Gatekeepers

"Gatekeepers have a big job," Donkey had himself straddled across the opening created by the turning of the key. The curious lambs were fast and agile and they had keen eyesight. Alex found his own flexibility as the smallest of them nosed under Donkey's straddled legs. "Well done. If you find yourself in need of work there's a shepherd's opening. I'd put in a good word for you." The humor of new acquaintances is a kind expression. There's plenty of room for it, and such a shame one had to dig around for it to find it. Alex had his arms full of fleecy animal, and with his right foot he managed to close the gate. Once on the inside, the lamb pirouetted to rejoin his sisters, or brothers, or cousins.

"The old cart hasn't been used for a very long time," Donkey stopped long enough for Alex to return the Sheep Key to its place around the animal's neck. Each of the keys dangled from a clasp that opened with a firm squeeze freeing a key independently, to allow the neck-piece to remain where it ought to be. "In his time, that cart has served many with intentions born from a broken heart. Yours would not be the first." To himself Donkey knew there would be other hearts needing the sturdy cart but he kept that insight to himself.

"I heard Camillia just before the gate opened. She was saying something about the color blue. It's not a thing I'd heard her say before so I'm not sure I heard her right."

"Blue. The old color of love." Donkey said. "It's something we know. Blue like water, deep ocean water or deep skies. Like those above the clouds. It's the color that reminds us how important water, and love is. 

"You know this ha?" 

"Oh yes. Now in that shed are all the tools you could possibly need to shore up the sides and bottom of the cart. You'll find them in good repair, unless ... well, you see for yourself when you get there. I have sheep, and lambs, to keep me busy and the farmer and his family like to check on things well before sunset. No one will bother you once you're in the shed, and there are a good many hours left before it's too dark to work. In addition to the tools you'll need the other two keys." Donkey waited for Alex to retrieve them. "Keep them safe."

"Safe?"

"Well yes, these are no ordinary keys my dear Alexander Santiago. Have you a length of rope or a chain?" Donkey hadn't seen any sign of either. "There might be some twine or copper coil in the shed. Copper would be my choice, even a short length enough to wrap around your wrist. Cinch the ends so they're secure and whatever you do don't lose either key. Good luck my friend, oh and one last thing."

Alex was not surprised there was something else.

"Before you keep your date with the old color of love, there is the small but vital issue of loitering needs righting. A certain Doug Fir has a piece of your story and he, that Doug Fir, is waiting for you and the sturdy cart. When you are content with the surety of your work, rub the two keys together and call me by name."

"So I rub the two keys together and call 'Donkey.'?"

"My true and proper name is hidden, until those with a broken heart cross the threshold. As you have done. To those who do so, my name is Don Pedro Salazar." Alex started to utter the name just to be sure he heard correctly.

"No!" Donkey kicked his hind legs. "Not yet. Only once and only when you are content with the surety of your work. Keep my name and those keys safe, Alexander Santiago." A subtle gauze not unlike spider silk dangling with dust circled the space from Donkey's ears to his chest. The look of a man with copper bracelets and a dusty leather hat. Alex blinked to gain focus. For those moments Don Pedro Salazar was a man as clearly present as was he.

"How fitting that your name and mine are so similar in origin. Coincidence?" Not likely, but then perhaps there was room for chance encounters. "Remember me Alexander Santiago." Don Pedro was gone. Donkey was gone.

What to do with a broken heart?

The barbed wire fence separated them and though Alex was more firmly present Donkey was a keen observer of details and saw the signs of a broken heart.

"See those lambs?" Donkey's formidable head kinked and his lips spread wide revealing his equally large and yellow teeth. "They can't get enough of this day, loving every second of it. Racing to get from that side to whatever is entertaining." Donkey's narrative popped the trance of walking into his personal labyrinth. Alex raised his head to see the blur of lambs. Their elders were busy with the business of eating, but not so the babies. The lambs were in love with the day and the feeling was catchy.

"They really are something," Alex agreed. It was hard to remain glum in the presence of such zest. The rain had not let up, but the sogginess fed the laughter in both man and beast as the lamb races kept up. Finally, Alex remembered the manila envelope. "Geez," He padded himself down reaching for the inside of his shirt. "How do I get into this field and over to that contraption?" Necessity was once again fuel for appeal. The thought of Camilia's soft warm flesh and graceful walk was doing a pumpkin-into-stage-coach thing to the worn old cart. Alex wasn't sure that would be enough to transform the wheel barrow and yet here he was chewing the fat with Donkey.

"There are notches at the corner post, tucked into my side of the post. Lift up on the latch cover, after you return this key to me." Donkey tilted his head to allow Alex at a simple chain. "A neck-piece," Donkey was one of the readers, sensitive to the way words were used. He corrected Alex's thinking that his was a necklace and waited for the man to retrieve the small but heavy metal key dangling from around his neck. There were three keys on the neck-piece, and all of them were etched with an Animal's likeness. One, a long billed bird. "Heron" filled in Donkey. Then, a furry four-legged creature. "Sheep. They're my responsibility, I keep track of this gate when I'm in the field, for that purpose." Third, a fish. "That will be Salmon," Donkey's lips were twitching, "It's not a well-worn truth, but a truth none the less. We Donkey love to eat salmon. But that's a story for a whole 'nother time. It's the Sheep key you want in that small lock."

The low clank of the metal keys chiming against each other sent a small but keen electricity through the old man's hands. With the Sheep key in place the key turned itself and the fence post a pale but definite shade of blue. Alex heard a voice as familiar as butter melting on toast. "Blue ... it's the old color of love." If he could hear her, there was hope. Wasn't there. Such simple conclusions.

Loitering

The signs went up. The lone Doug Fir would have protested the pounding of staples into his deeply creviced skin, but they don't listen to the protest songs of trees. Too long deafened. Too bad. He -- the Doug Fir -- watched the woman crossing the asphalt parking lot. He'd gotten very used to her company these few weeks. His thick limbs were a stout and protective roof for any who stood beside him. The woman often leaned against him when the rains came. The Doug Fir was glad for her presence, but what he did not do was read. The pounded staples secured runes that read NO LOITERING. The woman reads. What the Doug Fir could not read, she could.


In ordinary times the walk would have taken him no more than a few minutes, twenty at the most, but not today. "If we had a sturdy cart I could carry you forward to your chosen destination. It would be a feat suitable to a beast as willing as I." The donkey was looking straight at Alex and his speech was a clear and audible delivery as conversation between two neighbors over a fence. The donkey waited for Alex to return the volley.

"A sturdy cart is it?" The man was soft in his reply, not quite sure of his place in things. The drizzle had turned new epic, common for Salish, but inconvenient now as the old man figured the dream was done with him. Wasn't it? The donkey and the herd of sheep with whom he shared the large gentle slope of land were familiar. What was different was the question. I suppose with the tightening loop of generosity going on in his town, Animals were picking up the slack.

Paying closer attention now, Alex Santiago followed the stretch of the donkey's head. "That cart would not be my definition of sturdy my friend." The former welder and man with fixity at his core muffled a laugh. The wooden cart was no more than a wheel barrow with slates of weather worn cedar not unlike the barn wood on his former welding shop.

"Wouldn't take but a little concentrated effort with a few well-chosen tools to turn that cart stout and sturdy again." The donkey had a point, the wheels looked to be fit, metal though rusty they were not rusted through. Alex closed the gap between them.

"You know, Donkey," Alex addressed him as a proper noun. "I am on my way ... on my way to my further destiny."

"You are on your way to that cafe, hopeful you will find the ending to your dream. A dream come true. Am I right?" Young lambs one black, two white romped toward the old donkey. They were new to the world and eager to know it all, all at once. The donkey nudged them, "Get along with you now. Can't you see I have business tending here?" The lambs took no offense and continued in their explorations.

When Alex did not answer, Donkey gentled in his approach. "I know you were not loitering, but your pace was odd and whether you are aware of it, or not, you have worn a path a corkscrew spiral there. Some would call that an example of Spiral Jetty."

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/Spiral-jetty-from-rozel-point.png