Roger

Specky, rheumy and bird chested were the best ways to describe Roger. He reminded people of a nine year old meteorologist, and not the shiny tan forehead kind, the bow tie and science kind. Roger walked like key parts of his spinal column were made out of egg shells, requiring a strict discipline of posture to prevent collapse. His lilting gait wouldn't set a single head bobbing in a field of daffodils.

Roger's parents understood him as a formal child who asked for little. They enrolled him in classes and clubs to expand his social world, and maybe even skin his knees. Roger tolerated them in his considerate way but didn't stick with any of them for very long, until he began his guitar lessons. He approached the guitar as a kind of equation you have to solve with your hands. By making complimentary notes he produced a chord, enough chords became a proof, and he could proceed to the next song. Enough songs finished the lesson and he was released back into his introspective world.

He never much listened to the words but one day his teacher taught him a tune and he became fixated. It was the best song he had ever heard. His parents worked hard, had nice things, and always tried to be respectable. It seemed like a terrible life to Roger, and he was glad he had his thick glasses to hide behind when business strangers came by the house to look at all the nice respectable things his parents had. But this song was telling him he only needed to work long enough to afford a place to sleep, and the rest of the day he could be a bum. He could beg cigarettes and smoke cigar butts and break into railroad cars when no one was looking. It excited him so much he kept a hobo bindle packed in his closet and began casually asking questions as to the locations of train yards.