Glen Pourciau
I couldn't deny that Brazier rubbed me the wrong way. When I first heard his name it struck me as odd that he pronounced it in the French manner, but that was none of my business, likely his family's choice, Brazier brought up pronouncing his name in the French manner, too late to turn back now, forget about it. I'd see him in his yard occasionally on my neighborhood walks, behind the white picket fence surrounding his corner lot, his Akita on constant patrol, barking and snarling at anyone who stepped near, charging the fence as if the integrity of its boundaries were at stake. Brazier looked suspicious of anyone moving outside the confines of his fence, and he tended to peer down his face when greeting someone. I'd heard him say the dog's name, Granger, also pronounced in the French manner. Was it a tradition in his family, I wondered, to say their dogs' names in the French manner? I silenced myself, Brazier's choice of dog names also none of my business.
My suppressed aversion to Brazier raised its head one day due to the flagpole in the rear corner of his property. I couldn't help noticing that he was flying a yellow flag with a coiled rattlesnake in its center. Below the rattlesnake was printed: DONT TREAD ON ME (sans apostrophe). I absorbed the words over Granger's ruckus.
At home I complained to Nora. We often talked about observations from my walks, such as how people were painting their houses colors we didn't think we could tolerate or how pink flamingos had begun proliferating as the latest in stylish yard art. I had a harder time with Brazier's flag than with pink flamingos, which Nora was willing to complain at length about. She took the implicit position that the flag came under the heading of free speech while the pink flamingos did not.
"You don't even know the guy," she said. "How can you know what he means by that flag?"
"It sounds like a warning, words you'd post on a fort or a battleship."
"He has the right, and there should be no conflict. You don't want to tread on him, do you?"
"Why is he telling the neighborhood not to tread on him? What happens if we do?"
"It's just a motto."
I couldn't say Nora was completely wrong. I didn't know him. I looked Brazier up online but my search yielded only innocuous professional information and smiling pictures of him on social media with his wife and three grown children, nothing sinister, no coded suggestions of allegiance to fringe groups spouting hate. But what did his family pictures have to do with whatever roiled around inside him? I could have known him for the last ten years and still not know that. When it got down to it, I didn't care if I didn't know him. I didn't like his flag's attitude, and I didn't care if he donated to charity or if he went to church or if he loved his wife and never cheated on her or where he was from or where he went to school or what he did or had done for a living or if he recycled plastic, glass, and cardboard.
The following day I stopped to take a picture of the flag with my phone, Granger erupting furiously, perhaps recognizing my sweaty scent, defending the home front. I took a couple of action photos of Granger and then looked into his eyes. Here came Brazier, out his side door and down a few steps, his eyes on me.
"Is there a problem, Mr. Huff?"
So he knew my name. Maybe he'd looked me up online. Granger continued to bark, Brazier saying nothing to deter him.
"Is there a problem, Mr. Brazier?" I asked, shouting over Granger and pointing up at the flag.
"It depends," he replied.
"Am I too close to your flag?"
"Why are you taking pictures? What's that about?"
"What's the flag about? Is it a message to our neighborhood? Are we in some subterranean conflict I'm unaware of?"
"Do you and I have a subterranean conflict I'm unaware of?"
"I can't say what you're unaware of. Is the flag meant to be a cautionary announcement? Its tone suggests that. Do you visualize yourself on a Navy vessel in hostile foreign waters?"
"I think you should run along. You're getting yourself agitated."
"Your dog seems agitated. Is he expressing your views?"
Brazier shouted a command at Granger that sounded like "Bury him," but I wasn't sure. Granger seemed inflamed by his words and raised his head as he barked. I imagined Granger's birth, the dog leaping full grown from Brazier's mouth.
"Are you treading on me, telling me to run along? I may shop for a flag with a decapitated rattlesnake and a warning: DONT TELL ME WHERE TO TREAD."
Brazier's mouth worked as if he were about to expel something. He turned and went into his house, leaving me with Granger. I went on my way, fearing he might pop back out with prized possessions from a gun safe, if he had one, and why should I assume he didn't?
When I got back, I told Nora what had happened. She lowered the newspaper to her lap. She'd been reading about protests across the country.
"You guys are too old to be pounding heads in the yard. You'd better hope that dog doesn't explode on you. If Mr. Brazier opens his gate, that dog will be carrying what's left of you home in his jaws."
"What kind of neighbor flies a flag like that?"
"What kind of neighbor are you? Why take those pictures? Were you trying to provoke him? If he treads on us, I'll change my tune. If you tread on him, you'll justify his flag."
"You admit the flag is meant to limit my thoughts and footsteps."
"The flag addresses no one in particular."
"It's directed at others, including us, as if we're advancing enemies. It's warlike."
"If you leave the house in camo gear I'm calling 911."
I let her get back to the newspaper, distant voices still arguing inside me.
On my walk the next morning the flag flapped in the wind. Granger charged the fence at my approaching tread, in an uproar, looking as if he was about to jump. Were the eyes of Brazier upon me? I did not turn my head to gaze at the dog or at Brazier's house. I kept moving, my mind barking back, the noise echoing and rising as if coming toward me.