Cough Drops, Part V

Storage

The previous owners had never cleaned out the storage shed, and from the looks of it, neither had the owners before them, or the owners before them, or the owners before them. The only way of measuring what belonged to whom was to think that if it had never been cleaned out, whatever was at the bottom or at the back belonged to the original owners, or whoever had built the shed.

After a few days, all the following had been removed: two lawnmowers, one with a broken starter rope, and blades jammed with moldy grass clippings, the other with a grass catch and a broken key; a drafting table; folding chairs, rainbow striped cushions ripped and stained; a dead, petrified squirrel; brass lamps without bulbs; hedge clippers; boxes of board games, pieces missing from some, and mixed together; a box of many-colored dice; comic books, spines disintegrating upon touch, some over fifty years old in cellophane wrappers; a greasy, car engine; wicker baskets, sides of two goopy and stained blue from what once were blueberries, but over time had turned the sides into gelatinous branches; large leather chests, filled with holed sweaters, musty smelling fur coats, winter jackets, Swiss-cheesed socks, ripped, grease stained jeans; one chest filled with love letters, National Geographic magazines, tax paperwork, photographs; broken rakes; deflated basketballs; baseballs; stumpy baseball gloves; dog leashes; rifle racks; troughs and feeders for animals; plastic bamboo plants; lawn flamingoes; plastic Tiki gods; books, greened with mold and moss, pages crunched together as if protecting the secrets within the words; cracked trash barrels; bicycle chains; concave bicycle tires; ropes; a tire swing, leaves and spiders’ webs inhabiting the inner part of the tire; firewood stacked to the ceiling and halfway down one of the walls, underneath, scrawled into the concrete floor, a heart, initials J.H + S.L; a metal workbench; antique dinner plates, those on top, cracked and leaf-stained; a soldier’s uniform; empty cardboard boxes nested inside empty cardboard boxes; broken computer printers; gutted computers; Eisenhower lawn signs; army posters; a volcano-shaped ashtray, Hawaii spelt in lava along its side; stuffed eagles; a collection of pipes.