It happened 2 days before Christmas. My loving family which consists of my husband, me and our three beautiful children Ky, Brad and Tony were upstairs watching It’s a Wonderful life. Partway through we decided to take a short intermission to gather up some snacks and refreshments. We all descended the stairs in our traditional red flannel pyjamas and slippers into the kitchen where we set to work. As always my husband Tan Mori, who loves to cook, started making okonomiyaki a Japanese dish that is like a pancake and pizza combined with cabbage, crab meat and seitan. He also whipped up some spicy sauce known as kinpara gobo to go with the okonomiyaki. One last thing that Tan makes is a snack that has almost got a prickly texture. I personally don’t especially enjoy it but for my husband’s sake I eat them, although my kids aren’t quite so adventurous. Starring outside I shivered. It was a treacherous night with freezing rain plummeting down from the sky. Despite the fact that our house is well heated and insulated I still sometimes feel like I’m outside in the cold. You see my husband Tan and I never enjoyed simply following the norm. Instead we would rather be different and creative. One way that we showed this was through our house. It is a large dome built out of a web of light metal tubing and clear plastic, in other words all the walls and roof are see through. Everyone agrees that it really makes you feel like your outside and since we are living in the country at the end of a long driveway we have no need to worry about not having privacy.
As I stood there staring blankly into the miserable night I suddenly noticed a figure out there. When it moved closer to the light being given off by the single lamppost outside I realized that it was a person.
“There is someone out there,” I stated, “Why the poor man.” I promptly strode to the door and as I turned the handle a gust of wind blew it open.
“Come, come in!” I called against the wind and motioned for him to come. The stranger seemed unsure but after another gust of wind sent him flat on his bottom he slowly inched his way across the icy, slick driveway to our house. Just as he reached the door I noticed that all he had on was a jean jacket which was completely soaked through.
“Ky hurry to the bathroom and grab the largest towel we have,” I ordered. Ky returned just as I was shutting the door. I quietly thanked her and standing on tip toes wrapped the towel around his neck. He was large with black hair and smelled of cigarette smoke and alcohol. When the kids began to wrinkle their noses in disgust I quickly shot them a mom glare and they immediately stopped.
“Come in and get warm,” I invited attempting to play the role of a good hostess. I was pleased to see Tan already pouring him a cup of tea in the kitchen. Slowly I guided the stranger to a seat near the stove where it was warmest but he would not sit down. Gazing at him I noticed that he appeared uncomfortable. I accredited it to the strange house.
He sipped his tea and after a moment of silence said, “Dads in the truck.”
“Oh my!” I cried, “Where? Tan we should go and get him.”
“I’ll get him,” Tan replied and started towards the closet to grab his coat.
“No!” the stranger shouted. “He’s fine just sleepin in the warm truck.”
The boys were chuckling about his bad grammar and Ky just glared. I shot them another warning look that they had better stop or they’ll be in big trouble. Tan went back to cooking his okonomiyaki and I didn’t know what to say to break the awkward silence.
“Where am I?” the stranger asked.
“The fifth line,” I replied.
“Fifth line ya say,” the stranger seemed confused.
“That would be correct,” Tan said. I then realized that the large teen was staring at Tan. It dawned upon me that the stranger had maybe never seen a Japanese person before and was about to say something when the fax machine began to beep. Spilling his tea the boy watched in disbelief as a transmission came through and began to print out onto the paper.
“I don’t understand it either,” Tony blurted out, “but my parents are computer technicians so it is part of their job.” I had to stifle a laugh. The stranger didn’t seem reassure and I gently suggested that we should get his father.
“No!” he said firmly. “He’s asleep, eh. We was at Bernie’s playin some cards, havin a few drinks, ya know Christmas...” He stopped and looking around repeated his question from earlier “Where am I really, what is this place?”
“Here son have some warm food it might do you good,” Tan answered changing the subject.
“More to read?” the boy asked but Tan just handed him the plate and said to try it.
“Aint ya never heard of old Bernie?” the stranger questioned.
“No,” Ky replied
“Ya know Bernie Nystom.”
“I haven’t ever heard of him.”
“He just lives, I don’t know. We got lost, saw your light there, slid right out.”
“It is icy,” Tan stated.
“Never seen such a bright light,” the stranger almost seemed as if he was blaming us and I noticed Ky was growing more furious every minute. I decided it was time to get this boy and his father home.
“Is there anyone we can phone for you? Do you maybe need a tow truck?”I asked. Now I’m not sure if the boy had a hearing problem or if it was simply because of his alcohol consumption but I had to repeat myself several times.
“Can I use the phone?” the stranger abruptly said. I wondered if he had acknowledged any of what I’d said. Ky grabbed the phone from the office and brought it to him. After he sat there starring at the phone blankly for about a minute Ky decided to take the lead and ask what his number was.
“Don’t got one,” he replied but took the phone and slowly punched in some numbers anyways. Once the phone rang numerous times and still no one answered the stranger mumbled something to himself and hung up.
“Where am I?” the stranger repeated himself yet again. By this time I was positive that his strange demeanor was due to his intoxication. When we didn’t reply to his question the stranger started wolfing down his food along with two more helpings.
We stood there awkwardly watching until Ky said, “Hey you better save some room for turkey dinner.”
He stopped eating. “What?” the stranger replied absolutely stunned.
“Save some room for turkey dinner,” Ky repeated. He got up and tried phoning someone again but when he had no luck the stranger became overly tense. Of course fate had it that the answering machine would take a huge message right at that time when he was already freaked out. Next our glitchy VCR came on by itself and voices began to float down from the loft.
Sounding almost frantic the stranger asked, “You guys know Lloydy Rintoul?”
“No sorry,” I replied.
“He got himself a tractor. I’ll get him to pull us out eh.” The stranger headed towards the door but we stopped him.
“You can’t go outside like that you’ll practically freeze,” I stated. We suggested for him to phone Lloydy but apparently he didn’t have a phone. As the seconds wore by, the stranger became even more impatient to go.
“I’m gonna get Lloydy,” he exclaimed loudly. This time we didn’t stop him but we insisted that he put on a rain poncho. As well I was very proud when Ky generously offered for him to use her flashlight.
“I’ll bring it back,” the stranger assured.
“I’m sure you will,” Tan replied and helped him into a poncho then out the door. The boy slipped and slid down the driveway until he rounded a bend and disappeared from our sight.
I later explained to the kids that the young man had been given too much to drink and also might have come from a certain poor, old area of our county where people don’t have televisions or phones. Of course as we expected the stranger never returned the stuff.
In January one of Ky’s friends showed us a newspaper article that read as follows:
Teen Abducted by Martians!
Country boy undergoes torturous experiments
While contained in an alien flying saucer!
Experts wonder: Who or what is Kerdy Dickus
And what does he want with our moon?
It went on to explain how he had bruises from physical abuse and how there had been a bright light. The article also spoke of the aliens trying to poison him with food and give him drugs through a drink. Apparently his mother and father were extremely upset and wanted something to be done about this menace. They have put the boy through all kinds of therapy and he keeps repeating the same line, “Save the moon for Kerdy Dickus.”
All of us had a good laugh over the whole ridiculous situation. We considered trying to contact the stranger to explain but decided against it. Sometimes I wonder how people can get things so mixed up and have to take everything to the extreme before even considering a logical explanation. Oh well I guess some people just need to make life interesting.