had streamed around all the windows and doors.
He lay there staring at his finger marks in the bead of bone coloured silicone. Like brush strokes on a painting the lines dabbed and blobbed their way around the painted trim.
He noticed how the walls had yellowed from his damn cigarettes. He wet his finger and rubbed the painted surface behind his head, a beige streak was left. Marcus had forgotten about the lighter colour that his landlord had painted before he moved in. His smoking had made everything the shade of pasteurized honey. A murky shadow stood out over the kitchen table where he sat on his haunches and smoked in the mornings. He knew that if he looked over his bed there would be a similar darkness.
He lit a Rothmans and inhaled hard, he tried to make a face like he didn't give a shit. He picked up the phone and dialled his agent's number, something he hadn't done in a year. As he began to leave a message his voice trailed off, he knew they didn't need him anymore. He could be created with computers. He'd even seen his image on video games for Christ sakes, portrayed as the raunchy creature, always the stereotype.
In the early sixties Marcus was new in the business, a fresh oddity, a fourteen-year-old sensation. Recruited in his hometown by the same agent he's had for 43 years.
Stanton's first words to Marcus were, "Mythology comes to life. I can make you rich and famous my young friend," Stanton had said glancing at Marcus' parents while nodding with affirmation.
Marcus' mother and father were suspicious as usual.
Stanton repeated the pitch to Marcus' brother.
"Everything I want stands before me," his brother said with his arms spread out. The sun even pierced through the clouds as he spoke.
Marcus thought that his brother was a dramatic ass, afraid of change, of chance.
Less than a week later Marcus was on the set of his first film. His initial role was co-starring as a muscle man's sidekick, a stabilizer for a reckless hero. Marcus' character was intuitive yet cowardly, which helped the strong man shine. Marcus gave the hero support with an undercurrent of advice. In the scene where the bulky idol fought a Cyclops Marcus hid behind a boulder with his eyes bulging and his hand over his mouth. He thought about how this directed reaction had come naturally to him.
An acting coach was assigned to spend four hours a day with him. She helped hone his speaking skills and went over his lines. Marcus thought that she was beautiful and he told her on their second day together. Tears came up in her round eyes. She told him that it was impossible, their differences, most people had never seen anything like Marcus before.
"The public will love you as an actor, because you're an actor, not for what you are," she said as she wiped her cheeks. "You're a tender being Marcus. Don't lose that." She touched his arm. Marcus knew she was lying. He was a centaur, half man half horse, a freak, a curiosity, like the elephant man.
The actress that played the heroine flirted with Marcus, told him he was sexy and asked him out to the Whisky a Go Go club. Johnny Rivers was playing that night, when he sang "Secret Agent Man" she pulled Marcus onto the dance floor. The crowd moved back, she gyrated while Marcus awkwardly snapped is fingers.
The owner of the club bought them a drink and joined them at their table. He spoke into Marcus' ear, "I'm sorry man but I gotta ask you to split. The customers are getting creeped out. Listen, I know you're cool, but I got a club to run." He shrugged his shoulders and his skinny black tie swung back and forth.
Marcus finished his drink in one gulp.
The owner apologized again and thanked him for being cool.
As Marcus turned to leave the owner asked for his autograph. "Just sign this napkin. Oh and Johnny Rivers saw you and he wants your 'John Henry' too."
Marcus walked out wanting to tear them apart, shatter their spines with a good back kick. Watch them writhe for mercy.
He continued his relationship with the heroine for about six months. She went to clubs without him and came to his apartment in the early mornings drunk and full of regret. He felt sorry for her, caught up in the mess of stardom. She'd lay with her head on his hairy stomach and cry herself to sleep. She stopped coming one day and Marcus heard that she had started taking drugs and gone off to Vegas with a man.
Marcus took it hard, not forgetting that the relationship was nothing more than him being a pillow to cry on. But he craved the closeness, her warmth. He had a bout of mood swings that came and went for months. Stanton had to talk to him and threaten to send him home to his parents. Marcus couldn't go back and face the mockery, his kind were vicious if frailty reared its repulsive head.
He discovered liquor, its slow serpent like heat slipping into his stomach then climbing back to his brain and limbs to quell his spiking temperament. He quickly learned how much and when to drink, he controlled it like most never could. He spent time with a lot of women. He knew that most of them were just inquisitive, seeking something new to brag to their friends about, but a few belts of whisky could smooth him over enough to make him believe otherwise.
Marcus enjoyed a decade of booming success before movies began to change. Stone-faced actors like Steve McQueen came along in films like Bullitt. Big car chases, small dialogue and long staring contests became the style. The "Commitment to Reality" theme changed the industry. Marcus' popularity sank. He hoped for cult status but nothing happened.
In 1974 the band that had done well years before with the song Surfin' Cat did a novelty tune with Marcus called "Dionysus The Wine God." It hit the charts at number 91 but got bounced out a week later.
There was also a cartoon in 1974 that used Marcus' character from the Mount Olympus movies. Marcus didn't profit at all from it. There was no doubt that it was him that they were emulating. He tried to bring a claim against the producers and lost miserably.
Marcus clopped over to his bookcase. The fibreboard shelves sagged from all the movie and television books that he liked to collect. He pulled out one called "What the hell happened to.?" On the cover amongst a collage of headshots, obviously cut from old movie magazines, was Marcus. He remembered the photo, he was sixteen, and he was climbing down a ramp from the back of a shining red pickup truck. His hair was flipped up at the front and held in place with sticky hairspray. He could still conjure up the perfumed odour and the fact that the stuff stung his eyes when he perspired. For some reason Stanton had thought that Marcus' hairstyle should be elfish like Herby, the elf that wanted to be dentist in the animated movie Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.
Marcus tossed the book back. He went into the kitchen and drank a can of beer by the sink. Flashes of sunlight blipped between the cracks of the fence from the never-ending procession of cars nudging by in the drive-through. He heard the faint sound of static voices repeating orders for coffee and donuts. He'd seen drivers lean out of their windows trying to decipher the garbled words.
Once each week Marcus walked to the "R and S" grocery store on Bay road. He passed two large super food marts on his way but refused to shop in them. The owners at the "R and S" knew him, as did most of the employees and customers. The majority of the patrons were seniors and remembered Marcus from his hay days. It was a different situation at the mega stores, kids pointed and parents averted their eyes.
Once and a while a young person, usually a teenage boy that had been watching late night movies, would approach Marcus, their first comment was almost always, "You're bigger than I thought." Marcus would explain that he was adult sized but the movies were filmed to make the heroes appear to be the largest.
Their questions were predictable and the meeting would end with the kid's mind drifting while he gaped at Marcus. The employees at the "R and S" would keep working, but their conversations would cease until Marcus' latest enquirer went on his way.
His phone rang. He listened to the machine scratch out his greeting, rewind and wait for the caller to speak.
"Hello.Is this the Marcus?" The caller hesitated. "That was in, Mount Olympus, The Gods, The Seven Myths, and.?" More hesitation.
"Could you call me?" He left a local number.
Probably another third rate reporter. At least once a year one would call looking to do a story on an aging forgotten screw-up.
After his dinner Marcus lit a cigarette and called the number.
"Hi. Are you the reporter that phoned me earlier? Because I don't tell my story for nothing, no freebees here." Marcus stood with the phone pressed to his ear. He glanced at the television, another hurricane hammered at the shore of a tourist island.
"No, no, I'm not a journalist. I'm very interested in your life but I'm not planning to profit financially from it."
Marcus didn't speak for a few seconds.
"Are you still there sir?"
"No need to get formal," said Marcus.
For some reason Marcus felt pity for this guy. Not that he sounded weak but there was something breakable about him. Before Marcus could think it through he had invited him to come over the following day at noon.
He laid down the phone and continued to watch the news. Tornados in the mid west had pulled up houses as though they were loosely rooted weeds.
After he took a shower he decided to use the hair dye he had bought months before. He mixed up the whole package and rubbed it into his scalp. Auburn, it was a harsher tone than he expected. His skin looked grey beside it. He looked like his father.
He remembered the day his brother had summoned him. "Come home," his brother's nasally voice had ordered. Marcus had been asleep and was jolted awake. His father was ill, and his brother said that their mother had died the previous year on Christmas day.
"Why in hell didn't you tell me about mother," Marcus had yelled at the ceiling. But no answer came. Days later he contacted his brother in Greece, but he wouldn't come to the phone. Marcus' parents were dead and buried.
He tried to forget about his family by downing a beer and going to bed.
Marcus woke up early and scuffed his way to the bathroom. He wanted to call off the meeting. He winced when he looked in the mirror, he'd forgotten about the dye job. He brushed his hair and left it hanging over his shoulders. It didn't look as bad as he thought, he looked a little menacing.
The rap on the door came at 11:45. The bugger was early. Marcus swung open the door to find a bent over man on two canes.
"Come in," Marcus said and struggled to hold the door out as wide as he could.
The man wiggled and shook as he negotiated the step up to the house. Marcus showed him to the living room. The man said he would be more comfortable in a kitchen chair so Marcus sat him at the table.
"Can I get you a beer?" Marcus asked the man.
"No thank you, do you have ginger ale?" The man looked up at Marcus. He was younger than Marcus had first thought, maybe in his 30's. He had a face full of questions; Marcus knew that expression well enough. Yet, the man was worlds apart from the curious ones.
Marcus opened the fridge, "Holy shit, I do have ginger ale." Marcus was surprised to find it and felt good that he could accommodate the man.
"Thank you for having me over. I realise that I really haven't explained myself very well. I'm Josh Banning, I."
Marcus interrupted, "You're Josh Banning from 'All about you'."
"That's me. Or was me, as you can see I've changed a little."
"That show was a classic, intelligent humour, comedy that made me belly laugh. You were amazing, not the typical smart assed teenager, but - I don't know, older somehow." Marcus leaned forward and put his hands on the table.
"Thanks. You were amazing too. I'm more impressed with how you've stayed in this society and coped." Josh sipped his pop through the straw that Marcus had put in the glass.
"Coped. That's about the size of it," Marcus said.
"You're a centaur. Why didn't you go back to your home when your career finished its course?" Josh raised his shaking arms. "You would have been normal there, no one glaring at you, and I know how they treat you here."
"That's a story, a crummy one to boot," Marcus said and leaned back as he broke eye contact with Josh. "And I'd lose my royalty cheques," Marcus said grinning at Josh.
Josh nodded politely but looked like he had more to say. "I was in the drug store five years ago when those drunken red necks tried to ride you. I imagine that wasn't the first cruel incident that you've endured."
Marcus shrugged.
"Well, I know what it's like. Mine comes more in the form of pity. I feel as though people are watching me until I look their way, and then they turn their heads. It's as though they want to weep for me from a safe distance. I strike fear in those people in a much different way than you. I remind them of their vulnerability, something they consider when they have an odd ache in their joints, a pain they can't explain. I make them think, it could happen to them." Josh smiled. "Do I need a soapbox?"
Josh and Marcus laughed and looked away from each other, both of them in thought.
"I do know what you're saying." Marcus stared out the window, his mind racing through his life, looking for the turn, the reason for what he had become.
Josh broke the short silence. "Those crazy reporters from the tabloids followed me around for a few months after the disease set in, but I guess I became old news fast. Now, I'm more interesting in reruns."
"Paparazzi," Marcus said.
"I always hated that name," Josh said taking a breath.
"I always hated them" Marcus grabbed another beer and checked Josh's drink.
"So, where will you go?" Josh asked.
"What do you mean?"
"When this place sells, then what?" Josh looked Marcus in the eye.
"I hadn't givin it much thought," Marcus answered. He'd been denying the issue all together.
"I don't know how much you pay for rent but I can guarantee you'll be unpleasantly surprised at the prices in town."
Marcus' landlord hadn't upped the rent in ages. He hadn't actually seen the landlord for the last three years. His spotty royalty cheques were just enough to get by on. He'd be screwed if his expenses went up.
"Who's going to rent to a creature of mythology?" Josh said. Josh's body constantly bounced like he was riding a train, up and down combined with a side-to-side motion. "You centaurs are reputed to be drunks and womanizers."
"Drunk maybe, but no girls. Not since the movie days." Marcus shot a snort of air through his nostrils. "Nope, no womanizing here."
Marcus stepped outside for a cigarette. When he came back in Josh smiled and asked. "Is Mount Pelion as beautiful as the books portray?"
Marcus shook his head. "I've never been. I'm from a district that's south of Mount Olympus."
Josh looked excited. "Did you know.?"
Marcus cut Josh off before he could ask. "No I didn't know Hercules. He was our myth too. Hey, maybe my agent will find him and drag him to the land of milk and honey. Maybe he'll be governor some day." Marcus snickered. "It's all relative - right?"
"You're bitter Marcus," Josh said looking like a boy trying to get a word in after being scolded.
"Call me in ten years and we'll see how positive you are," Marcus said.
"I'm sorry." Josh said. "I thought that I could learn something from you about how to handle my disease, but your situation is totally something else. You're a centaur in modern society; people will rarely have the capacity to feel sorry for you. They look at you and wonder why you're with them, and why you didn't go back to where you came from. All you do now is scare the living crap out of most people."
Marcus didn't respond.
"Listen, I'm sorry for running off there." Josh reached for his canes.
"I've obviously got a lot to sort out and I'm trying to put it all on you."
Marcus nodded and wished that he could lay it on the table like Josh. Where to start, he'd buried it all for so long he'd need a map to locate it.
"Thanks for the visit," Josh said. "I'm really glad we met."
"I'm glad you came by." Marcus moved toward the door anticipating Josh's struggle.
"I wish I could go back." Josh said.
Marcus tried not to give Josh the pity that he hated. He smiled. "You go back and I'll come and get you."
Josh laughed and shook Marcus' hand. "I'll come by and check on you sometime."
"Call first, I'm pretty busy," Marcus said and rolled his eyes.
Marcus watched Josh wait at the bus stop, cars and transports screaming by, Josh's eyes squinting against the dirt and sun. Marcus shut the door and turned on the TV. The weather station, a row of seven little suns, two with clouds over their faces, and five all clean and smiling.
He thought about asking for a job at the "R and S", maybe night shift stocking the shelves. He could go down that night, or at least the next day. He tied his hair back and rubbed his chin. He would definitely do it when the landlord sold the house.
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