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    Every Story is a Love Story
    Every Story is a Love Story
    Every Story is a Love Story
    Ebook108 pages1 hour

    Every Story is a Love Story

    By John Moncure Wetterau

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    About this ebook

    When a society is wounded, it hemorrhages artists. In the early 1960's, young people searching for a more open way of life were drawn to Woodstock, New York. Musicians, painters, architects, writers, arrived from all over the country every week.
    Patrick is an army brat, well-traveled, self-educated, an intense reader, interested in everything. He hitch hikes into Woodstock and finds a job house painting with a crew of creative mavericks. He has been told by his father to look up an old friend who lives in town.
    Willow and her friend, Amber, are exploring on summer break from Stanford University. Willow and Patrick meet in the "Depresso," the cafe where Bob Dylan often hangs out. Willow's father is a music professor who has friendly arguments with her about Dylan; she claims that he has written an American masterpiece, Desolation Row. As the summer goes on, Patrick and Willow become close. Patrick's connection in town, Heidi Merrill, turns out to be keeping an old secret with his father.
    The novel is beautifully written. In telling the story of first love, it also presents the best picture yet of that exciting, sad, and tender time in the United States. Patrick's discoveries about art and science, about truth, are universal. If you like "The Great Gatsby," you will enjoy "Every Story is a Love Story," one of the rare short novels that belongs on the same shelf.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJohn Moncure Wetterau
    Release dateJan 11, 2013
    ISBN9781301194674
    Every Story is a Love Story
    Author

    John Moncure Wetterau

    Born in Greenwich Village, New York City, but raised, mostly, by my grandparents in Woodstock, a small town in the Catskill mountains. Midway through sophomore year at Hamilton College, an inner voice said, "Get out!" It seemed crazy, but I knew it was the right thing to do. A fraternity brother told me I'd have no trouble finding work on the shrimp boats in Key West. A friend and I hitchhiked south. Near the New Jersey line we got a ride with another young guy, Pete. "Where you headed?" "Florida." "Me, too." He told us that he'd gotten up before dawn in a small Vermont town, thrown clothes and a baseball glove in the trunk, left a note on his girlfriend's porch, and taken off. We rocked on down the coast, listening to Brenda Lee, getting warmer each day. I left my friends near Miami and went on to Key West. When I got there, I walked to the harbor and asked for a job on the first boat I found that had anyone on board. The captain said, "Shrimp season's over, kid." I think he felt sorry for me. He pointed to a rusty shrimper across the water. "He might take you." I picked up my bag and ran around to the other jetty, arriving just as the boat began to pull away. A man on deck was doing something with a cable. He wore a sweatshirt and had a two-day growth. "I'm looking for work," I shouted over the engine. "You a winch man?" The winch occupied a large part of the deck, a complicated assembly of giant gears and levers. The strip of water below my feet widened. It was jump or forget it. I had a vision of winching the boat upside down in the Gulf. I shook my head and walked to the Southern Cross Hotel, a wooden building with white peeling paint and a sign declaring, The Southernmost Hotel in the United States. I wrote it down in a notebook and have been writing ever since. Along the way I served in the Air Force, earned a degree in computer science from the University of Hawaii, married twice, and raised children. The adventures, the loves and betrayals, the teachers, the lessons---they are in my stories and poems, where, like all writers, I have tried to make of my deeper bio something worthwhile.

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      Book preview

      Every Story is a Love Story - John Moncure Wetterau

      Every Story Is A Love Story

      by John Moncure Wetterau

      Copyright 2013 John Moncure Wetterau

      Smashwords Edition

      Acknowledgements:

      Thanks to Larry Dake, Christopher Evers, Bruce Gordon, Majo Keleshian, Jane Lowenstein, Sylvester Pollet, and Nancy Wallace for valuable suggestions and invaluable support. Gino’s poem, Aesthetic, is by Sylvester Pollet and is used with his permission.

      Cover painting by Paul Brahms. More of his work can be seen at www.PaulBrahms.com.

      Smashwords Edition, License Notes:

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      More fiction by the author

      This book is for Rosy

      Chapter 1

      A red MG came racketing around the corner. It passed, stopped, and reversed, one front fender swinging freely.

      Where you going? The driver had wild eyes and a two day growth.

      Woodstock.

      Get in, get in. Patrick lowered himself into the small seat, holding his AWOL bag on his lap. Whisky in the JAR, the driver sang to himself shifting through gears. Musharingumgoogee…WAK for the Daddy-O… He turned and shouted over the engine, Where you coming from?

      Wiesbaden.

      Germany?

      Yes, Patrick shouted back.

      WAK for the Daddy-O…Good beer, the Krauts. They flew off bumps and jolted around curves for five or six miles. Conversation was impossible. They passed a golf course, rolling and open before a dark wall of mountain, then climbed a hill by three gas stations. Woodstock! the driver shouted, stopping at a narrow triangular green.

      Thanks for the ride.

      The sound of the MG diminished in the distance as Patrick looked around at trees, a neatly painted white church, and a row of stores. He walked in the direction that the MG had gone until he reached a field about a mile from the green. He turned back and stopped at a house that had a large porch and a sign announcing ROOMS.

      An older woman answered his ring. Her hair was white, elaborately piled above her head.

      I'd like to rent a room—if you have any vacancies.

      Hmmph. She was shorter than Patrick but seemed to be looking down at him. This is a quiet house.

      Yes, ma'am.

      No smoking.

      Yes, ma'am.

      She opened the door and showed him a corner room with a matching bed and bureau and a small rocking chair. Bathroom down the hall. He paid for a week and signed the guest register. O'Shaunessy?

      Yes.

      She handed him two keys. I lock the front door after dark. Patrick nodded and retreated to the room. He unpacked his clothes and a paperback copy of The Origin of Species which he placed on the bedside table. He lay on the bed a few minutes adjusting to his new home, then left, closing the door silently behind him.

      In town, he decided to try the Cafe Espresso. He walked down wide stone steps, crossed a patio, and entered an open door. Two people at the end of a small bar leaned towards each other, laughing and talking in lowered tones. At the other end of the room, a young man was practicing on an upright piano.

      Patrick sat at a window table and waited until a tall woman emerged from the kitchen. She wore bead necklaces, a tight gray jersey, and a wrap around red and orange Indian print skirt. A thick blonde braid hung to her waist. Patrick ordered rice and vegetables and watched her hips move to a gentle repeating melody from the piano. The player varied the tempo and the emphasis, working further into the piece, exploring its edges without losing its rhythmic heart.

      A man in his thirties with a round face and curly hair came in and sat at the next table. He placed black and white stones on a Go board, studying each move.

      That is Go, isn't it? I've read about it, Patrick offered.

      Go is an ancient Japanese game, the player said without looking up. It requires intelligence and concentration.

      That leaves me out, Patrick said. The couple at the bar walked out. As the woman passed through the door, she looked back at Patrick and smiled. Her eyes were gray, her shoulders half-turned, her weight evenly balanced. She was about 21, his age. He smiled back, surprised.

      Women didn't usually pay attention to Patrick. He was compact, medium sized. He had reddish-brown hair and a square face with high cheekbones and traces of freckles. His blue eyes were set deeply behind thick eyebrows. He had been called cute a couple of times. Mostly he got sympathetic smiles as women pushed past him, going for the tall, dark, and handsomes, or the ones with money, or the major losers. It was a mystery to him how people got coupled up.

      My name is Eve, the waitress said in a luxurious voice as she bent forward with his plate. She had goddess breasts and smelled of patchouli.

      I'm Patrick, he said and choked. King of repartee, he added, regaining his voice. She smiled as if she had known him deeply in another life, and then she swayed away into the kitchen. The Go player remained immersed in study, an air of relief emanating from his face. Perhaps he was recovering from the attentions of dark beauties with trust funds. Don't be jealous, Patrick told himself. When the gods want a good laugh, they give you what you want. Try me, another voice in him said. Long dark hair.

      He ate dinner and began to confront the next problem. He had a few travelers checks in reserve, but he'd always found work before he had to cash them. He had paid for his own flight back to Wiesbaden.

      Come on, Pat, let me pay, his father offered.

      Nope.

      You're a hard case, Patrick.

      It had been a good visit, but Patrick was ready to go after a week. I thought I'd try Woodstock, New York, he told his father. You used to talk about it.

      My old stomping grounds, his father said. I have a friend there, Heidi Merrill. Haven't heard from her since her husband died. She has a son. Look her up for me, Pat—give her my best.

      Will do.

      Patrick checked around the cafe for a pay phone, wondering whether there was a listing for his father's friend. No phone. On his way out of the cafe, he changed his mind and ordered a beer at the bar. The room was filling. A Van Morrison album had replaced the piano player. Attractive women crowded around guys who wore hammer hooks and Stanley tapes like jewelry on their belts, totems of a better way.

      Feels good to stand up, he said to the guy next to him. This is a happening place.

      You just get here?

      Yep. Any work around?

      What kind of work?

      Wash dishes, construction, paint houses…

      Hey Parker, you need anybody? A heavyset fellow came over. He had a pleasant ironic expression.

      For what? There were white paint stains on his button-down blue shirt.

      Says he's looking for work.

      Patrick O'Shaunessy. Patrick extended his hand.

      Parker Ives. He looked Patrick over as they shook hands. Ladders, Patrick. Wasps, he said.

      No problem.

      Good. Meet me in the News Shop at 8; we'll see how it goes.

      Tomorrow? Patrick asked.

      And tomorrow and—yes. Parker drained the glass of beer he was holding. Tomorrow. He put his glass on the bar and left.

      Parker's all right. My name is Claude, by the way.

      "Aieee, Claude! A thin blonde with green eye shadow and exaggerated cherry

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