St. Eubrie: Maurice Garin (757 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: Eubrie
Rating: 2 on 20 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Genko (View user info) at 2006-08-06 18:29:55 EDT
The door to 335 Pine Street creaked open slowly. Maurice Garin stepped out onto his front porch, closing the door softly behind him. The porch was still wet with dew and bore footprints as Maurice walked across it towards the street. He paused, slowly, and headed back towards the side of his house, pulling a newspaper out of the bushes and tossing it onto the front porch of his neighbor, old man Jake. Maurice shook his head, cursing the paperboy and his horrible aim. Jake was a good man, and Maurice tried to help him whenever he could. Jake certainly had enough problems without having to fish for newspapers in the shrubbery next door.
Maurice began leaving again, this time walking down Pine Street past old Jacob's house and a few others. He looked at the steam rising from Redcrown woods and the footprints he left behind him, admiring how peaceful the early morning hours were for those who were awake to experience them. Sometimes he thought he'd rather be in bed at such an ungodly hour, but the choice to be awake wasn't one he had made this morning; it was a choice he'd made when he'd chosen to live the life of a working man.
Maurice installed tile for a living. The company he worked for had been happy to hire him, feeling that they could use his status as a recent immigrant as an excuse to pay him less. They gave him numerous raises in his first few weeks on the job, however, realizing the value in the craftsman they'd hired. Working carefully, the man from southern France had ascended to the rank of foreman, laying his art out in slate and granite across the floors of St. Eubrie. The title came with responsibilities, some of which Maurice found hard to handle. Production, production, it was the foreman's job to drive production, to get all the tile laid in the shortest amount of time. There was no care, no arduous cutting and measuring, no effort made to hide the gap between the stone and the cupboards. People with money, people who'd worked hard and saved up enough to buy a nice house, thought Maurice, should get a nice house.
Instead, much to the peril of the Frenchman, those people who'd worked hard and paid good money got excuses about how stone was such a difficult medium. They got a two year home warranty and tiles that cracked after three. They got a man named Maurice, a true craftsman who cared about his work, but who simply hadn't been given enough time to do each floor as well as he could have.
A big corporation choosing production over quality was certainly nothing new to America and nothing new to the residents of St. Eubrie. It was new to Maurice and he didn't like it. He'd come from a place that valued hard work and honesty. A tiny little town with time honored values and Boy Scout rules, where good and evil were two separate things that didn't blend together to create some deplorable shade of grey.
Maurice was working with marble today, doing a bathroom. Marble was Maurice's favorite stone. It had strength similar to granite and slate, but was brighter and capable of taking a higher polish. Most people didn't realize, but pure marble, a metamorphism of limestone, was actually entirely white. The swirls and veins in marble tile came from impurities such as sand, silt, and clay mixing with limestone during the formation of the marble.
It was ironic that the very elements that gave marble its character and desirability were also the elements that held it back; that kept it from true natural beauty. In some ways Maurice wished that the stone could undergo a manufacturing process similar to porcelain, where the impurities were burned away in high temperatures and the finished product was a pure, unblemished surface.
Despite their purity, the manufactured materials didn't hold the elegance of natural stone. They didn't accept a high polish and were terrible to work with. If only there was some way of purifying marble. Refining it, taking out the veins and streaks and making it shine. But there would be no salvation here for the pretty white stone. The ideas would only serve to pass time at work, and in the end lend themselves to the creation of very beautiful bathrooms.
When the bathroom was finished, it shone superbly. Maurice had examined every tile and put them together in such a way that the natural variances complimented each other. It was quite an art form, he thought, blending the imperfections in with one another in such a way that they turned to strengths.
Maurice packed up his tools and headed for home. He walked slowly down Cedar Avenue, stopping at the corner of Cedar and Cherry, and stepping into St. Eubrie Roman Catholic church. The church was quiet, dark, but a hint of infinitum hung in the air, a testament to the undeniable goodness in this place. Maurice walked under the vaulted ceilings of the sanctuary and approached the confessional booth. His calloused hand, still stuck with mortar, took hold of the door handle and pulled the door open.
The voice of the Father McGuinty came through the screen as Maurice sat down.
"How long since your last confession?"
"I confessed last week," answered Maurice in his heavy French accent.
"Do you have anything to confess?"
"No."
"Same as last week. Why have you come here if you have not sinned, Maurice?"
"I need guidance, Father. All around I see evil, evil people doing evil things with no call to account. People being cheated out of good money by a terrible corporation that cares nothing for good workmanship. I feel I must do something."
"The Lord will call those people to account. In the meantime, Maurice, we must continue to pray and do that which is right. It is the Lord's place to avenge, not ours."
"So I must do nothing except pray?"
"Maurice, you can do more than pray. But like I said, it is God's place to repay. We are simply servants of Him."
"I cannot quit my job?"
"You can quit, Maurice, but you know what they say about idle hands."
"Thank you, Father."
Maurice got up and left the confessional, confused and irritated by the impotent Reverend. Sure, prayer was enough for Father McGuinty, but a man like Maurice, a working man who needed to have a measurable impact on his surroundings, couldn't sit idly by and watch as impurities overtook the town he lived in.
He may not be able to cleanse marble, but as a servant of God, he certainly had the means to cleanse this town.
User Reviews
Submitted by Fey (user info) at 2007-02-19 13:40:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Crystle (user info) at 2006-11-01 19:34:27 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by DCWoody (user info) at 2006-08-17 07:17:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I can't read the whole thing. I don't have time to read the whole thing. I musn't read the whole thing.
Submitted by goferforhire (user info) at 2006-08-08 00:16:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I feel like there's a potential overlap in the 'praying to kill the fairies' and his tacit encouragement of Garin... maybe something about the rev. using other people's crises of faith and crusades and whatnot to cover his own shenanigans in the woods?
I'll mull it over for a while. It might make more sense after I've come up with part 2 of the Natalie Baylor saga
Submitted by goferforhire (user info) at 2006-08-07 23:33:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
We should tagteam this Father McGuinty fellow. Between our two stories thus far, he's already righteously fucked up
Submitted by MandaPanda (user info) at 2006-08-07 23:22:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Good stuff, Canadian.
Submitted by BLITZKREIG_BOB (user info) at 2006-08-07 14:28:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Have him open his own business and become what he hates.
Submitted by sicosemen (user info) at 2006-08-07 12:10:40 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I think that Old Man Jake may be my neighbor too. Take a look. Nice addition.
Submitted by coley (user info) at 2006-08-07 05:36:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
DUN DUN DUNNNN
Submitted by kaos-king (user info) at 2006-08-07 01:13:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This was fucking beautifully written.
Submitted by Genko (user info) at 2006-08-06 23:06:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Okay, we've got one vote for no killing spree.
Interesting.
Submitted by forthewin (user info) at 2006-08-06 22:15:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Genko (user info) at 2006-08-06 21:23:27 (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-08-06 20:43:37 (#)
Ranking: 2
oooh..I like this addition. A misguided religious fanatic is good inspiration for a tale.
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Who says he's misguided? I haven't really decided yet if he's going to start killing people or just quit his job and start his own tiling business because he resents his employers.
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With all the crazy twists, psycho killers, and overly interesting stories you see on this website, it would probably be nice to read a well written story about someone that doesn't go on a killing spree.
There should be a +3 button to seperate posts like this from lesser posts with a solid +2 rating. (I think everyone knows the type of post I'm talking about.)
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-08-06 22:00:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Genko (user info) at 2006-08-06 21:23:27 (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-08-06 20:43:37 (#)
Ranking: 2
oooh..I like this addition. A misguided religious fanatic is good inspiration for a tale.
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Who says he's misguided? I haven't really decided yet if he's going to start killing people or just quit his job and start his own tiling business because he resents his employers.
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Good call. I'm a conclusion jumper sometimes. It's a good workout for my humility when I'm wrong.
What's funny is, my review was going to be just "I like.." and then I saw it was taken. I've said too much.
Submitted by Genko (user info) at 2006-08-06 21:23:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-08-06 20:43:37 (#)
Ranking: 2
oooh..I like this addition. A misguided religious fanatic is good inspiration for a tale.
---
Who says he's misguided? I haven't really decided yet if he's going to start killing people or just quit his job and start his own tiling business because he resents his employers.
Submitted by awesome_face (user info) at 2006-08-06 21:03:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
The more I think about this Maurice sounds like Agent 47 from the Hitman games. And thats a compliment cause 47 kicks ass.
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-08-06 20:43:37 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
oooh..I like this addition. A misguided religious fanatic is good inspiration for a tale.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2006-08-06 19:52:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
A very rich addition to this town.
Submitted by awesome_face (user info) at 2006-08-06 19:32:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I like. Interesting people in this here town.
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2006-08-06 19:29:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Genko, this was fucking wonderful! Obviously, you've been around the working
world and seen the decline in quality. Please continue with this. . .
Submitted by KindaNews (user info) at 2006-08-06 19:25:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Really nice.