Three - Above the church of faith

Rick came from the Washington, and he liked to go out when he could to draw the rose gardens. His drawings weren't breathtaking, but every now and then his friends would admire the work. On the rare occasion, he was able to sell his drawings in a coffee shop. He would host 10 minute drawings for a couple hours whenever he could to get a bit of extra cash.

Today was Rick’s day off, which wasn't something that happened too often. He decided to take full advantage of this and take a walk in the park to see if there was anything worth drawing today. He grabbed his coat, keys, wallet, pencil and paper and walked out his door. On his way down the steps to the ground floor of the church, he fixed the collar of his coat. He pulled open the church door, and, to his surprise, snow piled in. He had been asleep for the past eight hours and hadn't seen the snowfall that morning.

He tried in vain to scoop the snow back outside but eventually gave up, closed the door, and carried on his way to the park. The streets were mostly clear now that the plows had come through sometime in the morning. Like always on his day off, he walked down main street and snagged a copy of that day’s newspaper from the news vendor outside of Dreamwood Terrace apartment building. He sniffed, and he smelled something familiar floating out of the recently opened doors of Dreamwood Terrace. He ignored it figuring it was a figment of his imagination. He flipped through the paper as he walked and found nothing that sparked his interest. He put it under his arm and continued his way to the park.

Rick eventually found his way to a bench in the park opposite a fountain that had iced over in the night. He reached inside his coat pocket and withdrew his worn notebook and pencil. He started to draw the fountain. However, Rick paused when he saw a bit of color on the white snow near the base of the fountain. It was a card with a picture of a court jester on it. Below the picture, simple typeface displayed that it was the Fool.

Rick heard some muttering and looked over his shoulder to see a knobbly old woman wandering around the park, seemingly floating over the snow and looking for something. As she got closer to him, Rick smelled a strong odor of sage mixed with the smell of weed. He wondered what a woman of her age was doing getting stoned.

She stopped in front of Rick and asked, "Have you seen one of my tarot cards? It is the Fool."

Rick pointed towards the fountain base. "Yeah, right over there. Shame, though, I quite liked the look of it with the fountain," he said. The old woman reached down, picked up the card, and drifted off without a word.

Two

     When the Michael's truck made its rounds of Dreamwood it dumped large amounts of glitter on the streets. The glitter was dragged by the wind, winding its way into every nook and cranny of this small town. When Rick woke up he found the glitter had managed to seep through the thin walls of his apartment and cover everything. Rick looked around and saw the thin film of glitter glowing in the evening light. He swung his legs over the bed, walked across the room, and had dug through his dresser to find his work clothes, only to find that the glitter had oozed into all of his clothing. He tried in vain to remove the glitter from his clothing. He was going to grab his jacket for the walk to work, but he found that even with the thin walls in his apartment it was almost warm. Instead he ended up walking out of the house with his clothes drenched with glitter leaving behind small wisps of glitter on his way to work.


     It was a slow Wednesday night a O'Harley's and it allowed Rick to dwell on the night of the wedding reception. He had finally found out the girl in his apartment was named Laura. She had a reputation around the town for "borrowing" others valuables after sleeping with them. Rick had found out about her reputation first hand when he got back from work; she had stolen his potted plant that he used for recreational purposes. Damn Rick thought to him self. He would have to buy a new plant and they aren't common in the small town either. Meaning Rick would need to take a road trip. Rick shook his head to clear his thoughts. To distract himself from this annoyance he looked around the bar. There were three people. This was a slow night even by Wednesday night's standards. It was probably because everyone was home sick this week. Some sort of flu swept through this small town seeming to get everyone sick. The door of the bar opened at 8:26 and some old guy with a weathered face and cane to match walked in. The old man walked up to the bar, sat down on one of the stools near Rick. He looked worn out from a long days work.
"What can I get you?" Rick said. He had seen his kind before. Just getting a drink to take the edge off.
"One shot of whiskey." the old man said while puling out his wallet. He laid down a five on the counter.  Rick reached behind him to grab a glass and a bottle of whiskey off the wall, turned back around, poured the old man a little more than one shot in a glass, it was the cheaper bottle anyway. No big loss. The old man looked at the glass for a minute and took a sip. Rick went back to cleaning the glasses at the bar, which no matter how many times he washed there always seemed to have more glitter in them. The old man didn't say anything for a long while. This was no oddity sometimes people didn't want to talk and drink. A few minutes pass and Rick, out of boredom, finally broke the silence "So what's your story old man?"
The old man looked up from his drink and said "Well son I am Ángel, I have been here a long time. I work at New Hope."
"Well Ángel what are you doing out late aren't old folks usually sleeping about now?"
"It was a long day and I figured I could use a drink to relax," said Ángel. "but you are right, I am very tired. It was nice to talk, but I have got to be going," he grumbled.
"Alright Ángel careful out there." Ángel got up with the help from his cane and walk out of the bar. Well there goes my entertainment for tonight, Rick thought. He thought it would be amusing to see the old man drunk. He was sure there was at least one good story in him. One of the perks for Rick working at the bar was that he was able to hear what everyone's story was. Everyone liked talking when drunk. Rick in his somewhat short life had realized that stories were far more useful than money. Occasionally if the story was good enough he would give that person a free drink.