about the project
				archived issues
		The Fifteen Project
				submission guidelines
				contact info
Current issue:
				support the project
TOC
		An Ocean Beyond the Sounds		contents
		by Jerry Vilhotti
		Johnny only wanted the plane so he could fly far away from his older sisters and brothers who thought he had stolen their father's love from them or so they hinted when Tina of the Troy called him constantly "Big ears!" making him pretend he no longer had ears or when Tommy Tom Tom was trying to throw him down the steep flight of stairs to see if Johnny could fly as he did when his father gushed him out toward the sky or when Leny One n called him "Ugly" as he taught him to fight southpaw; making sure he matched him against the biggest kids from Hewes Avenue so able to get better odds from guys like Johnny "Sure sure" Garfield, Jake the Raging Bull, Tami M. who fought the great Joe Louis in the house that Ruth built and a future godfather's father and others who played the numbers every day. If his father had gotten him the plane, he would have flown over the "rouna cawna" gang's territory to see what trouble they were up to - always getting ready to attack the smaller kids on Arthur Avenue - of whom Johnny was considered the leader and was the mascot of the Fordham Baldy mob considered the toughest six guys in the whole city and then he would land on their roof and tell his good friends "Prunes" and "Cherries Strunes", who would be waiting, what was going down and they would tell the rest of their guys and with that all done, Johnny would take to the sky again and if anyone came near him and his plane up around near the clouds and sun: he would say, "I live on Arthur Avenue near Fordham Road. No, I'm not lost. I just live on ...." Johnny would say it in his father's voice and italic way and then in the stern way his mother had but just once he wanted to say it in his own voice and way but again found himself saying it like his father who told him - and made him repeat it all the times he had said it and then Johnny said it in the different ways Alice, who pretended Johnny was her little doll forcing him to dance with her while she was on her knees to songs, coming from the radio which was taller than he; songs he would remember for the rest of his life, Tina, Leny One n and Tom told him to say it; trying to use their particular facial expressions and then again he tried to get above a cloud to say it in his own way and voice but all the words got all jumbled up: stern, loud, whispering, left out words like the address numbers his brothers forgot to mention, but often no voice came out - only the howling noise of a sea shell he once found among the sands of Orchard Beach when his father had pointed Johnny's penis out to the ocean. The ocean.
				10