ABSTRACT CAMELOT, OHIO by Will Conroy This collection of short fiction is composed of six sepArAte stories thAt Are unified by plAce And time. EAch story is set in the fictionAl town of CAmelot, Ohio. This space is a fruitful plAce to investigAte themes of normativity, judgment, deviAnce, freedom, greed, loneliness, feAr, nostAlgiA And rebellion thAt structure And sometimes dictAte the quotidiAn decisions of the characters. The stories Are told from A third person perspective in order to experiment with the possible distAnces between two human psyches or subjectivities despite very close spAtiAl proximity. Ultimately, my goAl for the collection wAs to explore the tension between the uniquely AmericAn concept of individuAl determinism And the larger forces of history that have shaped the Midwestern lAndscape, and also, therefore, Midwesterners. CAMELOT A Thesis Submitted to the FAculty of MiAmi University in pArtiAl fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MAster of Arts DepArtment of English by WilliAm T. Conroy IV MiAmi University Oxford, Ohio 2012 Advisor: BriAn Roley Reader: Nalin Jayasena ReAder: Eric Goodman Table of Contents A Brief History of CAmelot, Ohio ................................................................................ Pg. 1 The Rabbit Hole .............................................................................................................. Pg. 11 The Weeds ........................................................................................................................ Pg. 20 The Storm .......................................................................................................................... Pg. 31 Coconut .............................................................................................................................. Pg. 51 The BlAck Sheep ............................................................................................................. Pg. 61 ii A Brief History of CAmelot, Ohio _____________________________ MAny yeArs before the existence of time, but still some time After the glAciers, the valley in which there would one day sit a thriving suburb reached the height of its popularity. The reason: salt. Between the gently sloping hills a subterranean current of sAltwAter broke the ground And coAted boulders And rocks in A fine dusting. Animals trAvelled from vAst distAnces to the sAlt springs. They would schedule their years around it; teAch the route to their offspring. Every living thing within reAsonAble distAnce made seAsonAl trips to lick the sAlt from the rocks, or to drink the blood of those who did. YeArs lAter, Amateur geologists would find the Absurdly sized fossilized skeletons of mastodons, car-sized ground sloths And something they cAlled An elk-moose. All species killed by the ice Age, ossified in Attitudes of repose And consternAtion, millenniA before they could be hunted to extinction. All going to or leaving the salt springs. It wAs the salt that brought the first humans to the vAlley. And when those humans showed the sAlt to fAirer-skinned humans, they Also reAlized the vAlue of the fine dusting on the boulders, Almost like snow. Once the most wArlike of the NAtive AmericAn tribes were subdued And pAcified, sAlt becAme vAlley’s first industry And the first reAson to give it A nAme—Saltpeter Springs. Great blAck cauldrons boiled the salt solution in pits lined with burning coal until it thickened enough to be packAged and strapped to a donkey or stAcked in a sturdy cart. Those sAme cArts brought bAck money. The money brought bAck fine whiskey, pAcks of plAying cArds And durAble tools. In time, the tools built houses Above the mud And, in turn, those houses brought women who Approved of neither whiskey nor plAying cArds. MigrAnts hAlted their WestwArd progression At the springs And eventuAlly something Akin to A town hAd formed. Children were born. Shortly After the settlement ArrAnged itself in optimistic expectAtion of permanence, bad news returned with one of the carts. The early salt-boilers were told thAt more fortunate settlers had discovered saltier springs in the EAstern pArt of the stAte, far saltier than their own. With that news the men who invested in the lArge sAlt furnAces And who owned the nicest houses anticipated heavy losses. When those losses were realized and the 1 local industry went under no one had the willpower to haul the cauldrons out of the pits. They simply buried them where they rested. The people who stAyed in the vAlley fell into A mournful indolence. On the SAbbAth they prAyed for An explAnAtion of the bAffling cruelty of fAte And they drAnk homemade whiskey. The hard luck residents could find no reason at all to remain except the lAck of Ability to do much else. NAture itself seemed eAger to retAke the collection of semi- permanent dwellings Around SAltpeter Springs. Creepers crept, deer Ate the best heAds of lettuce from the gArdens. A sApling grew between the floorboArds of the lArgest home in Saltpeter Springs, once owned by the proprietor of A sAlt mine, who hAd shot himself. And yet, it wAs during the wintriest of these uncertAin yeArs when A man nAmed Thornton EvAns stubbed his toe in A dry streAmbed and looked down upon a dully- gleAming hunk of iron ore. *** Six yeArs lAter Thornton wAs made mayor, And the town, for it wAs unquestionAbly A town now, hAd tripled in size. HAving been recently recognized by the stAte government, it was decided that the settlement needed A new nAme, something befitting it’s current manifestAtion. The decision-makers deliberAted on A nAme for weeks. They took strAw polls, discussed the dAtA, And gAve impAssioned speeches for their wives’ fAvorite choices. Locked in stAlemate, they eventuAlly decided to consult the schoolteAcher And town librAriAn, who owned A collection of seven books, for more leArned opinion. Her nAme wAs Emily EvAns, Thornton’s little sister. Her cAlming And scholArly presence brought the committee to consensus After only three hours. The next morning, A collection of locAl politicians and landowners announced to everyone else that the town was to be rechristened As CAmelot. In the ensuing burst of optimism And civic pride the townsfolk built a jAil And A courthouse thAt bore the EvAns nAme until it burned down hAlf A century later. In the yeArs of growth thAt followed, A number of migrAnt peoples settled in the AreA. The most prominent of these settlers were the towheAded Welsh. An eArnest group, they mined And smelted iron ore without complAint And maintAined the vitAlity to procreAte often. Those not mining And smelting cleAred And fArmed the surrounding hillsides And the flAtter lAnd to the north. German And Irish trickled in. Men of 2 prominence, slAveowners, settled in the vAlley. When slAvery becAme reprehensible, the slAveowners reformed into fArmers who pAid their minority lAborers non-competitive prices. A devout group of Mennonites settled there And mostly Agreed with the wAy the Welsh had already set up shop: the churches stood just taller than the courthouse. MAny brought with them A bleAk And conservAtive morAlity thAt hAs since come to identify the AreA And its people, to be chAmpioned by mothers And rebelled AgAinst by sons through all the subsequent years. They also brought a very defined sense of justice, fairness And propriety. That is to say, the hangings in the town squAre were very well attended. Two centuries later, a black sign with blocked white lettering would stAnd tAller thAn Any tree Along the interstAte highwAy, in the middle of A field of corn, And proclAim to all, “Hell Is Real”. Eventually, the population of the town plateaued after nearly a century of steady growth. A generAtion of people were born there and died. Buildings of stone were erected. LAnd wAs cleAred for cemeteries And filled methodicAlly with coffins. Children went to school, leArned to reAd, And were tAught to mistrust certAin books. InfAnts were born, rAised, left home And sometimes cAme bAck. Some stAyed AwAy, but the decline in populAtion wAs grAduAl enough so As to not matter too much. Over those yeArs people developed A sense of pride And identity. CAmelot wAs home. *** When it cAme, the rAilroAd split CAmelot in hAlf. On the north side of the tracks were the fields And the people who worked them. The honest, hArdworking Welsh. Here too were factories for ice, steel and eventually engine parts. The town’s itinerant settled south of the tracks, happy to have a plAce to finally cAll home. They were the descendAnts of the old sAlt miners whose blood hAd mixed too much to be cAlled more one thing thAn the other. Boozy old IndiAns who clAimed to remember the old hunting grounds. Freedmen, escApees, And ethnic minorities. Women with unforgiving fathers. They settled around the defunct salt springs, diverted And filled in with dirt, Almost forgotten. They All drAnk from the river that once drained the springs—and all the creeks north of the tracks—and in the water they tasted only a hint of refuse. For A hundred yeArs, the trAcks hummed with trAins going north, pAst the fields, to a city that city grew unceasing. The trains brought everything—seeds And clocks And 3 trActors, clothes And lemons And books. Germs And Anti-bacteriAl chemicAls. And they took from CAmelot too—the crops of soybeAn And corn, the smelted iron, the frozen wAter. The elder citizens of CAmelot, who made more money now thAn ever, wAtched the work of their hands feed the city, the beast that crept closer each yeAr. They wAtched the fArmhouses they grew up in rot in the field, greying with the weather, greying with the people. Even the bible wAs revised. When someone died, it wAs not uncommon for them to comment on the relief they felt at being taken before more chAnge wAs wrought, becAuse who the hell knew what would happen next? During these years, the mayor of CAmelot, the great grandson of Thornton Evans, looked warily to the north eAch morning. TowArd the end of his term As mayor, poring over columns of red ink, he cAme to the conclusion thAt growth, As A foregrounding concept for civilization, wAs As irrational the dreAm of everlAsting youth.