An Unconscious Belief

Nate Depke
· in ,

I call him Mr. Big Shot because that’s the name he goes by. This since last December when he took the Greyhound through New Mexico on his way to hearing his bullshit dad speak at a spiritual revival. The revival went bust. Apparently dodgy faith healers and snake handlers weren’t what the metaphorical Christians who attended from the Midwest were into. Mr. Big Shot says it doesn’t matter, that this blind kid sitting next to him at the bus station taught him all he needed to know about spiritual convalescence. Mr. Big Shot lies a lot.
Mr. Big Shot has a big head. Big ideas. Big feather in his cap. He sometimes wears war paint and a headdress too. He looks silly when he does. He’s NOT a fucking Indian for sure, no matter what he says. In fact, he’s got bushy red hair. He’s not even Irish. He’s a jerk really, same as his nutsodad.
Mr. Big Shot says I have no room to talk, that my dad is as crazy as his, though he’s never met one member of my family, so fuck him. I tell him I’m leaving. He says, “Oh, no, you’re not.” Then he smacks me across the face. I hit him back.
In the next room, I hear his dad yell. “Praise God,” he says.

Nate Depke’s writing has appeared in Crack the Spine, Jersey Devil Press, Apocrypha and Abstractions, and other publications. In recent years he has been a groundskeeper and apple picker. He lives in Los Angeles.