Split & Stack

When I was younger there was a man named Franklin who lived in a cabin in the woods behind our house. He lived off the land and perhaps molested it far more than needed to survive but he thrived this way and so you cannot blame him.

At night I would see him outside my window in the yard, luminescent in the pitch darkness of the wooded countryside. I would look down and wave at Franklin and he’d wave back and this surmised most of my interactions with him.

I imagine I should’ve been frightened of Franklin, but I wasn’t scared of any of the Franklins that would come and stand outside my window and wave. The bearded ones, the bald ones, the women and the men, none seemed insidious to me. They would just wave, but I would soon learn never to wave back.

When the sun rose I would run through the trees and hide in bushes to watch Franklin at his cabin. He would cut wood and stack it next to the cabin and then set another log and strike again, over and over, split and stack, split and stack. No fire burned.

He wouldn’t wave at me during the day. He’d treat me like a common thief, run me from his land with his ax held above his bald head or long hair depending on the day and I would run and at night Franklin would stand outside my house in the yard and wave.

One day I saw Franklin chopping things he shouldn’t have been chopping and on this day he didn’t chase me but instead he waved a red hand and I waved back and I left and I didn’t see Franklin that night or the following night or the weeks that followed.

I saw Franklin in the woods but he didn’t wave. I saw him on the porch but he didn’t see me. I saw him pet our dog who didn’t see him. I went camping and Franklin used his axe and my friends didn’t believe me but they weren’t my friends.

I saw Franklin at a county fair wearing a clown face and a red nose and a curly green wig and he juggled chainsaws but he didn’t wave. I saw Franklin marry my mother and move into our home and raise two children but he didn’t raise me.

I saw Franklin knock on our front door and sell my mother cosmetic supplies and Franklin was beautiful that day and convincing and she came back again but my mother didn’t answer the door that time.

I saw all these faces meld into one when I slept and they all smiled and none of them waved. I saw him standing behind my mother’s casket with a bible in his hand, and I saw Franklin wipe tears from her eyes but I didn’t cry and Franklin didn’t like that.

I saw Franklin outside my window standing in the yard but he didn’t wave. The next night she didn’t wave either, or the next. A week later he stood there with his axe across his shoulders and his hands were red again and he didn’t smile but his shadow did.

I heard Franklin walk across my roof and I saw her peaking at me from the hallway but she didn’t see me. I saw him peaking at me the next night and he saw me and he smiled but he didn’t wave.

I walked to his cabin but Franklin wasn’t there and the cabin wasn’t there but the wood was and stacked on top of the pile were things Franklin shouldn’t have been chopping and I saw my mother and I waved but she didn’t wave.

I saw Franklin in my yard and he didn’t wave but he beckoned me to come out into the yard but I didn’t because I was frightened of who Franklin was that night. The next night she didn’t wave but gestured me to meet her in the yard and I wasn’t afraid and so I walked out into the yard and she had left but Franklin was there and his hands were red so I went back to my room and I wept.

The next night I kept my blinds closed and Franklin didn’t like that. He walked into my room and opened the blinds and I saw him do this but he didn’t see me and he left my house and stood in the yard but I didn’t see him.

The next day Franklin knocked on my door and she asked for my mother because she wanted to sell her cosmetic supplies and I told Franklin that my mother was dead and I saw my mother stacked neatly at the wood pile and Franklin left.

That night I slept facing away from the window but I didn’t close my blinds so Franklin didn’t come inside but his shadow did and he knocked on the glass but I didn’t see him. In the morning Franklin was hanging from a tree in the yard by a rope and flies buzzed around him and he didn’t wave.

Franklin was still dead this morning but he grinned at me in the afternoon and tonight he waved and he’s using the ax to cut himself free and he’s coming up the stairs to my room and he sees me and I see him. He’s waving.

The birds are chirping and the wood pile is stacked higher than the cabin and my mother smiles and Franklin waves and I slice a log clean through and the pile grows larger. Franklin swings back and forth, split and stack, and a boy finds my cabin and I chase him off my land but tonight I’ll wave to him and see if he waves back.