The Disillusionists. cont'd...

Mike pulled another chair over towards the couch and May sat in it. I sat on the arm of the couch and tried to look comfortable. This Mike guy just stood smilin' at me, an activity which was likely to get him a punch in the head. Finally he said, "I see you have a beer there. Would you like anything else?"

May piped up and said we had helped ourselves, Mike acted as though this was alright but if it really was alright, why did he have to act? He stepped over the coffee table and made a small show of switching off the television, turning up the lights and turning down the stereo - all with the same remote. "Did you have a look around?" he said quasi-casually.

"Not really..." said May. She looked at me and stood up, "Here, sit here." She went and sat between Jay and Alexis and they all kind of scrunched together giggling.

"The drive up was interesting." I said as I sat down in the chair.

"Yes," Mike agreed, "Some of those trees are two-hundred years old. We had some trouble with a few of them several years ago... some kind of Asian lung beetle." He winked at May, "Although we were lucky enough to replace them with mature specimens on the grounds."

"Uh-huh," I nodded, trying to appear knowledgable.

"Have you ever seen a tree spade?"

"Not recently."

"Fantastic machine. Huge. Picks up an entire tree, roots and all and plops it right where you want. Big job. Hell of a mess... Still burning the firewood."

I looked over at the fireplace which was full of old newspapers, cereal boxes and dumped ashtrays. Mike caught me looking and laughed, "In the winter mostly."

It was then that I noticed I was the only one in the room not wearing a jacket. It wasn't that it was cold in the room, just damp. The coffee table was a small sandbox with a shelf around it covered with empty bottles, glassware and related paraphernalia. Mike wore a black shirt and jeans. He had several silver bracelets and leather straps around his tattooed wrists. He had black hair in a sort of punk Elvis style and smelled faintly of parafin. Alexis had beautiful straight black hair and wore a suede jacket with thrift-shop trim. She smoked a cigarette with detached vigour. In the better light, I could see now that she was a lot older than she first appeared. I thought I saw Jay scratch his crotch.