tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75559993239523901642023-07-17T21:53:46.752-07:00TGZJonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.comBlogger35125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-79320668819359383212010-12-08T17:02:00.000-08:002010-12-08T17:04:19.394-08:00On the Beach“I seem to be able to see my thoughts as something quite apart from myself. I can watch them rising, falling, their only form of activity.”<br />-- Italo Svevo, <span style="font-style:italic;">Confessions of Zeno</span><br /><br />“Oh to bring back the days when stars spoke at the mouths of caves.”<br />-- Joy Williams, <span style="font-style:italic;">The Changeling</span><br /><br />She stood barefoot on the beach, the bottoms of her jeans rolled, feet sinking into the wet sand. The ocean rushed up to meet her, the tide spreading out, teasing her ankles. The sky above like a blue bending canvas, punctured with the occasional soft blast of white. Her hand visoring off the sun, now dipping low with late afternoon, she turned back and smiled, her cheeks swelling with a private, untouched joy.<br /><br />*<br /><br />He flew back at the end of summer, a little more than a week before classes were to start. The first day back he bought groceries and cleaned his apartment. It had been left dirty due to a hasty departure, two months prior. The bathroom in particular was its own kind of disaster, with the towels and sink stained with makeup, clops of used tissue scattered on the floor, and long strands of dark hair strewn over everything like tinsel. <br /><br />It was restless going those first couple nights, re-adjusting to time zones, back in the old bed, sheets unwashed. Thousands of miles now separated him from the events of the summer. He went over things again and again, thinking about how he had left them. It was interesting, he thought, how after leaving a place after an extended stay that period came to form a totality in the mind, an unbreakable cube of thought you could hold up to the light and examine, objectively, from a detachment perch, getting a different impression depending on the refraction of light.<br /><br />On the second day back he got a call from a friend from the university and the two met for coffee. <br /><br />They were downtown at a relatively recently opened establishment called Serious Coffee, located in the newly constructed conference building, a modest aesthetic shock that offset the vague Old Town ambience of the surrounding fading brick, wood and cement architecture. They sat at a small table by a large window. It took up the whole wall. Two of them, in fact, were all glass, floor to ceiling.<br /><br />“You missed a bunch of stuff while you were away. Hiking, shows, trips to the beach, swimming, nights drinkin’ by the fire. It was a fantastic time.”<br /><br />Neal Sebado was tall and dark-haired, intense and animated in his looks and gestures. There was a general intensity about him, unceasing. Even when relaxing, J. imagined, there was an innate intensity to the process. The same amount of mental power used to write a philosophy paper was also channeled into TV surfing or drifting off to sleep, attuned to the slipping levels of consciousness. An inexhaustible intensity. The slow fire of being. He spoke in spasms of thought, moving from one subject to the next with a child’s glee and and scholar’s rigour. His speech peppered with an above average number of italics and accents. <br /><br />“You’re right,” J. said. “I don’t know what I was thinking. I hadn’t intended to leave. I would have stayed. But then Rita decided to visit and I got swept up in all that.”<br /><br />“I know. I understand. How’s she doing anyway? Is she still coming to the show next week?”<br /><br />“What show?”<br /><br />“Oz Mutantes, remember? The show you both agreed on seeing when you got back.”<br /><br />“Oh right. I forgot. Shit. Completely slipped my mind.”<br /><br />“She seemed pretty stoked when I told her about it.”<br /><br />“She’s like that with everything. In the moment everything’s a trip to the edge. OK, now I remember. I remember that night. We got drunk and went to the beach and writhed and crawled in the sand and then later got fast food. Good times. But considering the fact that she’s half-a-country away and I haven’t spoken to her in I guess it’s now, what, two months. Given all that, seems highly unlikely.” <br /><br />“And yet you two were so, I don’t know, chummy or whatever. When she was here.”<br /><br />“Chummy. I like that. Sure. All right. The two of us, chums. But then it was a whole different thing when I was back there. A different vibe permeated. I was on her turf. Her rules. I don’t know what happened. Things were good for a while. Then, I don’t know. Something to do with leaving a pair of socks out.”<br /><br />“Socks.”<br /><br />“Or maybe it was shoes. Shoes and socks. It was shoes and socks that were my undoing. Sorry about the tickets.”<br /><br />“Too bad. I liked Rita. We didn’t get along at first. You told me that would happen. What did you say? We’d either get along really well or be at each others’ throats.”<br /><br />“I said that?”<br /><br />“Something like that. Anyway, no worries. I’m sure Otis Driftwood can find someone to cover hers. He was the one who got them. He knows others who’d be interested, I’m sure. They’re a great band. Spacey grooves. Big sound. Lots a melody and rhythm.”<br /><br />Neal shifted in his seat, sipped coffee. There was an intensity even to the way he consumed liquids, a complete shifting of attention to the physical, for that instant, the feel of fingers around the cup or container, gripping, the simple repetition of the action, hand-to-mouth. He immersed himself in mindless tasks such as these, took pleasure in them, tossed them off, left them behind. It was all performance anyway, his sweeping, ironic body language seemed to suggest.<br /><br />“So what were you doing all that time? Did you find any work?”<br /><br />“No,” J. said. “Didn’t even really look. Didn’t do much of anything. Didn’t even write. It was so bad.”<br /><br />“J., see here. You know, if we’re ever going to do some traveling or whatever when we’re both through school, we need to secure some funds. Gain financial independence. Break out. Taste real freedom. Active living. Stasis is not nor should it ever be a lifestyle. Not of choice.”<br /><br />“Yeah. You’re right. I’ve been all hung up. Out of step. It’s stupid, really. See this. This my shamed face. A shamed face for a sham life.”<br /><br />“I wouldn’t go that far. You’re still young. Besides, who isn’t? Hung up, I mean. One way or another.”<br /><br />“Maybe. I just mean it was a lot of stuff at once. It was a weird time. I didn’t know how to cope. I didn’t absorb it all properly. That was it. Trouble absorbing things. I fell into a state of functional paralysis. I turned inward, toward cozy blankness. And now. Now I can’t stop thinking about it. I wait for it to resolve itself but it doesn’t. On and on. Perpetual. Circular. I’m waiting for the end credits. It’s like a movie without an ending. That’s what it is. Does that sound cliche? I can’t think of a good metaphor to convey it. I hate metaphor.”<br /><br />“You about done?”<br /><br />“Just about. Humble thanks for your indulgence.”<br /><br />J. went on to tell him about his summer. There was Lana’s new relationship. He learned of that right after getting back. He’d left things open at Christmas and she had moved on. Only understandable. Then there was Rita. Kicking him out and breaking off contact. That was sudden, surprising, the screeching finality of it. Something severed. The episode with Chrystal came towards the end. Tired drift leading to final exclamation. It was a long time coming. All the bitter, emphatic emails, cut-off phone calls. The odd surprise encounter. Vying for control of the emotional dagger. Fake civility, blackest intentions. All in the name having adoption papers signed, which eventually leading to the decision for the paternity test.<br /><br />“I can’t believe it. All this time. All this time we’ve known each other you’ve never told me.”<br /><br />“It’s not something that generally comes up in casual conversation. ‘Oh, hey Neal, by the way, just a heads up -- I’m a father. That’s right. Deadbeat of the year, right here. Ignoring the child I left behind so I could move out here and go to school.’”<br /><br />“That’s harsh. So the entire time, you thought it was yours?”<br /><br />“He actually. Not it. He’s a he. For what it’s worth. And yes, I was led to understand that there were no other possibilities. With regards to paternity. The test was meant only as a formality. An expensive formality.”<br /><br />“Harsh, man. Harsh. Did you see him much?”<br /><br />“A few times. When I’d go back. It was weird. Like stepping into another world, another time. Right there. An almost visceral shock.”<br /><br />“Hell of a trip.”<br /><br />“Tell me about it.”<br /><br />Neal chuckled.<br /><br />“At least now it’s through. Done with. Forget about the past. Past is past, as they say. Future is the game. Start plotting. Forward thinking. Now take my friend Quinn. We’ve been hanging out a bunch since he got back from Montreal. He’s got a bunch of stuff he wants to pursue. For one thing, going back to school. He wants to go back and take a bunch of publishing courses to finish up his degree. That’s the first step. From there he wants to move to Victoria and work on starting a publishing house. He even has the name for it. Blind River. Great name, no. I think it is. I’ll get him to tell you how he came up with it when you see him. Start by publishing friends’ stuff and go from there. Who knows? He also wants at some point to go down to San Francisco and dig the scene there. He’s been there before and said he had an incredible time. I’m surprised you haven’t met him yet. I think you two would get along. He’s really into music and books. The other day he dropped a copy of Celine’s ‘Journey to the End of the Night’ into my lap. He said, ‘Here -- read this.’ He didn’t say why but I think it was because he knew it was the sort of thing that aligned with my taste and sensibility. And he was right. I’m a couple chapters in and really enjoying it. It’s morbid and hilarious and totally fits with my outlook somehow.” <br /><br />He had another drink, taking the opportunity to purge his thoughts as he indulged the physical. J. looked around. He counted six others, including the girl working behind the counter. There might’ve been a seventh. He thought he caught a peripheral glance of someone going into the bathroom while Neal was talking. Then someone walked in. He was about their age. He had soft, ruddy features and wore a cap concealing a mess of unwashed hair, a few curls jutting out at the sides.<br /><br />“Shoot, there he is now. Hey man! What’s the haps?”<br /><br />Quinn grinned mischievously, like he had just deciphered the punchline to a joke he’d been working on before he’d come inside. He came over and sat down.<br /><br />“Quinn, this is J., the guy from school I was telling you about.”<br /><br />“Hey. So I was supposed to be meeting Nicole here but she just text’d me saying something about her dog getting a haircut. That was it. The entirety of the message.”<br /><br />“What? Weird. But then that’s not really surprising. Nicole’s always been a flighty one.”<br /><br />“Yeah. But still. I like Nicole.”<br /><br />“I like her tits.”<br /><br />“Like you know about Nicole’s tits.”<br /><br />“No. But Scott does. I’ve heard all about them from him.” Neal touched a finger and thumb to his lips, released them and said, “Magnifique!”<br /><br />A moment of silence to ponder the implications of this. <br /><br />“Anyway, I was just telling J. here about where you got the name for the press.”<br /><br />“Blind River, you mean. Yeah,” Quinn said. “So this one time when I was high I, like, imagined a long river flowing into complete blackness. With the wind carrying all these papers to the end of the earth.”<br /><br />J. noted a hint of light regality to his diction, a soft music whispering between the vowels. Neal looked at J., suitably impressed by Quinn’s retelling. <br /><br />“But nothing’s going to come of it for a while. At least until I get to Victoria. Victoria’s the place to be right now.”<br /><br />“Neal tells me you were in Montreal for a spell.”<br /><br />“Yeah. It was OK. Montreal’s OK. But there’s not much of a scene. Just a bunch of fucking rich kids moping about.”<br /><br />Quinn went over and ordered a coffee and a bagel. When he came back he said to Neal, “Have you asked out that cute New Zealand girl yet? The one who’s always working the counter when we come in?”<br /><br />Neal looked over at her and then back to Quinn.<br /><br />“No, not yet.”<br /><br />“I’ve been waiting for him to ask her out all summer,” Quinn said to J. “He’s so smooth when he talks to her. He has this thing. He can just turn it on on a whim. Mr. Smooth-O Silver. Impressive really.”<br /><br />“It’s not hard when she’s so sweet,” Neal said. “This one time I had paid six bucks and change for our Americanos. But there was some confusion about how many shots of expresso were in the large orders. We deliberated on the amount but still weren’t sure. Finally Quinn says ‘Just give us back whatever you think is right.’ The girl ends up giving us a dollar back. I look down at it and looked back at her and said, ‘Here -- take this as a tip.’ She was so excited.”<br /><br />“For that reason alone I would come back here,” Quinn said. “To be freely joyous and humble is halfway to sainthood in my book.”<br /><br />“In that case she better stay away from me,” Neal said. “But actually there’s this one girl at work. Lindsay’s her name. Very interesting. Also sort of flighty but in a good way. Something endearing about it, the way she’s both oblivious and intensely self-aware. At any rate, might be something there. We’ll see.”<br /><br />“Look at you. You’re starting to amass a real stable,” Quinn said.<br /><br />“I try. Fitfully. I try.”<br /><br />After the coffee they went over to the organic food restaurant across the street and then back to J.’s apartment for drinks. J. mixed generous Long Island Iced Teas while Quinn sat at the computer calling up old jazz songs from somewhere online -- the exact site wasn’t important since all music seemed to be available, even the most out-of-date or obscure. A limitless preserve of all world’s unmarketable music there waiting to be discovered and consumed. Commercial radio was a quaint indulgence by comparison.<br /><br />“You guys have to hear this,” Quinn said, turning up the dial on the little computer speaker. “Earl Hines is the greatest jazz pianist of all time!”<br /><br />They listened to the tinny sounding recording for a minute. Then Neal broke in.<br /><br />“Ah, say, Quinn, this is cool and all, but how about some music from this century. Or at least late part of last.”<br /><br />Later they were sitting outside working on a second round of Long Islands and taking in the expansive view of blushing sky over the distant mountains, when J.’s landlord, Dan Faulkner, came down the stairs with a hamper of laundry. He lived in a spacious three-bedroom space above the two ground-level suites that he rented out. A large man, thick but not flabby, muscular if not defined, J. imagined him a retired bodybuilder judging by all the old rusting gym equipment stashed away in the backyard. But he had never thought to pursue the matter. Dan was all brawn and force, at least the appearance of. The completely bald head seemed to add to his girth in some imperceptible way and the goatee he sported completed the hulking imagine. He wore a tank top and flip-flops and smiled jovially at J. as he approached.<br /><br />“Hey, you’re back! I’ve haven’t heard you down there. When’d you get back?”<br /><br />“Few days ago.”<br /><br />He turned the corner and disappeared into the laundry room, returning a few minutes with a more focused manner as he took J. aside.<br /><br />“Hey, so what happened to that cute girl of yours?”<br /><br />“Rita, you mean. I don’t know. She’s gone. She’s doing her thing. She’s got her own thing going on.”<br /><br />“I thought she was your chick?”<br /><br />J. tried providing a full account but details gave way to generalizations. While trying to pull his thoughts together he realized he had exhausted himself of the subject of Rita for the night with Neal earlier. He was also now fast approaching the point of hopeless, resigned drunkenness. So there was that also to consider.<br /><br />When he was finished Dan regarded him evenly though not without sympathy. <br /><br />“Well, damn. That’s too bad. Women, eh? Impossible to read. Always all over the place. Never know what they want. She was a cool chick though. That was a blast we had. The night we went out to the cabin out on Protection. Fried up those steaks and drank that bottle of gut-rot.”<br /><br />“Yeah. It was.”<br /><br />Then in a slightly conspiratorial tone, Dan said, “You still have any of that pot I gave you guys?”<br /><br />“No. No more. It’s all gone. We smoked it all before we left.”<br /><br />“Oh OK. Just as well. I don’t really smoke it much anymore. Just now and then.”<br /><br />This seemed to satisfy him and J. sat back down on the bench next to Neal, across from Quinn. But then Dan came over and continued, this time in a different vain, signalled by the slight shift of inflection in his voice. <br /><br />“So what do you think? Could you use a roommate?”<br /><br />said, “What? Why?”<br /><br />“‘Cuz, listen, I met these girls who are looking for a place. They’re going to the university like you. I met them the other day while I was on Protection. They’re here from Germany of all places. All blondes. There’s actually a guy with them, too. Ben. He’s a good guy. Anyway, I got to thinking I would rent out my space upstairs to them. They came by yesterday and were all excited. They’d be happy to have it. But the thing is they would still need an extra room. So I started telling them about you down there by yourself with the two bedrooms.”<br /><br />It was a two bedroom he’d ben renting the past two years. But he hadn’t used either for that purpose in some time. He had moved his bed into the breakfast nook, next to a side window, the quietest place in the apartment when the laundry wasn’t running. He got used to waking up in a cocoon of dull light. But at the moment he wasn’t sure if he was supposed to believe this. It didn’t seem quite right, quite real. It seemed surreal somehow. Someone was putting him on.<br /><br />“Where are you going to live? If they’re taking over your space, I mean. How does that work?” <br /><br />“I’ll figure something out,” Dan said. “I have the cottage on Protection. It still needs some work done but it’s livable. It has four walls. I’d make it work. I could also always go to the mainland. There’s always projects on the go over there a guy can jump in on. There ain’t shit around here these days. Not since the last batch of condos got finished. I did the plumbing on those. So what do you say? You think you might want to do that, rent one of your rooms out to her?”<br /><br />It was too much to take in at once. It seemed like a big decision that required proper thought and consideration. There were too many details, large and small, he had to go over before he could provide an adequate response. Loose variables yet to be considered. It was a task he could attempt only when he was more clearheaded, in the sober light of day. <br /><br />“Can I have time to think it over.”<br /><br />“Sure. Take the night to think about it if you need to. Shit, I thought I was doing you a favour. Have all these hot German babes living with you and above you all semester. The freakin’ Playboy Mansion over here. Anyway, they’re coming by again tomorrow morning to go over some paperwork and whatever so maybe she can look at it then. Give you a chance to meet them. Wait’ll you see her, the one who wants your place. Knockers out to her.”<br /><br />Dan gestured with his hands in front of his chest to indicate generous portions. Neal and Quinn were still there listening to all this, smiling and chuckling.<br /><br />“And hey, also. We were going to go camping up at Tofino for a few days. Drive up in my truck. If you want to come along you’re welcome to. Everyone can hang out, get to know each other.”<br /><br />Again J. could only offer a noncommittal response. Neal wouldn’t let him off that easy.<br /><br />“Come on, man. You should do it. Go.”<br /><br />J. smiled him off good-naturedly but something was off. He couldn’t help feeling a plan was being hatched that he had somehow become an active participant in and yet didn’t feel strenuously committed to. Was it possible the alcohol was making him paranoid? Had someone put something in his drink? But wait. But he had made the drinks.<br /><br />“Say, you wouldn’t happen to have a tent?” said Dan.<br /><br />“A tent.”<br /><br />“I’ve got one but we could really use a second. As much as I wouldn’t might sharing one with three German babes.”<br /><br />“I’ve got one,” Neal said. “J. can borrow it if he goes.”<br /><br />“Great. Thanks. Just wait’ll you get a look at them. Just trust me.”<br /><br />Dan went back upstairs. Shortly after that Quinn said there was a pick-up hockey game he was playing in. J. suggested he come back afterward and he agreed to. Neal was right. J. liked Quinn. Or maybe it was because he was drunk. People in general were so much easier to stand when one was drunk. After Quinn left, Neal and J. went for a walk.<br /><br />“So are you going to go tomorrow, on that camping thing?”<br /><br />“I guess so. I don’t know. I’m not sure if I really have a choice.”<br /><br />They were crossing a bridge close to downtown. Cars raced along below them, beside them.<br /><br />“Don’t fall for the mystical and un-rational allure of determinism, J. Choice is a matter of conviction and follow through. As long as you have those things working for you you will always have choice.”<br /><br />“I want to know what goes on inside that head of yours.”<br /><br />“Trust me. You don’t.”<br /><br />“Yes I do. I want to crack it open and gaze upon it a while. Contemplate it the way one would a void. Not that I mean to imply a connection between the two. Quite the contrary.”<br /><br />“Sure. Forget it. But some other time. Quick. Let’s go this way.”<br /><br />They stopped somewhere for more coffee and were back in time to meet Quinn. J. had sobered up some and they drove downtown. Eventually they ended up at an out of the way little bistro, located down a thin stretch of road and past a double layer cement parking complex. It was late now. No customers inside. All the chairs set, legs up, on tables. But they were met by the proprietor who welcomed them in. He took them to a table out on the patio and brought out coffee and an order of oysters. <br /><br />It was a calm, warm night. The air had that thick, almost enveloping texture to it. Weak light flooded out from the shop’s French doors. They drank the coffee and ate the oysters and talked with a sort of aimless exaltation. Neal performed a few impressions. They paid and left. On the way home, J. dropped them off at their separate residences, stopping at Neal’s to get his tent.<br /><br />He woke early. Too early. Dan had told him they were coming around ten and he wanted to be up and showered and reasonably put together before they arrived. He tried anyway. He went over to the sink and chugged a glass of cold water. Then he ate, showered, and collapsed on the couch with a coffee trying to stave off the evil rumblings of a hangover. He could hear the opening refrain of Fur Elise wafting in from the apartment next to his. The tenant’s daughter would play it over and over, the opening refrain and nothing more. Play it until the note’s seemed drained of all melodic content and emotion and became almost chant-like, a mad ramble of sounds, with the heft and resonance of a ringtone.<br /><br />He was in the calm daze of half-sleep when Dan knocked on his door and called to him, asking if he was up. He got up, checking himself in the mirror before answering.<br /><br />There was four of them. The three girls could have been sisters, of slightly different builds and shades of blonde but sharing something deeper -- what was only caught fleetingly in small gestures, subtle looks, immeasurable movements of the eyes. More than the idiosyncrasies of time and place, their shared German heritage. A deeper knowing beyond the locked gate of self. Sandra was the youngest. She had a natural, soft-slender body, like yogurt. She seemed the shyest, with a sort of undefined darkness, J. came to sense, lurking in her reticence, her remoteness. Desiree was the oldest and this gave her “mommy” status in the group. She seemed like that in a way. The perennially out-of-breath soccer mom. Bagging lunches and cleaning stains, whose communications with those closer to her age she came to regard as an brief island of relief for which you were thanked with fresh enthusiasms. Skinny and angular, with sharp, narrowing eyes, her attractiveness, her sensuality seemed a concealed if not a severe, an almost threatening thing. The one who was interested in the room was Lisa. She resembled a long-haired, voluptuous Jean Seberg. There was even a touch of Ingrid Bergman, if one dare evoke the black-and-white cinema goddess’s immortal beauty. With her full featured, expressive face. She had a prominent mole on her cheek, pleasant and familiar, thought J., in an obscure sort of way.<br /><br />And the guy with them. Ben. He was dark and thick. He presented himself enthusiastically but ambiguously. You weren’t sure, at first, with him if he was going to put his arm around you and take you out for a beer or punch you in the teeth and have sex with your girlfriend. Maybe both. In that order. He seemed nice.<br /><br />Here they were in his apartment, this German family of students.<br /><br />He showed them around the apartment, with Dan supplying the history, specs and basic pitch. Lisa beamed, taking it all in. <br /><br />“Geil! It’s wonderful. I take it.”<br /><br />They were standing in one of the bedrooms, J. and two of the girls, Sandra and Desiree. It contained weights, assorted large plastic containers, a stray night table and various instrument cases. It wasn’t very clean, J. now realized. He hadn’t had time to do anything. It hadn’t been vacuumed in some time. The dust was visible on the ledges that ran the lengths of two of the walls. The girls didn’t seem to notice. They talked on. In English mostly. He tried thinking of things to say while maintaining his poise with affirmative nods. The topic was education. They told him about their school arrangements and what they were taking while here until sometime after Christmas. Their English for the most part was impeccable, for a second language. They had been taught it in school since their earliest grades. Their speech had both a halting, drawn-out quality and a tendency to slink over words. Like each was a new toy they’d become enamoured with, only to quickly put it aside at the discovery of another. And another. And so on.<br /><br />“So you all flew over together?”<br /><br />“All of us except Lisa. We met her at the hostel the first night,” Desiree said.<br /><br />“What are the odds.” <br /><br />“Then we met Dan the next day,” Sandra said. <br /><br />“He is very helpful,” Desiree said. “He helped us when we said we needed a place. He was very forthcoming. Very friendly. Very much fun.”<br /><br />“Big fun,” he said. “Fun in the sun.”<br /><br />Back in the main room preparations for the camping trip was already in motion. Dan asked J. again if he was coming. The girls all looked at him eagerly, imploringly. He said yes, and there was a little explosion of hands and mouths. Dan grinned and nodded approvingly.<br /><br />He packed haphazardly, stuffing shirts and snacks in a backpack until the zipper could barely close. The others had left to bring in their weighty suitcases and separate stuff for the trip. J. could hear them being lugged up the back steps and wheeled across the hardwood into their respective bedrooms. A few minutes later Lisa returned.<br /><br />“You almost ready!”<br /><br />“Almost.”<br /><br />“I really like your apartment. It’s very -- big!”<br /><br />“Really. You think? Not for a two bedroom. But big enough we shouldn’t be bumping into each other.”<br /><br />“I am just glad to find a place. The other one’s I looked at were not so good. The landlord at one was a little how you say, more than friendly but in a bad way?”<br /><br />“Shady.”<br /><br />“Shady?”<br /><br />“Yes. As in, someone you want to stay away from. Suspect. A bit of a creeper. Shady.”<br /><br />“Ah, yes. Shady. Yes! Definitely that! He stood very close. He mentioned going out for lunch and other things. As if included in the rent. Is this normal here?” <br /><br />There was a small leap, he noted, a bounce to her words as she spoke. Little irruptions of language.<br /><br />“It’s not. That’s weird alright. How old was he?”<br /><br />“He was old, yes. More than fifty or even much older.”<br /><br />“I’m just curious. That word you used earlier, what was it? Geil. What does it mean?”<br /><br />“It means many things. Depending. If something’s cool, you say ‘Das geil.’ If you go out drinking you say you going out to get geil. It also means something else.”<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />She smiled, then said, “If you’re feeling, how you say excited in a sexy way.”<br /><br />“Horny.”<br /><br />“Yes. It means horny.”<br /><br />“Horny. Aroused. Hot and bothered. Lusting. Desiring. Randy.”<br /><br />She looked at him curiously.<br /><br />“Who is this Randy?”<br /><br />“Never mind,” he said. <br /><br />Ben then joined them.<br /><br />“What are you two doing in here?”<br /><br />“Nichts!” she said, her tone playfully defensive.<br /><br />“Dan’s truck is all loaded. He says we’re ready to go.”<br /><br />“Yes! I can’t wait! I am excited! A place to live and now camping. So happy!”<br /><br />picked up his pack and they started for the door, Lisa going ahead of them as Ben took J. aside.<br /><br />“So you two are going to be roommates.”<br /><br />“I guess so. It looks that way. She seems pretty set on it. No backing down now.”<br /><br />“But you are interested in her, no?”<br /><br />He paused as if gauging something, some subtle shift in his physiognomy, a break in the fog of groggy morning. <br /><br />“I don’t know. I hadn’t really considered it.”<br /><br />“Well, in case you are you should know she has no boyfriend back in Germany. Myself I am drawn more towards Desiree. She looks like she was made to do evil things. But alas I have girlfriend back home. Very beautiful. So I must be good,” he said. Then grinned. “But not that good.”<br /><br />They came around the side of the house and were met my Dan’s dog Jake (as in Jake the Snake, Dan told him, when as a bronze-coloured pup he appeared scampering about the yard, wily and spry), a two-year-old Norwegian elk hound-husky cross. He came rambling up to them, mouth open, tail wagging. Dan was trying to figure out where to put him. First he thought the hatch but when it was clear there was no room, he resolved on the backseat, on the floor with Sandra, Desiree and J. Lisa sat up front with Dan and Ben. They were all set to leave when Dan turned and said to J., “What about the guitar?”<br /><br />“Should I bring it? You want me to bring the guitar?” J. said.<br /><br />“‘Course you should. We need someone to play Kumbaya around the campfire.”<br /><br />J. went back inside. It was a black Ovation electric-acoustic. Not playing it himself, Dan had lent it to him back in the spring. J. had replaced the strings but hadn’t yet cut them down and the loose wires swayed and tinkled freely when he picked it up. He got a pair of wire cutters from off a shelf and snipped off the excess down to the tuning pegs and took it out. <br /><br />There was no room in the hatch so J. sat with the guitar on his knee, careful where he positioned the headstock, careful not to hit anybody with it.<br /><br />“Play us a song for the road!” Dan said as they pulled away.<br /><br />He tried getting himself in a playing position. It was difficult getting his hands around the neck to form and shift chords and he settled on noodling out a few single notes. <br /><br />On their way out of town they stopped outside a white two-story townhouse with a flawless turf-green lawn. <br /><br />“Just a sec, you guys,” Dan said. “I have to steal us a tent.”<br /><br />While he was gone the others speculated on whose house it was. J. tried to spot someone on the other side of the door, through the window, but couldn’t. Dan returned a moment later with the tent. They were all curious about the circumstances.<br /><br />“That’s my house,”Dan said decisively. <br /><br />“You own two houses?” Lisa said.<br /><br />“Actually three. Plus two cabins. I live in one. The others are rentals. My ex-wife lives here. She got it in the divorce. Among other things. I see she’s been doing a good job spending all the money I give her. But you don’t want to hear about that. You want to go camping!”<br /><br />He let out a hoot. The girls cheered. Everything was in place. They started off.<br /><br />*<br /><br />The day her flight got in he was there at the airport to meet her. They drove back into town and he showed her his apartment. Later they walked downtown. They stopped in at a few shops. She bought little things that caught her fancy, cards and trinkets for herself and people back home. They got sushi at the restaurant that played cool jazz and had old pews and saloon doors leading to the bathrooms. Their server was an attractive French woman, very pregnant. They ate and drank and went for a stroll around the harbour. Back at his apartment they drank some more and talked and went to bed. <br /><br />During the day while he was at campus she would lay out on the trampoline in the backyard and doze and bake. She made friends with his landlord’s dog and later his landlord. He came home one day to find them sitting out in the yard by the fountain having drinks. His landlord drove them out to his cabin in his boat. It was in the middle of renovations and the only way they could get in was by accessing the front door in a strategic fashion. They ate cheese and pork chops his landlord fried up, along with homemade wine from a rum jug. Upstairs they stood together looking out the paneless windowframe at the rippling ocean. The next day his landlord left to go up north to another cabin. He said he’d be gone a few days and she asked if he’d leave the dog behind. He obliged. They lived together for a time, the three of them. <br /><br />During the day he was at campus but when they were together in the evening and on weekends they would drive around checking out the sights, go to arts-and-crafts stores, take evening strolls, eat ice cream and watch movies. She had brought some Demerol with her, something she’d been taking for an undisclosed illness, some kind of nervous condition. One night they took a couple each, she perhaps one too many. Later they burned candles and spaced out to instrumental music, letting the sounds wash over them in dreamy, numbed waves.<br /><br />One night there was a cover band playing at one of the clubs downtown. They did versions of songs by a heavy progressive band, all hammer and abandon. Trembling catharsis. It was almost deserted when they got there and they drank overpriced drinks and sat at a booth. Eventually more people showed up and before the band started the singer came out painted all in blue and wearing a pair oversized novelty sunglasses. After the show they sat on the curb out back, behind the club. Lots of police cruisers were out and there was an inordinate number of guys dressed in tuxes with dates mulling about. He noticed a lone rose on the ledge next to them. It had a slender clip-on tube of water attached to the stem. He gave it to her. She kissed him. They sat watching the band load gear. She struck up a conversation with one of the members and before long they were riding along with them to get food. They stopped at a drive-thru and then drove back to the motel they were staying at. He sat on one of the beds and took nips from a flask and passed it around to the other band members. The bass player sat on the other bed uploading pictures they’d taken of the show onto his laptop. Later on the bass player and singer drove them back to the apartment and he rolled up a joint and the four of them smoked it outside as the sky began to lighten.<br /><br />He stayed home the next day and laid out with her. He had drank and smoked too much the night before and tried reading a copy of “A Brief History of Time” that a friend had lent him. He read a bit and put it down. He turned over and looked at her. She was wearing a two-piece and her dark skin had a rich, glistening sheen to it. She was laying on her back and appeared to be asleep. He watched her awhile and then got down off the trampoline and went inside, filling the sink with water and doing dishes to the sounds of heavy industrial music, played at loud volume.<br /><br />They went to a movie. He bought her candy and they sat in the darkened theatre with other strangers scattered about in seats. Afterwards, when they drove home, he took a detour along the harbour, basking in the meaningful silence. At the apartment, in the backyard, he heated up the hot tub and they stripped and got in. Later on, in bed, he read to her until she fell asleep.<br /><br />On their next to last night one of his friends came over and they had drinks and went downtown for a while, then drove over to a nearby beach and rolled around, then bought doughnuts and went back to his friend’s. They passed out together on the couch while his friend played bass in the next room. It was late and his mother had to come down to tell him to stop. When they were awake they all drove to a spot by the water and hiked up a rocky cliff to watch the sun rise and smoke a joint. They waited a while and watched a couple ships pass but the sky was overcast and instead they drove to McDonald’s for breakfast. Later that day he went up to campus to write his final.<br /><br />That night they had dinner with another of his friends and his girlfriend. They had all gone to school together at one point. It was a reunion of sorts. The return of an old dynamic. They had a good time. His friend barbecued and made margaritas. When she told them they should be getting back he wanted to keep it going awhile. She got mad and stormed off to find a store to buy cigarettes. He and his friend hung out in the kitchen, drinking and snacking and conspiring. She returned some time later, without smokes. She couldn’t find a store. His friend lived out of town and it was a long silent drive back. He drove while she sat moodily next to him. Finally he got her to talk and they talked all the way back and stayed up the rest of the night packing.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-48933072226834354472010-12-08T17:01:00.000-08:002010-12-08T17:02:33.731-08:00<span style="font-style:italic;">She stood. Barefoot on the beach. The ocean rushed up to meet her, tide dispersing. The sky reflecting back, calm. Sun dipping low with late afternoon. She turned back and smiled, cheeks swelling serenely.</span> <br /><br />The nausea started sometime after they got on the highway and were outside the city, beyond the commercial district. Unsure who or how to express this to and to what ends, J. suffered in silence. The truck soon became an oppressive force. He rolled down the window partway and leaned his head out. But there was little relief to be had and eventually the girls, Sandra and Desiree, asked if he would close it because of the cold. He complied. <br /><br />They passed through a large forested area, ancient living wood towering indifferently. To the left, a lake sparkled with the sun’s reflection. A cliff wall cut into it the middle of it, jutting out, arrow-like, to a narrow point.<br /><br />Tofino was roughly a three hour drive inland, traveling in a northwesterly direction. At about halfway they stopped in a town with a All-Mart and got out to stretch. J. went inside to get aspirin and a bottle of water. In the bathroom he splashed water on his face and swallowed the aspirin. He stood there accessing things. A moment passed. He felt a little better but not great. No great improvement. Then he started to experience a dizzy sensation, the feeling of continuous motion, speed replaces stillness, like he was still riding down the highway. He went back out to the truck. In the parking lot they were waiting around, eating. Lisa and Sandra sat on the curb snacking from a bag of something crunchy. Ben leaned against the truck inhaling a sandwich. Desiree held a bottle of water, pacing. Dan had gone into the building next door. He returned a moment later with various supplies. It was cool out. Afternoon but not much warming going on.<br /><br />Back on the highway Dan drove fast and easy, almost free-form, down the busy single-lane. At one point he had his cellphone out and was calling around to nearby campsites, doing his best to get them booked in on short notice. Lisa helped him out, looking up numbers. They weren’t having much luck. The first two he tried were filled up. There was an unspoken tension in the vehicle. A tense hush, fraught with meaning. No backup plan had been mentioned if they couldn’t get in anywhere. Things were becoming more perilous with each call. The hastiness of the arrangements seemed on the verge of revealing itself in complete disaster, their -- the German student’s -- hopes of a Canadian campout thrown into disrepair. <br /><br />Dan remained calm and headlong. The next call he made they had an opening.<br /><br />J.’s nausea had come on again since the All-Mart. Strong. An almost overpowering body wail. His lips and throat started to tingle sinisterly. He closed his eyes and imagined something solid and inanimate, like a statue or totem pole, and tried projecting himself into it. A solid, well-built structure. It was calming somehow. Eventually he fell asleep, waking some time later just as they pulled onto a gravel road leading to the campsite.<br /><br />There were three spots available. There was a spot on the beach. Lisa was most excited about this. She was excited about the prospect of going to sleep and waking up to the sight of the ocean as she popped her head out in the morning. The others liked the idea too. But it seemed it would be too windy and cool, out in the open like that, even with the tents and sleeping bags. More, it was only a single space for all six of them, plus Jake, and their two tents. The other option was a treed in area around back of the main building, where there was a fire pit with grill, a clothesline, and two picnic tables. There were two spots right beside each other. This seemed more acceptable and spacious, they agreed, and took both.<br /><br />After a decision was reached everyone grabbed things from the truck to take over while Dan went inside to pay. J. was coming back to the truck when he returned. He gestured for him to hop in.<br /><br />“What’s up?” J. said.<br /><br />“How you feelin’?”<br /><br />“Good. Better now, I think.”<br /><br />“I noticed you in the back there, you didn’t look so great.”<br /><br />“Yeah. Late night. Drinkin’. Not much sleep. Busy day. You know how it is.”<br /><br />“I know how it is.”<br /><br />“Guess it kind of got to me.”<br /><br />“Yeah.”<br /><br />“But better now. I feel better now.”<br /><br />“Well good.”<br /><br />Dan folded a piece of paper, a receipt, he had been examining and put it in his wallet.<br /><br />“OK. So, listen, here’s the deal. They’ve all split the cost of the two spaces for so far two nights between them. They’re going to want you to chip in on that. This way it breaks down five ways.”<br /><br />“Oh. OK. I thing I can manage that.”<br /><br />“Plus they have a cooler. They had it filled with food that they’ll also want you to put in for. But then, of course, you’re welcome to partake.”<br /><br />“Oh. What’s in it?”<br /><br />“A bunch of stuff. Breakfast stuff. Some meats. Pop. Snacks. Bunch a stuff. Food. Eating. Sound good?”<br /><br />“OK.”<br /><br />“Good. I know it seems like I’m dropping all this on you. But it was worked out in advance. ‘Course I’m supplying the transportation. Brought along my camping supplies. I’m providing a service. Way I see it, I’m acting as their unofficial island guide. They’re just arrived here. They want to see some of the sights. I’m here to help them out. And in exchange, I get a small fee.”<br /><br />“Oh.” <br /><br />“Make a couple bucks on top of it. Why shouldn’t I? I’m giving them my time. Offering my services. They get something, I get something. I set them up with a place to live after all.”<br /><br />J. thought about it. It made sense. The logic was airtight. He got out his wallet, thumbed through its contents.<br /><br />“But don’t worry about that here. You can handle that with them. That’s between you and them.”<br /><br />“OK,” J. said. He put his wallet away.<br /><br />“OK. Now that we have that out of the way, let’s have some fun!”<br /> <br />Dan started the truck and backed out of the parking lot. He drove over and they unloaded. They made camp. The tent of Dan’s turned out to be missing pegs and they were left them with only the one lent them by Neal.<br /><br />“That’s my ex-wife for you. Doesn’t miss an opportunity to sabotage me. Any chance she gets. She’s the queen of conniving, that one. Watch yourself J., Ben. Marriage is a loving union between man and wife, sure, but it’s also the most deft little ponzie scheme. Remember. Till death do us part but in dollars forever bind.”<br /><br />Afterwards they got beers out of the cooler and drank them. They stood around drinking and taking things in. A relaxed air. A time of unwinding. At the picnic table, J. sat next to Sandra. Lisa had been conversing with the young couple camping next to them. She came over and played with Jake. She threw her hands up in the air and he got up on his hind legs, jumping straight up. She did this a couple times, careful not to spill her beer. Over by the cooler J. noticed Dan giving Desiree a shoulder rub. <br /><br />Idle talk ensued. J. learned how to correctly pronounce the name of the German writer Goethe. He’d heard about four different versions, all different from how Ben now pronounced it. J. listed off German bands he liked to see if they’d heard of any. They were all old bands, for the most part. Cluster. Can. Popol Vuh. Others. They hadn’t. Then the subject of the War came up. It wasn’t so much brought up as was just there, in the air, since they’d first met, awaiting its verbal acknowledgement. It was topic they were familiar with. They perked up, each having something to add. They spoke with a sense of inevitability, as if their words were bound to a certain national duty as much as personal conviction. Each of them had their own thoughts but the tenor reflected the shared weight of being born into and now living with a complex national history for which they played no part, now generations removed from, and yet felt themselves intimately tied to. J. and Dan sat on the picnic benches, listening.<br /><br />Later they broke up into little groups, girls on one side of the camp, boys on the other. J. eventually shuffled over to girl’s side. They were all speaking German now. Their tone was heavy, solemn, less a reflection of their moods than the basic nature the language inspired. He watched them helplessly. He thought he should say something but didn’t know what. Invention and response are the component parts of any meaningful exchange. He was at a clear disadvantage, removed from the essential give-and-take of conversing. He listened, trying to decipher.<br /><br />“What’s that you were saying?” he said to Lisa when there was a lull.<br /><br />“Oh nothing. We were just talking about how nice it is here. And how much we like to go down to the beach.”<br /><br />The girls changed in the tent. They brought blankets and as many beers as they could carry. There was a narrow dirt path that cut between the main building and a mass of hedge. Tents were set up to the left, on the lawn, in front of the building. The path led them out to the middle of the beach. It stretched out for half a mile or more in either direction before curving out into rows of tree that edged out to the water. Directly ahead of them, in the water, about a hundred yards out, two great slabs of rock rose up, splitting the incoming tide, the waves peaking at maybe a couple feet before breaking. They found a free spot and laid out blankets and cracked open more beers. It was busy but not claustrophobically so. Plenty of sand and space for all. Dan had brought a foldout chair with him, and he sat behind them in a manner that can only be described as presiding. He presided over things. Jake, meanwhile, was in his element, his yard suddenly having expanded exponentially. He took advantage. He ran up and down the beach, sniffing out scents and cavorting with others, most of whom didn’t seem to mind his presence. Only one young girl, a few blankets away, suddenly, and without provocation, burst into stilted sobs at his wild, excited display, harmless as it was. Dan showed concern and was about to go intervene when the little girl’s father stepped in and was able to calm her, reassuring her in gentle, instructive tones that he was no harm, and she eventually become comfortable enough to approach and give him a few tentative pats.<br /><br />It was warm but there was a strong breeze. The sun did all the work. They had caught the last sigh of the afternoon. The girls giggled and took pictures. Lisa flipped through a tourist book of hers she’d been touting since they’d left. It seemed to have everything, all the information a foreigner might need to survive. It spelled Canada with a K. After a while some ventured down closer to the water. They took turns, going in pairs, at intervals. No set system. They cooled their feet and caught a stronger smack of the current off the ocean. All along the beach kids played and dug around while parents watched and baked from a safe, dry distance. J. watched as Lisa tested the water. He had regained a sense of equilibrium after the close calls and near delirium on the drive up. It was like coming out of a manic dream. The sudden eerie calm and lingering dissociation associated with moving between two worlds, of the inner and outer. But it was still a dream, in its way. The beers had sobered him up for the first time since sometime the day before. How things had changed. He needed to recalibrate, reassess. But the situation offered no opportunity to take stock of recent developments. He could only roll with it and see what came. This was him rolling with it. He pulled himself into an upright position and finished his beer. The beer was warm, having been sitting out in the sun. J. hadn’t changed out of his jeans and he took off his shoes and socks and rolled up his pant legs in a near absurd style, born of necessity. He went down to where Lisa was.<br /><br />“Nice, isn’t it,” he said, not sure what he was referring to.<br /><br />“It is lovely. I love it!” she said. Her hair was tied back but there were few a loose strands that had got away and curled over her lightly coloured cheek. He noticed her eyelashes. They were striking, in their way, magnetic, creating a strong sense of constant movement and vibrancy around the eyes.<br /><br />“You want to go for a swim?”<br /><br />“Swim?”<br /><br />“Yeah.”<br /><br />“I don’t know. I’m not dressed for it. Too cold probably.”<br /><br />“You’re probably right,” he said. “Where are you from? I mean, I know from Germany, but where in Germany?”<br /><br />She imparted some of her history. Growing up in Hamburg. Raised mostly by a dedicated, overworked mother. Schools she had gone to and places she’d been. He tried listening but kept focusing on her eyes. He wanted to brush the hair from her cheek and tuck it behind her ear. There were a few light wisps of hair, discreet as down, along the juncture between jawbone and ear. He started to sink back, his weight shifting to his heels. He dug his feet deeper by turning them back-and-forth in quick, twisting movements, regaining his footing.<br /><br />“What about you?” she said. “And where are you from? What is your plan?”<br /><br />“Oh, I’m from around. I was away. Now I’m back. I’m here, now, mostly. To stay, I think. For now. I don’t know. I don’t do much. There’s nothing much to do. I go to school. There’s that. I like to sit and think. Other things.”<br /><br />“That make you sound like a ghost of some kind.”<br /><br />“More or less. I like old movies and long walks on the beach.”<br /><br />“You’ve come to the right place then.”<br /><br />The others were all looking at them smiling like naughty school children when they were back at the blankets. <br /><br />“What was going on there?” said Desiree.<br /><br />“Nothing,” Lisa said. “We were talking only.”<br /><br />Ben nodded conspiratorially at J. There was a light air of mischief and insinuation that lasted until J. pointed out that Dan was gone. <br /><br />He had left somewhere. He had vacated his chair and gone off. He returned a few minutes later, lumbering over purposefully, a purposeful lumber, calf muscles working through the sand, kicking it out behind him as he stepped. He squatted at the corner of the blanket near J. and drew a couple lines in the sand. There was something ancient and primordial in the gesture, oddly apelike. He looked up, squinting.<br /><br />“Well I just got off the phone with Tera. She was all freaking out. Get this. One of her friends had seen me with them somewhere in the city, driving around. Imagine. Imagine what she thought. Me with a truck full of young blondes. That didn’t look good. So she went ahead and told Tera on me. I bet she even enjoyed it. Got a kick out of it. These women. Always stirrin’ the pot. I tried my best to smooth things over. Explain things to her.”<br /><br />“Man. That’s rough.”<br /><br />Dan and Tera had been dating since J. moved in. He remembered the first time coming over to see the place and meeting them together and just assuming they were married without there being a formal announcement or clarification one way or the other. She was blonde and skinny and had a small tattoo of a sun near her hipbone. Shelby Lynn, J. had thought. Shelby Lynn. He didn’t realize they were only dating and cohabiting until she moved out earlier in the spring, Tera and her two daughters from a previous marriage-slash-relationship. There was a lot less laundry being done and more Dan around after that. But they were still dating, apparently, still together as a couple. He remembered Dan mentioning the occasional booty call.<br /><br />“I don’t know if she believed me though. I was about to get you on the phone to back me up. You would have backed me up, right?”<br /><br />“Sure.”<br /><br />“I mean, it’s not like I did anything wrong. Right? She has no reason to be getting this angry?”<br /><br />He looked at J. in a gritted sort of pleading. There was genuine uncertainty showing, around the eyes and open mouth. Or maybe it was all show? But for who? At any rate, J. sought to reassure him.<br /><br />“I guess I can see why she would. At first. But you wouldn’t have thought it would have been as big a deal once she knew the facts. I guess, maybe.”<br /><br />“That’s right. It’s professional as much as anything. A professional relationship I have with them. That’s what I have with you. This is all part of that. Besides, we only just met -- them, not us. What could she think is going on?” <br /><br />“Pimp daddy Dan.”<br /><br />He resumed his line drawing. He squatted and drew.<br /><br />Lisa said, “Is everything all right?”<br /><br />The girls and Ben had overheard the last part and discerned the rest through tone and body language. <br />“Yeah. Everything’s fine. Everything’s great. We’re here to have a good time. Who’s hungry?”<br /><br />For supper they cooked meat from the cooler over an open fire. The girls chopped up assorted vegetables and potatoes and Dan opened a bottle of wine. They toasted the trip and the new arrangement. There was talk afterwards about possible evening activities but nothing resulted. They were all tired, the girls and Ben. Caught by the downward drag of transcontinental travel, still lingering. The flipping of time. Day becomes night. Night, day. It was an early night. A couple blowup mattresses had been inflated inside the tent. The tent itself was a good size. Large. Able to fit the five of them comfortably. Most of them anyway. J. lay close to the edge beside Lisa. Sandra was next to her. Ben and Desiree were somewhere out of sight on a smaller mattress. There was giggling and other noises and sounds coming from their side, followed by a sudden burst of laughter.<br /><br />“What are you two doing over there?” Lisa said.<br /><br />“It is fine. We are just -- how do you say it in English, J? Bull-shitting.”<br /><br />“Shoot the breeze. Shoot the shit. Gab. Ramble. Blather.”<br /><br />There followed an exchange in German. <br /><br />“What was that about?” J. said to Lisa.<br /><br />“Nothing. It was just nothing. I am so tired.”<br /><br />When the others were all asleep J. tried adjusting himself, nearly falling off the side of the mattress. Finally he got himself back on his back and laid like that awhile. Then he got up and snuck out through the zippered opening. They had left Dan dozing in a chair with the bottle of wine. He wasn’t there now, having probably lumbered off to the truck to sleep. Jake lay curled up, sleeping. Leashed to a tree between the camp’s entrance and the tent. J. put on his shoes and a hoodie and started off. He walked down a gravel road, in the opposite direction of the beach, away from the campground. It was quiet, curiously quiet, and dark. No one around. The only sound came from the rhythmic crunch made by his footsteps. He could sense the humidity in his breathing. An alluring aquatic gift from the oceanic night. His sinuses were clear. Everything about him was. Clear and empty. When he reached a fork he turned and headed back.<br /><br />In the morning they had a large breakfast. Fresh bread, butter, jam spreads, orange slices, fried eggs, bacon, juice and coffee. Dan’s hotplate had been brought out as the girls worked preparing. They wore loose-fitting clothes, shirts with bolded numbers on them. Everything was being laid out on the picnic table when J. ducked out of the tent. They smiled at him as he sat down, anxious to share what they had created. Sandra passed around cups and plates while Desiree dished it out. He selected things here and there, building up a plate. Ben tossed him a water from across the table. Dan was up. He leaned back in his chair, next to the scorched fire pit, sunglasses on, grinning, only joining them at his leisure. The mood was light. A feeling of generosity pervaded, everyone communing and sharing in the creation, realizing and consuming of the meal. <br /><br />They ate until full and afterwards the girls took all the plates, cups and cutlery over to a wash area connected to the rec building next to their campsite. The door to the building was left open during the day and inside was a pool, hot tub and showers. On the far side of the building, accessed from the outside, were washrooms. J. made a point of staying away from the washroom. All the plumbing and everything was in order, save for a wobbly knob and shoddy lock, but the odour was so fantastically rank and enveloping, pungent in the extreme, both sour and rotten, with other gaseous shadings mixed in to share in the abominable stench, that he kept his visits to an absolute minimum, using it exclusively, almost, for washing up, and meanwhile scouting out inconspicuous spots behind trees, buildings and vehicles to perform regular bladder evacuation.<br /><br />J. stood around the wash area brushing his teeth. It was cool out but nice. An enlivening bite to the air. The sun burned with the promise of good things ahead. It required easing in, was all, like most things. A slow building acquaintance with the day. There was a plan hatched to go into town, into Tofino proper, to pick up a few things and start off with a stiff shot of movement.<br /><br />They piled into the truck and eased out, careful of the stream of campers tromping about. Town was ten minutes away. Dan wanted to check out the Marina and they drove up and down streets looking for it. A couple times he came to the end of the same street and on the second approach he pulled into a parking lot near the waterfront. There was a lot of steel and a pier leading to a little shack-like construction but mostly deserted. Not many boats. Not what he was looking for. Dan drove determinedly, as if force of will was enough to get him where he wanted to be. The Marina was his destination. Directions be damned. The girls grew bored. They wanted to wander around a little and get some things for supper that night. After a while of searching with no luck Dan suggested he drop them off at FoodMart, the main grocery in town. The girls agreed and he told them they’d be back to get them in an hour, at the same spot.<br /><br />“Is there anything you want?” Lisa said to J. as she was getting out. <br /><br />“For supper. I don’t know. How ‘bout fish.”<br /><br />“Fish.”<br /><br />“Yes.”<br /><br />“What kind?”<br /><br />“I don’t know. The seabound kind. That was a joke. Just whatever seems freshest maybe.”<br /><br />“OK.”<br /><br />J. switched over to the front and they drove off. J. in the passenger seat, Ben in back. Jake had been left behind, to keep a watch over things. Many were out now, strolling about, coming in and out of little shops. A beach town, this was the tail end of its peak season, its population having swelled throughout the summer and about to drop back down to its usual population of a couple thousand or so. Dan parked by a row of office buildings and a restaurant and got out. In the backseat, Ben had his camera with him and was scrolling through pictures. He passed the camera up to J. <br /><br />“Here, look at this.”<br /><br />J. looked.<br /><br />“She’s cute. Who is she?”<br /><br />“Thank you. That is my girlfriend. She’s back home. I miss her very much. She is flying over at Christmas and we will be together until we go back.”<br /><br />“Christmas is a long ways away.”<br /><br />“I know. I miss her very much. She’s also in school. She is studying to be a biophysicist.”<br /><br />“Fancy.”<br /><br />“Very much so. Fancy. Yes. She is my special girl. I miss her very much. We all must have a special girl. To have a special girl. It is one of life’s imperatives, no?”<br /><br />“Yes. Sure. I would agree with that.”<br /><br />“Tell me, J. Who is your special girl.”<br /><br />J. was flicking through pictures on the camera. Most were from the last couple days. Local sights. Smiling faces.<br /><br />“I don’t have a special girl. Not right now. At the present moment. As we sit here,” J. said. “I mean I had one. Once. But not anymore.”<br /><br />“You must acquire one then. You are how you say -- on the market.”<br /><br />“The search is on.”<br /><br />“You won’t have to search very far, if you hear what I am saying at you.”<br /><br />“I suppose that’s what this is all about.”<br /><br />“Huh. What is that? What is this you say?”<br /><br />“Nothing. Never mind.”<br /><br />J. passed the camera back to Ben. The big man got back in. He had directions to the Marina and was driving there now.<br /><br />“You know, if you want fish for supper. What better way than to catch it ourselves. Straight out of the ocean. Don’t get fresher than that.”<br /><br />“That is true,” said J. Dan’s reasoning was sound as usual.<br /><br />At the Marina they parked and got out. On their right was a restaurant and bar with a patio overlooking the boats and the water. Across from it was the main office slash tackle shop slash check-in centre. They went in. A smiling young woman was behind the counter. Dan started chatting with her casually while J. and Ben looked around. Maps. Rods. Plastered fish. Shiny tackles displayed under glass. J. looked out the floor-to-ceiling glass at the view. It was some view. An island sprung up across from them, covered in deep, rich greenery. A small white boat had just come into sight and was making its way toward the pier. Dan called over to them, excited.<br /><br />“She says one of their guides has an opening this afternoon and can take us out. What do you say to that?”<br /><br />“He’s actually an independent guide,” the young woman said. “He operates on his own. Independent of the Marina. You’d have to meet with him to book a time and arrange payment. I can tell you that he has an opening this afternoon. He’s out with a couple right now. But he should be back anytime.”<br /><br />“So what do you say?”<br /><br />Ben looked at J. J. offered a noncommittal response. <br /><br />They left the building and walked around.<br /><br />“This would be great. To walk in like this is rare. Usually they’re booked up for months. We should really do this.”<br /><br />“What about cost?” Ben said. “How much is this we’re talking?”<br /><br />“The cost is the cost. We’ll get that figured out. Whatever it is, it can’t be that bad split between us. We’re here. The opportunity appeared. Let’s do this.”<br /><br />At that moment the young woman came out and told them that the guide was just getting in.<br /><br />Dan went down to meet him. It was the boat that J. saw coming in earlier. Dan reached them in time to take the rope and help tie it up. A middle-aged couple got out and then the guide. They were far away and hard to make out. He had a fishing cap on. Tall and lanky. The four of them stood talking awhile. Then the guide got a cooler out of the boat that Dan helped him with and they walked down the pier over to a weigh station. Dan continued to stand and talk with them as the fish were brought out.<br /><br />“Does Dan know him?” Ben said.<br /><br />“Sure looks like it.”<br /><br />Dan rejoined the boys.<br /><br />“Oh I like this guy. What a great guy. I can tell he’s a total pro. Really knows his stuff. I really want to do this. So what did you guys decide on?”<br /><br />Ben looked at J.<br /><br />“I guess so. Sure.”<br /><br />“So everything’s a go then. Great! I can hardly wait to get out there. This is going to be so much fun! Now we just need to get fishing licenses. I have one that’s good till the end of the year but you two probably need to get ones. Don’t worry, they only cost a couple bucks. They don’t offer them here but she told me where can get them.”<br /><br />“So what do we tell the girls?”<br /><br />“We tell them we’re going fishing!”<br /><br />Ben and J. looked at each other.<br /><br />“What’ll they care. They can lay on the beach all afternoon and work on their tans,” Dan said. “Then we come rolling in triumphantly with a truck full of fish to cook for supper. They’ll love it. They won’t be able to resist. Here come the men with the food. And don’t worry about the cost. I was talking to the girl and she was saying that this guy knows all the best spots. Before we came he had radioed in that he’d caught a couple twenty pounders with this couple he’s with. Come on. We’ll catch so much that it’ll pay for itself and then some. Then when we get back they’ll be a freezer full of good eating for everyone. Come on! What a great opportunity this is. Let’s catch some fish!”<br /><br />“I don’t know,” Ben said. “That’s still a lot of money.”<br /><br />“It’s the experience. Ben, this is exactly the kind of thing you were hoping to do when you came out here, isn’t it? Just think. You’ll have all these pictures of you standing next to all the big ass fish you caught to show your girlfriend and everyone back home. OK. You know what. Here’s what we’ll do. We’ll just have get the girls to chip in as well. Yeah. Why not? It’s only fair. They’re going to get to share in what we catch. They’ll have as much access to that freezer of fish. It’s a good deal for them. We’ll be the ones doing all the work.”<br /><br />“Still,” J. said.<br /><br />“What are you even worried about? Lisa’s going to be splitting the rent. Right there, one month you’ll be reimbursed for everything, the whole trip.”<br /><br />“I suppose you’re right about that.”<br /><br />“Right?”<br /><br />“Right.”<br /><br />The prospect of a lazy afternoon spent lounging on the beach with a bevy of bikini-clad females was fading with the ascent of Dan’s sudden fishing excursion enthusiasms. But here they were. They drove over to a bank to secure funds. When they were stopped Dan checked his wallet. <br /><br />“You know what,” he said to J. “I’m little short. How about. Would it be possible. You think you could spot me next month’s rent a little early.”<br /><br />“I already gave you a check for next month’s rent. Post-dated.”<br /><br />“I know. And what I’ll do is, I’ll tear it up soon as we get back. Actually no. I won’t tear it up. I’ll give it back to you. There. That’s what I’ll do. How’s that sound?”<br /><br />“I don’t know. I don’t know if I have that much right now.”<br /><br />“See, the thing is, I’m just a little light at the moment. I guess my last alimony check just cleared. That’s the only reason. These things happen. You understand.”<br /><br />“So what. So you’re short,” J. said, “and you’re looking for me to cover my half plus yours?”<br /><br />“No. That’s not what I’m saying. Listen, why don’t you just give me the rent money and we’ll deduct that from -- ”<br /> Calculations followed. Money rearrangements. Payments and paybacks. I.O.U.s and the like. Who owns what and to whom and how much when. J. was left dizzy and daunted but strangely determined and decisive as he went into the bank. Embarking on something new and unexplored. The whim of a whim. He returned to the truck moments later, having drained his checking account to its last few dollars.<br /><br />“Are we good?” said Dan.<br /><br />“We’re good.”<br /><br />The girls were there waiting when they pulled up.<br /><br />“You’re what?”<br /><br />“We’re going fishing!”<br /><br />J. watched their faces as Dan’s news reverberated through the truck. They were surprised. Vaguely unpleased in a way that still sought proper expression. Safe to say it had more to do with the fact that plans for the day had been made without them than that they weren’t getting to participate. J. could only imagine the reaction when Dan told them they’d be chipping in.<br /><br />“Is this so?” Lisa said to J. from the seat behind him.<br /><br />“That’s right.”<br /><br />Dan nodded at J.<br /><br />“We just have to get some fishing licenses for these two. Which is what we’re doing right now.”<br /><br />The place that offered the fishing licenses was in the same area as the office buildings and restaurant they had stopped at earlier. It was a slight, old building that stuck out like a blemish amid the modern glass and steel. A relic that had survived the postmodern flood. Next door the patio of the restaurant was teeming with noon hour activity. This time they parked on a hilly cliff overlooking the water.<br /><br />Day licences were ten dollars. A year was only twenty-five dollars but J. went with the the single day.<br /><br />“Are you big fish fan?” Lisa said. She had been sitting on the guardrail in front of the truck snacking on a bag of nachos when J. sat down next to her. The breeze coming off the water was cool and nice. Mixed with the growing heat to form a pleasing, whirling sensation.<br /><br />“Not really. Not at all. I used to go fishing with my Dad out at our cabin but I haven’t done that in years. I hated having to get up so early. It was always too cold at that hour. I never caught anything. There was something unnerving and not right about sitting in a boat in the middle of the water with the motor killed, having to be quiet while waiting for what usually ended up being nothing at all. It didn’t jive with my disposition, say.”<br /><br />“So why are you going now with Dan?”<br /><br />“Adventure. Excitement. The thrill of the hunt. Man versus the elements. Back to the land. Experiencing the great outdoors. Et cetera. Et cetera. Hell, we might actually catch something.”<br /><br />At camp the girls got themselves ready to go to the beach. They made up sandwiches using deli meat and mayonnaise they’d bought and wrapped them in plastic wrap to take.<br /><br />“Those are going to go bad,” Dan said.<br /><br />“No they’re not,” Desiree said.<br /><br />A mild argument ensued. Regarding the merits of taking the sandwiches rather than eating them right away or else keeping them in the cooler. The girls weren’t hungry and wanted to have something for later and save them the trip back. But leaving them out in the sun would risk them going bad, particularly the mayo. <br /><br />They stood firm to their conviction in the face of Dan’s unwavering appeals and in the end went to the beach with the sandwiches.<br /><br />“What’s with them?” Dan said. “Did you see Sandra. She was giving me the evil eyes as they left.”<br /><br />“They are very -- what is it? Heady. Strong. They are strong of head. Head empowered, yes. Many German girls are like that.”<br /><br />“Well I don’t like it.”<br /><br />They made lunch before going back. They had some time to kill. They were hungry. There was food. Synchronicity. Perfection. Fate. Pork chops, sliced potatoes and onions. All cooked over the grill. They cracked beers. When it was ready they sat at the picnic table and ate.<br /><br />“It’s one thing if they’re a little upset about us leaving them behind to go fishing. OK. I get that. But I hope they’re not pulling this stuff after we’re back. ‘Cuz if they are. You know what I think, Ben. Ben, I think from now on I’m going to do all business stuff with you. Whatever it is. Rent, cable, laundry, whatever. We’ll take care of it, you and me, and then you can go back to them and tell them what’s what. ‘Cuz if this is how they’re going to be over something so little than I can only imagine how it’ll be trying to deal with them on a professional sort of level. Damn near impossible. They need to learn quick this ain’t Germany. That tough chickie act don’t fly here. OK. So do have that? We know how this is going to work?”<br /><br />J. was enjoying the food but wanted more. He wanted to load up on carbs in preparation for the great sea battle that lay ahead. Man versus the elements. Man versus sea bass. No contest. But they hadn’t cut up enough potatoes. Barely enough to go around. He took a couple slices of cheese Dan offered and placed them on top of the meat and watched as they softened and stuck to the grilled side.<br /><br />When they were back at the Marina J. got a better look at the guide, who introduced himself as Chet Fisher. He was indeed tall and lanky, even gangly, all jutting arms and lean legs. The skin on his face was drawn taut. No doubt having to do with the constant workout it got. Ceaseless jaw movements and changing expressions that registered like conversational transition points. He had a ripening tan and was full of good cheer, loose and talkative. They boarded and set off. Dan and Chet jawed all the way out into deep waters, discussing boats and motors and the minutia comprising these areas of interest, all with knowing offhandedness. J. and Ben, donning bright orange lifevests, sat across from each other at the back, close to the motor. As they came out of the mouth of the Marina and the shimmering water opened up around them, Chet instructed them to stand up behind the glass screen and hold onto either the metal rail or the pole sticking up between them. With that he accelerated the motor and it let out a deep howl as they sped off, cutting through the water, the coastline receding behind them in a finning tail of white foam.<br /><br />They glided and jostled along for almost twenty minutes and then slowed down and trolled along until Chet got their coordinates lined up according to the electronic monitor mounted next to him. There were two rod mounts at the back of the boat, on either side of the motor, and Chet went about baiting up two rods and casting them out.<br /><br />“This is a good area. I was out here earlier with the couple and had lots a luck. It’s been a real hotbed all summer.”<br /><br />Chet moved all about the boat in professional frenzy, checking the monitor, checking the rods, adjusting the wheel. Then they waited.<br /><br />In a flash the nausea from the day before re-insinuated itself into J.’s system. He tilted his head back, eyes blinking. All around him was vast blurry blueness. It was everywhere. Never-ending. Land reduced to quaking smudges in the distance. The sun a shot of pure piercing light. But he felt contained. Centred. It gave him a point of focus. A needle-point sharpness to his thinking. Steady, steady. It became an inner battle. Man versus his physiognomy. Nervous system run amok. Suddenly there was movement from one of the rods. Chet scurried to retrieve it. He made a few quick jerks and adjustments and passed the rod to J. J. looked down at the rod. <br /><br />“Go! Go! Reel ‘er in.”<br /><br />The voice was faint and distant. It seemed to register from somewhere in the back of his subconscious. Or from far off. A calling from the blue.<br /><br />He began cranking the reel in tight flicking wrist movements, a wholly unnatural motion. <br /><br />“No, no. You’re going the wrong way! Wrong way!”<br /><br />Chet, in almost a leap, came forward and relieved him of the rod. He began reeling in earnest, the rod held firm to his lower abdomen, but it was a futile cause and he slowed his motion until the empty hook sprung from the water.<br /><br />“What happened?” Dan said.<br /><br />“I faltered. A momentary lapse. My head wasn’t in it. I wasn’t prepared. My head and body were on different wavelengths. I wasn’t up for it. I wasn’t up for the task.”<br /><br />“Ah man. You were reeling it in wrong!” Chet slumped back into his seat. Then he pulled himself up and said, “Don’t worry they’ll be others. Plenty others. He wasn’t that big anyway. I could tell.”<br /><br />The next one Ben took. He reeled in hard but in the middle of it the line went slack. Got loose.<br /><br />The third one Dan reeled in. He stood at the back of the boat and brought it in with precision and finesse. The scaly grey-green form broke through the surface and glided up beside the boat. <br /><br />“Hey, I got one!”<br /><br />Chet leaned over, lifted it from the water and unhooked it. He examined it a moment. A decent, if modest size. Then he placed it back in the water.<br /><br />“Sorry. That was a Coho. Any Coho’s we catch we have to throw back. We have a deal with the Americans. They leave the halibut to us, we leave them the Coho.”<br /><br />“You’re kidding.”<br /><br />“Thing is, there’s been a huge influx of Coho this season while the halibut have been almost nonexistent.”<br /><br />“Sucks for us.”<br /><br />“It goes in cycles. Changes from season to season. They keep things tightly regulated.”<br /><br />“So what if we brought in just this one with us. Sneak it in under the radar.”<br /><br />“There was this one guy not too long ago. He had snagged a whole bunch and was hanging onto them without reporting them in. Everyone back on land was getting real suspicious. What’s going on? They knew he was pulling them in, pulling in a lot in fact, based on the other boats nearby that’d been observing. He stayed out there all day, maybe thinkin’ he could wait it out. Buy some time. Finally he had to dock and that’s when they busted him with a couple coolers full of Coho. Stuff like that ruins it for everyone. Because then they have to start clamping down even harder. Enforcing stronger regulations. Everyone gets put on the hook. So to speak.”<br /><br />The lifeless form drifted away from the boat, a shining dimple carried along by the current. Once it had drifted off a safe distance, a pair of gulls swooped in and started tearing into the untended remains with brutal pecking efficiency.<br /><br />They waited and watched. Waited and waited. Perhaps an hour passed. More than an hour. It was hard to tell. There was no sense of time, of time passing. There was the drift of the current and the stillness of the rods. <br /><br />Waiting.<br /><br />“We should have brought beers,” Dan said.<br /><br />“I don’t know what to tell you guys. I can’t believe this. I’m surprised. I’m really surprised nothing’s biting. We had great luck this morning. All week they’ve been biting nonstop. This is unusual. This is really unusual. I don’t know what to tell you. I’m really at a loss. This is really unexpected.”<br /><br />J. leaned over and positioned his head expectantly, lips parted, a slight tremble. Nothing. Whatever it was had subsided, momentarily. <br /><br />Chet had another spot across the island, back in the direction of their beach and somewhere beyond that. They would have better luck if they tried there, he told them. Another prime spot. J. and Ben took their standing positions as Chet re-directed the boat and sped away. J. welcomed the move from sitting to standing. After his second close call in as many days, he had pulled himself into a near fetal position, rocking in time to the movements of the boat while finding fixed points to stare at. His mind continued unimpeded, and he thought up self-deprecating jokes regarding his botched catch that he refrained from voicing. He wanted to project a light air, a freeness of mind, and avoid slipping into silent morosity. But the latter won out. He soon became accepting of this and burrowed further and further into his thinking, somewhere underneath the sick feeling hovering uneasily over the surface of sensation, where all was clear and steady. Now he stood and opened his mouth to the pushing air.<br /><br />The area he took them to was calmer and even more deserted. They fished the placid waters but nothing grabbed the lines. <br /><br />“I don’t know what the problem is,” Chet said, observing the little blips that lit up the monitor. “They’re there. They’re just not biting. Bite you fishes!”<br /><br />The boat drifted closer to a small island on which a single tree grew, its lean trunk skewing to one side in a sever tilt. It was a haunting image, the distortions of nature, left isolated, alone, attaining its own unique singular beauty. Chet moved them over to another nearby spot and they waited some more, passing the time with more idle speculation on their underwater whereabouts.<br /><br />“So you guys are camping over near Long Beach,” Chet said after a quiet moment. “I remember this one time I went camping with my wife over by there. This was back when she was still my girlfriend. It was just the two of us and we had brought a bag of mushrooms. We drove around and found this perfect out-of-the-way spot. I mean nobody around for miles. Just us. So we pitched our tent and got settled and then decided to eat the mushrooms. I’d done them before but it was her first time. We were all set for this nice, mellow trip in this quiet, deserted spot. About an hour goes by after we’ve eaten them when this low rumbling sound starts up. At first it was quiet and we just thought it had something to do with the drugs kicking in. But it gets louder and louder and I peek my head outside the tent only to discover that we were in the middle of a new construction site and the heavy machinery was being brought in all set to go to work. Man, I’ll tell you, talk about timing, because right about then...”<br /><br />It was at that moment Chet cut himself off and made a break for the back of the boat. There was a quivering movement coming from one of the rods and he lunged forward to take it. But it was a false quivering. He gave the reel a few spirited spins only to realize the line had become snagged on more seaweed.<br /><br /> J.’d been enjoying the story. During the boat ride over the nausea had started to lift and he found himself returning to an even frame of mind. He felt lucid and lively at the same time the mood in the boat had reached desolate levels due to the lack of returns on their ocean game investment. As they raced back to shore, he was overcome with a sudden ecstasy. It lacked precise definition; came to him not as an idea firmly set in words but as running fragments. The dispersed excess of a fixed idea. Then it coalesced somehow and its significance was drained to a cliched husk upon registering. He preferred it when it was just out of reach, a thought endlessly receding. Senses swirled. It felt good. He scraped it now for meaning, teasing out the implications. It had to do with the past, of course; the present as continuous unfolding. Past, present. Future, past. Old reproaches, fresh perceptions. Past defeats, future failures. The lulls and accelerations, thought unbroken. Finally he let it go and that felt good, too. Better. He gave up the thread, abstract and dialectical as it was, and stared off at the small island and its solitary bent tree, receding now to a thin indistinct speck. He felt both calm and exited. A calm excitement. Above, the sun was now a twilight memory that lingered in the dusty maroon sky.<br /><br />At the dock payment was made and Chet offered to take them out for a free session the next day after lunch. Dan jumped on this. A deal, yes. More, he wanted another shot. They’d be there. J. and Ben exchanged glances but kept tight-lipped. <br /><br />It was almost total dark by the time they docked and there was nothing left for them to do but go over to the restaurant and take stock and reflect on the afternoon’s happenings. The restaurant was almost full. They found a corner table that faced a high-mounted flatscreen projecting the day’s sports highlights. They got drinks and ordered food.<br /><br />“I could tell Chet felt really bad about not catching us anything. Of course there was always that chance. But I had to make it sound good or you guys wouldn’t have gone. Anyway, I think what we should just tell the girls is that we caught a bunch but left them here to be cleaned and weighed and that we’ll be stopping in tomorrow to pick them up. Then we can leave them on the beach again for a couple hours while we go out. No chance we won’t come back with something. A simple matter of odds. It’ll be a tidal wave. I can feel it. We won’t know what to do with them all.”<br /><br />The girls had already eaten by the time they returned. They had cooked up meat over the grill along with preparing side dishes. They were proud of this, such an act was an assertion of their independence and strategic cunning. Conjuring the fire, bringing life, the essentials of survival. Rugged outdoor life. There was no firewood left and by chance they had run into two guys who had a cabin near the edge of the grounds where they kept themselves well-stocked. They sold them a few logs for five dollars. <br /><br />“They also said they had mushrooms and herb they could sell us,” Lisa said to J. “But I told them I wasn’t hungry.”<br /><br />“Mushrooms and herb?”<br /><br />“That’s right.”<br /><br />“And you said no you weren’t hungry.”<br /><br />“Yes.”<br /><br />“Oh man. That is funny. That is hysterical. You know the whole time we’re living together I’m gonna tease you mercilessly about that. Man. That is too funny.”<br /><br />She looked at him with desperate misunderstanding. Bewildered. Baffled.<br /><br />Dan asked them how much they got and Lisa said just what they had used. This was not a reasonable transaction, in his estimation. He took J. and the two of them drove over to the cabin. The cabin was hidden away in the woods, accessed via a gravel road, the same gravel road J. had been walking down the night before. The path forked off just before the cabin and they stopped and got out. The cabin could be see on the right. They scouted the place out but found it quiet and vacated and they went back and tried the other path, where they discovered a large stockpile of chopped wood, piled high. <br /><br />“Score,” said Dan.<br /><br />They started loading up the hatch, only stopping when it occurred to them they wouldn’t be able to take any home and would have to use it all that night.<br /><br />A modest fire was built up, contained and crackling. Bottles of wine were opened. Dan had J. get out the guitar for a campfire serenade. He strummed a few chords uncertainly. Then he adjusted the tuning pegs while letting notes ring out in no discernible melodic sequence. The girls called out requests for songs he didn’t know. Then he started one he knew and played while the others listened.<br /><br />“The couple next to us said they liked it,” Dan said when he was through. Sufficiently loose and lubricated he was about to start into another when one of the campground’s staff came over.”<br /><br />“Sorry, guys, but no noise after ten.”<br /><br />Dan tried providing a protest but it did little to puncture the definitiveness of his statement.<br /><br />“No noise after ten. There are family’s with kids here. They’re trying to sleep. We have to keep things quiet for them. We can here you all over the grounds.”<br /><br />The evening entertainment through they continued to drink and devise new plans, new courses for the evening to take. Dan wanted to go down to the beach and see what came of it. But it was a repeat of the night before as the German clan were weakening in their resolve for more. Ben sat in the chair near the fire, his head dipping forward.<br /><br />J. was wide awake. He was still riding the euphoria of his semi-mystical slash delirious thoughts earlier out on the water and the wine further fuelled him now. He was feeling antsy and reckless. Anticipating something he wasn’t sure of. He was seated at the picnic table drinking wine when Lisa passed and he gently pulled her over and eased her onto his knee.<br /><br />“I can’t believe it,” he said. “You’re going to be my roommate.”<br /><br />“That’s right,” she said.<br /><br />“I’ve never had a roommate before. This is going to be exciting. I’m excited. I really am. I’ll admit when Dan came to me with the proposition I was weary at first. I wasn’t sure if I was prepared to share my space and give up some of my privacy. But I can see now it’s going to work out fine.”<br /><br />She was perched on his lap, motionlessly. He squeezed her to him, enjoying the soft absorption of her sweater’s cotton fabric on his fingers. She smiled nervously. Dan approached.<br /><br />“You two coming?”<br /><br />“Coming, yes. Coming where? Where are we coming?”<br /><br />“To the beach.”<br /><br />“Yes,” J. said. “I’m there. Perfect. The beach. Yes.”<br /><br />J. uninstalled Lisa from his lap.<br /><br />“Are you coming too?” he said to her.<br /><br />“I am not, no,” she said.<br /><br />“What? How come? Why not? You’re going to miss all the fun. No. You must come. Come, won’t you. Come to the beach with us.”<br /><br />“I am sorry. I cannot. I am so tired.”<br /><br />J. sighed. “Suit yourself.”<br /><br />“Here, take these.”<br /><br />Dan handed J. cans of beer that he stuffed in the pouch of his hoodie.<br /><br />“And don’t forget the guitar.”<br /><br />J. picked up the guitar off the picnic table. He held it by the neck in one hand while gripping his glass of wine in the other. Dan filled his glass with more wine and they set off. Jake had joined them, running ahead sniffing out the pathway in the dark.<br /><br />They followed the sound of the waves, present and dark. At the beach they heard others. They were down from them a ways, gathered in a circle around a fire. Dan and J. walked towards them. As they got closer they heard music, loose singing with guitar accompaniment.<br /><br />“Start playing,” said Dan as they got closer.<br /><br />“What should I play?”<br /><br />“Anything. Just play whatever.”<br /><br />J. handed Dan his glass and fingered a chord, strumming. They were seated on logs, the group that had assembled, perhaps an even number of guys and girls. They greeted the new arrivals with grins and gestures of welcoming solidarity. Dan and J. sat down, feeling the heat on their faces and knees, an open shelter amidst the crisp flailing winds.<br /><br />The other musician sat across from J., guitar positioned in his lap. Between them they built up an unspoken correspondence across flame and night. They played through songs both intuitively and by a shared musical history. Strumming and belting. It was a release, putting voice to song. Shadows dancing off the flames. The ocean could be heard in the background. It pulsed hypnotically, a nocturnal rhythm beaten out by the smacking waves, full of rip and whoosh. <br /><br />Some left and others arrived. J. had put his glass of wine on the sand next to him and when he went for it again the glass had been knocked over in the bustle of feet. The same thing happened with the beers. He took one out, sipped it and put it down, trying to lean it against the log for balance. <br /><br />Wasted beers, wasted nights. A group of drunk guys came over in a big whooping arrival. They had on over-sized T-shirts and wore their caps sideways. They wanted to her something in a rap or hip-hop vain. There was a moment of confusion and uncertainty. Then J. dropped the guitar so the back was on his lap, and slapped out a beat for one of the hip-hoppers to improvise over.<br /><br />At one point, a guy took the free spot next to J. He had shaggy blonde hair, a prominent jawline. He smiled at him boyishly and clapped and nodded to the music. When the song finished he made a specific request.<br /><br />“I don’t know that one,” J. said.<br /><br />“That’s OK. Just play whatever. It sounds great. Play whatever. Keep playing. It’s all great.”<br /><br />They played another song and when it ended he made the same request.<br /><br />“Still don’t know it.”<br /><br />“That’s OK. Man, this is great. This is the greatest night of my life. I left my wife back at our tent. We just got married. We have two kids. Both boys. I love them so much. I just want to be the best dad for them, you know. The best dad I can be. That’s what it’s all about. This is the greatest night of my life.”<br /><br />He spoke with a thick Irish accent. It wasn’t noticeable at first. But the closer you listened and the more he went on the more prominent it became. A lather of language.<br /><br />Dan had been over on another log, talking with some of the others. He came over to J. with a lit joint. J. smoked it and passed it around.<br /><br />“Here, take this,” Dan said, looking around in mock tenseness.<br /><br />He handed him a ziplock bag that J. glanced at briefly before stuffing in his pouch.<br /><br />“I don’t smoke that much anymore but my friend over there offered it,” he said. “How we doing over here?”<br /><br />“Good. The vibe is excellent.”<br /><br />“I’m feeling the vibe too. It’s great out here. So glad we did it. Imagine we followed the Germans’ lead, we’d all be asleep by now.”<br /><br />The joint had circled around. Dan smoked a little and kept talking. J. freely strummed.<br /><br />“Say I noticed the other guy over there does a lot of the full sounding stuff but you’re doing all the fancy stuff.” Mimicking with his hands.<br /><br />“When I don’t know a song I just noodle around. Try to add something.”<br /><br />“Well I wish I could do that, what either of you are doing. You got to show me some stuff when we get back. I won’t be around as much once they’re moved in but I’ll still pop by every now and then. Maybe grab a beer or something.”<br /><br />They continued to play for the groups that came and went. New songs were suggested and taken up. A girl who had been singing enthusiastically brought over sheets of lyrics from somewhere.<br /><br />The Irish guy stuck around, observing J.’s playing raptly. A girl had sat down across from him, around the boundaries of the circle. She caught a few of his between song remarks. She was sober and slightly thickset. She revealed she was about to be married, right off. She had questions. Serious questions. She wanted to know what he meant when he said he loved his wife and kids. For real. What does love mean? How does one go about proving their love, actually prove it? It went further. How does love move from abstract concept in language to real life employment? What form does love’s manifestation take? She came at him hard and wouldn’t let up. This was serious stuff. She was looking for specific, detailed responses. Assert and elaborate. Wouldn’t settle for anything less. Anything less being deserving of her full ire. <br /><br />“I’m about to get married. I need to know about these things. I’m sceptical. If you really love your wife like you say why are you out here and not back with her. Is that love? Doesn’t seem like it to me.”<br /><br />The Irish guy’s earlier excitement had been whittled down now to gaping uncertainty, beyond the realm of word and nearing a void of paradox and unreason. He fidgeted and stuttered and rubbed his head.<br /><br />J. jumped in.<br /><br />“Why? Why now? Why must you? How about, spare him the Dr. Phil routine and let the man have a good time.”<br /><br />“I just wanted to know. I’m about to get married. I was looking for answers.”<br /><br />“Does this look like Oprah’s couch? Come on. Nobody here wants to hear that kind of babble.”<br /><br />“Babble.”<br /><br />“That’s right. We’re trying to have a good time and you come out here wanting to dissect the stars.” <br /><br />“What do you know?”<br /><br />“Enough,” J. said. “I know enough.”<br /><br />He had been speaking to her through a half-smile and employing a light tone, distant but firm, but this last remark fell like an anchor that surprised even himself. An annihilating blow. The conversation left with nowhere else to go after this dark note, he went back to playing, digging into the chords looking for lift and levity. <br /><br />Soon he had lost track of the joint and all his beers had spilled. The night drawing down, he and Dan started back to camp. But then they realized Jake wasn’t with them. He had been on the periphery of the circle throughout, darting in and out, disappearing and re-appearing, tail wagging. Dan looked back at the fire now.<br /><br />“He’ll find his way back.”<br /><br />They cut through the tents that littered the lawn, creeping cautiously. Dan retired to his truck while J. sat in the fold-out chair and drank water. The fire had been put out. The darkness was near total. He started to slip out of consciousness when he was brought back by a jingling sound coming from the other side of the trees. It was faint, spare. A distant midnight chime. Teasing. He got up and followed it. It lead him through the parking lot, towards the beach. He was back at the fire where a new looking group had gathered. He saw the musician he had played with all night. He was standing now, drinking a beer and talking with someone away from the fire. J. approached. They weren’t able to interact earlier beyond calling out chord changes and so forth. He was a student from Argentina. Attending the university down island. Came up with friends. Dark innocent features. His English was good, adequate. He was soft-spoken, smiling politely. The humble communications of a second language. While they were talking J. caught sight of Jake. He was on the far side of the fire, chasing a smaller dog up-and-down the beach. After a while he got his attention and the two started back for camp, where he secured him to a tree.<br /><br />*<br /><br />He lay spread out on the bed in tense repose. Early dawn. The house now an unsettling quiet after the disconcerting blasts and unearthly eruptions of some faux-apocalyptic pre-dawn storm. He was alone. He rose, creeping down the hallway, bare feet on hardwood, to the kitchen, where he poured a glass of water. Standing at the sink he felt the cooling liquid make the tunneling journey down his throat and through his system with the acute sensitivity that accompanies waking. Later in the day when he was up her ex came over. He was sitting at the glass table staring at a laptop when he, the ex, popped his head in. He had never wanted her to go and told her as much. The kid was with him, scampering and screaming as she entered, then retreated back out. Also their dog, a gray socially anxious Akita. Seeing she wasn’t around he made to leave but then got ahold of her on the phone and waited around until she arrived. She returned a short time later. It was Sunday and she’d been gone since sometime Friday evening, the day after they’d flown in, leaving him the house without further instruction or list of duties. She seemed vaguely put-off upon learning he’d slept in her bed while she was away.<br /><br />His birthday was a quiet affair. After going out for a low-key dinner with family he returned bearing bags of groceries. She was in the kitchen on the floor, the kid in bed. A friend of hers was over, on the floor beside her. They were painting, each immersed in their own individual projects. He dropped the bags on the counter and began unpacking. Crackers, cheese, cereal, juice, milk. Soon they cleaned up the floor and put away their canvases and the friend left, grimly, wordlessly, leaving them to converse in the low light of the kitchen. Later they retired to her bed. He lay there waiting as she got herself ready in the bathroom, brushing, cleaning, moisturizing. It was calm and quiet in the house, a pair of lamps offering the only light. She joined him, putting on a movie. As they watched he realized it held little interest and he started to doze, the images from the screen drifting in and out in no meaningful sequence. When it was over she asked him how he liked it. He answered in the affirmative and passed out. In the morning the kid came hoping on the bed. <br /><br />They began taking breakfast together out on the porch, he and the kid. She had grown fond of the cereal he preferred, a mix of peanutbutter and granola. He shared a few bites with her at first, then began supplying her with her own portion in a separate bowl. She chewed deliberately while looking up at him with wide wondering eyes. It became a routine. They ate cereal and sipped juice on the porch while the mommy slept in the next room.<br /><br />That night she was having some of her family over for dinner. Her step-dad was in town and she was going to give him the news. A major announcement. She was going to become a professional artist, she had decided. She was going to paint professionally. She had become serious about it again these last few months. She saw opportunities. There was more. He was going to get to meet the new boyfriend. He’d be joining them once he got off work. It was to be a gallant affair. She moved about the house in a frenzy of cleaning and reorganizing. While this went on he played with his iPod in the kitchen. It seemed to no longer work. Shortly thereafter he slipped out.<br /><br />He remembered the summer before and the time they would spend together. Those days their meetings, sparse as they were, seemed like an event. They spent most of their time on the porch, music always playing, candles lit at night. Some nights they stayed up till dawn, drinking red wine while listening to old jazz (for mood), switching over to coffee at some point. One time her ex came over (a different one, this ex, then most recent, just ended), just stopping by. He had caught them, it felt like. They were doing something illicit. He was just like every other ex of hers he had known. He was used to it by then. They paid him no mind. There was nothing he could do, even as he made like there was. He fretted and fought. They argued. Eventually he left. But still in her life somehow. Still hanging on. Hanging on to something.<br /><br />She got the news from her landlord in the morning and was anxious all the rest of the day. He was selling the place, he told her. Wanted to start showing it right away. Suddenly everything was thrown into chaos. Forced change. An upheaval. It took her the rest of the day to recover. She sipped from a bottle of codeine. He tried to calm her. It was no use. His words were no match.<br /><br />The last day he stayed there they had coffee together on the porch first thing and by suppertime he was told to leave. He had just walked in the door and found his sister there getting her nails done for her upcoming graduation. He hung around the kitchen and when they were done she came in and told him. He went downstairs immediately and packed his bags and took them out to his sister’s car, who was now behind the wheel waiting for him. Before they left, he went back inside but she was already in the shower. She had a date that evening to get ready for.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-77535466226237925822010-12-08T16:59:00.000-08:002010-12-14T08:17:53.148-08:00<span style="font-style:italic;">She stood on the beach. The ocean. The blue sky. Barely a cloud. Sun dipping low. Late afternoon. Turned back, smiled.</span><br />
<br />
He was awoke the next morning by Lisa as she tried stepping over him. He had passed out around the opening of the tent, wedged in a lean slot on the ground between tent and mattress. <br />
<br />
“I’m so sorry for waking you!”<br />
<br />
“Don’t be. Forget it. What do you expect. I’m the one blocking your way.”<br />
<br />
“You have nowhere else to sleep?”<br />
<br />
“There didn’t seem to be much room on the mattress and it was late and I didn’t want to wake anyone.”<br />
<br />
“Yet it is your tent and I the one waking you.”<br />
<br />
“Forget it. It’s nothing. How did you sleep?”<br />
<br />
“Very good. Thanks. And you?”<br />
<br />
“Adequate. The little I got. But I’m fine. I’ll be OK.”<br />
<br />
“You had good time with Dan then?”<br />
<br />
“Good time. Good time had by all. Can you do me a favour? Can you call me when coffee’s ready.”<br />
<br />
“That I can. Yes.”<br />
<br />
“That would be swell. Thanks.”<br />
<br />
J. dozed a while, then got up. He stood and stretched, outside the tent. It was cool. Still early. Probably. He assumed. He didn’t have his watched handy and liked that, the not knowing the time exactly. It was liberating somehow. A similar breakfast was being cooked up and J. tried lending a hand this time. But there wasn’t much to be done, they were managing fine on there own. He wound up moving a few things from the cooler to the picnic table, then sat and waited. <br />
<br />
The food wasn’t as good as the morning before. Runny eggs. The bacon hard and blackened. J. didn’t say anything. He thought it best. The girls were all gloomy quiet this morning and he took it as a sign to do same.<br />
<br />
He was still waiting on the coffee when Dan appeared. He walked over tentatively, his bulky frame taking the form of a slouch. Slouched over. He asked J. if he had any aspirin. “Just to get goin’, you know.”<br />
<br />
J. looked through his pack for the bottle of aspirin he’d bought on the way up but couldn’t find it now. Dan shrugged it off. He drank water from a bottle and went to inspect breakfast. His greeting was met with dull, wearied responses from the girls. <br />
<br />
“What’s with you guys. Me and J. were the one’s stayed up late. You all went to bed early. Again.” <br />
<br />
“We’re just tired, is all,” Desiree said.<br />
<br />
“Yeah, I see that.”<br />
<br />
Dan was less reticent than J. over the food. He picked at a few pieces but then gave up, disappointed with the quality. J. was by the coffee pot now, waiting for a sign of its readiness. Coffee. Coffee was the thing. Coffee would right everything. Whatever there was to be righted. Finally he started to pour a cup but the liquid came out a weak brown.<br />
<br />
“Still not ready.”<br />
<br />
“It takes awhile for it to build up,” Dan said.<br />
<br />
“That’s what she said.”<br />
<br />
A short while later they started to break camp. J. was over by the truck retrieving a fresh shirt when Dan approached. He was going into town for a breakfast proper and wondered if he wanted to come along.<br />
<br />
“I should hang around and help pack up.”<br />
<br />
“Sure. OK. Suit yourself,” Dan said and made for the door.<br />
<br />
“You know what. Fuck it. I need a coffee. A decent cup. Bad.”<br />
<br />
“There we go. All right. Hop in.”<br />
<br />
They brought Jake along and drove to a small cafe. It was a cozy old building that played classic rock over the sound system. An old Neil Young song was on rotation as they entered. Long line-up, calm waiting. It smelled nice. Fresh things, enriching aromas. After they ordered they took a table outside, observing things, Jake spread out at their feet, panting happily. There was activity in all directions. Smiling, inviting flesh. Trucks crowded with people passing by on the way to somewhere, some outdoor activity. Older couples with little furry things on leashes. Their server brought out the food and coffee. She was a girl around J.’s age. A fetchingly elongated face. Long unfussed over dark hair. Jewellery of all kinds. Tattoos peeking out from clothing.<br />
<br />
When she’d left Dan said, “You can’t throw a rock and not hit one of these attractive little honey babes. So fine. Tell me, J. How would you like to live here all summer?”<br />
<br />
“I could live anywhere anytime. Well, almost anywhere,” J. said. “But it would be nice, I’ll give you that. I could get used to it.”<br />
<br />
“Got that right. I had a great time last night. What a blast. The others sure missed out. They couldn’t keep up with us. Can you believe it. Can’t keep up with someone twice their age.”<br />
<br />
“Their loss.”<br />
<br />
“You bet it was. Say, what was up with that guy next to you?”<br />
<br />
“Irish guy. He just got married. Couple kids. Asked to provide a fully-realized presentation and analysis of his love. Was at a loss.”<br />
<br />
“Married. Really. I thought he was gay.”<br />
<br />
“No. At least I don’t think so.”<br />
<br />
At camp they helped finish packing and loaded up the truck. There was still time before the afternoon fishing, part two, and they spent it down at the beach. The girls and Ben positioned a blanket and sat. J. walked with Dan down the beach, Jake running and sniffing out things ahead of them. There were others out, walking. There was something ritualistic and defined about it, a morning stroll on the beach with strangers. Language was unnecessary. What they were taking part in was unspoken, requiring only gestures, acknowledging looks. The activity was complete in itself and marked everything else associated with it superfluous. They walked to the far end, where it broke off into forest and rock formations. Just before it was a nondescript cabin with canoes in front, nearer to the water, next to where some driftwood had collected. There were a couple large dogs engaged in scrapping play and Jake soon joined in. They growled and pawed. Barred their teeth. Lowered themselves to the ground in a front crouch and sprung at another. Good fun. When Jake came back over J. leaned down to pat him and noticed a spotting of blood around the shoulder blades. It wasn’t clear if it was Jake’s blood or one of the others. He didn’t seem to mind. He ran down to the water and splashed around and went running back over to the blanket, where J. now lay out with Desiree, Sandra and Ben. The tide was out and a group had formed in the newly exposed sand ahead of them. A few couples. Kids. Chairs set up. A surf board was present. There was some digging going on -- not clear toward what end. J. recognized a couple people from the fire. One of them was the guy Dan had been talking to, the one who had the pot. He looked older than he remembered. Nice haircut. He looked like he was in finances or possible home repair. He might have had a wife and kids even. Or J. was just imagining a history for him, like most strangers who caught his eye in public places who he had no intention of directly addressing. Imagining opened up endless possibilities to the point where the actual person couldn’t help being a let down -- all fixed in their psychology, a a well-crafted social self they had to present. Dan picked up the folding chair and went over but not before offering a parting remark, directed mostly at the girls. “I’m going over there to hang out with my friends.” They detected something off in his tone, the girls did, a slight dissonance, something possible cold or cutting, though nothing overt, and they chose to ignore it or didn’t follow through in its possible implications. At any rate they didn’t verbalize it. They hadn’t said much since the morning. At any rate not in English.<br />
<br />
J. looked at them and then over at the group Dan was now with. A funny notion got into his head. Without much in the way of commitment or conviction in his voice, as if he still hadn’t convinced himself of what he was about to do, he said, “Watch this. I’m going to do something really dumb.” Then took off his t-shirt and started toward the water -- first in a brisk walk and then breaking out into a jog. He didn’t become aware of the cold until he was in past his knees. The wind was a contributing factor, noticeably stronger than back at the blanket. But it was exhilarating, at the same time. Being out in the open like that. Exposed. The whip of wind on bare chest. When it reached his waist he began to wade and he was gripped by a sensation of near breathlessness that had him close to convolution. He experienced a genuine split between his upper and lower half, a simulated severing of the torso. An incoming wave threw him slightly off balance, pushing him backwards and he quickly turned his momentum forward, throwing himself ahead in a decided plunge. He was momentarily disoriented when he came up and turned in time to get hit by a wave that again took him under. Submerged, his nose filled with saltwater. He broke through and shook it out, breathing hard. He watched the waves coming in. As the next one got closer he timed it so that he launched himself up just as it hit. The first time he was late by half a second and received another nose full of saltwater. The second time he caught it just right. It seemed to scoop him up and carry him it its grip. He did this a third and then a fourth time. He was brought in closer and closer to the shore and he started swimming out, hard deliberate strokes, all chest and arms, angling himself so he could swim through the waves, coming in at a sideways direction. He swam further out. His body was becoming accustomed to the water’s cool temperature. He came up and righted himself with gentle paddling, navigating the waves, his head bobbing above the surface like an errant volleyball. He saw a few boys ahead of him, back at shore, teasing each other near the water. He could barely make them out. They were skinny and shirtless. Scrawny. White torsos gleaming. Some came out to their knees and quickly retreated. He wondered how long he could stay out there. The hard part was over. He was in. But it was still cold, almost stinging. He caught a few more waves and made for the shore, swimming as far in as he could until land snuck up underneath and forced him into a walk.<br />
<br />
Dripping and shivering he made for the blanket where he collapsed down in a soaking heap. He lay there on his stomach trying to get ahold of the cold-bite he felt. It radiated through him with each breath, consuming. The others had left. Dan came over and glancingly acknowledged his condition as he set down his chair and sat.<br />
<br />
Something was happening. Or wasn’t rather. He wasn’t warming up. A girl came over and started talking to Dan. She was wearing a two-piece bikini with an old band T-shirt overtop and a long silk fabric tied around her waist, like a skirt. She had on flip-flops. A tattoo of what looked like a tiger or some other jungle creature, or maybe even reptilian in nature or else something more abstract, wrapped around her ankle. It was hard to tell exactly. She stood near J. and he looked up at her. <br />
<br />
“I’ve been here with my group almost a week. I love it. I’m having a great time. Nothing like waking up with a little Bailey’s in your coffee. But I got to get back soon. Back into a routine. Work the Yoga. Tone up.”<br />
<br />
He wondered how Dan knew her. Had she been at the fire? A lot of people had passed through. He missed most, busy with songs, lost in the electric buzz of the music. The noodling. He was smiling at her and looking for a chance to cut in, engage her. He wanted to get in on the exchange. Be a part of it. Make himself known to this cute surfer chick who stood so close, homebred and lithe. But words wouldn’t come out. He couldn’t stop shaking. His jaw was moving spastically now, uncontrollably. Eventually she left. He continued to shake. If anything it was getting worse. Approaching a faint seizure.<br />
<br />
Then he remembered the hot tub. He had seen it through the large floor level window of the rec building. He put his shirt back on, got up and started off, teeth chattering all the way. Outside the building a work van was parked. Hadn’t been there before. He ignored it and went straight in. Down a hallway was a change room that led into the pool area. He moved quickly, tossing off his T-shirt and walking the length of the pool, headed straight for the hot tub. He lowered himself in, anticipating the snuggling warmth that would envelop him. But it was lukewarm at best. Hardly a relieve. It wasn’t hot at all. No steam rising off the surface. He sat there a moment, submerged and shaking. Then he noticed the workers moving back-and-forth from the van to the building with tools and other things. He put it together at once. It was broken. Clearly. A problem with the water heating system. Something.<br />
<br />
Outside, he was dripping wet again. He sun-dried himself a moment, then got his pack and changed into dry clothes behind the truck. It was his best shot, his only shot. Then he went over to a sitting area that cut into the trees to one side of the parking lot. It consisted of large stones. There was shade but it was also in the sun. It would do. Across from it was a payphone that he saw Lisa at. He sat and watched her. She was talking in German to whoever it was on the other end. Probably someone German. A relative perhaps. Perhaps her mother. Most likely it was her mother. Seemed like. Must be. Therefore.<br />
<br />
The conversation ended and she hung up and came over.<br />
<br />
“Are you all right? You’re shaking.”<br />
<br />
“I’m fine. I went for a swim. Water a little on the cool side. I’ll be alright. Who were you talking to just now, if you mind my asking?”<br />
<br />
“No. It was my mom. Back home. I miss her.”<br />
<br />
“How’s mom doing?”<br />
<br />
“She’s doing good.”<br />
<br />
“That’s good.”<br />
<br />
“So what is the plan? Do you know what’s going on?”<br />
<br />
“Not sure exactly. Back to the Marina. More fishing. Then back home, I guess. How have you liked it here?”<br />
<br />
“It’s been wonderful. I hate to leave it. But I am looking forward to getting back as well. So much to do!”<br />
<br />
They walked back to the beach together. Everyone had amassed around Dan and the blanket, awaiting further instruction. Dan told them of the fishing. After some huddled conversing they agreed to hang around the beach until they returned. Ben declined to come along this time. He was staying on the beach with the girls. It was decided. He was firm. It was left to Dan and J.<br />
<br />
They still had some time when they got to the Marina so they went into the restaurant and ordered lunch. They sat out on the patio and looked over at the boats and the forested islands beyond. So much green and blue and white. Beers were brought out. Dan lit a cigar. He smoked it and offered some to J. Then they saw Chet’s boat come in to dock and Dan went down. J. fingered the cigar and took a couple puffs, then abandoned it. The shaking had subsided, his core gradually warmed, achieving a preliminary equilibrium. Still, there was some kind of nervous fragility, some kind of post-shock fatigue, that continued to linger, his nervous system weakened and recovering. The food arrived and he ate.<br />
<br />
“Looks like we’re not going out again after all,” Dan said when he returned.<br />
<br />
“What’s this?”<br />
<br />
“I just talked with Chet. He was just out with this guy and they made a big score. Real big. I made a deal with him for the two biggest ones. Plus I’m going to bring back the rest for him. He lives on the mainland and I’m going to delivery it all to him at the end of the week when I go in to visit my brother. So it all works out. Now we’ll have something to show the others. Say we caught them right off and that’s why we’re back so soon.”<br />
<br />
The man in question came over to join them. He was an older fellow, lean and wrinkled. He had wiry grey hair and a big thick moustache that concealed his upper lip. He smoked and talked over logistics with Dan. He spoke with an aggressive mumble, the movement of his lips barely detectable. Ventriloquist-like. They wrote things down on napkins. Addresses and numbers. Dates. Then they all got up, paid, and went down to the dock. At the weigh station the old guy stood with his two prime catches, one in each hand, arms slightly bend, just above waist level, sleek tails reaching almost to the dock. His taut, veiny arms strained from the weight and a cigarette dangled from his lips as someone digitalized the image on a camera.<br />
<br />
The fish were packed in ice, put in the cooler and loaded onto the truck. Dan said goodbye to the old guy and they got in.<br />
<br />
“We’ll want to round up the others and get back quick,” he said. “What with all this fish we got.”<br />
<br />
Ben and Lisa were on the blanket with Jake when they returned. Desiree and Sandra had gone for a walk and hadn’t returned. Dan thought to call them on a cell but they had yet to get usable, local numbers since flying in. They were forced to wait.<br />
<br />
Lisa had got up and left her book. J. picked it up, curious. It had a colourful cover. It was a German best-seller, Ben told him dismissively. Something only girls were interested in. “Chick lit,” J. said absently. He flipped through it and observed the strange markings on the page. He thought of all the philosophers and writers and political thinkers the country had produced in relatively recent history, going back a couple centuries; those he had read and studied and thought through expansively. It was while holding this piece of German pop-lit that it dawned on him that disposable culture wasn’t entirely a Western phenomenon. It was an obvious observation but required a trigger, like most obvious things awaiting conscious appraisal. Then again, maybe it had its merits. Beyond the trite cliches. Boy meets girl. Girl in the big city. Challenges. Hardships. Complications. The endless search for human connection.<br />
<br />
Later he unwound his earbuds and put them on. He had brought his iPod along but this was the first time he’d brought it out. He toggled through the lists of bands, then albums, then songs. He selected Radiohead, their latest, first track. He listened to the music and looked out at the beach and the ocean. He liked how the forlorn, nearly suffocating atmosphere produced by the music contrasted with the sun-baked basking sheen of everything else. Like existing in two places at once. Lisa was back sitting across from him and he he took off the earbuds and handed them to her.<br />
<br />
“Tell me what you think.”<br />
<br />
She brought them to her ears and listened. After a moment she took them out.<br />
<br />
“I like it but it is too dark.”<br />
<br />
“Too dark,” he said.<br />
<br />
“Too dark. Too -- depressing.”<br />
<br />
He took them back and continued to listen, laying back on the blanket and looking up at the dizzying blueness.<br />
<br />
Shortly after that he fell asleep. When he woke he knew instantly from the pinched feeling of his ears and the heat of his cheeks that the sun had worked him over. He took off his shirt and put it over his head and stared ahead, slumped and cross-legged. He felt like a desert mystic conjuring the tides. He thought of this and other variations to amuse himself while he waited. And waited.<br />
<br />
Finally they returned. They had been gone a long time. They walked over from somewhere, Desiree and Sandra, a relaxed stride to their movements. Unassuming. Here they were. They were here. Dan was adamant about an explanation for where they were, where they’d been -- an insistence that seemed to greatly outweigh the explanation they offered, since they all already knew. <br />
<br />
Dan wanted to hurry back because of the fish but he had one last spot he wanted to take them. His final act as island tour guide. This time, before setting off, he put Jake in the hatch. He thought it might be more comfortable for him, more spacious. He cleared a spot for him to settle into without threat of falling debris. At Long Beach, a few minutes away, in the parking lot, they let him out and he seemed exceedingly grateful for this. They brought cameras and started for the beach. There were piles of old driftwood they had to step cautiously over to get to it. A sudden change in the weather had occurred. It was cooler here. The sky slightly overcast, a two-tone grey. Tide low. J. noticed a lone person a ways off walking on a drying sandbar. He could barely be seen. He had a wetsuit on, stripped to the waist, and walked with his hands behind his back, gaze directed downward. He was like an apparition. A character from a French novel come to life. There was something resigned in his posture. The whole of his existence distilled to this one basic activity. Sad discovery. Towering surfaces. The day pulled back.<br />
<br />
Beyond him great raging waves swelled and crashed. A group of surfers in wetsuits stood with their boards, contemplating another run.<br />
<br />
There was a finality to things now settling in. Everyone spent. They took pictures, then got back in the truck and made the road. Jake was in the back again, the guitar stored safely in the hatch. There wasn’t much talking. The truck sighed with a collective exhaustion, feelings turned inward. J. stared out the window. Long stretches of deepening forest rolled by. Dan had satellite radio playing -- a small succession of modern sounds. Every other song was by the Rolling Stones. Something recent. The same song over and over. The chorus cued with dependable certainty. Rise, fall. Rise, fall. They stopped at a town along the way. A bistro for food and drinks. Then more road.<br />
<br />
The city announced itself in stages. Diners. Scrap yards. RV rentals. The outskirts of civilization. Once inside the city limits Dan stopped at an All-Mart to pick up a few things. Ben went in with him and J. joined Lisa in the front, Jake at their feet. He wanted to say something to her but couldn’t. Or didn’t know what. Then he didn’t care either way and gave his attention to Jake.<br />
<br />
The silence had built up obvious if ambiguous tension as they neared Dan’s street, at which point he spoke up.<br />
<br />
“So you guys are still moving in?”<br />
<br />
There was a swelling pause and then Sandra in an even, subdued voice said, “We’re not sure.”<br />
<br />
“What do you mean you’re not sure?”<br />
<br />
“We don’t know yet. We have to look around first.”<br />
<br />
Dan stomped the brakes, the truck jolting to a stop. Everybody pitched forward slightly, simultaneously, before being snapped back by the elastic tug of their seatbelts.<br />
<br />
“What is this? Look around. We had an agreement before we left. A verbal contract. You dropped all your stuff off. You were all but moved in.”<br />
<br />
“We have to weigh different options before we decide,” Desiree said.<br />
<br />
They were stopped in the middle of the road, across the street from a church.<br />
<br />
“Sure, fine, of course. But you don’t agree to move in and then, all this time later, say you’re still looking around. Something seems fishy to me.”<br />
<br />
This last remark was directed more to himself than those in the vehicle. No response. It went quiet again. An unsettling quiet now. Tense eyes directed forward. Calm broken. He had started the truck moving and they were coming up on the garage. Parked inside the truck continued to idle. No one made a move to get out.<br />
<br />
“I don’t know, I can’t helping feel like there was something I did and you’re not telling me.”<br />
<br />
“We have to find a place we’re completely comfortable with,” Desiree said. “It’s a lot of money for us. We need to make an careful, informed decision. That’s all.”<br />
<br />
“But so when did you decide this, all of a sudden. We’ve been out camping together and everything was fine. It seemed like everything was fine. Then as soon as we get back you’re singing a different tune. Obviously something happened to change things. Either I did something or I don’t know. I want to know what changed your mind. What aren’t you telling me?”<br />
<br />
“We told you. We want to be completely happy with whatever place we decide on,” Sandra said. “That’s it. Nothing more.”<br />
<br />
Lisa turned to J., looking a little like a frightened woodland creature, he thought, something small and retreating. J. turned around in his seat, addressing the others in the back. He told them of his time living at the apartment. That in the two years he’d lived there he’d had minimal problems and been more or less completely happy with the situation. In Dan he had that all-too-rare thing: a competent, dependable, nonintrusive landlord. If there was anything about him as their landlord they worried about, they need not. All would work out, he assured them. It wasn’t all true, of course. He was skipping things over, leaving things out, painting an ideal picture. He wasn’t sure why he was doing this, saying what he was saying. It came out well, had good flow, a strong emotional force -- if only slipping slightly towards the sentimental in tone towards the end. Yes, a good speech. A good performance, all considered. He wished he’d kept his mouth shut.<br />
<br />
They got out and started unloading. There was an edge to Dan’s movements, he unloaded things with a violent assertion, gripping and chucking, that verged on collapsing into a spectacle of brute, dumb expression. He made a comment to Desiree, brimming with sarcastic intent, that threw her.<br />
<br />
“What does he mean? I don’t understand why he’s saying this.”<br />
<br />
“He didn’t mean it personally,” J. said, stepping in. “He’s just expressing anger and frustration because he feels you aren’t being completely honest with him.”<br />
<br />
“Well tell him we are being honest.”<br />
<br />
“He feels that -- well, you guys, as I am to understand it, had an agreement with him which you’re now backing out of without providing him with what he feels is a suitable explanation for why. And so he can only take this as something personal against him.”<br />
<br />
“There is nothing more to explain,” Sandra said. “We have told him our reason.”<br />
<br />
Desiree, “You wouldn’t want to make a decision, as important a decision as where you’re going to be living, without being sure about it in the fullest?”<br />
<br />
He was translating a different language. Interpreting now for the benefit of both parties. Withholding judgement in the service of unimpeded discourse. But where did he stand? He didn’t have a judgement to make, he didn’t think. He had only just met them. But he was in it now, conversing with both camps, making sure both expressed themselves clearly to the other, remaining evenhanded in the heated emotion of the moment.<br />
<br />
“Ben, what are your thoughts on this?” Dan said. “Where do you stand?”<br />
<br />
“I am with the girls. Whatever they want to do. We all must be in agreement, happy and satisfied with things.”<br />
<br />
“And what about her?” Dan said, a gesture flung at Lisa.<br />
<br />
“I know nothing about it.”<br />
<br />
“So you’re still moving in downstairs then? Nothing has changed for you?”<br />
<br />
“I want to move in. Yes. I would like to.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah. ‘Cuz I’m not sure if I want that to happen now. If they’ve changed their minds who’s to say you won’t all of a sudden decide on something different yourself.”<br />
<br />
Dan took some bags inside. Reverberations of the previous exchange continued to be felt. But when he came back out he had on a different demeanour. Diplomatic. <br />
<br />
“OK, listen. If you guys want to look at other places, fine. Do what you want. We had a good time. Let’s not spoil it all now. Friends. Everyone, friends.”<br />
<br />
They brightened at this. Further discussion ensued, the air cleared somewhat. Continuing with the same thread but with a renewed amicability. At a couple points Dan appeared to become worked up again but checked himself. They had reached an accord. A tentative, fragile accord but an accord nonetheless. The girls and Ben went upstairs and got their suitcases and brought them out to the truck.<br />
<br />
“So where to now?” Dan said after they’d all piled back in.<br />
<br />
Said Desiree, “The hostel, I guess.”<br />
<br />
The hostel was downtown, around the corner and across the street from where Neal and J. had had coffee. Night had fallen and the streets were lit up. It lent a dash of dramatic intrigue to the proceedings. They unloaded a final time. The handles on their luggage extended and gripped, ready to be rolled in, their new friends stood on the sidewalk uneasily, unsure of the next move. They said they’d be in contact over the coming days, let them know of a decision. Then a few curt goodbyes. J. handed Lisa a small pillow she’d left on the seat.<br />
<br />
“So call me. Tomorrow. We’ll get lunch. Talk. You have my number.”<br />
<br />
“OK. I will do that.”<br />
<br />
J. got back in and Dan nosed the truck into a sharp U-turn.<br />
<br />
“Now what was all that about?” Dan said.<br />
<br />
“I don’t know.”<br />
<br />
“People are weird.”<br />
<br />
“Mostly.”<br />
<br />
“They never make sense. They never do things that make sense. No consistency. Always changing their minds. Say one thing, do another. How was I supposed to react? That wasn’t cool. Not after the opportunity I gave them. That pissed me off. Might as well have spit in my face. But you’re good with all that psychology stuff. All those classes you take.”<br />
<br />
“I dropped psychology after my first year. Too dry. To much handholding, I felt.”<br />
<br />
“Even still. You had a good handle on it. Talking to them. Not getting worked up. This is what I get for mixing the personal with the professional. Trying to be their friend and their landlord. I should learn.”<br />
<br />
“Technically you’re not their landlord yet.”<br />
<br />
“What you think they’ll do? Think they’ll still move in?”<br />
<br />
“Beats the hell out of me,” J. said. “Me and Lisa are supposed to meet for lunch tomorrow. Guess we’ll discuss it then.”<br />
<br />
“Well you two have your own separate thing going on. Whatever you decide on is fine with me. She’s not with the others. I don’t think she knew what they had going on. You know what I think. I think that’s what Desiree and Sandra were scheming about on that long walk of theirs. That’s when the decision would have been made. Had the whole thing figured out. And Ben just went along with it.”<br />
<br />
“You might very well be right.”<br />
<br />
At his apartment J. brought his bags in and dropped down on the couch. He sat there a moment, then picked up the phone and called Neal. On the second ring there was an answer.<br />
<br />
“Hey J. What’s up?”<br />
<br />
“Nothing. Just got back.”<br />
<br />
“Back. From where?”<br />
<br />
“Camping. Remember?”<br />
<br />
“So you went?”<br />
<br />
“Yeah.”<br />
<br />
“Dave wants to know if you got any German tail.”<br />
<br />
“Tell him, yes. Loads. Swimming in it.”<br />
<br />
“Dave wants to know about the hair. What’s up with the hair?”<br />
<br />
“You get used to it, tell him. Where are you?”<br />
<br />
“We’re down at the harbour, drinking. Specifically, we’re at the gazebo. Dave and Quinn are with me. There’s a show in a little while we’re going to check out. Our friend Shawn is performing. You should come.”<br />
<br />
He parked in the Liquor Store parking lot across the street and walked down. There was a light fog coming off the water, dimming the lights. He followed the cement path as it coiled through the harbour, passing an ice cream shop and a restaurant, both closed now. He had taken the long way around but enjoyed the walk, the air, the deserted night. Walking toward something. For something. Towards people. It was a cool night. He felt his chest tighten. The gazebo was across from the park, at the end of a path, overlooking the water. As he approached the park he saw someone coming toward him, a shadowy figure, and he veered off. He looked back and saw it was only a security guard patrolling the grounds. The guard cut across the park, walking with an authoritative gait, paying him no mind, on to other things. He heard voices and when he turned around and started back he saw the three of them walking away from him on a nearby path. He ran to catch up.<br />
<br />
“There you guys are.”<br />
<br />
“I told you the gazebo.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, well, there’s like a million of them.”<br />
<br />
“Nope. Just the one.”<br />
<br />
“Be that as it may.”<br />
<br />
“How it go with the Germans?” Quinn said, getting to the point.<br />
<br />
“It was a time. Till the end. Sort of all fell apart then. At the end.”<br />
<br />
“What do you mean?” Neal said.<br />
<br />
“Hard to explain. Confusion, misdirection, surprise reversals. Suffice it to say, there won’t be a sequel.”<br />
<br />
“Too bad.”<br />
<br />
“It’s finished. Done. The dream is over. What can I say?”<br />
<br />
“I hate John Lennon,” Neil said.<br />
<br />
They continued walking back in the direction he’d just come from. Neal was carrying a backpack and J. unzipped it while they walked and took out a bottle of whiskey. He had a slug, then another.<br />
<br />
Dave was running up ahead, bounding, almost skipping. He jumped up on a cement ledge and proceeded forward with tightrope-like balancing, arms extended. J. liked that. He wanted to get in on that, get to that point, let himself go a little. He took another drink from the bottle. Dave was a slight wiry fellow with ironic good looks and a shifty sort of personality, an unpredictability to his attitudes and reactions. They climbed a flight of stairs. Once at the top, Dave flung himself onto the metal railing and from there propelled himself over to a slanting patch of grass. They continued on like that, committing semi-careless acts approximating drunken behaviour. They made noises and sounds, hollers, boisterous laughter. <br />
<br />
They eventually came up to street level and made their way downtown. <br />
<br />
A group had gathered outside the lounge where the show was taking place. It was next door to the hostel, on the corner, and he secretly wondered if they’d come down out of curiosity once the music started. It was a small, classy place with a bar and big windows, a fresh sheen about it. He recognized a few people from the campus. There was a girl he’d taken a philosophy class with. Next to her a guy, her boyfriend perhaps. Neal talked to her, overwhelming her with the force of his outsized and currently alcohol enhanced personality that she took with cool nonchalance. The guy next to her was tall and slender. He wore a shirt and loosened tie and had on black-rimmed glasses. He looked at J. with an uncommitted facial expression, a tier above blankness. <br />
<br />
“I know you from somewhere,” J. said, saying something to say something. “You look familiar. You go to the university, right? I think I might have seen you around campus.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah,” he said, the word a slight hack, as if he were bringing something up.<br />
<br />
“Really?”<br />
<br />
“No.”<br />
<br />
J. backed away. He went over to the entrance with Neal, paying the cover charge and receiving a stamp on the back of his hand.<br />
<br />
A good crowd had turned out. The place was almost full as he stepped in. People milling about, drinks in hand, social smiles on display. Otis was there. He was sitting at the bar and J. went over and sat next to him. He ordered a drink and the two talked. He liked Otis but never saw enough of him. Everyone did. There wasn’t enough Otis to go around.<br />
<br />
The show started shortly. Their friend performed a short solo set with an electric guitar. Then a girl from the audience came up and sung with him, impressing all with her tone and range. Neal and the others were positioned near the door, slipping outside between songs to smoke cigarettes. <br />
<br />
J. looked over and noticed a couple sitting in a booth. They were across from another couple out of view. The man had on a suit and a fixed nervous smile. His arm was around the woman. Her blonde hair was cut to shoulder level and she wore a low-cut sequinned red dress. She had strong, almost masculine features that seemed to contribute to rather than diminish from her attractiveness. The man was intensely balding, everything gone save for a sandy horseshoe around the sides and a bit of last stand fuzz on top. This along with his soft features gave him the distinctly undeveloped, babylike appearance unique to those men who’ve otherwise yet to exhibit the defined lines and slackening flesh of age.<br />
<br />
A black man with long dreadlocks approached their booth. J. imagined him a musician of some kind, currently on tour making a run through the coast. At their last stop a middle-aged businessman, well-to-do, was in attendance with his much younger girlfriend and afterwards invited them out for an afternoon on his yacht to impress the girlfriend who was apparently a big fan. Now he was back on land, glowing from this unexpected bit of luxurious fun, this flirtation with decadence, before moving on. He held a drink in his hand and smiled generously while conversing with the whole table. It was when he turned to address the out-of-view couple that the blonde women reached out an arm and took one of his dreadlocks in her hand. Her open-mouthed face lit up, full of wondering mischievousness as she stroked the long thick coil of hair. The man nervously leaned over and brought her arm down, continuing to smile at the couple across from him. He held her in a side hug, stared straight ahead, smiling. When J. next looked over a few minutes later, the woman was leaning far over the table, animately addressing the person across from her. It wasn’t clear what brought this on or led up to it. He couldn’t make out what she was saying over the murmur of the room and so couldn’t determine if it was being done for shared comical effect or was a genuine attack being levelled at the person. She had a serious look on her face, almost possessed. She thrust a nail-polished finger in the person’s face and the man again took action. He reeled her into her seat, a pained expression on her face as he did this. Fun spoiled. A few people standing nearby glanced over -- glancing over marking the extent of their judgement. A moment later the woman got up from the table, spilling a drink in the process, and charged past J. in a winking gust. She disappeared down a hallway, beyond which the washrooms were found. A few minutes passed and she failed to return. The bald man got up and went back to find out more. They emerged moments later, the man tailing behind her, trying to get an arm around her. But she seemed to want no part of it. A rebuff. She strode ahead of him, hands up, half-concealing her face as she moved towards the door, ignoring their booth partners.<br />
<br />
J. followed them with his eyes until they passed Neal. He was still over by the door and didn’t seem to notice the couple leaving, or anything that had transpired leading up to their leaving. Dave and Quinn had apparently left sometime earlier and he was carousing with a few others, including the friend who had just performed. J. parted with Otis and went over.<br />
<br />
“I’m going,” he said.<br />
<br />
“Can I catch a ride with you?”<br />
<br />
“Sure you can. I’m this way.”<br />
<br />
They walked in the direction of the harbour and then turned right at the street before it.<br />
<br />
“So really, how was the trip? I’m surprised you actually went.”<br />
<br />
“It was good. I had a good time.”<br />
<br />
“What about the girls? Were they as attractive as your landlord made them out?”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, sure. Thin, blonde. If that’s your thing.”<br />
<br />
“And the one moving in with you?”<br />
<br />
“Her, yes. There’s definitely something about her. I can’t quite pin it down. She grows on you. She’s a grower.”<br />
<br />
“Shut up. A knock out. Say it.”<br />
<br />
“Naturally.”<br />
<br />
“Lucky fuck. How ‘bout that for pulling you out of your slump.”<br />
<br />
“How ‘bout that.”<br />
<br />
“Well, I’m feeling mighty good myself. The semester starts in a few days. Got some money saved up. Oz Mutantes in a few weeks. I’m feeling really good. Ready to get at it.”<br />
<br />
“Glad to hear.”<br />
<br />
“This is the start of a beautiful year, my friend. I can feel it.”<br />
<br />
The next day before lunch J. helped Dan fillet the fish. They set them out on top of the cooler, over newspapers, in the backyard and went to work. They filled freezer bags with thick cut sections of the pink, white-lined meat. When they were done Dan gave him two bags and stored the rest in his deep freeze. J. didn’t hear from Lisa and in the afternoon went up to campus to buy books for his classes, using his credit card to make the purchases.<br />
<br />
Another two days passed and J. didn’t hear anything. Dan was down doing laundry in the next room and he knocked on J.’s door.<br />
<br />
“So did you hear?”<br />
<br />
“No. What?”<br />
<br />
“They looked at a place and decided to take it. Had room for all of them. Big place. So that’s that.”<br />
<br />
“Really.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah. I thought you would’ve heard. I thought you and Lisa were in touch?”<br />
<br />
“No. She hasn’t called,” J. said. “I don’t have a number to reach her. I don’t know anything.”<br />
<br />
“Well, listen. If you sit want to go ahead and find a roommate, someone from school or whatever, that’s fine with me.”<br />
<br />
“Thanks.”<br />
<br />
“Unbelievable! You try and help people out and this is the thanks you get. They go and walk all over you. Shit. I guess this is what I get for mixing the personal and the professional. At least we had a good time. The night at the fire was great. I think that was the best time I had all summer.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah.”<br />
<br />
“Oh, and so get this. Right after they got the place, Ben came to see me. He told me, ‘Yeah the girls found this place but I’ll still move in with you. I’m a man of my word. I don’t care what the girls are doing, I’m my own man, I’ll do what I want.’ So it was all set for him to move in but then today he comes over to pick up a pair of shoes he left and tells me no, actually I am going to move in with the girls after all. Isn’t that unbelievable. Two times. Two times he goes back on his word. He’s even worse than the others. So I said to him, I said: ‘Now I know how you led all those Jews into Auschwitz.’”<br />
<br />
“Jesus.”<br />
<br />
“And then I threw his shoes over the balcony and slammed the door on him. That’s the last we’ll be seeing of dear Ben.”<br />
<br />
“Jesus,” J. said.<br />
<br />
The washing machine had finished filling and at that moment kicked into its cycle, sounding a loud rattling wail that gave way to a churning metallic rumble.<br />
<br />
“Anyway, good luck with your roommate search. I’ll see you around. Take it easy.”<br />
<br />
“You too.”<br />
<br />
Dan turned to leave and J. closed the door. He turned on music to drown out the noise and lay on the couch. Classes started the next day and he wanted to be rested.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-style:italic;">She. On the beach. Turned. Smiled.</span>Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-28940121854275818952010-11-27T12:43:00.002-08:002010-11-27T12:44:48.488-08:00Summer Fun“I want to go home, mommy. I thought this was a passion, but it’s not. Emotions are like thoughts. They come and go. They’re not me. I can play being in one, being one, but it’s not me, it’s just playing, and after a while it makes me sick. I don’t know what to do anymore, mommy.”<br />—Kathy Acker, “Kathy Goes to Haiti”<br /><br />“If I write what I feel, it’s to reduce the fever of feeling. What I confess is unimportant, because everything is unimportant.”<br />—Fernando Pessoa, “Book of Disquiet”<br /><br />Jack and Alice have just gotten off a plane and are walking down a long brightly lit hallway. Following the other passengers ahead of them, they take a right and go down a flight of stairs, where the luggage pickup area is located. At the bottom of the stairs they are met by a girl Alice knows. It is her best friend. They hug. Her best friend glances back at Jack and doesn’t say anything or acknowledge him in any way. They have never met. Jack doesn’t say anything and goes into the bathroom. He flushes the urinal and washes his hands, struggling with the motion-triggered faucet. He looks up at himself in the mirror. From the way he’s looking up from the sink, and probably also the sense of dislocation caused by the flight, his reflection appears menacing. He grins at himself. Jack hates everyone. Well, most everyone. At least has a feeling of always being against them. He doesn’t know why that is. A vague sort of feeling, unpronounced. That’s always been there. His default setting. He means nothing malicious by it. When he gets out of the bathroom he goes over to where the girls are standing. <br /> <br />“That was the greatest flight of my life. What they say about alcohol is true also for Demerol. One on the ground is two in the air.”<br /><br />Alice laughs and looks over at Jack and with the laughter still in her voice, lulled only slightly by the drugs, causing it to shake and stutter, says, “Jack, this is Tina.”<br /> <br />“Nice to meet you.” He tries to smile naturally but it comes out all wrong. Like most things he attempts to do, say, believe in. They shake hands and say nothing else.<br /> <br />Out of the silence that follows, Alice says, “Well, we’re going to go out for a smoke.” <br /> <br />“What about the luggage?” says Jack.<br /> <br />“Oh, you know how these things are, they take forever to unload. Besides, it goes around in a loop.”<br /><br />Jack doesn’t know what to say. Her logic wins out again. The girls and Jack separate. Jack walks over to the carousel where a group of people from the flight have gathered, waiting. <br /> <br />Two minutes later the conveyor belt starts up and shortly after that suitcases start appearing through the small hole in the wall. Jack’s and Alice’s luggage are almost the first pieces to come through. Jack pulls them down as they’re about to shuttle past and lines them up behind him. Then goes and gets a luggage cart and loads the suitcases onto that. He looks around for the girls. He doesn’t see them. He moves with the full luggage cart toward the front glass doors. He doesn’t see the girls outside. Jack doesn’t know what to do so he starts walking the length of the corridor, the check-in desks on his right, the rental departments on his left, until he gets to the next set of doors. He looks out the big glass doors. No girls. He stands around and observers all the people rushing around in different directions. Fuck this, he thinks, then starts back toward the first doors. Still no girls. A line of four, five businessmen, briefcases in hand, stroll through the sliding doors and pass by Jack as he goes through the doors.<br /> <br />Outside he looks to his right and then his left. There are people hanging around but none are Alice and her friend.<br /> <br />Then farther down to his left he notices a patio area with tables set up and spots Alice at one. He is about to gesture at her but they’re already getting up and walking toward him. <br /> <br />Jack stands with a hand on his shoulder and the other on the luggage cart, hopelessly self-conscious. <br /> <br />“You got them already. We were just coming back in. Is it still going?”<br /> <br />“Nope. All through. Game over.”<br /> <br />The girls are crossing the street toward the parking lot as Jack is speaking and he starts moving along behind them with the cart of luggage. <br /> <br />“I hope it all fits in her car.”<br /> <br />“Is that it,” says Jack, pointing straight ahead towards a black Civic.<br /> <br />“No, it’s that one.” Alice gestures at a red Prelude that is older and, from a distance, seems even smaller than the Civic.<br /> <br />Up close it is definitely smaller than the Civic. With a bit of manoeuvring and rearranging, they get the luggage loaded in the car and drive out of the parking lot, Alice in the front and Jack in the back, an arm resting on his suitcase in the seat next to him. They get onto the road that circles the outskirts of the city and drive with the traffic for a while and then turn right at an intersection, onto the highway. They drive faster and faster. The wind whistles through the open passenger window, whipping across Jack’s face in the back. It is late afternoon. Alice lights a cigarette, smokes it and passes it to her friend while they talk. Around them there is nothing but dry, cut fields and a dull cloud-filled sky. Jack looks around at it and is bored and goes to sleep leaning on the piece of luggage. <br /> <br />When he wakes up they are parked on a street with houses and trees and sidewalk on either side. <br /> <br />“Want to come in?” says Alice. “I’m just stopping in to pick up the key from my mom. She’s sick. She has swine flu.”<br /> <br />“Oh.”<br /> <br />The girls go on ahead. Jack stretches out and sighs and shakes himself back into life. He gets out of the car and walks toward the house. Inside, next to the door, a man is sitting topless at a computer. It is Alice’s mom’s boyfriend. He has a moustache and thinning hair. He is also sick. <br /> <br />“So your flight got in OK?”<br /><br />“Yes.”<br /><br />“Come back to join the good Christians?”<br /> <br />“That’s right,” Jack says. “Get away from those Heathens on the west coast.” There is a silence. Jack doesn’t know what is going on, what he is saying. He probably fucked up. It’s just like being in school. There is uneasy laughter. Jack looks down, looks at the door. They talk a bit more and he dismisses Jack. He goes into the kitchen. Alice’s mom and Tina are sitting around a table, while Alice paces around. <br /> <br />Alice’s mother is catching her up on what she’s missed since she’s been away. They are talking back and forth. Tina sits and looks at them and doesn’t say anything. Jack says hi to Alice’s mom and then walks over to the sink and pours a glass of water and stands there drinking the water and doesn’t say anything.<br /> <br />They say goodbye and get back in the car and drive away.<br /> <br />They are driving along a cliff road and to their right is a valley with lots of tall, thick evergreens stretching out far and wide. A river cuts through the middle of them.<br /> <br />“Remember this place?” says Jack.<br /> <br />“I sure do. This is where we spent that summer the first time you came back. In that house on Carter Street with little Gracie and Hank the dog.” She turns to her friend. “The house overlooked the valley and everyday we would go walk the dog down there.”<br /> <br />“A simpler time,” says Jack.<br /> <br />“Liar.” Alice turns to the backseat and smiles at Jack. They both laugh.<br /> <br />They take a few more turns and park outside a house where people are sitting outside. On the stoop an old woman is smoking. As they approach the house a girl opens the front door and a small child with only a diaper on comes scampering out. <br /> <br />“Elijah!”<br /> <br />Alice goes running over to him. Alice goes up the cement stairs and scoops up the child and swings him from side to side. She puts him down and hugs the girl. It’s her sister. Her sister’s boyfriend, Elijah’s dad, is sitting next to them. Alice’s sister sits down on the stoop beside him and Jack comes up and says hi to her and sits down. He looks at her and notices she looks different somehow. Lost weight, maybe, or…<br /> <br />“You look good,” says Jack. “You cut your hair.”<br /> <br />“Thanks. Yeah, I was going for something extreme.”<br /> <br />“I know all about that,” says Jack, rubbing a hand over his stubbly head.<br /> <br />“When did you do that?”<br /> <br />“This morning before we left. I was in the bathroom trying to smooth out the patches and Alice was banging on the door saying the shuttle was outside waiting for us. We thought they might leave without us. It was way exciting.”<br /> <br />“So how was it?” Alice’s sister is now addressing Alice.<br /> <br />“I loved it. I wish I could have stayed longer than ten days.”<br /><br />Alice looks over at Elijah who is staring at her, elevated to eye level with her by the stairs. “But how could I stay away from you. Yeah, how could I.” He smiles and giggles, touching his hands to his head. He looks over at everyone and everything and smiles and giggles, his pale pudgy face full of innocence and joy. He starts down the stairs, backwards, and then starts running off down the sidewalk.<br /> <br />“Could you go after him?” Alice’s sister says to Alice.<br /> <br />Elijah cuts into the backyard, playing around near a hedge, and Alice goes over to him and together they play and run around. They come back over to the others. The child has a mischievous smile now, like he knows something the others don’t and is basking in his secret knowledge, flaunting it. <br /><br />Alice’s sister invites them over later, once they’re unpacked and settled. Alice and Jack start to walk away, saying goodbye to everyone. They go back to the car. Tina sits in the driver’s seat, waiting. They get in and drive away. They drive out of the neighbourhood and cross a bridge, loop around a turn that slopes down and goes into a long straight strip of road, leading to the downtown. On their right are the train tracks that run under the bridge. To their left a succession of car dealerships line the street and hide the crumbling, faded buildings that lurk behind them. There is dust everywhere. At the set of the lights up ahead the road is blocked off and they have to turn left at the street before it. <br /> <br />“Goddamnit. Fucking parade,” says Tina. “How are we supposed to get across?”<br /><br />The old buildings become more visible as they drive into the center of town. They pass through a series of lights and at each look for a chance to turn right but all the streets are blocked off. They drive up a hill and down a narrow street with trees growing over and behind them old-style homes. Porches, brick and hardwood. They get to the top of the hill and are finally able to take a right turn at the Burger King and cross Main Street and drive into a parking lot past the local Civic Centre. The Civic Centre is shaped like a giant half-pipe and is surrounded by a line-up of classic cars and horses ridden by men with red fezzes. <br /><br />They turn out at the other end of the parking lot and start back downhill so that they’ve driven in a J with an elongated hook and then turn at the next intersection, drive past the high school Alice and Jack attended and park in the driveway at the house on the corner. They unload the luggage from the car and haul it inside. <br /> <br />Through the first set of doors is a hallway and at the end of it is two doors, one straight ahead, leading into the backyard, and the other, on the right, into the house.<br /> <br />Alice tells Jack he can put his stuff in the basement and he goes down a narrow set of stairs with green carpeting and short steps. He almost trips over himself with the heavy luggage and at the bottom drops the luggage and looks around at the place he’ll be staying while in town. The walls are all wood paneling, divided into compartments for bathroom, bedroom and laundry. There is an old patterned couch in the middle of the room and piles of clothes and towels, in bags and out in the open, strewn about everywhere. There is also a child’s kitchen set and a few pieces of furniture, end tables and a coffee table, scattered about, in no particular arrangement.<br /> <br /> Jack walks into the back bedroom. The ceiling is so low it almost touches his head and a couple of the florescent lights flicker and hum nervously like in a morgue. On the ground in the room is a lamp that’s not plugged in, surrounded by an empty cigarette pack, candy bar wrappers and some pens without ink. In one corner of the room is a piece of furniture that is completely empty accept for the four, five empty bottles of hard liquor on top and a worn copy of Playboy sitting on a shelf. An empty box that once held a hi-def flatscreen TV takes up most of the space in the center of the room.<br /> <br />Jack observes the area without registering a reaction. <br /><br />He sniffs, scratches the side of his nose. There is a stale, sour smell in the air. Of rotting wood. Jack looks around and, at the far end, near the stairway, notices a couple stains on the walls. He goes back upstairs.<br /> <br />In the kitchen Alice is telling her friend stories from her trip and showing her pictures she’d taken. <br /><br />“And Hogan was such a good dog. I wanted to take him back with me so bad. But I don’t think Jack’s landlord would have approved though.”<br /><br />Jack pours a water and sits on the kitchen counter and listens to them talk without saying anything and then gets down and walks across the house into the front porch. He stands looking out the window, then sits down still looking out the window. Out the window, across the street, is the back of their old high school, with smoker’s alley straight across from the door. Jack has only a few memories from going there because he dropped out after a year-and-a-half because he had a nervous breakdown, though he didn’t know that’s what it was at the time. He didn’t know what was going on. Still doesn’t. <br /><br />Live and learn. What a bunch of clichéd bullshit, Jack thinks.<br /><br />For most of that year-and-a-half Jack smoked a lot of pot and doesn’t remember much from it now. He remembers he stopped after the first year and that’s when the problems started. Jack’s memory is mostly blackness after that, broken, jagged, impressionistic. When Jack started going back to school again, after a year or more, they put him in a class with a bunch of girls who either were pregnant or had been pregnant and had had their kids. Jack hadn’t been pregnant. But he was stupid and confused and searching for something. <br /><br />It was around that time he started hanging around with Alice again. They had gone to the same elementary school together but only knew each other through other people. Then when he started going back to school he was reintroduced to her through Jack’s only other friend he stayed in contact with. They started hanging out a lot together, the three of them, then just the two of them, and that’s when Jack’s friend got jealous and he and Jack stopped being friends. Alice and Jack stayed friends. It was a fair trade off. <br /><br />It was eight years later and Jack and Alice had just spent two weeks together just the two of them for the first time since that time. Life is cyclical, running on a continuous loop that seems to be moving only and always forward because of the illusion of time, of work weeks and weekends, waking and dreaming, meals and movie release dates. Parents and children. Birth and death.<br /><br />Jack goes back into the house and finds Alice moving around unpacking things. Her friend has left.<br /><br />“What’s the plan for tonight?” Jack says. He doesn’t really care but needs something to say.<br /><br />“I just got a text from your sister. She’s coming over after she gets off work.”<br /><br />“OK.”<br /><br />Jack goes back to the porch and reads a book. Alice joins him. She has a book with her also. She sits down, opens the book and reads the first sentence when, suddenly, there’s a knock at the door.<br /><br />“Who the fuck is this?” Jack says as he walks back into the kitchen to meet her, the words falling effortlessly, automatically from his mouth. He doesn’t know what he’s saying. Jack’s sister works at the Chillers’ bar. He feels bad when he sees the bottle of whiskey she brought for him. Jack loves his sister but she can be a real cold bitch sometimes. They haven’t seen each other since last Christmas and right now things are good between them. Another clean slate. They make up drinks and go sit in the porch.<br /><br />Jack notices his sister has lost weight. She is very tan and has straight dark hair down past her shoulders.<br /><br />Alice tells Jack’s sister stories from her trip. She talks about how it was “just what she needed” and how she feels “rejuvenated.” Jack shows her pictures of people she might remember who had either lived here or had visited. <br /><br />“Neal looks different.”<br /><br />“He got older. It happens.”<br /> <br />“Maybe. But it’s more than that.”<br /> <br />“Probably.”<br /> <br />“Oh, so this guy came in the other night. You might remember him. He was asking about you. He said he knew you. J.J. Hofner.”<br /> <br />“I remember. I went to school with him.”<br /> <br />“I wrote his number down somewhere. He was pretty out of it. He had a chipped tooth. Looking around, not focusing on anything, all like in a daze.”<br /> <br />“He was always kind of a weird guy. Fun guy. But weird. Last I heard he was way into the heavy stuff. Crystal Meth and all that.”<br /> <br />“Him and a bunch of guys we knew,” says Alice, “like Richard Fardo, Ben Kundie, on and on. They’re all fucked now. And J.J. most of all. I heard that at a party a girl had passed out and they busted in on him jerking off with a hand down her pants. Yep, J.J.’s fucked. He’s going to wind up a fucking pedophile.”<br /> <br />They all three of them have a drink. <br /> <br />It’s gone dark outside. They talk for a while. Then someone else is at the door. Its Jack’s other sister. She comes in and gives Jack a hug. He offers to get her a drink but she declines. The next day she is writing her next to last final and graduating from high school after that. She is not sure what she is going to do after that. She dances, works part-time at a spa. Jack recommends to her that she go to university but is careful not to push it on her since he didn’t start going to university until a few years after he graduated. She can figure it out for herself. Like he did. Though, thinking back on it, he was never sure what happened that made him decide to go back. Secondary education is fucked. But so is everything else.<br /> <br />Jack’s younger sister goes to put on her grad dress she brought along with her and comes back and shows it off for the girls. It is a purple-gray color that frills out around the chest and shoulders. It is medium-short in the front and medium long in the back. Jack takes up his drink and observes his life happening in front of him. He thinks everything is all right.<br /> <br />Everyone accept for Jack’s younger sister has another drink and then his sister leaves to meet a friend whose birthday it is to have more drinks with. <br /> <br />Jack has only had two drinks but is already quite drunk. This always happens when he drinks after flying. He likes it. It is a dizzy drunk. He drinks a tall glass of water and pours another glass of whiskey and coke. He goes back to the patio and sits across from Alice. Alice is texting. Jack has a sip of his drink. She looks up.<br /> <br />“Do you know Steve Guy?”<br /> <br />“No.”<br /><br />“Oh. Well I just got a text from Don. There’s a bunch of people over at his place. I thought we could go over there. They’re all musicians and so maybe we could have a few drinks and then you guys could get something going. If you want to go?”<br /> <br />Jack says OK. There’s really nothing else for him to say. Alice goes and gets ready. Jack finishes his drink.<br /> <br />They’re walking away from Alice’s down a dark street. They pass a couple ballparks and then cross a set of train tracks into East End. Jack looks over at Alice. He feels like he’s in a movie or something. Like something’s about to happen but he’s not sure what. <br /> <br />“You didn’t bring anything to drink you.”<br /> <br />“I’m good,” says Jack. Jack thinks that that was a strange thing to say but so was what she said maybe. <br /> <br />They turn down a block into a neighbourhood. Across the street, on the corner, a guy holding a bottle in either hand in talking and motioning to a girl. Jack watches them but doesn’t say anything and follows Alice across the street to a house with a bunch of cars parked in front of it. They walk up the path toward the door. Loud heavy metal is coming out of the open window. It’s the Iron Maiden song “Cannot Play with Madness” and the guys inside are singing along to the chorus all out of key and out of time. Alice knocks on the door and then enters. Jack follows behind her. In the room to their left six, seven guys and one girl are sitting around a coffee table. The coffee table is covered in empties. Everyone is crammed onto two couches and one guy sits apart from them on a chair yelling and singing loudest of all. A couple people look over at the new people but nobody says anything. Alice and Jack stand there. Jack leans against the door frame and looks around the room. On one wall is a Pulp Fiction flag, on another is a poster of Dimebag Darrell. Underneath the poster is a small bookshelf filled with back issues of Guitar World. Hanging from the ceiling is a plastic copy of a Zack Wylde custom bullseye guitar and next to that, positioned in a wall mount is a Jackson flying-V. The room is darkly lit with colored bulbs and the glow from the menu screen of a Pantera DVD on the television. Jack thinks to himself that this would be the coolest room ever if he was still seventeen.<br /> <br />The guy in the chair, who Jack takes to be Steve Guy, finally looks over at the newly-arrived guests. He is sweating heavily and smiling and holding a beer near his face.<br /> <br />“Hey Alice. And who’s this other guy?”<br /> <br />“This is Jack.”<br /> <br />Steve waves at Jack. A few others look over. <br /> <br />Jack waves back at them like an idiot as they make their silent judgements.<br /> <br />Steve starts to say something looks away trails off chuckles something to himself then takes a drink of his beer.<br /> <br />Alice and Jack continue to stand there. Alice turns back to Jack and says something about it being muggy in there and makes a start toward the door. Jack follows her outside. He sits down beside her on the steps. <br /> <br />“Well they sure seem like a friendly bunch.”<br /> <br />“I didn’t know who any of those other people there besides Steve. Don was supposed to be here. He texted me that he went to pick up beer and would be right back. We’ll wait here until he gets back and then see what’s going on.”<br /> <br />“OK.”<br /> <br />The Iron Maiden continues to blare out the window. On the sidewalk a house or two over the guy and girl are still having it out. The guy starts toward the house with the girl slowly coming up behind him. Jack is able to make him out as they approach the light of the doorstep. He has tattoos running up his neck, with a shaved head and scruffy, dark, unshaven face. He is wearing a BLS t-shirt the same as Jack owns. Alice and Jack are blocking his way to the house. Jack gets up and lets him by. The guy doesn’t say anything to either of them. The girl follows. She is wearing a black-and-white checkered dress and has dark hair, dark features. She walks past them with her head hung. As soon as they pass into the house Alice stands up and walks down the steps and starts across the street without saying anything. Jack follows her. <br /> <br />They walk back to Alice’s. <br /> <br />Back at her house Alice starts making up food from out of the freezer. She asks Jack if he’s going to have another drink. Jack is only a little drunk. He decides to have another drink. <br /> <br />“I’m going to start drinking again. Right after I eat. I haven’t eaten all day.”<br /> <br />Jack sits down in a chair with his drink. He watches Alice move back and forth while making up food. He takes a sip of his drink. It doesn’t take him long to start feeling drunk again. He watches Alice. He likes looking at Alice. He likes what she’s wearing. She’s wearing a tight pair of jeans, stylishly frayed and tattered, a tight, dirty white tank top and a matching cap. She gets up on the counter to reach something in one of the upper cupboards. She is bent slightly forward and her ass is eye level with Jack. Then she gets down and goes over to the stove that’s next to Jack to turn on a burner and puts on a pot. Jack wants to tell her he thinks she looks gorgeous. She gets some sticks of spaghetti and breaks them up into the pot and puts a cover on it. He is about to tell her but then doesn’t. What’s the point, he thinks. It’s not going to lead to anything. It can’t. But that doesn’t change how I feel. There’s nothing wrong with saying how you feel. Alice puts a Tupperware container of frozen meat in the microwave and punches some numbers. This is fucked, thinks Jack. Jack sips his drink.<br /> <br />The pot with the spaghetti starts to boil over. Jack gets up and turns down the heat. He is confused because the numbers for the burner level are reversed. The spaghetti stops boiling.<br /> <br />When the food is ready they go into the patio. Alice eats hungrily. <br /> <br />“This is the first time I’ve eaten since that bagel at the Vancouver Airport,” she says between mouthfuls.<br /> <br />She puts the plate down. She says, “There, I am totally full.” She picks the plate back up, eats what’s left.<br /> <br />“I think I’m going to clean up and go to bed soon. I’ve got to be up early for when Dennis brings Gracie over.”<br /> <br />Jack looks down at his drink. He’d lost interest in it anyway.<br /> <br />They take the plates and glasses from earlier back into the kitchen. Alice turns on the tap to fill the sink. <br /> <br />“I think I’m going to go figure out this bed situation,” Jack says.<br /> <br />“OK. That couch down there is a pullout. So you can use that.”<br /> <br />Downstairs, Jack plays with the couch. He sees how the bottom section, the part you sit on, lifts up, but can’t figure out how to flatten the back out into a bed. Fuckit, he says. He decides to make due with it as is. The couch is very small and doesn’t have cushions or armrests. It’s hard. It’s like a box. A rectangular box. He moves one of the end tables over beside it. He goes and gets the lamp from the bedroom and puts it on the end table and plugs it in. He grabs a couple pillows and a thin blanket off one of the laundry piles and throws it on the couch. He takes off his t-shirt, tries to position himself in a semi-comfortable way on the couch. He picks up his book and reads.<br /> <br />Upstairs Alice is still getting things unpacked. There is a knock at the door and Don comes in. Don and Alice had dated over the winter. Don apologizes for the lame scene over at Steve’s. He tells her about a party that weekend that they should check out, her and Jack, that won’t be so lame, have people they know there, good music, drink. Alice invites him in. She puts Sigur Ros on the stereo. They hang out in the kitchen. Alice tells Don stories from her trip. They hang out and talk for a couple hours.<br /> <br />In the basement, after reading for a while Jack went to sleep but was woken up by the talking and the bass from the music. He wakes up disoriented and groggy. Jack lies there with the noise swirling around in his head like in an echo chamber. <br /> <br />He lies there for a while then gets up and goes to the bathroom and gets a glass of water and goes back to the couch. He snacks on something he brought in his backpack and drinks the water and tries to go back to sleep. He stares at the light from the streetlamp coming in the two small windows near the ceiling. He turns and adjusts himself but the small couch limits his movements. Then when he hears Don leave he gets up, wrapped in his thin blanket, and goes upstairs. Alice is in the bathroom getting ready for bed. The door is open. <br /> <br />“There anywhere else I can sleep?”<br /> <br />“Sure. You can go sleep in Grace’s room.”<br /> <br />Her bedroom is to his immediate right and without saying anything he goes and flops down on the bed, bashing his head on of the toys arranged on the pillow. He ignores it.<br /> <br />“Was something wrong with the couch?” Alice says from the bathroom.<br /> <br />“Yes. No. I don’t know. It was a combination of things.”<br /><br />“Just so you know, she’s going to be here at eight so there’s going to be a four year old running in and out of there.<br /><br />Jack grunts and raises himself off the bed, still wrapped in the blanket. He shuffles in the porch and closes the doors behind him. He looks over the different options. He decides on the lounge chair at the far end. He stretches out on it, positions the two small soft pillows under his head and falls asleep.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-66823762567663859012010-11-27T12:43:00.001-08:002010-11-27T12:43:36.796-08:00Noon the next day and Jack is slumped on the curb next to Alice’s driveway reading a book. He’s waiting for Alice to get back with her mom’s car. She had gotten a ride with Grace’s dad.<br /><br />“I’m just going to grab a shower and then I’ll be ready to go after that,” he’d said to Alice as she walked out the door.<br /><br />The sun is high in the sky and burning down Jack’s neck. The heat is so thick it’s almost visible, like a paste or pie filling. A few kids walk past on their way to afternoon classes. A yellow jeep SUV pulls up to the curb close to Jack. He keeps reading. <br /><br />One o’clock rolls around and finally Alice pulls into the driveway. Jack gets up and walks towards the car, but when he goes to open the passenger door to get in Alice turns off the engine, gets out and starts walking towards the house.<br /><br />“I thought we were going as soon as you got back?” says Jack, still standing beside the car.<br /><br />“I have to get ready first. I can’t go anywhere like this,” she shouts back before disappearing into the house.<br /><br />“We’re just getting groceries, I thought,” says Jack, but there’s no one around to hear it. Only the sound of the passing traffic. <br /><br />“I’ll be waiting out back when you’re ready to go,” Jack calls into the house and steps out onto the little back patio.<br /> <br />The small, well-shaded yard is bunched in by a tall, dark bush. Off the deck, to the left, is a small shed and scattered on the lawn is a hose and a red plastic kiddie pool. Jack takes a seat and passes the time reading a little and staring at nothing. At a quarter to two he gives up and goes to check her progress. Next to the door is a pair of sandals that Jack notices weren’t there before and he can hear voices coming from inside. He can make out Tina’s voice. Jack walks down the hallway and out the side door.<br /> <br />He walks around the side of the house and crosses the street, still with his book in his hand—by some Southern writer or other, writing vaguely autobiographical tales of booze and women and loneliness. That is, life’s bitter essentials.<br /> <br />He walks past the school, crosses the street at the four-way, past the dirty apartments and keeps going in the direction of Main Street. He’s not sure where he’s going, but he’s hungry, he knows that. He passes the red brick Pizza Hut and starts walking up Main. The traffic whooshes past as he climbs and climbs, out of the downtown. At the top of the hill he stops at the lights, next to the fire station. He stands on the edge of the curb, and sways back and forth, surrounded by all that motorized metal coming at him from all directions. If he concentrates on it all for too long he fears it could cause him vertigo or something, so instead and stands there and blocks it all out, all incoming stimulus, as a counter measure. But then when the lights change and he starts to cross there they all are on either side of him growling and panting, twitching with anticipation for the light to change. He crosses as quick and calmly as he can and then darts across another street without waiting for a cross signal, walking straight up to the entrance of a convenient store. He goes in.<br /> <br />The store is cold. It is a fairly new store. Sleek. Jack has never been in it before, he doesn’t think. Maybe one night last Christmas when he was drunk, he can’t be certain. He is greeted by a cardboard display of a generically attractive blond woman in a bikini urging him with her bland sexuality to buy some brand of energy drink. Past her, a series of little display booths are setup seemingly at random all over the store, forming a kind of obstacle course, only that you’re meant to be drawn towards the objects not away from them.<br /> <br />At the far side of the store is a sandwich station. Jack goes over, waits in line and orders a turkey and ham sandwich. The young Indian guy working behind the counter asks him if he would like extra turkey and/or ham. “Just what you’re giving me,” says Jack. Then he asks if he would like extra cheese. “No thanks,” says Jack. Waiting in line to pay, the guy working the till is all smiles and professional courtesy to the customer ahead of Jack. “And you have yourself a great day,” he enunciates perfectly to him, beaming. Then as the customer walks away and Jack steps up to pay the guy working the till, a guy around thirty bland handsomeness of a car dealer or chartered accountant, goes to the back area where Jack can hear him say, “What an asshole.” Jack smiles at the Indian guy as he pays him with Interact. And when he says, “Have a nice day,” Jack mumbles to him, “Yeah, right” and walks to the other side of the store, where, by the window, there are tables and chairs and a counter. <br /> <br />He eats hungrily, to the point of momentarily getting a segment of cucumber or tomato stuck in his throat that has to be worked down with gulps of water from a paper cup. Jack finishes, throws out the wrapper and starts for the door. He doubles back and grabs a couple nut bars off the shelf of a nearby booth, pays for them, and then leaves. <br /> <br />He walks back downtown, passing a Presbyterian church, a Blockbuster and a Tim Hortons along the way. Where to? It’s still early in the afternoon. He has the whole day ahead of him. He thinks about going back to Alice’s to see where she’s at in her getting ready. But there’s something that keeps him walking downtown, something about the novelty about being back in town. Like he’s the outsider, observing everything going on, at a distance, without being a part of it. Present but not. Uncommitted. So Jack keeps walking. But where to?<br /> <br />He’s standing at the lights on the corner by the 7Eleven. Across the street to his left will take him back to Alice’s but instead he goes right, down the block. He cuts up the street, across from the other high school, the one his sisters attended, and then turns right again at the Post Office. Across the street is Lesley’s house. It is almost right next door to the Tim Hortons. He had met Lesley the summer before. Although they had briefly gone to the same high school, they had never met before. Lesley had been a couple grades lower than Jack, but the years have a way of bringing people together. They met at a local music & arts festival where Lesley was selling some of her paintings. After the music and drinking that followed, Jack ended up trailing her back to her house that night like a lost puppy. They sat up in her studio drinking wine and eating nuts and salad. Jack was so nervous he took too big a bite of salad without chewing thoroughly enough and started choking. He was sitting there unable to swallow and she was asking him if everything was OK. “Fine, fine,” Jack tried to say but the words came out as a whisper. He brought her a glass of water but when he drank from it the water just sat in his throat and he went into the bathroom and let it spill out. He started heaving, eventually bringing the obstruction up. He looked in the sink where an unchewed hunk of cucumber, covered in a slimy translucent film, sat next to the drain. Jack had a wheeze in his breath the rest of the night and the next day, which he spent entirely with Lesley.<br /><br />They had been in sporadic contact, entirely online, since he last saw her at Christmas and hadn’t told her of his coming back. This’ll surprise her, Jack thinks. Being away for six months and then suddenly showing up at her door. It’ll be romantic, or something. He crosses the street. He walks up to her house and goes up the stone steps into the porch. Jack is excited. He is acting spontaneously. His anticipation to see the look on her face helps to minimize the intense, almost overwhelming anxiety he feels as he knock on the door.<br /> <br />He looks around the porch as he waits. A few open cans of open paint are set out giving the area that tart chemical smell. A moment later her mom answers the door. She is a frumpy woman and is wearing a long brown shirt that has a stain on it. Her brown hair is messed like she was still in the getting out of bed stage of her day.<br /> <br />“Hi, is Lesley home?”<br /><br />“No, no she’s out for coffee.”<br /><br />“Did she say what time she’ll be back?”<br /><br />“No. But it should be soon. She’s leaving for Graniteville at four and still needs to pack.”<br /><br />Jack smiles with a look of concern that approximates hers.<br /><br />“Well, when you see her, could you mention I stopped by.” Jack takes off his sunglasses. “It’s me, Jack. I just got back in town yesterday.”<br /><br />“Oh.”<br /><br />Having been so long since they were last together, Jack isn’t really sure where he stands with her. He doesn’t know if she heard about Alice’s coming out to visit him, and if she does, if she even cares. This might be why he’s got it in his head that she might be pissed at him, though he has no real evidence. The only thing he has to go on is a long rambling email he sent her, about a month ago, that never got a reply. But then again Jack always gets nervous when his emails or messages or comments get no response from the other party. “I finally did it,” he thinks, “I stepped over the line; I freaked them out good this time. They’ve finally found me out; no matter how I try to hide it, those naked words on the screen, spewed out of my fuzz-addled brain, show, beyond a doubt, just how insane I really am. Now they know. Fuck.” So now he tries to read into her mom’s reactions, gestures, tone of voice, anything, anything at all that would give him a clue as to Lesley’s current feelings about him, this insane person standing here on her porch. For a minute he thinks he picks up on something, an agitation, some negative vibe, but then realizes it is only her wanting to finish with him so she can close the door and be left alone that is not being well concealed. Jack is not insane, in her eyes, only a vacuum cleaner salesman, a Jehovah’s Witness. <br /><br />“Maybe I’ll just give her a call. I think I still remember the number.”<br /><br />She looks at him blankly, nervously. It’s the complete opposite of an interrogation. The door starts to shut slowly. Only her head is sticking out now. They both look at each other, saying nothing. Jack can’t think of anything more to add. He turns to leave.<br /><br />“OK. Thanks. Bye.”<br /><br />She shuts the door.<br /><br />Jack puts his sunglasses back on, walks out of the half-painted porch and down the stairs.<br /><br />The afternoon heat is at its peak as Jack walks down Main Street. He looks around at the same old buildings, the same old streets. Nothing’s changed. What am I doing here? he thinks vaguely. His lazy stroll picks up, turns into a brisk walk. He has the sudden need to see a familiar face. He decides that he must find Lesley. Her mom said she was leaving at four for the weekend. That gives him just over an hour to find her. He needs to see her before she leaves. He takes a long look in at the window of the coffee shops along the way, peering in trying to make out the faces through the reflected glare. No Lesley. He turns down High Street and stops at the building next to the bakery. It’s a fitness center but above it is where Frank lives. He tries the door to Frank’s side of the building but it’s locked. Taped to the window on the door is a homemade poster promoting an “experimental” music show scheduled for the next week. <br /><br />Jack walks back down Main Street and stop at the last coffee shop on the block, Bean There. The tint of the glass is too dark to see inside very well so he goes inside. He looks around. No Lesley. Jack decides to get a coffee while he’s there. He orders, pays, and goes out a side door to an outdoor sitting area. He sits at an empty picnic table. He reads a couple pages of his book while waiting for the coffee to cool.<br /><br />A couple guys come out the door with iced lattes and sit at a table next to Jack. They’re a couple of burly guys, dressed almost identical in sandals, navy blue shorts and polo shirts, and one of the guys starts talking to the other about his business. His voice increases as he gets going on whatever it is he’s talking about and Jack has to put his book down. It has something to do with recreational services or something, Jack can’t really tell. He’s trying not to pay attention but, regardless, feels like he’s stepped into a business meeting or “power lunch” where one guy comes in with his rehearsed spiel that he’s already given to a bunch of potential clients and investors and interested parties a hundred times before. Jack hears this thing all the time on campus when upper level students start talking about their plans for how they’re going to use their degree once graduated, elaborating at length, with all the little details and specifics, always in that composed confident tone, as if their futures are set and uncertainty has been banished to the wolves. It’s at times like these when they’re in their element. When their existence is brought into focus with needle-point precision, worry, fear, doubt and all the rest be damned. Hearing talk like this, of career aspirations and ambitions, Jack has a hard time relating it to his own university experience, which so far, after three years, has meant a lot of trips back-and-forth between his apartment and campus, uncomfortable classroom encounters and semester long bouts of insomnia. He still isn’t entirely sure how to write a proper essay.<br /><br />Another man comes over and stops the guy in the middle of this and asks him if that’s his SUV parked out front. When he tells him it is he replies that the meter has expired.<br /><br />“Well, shoot, we were only going to be a couple more minutes, hang on a sec, Ted, let me…”<br /><br />“Oh, don’t worry about it,” the man says, “I took care of it. I bought you some time.”<br /><br />The guy, who was starting to get out of his seat, sits back down and thanks the man. He turns back to the other guy. “So, I was saying, it’s all about finding the right group of people who understand your needs as a…”<br /><br />Jack downs the rest of his cooling coffee, picks up, and puts boots to concrete.<br /><br />But he’s run out of coffee shops. And out of Main Street for that matter. Time is ticking. He needs to contact Lesley. He needs a phone. He doesn’t have a phone but knows someone close by who does.<br /><br />His sister lives on the South side of town, across the Sakami River. He fancies the idea of “popping in to see her,” the novelty, just like the town itself in this early returning stage. Jack walks along the sidewalk off the One Way that juts out and curves up a slight hill. Before the hill starts to ascend Jack stops at the bridge to look at the blue-green water. He looks past it, up the bank, where a train of about fifteen, twenty cars is stopped on the tracks. Beyond them the old ugly buildings of the downtown puncture the clear faded sky like a line-up of dirty syringes. <br /><br />When he gets to his sister’s house the doors are all locked and there’s no one home. So much for that, Jack thinks, and starts back across the river. By now it’s well past three. He passes an old man under the bridge that supports the train tracks and nods at him. The old man looks at Jack. His wide eyes and open hanging mouth give his wrinkled, leathery face the expression of possessing something akin to pure, abject terror. But at what exactly? Jack thinks. The noise from the flock of pigeons nesting in the overhead girders can be heard all around him: a cluster of hooing that echoes out in grim cadence; the amplified violence of a dozen wings flapping at once. Jack walks along. The coolness of the shade, in contrast to the sterile heat, wraps around his skin and locks into his veins.<br /><br />Back out in the sun, Jack backtracks down Main Street and winds up back at Frank’s door, between the bakery and the fitness centre. This time the door is unlocked and he takes the stairs up to Frank’s loft. He knocks on the door and a familiar voice calls out, “Come on in.” <br /><br />Frank meets Jack in the kitchen. They greet each other, shake hands. <br /><br />“Hey man. You’re back. How long you in town for.”<br /><br />“I’m not sure yet. A couple weeks, a month. We’ll see. I’m staying at Alice’s in the meantime.”<br /><br />Frank is 65 and made of iron and tar. Jack met Frank through Alice and Bobby a few years back, when he still lived in town and Frank was living in a small apartment on the same street four, five blocks down. They would go over at night when there was nothing going on or after the bars had bummed them out and they would listen to Frank, always puffing on an endless rolled cigarette, read from his poetry, which was all from memory, and tell stories from his years of wandering from one coast to the other and even traveling to places way down south. When he would give readings like this to the small group that had assembled, his voice, which ordinarily was gravelly and deep from decades and decades of cigarettes and bourbon, filled with a wonder that was part show and part communion with some other presence that had joined them there in the room. These readings, at there best, when he really got into them and was almost taken over, became hypnotic, calming affairs. That was one of the reasons Jack kept coming back. That—and he was also a great pot connection when Jack was still into that.<br /><br />“So. Can I use your phone?”<br /><br />“Go ahead.”<br /><br />Jack sits done on the padded bench by the window punches in a number on the phone on the counter, next to the wall.<br /><br />It rings and rings. The voicemail cuts in. Jack leaves a message and hangs up.<br /><br />“Have you heard from Lesley?” he asks Frank.<br /><br />“Yeah. Matter of fact, she’s supposed to be coming over any time to pick up a couple tables for the weekend.”<br /><br />There is the sound of footsteps on the stairs.<br /><br />“That must be her now.”<br /><br />The door opens. There’s a voice that greets Frank and then Lesley appears from behind the open door. <br /><br />“Hey Jack,” she says, sliding around the door and past the counter to give him a hug.<br /><br />And just like that he had what he wanted, Lesley there standing before him, and the vague fear that had occupied the back of his mind was coming true: He couldn’t think of what to say to her.<br /><br />She glances at the book he brought that’s sitting on the counter.<br /><br />“I tried reading that book you gave me. Didn’t make it very far.”<br /><br />“Don’t worry about it. A lot of English majors I know still haven’t got through it. I haven’t got through it.”<br /><br />At Christmas Jack gave Lesley a box of books for a new bookshelf she got. One of them was an old translation of “War and Peace.” He made a deal with her that if she finished it by the next time he saw her he would give her something or do something for her or take her out somewhere. He can’t remember want the deal was exactly, and now he’s off the hook.<br /><br />Frank leads her into the next room where the tables are. Jack follows them. <br /><br />“These should work good,” she was saying, inspecting the foldable tables. <br /><br />“You need a hand with those?” says Jack.<br /><br />“No, that’s OK. I got Wally to help. He’s parking the van. He should be up in a sec.”<br /><br />Jack is sitting on an old couch. Lisa sits down beside him. The sound she makes as she flops down indicates that it was well-earned.<br /><br />“Long day.”<br /><br />“Yeah. Been running around all morning, and the afternoon had to finalize the van rental. That turned out to be a lot more work than I was expecting. But that’s all taken care of and now there’s just some packing to be done. And then we’re off.”<br /><br />“Busy girl.”<br /><br />“Yeah, but it’s good. It’s a good opportunity to get some of my stuff out there, outside of this old bastard town.”<br /><br />“Yeah.”<br /><br />“How long are you back for.”<br /><br />“A while. Until they kick me out.”<br /><br />“OK. One of those deals.”<br /><br />“I don’t know. A month maybe. I just finished up some classes. I don’t know what’s going on. I’m glad I got to see you before you left.”<br /><br />“I got your email you sent a while back. I didn’t respond because never know how to reply to those things.”<br /><br />“That’s OK. Most don’t.”<br /><br />Frank comes back in from the kitchen.<br /><br />“I should have a joint here.”<br /><br />Neither Lisa nor Jack mentions his staying with Alice. They go into the kitchen and Frank lights up a joint. They pass the joint around. In the middle of this a guy comes in. Jack has never met him. His thin hair is pulled back into a ponytail and he has a long thick goatee and long thick sideburns. Probably to make up for the lack on top, Jack thinks. Lesley introduces them.<br /><br />“Jack, this is Wally. Wally, Jack.”<br /><br />“Well, this is always an apt way of meeting someone.”<br /><br />Jack takes a hit off the joint and passes it to Wally. He breathes out the smoke. “Yeah.”<br /><br />Before Wally takes the joint he puts a couple paper bags down on the counter. He has a toke from the joint and says, “I got all the essentials for the trip right here.” He passes the joint to Frank and starts going through the bags, pulling out cases of brownies, cinnamon buns, chocolate chip muffins and other decadent treats. <br /><br />“I’m not sure I’m going to be able to eat all that,” says Lesley.<br /><br />“Suit yourself,” says Wally, picking out a brownie from one of the plastic trays and shoving it in his mouth. He finishes it in two bites.<br /><br />Some time after the joint is finished Lesley says, “We better be a moseying.”<br /><br />Jack offers to help her move stuff outside, forgetting he already offered.<br /><br />“I think we can manage.”<br /><br />Lesley and Wally leave with the bags of treats and the tables and it is just Frank and Jack again. <br /><br />“I got something else we can smoke,” he says, pulling a tray off a shelf and placing it on the counter like a waiter in a restaurant presenting the main course. <br /><br />On the tray there is tobacco, rolling papers, little glass jars, a roach clip, and other paraphernalia. Frank opens a tin containing a brown chunk about eraser size. He brakes off a small portion and drops it in a glass pipe, passes it to Jack. <br /><br />They smoke the hash and then Frank tells Jack he should get going. “I got some people coming over to do a bit of business. They wouldn’t like it much if I had someone else here when they get here.”<br /><br />“I gotcha, I gotcha,” says Jack, about ready to be leaving anyway but unable to take the required step. They shake hands and Jack is down the stairs and out the door.<br /><br />He wanders down to the park. The early evening sun cuts through a row of trees as dusk approaches. Jack leans up against a tree and reads from the book he’s been caring around. He takes out the nut bar out of his pocket and eats it. Then he lies down in the grass and stares up at the cloudless sky. At the time Alice came out to visit Jack was finishing up a summer English class. The focus was on Eastern religion. A lot of the books Jack read talked about things like how to live an “authentic” life, based around “goodness” and ridding oneself of earthly “illusions” and seeing life “purely,” and learning to appreciate the sad, tragic beauty of human existence on this planet. One of the ways to do this, to live an authentic life that promotes goodness and honest understanding, is to mediate on the emptiness of the world, on the impermanence of all life. Jack stares up at the sky and tries to do nothing. He lies there and tries not to think about anything, his life, the people he knows, his insecurities, his prideful ambitions. To focus just on the naked sky above. But it is impossible. There is always something going on. Scouting out the next thing, weighing possible scenarios, possible futures to be lived. It is no use. And what about Alice? The question comes to him in a flash. He had left only meaning to get some lunch and now here it was after six. Maybe we can go out for supper, Jack thinks. Yes, that’s it, he’ll make it up to her by getting her supper. But make what up to her? All he did was not tell her where he was going, she was the one who got preoccupied with other things, other people. She can’t expect him to wait around all day. Can she? Waiting around for her had been something he had got used to as long as he’s known her, and he rarely if ever voiced complaint. A precedent had been set. What were the rules, the codes and procedures he should follow in such situations? In school he heard something about how if a teacher didn’t show up fifteen minutes after the bell rang for class the students were allowed to leave. Or was it twenty? He was thinking this and then became aware of the level of thinking he had reached and realized he was a long way from the kind of clear-minded do-nothing thinking he was shooting for. Well fuckit, he thinks, as he stands up and begins walking across the park and down a stone stairway, passing the amphitheatre on one side and the small waterfall on the other that runs into a stream circling the whole of the park. Up another stone stairway he goes and is back out on the street heading towards Alice’s house.<br /><br />When he gets inside Alice is moving back and forth between the kitchen and the bathroom. Her makeup is done up and she is wearing a black dinner dress. Jack leans against the counter, takes the earbuds from his iPod out, places them on the counter. <br /><br />“Hey,” says Jack. <br /><br />“Hey,” says Alice, coming back into the kitchen, her head down, not looking up at him.<br /><br />“Sorry for disappearing,” says Jack.<br /><br />“I was wondering what happened to you.”<br /><br />“What can I say? I’d been waiting awhile got hungry. The fridge doesn’t exactly have much to offer.”<br /><br />“That’s why I thought we were going to go do something about that.”<br /><br />“Yeah, I thought so too, but then I saw your friend over...”<br /><br />“Oh, Tina. She just popped in. Under her own volition.”<br /><br />“I see. Well, I wasn’t sure what was going on, so I split.”<br /><br />“I noticed. I wondered where you got to.”<br /><br />Jack starts to tell Alice everything that he did when he was out. She isn’t really paying attention, preoccupied with what she was getting ready for when Jack came in. She keeps bouncing around from room to room and Jack sort of half-follows her, trails her, as he talks. He gets to the part in the park and isn’t sure how to explain it to her but it doesn’t matter because she’s already halfway out the door.<br /><br />“I’m going out for supper,” she calls back, as if this explains everything.<br /><br />“OK,” says Jack, conciliatorily as the door closes behind her.<br /><br />“Guess she was a step or two ahead of me,” says Jack, looking around the kitchen uncertainly while scratching a spot behind his ear. He goes over to the fridge, opens it. Besides salad dressing and a few other condiments in the door compartment, the only other thing in sight is an open container of condensed soup broth and a container of yogurt, expiration unknown. <br /><br />Jack doesn’t want to find out. For something for supper Jack walks over to the 7Eleven and gets a bottle of strawberry and kiwi juice, a coke zero and a barbecued chicken pita. He walks back to the apartment.<br /><br />On the way he sees what he thinks to be his sister’s car, a black Honda Civic, stopped at the lights. Because of where he’s standing in relation to the sun’s reflection he can’t see into the car to see who’s driving but he waves anyway, a kind of tentative gesture. The lights change and the car drives ahead of him and turns into a parking lot. Approaching the car he can see that it is in fact his sister and gets in passenger side. <br /><br />“What are you doing?”<br /><br />“Getting supper. You?”<br /><br />“Nothing. What’s Alice doing?”<br /><br />“I don’t know. Went out. For supper. With someone. Didn’t really say.”<br /><br />“Oh. It’s probably Lyle.”<br /><br />“Lyle, right. I’ve heard about him.”<br /><br />“Have you two met?”<br /><br />“Nope. All’s I know is what I’ve heard.”<br /><br />“And what’s that.”<br /><br />“Let me think. This point, just his name, I guess.”<br /><br />“That’s not much.”<br /><br />“No. An abstraction, really. He’s whatever I want to make of him.”<br /><br />“He used to be her boss when she worked at the dealership.”<br /><br />“Oh, that’s right. I knew that. But that’s it. That’s it. Have you talked to her?”<br /><br />“She texted me this afternoon. Wondering where you were.”<br /><br />Jack explained what had happened, his waiting for Alice, Tina coming over and his deciding to leave.<br /><br />“That’s a little different than what she told me.”<br /><br />“Well, what can I tell you? That’s what happened.”<br /><br />“She told me she hopped in the shower and when she got out you were gone.”<br /><br />“Hmm. Fancy that.”<br /><br />While they were talking, his sister started driving, first pulling out of the parking lot and then, unsure of where he was headed, took a roundabout way to Alice’s, climbing the hill up Main, turning down a side street that led back down. They were now parked on the street next to Alice’s house.<br /><br />“So what are you doing now?”<br /><br />“I don’t know. It would seem I have the house for the night. In which case, there’s only one thing to do.”<br /><br />“Oh, yeah. What’s that?”<br /><br />“Throw a big-ass slammin kegger.”<br /><br />“Damn. And I have to work.”<br /><br />“Great, you can supply the keg.”<br /><br />“Right.”<br /><br />Jack’s sister gives Jack an incredulous look as he opens the door and starts to get out.<br /><br />“Right,” says Jack, resigned. And tapping the hood of the car he says, “Have a good one” and closes the door with a toss of his hand. He watches her drive away and then goes in the house.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-89588757178805814142010-11-27T12:35:00.004-08:002010-12-10T15:14:20.713-08:00It’s Saturday night. Jack is pacing around the house. He is alone. He has been alone all day. Alice stopped in briefly in the afternoon but only to pick up some things and then she left. Jack was lying on her bed when she got home and didn’t get up, only looked up at her from his book. They said hi to each other and she was quickly out the door. <br />
<br />
Jack spent the rest of the day reading on the bed, trying to read, that is, but mostly thinking of Alice. He didn’t want to but he couldn’t help it. He thought about Alice out with her boyfriend. He thought of the fun they were having together. He thought about how much he was thinking of her and how little she was probably thinking about him relation. This is the worst kind of loneliness. Other than this Jack enjoys having the house to himself. Jack is full of shit. Jack is anxious for something. Jack decides to go out.<br />
<br />
The sky is a dull gray, the fading sun shining weakly like a half-lit bulb. The air is warm and cold at the same time. Jack cuts through the park behind Alice’s, past the Casino, heading toward Frank’s. Across the street from Jack, the building next to Frank’s, is the Bus Depot. A blond girl leans against the side of the building, facing the street. She is smoking a cigarette. Jack crosses the road ahead of her, thinking of her watching him, and tries the door to Frank’s. It’s open and he goes upstairs.<br />
<br />
“Who’s there?” Frank calls from the living room. Jack walks in. Frank is lying out on the couch, half-asleep from a nap. The television is on. Jack watches it for a minute, through the static. It is “The Fifth Element.” Jack feels uncomfortable standing there, having woken Frank. He asks Frank if there’s anything going on tonight.<br />
<br />
“Maybe later on,” says Frank. “Some guys are supposed to be coming over.”<br />
<br />
“The Nerve Ending guys?”<br />
<br />
“No. Harry, Leo, and Shawn, maybe.”<br />
<br />
“In that case maybe I’ll check back later.”<br />
<br />
“OK. Do that.”<br />
<br />
Jack starts to leave. At the door he turns around.<br />
<br />
“Do you have Lea’s number?” he says to Frank, back in the living room. “I’ve meant to call her since I’ve been back but haven’t had her number.”<br />
<br />
Frank gives him the number. Jack asks to use Frank’s phone. Jack goes into the kitchen and dials but gets a busy signal. He goes back to the living room. He is unsure of what to do next. He says goodbye and leaves.<br />
<br />
Out on the street, Jack walks by the Bus Depot where the blond girl is still hanging out smoking. I should say something, Jack thinks. Jack walks past her without looking in her direction. I suck, thinks Jack. I need to be put down. Put out of my misery.<br />
<br />
He turns down the street between the Bus Depot and The Pub and keeps going. He walks through a parking lot and then turns up Main Street. He keeps walking and ends up back at Alice’s house.<br />
<br />
Jack stands in the dark, empty house. Now what? Jack picks up the phone and tries Lea again. This time it rings until the voicemail cuts in. On the spot, Jack leaves a message that goes through about three, four different tones of voice and ends with a self-deprecating remark. He hangs up. So much for that, he thinks. He throws the phone down on the bed and picks up a guitar. He plays a couple Radiohead songs and noodles around with some other stuff and then puts it down. He looks at the clock. It’s after ten. Lea hasn’t called back. He figures she is out or busy and decides to just stay in for the night. Jack is such a fucking loser. He puts on music. He doesn’t feel as anxious now as he did. He lies down on the bed. He’s not thinking of much of anything now. He picks up a book and reads. He reads two, three pages and then there’s a knock at the door. Jack looks up at the door but doesn’t move. Must be Alice and her boyfriend, he thinks. He doesn’t want to get up and answer it. There’s another knock. Jack doesn’t know what else to do so he gets up and answers it. <br />
<br />
It’s not Alice. At the door is Lea and behind her a guy he doesn’t recognize. They are standing in the doorway holding beers.<br />
<br />
When Jack fails to react, Lea reaches out and hugs him and they stand there in the dark until Jack invites them in and turns on a light. In the florescent glow of the kitchen Jack looks at the guy with Lea and realizes he knows him. They weren’t really friends but they knew and hung out with the same people in high school. He hasn’t seen him in four, five years. His name is Jay Bryan. He is dark and skinny. He has frizzy dark hair and mad gleaming eyes buried in deep worn sockets. Ragged-ass, Jack thinks. <br />
<br />
They’re all standing in the kitchen with the music playing in the next room. It is a weird psych-folk album. Jack was not expecting guests. He invites them into the front porch. They go ahead while he makes up a drink. He goes into the porch.<br />
<br />
“How long are you back for?”<br />
<br />
“I don’t know. As long as it takes, I guess.”<br />
<br />
“As long as it takes to what?”<br />
<br />
“I don’t know.”<br />
<br />
“Where’s Alice?”<br />
<br />
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen her all day. I mean, I saw here for like a minute, but she didn’t say what she was doing.”<br />
<br />
“I see.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah.”<br />
<br />
Jack feels like he’s coming off more bitter than he means to and wonders if Lea picks up on it. He doesn’t mean for it to come out that way but most of the time he just opens his mouth and though he might know what he’s going to say he’s often surprised by the tone his words take, like he has no control over it, and the meaning of what he’s saying suddenly takes on a different significance, altered in some way from what he intended. He tries to shift back to a lighter, looser conversation style. Meanwhile, as Jack tries to get on an even conversational footing with Lea, Jay Bryan is sitting on the lounge chair across from them smoking a cigarette. He is just back from the Bonnaroo Festival in Tennessee and basking in the afterglow.<br />
<br />
“Craziest fucking party ever. Five days. The first day there wasn’t even any music and it was craziest of all. Everyone just getting in. People drinking their faces off. We didn’t bring in anything with us of course. Cause of customs. But it didn’t matter. There were drugs aplenty. And cheap. Only spent five, seven dollars American, total. Got sold some bum acid, but no biggie. Also got some really good shit. Fuck you up good. Met so many new people. Everyone getting fucked up. Walking around. Hey, what’s up! Lots of hook-ups. I can get you a half ounce for $130.”<br />
<br />
Lea pulls out a pipe and packs a bowl. She takes a hit and passes it to Jack. They smoke and drink and talk. <br />
<br />
Lea and Jay Bryan finish their beers. <br />
<br />
“Lets get out of here,” says Jay Bryan. “It’s too confining in here. I need to be outside.”<br />
<br />
“Where do you want to go?”<br />
<br />
“We could go to Frank’s,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
“No, not Frank’s,” says Jay Bryan.<br />
<br />
“I don’t want to go Frank’s.”<br />
<br />
“What is there to do around here?” says Jay Bryan.<br />
<br />
“There’s nothing.”<br />
<br />
“Same thing as anywhere else,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
“Let’s go to Graham’s,” says Jay Bryan. “Graham’ll know what’s going on. Graham’s is where it’s at.”<br />
<br />
Lea and Jack silently agree. They drive to Graham’s in Lea’s car.<br />
<br />
They park in an open backyard and go in the backdoor. No one is around. The inside of the house is completely stripped bare. Exposed beams, torn up floors. <br />
<br />
“He’s in the middle of renovating.”<br />
<br />
“You don’t say.”<br />
<br />
Jay Bryan goes upstairs to look for Graham. Lea starts putting beers in the fridge from a case they brought in.<br />
<br />
Jay Bryan comes back downstairs.<br />
<br />
“Graham’s out. He’s been working all day. Let’s try Lou’s.”<br />
<br />
“Oh that’s great,” says Lea, and starts taking the beers out of the fridge and putting them back in the case.<br />
<br />
They drive to Lou’s. In the backseat Jack takes a nip off of a bottle of whiskey he brought. Some kind of funk music plays on the stereo. The combination of the music, whiskey and fresh air from the open window make Jack feel good. He picks up a stick from the floor and sticks it out the window and waves it around. For no other reason than it felt like the thing to do. <br />
<br />
They get to Lou’s. They stroll into the backyard. No one is around. They sit down on a wooden bench that is actually an old pew from a church. Lea and Jack mimic the funk song from the car. They are having a good time. Jay Bryan gets mad.<br />
<br />
“Hey, don’t be making fun of my funk.”<br />
<br />
“I wasn’t,” says Jack. “Who was it?”<br />
<br />
“Fucking Parliament, man.”<br />
<br />
“I love Parliament. No, I do. George Clinton is the king of funk. Bootsy Collins. All that stuff he did with Bill Laswell. It’s great shit.” Jack tries to think of other ways to convey his knowledge and respect for all things ‘70s funk, but that’s all he can think to say. He tries to think of something else but decides all attempts are futile, like arguing with a piece of furniture. <br />
<br />
Jack goes quiet. Jay Bryan spills his beer on the pew. Lea is sitting next to him and gets up and moves to a chair next to Jack. The foamy liquid slowly snakes down the back part of the seat. <br />
<br />
“Relax, it won’t hurt you,” says Jay Bryan. “At Bonarroo you were completely filthy for five days straight. Today I showered and had clean clothes. Getting a little beer like that on me would be no big deal. You need to toughen up.”<br />
<br />
Jay Bryan goes in the house. When he comes back out he has a Bonarroo t-shirt with all the bands listed on it. Jack reads over some of the names.<br />
<br />
“That’s a lot of bands.” He names off a few of them. “I would be happy to see any of them on their own.”<br />
<br />
“I would have gone just for Nine Inch Nails,” Lea says. “Apparently Trent said this will be their last tour and then they’re breaking up.”<br />
<br />
“Damn. Well then again he is Nine Inch Nails. Can’t exactly break-up with himself.”<br />
<br />
“Trent, I’m afraid we’re kicking you out of the band.”<br />
<br />
“Sorry but the band has just gotten so much bigger than you. We have to move on. You were holding us back.”<br />
<br />
“But I write and produce all the music.”<br />
<br />
“We didn’t say it was an easy decision.”<br />
<br />
“Fuck you guys.”<br />
<br />
Just then it starts to rain.<br />
<br />
“So much for being outdoors,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
“We can go in my shack,” says Jay Bryan.<br />
<br />
They all go over to a small building next to Lou’s house. Jack and Lea stand close to the wall while they wait for Jay Bryan to unlock it. Jack holds his unzipped hoodie over Lea. Lea crouches down to get under it.<br />
<br />
“Ah, toughen up,” says Jay Bryan. He unlocks the door and they go inside. <br />
<br />
The shack is done up like a very nice shed or basement. Next to the door an air mattress is propped up against a wall. There are three, four soft chairs and a coffee table. A TV sits on a bench in a far corner and next to it is a fireplace. <br />
<br />
“This is where Lou’s letting me crash.”<br />
<br />
“Nice.”<br />
<br />
“Let’s have a fire,” says Lea.<br />
<br />
“We can. But that would require me finding something to burn.”<br />
<br />
“We can burn this here coffee table,” says Jack tapping on it. “It’s not like its oak or anything.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, we can start with the legs.”<br />
<br />
“How ‘bout I put one of you in there,” says Jay Bryan.<br />
<br />
“Wow. That’s quite a jump from a coffee table to human flesh.”<br />
<br />
“That’s how Jay Bryan disposes of his victims bodies,” Jack says.<br />
<br />
“Don’t pay attention to what I’m saying. Stuff just comes out sometimes.”<br />
<br />
“We should make up a sign that says JAY BRYAN’S CREMATORIUM and put it above the fireplace.”<br />
<br />
“Hey man, that was uncalled for.”<br />
<br />
“It was just a joke,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
“No man, that wasn’t cool. You don’t need to talk like that.”<br />
<br />
“You’re the one who brought it up.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, but you don’t need to keep it going. Just drop it, ‘kay.”<br />
<br />
Jack looks over to where Lea was sitting but she’s gone to the bathroom somewhere inside the house. Jack doesn’t say anything else. He takes a sip of his whiskey. People are fucked.<br />
<br />
Lea comes back. Jack is glad to see Lea. He wishes he knew how to show her this but knows it would all come out wrong anyway. There was a time when Jack thought he was in love with Lea, but that was a long time ago, a few relationships removed, and before he spent these last two weeks with Alice. He still likes Lea but feels foolish for getting such funny ideas in his head about her, without knowing better. He should know better. Lust and love are the twin sisters that guard the gates of all our burning fate. The flames eat and devour and all is ashes in the mouth. Everything is fucked. <br />
<br />
Lea is looking over a booklet from Bonarroo that was on the table. Among other things, it mentions all the activities available over the course of the festival. There is something on burlesque dancing that Lea becomes interested in. They talk about burlesque dancing. Jack’s knowledge of burlesque extends as far as the work of Dita Von Teese. Lea mentions some classes she’s taken and the work that goes into it, all the small details, movements, gestures that must be developed and honed and worked into the full presentation. Jack follows that with an argument comparing strippers and burlesque dancers and how the latter is more subtle and refined and therefore more artistic than the former. Even as he’s saying all this, Jack knows its bullshit because his experience with both groups is limited and biased and requires him leaving out certain facts and information and is therefore built on a false argument. Sometimes Jack wonders why he even bothers to open his mouth. Jack thinks the same thing when he gets into a discussion about globalization, Americanized brainwashing, the failure of ever major political movement, and the depletion of natural resources resulting in our eventual need to move back to locally produced goods. Once he gets going throwing out his prepared points and observations he can’t seem to stop himself. <br />
<br />
Lou is at the door.<br />
<br />
“Hey Jack, are you back for the summer.”<br />
<br />
“I guess so. Yes. We’ll see how it goes.”<br />
<br />
“Well, great. It’s good to see you. Pete’s here. We just got back from the fair. One of the operator’s was messing around with the Gravitron, running it at double speed, and Molly got sick. She’s not feeling well. They’re going to get going soon.”<br />
<br />
Pete and Molly are engaged. They are getting married later in the summer, in August sometime. Pete stops in and says hi to Jack. They make tentative plans to hang out and he leaves. Lou gets a drink and joins them in the shack. Lou is a lot older than Lea, Jack and Jay Bryan. He is in his fifties. He has a full head of poofy white hair, a big belly and talks in a high, strong, amused voice. He used to manage the band Jack was in with Pete and a couple other guys. The band broke up before Jack moved away. <br />
<br />
The four of them hang out and Lou puts on a video recording he made.<br />
<br />
“Have you heard of Phil Lincoln?” Lou is talking to Jack.<br />
<br />
“No.”<br />
<br />
“He plays with this group that does a bunch of songs from the K-Tel period, forgotten sixties-seventies songs.”<br />
<br />
Lou plays the video. They sit and watch the video. The band is playing at some kind of convention hall to fifteen, twenty people. The songs are tight and well-rehearsed and the lead singer, a big burly guy in his forties all dressed in black, gets into the performance with gestures, dance steps, handclaps. Lea, Jack and Jay Bryan watch the video and laugh at spots and look at each other but don’t really say anything.<br />
<br />
“These guys need to go down to Vegas,” says Lou. “They could make fifty grand in a month. Play to five hundred people every night. It would go over real well. People eat this stuff up down there.”<br />
<br />
“They could open for Celine Dion.” Jack looks over at Lea. Everything he says from this point on is for Lea’s amusement or his peril.<br />
<br />
They keep watching the video.<br />
<br />
“How much longer is this?” says Jay Bryan.<br />
<br />
“Ten more minutes,” says Lou.<br />
<br />
Ten minutes later the video is still playing and Jay Bryan gets up and fiddles with the buttons on the television. The channel flicks over to PBS.<br />
<br />
“Jay Bryan, what are you doing?”<br />
<br />
“He wants to watch TV,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
Jay Bryan turns to them.<br />
<br />
“I DON’T WATCH TV!”<br />
<br />
Jay Bryan sits back down and Lou gets up and turns the video back on. The band’s set ends and the video switches over to a scene from the rodeo from earlier in the night. They watch that for awhile and then it switches to a guy performing a one-man-band outside the grounds. He plays an acoustic guitar and harmonica and has a bass drum and high-hat on his back that he plays with his feet. He’s doing a version of “Wild Thing.” When it’s over he does “TNT” by AC/DC but the video cuts out in the middle. From there it switches over to video of Pete and Molly walking through the fair grounds. <br />
<br />
Jack gets up and goes into the house to find a bathroom. <br />
<br />
When he comes back outside he runs into Lea. They are trying to figure out what to do next.<br />
<br />
“We could catch a last call somewhere. I don’t know.”<br />
<br />
They go back into the shack with Lou and Jay Bryan.<br />
<br />
The video has been turned off and Lou is playing a CD of himself and a friend of his on guitar. Blues folk, done with guitar, voice and flute.<br />
<br />
“So what were you doing out west? asks Lou. “Still going to school.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah. One more year to go, I guess. Then, I don’t know.”<br />
<br />
“What will you have after that?”<br />
<br />
“English B.A.”<br />
<br />
“That’s alright. How many books you figure you read in a week, two three?”<br />
<br />
“Sure. At least. When the semester’s going. That’s all I do.”<br />
<br />
“Who’s your favourite author?”<br />
<br />
“I don’t know. Hemingway, I guess. I don't know.”<br />
<br />
“Oh yeah. Hemingway. Great writer. Shit person. All that bullfighting, shotguns and booze. That’s what did it to him, made him who he was.”<br />
<br />
“And probably the five marriages also.”<br />
<br />
Lou nods at Jack, smiles and sips his beer.<br />
<br />
“One for ever decade he wrote.”<br />
<br />
“That guy was no surrender. Him and his bullfighting. And look where it got him in the end, staring down the barrel of a shotgun.”<br />
<br />
“Everything was life and death with him.”<br />
<br />
“It was all their in his books. That’s what I like about writing over any other art form. You get to go right into their heads. It’s all laid bare in their books. Nothing for them to hide behind.”<br />
<br />
“Sometimes,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
Jack has his own theory but choices not to share it. It’s starting to feel too much like a discussion from one of his English classes where people start in on trying to psychoanalyze a certain writer, provide a profile and an easy motive for why they wrote like they did and connects nicely with how they lived and died. Problem solved. It’s all bullshit anyway, Jack thinks. He drinks whiskey and smiles in a kind of pained expression and crosses and re-crosses his legs. <br />
<br />
It’s almost two. They listen to a few more songs and then Jack suggests they go somewhere, find a last call or something. He doesn’t care really what.<br />
<br />
Jack, Lea and Jay Bryan get up to leave.<br />
<br />
As they’re walking out to the car, Lou asks Jack if he’s heard of Denis Johnson.<br />
<br />
“Sure I have. ‘Jesus’ Son.’ ‘Angels.’ Other books.”<br />
<br />
Lou tells Jack that about he knows Denis Johnson, how they’ve hung out together. He tells Jack that it was he, Lou, who gave him, Denis Johnson, the idea for the biblical image of the tree in his National Book Award-winning novel “Tree of Smoke.” <br />
<br />
“He’s a hard guy to track down. He has to move around a lot because of the cult of crazies he attracts. His bio says Virginia but he’s all over.”<br />
<br />
“I heard he teaches in Texas,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
“I’m trying to get him to come up for the Festival of Books next year.”<br />
<br />
"Right," Jack says.<br />
<br />
"Bullshit," thinks Jack.<br />
<br />
Jack wants to stay and talk more about Denis Johnson with Lou, but Lea and Jay Bryan are already in the car. He shakes hands with Lou.<br />
<br />
“Don’t be a stranger,” says Lou. <br />
<br />
Jack, Lea and Jay Bryan are driving around downtown. They aren’t sure where to go. Jack suggests The Pub for last call and they drive over there but the doors are locked. <br />
<br />
“They lock them at twelve,” says Lea.<br />
<br />
“Probably to keep out the crazies,” says Jay Bryan.<br />
<br />
“Like us,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
There are no other bars to go to. The only other bar is The Park across the street. There used to be two, three others on Roxy Street but they were bought out, torn down, and turned into parking lots. They were the same bars that the bootleggers coming in from Chicago and other places on the trains in the twenties and thirties used to drink and stay at in the hotel rooms upstairs. They had a history. Now they are nothing.<br />
<br />
They turn off Main Street. Lea is driving with loose abandon, taking sharp turns without signalling and accelerating to excessive speeds down short streets. <br />
<br />
Finally she parks in front of an old two-story house. <br />
<br />
Past the porch area is a stairway that leads into a hallway and to the right there is a kitchen and the left a living room. Straight ahead are doors to the closet and bedroom but they’re both closed. They go in the living room. Jack has never been in Lea’s place. Lea moves a lot. She has been in this house for over a year.<br />
<br />
There are two couches in the living room, a red and a black one. Jay Bryan flops down in the red and Lea the black one. Jack sits on a soft chair next to Lea. In the center of the room is a coffee table with a laptop on it. The base is made out of brass and Lea tells Jack the design is of a pineapple tree with the leaves acting as support for the glass top. In the middle is what looks like a many-eyed ball.<br />
<br />
“It looks like the apocalypse alien from “Watchmen,” says Jack.<br />
<br />
“It’s a pineapple,” says Lea.<br />
<br />
“I didn’t know pineapples were housed in leaves like that.”<br />
<br />
“They’re not. But just go with it.”<br />
<br />
Lea puts on music from her laptop and they smoke a bowl of Jay Bryan’s pot that Jay Bryan has Jack pack. Jack takes out two small buds, intending to pack both. Instead he only packs one and puts on the other one down on the coffee table. <br />
<br />
To Jack’s right there are two big curtained windows and between them a fireplace. On the mantelpiece there is a stack of books, including a biography of Timothy Leary.<br />
<br />
“Did you read those books that I sent you?”<br />
<br />
“I read one of them,” says Lea, “haven’t had a chance to get through the other.”<br />
<br />
Jack goes over to the fireplace and pulls out a book by Kid Koala. He sits back down and flips through it. He examines a couple of pictures and puts the book down on the coffee table.<br />
<br />
Lea turns on a lamp. <br />
<br />
They sit and talk and then Jay Bryan stretches out and goes to sleep. Lea gets up, throws a plaid blanket over him. <br />
<br />
She sits back down and her and Jack continue talking. Jack remembers when he first met Lea. It was at The Pub, two summers ago. She was goofy and hyper back then and Jack liked that. Now she seems calmer and sadder somehow.<br />
<br />
Jay Bryan starts to snore loudly. They ignore it at first then, fed up, Lea goes over and smothers Jay Bryan’s face with a pillow. The snoring temporarily stops until she lets up and then it starts again. She leaves the pillow on his face and it somewhat muffles the sound.<br />
<br />
She sits back down on the couch. Jack makes a comment about a wooden shelving unit next to her that she tells him she got cheap somewhere and is really great she just needs to paint it. A little while later they go into the kitchen and make food and come back to the living room to eat. When they're down Lea takes the plates back and goes into the closest and gets blankets. She gives one to Jack. There is no formal announcement that he is staying over. They curl up, each on their separate spots, across from each other, and talk and then only mumble and then they’re asleep.<br />
<br />
When Jack wakes up Lea and Jay Bryan are both still sleeping. He gets up and sees on the clock in the kitchen that it is after four. He walks quietly down the stairs and through the porch. Outside the sky is lightening but overcast. The streets are quiet and deserted. He walks back downtown toward Alice’s. Just before he reaches her block it starts to lightly rain and then is coming down harder once he’s at her door. He goes inside, undresses, and gets in her bed and falls back asleep.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-14064066754372459662010-06-17T18:20:00.000-07:002010-06-17T18:23:17.391-07:00In MemoriamHis Mother was the one to give him the news, and afterward she had she asked if there was anything she could do for him. He said no and later went for a walk down to the creek. Along the way it started raining, lightly at first and then harder, coming down in great lashing streaks by the time he was back home. It continued all afternoon, hammering against the pane over his desk while he passed the time idly playing guitar and lying on the bed. <br /><br />After supper the phone rang. His Mother answered it and called for him.<br /><br />“Hi...Craig,” the voice hesitated. “It’s Claire.”<br /><br />“I know,” he said. “Hi.” <br /><br />“I wasn’t sure if you knew yet and I just thought I should call and see if you’d heard.”<br /><br />“Yeah,” said Craig. “I heard.”<br /><br />The line was quiet. Then after a moment she said, “So you moved back home.”<br /><br />“Yes. I did.”<br /><br />“Listen. I know it’s been awhile, but did you want to come over? Maybe, you know, talk about it.”<br /><br />“OK,” he said. “Sure. Where are you living?”<br /><br />Claire gave him her address. It was on the other side of town, the second floor of an old brick apartment building located at the top of a hill overlooking the Cahmoo Valley. Craig drove over and let himself in, as instructed. He found her on the couch in the living room. She was watching a late night talk show. The picture was grainy and hard to make out. “We don’t pay for cable,” she said turning to him.<br /><br />“I see.”<br /><br />There was a crackle of laughter and she hit mute on the remote.<br /><br />“Is it just you here?” <br /><br />“Yeah. Phil’s at work,” she said. “West End Video. They’ve had him working nightshift all week. Have a seat.” <br /><br />He sat down next to her.<br /><br />“I’m glad you came over,” she continued. “To be honest, it gets kind of lonely around here at night. Lonely and quiet. Add to that, I think the building might be haunted.”<br /><br />“Weird.”<br /><br />“It is,” she said. She adjusted herself on the couch so she was facing him. She didn’t look that different, he thought. Her hair was a bit shorter but still black, though now it had streaks of blond in it. He liked that, thought it suited her. Made her look older, he thought. More mature.<br /> <br />“So how have you been?” <br /><br />“OK,” he said. “What about you?”<br /><br />“I don’t know. It’s been a strange day. I guess it hasn’t really sunk in yet. I still can’t believe it really happened. I’m not sure how I’m supposed to feel.”<br /><br />“That’s how I feel most of the time,” he said and grinned weakly.<br /><br />Claire pulled her hair back and tied it behind her head with a hair elastic.<br /><br />Craig sat nervously and watched her, feeling self-conscious but calm. He had imagined this meeting countless times and now it was here. It had been a long time. Several months now, since he’d last seen her. That time at the coffee shop. When he learned he would not be a father after all. At the time he’d taken in the information, nodded, finished his coffee and got up and left. Time passed and tried to put it out of mind, to move on, but found the incident coming back to him at unexpected hours of the day, playing over and over, the news, the sudden rush of something, like a zap from some electrode, followed by his numbed response. And so, almost unconsciously, he began preparing himself for that inevitable day when he would see her again. He had formulated a full response. One that was sound, complete, considered. He knew exactly what he would say, he had the whole speech planned. Only thing left was to get up the nerve. But now that had all changed. <br /><br />“When was the last time you saw him?” she asked.<br /><br />“Long time,” he said. “A few months at least. Around the time…” He caught himself, looked down, and played with the zipper of his jacket. “Anyway not since our last show.”<br /><br />“How was he then? How did he seem?”<br /><br />“About the same,” he said. “No, that’s not true. He was sort of weird. Thinking back now, he seemed sort of weird and distant. Fuzzy. I should have known something was wrong. I should have read the signs. Done something.”<br /><br />“But how could you. You didn’t know. You didn’t know what he was going through.”<br /><br />“Maybe,” he said. “Maybe you’re right.”<br /><br />“What could you have done anyway? These aren’t things you plan for. There’s no set way for how you’re supposed to react in these situations.”<br /><br />“No,” he said. “No, I suppose there’s not.”<br /><br /><br />They continued to talk, eventually getting caught up on things, other mutual friends they’d gone to high school with. It felt easy and natural. Then around one o’clock there was the sound of footsteps across the hall and the door creaked open. <br /><br />“I should probably go,” he told her. “It’s getting late.”<br /><br />“OK,” she said. “Maybe I’ll see you again, before.”<br /><br />“Yeah. All right.”<br /><br />In the hallway he passed Phil. He had shoulder length hair and a goatee. Craig nodded a greeting on his way out and got back a quick nod and a weary “Hey.”<br /><br />The next day when no one else was home, Craig made copies of the band’s last concert. It was held at a small club in town that had recently opened. The club had a full PA system, good acoustics and was clean. The show was well-attended. His Dad had been there and got the whole thing captured on his camcorder. <br /><br />He sat on the carpet in his parent’s living room, cross-legged, in boxers and a t-shirt, and watched the playback. It was the first time he had watched it. The sound and video quality was quite good and you could see everybody, the whole band on stage, clearly. But then, in the middle of the first song, the camera zoomed in for a close-up on him, his face locked in deep concentration behind the drums. It held the shot for what seemed to Craig an eternity, and then pulled back and scanned over the others. Then a few minutes later it did it again, focusing in on his flushed, sweating face. It continued to do this throughout their performance, and he cringed every time. “Thanks, Dad,” he thought ironically. He thought of all the people, friends and family and others still, people he didn’t know or hadn’t met before, who’d be watching it. He cringed but he had no choice. He had to accept it.<br /><br />That night they drove over with the tapes, Craig and his Dad. The house was filled. In the living room people, mainly adults, sat and stood around talking quietly, having subdued conversations—most with drinks in their hands. In the kitchen was a whole other scene entirely, and it was where most of the sounds—hooting and hollering and irrupting, dangerous-seeming laughter—were coming from. Craig break off and went over. They were mostly younger people, compared with the other room, people closer to his age but maybe a few years older. No one noticed him at first and he went over and filled up a plastic cup with punch from the punchbowl. Then Craig saw a couple people he knew. Two guys. He wasn’t good friends with them, didn’t know them really well, not personally, but they had been friends of the band and sometimes helped move equipment for gigs and then would drink with them after. One of them, the guy with dark curly hair and an indulgent grin, spotted him and came over.<br /><br />“Jesus Christ,” he said, putting a consoling arm around Craig. “Can you believe it? I can’t. Can’t fucking believe it. Unbelievable! Un-fucking-believable. Fuck, man, fucking hell. Goddamn!” <br /><br />Craig said, “I know, I know,” but the curly-haired guy wasn’t listening, was ignoring him—drowning out his words of comfort with more of his own.<br /><br />Craig looked around at the others and it seemed more of the same. They too carried on talking loudly, gesturing and even laughing. On the surface it was just like any other party but there was something else—an unease maybe, a sort of creeping desperation in their laughter; like being on the brink of something, trying to push against a wall and break through but it wouldn’t give. Wouldn’t give for anything. There was purpose to their drinking. <br /><br />Then Craig’s Dad popped his head around the corner and signalled him into the next room. <br /><br />“What is it?” said Craig, following behind. <br /><br />“There’s someone who wants to see you.”<br /><br />His Dad directed him to a man sitting in a recliner in the corner of the room. Others stood around, nearby, watching, but no one else approached. The man’s face was pale. His features seemed frozen in an expression of surprise, shock, pure bewilderment. Craig approached.<br /><br />“Thanks for coming,” said the man, each of his words was slightly forced, in a wheezy drawl.<br /><br />He held out his hand. Craig took it. He leaned in closer, concentrating on the man’s words.<br /><br />“He thought highly of you,” he said. “He respected your talent.”<br /><br />Craig nodded to him, then again. <br /><br />“Thank you,” he said. “Thank you for saying so.” <br /><br />He looked on pensively at the man. His eyes were raw looking and dried-out, strained and unblinking. Craig continued to hold his hand, to nod.<br /><br />The next day Claire invited him over. It was almost noon when he arrived, and she was still in bed. <br /><br />“Come in here,” she called out from under the covers.<br /><br />“Is it just you here?” he asked. He was leaning against the door frame, looking over the apartment.<br /><br />“It’s just me. He went to work an hour ago. What is it?”<br /><br />“Nothing.”<br /><br />“Right,” she said. “Come. Sit,” she patted the sheets. <br /><br />He came in and sat down on the edge of the bed. <br /><br />“You OK,” she said. “You seem tense.”<br /><br />“Tense?” <br /><br />“Yeah. Tense.”<br /><br />“I went over last night.”<br /><br />“Oh. How did it go?”<br /><br />“It was…”<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />“Tense.”<br /><br />“Come here,” she said. “Lie back.”<br /><br />He did as she instructed. With his jacket still on he laid down next to her on his side, facing away from her. He stared ahead at the black-finished dresser. On top of it was a small stereo playing a Matthew Good album. He lay there stiffly overtop of the black silky sheets. The bed was still warm and his body seemed to sink into a space that was already there. Then Claire rolled over on her side. She pulled herself up slightly and brought herself closer. Craig suddenly felt a hand on his shoulder. He felt another one on his back as she began massaging it. She brought herself closer still and he could feel her breathing on his neck.<br /><br />“Claire,” he said.<br /><br />“I didn’t mean for it to happen,” she said.<br /><br />“I know. It wasn’t your fault. I know that now. It’s nobody’s fault.”<br /><br />She rested her cheek against his back and breathed heavily. Craig continued to stare ahead. One of the drawers was missing a handle and there was a band sticker on it, starting to peel. <br /><br />In a moment she sat up. Craig turned to her. Her eyes were red and puffy. She wiped them with a Kleenex off the nightstand. <br /><br />“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you. I should have been. And I wasn’t.”<br /><br />“I should get up and shower,” she said. “There should be some coffee already made up if you want it.”<br /><br />Craig sat in the kitchen drinking coffee and flipping through an entertainment magazine. In a while Claire emerged. She stood in the doorway with her hair wrapped in a towel.<br /><br />“How would you like to take me shopping?” she suddenly let out.<br /><br />“What for?”<br /><br />“For a new dress,” she said.<br /><br />“But you already have lots of dresses.”<br /><br />“Yeah, but I want something new” she said. “Something...special.”<br /><br />“OK,” he said, and she disappeared back into the bathroom.<br /><br />At a clothing store in the mall, Claire tried on a series of dresses. While that went on, Craig perused a some rackets in the men’s wear section, trying to seem interested. Then Claire came out of the change room wearing a silk black dress that was cut in a v at the bottom around her calves. He watched while she examined herself in the mirror. She raised her arms and touched her shoulders. She made a graceful little spin and then arched her back slightly, looking back at her reflection. The dress fit neatly around her naturally slender figure, and she turned and smiled at him. She suddenly seemed younger to him, even with the hair. She looked to him like she did back at prom when she wore something similar and her hair was long and black and styled for the occasion, with a flower in it.<br /><br />“What about this one?” she said, running her hands down the sides of the dress.<br /><br />“I like it,” said Craig.<br /><br />She turned back to the mirror, hands on her hips.<br /><br />“I don’t know,” she said, and rolled her head side-to-side critically. “I don’t think it’s black enough.”<br /><br />“Not black enough,” he said. <br /><br />“I mean do you think it’s right,” she said. “You know, for the occasion.”<br /><br />“Who’s to say what’s right with something like this.”<br /><br />She continued to scrutinize herself, and he walked up behind her, standing over her shoulder. He adjusted one of the straps and then looked up at them in the mirror and for a moment it was as if nothing had changed.<br /><br />Finally she settled on a dress and bought it. They went to the food court to eat, sitting at a metal table with attached swivel chairs sharing a container of seasoned fries.<br /><br />“Are you still with that girl,” Claire said. “What’s her name?” <br /><br />“You mean Bree?” <br /><br />“Yes,” she said.<br /><br />“How did you know we were seeing each other?”<br /><br />“Word gets around. So...”<br /><br />“No,” he said. “Not really.”<br /><br />“Oh. When did it end?”<br /><br />“I don’t know.”<br /><br />“What does that mean?”<br /><br />“It means...It means it’s been kind of off-and-on.”<br /><br />“So what is it now, off or on?”<br /><br />“Off,” he said. “But I think she wanted to get serious.”<br /><br />“And what gave you that impression?”<br /><br />“I think she wanted a kid,” he said.<br /><br />“That is serious.”<br /><br />“Yeah. She hadn’t said anything but I was getting that feeling. Strong baby vibes for sure.”<br /><br />“And you weren’t into that.”<br /><br />“I don’t know. I’m not sure. I still do, I think. Someday. But…”<br /><br />“Not the right one.”<br /><br />“Something like that,” he said. “Phil—you think he’s the right one.”<br /><br />“We’re engaged aren’t we?”<br /><br />“So it seems.”<br /><br />“I know it probably took you by surprise. I know it did me.”<br /><br />“I’d heard,” he said.<br /><br />“You heard?”<br /><br />“Word gets around.”<br /><br />“Yeah,” she said. “Well, I would have told you earlier but I wasn’t sure if you wanted to hear from me.”<br /><br />“I did. I just had to get things figured out.”<br /><br />“Uh-huh.”<br /><br />“Yeah.”<br /><br />Claire snatched at a lock of hair nervously and wrapped it around her finger, then ran her fingers through it smoothing it out.<br /><br />“You know,” she said, “sometimes I think I wouldn’t mind if I got pregnant again.”<br /><br />“Are you two trying?”<br /><br />“No. Well, I guess. But I mean we’re not trying-trying. I’m on the pill. But you know how that can turn out. Anyway, if it happens, it happens. If not—that’s OK too. No rush. He goes back to school in the fall. And I’ve been thinking of doing the same—if I can get all my records in order in time.” She took a sip of her drink. “Then there’s the wedding to plan.”<br /><br />Craig tore open a ketchup packet. He spread its contents over his half of the fries and ate one. <br /><br />After a moment Claire said, “So is she coming tomorrow? Bree, I mean.” <br /><br />“I think so,” he said. “She knew him. She’ll probably want to go.”<br /><br />“A lot of people did.”<br /><br />“That’s true.”<br /><br />*<br /><br />They were almost late getting there. Craig waited in the kitchen with Phil while Claire rushed around getting ready, moving back-and-forth hurriedly between the bathroom and bedroom. They sat at the table drinking coffee and trying to ignore the clock. <br /><br />“So what are you taking at school?” said Craig.<br /><br />“I’m in the film program,” Phil said. “Going into my third year.”<br /><br />“OK. Cool.”<br /><br />“I want to get into directing. Start in commercials and go from there. Claire told me you were a musician.”<br /><br />“Yeah. Drums and guitar.”<br /><br />“Are you playing with anyone, a band or anything?”<br /><br />“No,” Craig said. “Just myself.”<br /><br />When she was finally ready they drove over in Craig’s car. Along the way they stopped to pick up Claire’s friend Michelle and then Bree, who had called earlier that morning asking for a ride. When they arrived at the church it was almost full but the service hadn’t started. The Billy Joel song “Only the Good Die Young” played over the sound system.<br /><br />At the end of the aisle, in front of the podium, was the open casket. Next to it was a wreath of roses and a blown-up portrait. Claire turned to Craig. “Do you want to go up?” <br /><br />“I don’t know,” he said softly. “I’m not sure of the procedure for this sort of thing.”<br /><br />“It’s alright,” she said, and took his hand and led him up, while the others found seats in one of the pews near the back. <br /><br />It wasn’t real, he thought, looking down at him. The makeup made him seem more like a doll, more unreal than any person he remembered. He was more put together, more made up than he ever remembered him being. His normally wild, frizzy hair was combed down and neatly parted and his face was completely shaved. He wasn’t wearing his glasses, and as a result his nose seemed more prominent and severe. The contours of his face were harder, more defined. Like a mask. Harder but relaxed—peaceful somehow. Like an infant gently sleeping. He hadn’t seen him in a suit and tie since their prom.<br /><br />Craig turned around and scanned the room. Directly back from the casket, in the second row, his father sat with the rest of the family. His expression remained unchanged from the other night, his eyes glassy, his expression beaten, shattered. <br /><br />As Craig and Claire walked back up the aisle the song ended and another, “In My Life” by The Beatles, started.<br /><br />“How did he look?” asked Bree when he was seated next to her.<br /><br />“Jesus,” he said. “How do you think?” <br /><br />The service began shortly. There were speeches and eulogies delivered by the minister, friends and family members. Those from family members all ended the same, with the person saying we’ll meet again one day while staying admirably composed.<br /><br />At one point Claire started to tear up and Michelle gave her a hug while Phil rubbed her shoulder and held her hand. Craig, who was a few seats down, looked over at her and then Bree. Her hair was long like Claire’s used to be but lighter, dark brown, her skin naturally darker. She sat slouched and tried to smile back at him but it looked more like a scowl or mischievous grin. They didn’t say anything and Craig waited for something to pass—a gesture, a whisper, anything. Then slowly she moved her hand over and took his. It felt cold and clammy, he thought. Muggy. A muggy hand.<br /><br />After the service let out, the parking lot filled with people. Craig and Claire recognized many from high school—mostly fellow students but also some teachers. Claire and Michelle talked with a group of girls while Craig gave a few passing nods and waves. He looked around at the crowd. It was obvious some were seeing each other for the first time since graduation. They appeared excited and beaming as they talked, while, close by, others were visibly distraught and being hugged and consoled. “Some reunion,” Craig said out loud to no one.<br /><br />Once back at the car, they decided, all five of them, to go for lunch. <br /><br />At the Dairy Queen by the highway they sat at a booth after placing their orders. Phil had ordered a burger, fries and a shake; Claire and Michelle chocolate fudge Sundays; Bree an Oreo Blizzard; and Craig chicken strips and fries, with ranch dipping sauce on the side. Across from them were a group of people who had also, obviously, from the way they were dressed, come from the service. <br /><br />While waiting for the rest of their food, Michelle mentioned the road trip she was about to go on. She was driving down south to see her fiancé. He was in California, for one reason or another, and they were going to meet up and then go on to Las Vegas to elope.<br /><br />“Don’t tell anyone,” she said. “It’s our secret, for now.”<br /><br />“That’s so cool!” said Claire. “That’s how I want to do it. Forget all this planning. I get overwhelmed with all kinds of anxiety and whatnot just thinking about it.”<br /><br />“But there are others to consider,” said Phil, between sips of his shake. “We want to make sure everyone’s there. Both our families. It’s not all about you and what you want.” <br /><br />“I know,” said Claire. “But still.”<br /><br />“We’ve got to plan it out,” he said. “Do it right.”<br /><br />“Of course we do,” she said.<br /><br />“Have you set a date?” asked Bree.<br /><br />“No,” said Claire, still looking ahead at Phil. “Not yet.”<br /><br />Later on Craig and Bree ended up back at Claire and Phil’s apartment where they ordered pizza. When the buzzer went Claire said, “That must be Freddie Mercury with our order.” <br /><br />“Freddy Mercury?” said Craig.<br /><br />“That’s what we call the guy,” she said. “You have to see him—the resemblance is uncanny. He has the mustache and everything.”<br /><br />They ate the pizza and drank red wine and watched the movie Vanilla Sky. After it was over they watched the special features. In an interview with Paul McCartney, who wrote the title song to the movie, he described his songwriting process, which involved finding words that rhymed with sky.<br /><br />Some time after they’d finished the wine, Claire and Phil disappeared into the bedroom, leaving Craig and Bree on the couch. <br /><br />“I’ve missed you,” she said when they were alone.<br /><br />“That’s just the wine talking.”<br /><br />“No,” she said, “I really have. You’re so hard to track down. I can never get a hold of you.”<br /><br />“I’ve been busy,” he said. “I’ve been occupied with things.”<br /><br />“It’s because you don’t like me, isn’t it?”<br /><br />“I like you fine.”<br /><br />“Really,” she said. “It sure doesn’t seem like it.” <br /><br />“I do.”<br /><br />“Then why do you ignore me?”<br /><br />“I don’t ignore you.”<br /><br />“You do. We never talk anymore. You don’t return my calls.”<br /><br />“Well I’m here now. What do you want me to do?”<br /><br />When Craig awoke early the next morning, Bree was already up getting ready. She noticed him stirring and came over. <br /><br />“Morning, sleepyhead,” she said, kneeling down in front of him and running a hand through his hair. “I have to go to work. My ride’s waiting outside. FYI, I found the aspirin in the bathroom behind the mirror if you need any.”<br /><br />She pulled the blanket up to his chin and kissed him. <br /><br />On her way out she turned and said, “Call me sometime.”<br /><br />“I will,” he mumbled.<br /><br />He went back to sleep. Sometime later he was woken again, this time by Claire who had made tea. She brought over a cup and he sat up to take it, still wrapped in the blanket. She sat next to him.<br /><br />“You and Bree have a good time after we went to bed?”<br /><br />“What?” he said. “What do you mean?”<br /><br />“You didn’t…”<br /><br />“No. We didn’t.”<br /><br />“Right,” she said. “I’m sure.”<br /><br />“We just talked and went to sleep is all. Together. On the couch.”<br /><br />“OK,” she said. “I believe you. I just assumed...”<br /><br />“Nothing happened.”<br /><br />“It’s fine if you did. I don’t mind. Really.”<br /><br />They sipped their drinks in silence.<br /><br />Then Craig said, “Listen. There’s something I want to tell you.”<br /><br />“What is it?”<br /><br />Just then Phil walked into the room. He was wearing a housecoat and holding a mug of coffee.<br /><br />“Claire—where did you put the sugar?”<br /><br />“Where it always is,” she said. “In the cupboard over the fridge.”<br /><br />He went back into the kitchen as she turned back to Craig.<br /><br />“So you were saying.”<br /><br />“Never mind,” he said. “It’s not important.”<br /><br />“I’m glad we got to hang out again. It’s been good. Even if the circumstances completely sucked.”<br /><br />“I’m glad too.”<br /><br />“We should do something,” she said. “Not to celebrate it, of course, but to—what’s the word? Commemorate it.”<br /><br />“What were you thinking exactly?” <br /><br />One night, some weeks later, Craig picked her up and they drove out to the highway. In the passenger seat Claire rolled a joint while beyond the windscreen headlights rushed past like dozens of exploding stars in the night. <br /><br />Ten minutes outside of town he turned down a side road and drove through a set of gates. A sign overhead read SUNSET SANCTUARY in stately metal lettering. <br /><br />He parked the car and they get out. It was dark and there were no lights so Craig retrieved a flashlight from the trunk while Claire pulled a lighter out of her purse. They started off towards the large open field, making their way as best they could. They looked around but had no luck and after a while they split up, with each walking as far as they could in the opposite direction, until coming up against the thick shrub that surrounded the grounds, and then back.<br /><br />Craig stopped and shined the flashlight over the wet grass. The air was calm and still and slightly humid. He moved the flashlight all around him and then caught sight of it and called Claire over. She was some ways away but heard him and in a minute was there and both were looking down at it. <br /><br />His full name, Markus Warren Lessing, was written out on the rectangular slab of stone, with the years 1986-2007 carved underneath. An electric guitar had been chiseled in the right corner.<br /><br />Claire pulled out the joint and lit it. She took a drag and passed it to Craig and he did the same. They passed the joint back-and-forth, with neither saying anything for what seemed like a really long time. Then, without thinking about it, he put his arm around her. He rubbed her shoulder, and then squeezed her a little next to him, like they were two human-size puzzle pieces that didn't quite fit. She tilted her head and let it rest on his shoulder. Then she leaned over and put what remained of the burning joint on the grave marker and the two started back towards the car.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-87664170735408532212010-05-16T13:34:00.000-07:002010-05-16T13:37:10.474-07:00Twentynothing“Genius is not a lazy angel contemplating itself and things. It is insatiable for expression. Thought must take the stupendous step of passing realization. A master can formulate his thought.” <br />—R.W. Emerson<br /><br />[Saturday night, late summer. Basement of house furnished with two couches around coffee table; desk with laptop and chair to one side, kitchenette area, small fridge, counter littered with glasses, bottles of soda and alcohol on the other. Mirror on side wall. Front door, door to bedroom, door to upstairs. Knocking on front door. Jack, early-to-mid twenties, wearing dark jeans and collared shirt, enters, looks around tentatively.]<br /><br />JACK: Dave? Dave? HEY DAVE! You here, man?<br /><br />[A moment passes as Jack wanders the stage searchingly until Dave, early twenties, wearing a white undershirt and black shorts, enters through bedroom door. Jack has his back to him. He turns around, slightly startled, looks Dave up and down.]<br /><br />JACK (cont’d): There you are.<br /><br />[Dave looks at him woozily, takes a moment to register his words.]<br /><br />DAVE (flatly): Hey Jack. What’s up? You just get here?<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. The door was open so I just…You told me drop in any time, ‘member?<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah, yeah. I remember.<br /><br />JACK (chuckles to himself): Say, didn’t happen to catch you at a moment of self-pleasure did I?<br /><br />DAVE: Say what?<br /><br />JACK: You know. (Gesturing with hand.) Tuggin’ one out.<br /><br />DAVE (coming around): No, man. No.<br /><br />JACK: Sure. OK. Just, you had that look about you like you were in the middle of something, is all.<br /><br />DAVE: No, was only sleeping. (Rubs his eyes and stretches.) Crashed out couple hours ago.<br /><br />JACK: Still recovering, eh? From last night.<br /><br />DAVE (with a sigh): Still recovering… (Gestures to couch.) Have a seat. <br /><br />[Dave flops down with a weary grunt on couch nearest him. Jack takes seat on other couch across from Dave.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Give me a couple minutes. Then I’ll make us up some drinks.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. Sounds good…Little hair of the dog.<br /><br />DAVE: Huh? Hair of the what now?<br /><br />JACK: You know…Go out for a night on the town and throw back a few too many. Wake up feeling it the next day. What’s the best cure, best way to get over it? Little hair of the dog…<br /><br />DAVE (yawning): Oh God. That about describes my whole summer.<br /><br />JACK: You and me both, pal. (Sighs.) Shit. Gonna have to do something about that. Here we are. Summer’s over. Semester starting up. Time to buckle down and focus. Hit them books. Four months. Nothing but words, words, words. Jesus, I need a drink just thinking about it.<br /><br />DAVE: What about tonight? How you feeling about that?<br /><br />JACK: At least two. Three. To start. I don’t know. Honestly, something doesn’t feel right. <br /><br />DAVE: What? What doesn’t feel right? <br /><br />JACK: I don’t know exactly. It’s just a feeling I have. I can’t describe it. <br />(Beat.) <br />Like I’m Conrad’s Marlow. Setting sail on a journey he knows from the start is doomed. <br /><br />DAVE: Doomed.<br /><br />JACK: But he goes in anyway. Thinking somewhere along the way he’ll get things figured out. That if he just throws himself into it, all will be made clear. That it’ll make sense. Somehow. <br />(Beat.)<br />But no. What happens? His illusions get shattered. Worst fears, confirmed. <br /><br />DAVE: Worst fears about what?<br /><br />JACK: About everything. The whole goddamn human enterprise. Shit man. It’s all fucked.<br /><br />DAVE: Jeez. And I thought I was freaking out about my date with Lana.<br /><br />JACK: I’m not freaking out.<br />(Beat.)<br />OK, I’m freaking out. But this is different. Lana you had known a while. Hung out with her at work.<br />(Beat.)<br />Me, I’m going in cold. I don’t know where I stand. Hadn’t seen or heard from Christy until the other day, up in the library. Till then, I didn’t know if I’d ever hear from her again. <br /><br />DAVE: How long’d it been?<br /><br />JACK: About two weeks, at least. Back when she still was going to be my roommate. <br /><br />DAVE: So it’s not that different. You started off with a professional relationship and it developed from there. Into something, you know, more personal.<br /><br />JACK: Professional…yeah, I guess you could say that. She came over, checked out the place. Agreed to move. Right there on the spot. Seemed excited. “Seemed” being the operative word. <br /><br />DAVE: This was all before the camping trip? <br /><br />JACK: Yeah. Obviously. I don’t know. I guess afterwards she had a change of heart. Found a place with some friends instead. <br /><br />DAVE: She flaked.<br /><br />(Beat.)<br /><br />JACK: …Yeah. Basically.<br /><br />DAVE: Well, least it was a chance to get to know her better. <br /><br />JACK: It was. And I did. But then, nothing. Silence. Had no way to reach her. No number or nothin’.<br /><br />DAVE: Not even an email?<br /><br />JACK: Nope. Nada.<br /><br />DAVE: She had yours though? Your number I mean…<br /><br />JACK: That she did.<br /><br />DAVE: Hmm…Well, now, so it’s all for the best. Professional put aside. Work on the personal. All for the best.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. I guess. (Retreating) Whatever that means… <br /><br />DAVE: Oh, come on. You know what that means.<br /><br />JACK: Sure, sure. But in this particular situation, I mean. <br /><br />DAVE: What? What about this situation?<br /><br />JACK: I don’t know. Just the way it’s played out so far.<br /><br />DAVE: How ya figure?<br /><br />JACK: It’s just hard to read…What may or may not be going on.<br /><br />DAVE: What do you think’s going on?<br /><br />JACK: I don’t know. I don’t know what to think. One thing minding my own business, slogging through some readings for class. Next thing, there comes a tap on my shoulder and I look up and, surprise, surprise… <br /><br />DAVE: It’s her.<br /><br />JACK: It’s Christy. Re-emerged! All smiling and showered, her hair done up nice. Last time I’d seen her, remember, we’d been camping three, four days, neither of us having showered or anything, sand everywhere, in everything…total back to nature, call of the wild. <br />(Beat.)<br />So we’re there. Middle of the afternoon. Sun shining through those big windows hitting her at just a certain angle. That moment, I swear ta ya, man, she looked perfect. I mean, fucking flawless. <br /><br />DAVE (incredulous): Right.<br /><br />JACK: Should have seen her. Cute as can be. <br /><br />[Dave swings his head back in an exaggerated rolling of the eyes gesture.]<br /><br />JACK (cont’d): I know. I know. I’m romanticizing the hell out of it. A blatant sentimentalist. But what can I say, it’s truth. Through and through. Scouts honour. <br />(Beat.)<br />Any ill sort of feelings I might have been harbouring about how things ended off before just seemed to fall away. Disappear. Start anew. <br /><br />DAVE: So then what? <br /><br />JACK: So we talk a few minutes. Catch up. She tells me all about her new place, how her friends from the trip are doing, and eventually I ask her out for coffee.<br /><br />DAVE: Good. That’s good. Coffee is good. <br /><br />JACK: Right. <br />(Beat.)<br />Then she tells me her and her friends are going to be downtown on the weekend — probably, most likely, Saturday — and maybe we could meet up. Then when I tell her I actually had plans to go downtown Friday, she says, “Well, hey, no problem. I’ll talk to my friends. See about changing it to Friday.” <br /><br />DAVE: Well OK. Sounds promising so far. <br /><br />JACK: But then, course, that fell through.<br /><br />DAVE: That fell through.<br /><br />JACK: But, anyway, point is: she was all ready to change her plans for me. Or so that’s how she made it sound…you know, for what it’s worth. And then, and then…as she’s leaving, I get the quick shoulder rub. <br /><br />DAVE: That so…<br /><br />JACK: Leans in and everything. For emphasis…or something.<br />(Beat.)<br />What does that mean? The shoulder rub. How many guys get the shoulder rub? What subtle, unspoken meaning is being passed on at that moment of delicate splendour when hand meets shoulder? Tell me…tell me now, I need to know.<br /><br />DAVE: It’s true. Scientists and researchers the world over have for centuries now been trying to understand the exact nature of the shoulder rub.<br /><br />JACK: Seriously. Dave: Have you ever gotten the shoulder rub? <br /><br />DAVE: Not many. Not that I can recall anyway. And of all the girls I know or have known, I don’t know of too many of them given to passing out shoulder rubs willy-nilly to every other guy looking for the time of day…if you know what I mean. It’s a good sign. <br /><br />JACK: Yeah. You think?<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah?<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah. Definitely.<br /><br />JACK (incredulous): Hmm. Shit. I really hate this part. This grey middle area. This purgatorial space where you think you’ve experienced something but you’re not sure. Not sure because you’re too caught up in it. To close to the thing. It’s too…subjective. You need it laid out for you. Both sides. See the whole playing field. To know, right, to know there was something there. You’re riding the same wave. You felt it, she felt it. <br />(Beat.)<br />Only then—then and only then—does it become—for want of a better word—real. <br /><br />DAVE: Uh huh.<br /><br />JACK: Otherwise, well, that’s it. Roll credits. The big No-ender.<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah, there’s always that. But who knows, right? <br />(Beat.)<br />Take the time I asked out Lana. We were both of us outside on our break. She was standing a ways over from me. I was having a smoke. And then, just all of a sudden, I go over to her, say, “So how about a movie, me and you, this week.” Right away she was like, “Yeah. OK. Sure.” Doesn’t have to think about it. There. Done. Just like that. Just went up, did it. Pure gut instinct. Register. React.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah.<br /><br />DAVE: Thinking about it kills it. Or at least blurs it. All that working it over in the mind. Inventing scenarios. Setting up mental booby traps. These are the dangers.<br /><br />JACK: Sure, sure. I believe you. But I just don’t have that. <br /><br />DAVE: Have what?<br /><br />JACK: I don’t know. Whatever you call it. <br /><br />DAVE: What?<br /><br />JACK: That assurance… <br /><br />DAVE: Yeah.<br /><br />JACK: That skill…<br /><br />DAVE: Uh huh.<br /><br />JACK: That…Ah, forget it.<br /><br />DAVE: You mean confidence?<br /><br />JACK: But more than that: The ability to put all mental shit aside, empty the mind of all excess baggage, and just focus on the task at hand. At that moment.<br /><br />DAVE: So…confidence.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. No. Maybe.<br /><br />DAVE: Confidence, my friend. That’s all it takes. Be assertive. It’s sexy. I’m telling you, it automatically bumps you up at least three notches on the physical attraction meter. Fives instantly transform into eights. Even the most homely gain a modicum of sex appeal just by carrying themselves like an eight or a nine.<br /><br />JACK: Sure. Fine. That’s all well and good…But, OK: for one thing, right there you’re inferring a level a ‘bliviousness that I’m just not capable of. <br />(Beat.)<br />And besides, I’m thinking beyond that…You’re talkin’ about the physical…I’m thinkin’ more like…<br />(Beat)<br />What I’m talking about, it’s more like - mind over body. <br /><br />DAVE: Oh yeah.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah.<br />(Beat)<br />See the thing is…<br />(Beat.)<br />The thing about…<br />(Beat.)<br /><br />DAVE: Ye-e-s…<br /><br />JACK: What I’m trying to say…<br /><br />DAVE: Go on…<br /><br />[Jack stands up, starts pacing.]<br /><br />JACK: Howda put this?<br /><br />(Beat.)<br /><br />DAVE: Just come out with it already.<br /><br />JACK: OK.<br /><br />DAVE: My breath’s been sufficiently bated over here.<br /><br />JACK: OK.<br />(Beat.)<br />OK.<br />(Beat.)<br />See. Lot a times when I meet someone — I mean someone I’m really into, right off the bat — I swear, it’s like, within minutes I’ve already experienced the entire relationship. Had it all play out in my head. The awkwardness of those first few dates. Learning her sense of humour, if any…What her interests are, turn-ons, turn-offs…on and on. All that compatibility stuff. <br />(Beat.)<br />Things go well, they start to pick up. Action intensifies. That lasts however long, few months tops. Then things slow down. Conversation lags. You become like two overly familiar strangers…without even realizing it. Or maybe you’re just in denial about it. Instead treat everything business as usual. But it’s not like it was. The spark’s no longer there. <br />(Beat.)<br />But then things come in to fill the gap, right. First move in together. What could bring you closer, right? Literally if nothing else. But that only means more hours to fill. To entertain this phantom relationship you’ve fostered. So then what? What do you try? Go down the list. Rings, vows, mortgages, careers, kids born, raised, out of the house, grey hair, wrinkles…before you know it you’re counting down the days in some bleached-out, meticulously maintained condo somewhere in the Florida Keys with a little pet…<br /><br />DAVE: Whoa. Whoa. Slow down, Speed Racer. One step at a time. <br /><br />JACK: See? There you go. What I mean… <br /><br />DAVE: Rewind it there. At least get through the first conversation before sounding wedding bells.<br /><br />JACK: But by then it’s too late. She already walkin’. And it ain’t down no aisle, let me tell you. Or if I’m really honest, it’s me who is. Either way, so much for first impressions.<br /><br />DAVE: Come on. You’re two attractive people. You like her. She’s obviously into you…<br /><br />JACK: Maybe.<br /><br />DAVE: So: just ride it out. See where things go. Who knows? Good things may come…<br /><br />JACK: …to those that wait? Right…<br /><br />DAVE: Won’t be long now. You won’t have to wait much longer.<br />(Beat.)<br />What time did you say you’d meet them?<br /><br />JACK: No set time. Whenever we get down there. <br />(Beat.)<br />Guess we probably should soon.<br /><br />[Jack sits back down. A short buzzing sound, not unlike a doorbell but not, rings out twice. Dave gestures with his arm in the air, his index finger raised.]<br /><br />DAVE: Hold that thought. One sec.<br /><br />[Dave reaches out to coffee table, picks up cell phone. He plays with buttons, eyes transfixed on screen. Jack looks around. Head still down looking at cell phone Dave lets out a short burst of laughter. Jack looks at Dave expectantly, waiting for an explanation.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Lana just sent me a text saying she can’t wait till the next solar eclipse.<br /><br />JACK: Wow, that’s random.<br />(Beat.)<br />You tell her not to hold her breath.<br /><br />DAVE: It’s weird. She’s always sending random things like that. Like, “This is so important I need to message Dave right away.” And when we’re hanging out she’s always throwing out these random thoughts and ideas that come to her. Bits of weird information. Totally random. Her mind is always going. It’s all over the place.<br /><br />JACK: Sounds very…spontaneous.<br /><br />DAVE: I really can’t believe I found this girl.<br />(Beat.)<br />She crochets. She dances. She’s tried acid, mushrooms. Took philosophy for a year at university. Now works at a deli. She’s a hippie chick who listens to punk and hardcore bands. Really outgoing and talkative in public, around lots of people…she’ll start up conversations with anybody, strangers, whoever. But then when it’s just the two of us she’ll sometimes get really shy, almost insecure.<br /><br />JACK: She’s a riddle, a contradiction. An explanation wrapped in a question wrapped in endless digression. <br />(Beat.)<br />Yep. A real conundrum, I tells ya. <br /><br />DAVE: Man. She’s like the female me.<br /><br />JACK (chuckling): Really. You don’t say.<br /><br />DAVE: My buddy Dennis, who met her when we were at the Cambie—all of us playing pool—was afterwards like, “Whoa, Dave…She’s you with a tight bod and nice rack.”<br /><br />JACK (picturing it): That’s kind of a disturbing image…but I get what you’re saying.<br /><br />DAVE: We get along so well, it’s like I’m hanging out with you or Steve or Mitch. Just one of the guys. She laughs at all my jokes. I can be a complete goofball. Her too. Funny and sweet. She’s almost too perfect in a way. <br /><br />JACK: Sounds like it.<br /><br />(Beat.)<br /><br />DAVE: Though to be honest, I think I’m less attracted to her now than when we first met. When I first saw her I was completely floored. Like, I need to know this girl. Nothing could stop me. I was possessed. Locked in. Tunnel vision. Forget about it. <br /><br />JACK: But that’s just what I’m saying. Maybe that’s how it was meant to work out — to just be good friends. Things settle out. The initial flush passes. It happens more often than not. And better to realize it sooner than later.<br /><br />DAVE: Oh, believe me. The flush is still there. Big time.<br /><br />JACK: So what are saying then? It’s easy to get complacent. Take what you have for granted. I’m not following…<br /><br />DAVE: It’s like…You’ve seen Bonnie and Clyde, right?<br /><br />JACK: Yeah, sure. Saw it this summer. The miracle of downloading. The soft, milky skin of an impossibly young Faye Dunaway. Pour me a glass of that, wouldya.<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah. And you have Warren Beatty as like your classic example of the Ah, shucks good-old boy. All raw masculinity. Tame and unassuming yet set to explode any minute. <br />(Beat.)<br />There’s that one scene where they’re on the run from the authorities, holed up in some cheap motel. Him and Bonnie are on the bed getting into it when suddenly he pushes her off and rolls over and… <br /><br />JACK: Yeah, I remember that. And he says something like…Shoot, what does he say?<br /><br />DAVE: They’re lying on the bed, on either side, apart, all awkward. She’s all “What the fuck was that.” And he says, (affecting mild Kentucky accent) “You gotta know somethin’ about me. I ain’t like all the others. The thing about me is: I ain’t no lover boy.” <br />(Beat as he comes out of character.)<br />“I ain’t no lover boy,” he says.<br /><br />JACK: Right. He’s got her right there. She’s giving herself over to him. Here ya go: Happy birthday, time to unwrap your present. And he’s not interested one bit. Like it’s too easy or something. <br /><br />DAVE: Yeah. Too easy. The Paradox of Desire. <br /><br />JACK: The paradox of…Sorry, you lost me there.<br /><br />DAVE: No, that’s it. That’s what we want, see? Desire itself. The real drug. The desire for desire. Once it gets fulfilled, consummated—then: Poof! (Gestures with his hands.) It’s gone. No more. What’s that leave you with?<br /><br />JACK: A relationship, that’s what.<br /><br />(Beat. A few chuckles.)<br /><br />JACK (cont’d): OK. Listen, I think I get your drift—all that “the chase is better than the catch,” I get that—but listen: You and Lana, what you got is fine. It’s ideal really. Just don’t let — don’t let it coast along for too too long before you know good and well where things are headed. Because, believe you-me, once you become “Just Friends,” brother, that’s it. Ain’t no changin’ that. <br /><br />DAVE: I’m not worried about that. Things are good. It’s important to have a little tension. There’ve been relationships in the past where I couldn’t get into it at all. It was my fault, I admit. I laid back. Got too relaxed. Too comfortable. Just look at with Heather. <br /><br />JACK: Yeah, what happened there?<br /><br />DAVE: Well talk about being complacent. I didn’t know what I wanted. Sat back, watched as she drifted off. Dissipated. Dispersed. Right there in front of me.<br /> (Beat.)<br />It’s like when you’re fishing, right. What do they teach you? One of the most important things. You gotta keep the reel taut. <br /><br />[Dave makes gesture like he’s holding a fishing pole, pulls back.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Keep that reel taut. Gotta keep that reel taut.<br />(Beat.)<br />Relationships, it’s like: same thing. Don’t keep up that tension, things start to flounder. They kick loose and swim away. And it’s bye-bye, fishy.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. Or more like they’ll get loose, jump up, and take a chunk out of your cheek. Go right for the jugular, they will.<br /><br />DAVE: I suppose you gotta watch out for the occasional dogfish… <br /><br />JACK: Believe that. I know only too well…<br />(Beat.)<br />Not that I’m bitter or anything. <br /><br />DAVE (refocusing): OK, that’s it. <br /><br />[Dave starts to shift on couch, getting up the energy. Pats hands on knees.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Drinks. We need drinks.<br /><br />[With a bit of effort, Dave gets up, walks over to counter, mixes couple drinks. Jack gets up, walks over to desk, sits down, fiddles with mouse, observing computer screen.]<br /><br />JACK: While you do that I’m gonna get some tunes going. <br />(Beat.)<br />(Calling out.) Anything new?<br /><br />DAVE (over his shoulder): Not really. Same old shit. Floyd, Zeppelin, Stones, Beatles, Dylan…Just don’t put on Exile on Main Street. I’ve been listening to that way too much lately.<br /><br />JACK: Exile it is.<br /><br />DAVE: Hey!<br /><br />JACK (singing in a raspy croon): “And his coooat is tooorn and frayed, <br />it’s seeeen much beeetter days. Just as looong as the gitar plaaays, it’ll steeeal your heaaart ahway.”<br /><br />DAVE: Fuck off.<br /><br />[Dave approaches Jack with two tumbler glasses.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Here. Wait till you try this. This is the oldest drink there is.<br /><br />[Dave holds out drink, Jack stands to take it.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): This is what Hemingway and the boys were drinking over there in Paris back in the day.<br /><br />JACK: You mean absinthe?<br /><br />DAVE: No. Better. I got the mix just right. Enjoy.<br /><br />[Jack holds his drink up for a toast, Dave does same.]<br /><br />JACK: Here’s to it, man. To…<br />(Beat.)<br />To our impending doom.<br /><br />DAVE: Cheers.<br /><br />[They clink glasses, drink.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): And cheer up, wouldya. Buck the fuck up. Tonight’s gonna go fine. Trust me.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. I guess. I don’t know. I’m all worst case scenarios. More so than usual. <br />(Beat.)<br />Hey, this is pretty good. What’s in it?<br /><br />DAVE: Just whiskey and bitters. And a little sugar.<br /><br />[Jack takes another drink, examines glass.]<br /><br />JACK: Yeah, this is really good. Not like most bar drinks where they sugar the shit out of it. Like it benefits them having their patrons getting all sick in the bathrooms and back alleys. Fu-u-ck.<br /><br />[Jack and Dave take periodic nips from their drinks.]<br /><br />DAVE: Better not be how I end up tonight. I need to take it easy this time.<br /><br />JACK: That bad, huh?<br /><br />[Dave leans against couch.]<br /><br />DAVE: Actually, no. Not really. Just not much sleep. I was exhausted all day. Other than that feel pretty good.<br /><br />JACK: Dude, you’re a champ. What’d you guys end up doing? Was there a party or something?<br /><br />[Jack sits back down in chair.]<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah. Over in Cedar. Some guy’s parents were away. Big place. Lots of people. Should have come.<br /><br />JACK: Was Lana there?<br /><br />DAVE: She was there, Steve was there. Mitch. Ben came by for awhile. It was a good time. <br /><br />JACK: Yeah.<br /><br />DAVE: I was hangin’ with my friends. Lana was off with hers. I’d catch an occasional glance of her across the room. She’d look back. Sometimes I’d catch her talking with another guy or group of guys. You know me: I got a real jealous streak. <br /><br />JACK: Uh huh.<br /><br />DAVE: But then—this is great, I love this—she’d point over to me. Talking about me, I could tell. “Oh yeah, that’s him—the guy I came with,” whatever. Then every so often I’d pass her by or we’d meet in the kitchen to get a drink and just say hey or something. Then go our separate ways again. Hang out. Meet up later. All night it was like that. <br /><br />JACK: I love that. The safety net thing. At parties or wherever. That’s the only way I can stand going out. It’s like reassurance or something. Back-up. <br /><br />DAVE: That’s an interesting way of looking at it.<br /><br />JACK: When Sarah was staying out here we went to this party in Parksville. Outside Parksville, actually. In the woods somewhere, near some swamp…I don’t know. Barry invited us. I was nervous as soon as we got there. Kind of awkward…I didn’t really know anyone else. It was his crowd. Even he didn’t seem that friendly with them. <br /><br />DAVE: Weird.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. Anyway, I medicated on a few beers, and that combined with the nervousness, got ta rambling on absently about who knows what as I am wont to do. <br />(Beat.)<br />Most times no one pays attention…But Sarah, she was right there with me, knocking back everything I said. Like we were speaking our own private language.<br /><br />DAVE: Was that the same night you’d talked mentioned before?<br /><br />JACK: The night we ended up lost in front of some biker bar in Coombs? Yeah.<br /><br />DAVE: That’d be pretty far out there.<br /><br />JACK: The fuckin’ boonies, man. We’d been driving around about an hour. Trying to find our way back into town. Back to Barry’s. It was late. Dark out. I took one wrong turn somewhere and then another and then…Yeah. <br />(Beat.)<br />But there was this weird energy in the car. Like a blind anxiousness. Indefinable. Lacking target or direction. You know that feeling you have, when you’re lost somewhere and with every movement forward there’s the sensation that you’re about to go off a cliff? The dizzying rush…on the brink. Between blackness and security. Everything is a reflection of a place you remember being but can’t quite place. The whole world becomes just a little off. Tilted to one side. Skewed angles and whatnot. Ya know?<br /><br />DAVE: Bizarre-o world. <br /><br />JACK: Yeah, sure. Exactly. But, so anyway: There we were, driving around, completely aimless…no idea how to get back. Neither of us was saying much. Maybe silently blaming the other for getting us lost. My bad driving. Her bad directions. It was a tense hour, for sure. <br /><br />DAVE: Yeah.<br /><br />JACK: Finally we see some lights and pull in at the bar. I used the payphone outside to call Barry to get directions while Sarah went inside to take a powder. <br /><br />DAVE: Yeah.<br /><br />JACK: So: Talked to Barry. Got laughed at by Barry. Got directions. Got back in the car. Sarah came out, got back in. And…Ah…<br /><br />(Beat as he hesitates.)<br /><br />DAVE: Yes, and…<br /><br />JACK: And…ah, I don’t know what I’m saying. Forget it. Just forget it. <br /><br />DAVE: No, go on. <br /><br />JACK: No. Never mind. I’m off the rails.<br /><br />DAVE: No, what? You found your way. Drove back into town. Happy ending.<br /><br />JACK: Well, yeah. But before that. In the car, there was still that tension. We were both pretty exhausted and a little exhilarated. Like we’d been on a long journey. Like we’d made it through something, survived…The two of us. At that moment, I felt either really close to her or really far away. Like I was outside myself observing us and yet fighting to stay inside, present. <br />(Beat.)<br />Nobody’s saying anything, we’re just staring at each other. A standoff. But something’s happening. The molecules in the air are changing around us. We go from here to there in zero steps, nary a movement. It was like: for that moment we had broke through the continuum and stepped right out of time.<br /><br />DAVE: And…<br /><br />JACK: And?<br /><br />DAVE: So what happened?<br /><br />JACK: That’s it. What I told ya.<br /><br />DAVE: That’s it?<br /><br />JACK: That’s it.<br /><br />DAVE: Nothing else? <br /><br />JACK: Nope. Nothin’.<br /><br />DAVE: You kiss her at least? Make-out a little?<br /><br />JACK (hesitating): Yeah. We kissed.<br /><br />DAVE: And…<br /><br />JACK: And that’s it.<br /><br />DAVE: That’s it?<br /><br />JACK: We might have smoked a joint…before we left. Before heading back.<br /><br />[Jack catches Dave raising an eyebrow while giving him a knowing look.]<br /><br />JACK (cont’d): What?<br /><br />DAVE: Nothing. I’m not saying anything.<br /><br />JACK (pointing): I know what you’re thinking. And no, nothing happened. It was out of the question. I mean, what could I do? I knew the stakes. Boyfriend back home…Out of the question. I wasn’t going to be that guy. I’ve already been that guy…I never want to be that guy again. No thank you.<br /><br />DAVE: Maybe that’s what she wanted. For you to be that guy. <br /><br />JACK: Huh?<br /><br />DAVE: You know, come in and upset the established order. Run the old guard out of town. Maybe that was the whole point of her little visit.<br /><br />JACK: No. No, that’s crazy. That don’t make any sense.<br /><br />DAVE: No?<br /><br />JACK: None whatsoever. <br /> (Beat.)<br />Listen: How ‘bout make me another one of these? Then we can get out of here and get on with things. Take this sideshow on the road, yo.<br /><br />[Jack hold up his empty glass, shakes it.]<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah. OK. Sure.<br /><br />[Dave takes Jack’s glass.]<br /><br />JACK: Thanks. I’ll get you back at the bar.<br /><br />DAVE: Of course. No worries.<br /><br />[Dave goes over to counter, mixes couple more drinks.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): (Over his shoulder) But hear me out, OK. It’s not so crazy. <br /><br />[Dave comes over with drinks, Jack stands to take his. Sips it.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): I mean, for one thing she sure wasn’t acting like she had a boyfriend. She seemed pretty free and breezy when I saw her. <br /><br />JACK: But she’s always like that, relationship or not. Besides, I would have caught something. There would have been more signals. If that was the case, surely she would have made her intentions more clear.<br /><br />DAVE: Would she? What if that was the point. The challenge was yours to take up. To be assertive. Do the whole knight in <br />shining thing and sweep her off her feet. Did you do that? Did you try at least?<br /><br />JACK: I…well…no, I guess not…but…<br /><br />DAVE: Eh?<br /><br />JACK: Well, like I said, it wasn’t my position to…hmm…<br /><br />DAVE: Listen. You think about it. Ponder the possibilities. I’m gonna run upstairs and see if the Old Man wants a drink. Right back.<br /><br />[Dave exits through door to stairs. Jack puts his drink down, paces stage anxiously, in deep thought. He comes to mirror, stands in front running a hand through his hair, then smoothes it out. Continues to pace. Dave re-enters through same door.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Well…So what’s the verdict?<br /><br />JACK: Jury’s still out. How’s your pops doin’?<br /><br />DAVE: He’s fine. He’s up there in his den watching some action movie.<br /><br />JACK: Same my dad no doubt. Right about now he’s switched over from his after-work scotch to wine and plopped himself down in his leather Lazy—forced as he is to cope with the thirty-six hours still to go before next work day. Flipping back-and-forth between a dish full of ‘80s action movies. Pretty good chance at least one of them is starring either Mel Gibson or Bruce Willis. Or the Governator himself.<br /><br />DAVE: Those are actually really good date movies. You know, something fun. Light. Not too obvious.<br /><br />JACK: I guess it’s better than a Werner Herzog art flick, say.<br /><br />DAVE: There are girls into that as well.<br /><br />JACK: Shit, you need to introduce me. Not many people out there—girls especially—interested in feature length angst fests trading in madness, guilt, doubt, and the nature of reality.<br /><br />DAVE: You’d be surprised.<br /><br />[Ringing sound from earlier. Dave walks over to coffee table, picks up cell phone, looks at it, then back to Jack.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Well, well. Looks like we’ll be seeing Lana down there after all.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah.<br /><br />DAVE: Just got the update. Seems her and some friends are on their way out. As of right now she’s four tequila shots in.<br /><br />JACK: At least someone’s gonna have some fun tonight.<br /><br />DAVE: Maybe the four of us can break off later on. Maybe go get some pizza.<br /><br />[Jack walks over to couches, closer to Dave.]<br /><br />JACK: Yeah, maybe. <br />(Beat.)<br />Listen. Dave. Did I ever tell you about Sarah’s fiancé?<br /><br />DAVE: Fiancé? She’s engaged? When this happen?<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. No. She was. Few years back. We when we were right out of high school. <br /><br />DAVE: Oh. OK. That makes a little more sense.<br />(Beat.)<br />No, you didn’t.<br /><br />JACK: I kinda knew him. Had gone to school with him for years. Really nice guy. Chill. Laidback to the point of being laconic, really. Not sure how he landed her in the first place to be honest. Anyway, it ended up falling apart…whatever the reason. Never did really talk about it with her at the time. Just one of those things. <br /><br />DAVE: I can see how that would be kind of weird.<br /><br />JACK: Well, for one thing, it forced me to change the way I looked at her, my whole relationship with her. What I was in it for. Yeah, but anyway…so when she was here the topic happened to come up. She told me how…how she looks back on that time, when they were together, like it almost didn’t happen. Barely registered. A blip on the emotional radar, she said. Or something to that effect. <br />(Beat.)<br />But I mean: they were engaged for like a year. Over a year. I’ve never been with anybody that long. Have you ever been with anyone that long?<br /><br />DAVE: Close to, but not quite.<br /><br />JACK: A year. I can’t even fathom that. It’s beyond my comprehension. Seriously. And she was this close to taking the plunge. Yet for her it was like…Like it never happened. <br /><br />DAVE: So what’s your point?<br /><br />JACK: My point? Well, so look at the guy she’s with now. They’ve been together off and on the last two years. They’re always fighting. Always some kind of excitement going on. After the first time they broke up, right. The guy, he was so fucking distraught over it he threatened to take a header off the Fourth Ave bridge…such was his undying devotion to her. Absolute fucking proof he couldn’t manage another day in this cold-hearted world without her by his side. The poor bastard.<br />(Beat.)<br />So my point is your point. Like, you’d think when he starts talking about going for a sidewalk splash, that that would, I don’t know, be a sign that “Hey maybe this guy isn’t the best mate. Maybe he’s just a little too unstable. Maybe it’s time to move on.” Mind you, that’s just me, what do I know. <br />(Beat.)<br />Yet she doesn’t see it that way. She takes it as this great meaningful romantic gesture that overrides everything else, all the selfish shit he’d put her through to get to this point. It’s like this…this…Shit, I don’t know. I can’t explain it.<br /><br />[In the following exchange, Jack and Dave talk over each other, their words coming out faster and faster, overlapping at times.]<br /><br />DAVE: Don’t you see? It was a way to demonstrate, in the biggest way possible, his emotional commitment. That you’re there, present, all of you, completely involved…<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. Caught up in it…A whole performance…Putting on a show… <br /><br />DAVE: Committed in all ways, in no uncertain terms: mind, body and soul…<br /><br />JACK: The bigger the better. Bigger the better. Spectacle. Emotion. Large gestures of whatever for whatever purpose…<br /><br />DAVE: …a way of showing that you’re prepared to give up everything, lay it all on the line, no matter what…<br /><br />JACK: Drama. Drama, man. As if you’re playing the role of who you think you’re supposed to be, what you’ve been shown to be. This is how it’s done. Everything larger than life. Cliché of clichés.<br /><br />DAVE: …like the soldier going into battle. Honour. Sacrifice. All these cherished ideals. This is what today’s movies and magazines have taught us to believe in. When really what it comes down to is…<br /><br />JACK: But that’s it. The role. The show. The play. That Billy Shakes was onto something. He sure was. The guy had it bang on.<br /><br />DAVE: Will.<br /><br />JACK: That’s what I said. William fucking Shakespeare.<br /><br />DAVE: No. I mean it’s a matter of will. <br /><br />JACK: Huh? What’s the matter with Will? Besides being over four hundred years old.<br /><br />DAVE: No, will. As in, you have to will it into being. <br /><br />JACK: Will it?<br /><br />DAVE: In whatever way possible. No other way. Nothing just happens.<br /><br />JACK: But will what?<br /><br />DAVE: The whole world round. How do you think all this appeared? How do you think you and me got here? <br /><br />(Beat.)<br /><br />JACK: I’d rather not think about how I got here.<br /><br />DAVE: There are infinite modes of being, Jack. Philosophy 101.<br /><br />JACK: I failed first year philosophy.<br /><br />DAVE: Be that as it may. There are infinite modes. But we’re not always aware of that, being limited by our circumstances and all. Only so many ways of operating at one time, of course. So but whatever form it takes, in order to make it come into being, first it has to get constituted by the will. You follow?<br /><br />JACK: I think so. Sort of.<br /><br />DAVE: Freedom or whatever you what to call it is measured by our ability to will. The exercising of it. However much we are able to. Based on what we have—the tools, resources, connections, so on—at our disposal. That’s what it comes down to. What would life be without will? It’s inconceivable.<br /><br />JACK: Wait. Now I’m confused.<br /><br />DAVE: OK. Think of it another way. You have a guy who’s really into cars. Driving cars. Working on cars. Knows everything about cars. How to take apart and rebuilt an engine. Day in day out, that’s what he works at, thinks about. That’s his world. Or take a musician. The world of notes and chords, melody and rhythm. And through that he brings all those songs and symphonies into the world. A chef cooks up a filet mignon. A scientist invents a vaccine. Teachers teach. Writers write. Actors act. Each of these things, in their way, is a function of the same thing. Each requires the same basic thing to bring it off. An impetus. <br /><br />JACK: That being?<br /><br />DAVE: What do you think?<br /><br />JACK: Are you for real? What are you getting at here? Seriously.<br /><br />DAVE: Seriously, man. What?<br /><br />JACK: No.<br /><br />DAVE: Come on. Simple answer.<br /><br />JACK: No.<br /><br />DAVE: Lights, camera…<br /><br />(Beat.)<br /><br />JACK (mumbles): Action.<br /><br />DAVE: Hey?<br /><br />JACK (louder): Action.<br /><br />DAVE: You got it. Action, Jackson. Not this sitting around. Pontificating hours on end…to what end? None. All that concocting of speeches. Ways of carrying yourself. Affections. That’s fine. That has merit, sure. But it’s not putting out anything new. You’re not cracking anything open. Only one way to do that is…<br />(Beat.)<br />Is…<br /><br />JACK: …through action.<br /><br />DAVE: Bingo.<br /><br />JACK: So action. <br />(Beat.)<br />That’s it, eh. <br /><br />DAVE: That’s it. More or less.<br /><br />JACK: Next you’re going to tell me that’s how we’re defined. Character is action, or something of the sort.<br /><br />DAVE: Or: actions speak louder than words.<br /><br />JACK: To borrow an oft-used phrase.<br /><br />DAVE: That’s what my dad always says. That’s his line. “Actions speak louder than words.”<br /><br />JACK: Yeah. My dad’s line is: “Perception is reality.”<br /><br />DAVE: My dad read all that Hemingway when he was younger. What makes a man. Keep to the code. Unflinching in the face of impossible odds. Know the reality of the situation, no matter how fraught.<br /><br />JACK: So action above all, eh. Over insight even. <br /><br />DAVE: Put it to you this way: Insight over action, no satisfaction. Action over insight, always in the right.<br /><br />(Beat.)<br /><br />JACK: Right. (Sighs) And a night without drinking leads ta too much thinking.<br /><br />DAVE: There you go. I’ll drink to that.<br /><br />[They down the rest of their drinks.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): OK. One more of these then we be outta here. <br /><br />[Dave gets up, gives Jack a pat on the shoulder.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Get to it, friend. Set the night on fire.<br /><br />[Goes over to counter, mixes more drinks.]<br /><br />JACK: I don’t know, man. I just don’t know.<br /><br />DAVE: Know? What’s to know? <br /><br />JACK: Maybe what’s the use? Maybe I’m making something out of nothing. Maybe it’s hopeless. Futile. All just fucking futile…<br /><br />DAVE: Futile? No, no, no…That’s the wrong attitude, Jack. Wrong attitude.<br /><br />JACK: Torturing myself for nothing. No point. No goddamn point at all.<br /><br />[Dave comes back over, hands him his drink.]<br /><br />DAVE: Yeah, yeah, yeah…sure, sure, sure…there’s no point to anything. It’s all absurd. Same old song. Listen: that’s beside the point.<br /><br />JACK: Whatever I do, she’s already made up her mind…one way or the other. There’s nothing I can do to change it. All this talk of action, taking control, asserting oneself…it’s all been preordained in a way. Set in stone. I can pace and fret all I want, but truth is whole thing’s outta my hands. What does it matter how I feel? What is there to be said? Words are worthless. I’m paralyzed regardless. I mean, all I can do now, really, is just show up and see it through. Whatever happens happens. Anything else, I’m just spinning my wheels. Putting on a fucking show. <br /> (Beat.)<br />Futile…fucking futile…<br />(Pause.)<br /><br />DAVE: Ah, what a load, what ah…Fuck. Look: I’m sorry, man…You’re my bud and all…and you know I love ya like a brother…but that, what you just said, is a ten-foot steaming pile of bullshit.<br /><br />JACK: No. It’s true. It’s absolutely true.<br /><br />DAVE: No. It isn’t. And I’ll tell ya why it isn’t.<br />(Beat.)<br />OK, so you say you like this girl?<br /><br />JACK: Yes. I thought I made that clear.<br /><br />DAVE: OK, so you’re very much into her. You feel that you’ve experienced something you consider to be unique and special, yes?<br /><br />JACK: When you put it that way…Yes, very much so.<br /><br />DAVE: Then listen, man: you gotta hold to that. Nothing else means anything. There is nothing else. If you truly feel this way about her like you’re saying, than it would be a crime nay a tragedy for you not to do everything in your power to convey this to her. Get it across. Travel to the ends of the earth, if need be. <br />(Beat.)<br />‘Cuz, listen: if you give up on it this easy, if you just let this pass without fighting for it, really digging in and going all out, than there really is no point to anything. And we really are just doomed like you say. <br />(Beat.)<br />Days are numbered, so make it count. Time for pity has passed, Jack. And if it doesn’t work out — well then: so what? At least you’ll be able to look back and say you gave it a shot. Did all you could. Didn’t wilt and cower at the moment of truth. No fucking regrets.<br /><br />JACK (detached): Yeah.<br /><br />DAVE: And if you do all that and she still looks at you with blind eyes, than fuck it. It’s her loss.<br /><br />JACK: Yeah.<br /><br />DAVE: OK.<br /><br />JACK: You’re right.<br />(Beat.)<br />You’re right.<br /><br />DAVE: OK, good. Look: I’m going to go get changed up. Then after that: we’re outta here, OK.<br /><br />JACK: OK.<br /><br />DAVE: OK.<br /><br />[Dave exits through bedroom door. Jack continues to sit slumped on couch sipping his drink. Dave enters through same door now dressed in a shirt and jeans. Pats Jack on the shoulder.]<br /><br />DAVE (cont’d): Just think, Jackie old boy: This could be the start of something beautiful.<br /><br />[Jack stands up.]<br /><br />JACK: Let’s just go. Get this over with.<br /><br />[They walk towards front door, stopping just before they reach it as Jack turns to Dave.]<br /><br />JACK (cont’d): But imagine, now just imagine…After all this, we get down there…we get down there and low and behold…she’s with another guy.<br /><br />[Dave chuckles to himself, puts a hand on Jack’s shoulder as they continue walking.]<br /><br />DAVE: That’s funny. That’s really funny. <br />(Beat.)<br />You know, Jack, you’re actually a funny guy. Some people miss that about you. But it’s there alright. Hysterical. A funny guy you are, Jack. A real funny guy…<br /><br />[They exit front door, Dave’s last words abruptly cut off by the sound of door slamming shut.]Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-42973522217626885302010-05-02T19:47:00.000-07:002010-05-02T19:53:22.102-07:00The Fictive: An Excerpt“Writing your name can lead to writing sentences. And the next thing you’ll be doing is writing paragraphs, and then books. And then you’ll be in as much trouble as I am!”<br />—Henry David Thoreau<br /><br />James Harper Wells sat staring at the bright white of the computer screen, at a desk covered with all manner of clutter. There were newspaper clippings, energy bar wrappers, an empty coffee mug. Opened and unopened mail. Jewel cases for CDs. Blank CDs. CDs left out, stacked up. Music magazines, books. Books of poetry. Biographies. Books as inspiration. There was a stapler without staples. Headphones for an iPod that no longer worked. Pens with names and numbers of hotels he never remembered staying at advertised along the side. Pencils, erasers, Hi-Liters. Scraps of lined paper, some with coffee-stains, torn from ringed notebooks that had odd notes scrawled on them, random words seeming to correspond to nothing but themselves. And endless sheets of copy paper, written, sketched, printed on, of varying uses and importance, strewn about. <br /><br />Beside him, near the edge of the desk, sitting on top of some papers being used as a sort of makeshift placemat, was a plate from lunch, an abstract smatter of tomato sauce caked on, knife and fork resting across it. <br /><br />A desk that doubled as a dinner table. <br /><br />He spent many of his waking hours here. An island of leisurely and work-related amusements, everything required to get through the day within arm’s reach. A controlled chaos he placed himself in the middle of, the heat of. <br /><br />Before breaking for lunch he’d spent his morning typing three quarters of a page of new words, what amounted to a single long block of black lettering that he now could only look at vaguely, blankly, like one would the scene of an accident, unable or unwilling to bring himself to focus on the particulars. <br /><br />Two years. He had given himself two years. The timetable laid out. And he was now well into the second year. <br /><br />Funds were running low. There was the student loan he cashed out and would soon need to begin paying back. Also what was left of his savings, what was meant to be put towards graduate school. <br /><br />He wasn’t working, not at present. At one time he held various part-time jobs. At a grocery store stocking shelves. In charge of inventory at a hardware store. Clerk at a video store. Janitor at the energy plant. <br /><br />He would get fired. Or quit. All those times he couldn’t be bothered to break off from his writing, when it was really taking off. He couldn’t justify it to himself, having to give up his precious hours to something he felt only stifled his imagination. <br /><br />It was a drain on his creative energies, he would tell others, family and friends, when they pressed him for an update on his current activities.<br /><br />“You’re not serious?” said Melody. They had just come from a movie, a “rom-com.” Not particularly well-written, he’d thought. Derivative. Inconsequential. Not even that funny. An attractive but goofy single woman, clumsy, somewhat ditzy, crosses paths with a charismatic, blandly handsome career man with a checkered dating past. Personalities clash. Then gradually they take to each other, finally falling for each other. They learn things. A popular song plays on the soundtrack. Ninety minutes. It’s all so easy and fun and pat. The ending not so much inspiring thoughtful conversation afterwards—a meditation on modern relationships within a culture dominated by impersonal communication, say—as have you exiting the theater into the still night air feeling a kind of contented emptiness, like after buying a new shirt or pair of jeans, or finishing off your third plate of pasta during Tuesday’s All-You-Can-Eat special at Luigi’s Pizza Palace, the little Italian restuarant tucked away downtown, around the corner off Main. It depressed him. It was everything he wanted to avoid in his own writing. <br /><br />But she seemed to have liked it. <br /><br />They were at a coffee shop pensively sipping cinnamon-spiked espressos when he brought up the news of his latest, and what he said was sure to be his final, employment termination.<br /><br />“Absolutely I am. I have to do this,” he said. “Scott Fitzgerald and Hunter Thompson both had their first books written by the time they were twenty-two. Look at me. I’m already twenty-three. Soon to be twenty-four. Philip Roth was twenty-six when he won the National Book Award.”<br /><br />He was always throwing out names like this, names of writers she’d never heard of—Kafka said this, Conrad did that—a novelty, a quirk, the appeal of which having worn off some time ago. The way he casually brought them up, sprinkled them into conversations, it was like they were people he’d known personally, grown up with and had moved away but still kept in occasional contact, through email or Facebook. Any day now she expected to be invited out for dinner with one of them, this queer Bukowski fellow, say, and so have them made real. Name given its proper, physical form.<br /><br />“I still think it’s crazy,” she said.<br /><br />“It’s not crazy. You’re crazy.” He took a generous sip, grimaced from the near scalding temperature, then put the cup down and looked at her earnestly. “It feels like, honestly, it feels like everything in my life has led up to this point.” <br /><br />“You’re referring to the passage of time.”<br /><br />“I’m referring to my work. The novel in progress. It’s a monumental undertaking, all that you have to juggle to make it come off. I’m on the verge of a breakthrough. I can feel it.”<br /><br />Melody rolled her eyes and turned her head away from the table. There was a time when this sort of sudden, self-serving decision-making, these heedless excursions into the grandiose he took, would have excited her, thrilled her even. <br /><br />She examined a framed painting on the wall near the shop’s entrance, between a large window and the door. It was a watercolor of a man and woman. They were strolling hand-in-hand through the park amidst a splatter of golden swirls, splashes of autumnal reds and oranges filling out the background. It was a classic image, timeless. The man had on a trench coat and fedora. The woman a burgundy scarf, her long brown hair flowing out behind her like a ragged cape. Both smiling. They seemed so happy. <br /><br />“It’s hard to explain,” he continued. “The whole creative process, it’s too...” James fell silent, absently tapping a finger on the table. He searched his mind, looking for the single word that would bring understanding and closure to the matter. Then settled on:<br /><br />“…intimate.” <br /><br />She sighed and turned back to him, her face not registering a reaction.<br /><br />“If you say so.”<br /><br />What did she know about these things, the whims and worries of the creative artist? She had never gone to college. Since graduating high school she’d worked as a waitress at various bars and restaurants in town. She met James during a six month stint at the Caufield Bar and Grill. He would come in occasionally, with friends or else alone, a checkered comp book nestled under an arm, pulling up a stool at the bar or hunkering down in a booth near the back, laying low, observing things, taking in the atmosphere. <br /><br />He looked ambitious, she thought, whatever that meant. He was there, a part of his surroundings, but also removed from them, consumed by something else, something less tangible but bigger than it all. The idle drunkenness, full of cheery cynicism and tedious complaining, groinal humor and good-natured epithets—all part of the testy currents running just under the placid surfaces of small town chatter. <br /><br />Maybe he was going somewhere. Maybe he wasn’t. The people she dealt with on a regular basis, it was tough sometimes to tell the difference. <br /><br />He hadn’t shown much interest in her at first, leaving her to make the first move. She’d bring over his drinks, hovering over his booth a moment with an easy, open smile, waiting for the line to come to her that would start them off, take them beyond the usual what-can-I-get-ya patron-waitress banter. But he’d only look up, mumble a few words of appreciation for her services, and return to his notebook, jotting down more notes. Over time, she became almost jealous of those notes, whatever it was he was writing. But then again that would be ridiculous.<br /><br />Then one day, as she approached his booth to take his order, she noticed a weathered copy of <em>One Hundred Years of Solitude</em> on the table.<br /><br />“Hey, I’ve read him,” she said, gesturing to the book.<br /><br />James stopped in the middle of what he was writing and dropped his pen, his eyes suddenly coming to life, slightly shocked and startled. Almost fearful, she thought.<br /><br />“You’ve read it?”<br /><br />“Well, no, not…”<br /><br />“What about <em>Love in the Time of Cholera</em>?”<br /><br />“Who’s that by?”<br /><br />“Same author.”<br /><br />“Oh. No,” she said. “But I remember having to read a short story by him for an English class. About an avenging dentist or something. I don’t know. It was a long time ago. What I remember is his name. When a person goes by three names it’s hard to forget. It’s like poetry, the way it dances on the tongue and gets resolved.”<br /><br />“I think I know what you mean.”<br /><br />Melody wasn’t her real name. That is, her name of birth. Her full name was Melinda Olena Davies. One of those things growing up that seems to slip out of one’s control. Through a gradual process of reduction and reshaping, of having it tossed around, played with by people, morphed and twisted, it was given back to her in its present form. Melody. <br /><br />“Do you read much poetry?” <br /><br />“Not really,” she said. “Not any more. I mean, there was a year there in high school when I became sort of obsessed with Sylvia Plath. But I think every girl goes through that phase.”<br /><br />James chuckled, let it die out, and with a slight tremor in his voice said, “I always preferred Anne Sexton myself. She was less wild in her images but had a better sense of form.”<br /><br />His gaze dropped to the table.<br /><br />“Is that so?”<br /><br />He looked back up at her. She caught something pass through his eyes, quick and tense, hard to pin down. A hurt, a heaviness, a loss. It took her aback. Then she found an instant familiarity in it which became a source of comfort. Like a dying deer on the side of the road, she thought. <br /><br />“Just my opinion,” he said.<br /><br />The next day before work she stopped off at the bookstore down the block. She found a copy of Anne Sexton’s <em>Collected Poems</em> on the lone, sparsely-filled shelf of poetry. She paid for it and slipped it into her bag, pulling it out and leafing through it during breaks, becoming more and more curious about this odd boy and the secret knowledge he was keeping to himself. <br /><br />He continued coming in to scribble, sit and sip, often during times she was working. They struck up a rapport. Shaky at first, it eventually found its own logic, and they moved it outside the dim, noisy surroundings of the bar, and started seeing each other the next month. It was October.<br /><br />In the weeks and months that followed his coffee shop announcement to Melody, James made sporadic progress on the novel. Holed up in his one room apartment. Anchoring himself to his desk. He usually worked late at night, keeping nocturnal hours, moving ahead fitfully. At the best of times he’d get on a roll, knocking off page after page in steady succession. But just as often he slowed to a standstill, having to fight for every word, every sentence, every fragment. <br /><br />Regardless of his productivity, he was never entirely happy with the end results. There was always something about it that, reading it over, made him turn away. Something was off. Not quite right. He tried to go on, ignore it as best he could. But the more he wrote on the more obvious it became. <br /><br />The manifold problems were persistant in asserting their presence.<br /><br />For one thing, the characters were flat and lifeless. They moved mechanically, rigidly, like they were strapped to an inverted table and being pushed around on a set of crooked wheels. At the same time, the overall form was fuzzy, dispersive. His exposition digressive in the extreme—dipping at times into the abyss of abstraction. Adjectives that missed the mark. Adverbs that were there for no other reason than to draw attention to themselves as prosaic adornment. He couldn’t get a handle on it—attend to the artful shaping and scrupulous cutting so obviously required. But above all, the biggest problem he found, what really ate away at his writerly confidence—small and fleeting as it was to begin with—was he couldn’t for the life of him make the sentences sing. Consistently. Not like the writers he admired. <br /><br />In their assured hands, they were capable of making magic out of mere words. Transformative. They had the ability to take even the simplest language and wring it for all its mercy and meaning, impact and implication. Give it a haunting resonance. Fire-branded with emotion. Phrases and images that, when read for the first time, even after multiple readings, detonated in the mind with a fateful blast, a penetrating shock that continued to linger on, a wave, a tremble, a flicker, a spark, potent and alive like an exposed wire, for days and weeks after. What did the masters have that he was lacking?<br /><br />He sat staring at his dead words on the screen trying to think up ways of zapping them to life. Nothing was coming. He gave up, clicked on his web browser and watched the homepage load. The flashes of distraction, the instantenous feeding of information, a temporary cyber haven from the psychic storm swelling up inside him. <br /><br />There were five or six sites he visited daily while working, their addresses appearing at the top of his search history. One was eBay. Though he didn’t have sufficient funds to make many purchases, he liked to search the names of his favourite writers and pore over the results. Mostly what came up were used copies of their books—the occasional first edition, the rare signed copy, legitimate or otherwise. Sometimes he came across bits of merchandise: homemade t-shirts, lighters. Mugs displaying their silhouette. Posters of their grainy black-and-white image blown-up to full size. Framed portraits of them appearing effete, coy, unassuming. In others, there was a playfully mischievousness in their expressions, lit up as if in response to some private joke being shared between themselves and the camera. But in others still there something far darker subsumed in their features, the author’s brooding gaze projecting a severity—an inexhaustible angst, a barely concealed cosmic sense of indignation. <br /><br />It was true they weren’t known for their longevity, these writers whose work James was drawn to, whose observations on the human condition, meditations on the eternal questions, stirred something strong and unnameable in him. It came with the terrority, he supposed. The risks one assumed in approaching this line of work. And left it at that.<br /><br />Of these literary flameouts was an east coast writer by the name of Howard Dexter Moses. Writing in the early seventies, Moses’ debut short story collection was lauded by critics, claimed to be the brave new voice of the post-Love Generation. The only other published work of his was a slim novel about his youth in Denmore, a once thriving mill town located fifty miles from where James grew up. Considered an immature work, it nevertheless demonstrated the same flashes of brilliance found in his earlier short stories. Next was to be the Great Novel, the one that would realize all the raw, teeming potential found in his earlier work, and vaunt him into the literary big leagues. <br /><br />It never came to be. His death, before the age of thirty, was, as they say, shrouded in mystery. Differing accounts were brought forth and spread around the college town where he lived and wrote and occasionally taught, amongst the east coast literary circles that first championed his work. Further speculation was provided by the morbidly inclined hearsayers, less interested in his artistic output than the unseemlier details of the case. But over time a general consensus was reached, and the ensuing years seemed to only confirm what had long since passed into fact: that the gunshot wound that killed him was self-inflicted. <br /><br />Rumours got kicked around about the novel-to-be, its literary potential, but nothing was ever recovered. Some said he had given instructions, prior to his death, to his widow, a then twenty-three year old graduate student and office secretary, to burn any and all of his papers left behind. Others said it was stolen during a break-in of the lakeside cabin where the writer had been known to disappear to for months.<br /><br />Stories like these had fallen into the lore surrounding Moses, and his was name given up largely to obscurity, save for the few aspiring writers who, through chance or a bit of digging, stumbled upon his stingy output and became as much transfixed by the myth as the work itself.<br /><br />James typed in his name and waited for the results to load. <br /><br />There were eleven results for Howard Moses. Five of them were for his short story collection, three for his novella, <em>Seaside Memories</em>. Two were for used copies of his collected letters. James read all them including the letters, most of which were addressed to his mother while he was away at college, and then later on an unidentified woman—younger or older, who knew? Not his wife—known only as “KEL.”<br /><br />James scrolled down the page. There was one other result. Something called WHERE THE WIND BLOWS BY HOWARD D.J. MOSES. In the linked title the seller had typed *RARE*. No image accompanied the item, no avatar. James was curious and clicked the link. The listing page came up. The seller’s name was mack_da_knife65, operating somewhere out of Arizona. The seller’s description was limited to a few oblique sentences.<br /><br /><em>This auction is for a used one of a kind hardcover book by the world famous American writer Moses D.J. Howard. Some of the pages starting to yellow and has a loose spine (reconstructed) but good condition overall. 880 pgs. Big! Limited print run made. Hard to find item. Perfect for collections! Payment options: Major credit cards accepted but PayPal preferred.</em><br /><br />He stared at the screen, incredulous. Splittered impressions began to take shape in his mind, crisscrossing, back-and-forth, drifting into and out of each other—finally realized in a series of half-committed questions. But before any of them could fully register, he already placed a bid, twenty-five dollars higher than the previous one—the only other one placed thus far—and was now the High Bidder.<br /><br />James closed the webpage and pulled his writing back up. He started to read over the words, methodically, searchingly, looking for some new hook or insight. Some way in. He brought his fingers to the keyboard to start a new sentence when the phone rang. He got up and answered it. <br /><br />“Hello.”<br /><br />Michael, a friend of from college, was back in town. He wanted to meet for drinks. It was just the excuse James needed.<br /><br />They were sitting together in a bar, the same one they once frequented during college. It had a pool table, leather couch and Sundays were karaoke night. It was just like old times, only different.<br /> <br />James was drinking the beer of the day, Michael a scotch and water. This was a new development. There were also changes in his general appearance. His formerly loose dark curls were now slicked back, flattened out into a domed shield melded to his skull. He leaned back in his chair with a hand fastened to his drink, like an anchor. He was wearing a shirt and tie, a button undone at the collar.<br /> <br />“Hell of a thing, being back here. Nothing’s changed a bit. It’s the story with hometowns. So what have you been doing with yourself, Jim? Still holding on to the writing dream?” <br /> <br />“Working at it, I guess. What can you do? Call me cursed. You write anymore?"<br /> <br />“The only writing I do these days is legal briefings and the occasional love note.”<br /> <br />“You should get back to writing your own stuff. Hell, you were a better writer than me. And with half the effort.”<br /> <br />“Jim, my man, you’re too kind.” Michael threw his head back and called out: “Somebody get this man another drink!” He turned back to James. “I was set on it for a time. What can you do? Folly of youth, I suppose. But I woke up. Realized that if I was going to dedicate myself to something, I needed to be compensated for it. You know as well as I that this is the age of digital entertainment. CGI movies. Electronic media. There’s no market, no living to be had in plain old words. Now it’s all about the visual, the concrete, the real. What’s there in front of you, see.” <br /><br />He cocked his head to the side, studying the ice in his glass, then glanced up, shooting a look across the table at James. “Sorry for the spiel, Jim. I don’t mean to be that guy. The one warning you of the peril that lies ahead. Silly. What do I know? Here I am, just back. Haven’t seen or heard nothing from me in well over a year. Just ignore it. Do what you’re going to do. Don’t let my sermons deter you.”<br /> <br />“I won’t. And you’re wrong. They still have value. Words. And the writers who write them. They’re needed today more than ever. Someone bringing truth into a world that increasingly has less and less of it. Who else if not the writer?”<br /> <br />“That’s a nice sentiment, Jimmy, old boy. To the humble few that plod on, in spite of it all,” he said, holding up his glass. He lowered it and took a sip. “No, but seriously. There was a time not too long ago, back in my idealistic days, you might say, that I would have agreed with you. But look. Truth’s become an outdated commodity. It has no currency in today’s market. We strive not for truth but compensation. It’s in our blood. Instilled in us over the generations. Important to us as food and shelter. And if you don’t realize that, than on some level you’ll always be lying to yourself.”<br /> <br />“Oh, I see. I get it. That’s what you want to be a lawyer for. This whole rationalization of yours. It’s to give you carte blanche to rake in all you can, and to hell with the rest.” <br /> <br />“Yes and no.” Michael leaned forward, elbows on the table. “The way I see it, it’s a compromise. Do I still want to effect social change, the way writers were once able to? Yes, for sure. Truth and Beauty and lounging under apple trees waiting for the song of the nightingale. Open people up, you know. Affect people’s lives in a positive way. That’s still the aim of the game. But now I can do it in a more direct way. Focusing those aims through practising law. And if I stick to that, well, the rest will take care of itself.” He flashed James a wicked grin. “Come over to the dark side, James. It’s not too late. Put that philosophy degree of yours to use.”<br /> <br />“I don’t know,” he said. “Right now I’ve got too much invested in it. Besides, I can’t picture myself doing anything else. I’d have to become a completely different person. Shed my old skin. I'm not prepared to do that.”<br /><br />“You’re never too old to change,” said Michael. “Only too dead.” He sipped his drink. “So how far along are you now in this <em>For Whom the Bell Tolls</em> magnum opus of yours?”<br /> <br />“It’s hard to say. I’m too deep into it. It’s hard to be objective. It all blurs together. The meaning is buried. But what can I do? Can’t turn back now. Only soldier on.”<br /> <br />“Well, don’t kill yourself over it. It’s important to step back. Appreciate the finer things in life. There’s never a day goes by that I don’t remind myself that anytime all this”—he spread his arms out in a sweeping gesture that took in the whole room—“can be taken away.” <br /><br />He picked up his drink, pointing a finger at James with the same hand, ice swishing around in the glass as he spoke. “Perspective, my friend. That’s what’s important. See the big picture.” He looked at James, letting his words sink in. His cheeks were flushed from the scotch, eyes reflecting either sorrow or pity—or maybe that was the scotch, also. <br /><br />“Self-knowledge,” he continued. “Don’t let yourself be defined by your circumstances. Know who you are and what your aim is. Always be true, that way you’ll never lose.” He brought the glass to his lips. “My oh my,” he said. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I should have been a poet instead.” He finished off the rest of his drink, the ice crunching around the bottom of the glass as he brought it down. <br /><br />“Let’s get another round here!” he called out to no one in particular.<br /> <br />They kept it going after that night. A three day drunk during which time they got caught up, brought their lives back into the present. On the fourth day James was back at his apartment. Having groggily roused himself with coffee and an aspirin, he sat down at the computer to check his email. In his inbox was a message from eBay. CONGRATULATIONS! YOU ARE THE WINNING BIDDER OF WHERE THE WIND BLOWS BY HOWARD D.J. MOSES *RARE*. <br /> <br />A week later a package arrived. James signed for it, took it inside and cut open the brown wrapping and extracted its contents. <br /><br />It was big alright. A weighty tome. He held it in his hands, turning it around and around, examining it as one would a piece of fruit for blemishes. He cracked the cover, letting the wide spine rest in his palm while thumbing through pages, slowly at first, then rapidly, in a rhythmic flicking, fanning through large chunks at once. A wisp of a breeze, marked by a stale, acerbic smell, like the dusty, old furniture in Grandma Wells’ basement, caught his face. <br /><br />The pages were indeed aged some years, decades probably, loose and dry and fraying. The plain red hardcover that contained them was obviously a homemade job, constructed out of a tough, cheap cardboard material, fitted and glued together, with the only lettering being the title, printed in all caps, in black marker. <br /><br />Even now as he held it in his hands, physical, real, affirmed, the questions were still with him. The mystery of its origins remained. <br /><br />He got down to it. He spent the next week on the couch, camped out reading it through, beginning to end. <br /><br />The story followed a Midwestern couple, the Wheatleys, and their four children, three boys and a girl, that had moved east and settled down in New Vestment, an industrial boom town on the rise just as war was breaking out—Germany having already invaded Poland. At a glance it seemed like a traditional tale, an examination of familial bonds and breakages spanning decades, a throwback to the kind of sprawling generational epics once popular when being penned by the likes of Thomas Wolfe, Steinbeck and others. <br /><br />It would seem dated now if not for the structure. The nonlinear narrative, though nothing new for its time, cast a new light over the relationships, saw them from a different angle. There was a mounting tension in its main plotline, which followed the oldest son, Byron, a longshoreman who’d been ostracised from the family during a misspent youth, and his struggle, now that he was grown up, with the bureaucratic workings of the town’s major banking firm. His story was placed alongside the father’s earlier rise to corporate wealth and eventual fall into delusion and senility. <br /><br />A building narrative tension, unfolding as it simultaneously closed in, tightened. Their stories intersecting, bumping up against each other in an uneasy dialectic of chance and causality. One not so much following the other as mirroring it, the two men’s fates interlocked, sealed together, despite the thirty years separating them and their circumstances.<br /><br />He could see where it was leading, he knew. It was inevitable, how it would end. There could be only one outcome. But he was drawn in all the same, seeking confirmation, belief solidified. He read on, inhaling a hundred pages or more at a sitting. The action built and built as fewer and fewer pages remained. And then it stopped. Just like that. Plenty of rising action but no final climax.<br /><br />It just ended, abruptly, inconclusively. <br /><br />He put the book down and looked over to check the time. It was late. Three-thirty according to the illuminated digits on the microwave clock.<br /><br />He felt an exhaustion he’d never felt before. Not so much shattered by the intense focus, the prolonged mental play of eye and object, eye and word—deciphering, sorting, retaining, recalling—as he was relieved, what felt like a purging. A weightlessness enveloped him.<br /><br />In the bathroom he ran the tap, splashing lukewarm water on his face. As he patted himself down with a hand towel he caught a glimpse of something in the mirror that stopped him cold. He stared ahead starkly, charged with a disorienting sense of a ghostly presence, of this shadowy self reflected back at him. The stranger whose gaze he shared. <br /><br />Back in the main room, he went over to the kitchenette, taking a beer out of the fridge and over to his desk. He opened a web browser and popped the cap on his beer and took a sip while waiting for it to load. He put on music, some plaintive Will Oldham album, and opened a folder in his Favourites menu labelled HDM. A stream of links spilled down. He clicked one. <br /><br />It was a link to an essay written for an online literary journal on the life and mysterious death of Howard Dexter Moses. Of the many searches he performed on the writer, this was the only substantive piece he could find, researched and annotated, including interviews with friends and colleagues. He had read through it twice already and began reading it again, hoping to perhaps make some unconscious connection between the author as he was represented in the essay and the book he had just finished.<br /><br />He read until strain on his eyes from the light of the screen became too much. He minimized the page and leaned back, downing another slug of beer.<br /><br />It seemed plausible enough, that it was the work of Moses. The style was unlike any of the other writing of his that he had read, but he recognized the hallmarks, embryonic as they might have been, of the earlier work. The indistinct longing for home. The mad need for personal expansion, to test and stretch the walls of self. The resigned isolation underpinning his characters, which they wore like a second skin. The choking power of the past and the beating onrush of the future. Even the meatier, more textured prose, for the first time given free reign in the long novel form, were tempered by a melancholy, a stoical sadness that seeped off of every page. <br /><br />He brought the webpage back up and scrolled to the bottom where there was a photo of Moses, the only one he’d been able to find, the one on the dust jackets of all his books.<br /><br />He had even started to look like him, he thought. Take on his qualities in some dimly discernable way. The neat, trimmed beard. Solemn forehead. Pale, thin hair receding above the temples and parted at the side. He stared at the photo like he had so many times before but with a new intensity. His features were downcast, head bent forward, as if in prayer, sombre reflection. Chin swallowed up by his open collar. Eyes that might have been closed though it was hard to tell, darkened as they were by shadow. The crown of his head was lit brighter than the rest, halo-like, contrasting with the darker grays shading the side of his profile. From an overhead light most likely. But the religious connotations were not lost on him. There was an irony there. Or was it coincidence? In the essay it mentioned his conversion, in his mid-twenties, to Catholicism. This accounted for the extra initial, they said, the J. sometimes included in his name, and only made his end a scant few years later all the more baffling.<br /><br />So maybe it was and maybe it wasn’t. Who could know for sure? How many others had read it? He had googled the title, and though it brought back 3,720,000 results, they were all for pages that were either variations on it or had the words randomly contained within the body of the article.<br /><br />He couldn’t know for sure, and yet he was sure of one thing. It was an amazing piece of work. Even without a proper ending, there was the compelling command of language throughout, an insistent thrust to the narrative that never let up for one page. The characters complex, layered. And just then, as he thought back on his reading, he felt a sudden sense of hopelessness, of sinking and utter futility at the realization that it was something he could never match. He could continue to write and write day in and day out for the next hundred years, into the total destitution that loomed with the next rent payment, and never come close to that concentration of scene and character. Rendering the unrenderable. A gesture, a look, life momentarily captured and distilled to its essence. Held under the lens to reveal the subtle intricacies and eye-flicker movements of things. <br /><br />Sitting there in the familiar confines of his workspace, he felt a strange ache rise up inside him. It wasn’t anything he was used to, related in any way to the typical tensions associated with the creative process at its most grim and grinding. The precision demands of a tricky descriptive passage, frantic tightening of a loose-hanging plot thread. No, nothing like that. It was an elusive yearning, without attachment or intention. Lean, unprocessed desire. It gnawed at him, whatever it was. As if he hadn’t eaten for a week, body left reeling. A deprivation accompanied by a dizzying, vacant cry that echoed, both shrill and sonorous, all through him. And then there it was, crystallized. What it meant. Bitten with absolute certainty. The terrible, inescapable knowing that everything he had done up until that point, the last year-and-a-half of work and anticipation he had given himself over to, had been for naught. <br /><br />He turned back to his desk in near collapse, his elbow knocking over some papers that swished off the desk and landed with a light slap against the linoleum floor. He ignored them, head held in his hands staring down at the keys. F-G-H-J. It was code, he thought, a puzzle. Something to be deciphered. Inaccessible to immediate understanding. He rubbed his temples, looking over his brow at the screen. Right palm settling over the mouse, he moved the cursor about the screen. And then, as if to bear out the doubtless fact that now resided in him like a soundless, resounding scream, appropriate the apprehension such a heightened, delirious state brought him to, he moved a file on his desktop labelled NOVEL IN PROG over to the Recycle Bin and right-clicked EMPTY.<br /><br />Sleep that night offered a scarcity of solace.<br /><br />He woke the next morning having only stolen a few restless hours. Caught in a tangle of damp sheets, he turned himself over in bed, looking bleary-eyed at the red, crumbling hardcover on the nightstand. Suddenly it became clear to him. All at once he knew what he had to do. <br /><br />He took the book over to his desk, and minutes later had a steaming mug of coffee with him as he sat down, ready to begin.<br /><br />It was all he did for weeks, typing out every page word for word, for hours on end. He became lost in the rhythms of sentences, the push and pull of punctuation, the sudden, breathless jolt of an em-dash, dips and turns of clauses, working through the dense valleys of paragraphs.<br /><br />He got on a roll. His focus honed in, hardened and exact. So attuned was he to the work, the repetition of keystrokes combined with the line reading of words, thousands upon thousands of them, that over time he began to take on their aura. The words imprinted on his consciousness. During those heady, solitary days of typing, rereading, and more typing, he lived with the characters in a way he hadn’t that first time, that week on the couch. He came to know them deeply, inside and out, in their full scope and depth. It was an intimate knowledge. The privileged position of the creator, who having extended himself to his emotional and imaginative limits, is made one with his creation. <br /><br />It took him nearly two months, all told. On the night he finished the last page and printed it off, he sat back in his chair aglow from the endless creative surge, his senses alert, attentive, almost painfully so. The nice composed stack of pages towered on his desk, the only thing on it now save for the monitor and keyboard. Everything else had been cleared off, boxed up, thrown away. Discarded. He looked on with satisfaction. There was a sense of being redeemed somehow, like having undergone a total blood transfution. Something brought into line. Revitalized. The old made new again. <br /><br />He hadn’t changed a word or sentence. <br /><br />He went downtown and had copies of the manuscript made and sent them out to the five east coast publishing houses he knew of, their contact information having been recorded and stowed away for such a time when they would finally be of use.<br /><br />Time passed darkly. Then one day, two months on, a call came from one of the publishers, Clyde and Jefferson, out of Stanton, Mass. <br /><br />It had been accepted. <br /><br />It was all set, they said. This was an amazing piece of work. Everyone who read it had been floored. “An extraordinary achievement,” said the editor, a man by the name of Tom Murphy. They would be proud to be the ones to put it out there. <br /><br />There were just a couple things. Small things that needed to be taken care of before it could be considered publishable. <br /><br />For one thing, it was too long. Cuts needed to be made. <br /><br />“Also, and about the ending,” said Tom. “I like it. I like where it’s going. But where you decide to break off, it doesn’t feel right. It doesn’t completely satisfy.” He wanted James to work on it, massage it out. It was too great on the whole to let a weak ending spoil all that came before. “It cheats the reader,” Tom said.<br /><br />He invited James out to their offices in the city, to meet and discuss cuts and a new, improved ending. As soon as possible. He mentioned a beach house belonging to the managing editor who was away in Europe until the fall. If he could make it out in the next few weeks he could stay there while polishing the manuscript. <br /><br />It had happened.<br /><br />“You what?”<br /><br />“My novel got accepted,” he said. “They’re going to publish it.” <br /><br />“Like a book-book?”<br /><br />“The very kind.”<br /><br />“Liar,” she said. He had surprised Melody at her apartment, where she was on a break between working a split shift. Her hair was still wet from the shower. <br /><br />“It’s true,” he said.<br /><br />“Really.” She thought about it in a peripheral way, what it might mean. “Can I read it?”<br /><br />James had mentioned to her once an idea for writing a book with her as the main character, based on events from her life. Coming from a broken home. Growing up with her mom and younger sister, moving around. Their travels back and forth across the country. At first she was flattered by this. But then she thought it over, and as the reality of what this would entail began to settle in, she found it vaguely disturbing, almost creepy. Going so far as to censor certain stories she told him, in the back of her mind aware that they may one day find there way, in whatever mutated form, filtered through his writer’s imagination, into the purported book. But now, thinking this might be what he was talking about, the book that was to be published, she was getting excited all over again.<br /><br />“Sure. Of course you can. But there’s still some work to be done on it.” He told her about the beach house, that she could come with him.<br /><br />“But I have to work,” she said. “Next month’s schedule just got put up.”<br /><br />“So quit. This is it. Our chance to get out of here. It’s what you’ve always wanted, right? What you’ve always talked about.” <br /><br />She let out a breath, looking him over. She couldn’t remember ever seeing him like this. He couldn’t stop smiling.<br /><br />“Well, yeah,” she said. “But I’ve barely seen any of you the last however long. You even look sort of different. Lost or gained weight or something.”<br /><br />“My metabolism jumps around when I’m working. What can I say, it’s been a crazy time. But this is it. What everything’s been building towards. Whattaya say?”<br /><br />“I don’t know.”<br /><br />“Hey. Come on,” he said, a hand clutching her arm, pulling her close. “I need you in this.”<br /><br />She looked him up and down.<br /><br />“Who are you?”<br /><br />“Same old me,” he said.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-53099428723218661422009-08-11T14:42:00.000-07:002009-08-11T14:45:19.296-07:00Road Trippin'<em>pirate feet have trod<br />the clean-thatched floors<br />of my soul,<br />and the canaries sing no more.</em><br />—Bukowski, “for they had things to say”<br /><br />“Life has a way of turning us into human fireworks that can’t reach the sky.”<br />—<a href="http://htmlgiant.com/?p=8074#more-8074" target="_blank">Jimmy Chen</a><br /><br />Where to begin? It was a trip meant to restore one’s faith in the human capacity for excitement and adventure, to feel alive, in the sense Zen Buddhists speak, in the “Here and Now,” to accept uncertainty, open to change like the shifting winds, ready for movement, on a whim, in any direction, however the moment dictates, to give oneself over to the element of chance in all its manifestations: anticipation, risk, opportunity, bald desperation. But this is getting ahead of things. It started off with much simpler, practical concerns.<br /><br />It started with a flat.<br /><br />It was early summer, and I was coming off my third year at university. Most semesters up till that point had always been something of a slog—the better part of four months spent trying to keep up a precarious balance of work, study, and occasional socializing only to see it all go out the window by the end when, deadlines fast-approaching, hitting all at once, there comes that mad rush to cough up work, meet the word counts, meanwhile holding onto the hope, the loose assertion playing on a loop in the back of the mind, that if only it can just be adequate then everything will be fine. Salvaged, if nothing else.<br /><br />But this last one in particular had worn my emotional reserves down to nil, in serious need of a recharge. A number of factors contributed, but mostly I owed it to a Shakespeare class, and specifically a research paper on “Hamlet.” Meant only as simple undergrad paper containing the requisite 3,000 words, presented, as was the case, in smartly arranged half-page paragraphs that elucidated my main arguments—employing a prose style not too dense, but lucid, clear, declarative; secondary material properly cited, etc.—it soon spiralled into something much larger than that, something big, unwieldy, something altogether stranger. For weeks on end the only place I could be found, outside of class and coffee shops, was hunkered down in the campus library occupying either one of a roomful of three-sided wooden booths or off in a solitary corner seat, books stacked next to me like a tilting, precarious drink stand, until closing, reading through all the criticism and commentary I could get my hands on, decades and decades worth, pushing all the way back to the earliest part of the twentieth century, when Shakespeare criticism was just coming into vogue... <br /><br />I traced the whole history of the play back to its “Ur-Hamlet” origins, immersed myself in the forever ongoing debate over original author credit. Was it the semi-famous in his day playwright Thomas Kyd, author of the earlier “Spanish Tragedy,” who was responsible? Shakespeare himself? And who was that exactly? Perhaps it was some other uncredited ghost writer, forever lost to history? On and on it goes. With never an end is all we know.<br /><br />In the deep hours of the night I meditated on the loss of Shakespeare’s only son, Hamnet, at the tender age of eleven, and what if any connection could be made between his death and the final play produced only a scant few years after his passing. <br /><br />The semester dragged on.<br /><br />When not engaged in an all-consuming process of literary investigation soaking up everything from random bits of background information to the hundreds of critical arguments and diverging stances taken (the poet, playwright, critic, and all round literary prude T.S. Eliot, for example, considered Hamlet, the four hundred year old play to this day regarded as the apex of world literature—irrevocably impacting the direction of all “important” writing to follow thereafter—a failure), when not doing all this, I was glued to a television set viewing every recent, and not so recent, adaptation and stage performance recorded for posterity. From the latest streamlined Hollywood versions to the 1948 Olivier gold standard to the endless copies of grainy VHS recordings culled from the shelves of the campus library’s electronics section, starring a century’s worth of the best and brightest from British theatre—I couldn’t get enough, it’s fair to say. <br /><br />My “Norton Complete Shakespeare” had been marked up with all sorts of barely-decipherable annotations, mostly in the form of cryptic jottings scrawled down in the throes of a fevered ecstasy brought on, no doubt, by some minor insight or other, that—silly deluded me—I was convinced at the time cut to the core of the text. “Now I have this thing cracked, yes!” <br /><br />No. <br /><br />And as for the many yellow hi-lited sections comprised mostly of but not limited to those beautiful, solemn Hamlet soliloquies—they became such a constant point of reference that, reading and rereading them on into language comprehending oblivion, before long and without consciously realizing it, I would fall into reciting sections to myself any time day or night: in the shower, while frying up eggs, waiting in line at the grocery, even dropping in allusions during random conversations—most if not all of which had nothing whatsoever to do with Shakespeare, Hamlet or any of the heady themes that cut through and subverted the horror and revenge conventions of the plot. Indeed, becoming more and more consumed with these themes of such great existential heft, I eventually brought out the big guns, seeking out the works of Nietzsche, Heidegger, Benjamin and other scholastic touchstones of modernity (and not all of them of German heritage), in an effort to better understand the dark notions I had began to unearth, insights into the human experience that seemed to only grow darker and darker as, paradoxically, more light was thrown on them.<br /><br />Over the weeks, as my thesis grew and mutated and stretched out into the furthest reaches of what can be called “critical theorizing,” the netherworlds of philosophical argument and discourse, it became clear that what I was working on was more than any mere college essay, some assignment constituting a single mark that averaged against the rest of my course work would contribute to my overall GPA. No, it was beyond that. Way beyond that. The scope and breadth had expanded exponentially. Now it dealt with matters no less pertinent than that of life and death.<br /><br />Months went by, and by the time finals rolled around and I came stumbling into the gymnasium one gray foggy morning, gaunt and bleary-eyed, to hand in my finished paper—what amounted to a piddling distillation of my total accumulated material—two weeks overdue, before sitting down to write my exam, I could no longer for the life of me accurately discern where Shakespeare’s play ended and my real life began—if indeed I even still had a life to speak of.<br /><br />It’s hard to describe exactly what it was I was looking for in my obsessive research, what great illumination I hoped my relentless exploration of a four century’s old play—one that however archaic in form, is still considered eternally relevant in content—would ultimately achieve. Many a better man than I had, like sailors charting an unreachable course to the unknown land, fallen into the abyssal mazes of self that can be the peril for those identifying too strongly with a hero that for years has stood as a grim monument to the limits of human consciousness, a kind of forlorn archetype to our fated modern condition.<br /><br />In the end, despite an academic diligence that spiralled into a dedication to subject bordering on the pathological, what I finally came away with, in the final analysis, was far short of profundity, and maybe comes closest to getting summed up in the Kerouac statement at the outset of “On the Road,” describing his state following the death of his father and first divorce that precedes the events of the book, about the “feeling that everything was dead.”<br /><br />Indeed. It was unshakeable. A constant presence. There everywhere. Interrupting ever conversation. Undercutting every joke. It lurked behind every smile, every glance. Inescapable. Enough force to black out the sun on an otherwise perfect cloudless day. Sucking the fun out of an otherwise festive night out. It couldn’t be ignored and there was no comfort to be found, no person unaffected. Faces seemed unreal. Expressions, empty. Food lost its flavour. Music stripped of its sonic majesty and resonance. There was no way to get away from it. <br /><br />And it wasn’t even anything new either, some great revelation brought down from on high. It was nothing; so banal, uninteresting. A futility, a yearning, an inkling, a lie. A fear, a phantom, a shadow, a form undefined. Whatever it was it had buried itself deep within. And was here to stay.<br /><br />Everywhere I turned I was faced with the awful projection of my own insurmountable fallibility. <br /><br />With the rigours of the semester now behind me I was happy to eschew all further responsibilities and lock myself up in my apartment indefinitely, away from an indifferent world incapable of reconciling our fundamental existential plight with the unfathomable mystery forever sealed up in the hidden depths of the human heart.<br /><br />And I did. For a time. But then one day, I got a call, and crawled out of myself and answered it. It was a human voice, female.<br /><br />“Hey! How goes on the west coast!”<br /><br />“Oh. Same old. Same old.”<br /><br />It was Marissa. I hadn’t heard from Marissa in months, probably since Christmas, and the sound of her voice was as good as an unwrapped present that forgotten under the tree. <br /><br />Marissa and I had been friends for as long as I can remember and probably before then. She was coming off her first marriage and the experience had left her terribly raw. Even so, as much as I could gauge it over the phone, she seemed no less her vital self. The ceremony had taken place the previous fall after a short, very short, engagement. In the process she had left behind her studies and a young daughter to relocate some 250 miles north, to where he lived. Things were good for a time, but then the honeymoon period came to an abrupt end and with it, not longer after, the union itself. The details are numerous, complex and involving, and enough to fill several volumes of Carveresque tales of woebegone relationships, domestic entanglements and general misunderstandings between the sexes. Months of tiny squabbles over anything and everything, from money to lifestyle to personal philosophy, snowballed until one day, arriving home late in the day from work, she found her stuff, clothes and everything else, tossed out all over the front yard, the locks changed, and her ’84 Volvo, which had just had thousands of dollars in repairs and upgrades invested in it—along with other personal items, CDs, DVDs, and anything else of any value—sold off, with her new-but-now-soon-to-be-ex-husband pocketing the profits. <br /><br />A new twist on an old standard. <br /><br />“You might have married me for love, but I married you for money.” Those his last emphatic words, and just like that she was out of there, back at home getting things sorted.<br /><br />“This whole experience, it’s forced me to revaluate my relationships, who I can trust.”<br /><br />“Yeah, no kidding.”<br /><br />“I mean, I always thought I was a good judge of people, knew where I stood…but now—now, I just don’t know.”<br /><br />“Shit. That sucks. It’s like this instinctual need we have or something. To top each other, take advantage of each other. Including those closest to us. Especially those closest to us. People are fucked.”<br /><br />“I guess. But I always try and see the best in people. And like with this thing with Chris, for the longest time, I mean as long as we were together, I wanted to believe it would work itself out. Otherwise it would be that I was wrong, I had put my faith in the wrong person. And if I can’t trust my own judgement, then what do I have to go on, you know?”<br />“Yeah. It’s like a double bind or something.”<br /><br />“What’s that?”<br /><br />“It’s…I don’t know. Never mind. I can’t think. I’ve had my brain on standby.”<br /><br />“Oh yeah. How’s that working for ya?”<br /><br />“Hard to tell. About the same.”<br /><br />“H’uh.”<br /><br />There was music playing in the background on her end, coming through the receiver, and to change the subject I asked her who it was.<br /><br />“It’s just this song that was on this iPod I got. It was Chris’s brothers’. He got one of those new video ones, and gave me his old one for my birthday. He put a bunch of songs he knew I liked. I’ve been listening to this one on repeat all day.”<br /><br />There was a pause as she listened for a minute, then came back on the line.<br /><br />“Sorry, there’s this line near the end, it’s kind of cheesy but I just like the description. ‘You are the smell before rain / You are the blood in my veins.’”<br /><br />It was after that, over the phone, that I made up mind to go back. Back east.<br /><br />The spoils of solitude are meagre indeed. And once the glass has run dry, what is there left? Crawling along the swampy psychic bottoms with a thirst left unquenched it’s all you can do to call out for another draught. <br /><br />It was time to once again drink from the mug of life, time to throw off the mental shackles and reacquire a taste for good, honest freedom. <br /><br />In short, it was time to hit the road.<br /><br />But it was a trip I had made once before and knew that to do it right I was going to need a traveling companion to bring along.<br /><br />I first met Nick my second year of university. We were both taking an English class on British Modernism. Nick was a philosophy major of a decidedly analytic bent, and had his sights set on law school. But for now he was living the blissfully uncommitted college life of classes and study, bagging groceries, pub crawls, weekend jams and the rest of it. We hit it off discussing Camus and Dostoevsky over pitchers of Pil and games of pool at the campus pub. We had stuff in common. We both had fathers in the stock market game (however divergent the roads they each took to get there). Both our mothers were singers who sang in church choirs. At least mine did. I don’t know if Nick ever went to church. It never came up. Anyway, after that we wound up in a bunch of other lit classes together—which included the doomed Shakespeare class. <br /><br />Nick had been caught up in his own existential conundrum, however more grounded in reality than mine. In the fall, as classes were resuming, his long-term girlfriend had left for Germany to live and study for a year. It was obviously a tough decision for her, leaving behind friends, family, loved ones, as it were, all in the name of discovering some of the world, other cultures, expanding horizons beyond hometown confines. She saw it as an important test of their relationship, and pledged to stay faithful, through it all, until she returned. Which he did. As far as I know. But by the spring, the strain had become too much, for both of them, and they broke it off, long distance. It was some time later he learned she had become enamoured with a certain strapping young German fellow, who also happened to have only one leg. Nick was bowled over. “How do I compete with that?”<br /><br />So for those reasons and others he had been entertaining his own cross-country motorcycle dreams, and was totally game when I brought up the idea. A request was put in for time off work, and as soon as it was accepted we made plans for an early departure the day following.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-81188801524311836512009-08-11T14:41:00.001-07:002010-11-27T12:48:04.151-08:00The day we were to leave it was hot and cloudless, a light wind blowing in from the west. The potent sun pulsated high above, glaring off the body of the red Probe parked on the street out front, which had been loaded up the night before and was ready for one last go round. Stepping woozily out of my apartment when we did, it wasn’t much of an early start; already late morning by the time we roused ourselves after a night of drinking and last minute planning. And now there against the sidewalk, sagging pathetically, was that sorry piece of rubber. Set back even further now, we limped over to the nearby tire shop. Around the corner and two blocks down, the same place where only a few months before I had gone in only intending to get one, a different one, patched up, and wound up driving away with a completely replaced set. <br /><br />It was a Friday and we hoped to make it to our destination by the end of the weekend. But it was also the holiday weekend celebrating the inception of the very country we would be booming across—though what this would mean for us later on, at the time, we hardly took into account. It was all about making it back there in time to meet up with Marissa and a few others to hang out, throw back a few, and watch the million fireworks that would light up the night sky capping the weekend’s celebrations. That was the plan.<br /><br />Starring at a couple thousand miles of road ahead of us, the sight of that flat wasn’t the best note to set off on, but at the tire shop we got quick service, the dud replaced in the time it took us to suck back our paper cups of coffee and go over the planned route one last time. And as we stepped back outside into the afternoon warmth there was nothing that stood between us and the open road<br /><br />That is, nothing except for the wild wailing Pacific.<br /><br />We arrived at Deport Bay just in time to miss the latest ferry. A long line-up of cars had already started to form for the next one, stretching back twenty or thirty, and I pulled up and parked in behind them. In the next lane, a few cars ahead, a whale of a boat stood towering over the others. It had a dull blue hull that hulked out maybe twenty feet, and I could hear two middle-age men, both decked out in clashing weekend attire, commenting on as we got out. “Would you look at that?” said the one guy, hands on hips squinting up at it in dry amazement. “Musta cost him a fortune, bringing that thing along.” <br /><br />We started toward the terminal, and in among the collection of wandering, heat-dazed denizens was a woman holding a leash connected to a big shaggy Australian sheepdog and saying to the woman next to her, “She’s so smart, she knows how to play stupid.” I couldn’t tell right off who she was referring to and could only assume it was the dog. <br /><br />We passed the time staggering about inside the terminal, where dozens of knickknack booths were positioned on either side of the long hall, merchandise placed on prominent display, easily accessible, in a way that allows for one to engage in a kind of disinterested shopping experience driven only by tedium and exhaustion. We made the walk of inconsequence and then went back outside. Across from the building was a large tent set-up hoping to capitalize on the holiday traffic, with more of the same stuff as inside, jewellery, clothing, other trinkets and souvenirs, all “On Sale.” We found a cool spot a ways away, behind the building, where there was a picnic table. We took a seat on top and Nick lit up a cigarette. An announcement came over the loudspeakers that the next ferry would be late getting in, causing a slight delay. <br /><br />“I hope our luck is better once we get moving,” I said.<br /><br />“Luck has nothing to do with it,” said Nick. “There’s no such thing as luck. Luck implies something lacks a cause, and everything has a cause.”<br /><br />“It was probably a couple Harewood skids punctured the tire. The same one’s who keyed it. And broke in and pilfered my wallet.”<br /><br />“Accepting the notion that there are forces working out of your control that you lack the power to influence is acquiescing to such conditions, a giving up of your free will to the tyranny of the other.” <br /><br />“Yeah. I wish there was something I could do about it. Nothing major. A little retribution. Eye for an eye. I live in a shitty neighbourhood.”<br /><br />“So move. No one’s forcing you to live there.”<br /><br />“I don’t know. Might feel like I’m running away.”<br /><br />“What are you running away from?”<br /><br />“I don’t know. Something. Nothing. Isn’t it sharks that die if they stop moving?”<br /><br />“Yeah, I think so. Terminal stasis.”<br /><br />“I wonder if stasis can be infectious.”<br /><br />“Maybe. Why not. Ask the dead.”<br /><br />“I have a few questions.”<br /><br />We got up and walked back out into the hot sun, over to a railing, where far down below the waves lashed against the high cement wall, the white foam floating about like little cloud tails, swishing and sloshing, waiting to be thrust back out into the waters deep. I looked up. I could start to make out its form in the distance, growing larger, more defined, and soon it was right there, cutting through those waters, in all its grand stature, the St. Elizabeth, coming into port.<br /><br />Nick turned around, leaned against the guardrail, and lit another cigarette. There was a sweet freshness in the air and a crisp breeze had kicked up to temper the heat. <br /><br />“How far you think we’ll drive tonight?” said Nick.<br /><br />“Depends,” I said. “To Kamloops would be a start. Push it hard tomorrow.”<br /><br />Back in the car I ate a late lunch out of the cooler, while Nick buried his head in a dog-eared copy of Hume he had inexplicably brought along for the trip. <br /><br />The ferry docked, unloaded, and a short time later the next line-up of cars were loaded on. Then two hours later, having made the sprawling, scenic trip all along the Georgia Strait, they too were unloaded and sent off huffing and fuming and roaring down the long strip of road, the ocean spread out on either side like untouched crystal, leading out of the Tsawwassen terminal. We were on our way, speeding along with the tightly clustered traffic. I knew the road we were on followed straight through eventually took us into downtown Vancouver, and was already checking for the quick turnoff that would keep us rolling down Highway 1 and later merge on to the 5. But as we roared along there were no signs anticipating the turnoff, or short I say there was an abundance of signs, so many in fact it was nearly impossible to make any sense of them as they flew by, one after another, with all the stampeding vehicles jockeying for position and nobody giving an inch to others trying for a tight lane change. Nick looked over the map, trying to zero in on our position, but I had a sense of the road and figured my instincts enough to guide us through. But then, so much for that, as in the confusion I got overanxious and heedlessly took the next available right. <br /><br />It didn’t take long, after entering the town of Delta, coasting down the main drag, to realize I had completely miscalculated. In another desperate move I got us quickly swung around, trying to retrace our way out of there. The roads were a whole mess of lights, intersections and confused street signs, and not long after we were back on the road I hoped would get us out of town, we came to a standstill. Traffic was backed up a mile, a long line-up of idling vehicles backed up for blocks. It was close to five by now and everyone was just getting off work, gearing up for the long weekend. We waited and waited some more. <br /><br />Traffic was slow moving. I strained my neck out the window trying to get a read on things. Up ahead, the road curved off and disappeared around a thicket of spruce, making it impossible to tell what lay ahead. We sat there helplessly. Then Nick spotted a couple guys strolling past, across the street from us. These guys in their silly striped golf shirts and khaki shorts, wheeling their fancy-pants golf bags down the sidewalk, it was clear they were fresh of the lynx. Nick shouted out the open window, asking them where the road was headed. “US Border,” one of them shouted back. Nick turned to me. There had already been some talk about a quick detour down to the border to pick up some duty-free—and now through pure dumb chance here we were this close. But it was getting on and we had barely started out. And it looked like we would be waiting for who knows how long, at least another hour, maybe more. More importantly, now I knew where we were in relation to where we needed to be. And I was through with waiting. <br /><br />Pulling out of line I heard one of the golf guys shouting something at us. “Hear there’s a Grateful Dead concert tonight!” They both had a good laugh over this, and Nick at first smiled and nodded amicably. Then the remark suddenly sunk in and he leaned out the window and shouted back, “EAT IT, YUPPIE FUCKS!” as we peeled away back towards the highway.<br /><br />We shot through a few greens out of town, and a couple turns later the sight of the verdant fields of the vineyards, all spacious and rolling, confirmed that we were back on the 1 headed for Surrey. Behind us the sun was just starting to dip, shooting bright white shards of light across the horizon. I loosened my grip on the wheel, cranked up the jangling chords of “Blonde on Blonde” playing on the stereo, and let out a good deep breath. We were on our way.<br /><br />But I couldn’t enjoy the view for to long. There was still some business from earlier left to deal with. The mechanic back in town mentioned stopping in to get the tire re-torqued around 100 klicks. When I told him we would be out of town by then he told us of a place in Surrey that could do the job, and called ahead to let them know we were coming in. We were well over a hundred clicks by the time we reached Surrey, but when we passed by the tire place, it was obviously closed, no signs of activity, deserted, like most other places by now. Sure, maybe it was only a precautionary measure, but not having it done, I couldn’t help feeling a bit nervous. <br /><br />My mind started working over the matter, spinning it out into the most desperately devised of scenarios. Terrible sights. Fiery ruins. I pictured us driving along as normal, when suddenly, without warning, the damned wheel breaks loose, snapping off and rolling back down the road while, back at the car, sparks shooting up from the empty rim grinding into the pavement, we go skidding and spinning uncontrollably, at top speed, into a ditch, or worse, a blazing nosedive off a cliff. End of the road. End of all. Sure it was extreme, but I had been through similar situations in the past, if only on a less severe level, and now the terrible thought wouldn’t leave me.<br /><br />But for the time being, at least, I managed to put it out of mind as we zoomed on, cutting through the mouth of a mountain, the deep dense greens of the valley swelling up next to us, and shrouded by the shadows cast by the mountain walls that flanked us on both sides. We pushed through. An hour on Nick volunteered to take over driving duties. I was happy to hear this, but also knew that Nick had only had his licence for a few weeks. Not because he was that young, an underage <em>wunderkind</em> or something, but because he had never bothered to go through everything—the lessons, the practice time, road tests—you need to get it. It was an easy stretch of road, and a good chance for him to log some hours before we hit the heavy mountains, where the real fun would be found.<br /><br />I pulled off the highway onto a gravel road that led to a nondescript park area. Deserted for the most part, I caught sight of some movement in the distance, a couple young kids running around, playing. Also, parked in the parking lot, off by itself, was an RV. The business with the tire still had me occupied and I got it into my head that maybe these campers, with all their camping supplies and whatnot, could help us out. I approached the RV hesitantly. No one. I rounded the corner and suddenly came face to face with a tall man who looked to be in his mid-forties. He was German. He had a crew cut and wore short cargo shorts that exposed long hairy legs and an aqua blue shirt with an orca whale swimming across it. His startled expression quickly gave way to a cordial manner. <br /><br />“Ello dare! Is ah very good veet yo.” He smiled, his teeth all black and crooked. His wife came over. She was also very tall, almost as tall as him. I explained our predicament as precisely as I could. He looked on with grave concern. I think I had oversold the perilous nature of what we were facing, still under the influence of my earlier visions. When I finished he let out a breath and scratched his head, mouth hanging open, brow scrunched up in concentration, thinking it over. He looked over at the RV thoughtfully and then back at me. “No, vade not. No cun elp yo vit tat. Vish ve could. Sorry bout that, yah.” I thanked him all the same and talked with him a few minutes more. The communication was broken, hard to make out, but I gathered that he and his family were visiting from Berlin, taking a month to travel up and down the province and enjoy all the sights and wonders of the coast. Maybe they were on the same elusive search as we were? He seemed to have liked what he had seen so far. I wished them well and started back.<br /><br />We drove on, Nick still behind the wheel. The mechanic’s words still stuck in my head and I wondered more and more about what we were going to do. Could we just ignore it, make it all the way without bothering about it further? I was getting antsy, sitting there. I was filled with a nervous energy. I tried to forget about it by scribbling down some notes in a notepad, but even my writing took on a paranoiac edge that the tire matter had seemed to instil in me. Like for example, one fragment I recovered.<br /><br /><em>How we construct language and meaning. The iconoclast artist Robert Crumb coined the famous sixties counterculture slogan “Keep on truckin’.” In interviews he admitted that there was no significance behind the phrase, held no explicit meaning, and this admission reveals both the triteness of the hundred of stock phrases we utter on a daily basis and our natural communicative tendency towards cliché and platitude, language that is employed less an means of communication than of getting through the day, reinforcing, in the process, the dominate beliefs of culture and the deadness of our language. In addition, we see how certain words and word combinations, empty on their own, become imbued with meaning by the connections and connotations that culture attaches to them, forever tied together.</em> <br /><br />I continued to scrawl out longhand nonsense like this as we drove along, but then finally threw the notepad down. This was the kind of over-intellectualizing I was trying to get away from. I needed to turn off and try and tune into the frequencies of the road. Dylan continued to stir up a great jangling noise on the stereo, now well into “Highway 61” as we hit Chilliwack. <br /><br />We stopped in at a gas station. Nick had a smoke by the car while I went inside. At the door I was met by a large group of kids probably in early high school and who were probably on there way either to or from a party or game or something else, some other weekend event. The little service building was packed full with them, and a big confusion and excitement ensued as they grabbed up drinks and tore down chip bags and candy bars off the shelves, all the while talking and joking loudly. Up at the counter, I tried talking with the attendant, explaining our situation and what we needed, but the attempt at communication proved even worse than with our German fellow. Nothing came of it. I was back at the car deciding our next move. Nick put out his butt and suggested we get a bite to eat. Good call. There was a plaza nearby and we walked over to the only place in the area there was to eat, a Pizza Pit. But it turned out to be closed along with everything else. Everyone was closing up for the weekend. We were locked out of everywhere, with nothing but our wits and a five dollar map to show us the way. The only thing we could do was follow the road. Follow the road. I snacked out of the cooler and then picked up the driving.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-19894078481618524212009-08-11T14:40:00.001-07:002010-11-27T12:49:04.365-08:00The mountain pass had given way to a large, open expanse of prairies. Above us, the sun had dipped and was almost touching the surrounding bluffs and lowlands, creating a sprawling orange and red splatter spread across a pale sky that brightened our past and threw shadows on our future. And somewhere in the middle we floated along in that strange undefined space that rolls on endlessly like the Fraser River surging along somewhere in the distance, across from us. By the time we reached Hope the last of the sun was disappearing completely out of sight, leaving us to light our own way. <br /><br />Hope is a logging town where Highways 1, 3 and 5 all intersect. We had the option of taking the 3 south, straddling the border through the majestic Okanagan valley and on to Nelson and Cranbrook—the point where the Kootenay River runs southbound from the Rocky Mountains into the States. But the twisting mountain terrain makes it slow traveling, so instead we were headed north up the 5 to Kamloops. From there we would hook up with the Trans-Canada and it would carry us east all the way to Calgary and beyond. <br /><br />I pulled in at a crossroads service station where the highway roads all converged passing through town, a kind of toll booth at that mythical crossroads of Robert Johnson and his ilk, where the price was nothing less than your own damned soul. But I had stopped believing in silly metaphysical conceptions of one sort or another and from here on out was only was concerning myself with that which I could see in front of me, with my own two eyes. Touch, feel, taste, and see. That was my only Truth. The rest was some cosmic punchline to a joke I never got to begin with.<br /><br />And what lay in front of me now was the dividing line of our journey. Beyond this point there was no turning back. We were going all the way. <br /><br />I gassed up and Nick went inside to buy some sustenance. When he came out along with the snacks, he also had with him a tire iron he snagged from the auto shop next door. “Eureka!” I said, or didn’t. Regardless, he went to work, loosing and tightening the steel nuts, muscles straining, face grimacing, and just like that we had it checked off. I breathed a sigh of relief and we started off, once again on even footing.<br /><br />My mind was completely at ease, all focus and mental energy directed at that trusted yellow centerline unravelling forever out ahead of us. But now, next to me, it was Nick who wasn’t feeling good about things. Out the windshield, the rolling fields had been replaced by desolate woods and the highway had narrowed to a tight single lane. “I don’t know about this,” he said.” “Something doesn’t feel right.” <br /><br />“Nonsense,” I said. “We got nothing more to worry about now. We’re making terrific time. This rate we’ll make Kamloops just past sundown.” <br /><br />“I think we took the wrong road out of town.” <br /><br />“Well then, check the map.” <br /><br />The lonely Spanish notes of “Desolation Row” ringing out of the stereo, we zipped along up the winding path. “Everybody is making love or else expecting rain,” mused Zimms in his croaked croon. Nick was fidgeting around in his seat like he was trying to fight off a mean-ass bee that had snuck in, buzzing about. “I can’t find the map?” <br /><br />“No map? What do you mean? I was looking at it not long ago. Gotta be there somewhere.” <br /><br />“Well it’s not here.” <br /><br />We had been meandering along, tense and fretting, a good twenty minutes when we passed a lonely sign indicating that we were in fact on the 1. Uncertainty mounting—or more like confirmed—I stopped at the first convenience store I spotted and both of us gave the car a search for the map. Bought the night before departing, it had been marked up with all manner of notes and specific routes to follow. It was a good map. But Nick was right, it wasn’t there. Gone. Lost. Discarded. Shit. I was sad to see it go. What could have happened to it? <br /><br />“It probably fell out when we stopped at Hope,” said Nick. “Let’s turn around, drive back and figure things out from there.” I agreed, reluctantly, and back we went. <br /> <br />But it wasn’t there either. Nick continued to scour the area after I gave up and flopped down on the curb with a tuna sandwich. “Not going to find it,” I said between bites, “thing’s gone for good.” <br /><br />“I still say we were headed the wrong way,” Nick said. “Tell you what, I’ll go inside, get us another one.” <br /><br />And he did. Turned out we had been headed due north on the 1 after all and even though the 3 would eventually merge onto it, it would have us on an eastern bent that would save us a good chunk of time. <br /><br />We had wasted enough, no point wasting anymore. With the day’s light failing us, it was dusk by the time we got onto the Coquihalla. We paid the little toll fee and roared on through, Nick chain-smoking into the open mountain air, while on the stereo the ABB’s Mountain Jam induced a blues-soaked trance that echoed across the meditative gloom of the surrounding foothills. Up, up, up we climbed, cutting through the darkness, the downhill descent, then up again, and on and on, steering through every turn and curve in time with the road’s hypnotic rhythms. And then, just as we started to peek over the last steep hill, the dark sky was suddenly lit up by a thousand shining jewels in the night, a shimmering golden sea, and the city of Kamloops rose to greet us. <br /><br />Dropping our speed as we came into town, the neon city lights washed over us like an explosion of innumerable falling stars. It was a welcoming sight. I was completely beat, ready to get off the road and find a room to lay my head for a few dream-filled hours before the morning’s song came around and we did it all again. <br /><br />Kamloops is the kind of city you imagine the Egyptians designing if they had survived into the Industrial Age. The city seemed to be constructed in layers, with the commercial district, coming in off the highway, on the first, bottommost level, the restaurants and hotels and gas stations and parks up another level from that, and, finally above that, on a kind of crest, residential homes and school districts overlooked it all. It was a strange city, very easy to get lost in even more than most, and I can’t think of another one quite like it, with the closest exception being where I live now—which, after a few years, doesn’t feel as strange as it once did.<br /><br />Once we hit the city, first thing was to gas up. Nick and I had earlier agreed to split all costs on the road, to minimize confusion and avoid needless squabbling over dollars and cents. Or something. I had gotten the last gas bill so he was to get this one. But then there was a problem at the pumps. Nick wasn’t able to get his card to work. He tried it a couple times and then, having no luck with it, went up to the building to pay there. The guy working was set up behind a reinforced glass barricade. He was giving Nick a hard time, not accepting payment directly and wouldn’t come out from the safety of his register to help. Nick couldn’t get anywhere with him. The only advice he had was to try again. I was told all this by Nick when he came stomping back over, having had it with the absurdity of the situation.<br /><br />“Guy must think we’re trying to pull one over on him so we can rob him or something.”<br /><br />“Jesus,” I said. “So this is what things have come to.”<br /><br />Sure enough when he tried his card again it no more worked than the other times, and suddenly a warbling voice came on over a loudspeaker asking us if we were still having problems. <br /><br />“How’s he expect us to respond?” said Nick. “There’s no intercom to talk into.”<br /><br />Nick spit out a spiteful laugh, turned back to the building, and threw up his arms in a big animated gesture.<br /><br />We stood there dumbly in the warm summer night stillness of the big empty lot, a million flies buzzing overhead under the floodlight glow, and were about to drive off and try somewhere else when I said, Fuckit, I’ll pay the thing with my own card. See if I can get the thing to work. I was tired, done with driving anymore that night. I was ready to surrender the whole damn cause. <br /><br />My card worked fine. Nick said he would pay for the room to square it, and we gassed up and started for the nearest, cheapest motel.<br /><br />The hotels and motels in Kamloops are all squashed together in the same little district located on a kind of ledge that, with everything else, was up on its own level, and could only be reached by taking a series of sharp little ramp-ups. It was obvious right away that the most expense ones were the bigger places found the higher up you went, so we stayed to the lower part and pulled in at the first place without a brightly lit NO VANCY sign. <br /><br />Once inside, however, standing in the spacious, air-conditioned marble lobby, the guy at the desk informed us there was a wedding reception going on and that they were all booked up. He was just a young guy, not much older then us, fresh-faced, dark hair greased and perfectly parted. He sympathized with our situation and tried to help. He called a couple of the other places in the area to see if anything was available. He hung up the phone after trying the last place and looked up at us with a face full of generous professional concern.<br /><br />“Sorry, guys. Said they’re all booked up as well. There are a few other places you could try, if you don’t mind paying more, or else drive up the road to Pritchard or Chase and see if you can get in somewhere there. To be honest, with it being the long weekend, you’re probably not going to have much luck getting in anywhere. My suggestion: your best bet would be to find a quiet spot in an empty parking lot somewhere and camp out there for the night.”<br /><br />It was an obvious detail we failed to consider. In all the excitement and haste to get going, Nick’s arranging to get off work when he had, we had managed to let slip the most practical of considerations. Where were we going to sleep at night? Might not have seemed like a necessity then but now it was. We thanked him for his help and asked where there was a washroom. <br /><br />Down a flight of stairs the air became humid and there was a large marble fountain that towered over two stories high, with thickly frayed green vines drooping all over and about it. I thought to toss in a coin but had nothing on me, just pocket lint and a cracked compass. The area was dimly lit and across the hall, behind a metal door, you could hear the muffled sounds of the reception going on.<br /><br />In the bathroom I splashed cold water over my face and wetly patted the back of my head and neck, then looked up at myself in the mirror. Well, what next? Nick was off behind me, around by the shower stalls, jumping around energetically and joking about this and that, blissfully unconcerned with any of it. He wanted to have some fun. Suggested we crash the party next door, see if we couldn’t score some free drinks—friends of the groom after all, drove in from out of town, got in late, but, you know how it goes, better than not at all, we’ll take those off your hands, thanks, Shakey—and then flirt with some bridesmaids. Or if not that—go find an open liquor store—how late is it?—or bar or somewhere, get a bottle, go explore the town. This is freedom, man! The night is ours! <br /><br />But I wasn’t having it. Fun was not my objective at present. <br /><br />“Goddamnit man! This is important!”<br /><br />I was adamant. I desperately needed sleep. Sanctuary. That was all I had in mind. He came stalking up behind me, his dark, smirking reflection growing larger in the mirror, and, before I could react or turn or anything—whack!—on the back of my stubbly plate. Momentarily dazed from the blow, I quickly shook it off, and, still leaning over the sink, filled my cupped hands with water from the running tap and let it fly it in his direction. Splat! It got him good, but Nick laughed and shrugged it off and said, So what are we going to do next then? I rubbed the back of my head, which was still smarting, and sighed.<br /><br />“Fine,” said Nick. “How ‘bout, how about what we do, we try a couple more places, and if we can’t get in anywhere I’ll take over driving. That way we can pick up a few more hours while you get some of your precious rest.”<br /><br />“Fuck you.”<br /><br />That seemed to settle it. We went back to the car and drove over to the biggest, fanciest of all the hotels. They were all filled up and it was just as well. Driving down the block over to the last place—perhaps a Best Western but then again all the signs, as closely positioned to each other as they were, and as drowsy as I was feeling, seemed to mash together, making it hard to tell—I first noticed the car was handling funny. I couldn’t quite pinpoint it exactly, but I was having to work harder to keep the car on a straight path. There was a kind of barely perceptible, strange sort of trembling coming from the wheel as I gripped it, and when I took my hands off it for a second the car abruptly veered off too the right. <br /><br />“That’s weird,” said Nick. <br /><br />“Yeah,” I said. <br /><br />I parked and went inside. I popped my head, discovering a crowd in the lobby engaged in what appeared a cordial, but verging on the uncivil, squabble over the last room available. I took in the scene and quickly ducked back out. No room at the inn. Back at the car, Nick was standing around having another smoke. “No go,” I said. “Guess that means we go.” And tossing him the keys, I added, “Godspeed, young grasshopper.”<br /><br />But without so much as a word or a look, Nick handed back the keys and got in passenger side. I stood there, my mouth hanging open, looking down at the keys in my open palm. Confused, I did the only thing I could do which was get in driver side, shut the door and turn to my driving cohort, and with exceeding composure and a total sense of objective reasoning, say, “Dude—what the fuck?”<br /><br />We argued it out a few minutes there in the car in the parking lot until we both realized there was nothing to be won and whatever had been lost was lost a long time ago. Nick got out of the car and walked over to a patch of grass to lie down and smoke. I starred at the keys in my hand like they were the keys to a golden palace I had never tried to enter before and probably never ever would, then tossed them up on the dash. I tilted my seat back as far as it would go until it came up against the boxes in back, crossed my arms over my chest, and closed my eyes and waited for sleep. <br /><br />I waited and I waited.<br /><br />Heart still beating rapidly, I tried my best to calm myself, ignore all other sounds around me, clear my head, allow everything else to disappear completely, vanish from my consciousness. After a few minutes of silent struggle I fell into a kind of half-sleep. I still had a sense of myself but not of where I was. Then suddenly it all slipped away and I found myself in some kind of enclosed space. I tried to move around in it, adjust myself, but whatever it was it was only big enough to fit my body, barely even that. All was dark, I couldn’t see anything. <br /><br />Then all at once it hit me. It was a coffin. But I was still very much alive. I raised my arms as far off my chest as was allowed and started banging against the invisible, concealed obstruction. Becoming increasingly frantic and unable to so much as turn to one side, I groped in the dark to find an outing. But I was locked in place, my own weight working against me, my air running out rapidly. Then, at the height of my frenzy, my eyes suddenly shot open and I found myself back in the parking lot, gazing out on the bright midnight streets. The stream of city lights streaked together so everything was a blurry whiteness, until my eyes refocused, and I could once again make out individual objects. I rubbed my eyes and blinked over and over and looked out at the city spread out for miles in front of me. It all seemed so distant and removed and not quite real. Nick was back in the car and I told him the dream.<br /><br />“Do you think it means anything?” I said.<br /><br />“Everything means something,” he said, staring straight ahead out the windshield. “That doesn’t make it meaningful.”<br /><br />“I need sleep.”<br /><br />We had been parked there not even an hour. It was going to be a long night. It was a muggy, windless night, and we decided we’d drive around until we found a park to spend the night in. A couple wandering bums camped out in the western night. The nap had been a short and anxiety-filled but it was also in its way a little refreshing and anyway my mood was up. I had all but forgotten about the early argument and was happy to be driving again, in control. And the car seemed to be handling fine as I manoeuvred her through the heaving, narrow streets, past other roaming cars filled with people searching madly in the night for a place to rest weary heads. <br /><br />Nothing was familiar but I thought I could find the way. Where is the way? Which way? Who knows? Where we were in relation to the highway was the only thing I had to go on. I started in toward the center of the city thinking that our best bet. I tried to direct us to where there was least light—the reverse instinct of a moth. I felt alert to everything, every sign, face, car, street. My mind was a psychic conductor filling up on the energy of the night until it expired with satisfaction or exploded in shafts of moonbeam light. I didn’t know which would come first but had an eagerness to find out. <br /><br />But there was no park. The closest we came was an open field that had sprinklers going, launching great blasts of water over the wet lawns. As much as I tried to keep to the heart of the city the roads had a way of spiralling out, pushing us farther and farther to the underskirts, gradually being nudged out like guests who had overstayed their welcome. We drove on. The streets became more deserted, the area more sparse. I made another uncertain turn, and all at once we were thrust back onto the highway. I pushed my speed up appropriately and watched the lights of that strange city dissolve in my rear view mirror like the after mist of a neon rain. And like that we had set out on our night journey along the Trans-Canada, destination unlimited. <br /><br />“How far we going to go?” said Nick.<br /><br />“Far as it takes.”Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-61995533027851619472009-08-11T14:38:00.000-07:002010-11-27T12:50:10.673-08:00We drove as far as a town called Sorren and I pulled over at an abandoned gas station just outside of town. I went around back and took a piss among garbage bins and came back to the car and looked out at the highway, the few passing vehicles, the signs listing the upcoming towns and the three digit numbers next to them. I got back in the car and turned to Nick.<br /><br />“I don’t know if I can do this.”<br /><br />“So we go as far as we go.”<br /><br />“You’re awfully reassuring.”<br /><br />I didn’t need reassurance. At that moment I possessed an all-or-nothing mentality, though not quite sure which way I was leaning. Apropos of nothing, Nick started recounting a “Kids in the Hall” skit, he described it all, imitating the high, nasally voice, reaching the end of it by repeating the word “Sausages” over and over, at which point I was in stitches. That was all it took.<br /><br />“OK,” I said, starting up the car, “Let’s do this. Rack up the miles.”<br /><br />We drove all night, through the darkness, spectral fog spreading and changing and morphing abstractly across the highways, the hard yellow line the only constant sight, illuminated by the interrogation flush of the headlights; through tunnels temporarily ricocheting light off the car and then back into the black and forever the line running out ahead, following it out into the open mountains into the predawn hours, gray, fuzzy, the sky blurry with jagged distant shapes forming into peaks. On and on like an insomniac vision, there but not, drifting out of body, out of mind as the car seemed to carry itself of its own volition, then coming back into it, taking over while speeding up into the hard, whipping turns, holding straight on the approach and then—whoosh!—cranking the wheel the second the approaching guardrail appeared, the tenuous white line, the only thing between you and the big drop into naught—<br /><br />When daybreak hit we where cutting around the curb of a mountain, the peaks across from us suddenly up close and drawing a halo of frayed clouds.<br /><br />Sometime after seven we reached Golden, driving along the mountain road with the green valley bowl spreading out for miles to our right. I pulled into a service station, completely exhausted and on the verge of collapse. My last act would be to fill up the tank and give over driving duties to Nick.<br /><br />A felt around in the glovebox, over the mess of stuff that was crammed in it, CD cases, granola bar wrappers, folded papers, notebooks, pocket paperbacks, a Hustler Nick had picked up somewhere, and came out with a cheap jewel case. I opened, found a live Phish CD contained therein, and slid it into the CD player. I laid my head back against the seat and closed my eyes. It didn’t take long, for as the crowd noise swelled up and the band jumped on the first notes of the song, I sunk into sleep.<br /><br />The next thing I heard were the last notes of their final encore. My eyes came into focus on the twisty mountain roads, and Nick was saying to me, “Hey. Hey. Hey.”<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />“Can you grab the map out of the glovebox?” He was leaning over to my side, stretching an arm out towards the glovebox.<br /><br />“That’s what you woke me up for?”<br /><br />“I want to make sure where we are. In case we’re lost.”<br /><br />“Makes two of us. But the map’s not going to help that.”<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />“Listen. So long as you haven’t taken any ill-advised detours”—I looked around at the mountain terrain which hadn’t changed drastically since I had fallen asleep—“this road we’re on will take us straight into Banff.”<br /><br />A passing road sign confirmed this, and also alerted me to the fact that sometime while I was asleep we had crossed the border into Alberta.<br /><br />“We’re making good time. This rate we’ll make Banff next half-hour.” <br /><br />“I saw how you were flying down those roads back there,” said Nick. “Figured I needed to keep up.”<br /><br />“Yes, yes.”<br /><br />I stretched my neck out, shoulder to shoulder, hung my head back, and closed my eyes, concentrating. Then I noticed it. The rattling around the glovebox had gotten worse. No longer was it a slight trembling, now it was considerably louder, having spread over the entire dashboard. I put my hands on the dash and watched them shake wildly from the vibrations.<br /><br />“How long’s it been doing that?”<br /><br />“I don’t know,” said Nick. “Most of the way I guess. Gets worse faster I go.” And to prove this he pushed his speed up and the rattling got louder, more insistent. He eased off the gas.<br /><br />“Something’s wrong,” I said.<br /><br />Nick was unfazed. He had other things on his mind. We drove along and passed a sign, much more decorated compared to the others, for the Radium Hot Springs. Seeing it Nick suggested we take the turn off and go for an early morning soak. “It’d do you some good. Relax those weary bones. Afterwards return to the road refreshed. Come on. What’dya say.” <br /><br />A tempting offer, but I didn’t feel good about such indulges and besides that we had come this far in so short a time, now past the halfway point; best thing to do was push on.<br /><br />“All right. Suit yourself.”<br /><br />Not long after that we crossed a short bridge and suddenly there we were driving through downtown Banff amid the teeming morning traffic. The streets were lined with a tight concentration of old-style shops that stretched for blocks in either direction, and across the street, to our right, there was a little park, with a school house next to it, and next to that a little chapel with a cement walk-up. It was like no place we had passed through thus far. It seemed undisturbed, out of the way, belonging to its own place and time. The sun shone unassumingly and the blue sky seemed to enwrap everything like cosmic cellophane, preserving the scene so it could play on perfectly on an infinite loop. The traffic was packed bumper to bumper, everyone excited to start on the weekend action, and at the next intersection we turned off and down a sidestreet to get away from the bustling hub of the town. <br /><br />Nick parked at the first spot he found, immediately killed the engine, took out the keys, unbuckled himself and got out—all in a fast deliberate motion. I followed him out of the car. There was nothing else to do. Standing on the sidewalk I was met by crowds of placid-faced tourists, couples paired off in matching t-shirt and shorts outfits. I had the sensation of standing still and moving all at once. The uneasy vibrations of the car were still rattling around in my head, over my whole body. Here we were.<br /><br />Banff is a town that likes to advertise itself as the tourist Mecca of the country, at least in the west, when in truth it has as much culture as Disneyland. <br /><br />The people are a weird mix of local drug freaks, out of work musicians, trust fund punk rockers, and rich retirees. To go along with that are the constant influx of wide-eyed tourists whose interest in local handcraft keeps many of the junk shops in business. It’s maybe what you get if you take every Canadian cliché and stereotype that’s proliferated and concentrated them into one space. <br /><br />I had been there all of three minutes and was already ready to leave.<br /><br />Nick came around and handed me the keys, and I said lets go. <br /><br />As soon as I was behind the wheel and started pulling away from the curb I knew something was seriously wrong. It was clear it wouldn’t last another ten minutes on the highway let alone the ten plus hours we still had to drive, not at the speeds we were going. I pulled over at the next available spot, put it in park and slammed my fist against the wheel and shouted, “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Then I turned to Nick, composed, and said, “We’re fucked.”<br /><br />“Are we?”<br /><br />I leaned forward, sunk my teeth into the hot plastic of the steering wheel and clenched my jaw.<br /><br />Neither of us had any idea what it could be. My first thought was the transmission, that it was shot, in which case we had definitely reached the end of the road. We decided to walk over to a gas station to see if we could get it serviced, or at least looked at, diagnosed, though being that it was the weekend, we knew chances were slim. Fuck it. What choice did we have? So much of life involves finding the precarious balance between long-shots and dumb luck. Plan and organize till the sun expires, at some point you just have to cast all that aside and throw yourself in blind and screaming. Nothing else compares.<br /><br />At the place around the corner I talked to the guy behind the counter. He was a dark sullen fellow. I explained the situation as best I could, asked if there was anyone in town he knew who could help us. He stared at me without expression, then said simply, with grave finality, “No, sorry. Not in Banff.” Stepping back outside, I thought, What a slogan. That should be on the welcome sign, “Not in Banff.” Looking to get away from the high-pressure work-a-day world and unwind and have some fun? “Not in Banff.” <br /><br />NOT IN BANFF.<br /><br />There was one other place for us to try, across the street. The guy working was more helpful, even if our prospects were just as low. A older gravelly voiced biker-type—fading muck green tattoos dissolving on hairy forearms, long thinning grey hair pulled back in a ponytail, the seen-it-all-and-the-hell-with-it curl of the lip, that type—he said there was one mechanic in town but he unavailable for the weekend and, what with it being the long weekend and all, might not be reachable until Tuesday, or even Wednesday. <br /><br />My immediate future flashed in front of me. Four or five days holed up in some overpriced room sulking about, watching bad cable television, eating over-priced food, throwing back large quantities of the cheapest local brew, just to keep sane. That is, if we could even find a room. More likely we would end up on the streets like back in Kamloops, stumbling and cursing through parks and woods while avoiding elk and deer paddies like they were landmines. But, he said, there was one other option. You could try Canmore. About twenty minutes due east. He wasn’t certain, but there was at least a chance of finding someone there to look at it. That was all we needed. A chance. There it was. I thanked him and stepped back out into the terrible sunlight.<br /><br />It was still only morning but the temperature was rising fast, many out enjoying it, the streets packed. From down the block a skateboarder came zipping by. Then from the other direction a woman passed walking a fluffy little black dog. It yipped at me, jumping up on its hind legs, excited, and she gave a couple firm tugs on the leash for it to settle. Dumb thing. All I wanted was to get out of there. I needed to think of something fast. The fatigue from the lack of the sleep had my thoughts sufficiently scrambled. I thought and thought. Nothing was coming out straight nor clear, all a muddle, a blank. Next to the building was a payphone. For a minute I thought of calling a friend in Medicine Hat who I had told of the trip during one of many gchats. She had said if I happen to find myself passing through town we should meet up for a drink. Which we would be. But it was still a good five hours away, and I didn’t want to ask her to make the drive all the way to pick us and our stuff up and drive all the way back the same day. I wasn’t that desperate. Yet.<br /><br />Then I lifted the receiver dumped in some change I got from Nick and dialled a number. It was my mom’s. It rang twice and I hung up. What was the point? She was hundreds and hundreds of miles away. There was nothing she could do, other than to reassure me. “Don’t worry. It’s going to be OK,” those words that every distant son secretly longs to hear, but I knew I would only end up worrying her.<br /><br />We started off down the street, in no particular direction, moving with the crowd. It was cool under the shade of the long line-up of buildings. Nick was hungry. We ducked into a sub shop to eat and mull things over. We ordered and sat down at tables at the back where the rays of the sun pouring through the big glass entrance couldn’t reach us. I unwrapped my food, looked down at the sauce-drenched sub. I had no appetite. Nick was wolfing his down.<br /><br />“You ever been here before? The town I mean?”<br /><br />“Yeah. Bunch a times. Years ago.”<br /><br />“What’s your impression now? What do you think of it?”<br /><br />“Nothing.”<br /><br />“Nothing?”<br /><br />Growing up, the weeklong trips in the spring became a constant. There were the concerts bands my dad threw me into when I was young and shy and nervous and out of place with things and others, then later the school bands and friends and all the strange, interesting girls. I’d never spent any time with any of them outside of school. During the trips they would act a lot different than when they were in class. More open, talkative, flirtatious. It was exhilarating. <br /><br />Eight hour bus rides up there, with headphone music and movies playing on the little overhead screens, while out the window the flat lifeless prairie landscape with its vast empty skies would suddenly transform, come to life in the form of great snowy peaks, fuzzy, at first, then becoming more defined and immense as we roared along. <br /><br />Once arrived, we would be set up in either one of the low-cost hostels with shared bathrooms or, later on, on the school’s bill, one of the big fancy hotels, its wood-construction giving it that pseudo-old-timey backwoods, log cabin vibe. There’d be big buffet breakfasts every morning before being sent off to music clinics all morning at the downtown music academy. Afternoon came, and we’d be given a few hours to go off and roam around, explore. At first I found the place fascinating, the newness, how different it was from home—all the little shops with the sounds of folksy music wafting out of their open doors, the bistros with the sweet scents and smells. But after a few years of this it started to loose its charm. I started to notice some of favourite places, like the magic and occult store run by a dark-haired gypsy woman, had been closed down or just disappeared altogether.<br /><br />When I was older me and a couple friends would try our luck at procuring a bottle (provincial drinking age being 18, even if we weren’t), then sneak off into the woods to take hits off it and get high on the stuff we brought. At night, feeling good and fresh with a giddy sort of recklessness—nobody knowing what we had been up to—we’d meet up back at the hotel, with everyone now dressed in their formal attire, to either go off to give a performance to a hall full of appreciative onlookers or take in one.<br /><br />But that was years ago. The choir girls had since grown up, some with degrees, entering into careers, some engaged, others already married, and others still with kids of their own. Like Marissa. <br /><br />Marissa. <br /><br />What were we doing here? Why did I suddenly abandon everything, well, what there was, to take off like I did? It all happened so fast, the plans falling into place, decisions made on the fly, until now I hadn’t stopped to so much as give it a second thought—something I rarely did. And now, right now, brought before some unseen jury, I was being told to answer for it. It was like the world was calling out for an explanation for my acts, my very existence. The lure of the open road and the freedom and possibility it contains, there at the outset of the trip, had spurned us on this far, but now it was breaking up, falling apart in front of me, coming to pieces, just like that fucking car that had pushed us through the mountains and decided on this moment to crap out on us, leaving us scrambling. The fucker. The bitch.<br /><br />But fuck it. We were headed back out on the road. I would push her for all she was worth, until her damned dying breath. We made it this far. We had to test our luck. We had to keep going. It was all we could do. Nick agreed, follow the road. Follow the road.<br /><br />Our only hope was to make it to Canmore. We eased away from the curb and started off at a lurching pace. The wheel shook uneasily in my grip, and the whole car had the unsteady, explosively erratic feel of a wild bull. Easy, big fella. I tried to find a less heavily-trafficked route to get us out of town but this plan came to naught, as first we hit a dead end next to a visitor center crowded with gaping tourists, and then a short time later, got caught in a looping road circled into a cul-de-sac that delivered us right up close to a great old Victorian building, a brightened up Gothic mansion still no less strangely forbidding in its size and grandeur—the Banff Springs Hotel. <br /><br />“Go for a soak?” said Nick.<br /><br />“No time,” I said, and swung us around, staggering back towards the downtown.<br /><br />On the highway out of town I locked in at around 60 and kept to the shoulder as close as possible to keep those behind me off my ass, allow them to pass more easily, and keep to a minimum their annoyed, persistent honking. All those cars, trucks, van, motor homes, SUVs whizzing by—it was a strange position to be in now, but I did didn’t dare chance it by speeding up any. <br /><br />The car clattered and banged and heaved worse than ever. The earlier crash visions of fire and destruction were coming back to me. Less dire but no less unsettling, I was convinced that it was only a matter of time that, in addition to tires, doors and panels and everything else would come flying off leaving us only an axle, wheels, seats, and engine, the skeletal remains, as we continued down the road like a bad Easy Rider recreation. My anxious nerves urged me to push it to Canmore fast as I could, get off this damned road, and in one piece, while the horrible reaction I was getting to every slight fluctuation in speed, every minor alteration in positioning, said no, not a chance.<br /><br />Not a chance. Yet it wasn’t all bad. Our creeping speed gave me the chance to finally take in the view around me. It was incredible, overwhelming. The snow-capped mountains sailed up and pierced the sky, with the melt pouring down through rocky clefts. And then as the forest receded, to our left, a crystal blue lake appeared, twinkling invitingly, surrounded by lines of firs, and directly back of it a mountain that stood tall and momentous against the empty sky. <br /><br />Observing the glorious sight out my window, over my shoulder, my concern seemed to fade to nil. I was possessed of a strange urge. I wanted to abandon the car right then and there, in the middle of the road, strip down bare-ass naked in front of all the backed up traffic, under the exposed morning sun, make a break for it and dive straight to the bottom of that glistening lake, and only coming up when I had suffocated ever bad, scratching thought out of me, until there was nothing left—blank and pure as the day’s sky. But it was a fleeting feeling, and mercifully the turnoff to Canmore soon appeared. We drove along a serve road and pulled in at the first serve station.<br /><br />The place was packed with vehicles filling up at a dozen or so pumps; others idling behind or off to the side, waiting there turn. People milled around, back-and-forth from their vehicles and the adjoining store. I circled around the periphery, parked off to one side, near a natural gas tank, and when I got out that’s when I saw it. The front driver side tire. The thing looked like it had had a bite taken out of it, so sunken in was it, a section about a foot long, horribly drawn in like a botched lipo-job. A whole series of questions flashed in my mind at that moment. How long had it been like this? How had we missed it for so long? And moreover, how did it come to this, get so bad?? I had no answers. The only conclusion I could make was that all the pressure and strain put on it by all that rattling and throbbing—which by the time we were out of Banff had spread from a point around the dash to almost the entire car—had, over time and hundreds of miles, caused it to warp into the shape it was in now. I gnashed my teeth and cursed my neglect. Now not only was our engine fucked but because of our lack of attention so too was one of our tires. That was it. The trip was through. Done with. A failure. A premature end to what had all along been nothing more than a flaccid fantasy of life on the road. Bollocks.<br /><br />What were we left with? It was time to cut our losses. I knew there was no taking it back out on the road in the state it was in, not even the short jaunt back to Banff—no, definitely not Banff. We had left that daydream town behind for good. I popped the hood and Nick went inside. When he came out he was with a young shaggy-haired guy, one of the attendants. His name was Fraser. He had soft dough features and the mop of unruly hair fell over his face and almost concealed his glazed, red eyes. And instead of gas jockey overalls he had on striped shorts a vintage Who t-shirt. He was fresh off his break, blazing up. But he knew a hell of a lot more about cars than either Nick or I. He craned his head under the hood and poked around. Fiddled with the sparkplugs. Unplugged and re-plugged wires. At least I thought knew what he was doing. No—he knew. We showed him the tire. I started it up and the engine coughed sickly.<br /><br />No point inventing, after that I don’t remember much. After that things were a bit of a blur. There was mention of a guy who owned a tire place. Fraser thought if he explained things he might open it for us. A chance. If he was around. Fraser went back inside. <br /><br />Realizing we would still need to do something about the tire to get it over there, Nick and I went to work getting on the spare. We had it jacked up but then discovered there was no tool for loosing the tire. Nick checked to see if they had one inside. They didn’t. Across from us, down a slightly sloping path and another fifty yards on, was another service station, and Nick ran over to see if they had anything. Meanwhile I checked back in with Fraser to see about the getting a replacement. He said the place was called Ben’s Tires and he had just spoken with Ben and, low and behold, Ben was on his way over for his morning pick-me-up. Well, late morning, here it was getting on to noon. <br /><br />Back out in the blazing sun I saw Nick come loping excitedly back up the dirt path, holding over his head what looked like a black sceptre. But then when he went to fit it on the nut it turned out to be the wrong size. We stood around thinking of what to do next. All those vehicles passing in and out of the lot, one of them should have what we were looking for. But I couldn’t bring myself to go up to any of them and ask. I was so drained by this point I could barely form a sentence and had been relying exclusively on Nick to handle most of the communication. <br /><br />I could see the scene play out. People out enjoying the start of their holiday weekend, only to be suddenly confronted with sunken-eyed skin-head, sweating profusely, jabbering on about needing this to get to there and maybe you could help a person out being so far from home but not to trouble you any and enjoy your weekend sir I mean Madame I mean... <br /><br />No, there would be none of that. I was whipped, beaten, used-up, sent adrift, and ready for surrender. I felt a hundred years older and not a day wiser. I decided to save the hassle, take it in the wallet and call for a tow. They said they would be there within the hour, and I went and had a sit on the curb, under the broil of the afternoon’s desert-like heat, while Nick and Fraser bullshitted about, well, whatever it was, I had no more language and could only listen on. <br /><br />“Thanks for helping us out.”<br /><br />“Hey, no worries, man. You guys caught me while I was getting my toke on. If you’re interested, I still got a bit left.”<br /><br />“Thanks, but I’m all good.”<br /><br />“That’s cool, man. Hey, I got some other shit if that’s your thing. You guys dig the fungi? Me and a couple buddies were up at the quarry last night trippin’ on this new shit we just got. Fucking primo.”<br /><br />“Where’s the quarry?”<br /><br />“Oh, it’s this place we always go. Around those mountains back behind us, a couple miles in. Lots of woods. Isolated. Quiet. No cops. Great spot. Hey, if you guys are going to be sticking around I could take you over there, eat some shit. Be a wild time.”<br /><br />“I could get behind that.”<br /><br />Nick looked over at me, expecting some sort of response. But I wasn’t with him. Suddenly something clicked, started to all gel in my mind. In the swirl of action it hadn’t been made clear to me. It just hadn’t sunk in, as if put aside until such time when the boost was most needed. Who’s to say? But now was that time. Sitting there in a kind of heat-maddened stupor, I finally pieced it together. I stood up and addressed Fraser.<br /><br />“So the deal with the tire, it getting all warped and like that, it is what caused the engine problems? Not the other way around?”<br /><br />“Yeah,” he said. “Pretty much. When the tire started to warp the engine had to overcompensate for the imbalance it caused. It was being overworked.”<br /><br />“And so there shouldn’t be anything wrong with the engine, or the transmission, or the sparkplugs, or anything else mechanically related?”<br /><br />“Not that I can tell. Just get the bum tire replaced, it should drive fine.” <br /><br />And like that as quickly as it descended, cast a pall, the shadow of uncertainty withdrew. We were back on track. Sanity restored. I felt a great lightness, like a kite taken by the breeze, I wanted to go around and hug every person in the lot and tell them all the great news, I wanted take everyone and everything into my embrace. But instead I only stood there grinning with a mad wonder, my hands bobbing freely at my sides. And just then, through the swirl of excitement, like a prophet of flame descending on a dark land, a shabby looking figure came upon us. <br /><br />It was Ben. <br /><br />Ben from Ben’s Tire. <br /><br />In my delirious, sleep-deprived state, just now given its manic boost, he seemed to take on a certain, almost tangible biblical aspect, hard to put into words but there all the same. Lean and ragged, he had the permanently greasy soiled look of the mechanic carrying the shop with him at all times. He ambled over, bedraggled and unshaven, dressed in sweats and slippers, coffee in hand and an unlit smoke dangling from his lips, with that day-after stoner’s glow. He surveyed the car, lazily massaging some stumble, and in a low laconic drawl made his pronouncement. <br /><br />“Yeah, I can help you out.” <br /><br />That was it. The magic words spoken, it was all coming together. He went off to his shop to dig around, while we waited for the tow truck.<br /><br />Once it arrived, we thanked Fraser profusely for all his help, told him if his offer still stood we might take him up on it on our way back through. For now our course was set.<br /><br />Seated in the air-conditioned cab, we were taken through the outlying area of Canmore, then into a plush neighbourhood with lines of new looking two-storey, two-car garaged milky white homes, and by the signs of all the constructions, the cement foundations laid down, many more on the way. <br /><br />“Yeah, we’re doing all right here,” said the man behind the wheel. “There’s been a big influx of people last little while. There’d probably be a lot more too if they didn’t put in the growth cap.”<br /><br />I looked around at everything, so perfect, peaceful, calm.<br /><br />“Very controlled.”<br /><br />“Yeah, it is, but it gives you a good sense of the people. People who move here are serious about it. About community. About good surroundings. The people.”<br /><br />“Yeah. Sure. Of course.” I didn’t know what I was agreeing with.<br /><br />He turned into a crescent block that spiralled out into a long row of houses that extended out a couple blocks until coming to the dead end, with nothing but fields beyond and mountains beyond that, turned around and parked across from a residential house with an oversized garage. He lowered the car down off the lift I eased it into the garage. <br /><br />Ben sized it up. Then rendered his verdict. “Know what,” said Ben. “We don’t have a tire the right size.” <br /><br />“Damn.”<br /><br />“<em>But</em>…what we do have are two one size down. So what we could do is stick them two on the back, rotate the one’s there to the front. That way your front end’s not sinking too low. And you’d be good to go.”<br /><br />“Whatever,” I said. “Sounds good to me. Long as it has four wheels under it I’m set.”<br /><br />There was another guy there with black bushy sideburns wearing stained overalls and he and Ben went to work while I joined Nick to sweat it up on a picnic bench in the front yard. The afternoon sun was burning hot as ever but it no longer felt oppressive but a relief, and I lay back on the tabletop and bath in the heat.<br /><br />When they were through Ben brought old, bum tire, which was thoroughly thrashed. Flaunting the flabby piece of rubber, held up in one arm, it looked even more sad, shriveled and pathetic than the one from the day before. Like the rejected runt of the litter given its final viewing. He showed me where the tread came undone causing it to warp all to hell. I told him about the recent patch job and if he thought there any connection.<br /><br />“Nah, man, I don’t think so,” he said. “Total fluke, this one. It’s rare, really rare, but it happens.”<br /><br />The new tire from the day before almost got left behind, but amazingly there was enough room in the hatch for it to rest on top of the luggage, with an old piece of carpet laid overtop, and still get the top down and locked in. I was ready to use either credit card or cheque but he preferred that I pay him in cash—easier for him to write it up. This meant that we would have to drive back into town to an ATM to get the money. I offered to leave a suitcase or something behind as insurance, but he just shrugged his shoulders and turned his head to one side with a casual slouch and said, “Don’t worry about it. I trust you guys.”<br /><br />He gave us instructions to the nearest convenience store and we drove into town. The transformation was uncanny. The car drove like a dream, the rumble and clatter from earlier nothing but a distant memory, with only the dim psychic reverberations left to account for its once-upon-a-time reality. Nothing more. Downtown Canmore amounted to a mile long strip of road set adjacent to the highway with only grassy fields laying between. The whole atmosphere gave off something of an updated version of an old western settler’s town and we were riding into town not to shifty glances and sizing up stares but breezy, tanned faces. The vibe was infectious. In the parking lot, after I got the money out, Nick and I set things straight from the previous night. I felt reenergized, ready to make the drive the rest of the way to Medicine Hat. But there was one more thing before we left town.<br /><br />Back at Ben’s, payment made, we chatted lazily for a few minutes in the heat and just before we took off, Nick asked about a place to cool off.<br /><br />“Yeah, sure. Place called the quarry.”<br /><br />It was the same place Fraser had mentioned earlier, and it was where we were headed now. The directions he gave us got us part of the way, and the rest were supplied by a woman we passed out walking her dog down a residential street of rubble. A winding gravel road brought us into a parking lot packed with cars and half-dressed people coming and going. We snuck into the first small opening we spotted. It was snug but we were parked, and we got out and looked around. From the parking lot a dirt trail led past an open field and into a grove where it disappeared. To our right, down another path and behind a dense wall of shrubs, was where most of the people were making their way to and from. I figured to do the same. We stripped down in the car and started off in that direction. <br /><br />Follow the flesh. Follow the flesh. Behind the thicket of lanky trees, the valley opened up and, like a curtain pulled back to announce a new day, revealed the sparkling, placid surface of the water—a dug out pool about the size of a football field all around. We were met with the sounds of hyper, screaming kids, the sight of half-naked people of all ages and all shapes and types. On the far side, next to the water, there was a small pocket of beach littered with bodies—young kids mostly, their parents on nearby blankets, lying out. Along the path to our right, on a low-sloping hill, groups of giggly girls were congregated on the lawn, sunning, showing off, sipping drinks and gossiping. His svelte white chest prominently on display, Nick gave them a gawky smile and a nod of interest as we passed. I didn’t even bother with that much. He slapped my equally white and svelte chest and said, “Race you across.” <br /><br />We both took to the water like men set afire, both of us burningly aware of the girls behind us, watching from the hill, and waded in through the muck and reeds. The refreshing sting of the cold felt good the way, say, that first a first shot of whiskey does, and I quickly embraced it and submerged my whole body. In another second I surfaced and launched off toward the far shore. Through the splashing water, my head turned to the right between strokes, grabbing a shot of air, I could make out Nick’s dark head and arms, moving out farther and farther ahead of me, lashing through the water with concentrated effort. <br /><br />I was no match. I pulled up, treading water and breathing heavily. I looked back to see how far I’d gone. I turned back and Nick was now a mile ahead, not having noticed my surrender. I didn’t care. I let myself fall backwards so my ears were underwater and all noise was muted by a bubbling mantric hum, my eyes fixed upward at the low glowing sun radiating a blinding white-yellow. Then I held my breath, pulled my legs in close to my body, and heaved myself face forward into the water, letting myself sink like a until, with a bit of willing it on my part, I touched murky bottom. I stayed under until the survival mechanism kicked in and demanded I resurface. By this time, Nick had realized my retreat and was swimming back towards me.<br /><br />“And I’m the smoker,” he said between breaths.<br /><br />“Yeah. And I’m no Tewksbury.”<br /><br />We swam short laps back and forth until we were both good and exhausted and got out and sat on a patch of grass at the water’s edge, our feet dangling over into the cool wetness. A topless guy with shades and a cap that had a flaming C on it came sauntering down the path behind us. He was carrying a two-four. His very attractive girlfriend was with him, dark hair, pale, wearing a string bikini. I let my eyes linger on her maybe a beat longer than was kosher, just short of creepy truthfully, and when he passed by he addressed us with a formal, “Boys.” Nick nodded up at him, offered a greeting. Now past us, he turned and shouted back, “Git ‘er dun!” and continued on.<br /><br /> I looked down the path to the other end of the pool, where he was headed, where there was a bunch of people around our age hanging out, drinking. They had a mini barbecue going and were roasting up wieners and burgers, the delectable smells wafting over to us.<br /><br />“Should we join them?” said Nick.<br /><br />“Like to,” I said. <br /><br />“So?”<br /><br />“So best be moving on,” I said. “No time for celebrations yet.”<br /><br />“Whatever you say boss.”<br /><br />We put our shoes back on and traipsed down the path in the oppose direction of the revellers. Back at the parking lot, to give us time to dry off, we decided to go investigate the second path that led into the woods. The shafts of sunlight that beamed in gave the deep green meadow we strolled through an almost unnatural lustre. Thick, massive evergreens, tall, swishy wild grass, everything was huge and jungle-like, dwarfing us in its aspect. And all untouched, pristine. A gurgling brook ran off to our right, flowing out of sight behind a tall growth of hedge. There was a trace of sweet, pungent wild flowers in the air. Somewhere above an unseen chorus of birds were singing an endless, unresolved melody.<br /><br />“So what’s your rush to get to Medicine Hat?”<br /><br />“Nothing. I just want get some rest.”<br /><br />“It’s that girl isn’t it? What’s her name?”<br /><br />“Alyssa.”<br /><br />“Alyssa, right. And, tell me, does Alisha have any cute friends?”<br /><br />“I don’t know. I guess we’ll find out when we get there.”<br /><br />“She know we’re coming? Or is this a drop in on her deal?”<br /><br />“I told her we’d be passing through sometime Saturday.”<br /><br />Nick bent down, picked up a flat rock off the path. He massaged its smooth surface in his hand and then pulled back and flung it with a grunt in the direction of the stream, some distance off from us, downhill. It sailed high in the air and hit the water with a soft, tight <em>plop</em>.<br /><br />“Well what are we waiting for?” he said. <br /><br />Back behind the wheel, stripped down to only the small pair of black shorts I was swimming in, I felt good, I felt invigorated. I felt like someone had hit the reset button and I was ready to begin again. No longer was I besieged by the lingering sense that I was running from something. We set out on the road, out of Canmore and now driving down the Trans-Canada, straight and true, surrounded by the wide-open, limitless plains, toward something, something I swear was within reach.<br /><br />We passed through an area taken over by construction, machines of ever size and model, extended crane arms breaking the skyline, sand piles, lumber piles, piles of unidentified metal tubing. All signs of nature removed, the whole landscape had been flattened out into a fine smooth surface, like that of the moon and other uninhabitable planets.<br /><br />“Way things are going, in a couple years time we won’t be able to make this trip. Not feasible,” said Nick, and I didn’t say anything because I knew he was probably right.<br /><br />We made Calgary in less than two hours and stuttered along with the rush hour traffic through every light and crossing. Beyond the city, we stopped to gas up, change, snack. We sat in the sweltering car and observed the low-lying sun housed in an expanse of sky, that now extended down to meet the flatness of the amber plains. We continued on.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-74194560525075330292009-08-11T14:35:00.000-07:002011-01-03T22:49:55.091-08:00It was early evening when we rolled into Medicine Hat. We got a room at the first place we happened upon off the highway, a place called—I shit you not—The Motel Relaxo. We checked in got a key to a room.<br />
<br />
I unlocked the door, turned the knob and tried to push it open. When that didn’t work I gave it a bit of a shove with my shoulder. The door popped open and I stepped into the room and into the past. Swamp green shag carpet. Fake brick cement walls, checker-colored. Exposed pipe framed the corners of the walls and the ceiling, painted white to blend in, and behind a metal, lacquer-topped table in one corner there was a wall of artless tiles in colors offensive to the eyes and taste. Sick pinks, sour greens, pale yellows, nauseous browns, greys, maroons. Flophouse chic. It smelled of cigarettes and pancakes. <br />
<br />
It was perfect. <br />
<br />
I foresaw a time in the near future when I would return to it and hole up for a few weeks to work on a novel or book of stories when there was nothing else. I threw my suitcase down on the nearest bed. Above the lamp that sat on the night stand between the beds there hung a framed Bible quote, a familiar one, composed in cursive, high-flung lettering, with a sparse background containing two roses. “For God so loved the earth that He gave His only begotten son, so whosever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”<br />
<br />
Nick through his bag down on the far bed and read it. He chuckled to himself and turned to me.<br />
<br />
“You know by rejecting God, Jesus, the Bible and that whole system you give up heaven on the one hand. But doesn’t that system also include hell? So therefore you loose eternal life but also the possibility of eternal punishment at the same time. Maybe purgatory is the best option, a kind of pragmatic compromise between the two.”<br />
<br />
“I seriously doubt God’s the compromising sort.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, well. Just a thought.” <br />
<br />
“Well keep working on it while I make a call.” <br />
<br />
I sat down at the desk, lifted the receiver and punched in a number on the phone. It rang four or five times and an answering message, narrated by Alisha’s voice, cut in. I stumbled through some kind of a response and hung up. <br />
<br />
“I hate those things,” I said.<br />
<br />
“Me too,” said Nick. “So what should we do? Find a place to eat?”<br />
<br />
“Let’s do it.”<br />
<br />
By this time it was getting dark and most restaurants and stores were closed. We drove around. The downtown was lifeless, deserted. Nobody anywhere. Streetlamps lit up palely and formless like spectres. We drove past a strip lined with box stores, and found one of them, a Vietnamese restaurant, that appeared to still be open. We turned in, parked, and went inside. We were greeted by a girl. She was our age and had long straight black Asiatic hair. She was all smiles. She seemed genuinely happy to see us. It was quiet; there was nobody else around. It was just like on the streets. It seemed sort of eerie.<br />
<br />
She led us past the brass gateway into the empty main room. Under our feet, images of great golden dragons jumped out of the burnt red carpets. The ceiling was dirty gold, with circular designs that swirled up dramatically at the center point for a dome formation. We took a seat and ordered beer and cheap whiskey. She went off to the kitchen. I leaned back in my chair. I let out a relieved sigh and looked around. There was a faded elegance to the place. It reminded me of the old Shrine Hall. It was in the basement of a building downtown and as a kid my dad would take me there with him when he had practise. He would sit me down in a corner with a glass of fizzy pop they had on tap to watch them, or else put me by myself in a dusty room to watch early ‘90s sitcoms on a wood-encased TV wheeled into the middle of the room. Meanwhile, my dad, in another part of the building, cracked the snare to a series of old timey marches with a group of guys all nearly twice his age. It seemed like he was always around men much older than himself and that in turn made him seem much older and it sometimes feels like I’m destined to age in the same manner, and my children after me—a continual, generational acceleration of decay. I was starting to understand how Hamlet managed to inexplicably age ten plus years over the course of five concise acts. <br />
<br />
Age is all in the head. And by head I mean the face and its features. But a brutal adolescence had already prepared me for that and so it was only a matter of time before time filled in the gap. Love is hidden in ever crease and crevice of flesh that time buries deeper and deeper until its mystery is so contained that the infirmities and indignities of age are all that can expunge the weight and depths of a beauty so immense, so ruined, so raw and true. Some things resist words. They say love never dies. But it does. Everyday. So we chase after it until we lose ourselves in the chase. It is love we bury in the end, not flesh. And the beauty of the world remains something bleak and astounding, and always far off—<br />
<br />
“Hey. Buck up, soldier. We made it.”<br />
<br />
“We sure did,” I said.<br />
<br />
The waitress returned with our drinks and we held them up for a toast.<br />
<br />
“To the road.” <br />
<br />
“To tactful gas station attendants,” I said. <br />
<br />
“And guys in Canmore named Ben. Who own tire shops,” Nick added. “Never can be too many of them around.”<br />
<br />
“There sure can’t.”<br />
<br />
We clinked glasses and drank. The whiskey burned good and was the best I’d ever had. And that’s the truth.<br />
<br />
“This is excellent,” I said to her, looking over the glass and the almost clear fluid in it.<br />
<br />
“I’m not even sure the brand. Just whatever we have lying around.”<br />
<br />
“I’ll take four cases,” I said.<br />
<br />
“OK, sure.” She laughed. “So you guys from out of town?”<br />
<br />
“Yep,” said Nick. “Sure are.”<br />
<br />
“Just passing through,” I said.<br />
<br />
“Oh yeah. So where are you headed?”<br />
<br />
“Home,” I said. “I am. He’s tagging along.”<br />
<br />
“I home wherever I can get it,” he said.<br />
<br />
“Yeah, well I’m from Ontario originally. Moved out here with my family about five years ago.”<br />
<br />
“You like it here?” said Nick.<br />
<br />
“It’s OK.”<br />
<br />
“We were driving around earlier. For a Saturday night not much going on. Town seems sort of…”<br />
<br />
“Quiet?”<br />
<br />
“Dead.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, well…”<br />
<br />
She gave us a waning smile, her cheerfulness seemingly unaffected. I looked at Nick. Nick looked at me. We both looked back at her.<br />
<br />
“So I’ll get your food together,” she said, for lack of anything else. Pointing at my glass as she turned, she said, “You going want another one of those?”<br />
<br />
“Absolutely.”<br />
<br />
We both sipped our drinks in silence. Then Nick, in a hushed tone, said, “Nice girl. Kind of lonely though.”<br />
<br />
“You’re great. You’re a beautiful shining star on a chill evening in fall.”<br />
<br />
“Piss on it.”<br />
<br />
“Can you blame her?” I said.<br />
<br />
“I bet you she’s looking for a husband.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah. How can you tell?”<br />
<br />
“I can tell.”<br />
<br />
I shrugged. “Maybe that’ll just make it worse.”<br />
<br />
“Got a better idea?”<br />
<br />
I arched my eyebrows and with a sad tilt to it, shook my head. I had another nip of whiskey.<br />
<br />
She returned with plates piled high with noodles, rice, dumplings, steamed vegetables, marinated chicken, deep-fried shrimp, large quantities of food steaming up from the table that Nick hungrily dug into. I didn’t have much of an appetite and only ate sparingly, sipped my drink, and let my gaze wander over the brass construction, lanterns hung from every wall in twos, below them a rail that ringed around the vacant room, framing a kind of palpable emptiness all Asian cuisine in the world couldn’t fill. <br />
<br />
“The sound of silence is so intense.”<br />
<br />
“What?” said Nick between mouthfuls of dumplings and noodles.<br />
<br />
“Nothing,” I said. “Some quote I remember. Lenny Breau. I think.”<br />
<br />
“Who?”<br />
<br />
“No one. You going to want dessert?”<br />
<br />
“No, man,” he said, wiping the sides of his mouth with a napkin, “I’m stuffed.”<br />
<br />
We had another drink. <br />
<br />
When we were paying the bill we asked about any places in town to check out on a Saturday night. When she couldn’t think of anything we gave her a resigned goodbye and staggered out into the dimly lit streets. <br />
<br />
We stopped in at the convenience store down the street and bought coke and ice and then drove to a liquor store we made note of when we passed by earlier and then went back to the motel room. I mixed us a couple hi-balls in plastic cups from the bathroom and sat down at the table and dialled a number. It rang four or five times and went to voicemail. This time I hung up before it ended and leaned back and took a hit of my drink. Nick was lying on the bed holding the drink over his chest.<br />
<br />
“Not home, eh?”<br />
<br />
“She has a cellphone.”<br />
<br />
“Right.” Neither of us had cellphones. “So what’s the deal?”<br />
<br />
“No good. The deal is dying fast.”<br />
<br />
“Try again. Right now.”<br />
<br />
“But I just did.”<br />
<br />
“Again. Do it. The deal. It mustn’t die.”<br />
<br />
“No. You’re right. It mustn’t. She knows we’re coming. She’s expecting us.”<br />
<br />
“The success of all deeds great and small is predicated on one’s persistence.”<br />
<br />
“Uh huh.”<br />
<br />
“So call again.”<br />
<br />
“OK. I will.”<br />
<br />
I swished the ice around in my drink. Drank.<br />
<br />
“Now.”<br />
<br />
“Yes.”<br />
<br />
I dialled the number from memory this time. It rang three or four times and instead of a recording I got the actual thing.”<br />
<br />
“He-llo?”<br />
<br />
“Alyssa. It’s me.”<br />
<br />
There was a lag in response during which time I could hear background noise made up of loud overly-articulate voices and distorted music. I had a good buzz on and was enjoying the broken communication. An amused curiosity. The possibility that anything was possible. Something totally unexpected was about to happen that I was in on. Birth. Death. Suicides. A meteor shower. Tectonic plates shifting underneath us, about to rupture and explode the very ground we stood on. Nothing was out of the realm. Here it comes. Be ready. I stayed on the line, smiling blissfully at my ignorance.<br />
<br />
“Hello? Alyssa?”<br />
<br />
“Oh my God! Jonny!”<br />
<br />
I couldn’t tell by the ambiguous stabs of her voice if she was excited or put off.<br />
<br />
“Yeah. How are you?”<br />
<br />
“Really drunk. How…why…where are you?”<br />
<br />
“I’m in town. Remember?”<br />
<br />
“Yeah…but—but you were supposed to be here yesterday. I stayed home waiting, expecting you.”<br />
<br />
“Why would you do a thing like that? Friday. It was Friday when we left. I told you that.”<br />
<br />
“So what took you so long?”<br />
<br />
“Long story. Look. We’re here now. We’re staying in town. We got a room for the night.”<br />
<br />
The background noise surged up and then a scream, or more exactly, a shriek pierced through the receiver. As a reflex I pulled my ear away. Then tentatively:<br />
<br />
“Hello?”<br />
<br />
“Sorry about that. Oh Jonny. I’m out with friends tonight.”<br />
<br />
“Perfect. So where are you? We can meet up for drinks. Me and Nick are looking for something to do besides drink in our room and play Uno all night.”<br />
<br />
“Umm…Well, OK, I guess. We’re at the Horseshoe Bar but we’re just about to go over to The Eightball.” Then in an irritated voice that didn’t seem directed at me. “That’s if Barrett ever gets back here.” <br />
<br />
“The Eightball. OK. And where’s that exactly?”<br />
<br />
She gave me some scattered directions, all the more confused by the fact that I didn’t know any of the streets she referenced. When she was done I asked her to go over it one more time and got a completely different set of directions. Then she mentioned the one street name I remembered, a few blocks from the motel, and said we’d find it from there.<br />
<br />
“The Eightball in twenty. See you then.”<br />
<br />
I hung up and looked over at Nick.<br />
<br />
“So,” he said.<br />
<br />
“She said she can’t wait to see us. And she’s thrilled to meet you.”<br />
<br />
In a strange town after dark, I knew it would happen. Night reigned. We were lost, completely lost, driving down unfamiliar streets, eyes peeled for signs indicating where we were, where we needed to get to. I turned right at a four-way crossing, the lone red light blinking overhead soberly. I drove past a church, a line of trees and into a residential area. <br />
<br />
That was our first attempt. <br />
<br />
I turned around and this time came downhill, past the trees, the church and again turned right at the four-way, now back on the street we were originally on. At the next intersection—uncontrolled—at this one, I took another right and was somewhere past the downtown, where the brick buildings became increasingly slumped and crumbling-looking, like an ancient face that was all dark frowns. <br />
<br />
“Are we still even in town?” said Nick.<br />
<br />
“I hope not.”<br />
<br />
“What?”<br />
<br />
“Yes. Up ahead. This might be something.”<br />
<br />
We passed a low-roofed building with a high-fenced patio. Umbrellas and few bobbing heads, like human buoys, hovered over it. It was the first semi-populated area we had come across all night. <br />
<br />
“Is that it?” said Nick. “I don’t see a sign.”<br />
<br />
“Only one way to find out.”<br />
<br />
I parked in a lot across the street and we went inside, the dark night giving way to bright overhead lights, flashing big screens and neon beer signs. In was like stepping into a new world, the sudden contrast making it temporarily fascinating as it quickly became completely unremarkable in the realization of its familiarity. Unremarkable. A sports bar like any other. We stood around, half-dazed, half-uncertain, until a striking dark haired waitress, a glimmer in her eyes that were like dotted pearls, came over and asked us what we’d have. We did the only thing that made sense. While waiting for our drinks, I dug the place, looking for Alyssa. In a corner booth was a gang of guys and girls, and I took one of the girls seated in the middle to be Alyssa. I waved in their direction, trying to get her attention but only half-committed. It had been so long I wasn’t sure if I’d still recognize her.<br />
<br />
On the other side of the bar was a pool table where some jock guys—tight, bicep enhancing t-shirts, spiky hair gelled and streaked in a garish manner resembling the possible effect of crossbreeding a rooster and a ferret—were finishing a game and we went over and racked them up and after a while the dark haired waitress brought over our drinks. I paid for the drinks and tipped those shining ocean-washed eyes. Between shots I paced around the table, my eyes roaming around for that recognition. <br />
<br />
“See her yet?”<br />
<br />
“No. Pretty sure we’re in the wrong place.”<br />
<br />
I was sure of it. We finished our game and the drinks and left.<br />
<br />
We stood around in front of the patio looking over the blind streets, the slanty buildings, waiting for something, someone to show us the way. There was no one, nothing.<br />
<br />
“Which way now?” said Nick.<br />
<br />
“No idea,” I said. “No other place looks open. All is dark. Everything is nothing.”<br />
<br />
Just then a voice rose above the noise of the patio behind us, calling out to us. We turned and the dark-haired waitress from inside was stretched over the patio trying to get our attention. “Hey!” We turned to her with alarm, with excitement. “Did you guys pay?”<br />
<br />
“And then some,” I said. “Don’t remember us?”<br />
<br />
She stared at us, expressionless. “Oh, right.”<br />
<br />
Nick started to say, “You know where the—” then turned to me. “What was it called?”<br />
<br />
“The Eightball,” I said to him, and then to the waitress, “We’re looking for The Eightball.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, The Eightball. Just follow that street a couple blocks,” she said, straining over the wall separating us, arm pointed straight as a pool cue down the darkened street. “It’s on the left. You can’t miss it.”<br />
<br />
The night was warm, the air almost humid, Around us there was nothing but old, hard buildings, once the site of lifetimes worth of sweat and toil now little more than grim still-standing relics, and paint-peeling repair shops—made all the more desolate and done in by the darkness that enfolded them. We strolled along and there was a building like all the other buildings except that this one had people gathered by it, standing around under the dull floodlight of the parking lot, marooned together among the sightless surroundings.<br />
<br />
We crossed the street and approached. Everyone one was loud and drunk. We laid back, close to a chain link fence, unsure whether to go in or wait for an invitation. Nick smoked a cigarette. Past the fence there was a stretch of road and across from that were cement columns supporting an overpass that wound above us. A couple guys approached, started in questioning us, our presence here. They saw us standing around, didn’t recognise us and that was reason enough to investigate further. They wanted to know if we lived in town and when we said no, we were just passing through, they became more belligerent toward us, trying to intimidate us, toward what end remained a mystery. Drunken behaviour, however determined and directed, however much conviction there is shown flashing in those cold, bleary eyes, requires no motivation. But it was hard to tell. Maybe they weren’t that drunk. In which case—<br />
<br />
They got up closer to us. I could see one of the guys, who was wearing a bandanna and had two pierced ears, had a tattoo of something on his throat peaking out of his collared flannel shirt, impossible to make out what it was. His sleeves were rolled up and he had a faded leather band around his right wrist. This guy had the presentation down. I’ll give him that. But he might as well have been a clown performing at a backyard birthday party for a bunch of six-year-olds. I felt neither fear nor hatred toward them, completely detached, removed, untouchable. I just didn’t care. <br />
<br />
The questioning kept coming, their put-on intensity, making damn sure there was no doubt in our minds that this was their turf we had trespassed on. I stared at them blankly, like at an ATM machine. Before long their act started to falter. With nothing more to go on, having made their point clear as can be to us, they walked off, disappearing into the crowd, while mumbling something about the threat of outsiders coming in and taking over.<br />
<br />
“This is a strange town,” I said to Nick.<br />
<br />
“Yeah. Weird people.”<br />
<br />
“That’s almost too much of a compliment.”<br />
<br />
“What do you mean?”<br />
<br />
“Weirdness implies substance.”<br />
<br />
Nick dropped his butt, stomped it out.<br />
<br />
“Do you still want to go inside, or what?”<br />
<br />
“Well, we’re here.”<br />
<br />
Up cement steps and through a metal door, a long bare hallway, a few old black and white concert posters decorating the walls, led to the bar. Next to it was a line of bright blinking electronic poker consoles. As I stood there uncertainly a girl walked past me, up to the bar. She was wearing a silky low-cut blue dress. She gave me a glance that lingered. It was her. There was no mistaking it. It was Alyssa. She looked at me blankly, without recognition. It felt eerie. Like something out of a dream. I swam in the feeling a minute. She turned to the bar.<br />
<br />
“Alyssa.”<br />
<br />
She turned back to me immediately in one hard motion, her expression unchanged but now gesturing surprise.<br />
<br />
“Jonny?”<br />
<br />
Her eyes grew huge as her pupils drilled into me, smiling hard with sealed lips. An almost unnatural expression, it seemed as if it might run the risk of becoming permanently fixed if she held it too long. Then her jaw went down and her eyes went up and the curse was broken. She started to laugh.<br />
<br />
“Hi. Did I miss something?”<br />
<br />
“Your hair! What happened?! You look like you joined a cult.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, but shh,” I said, a finger to my lips. “They told me I’m not supposed to talk about it.”<br />
<br />
“You dummy!”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, well what about yours?”<br />
<br />
It had gone from sandy brown to sunset red, long and straight. She made a little pose, running her hand through it self-consciously.<br />
<br />
“You like it?” <br />
<br />
“It’s…you.”<br />
<br />
She nodded, then looked at me with pity and understanding and filled the moment’s silence with her smile.<br />
<br />
The bartender put two beers down on the bar behind her and she turned to take them and then turned back to me with one in each hand.<br />
<br />
“You drinkin’?” she said.<br />
<br />
“Unless you have a better idea.”<br />
<br />
I ordered a beer from the bar and Alyssa led me along, through a corridor and down a short flight of stairs. The place was packed and I followed close behind her, shouldering by others. My eyes caught sight of a guy with a shit-eating grin and tiny piercing eyes held in a leathery stubbly face—a real true to form mug—gazing at me straight on. He was wearing an unbuttoned black trenchcoat and nodded at me as we past, tipping his beer in our direction as a sign of some unspoken bond that existed somewhere between the profoundly limited reach of our stares. He seemed to know me. I had no idea who this person was. <br />
<br />
The bland radio rock was blaring and in the center of the room, between two poster-covered pillars, there were black leather couches arranged in front of a big screen with a rug over the worn hardwood, though the TV was off and nobody sat at them—too exclusive for even those there apparently. <br />
<br />
Around a corner and down a couple stairs her friends were seated at a table. She introduced me. I shook hands. They all had a certain knowing look for me, which was disarming enough, and then one guy—who I soon learned was the elusive Barrett from the phone—took my hand and, grinning hard with eyes locked in, said: “So this is the one we’ve heard so much about. We finally meet. Alyssa has told us a lot about you.” I didn’t know how to respond. “I hope she gave you the abridged version.” Canned laughter. Already there had been some kind of unclear, undefined level of expectation placed on me that I could only disappoint. I felt like I was on a blind date with a person who had done a full background check, and brought backup to boot. They had the numbers. I looked around for Nick who was across the table, watching, and I could tell he was enjoying seeing me sweat.<br />
<br />
A waitress brought over my beer and I downed half of it immediately and then paid for it. What followed was a lot of drink sipping, occasional glances, waiting for something that wasn’t made clear. Somewhere in the middle of the excitement another guy and girl joined our table. The guy had short curly dirty blond hair and talked buoyantly and with a lisp. She had thick dark hair and was morose and didn’t seem to say much at all to anyone. They sat on opposite sides of the table, far apart, the guy closer to me and leaning over the table, gesturing loudly and talking with three or four people at once, and she all quiet on the other side, next to Nick. “They’re supposed to be on a date,” Alyssa loud-whispered to me, leaning over. “I set them up.” And when I responded with “Guess it doesn’t seem to be going so well,” Alyssa said, “Guess not.” “Wonder how come?” I said. “I wonder,” she said.<br />
<br />
There was a pool table next to our table. When it became free someone suggested a game and I jumped. We played in teams of two, Alyssa and I and Nick and her friend, a girl whose name escapes me. The pool table was set up in a tight, busy corner, next to a brick wall with a wooden ledge for drinks sticking out and a framed “Pulp Fiction” poster above. Alyssa didn’t know how to play that well, so when her turn came up I leaned over her to show her how to position the cue. I bent her arm and eased it back, and suddenly I was enacting a bad pickup cliché that both of us were aware of and smiled and chuckled at as we went through with it. We played on. After helping her set up a tough corner shot I leaned back on the ledge and knocked over my beer and it was like that first time we had met the summer previous, in a bar, only now the rolls were reversed. We finished the game and we ordered a pitcher and were back at the table with the others.<br />
<br />
The atmosphere had changed now, the beer flowing, the focus shifted from the new guys and in town. The curly haired guy was holding court with tales and anecdotes punctuated with high stabbing laughter, exploding from open mouth with an insistent force that quickly becomes jarring, like a motorcycle revving its engine only to realize there’s a cat stuck in it, it’s helpless yelps drowned out, buried in the terrible noise. I huddled in a corner with Alyssa, off in our own private talk like a real life gchat. Across the table Nick sat next to the girl who’d been on the aborted date with cat engine guy. <br />
<br />
“You’re friend seems nice.”<br />
<br />
“He is, mostly. For a genius.”<br />
<br />
“Is that what he is, a genius?”<br />
<br />
“In his own mind. We’re all geniuses in our own mind.”<br />
<br />
“I’m no genius. But I’m back in school.”<br />
<br />
“That’s good. What are you taking again?”<br />
<br />
“Math. I’m going into accounting, I think. I’m tired of Music City. I want to find stable work. I’m not getting any younger. I want to work in a bank.”<br />
<br />
“That’s good if that’s what you want.”<br />
<br />
“I think it is. And it’s all because of you that I went back. Everything you told me. You’re my inspiration.”<br />
<br />
“God help us all.”<br />
<br />
“It’s true.”<br />
<br />
I scrunched my face and smiled.<br />
<br />
“You’re silly.”<br />
<br />
I took a hit of beer.<br />
<br />
“No truer words.”<br />
<br />
We talked and joked and drank and it was all effortless. A girl Alyssa knew came by the table and then went outside for a smoke. Next to me was a guy with dark shoulder-length hair and dark features, who I swore I recognized from somewhere. This was impossible, but then I realized who it was. It was the actor Jason Schwartzman. It was uncanny, really. I didn’t tell him this. <br />
<br />
We started talking by default. His name was Curt and he was telling me about how he planned to start some kind of animal car service. Or maybe it was just dog care. He told me about how when he was younger he would look after his neighbour’s dogs, all six of them, for long stretches at a time, walking them, feeding them, grooming them, and this led him to do the same for other’s in the neighbourhood. Where other kids would go around door-to-door mowing lawns he would go around and see about taking care of their dogs. Eventually word got around and people would start coming to him about tending to their dogs, and he started making pretty good money at it. After high school he had moved away to go to university to take some finance classes but ended up dropping out and returning. And so came more offers.<br />
<br />
“I just really like them a lot. And they really seem to take to me. I’ve had owners say how they couldn’t get their dogs to behave at all and were almost to the point of getting rid of them, until I would come in and start training them and then they said their behaviour would completely turn around.”<br />
<br />
His story perplexed me at first, I didn’t know what to make of it, but then it made perfect sense. He was completely sincere. There was something so sweet and simple and perfect in it, and it made me wish that I had discovered some sort of gift so naturally and so early and had honed it or whatever and could now be at the point of putting it to good use. Instead of what I’d ended up doing which was jump around from one thing to another, chasing it awhile like an errant kite sailing off higher and higher, the air getting thinner and thinner, then off after another one, only to watch it also slip through my fingers. Nothing ever stuck, and whatever adhesive there was that provided a short-term handle was starting to wear away for good. But such is the way of things.<br />
<br />
“Hey.”<br />
<br />
Nick had come up behind me and slapped me on the back. <br />
<br />
“I’m going out for a smoke.”<br />
<br />
There was a finality in his voice and I said I would join him and bottomed my beer and wished Curt all the best with his dog grooming venture.<br />
<br />
Outside Nick was smoking with a purpose.<br />
<br />
“This fucking town.”<br />
<br />
“What got into you?”<br />
<br />
“What got into me? Well, if you really want to know, I’ll tell ya. It’s this whole small town apathetic mentality, man. Negativity, cynicism, tearing down everything. Can’t bother to do anything with their own fucking lives they got to shit on others who actually do something, put something positive out into the world. I’ll tell you what it is—it’s fucking cancerous.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, OK, fine. But where is this coming from?”<br />
<br />
He took a long drag.<br />
<br />
“You know that girl in there, the friend of Alyssa’s I was sitting next to. We’re both there, so, you know, I figure why not chat her up a little. I asked her, ‘So what’s there to do around her for fun?’ Harmless, right? But she gives me this look like I’m out of my mind. Says, ‘What do you mean by that?’ I mean, I was just trying to get her to open up a little, now suddenly I’m having to explain myself. I says, you know, ‘What do you guys do besides come to the bar and drink?’ And her response: ‘Nothing.’ Just spits it out at me—nothing. I ask her if she works. Yeah, she says, and leaves it at that. Geez, sorry for prying. So I take a different tact. I start telling her about myself. If only to fill the silence, you know. I tell her I’m in school, working on my degree, play bass, etc. Meanwhile she’s just looking off, bored. Like, Oh sorry, didn’t me to try and engage you, relate with you. How stupid of me. I mean, we are in a fucking bar after all. I’m a guy, you’re a girl. This is usually how it works after all. Fuck. Why fucking bother. You know.”<br />
<br />
He took a breath, sucking on his smoke. <br />
<br />
He was in a real mood. I bounced around a few different angles to take with my next remark. I had to pick carefully, cautiously. I chose empathy.<br />
<br />
“Maybe she was having an off night.”<br />
<br />
“Try an off life.”<br />
<br />
“Christ!”<br />
<br />
“Well fuck it. Fuck it all. Fuck this town.” He tossed the remains of his cigarette over the chain-link fence. “So what’s the deal with you and Alyssa? You two were really hitting off.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, I know. This night is full of surprises.”<br />
<br />
“Listen. You should invite her back to our room for a drink. See what happens, where it might lead. I don’t mind sleeping in the car.”<br />
<br />
“You don’t need to sleep in the car.”<br />
<br />
“So what do you want to do? I’m ready to get out of here.”<br />
<br />
It was a good question. What was I doing? Where was this night leading? Could we stay here another day? No, that was out of the question. So what then? What was it I—<br />
<br />
My attention was stolen by a fight that had broken out, near the entrance. A punk girl had come storming out the door and was screaming at a couple guys about who knows what. She was really screaming. The two guys were laughing and trying to calm her down, but mostly they were laughing. To show them she was serious, she knocked over the guy closest to her, then pounced on the other, neither of them knowing what hit them. She had the second guy on the ground, with her kneeled on top of him, wailing away with fists of fury. <br />
<br />
The crowd moved in around them, enjoying the show. The girl kept working him over but the guy did nothing to fight back, only raising his arms to block the incoming blows. Everyone was having a good laugh at this impromptu bit of late night entertainment. Here was this wee punk girl—Mohawk, suspenders, patched up cargos, wife-beater, Doc Martin’s—having her way with this skinny little dweeb. But she was relentless, not letting up, a wild cat on the attack. <br />
<br />
Some guys—maybe friends of dweeb boy, maybe not—came over and tried to pull her off. Fists kept flying when suddenly one guy got her from behind, arms wrapped around her tightly, holding her at bay so the guy under her could get away. He got up, stunned and bloody-nosed. <br />
<br />
The guy now on top of punk girl had her down on the ground, pinned underneath him as he mounted her and dry humped her for good measure. She forced them both back up, at which point he lowered his hands, still wrapped around her waist, into her cargos, coming out with a handful of white underwear—men’s underwear. He threw his hands up, then let go, backing away from her. She stood their still screaming and gesturing wildly, the underwear having been hiked up over her shirt like that poor loser from grade three left cowering in the corner at the end of every recess. <br />
<br />
I still had no idea she was so mad about. Drunken behaviour. No motive needed.<br />
<br />
It was a hell of a show, and in the aftermath Alyssa had come over to us, a bit freaked out, or so she pretended to be. Showing concern, I hugged her around the shoulders and rubbed her back as we watched the last of the action play out. Somebody from the bar came out and barked at those involved to get off the property and the crowd that had gathered to watch started to disperse, though most remained in the parking lot. A few cars were driving around doing victory laps, or something. Victory? What victory? <br />
<br />
There were no winners, only losers on this night.<br />
<br />
“That was some crazy shit,” I said to her. I felt the obvious needed to be stated, for verification.<br />
<br />
“Yeah.”<br />
<br />
“What do you saying going back with us for a nightcap?”<br />
<br />
“Oh Jonny. Not tonight.”<br />
<br />
“What night then? We’re gone tomorrow.”<br />
<br />
“Do you have to leave tomorrow?”<br />
<br />
“Yes.”<br />
<br />
“Oh Jonny, you were supposed to be her yesterday. It only takes 14 hours to get here from where you were.”<br />
<br />
“Fourteen hours? Where’d you get that number from?”<br />
<br />
“I looked it up on the internet.”<br />
<br />
“Well, maybe by jetpack. We drove all night, nonstop. Our only hold up came when we got to Banff—”<br />
<br />
I explained the whole ordeal we had gone through. How we intended to leave early on Friday but got set back by the flat tire. Then finally getting off the ferry late afternoon, driving as far as Kamloops only to wind up not being able to find a hotel room and nearly spending the night in a park, only to drive all night through the mountains, only to have the car fuck up on us by the time we reached Banff in the morning. <br />
<br />
I told her of the emergency call I almost put in for her to come get us. But then taking our chances and making it to the next town and discovering the problem with the other tire, and then the sheer luck of meeting up at the same place with the one guy who could service it. I tried to convey to her the sense of desperation we felt when our plans were effectively got shat on. And in turn the exhilaration at overcoming everything and getting back on the road and driving balls out all the way into town, just to get to spend Saturday night with her, in a bar, right here, right now. And all in just over 24 hours. Explaining this to her, I could barely believe it myself, this being my first opportunity to reflect back on the previous day’s events. Did all that really happen? I was informing myself as much as her. <br />
<br />
But my excitement was for not. I sputtered out my story, gesturing and emphasising certain points, going back over things to fill in certain details as they came to me, and Alyssa, a consoling smile, with the mildly condescending false wonder of a mother giving her attention to an insistent child demanding they see, right now, right this second, how they can do a cartwheel, listened to it all, and then said: “I’m going back inside now.”<br />
<br />
I let out a breath. I was a fool.<br />
<br />
“Well, maybe if you decide to visit your friend this summer you can take a little detour and stop in for a drink.”<br />
<br />
Her friend lived two hours away from where I would be—the same city Marissa moved to be with her husband.<br />
<br />
“No,” she said with a smile that didn’t reach the eyes. “I don’t think I’ll be doing that.”<br />
<br />
She started for the doors, and at the stairs turned back, a hand on the railing. <br />
<br />
“You coming back in?”<br />
<br />
I looked over at Nick.<br />
<br />
“I’m going for a walk,” he said, starting off.<br />
<br />
“Just a minute,” I said. “I’ll join you.”<br />
<br />
I turned back to Alyssa. I was trying to hold onto something but wasn’t sure what.<br />
<br />
“I’ll be back.”<br />
<br />
We slumped along the barren streets, back in the direction we came. I stopped behind some kind of aluminum bunker and took a piss. The temperature had dropped but there was no wind, a quiet night. <br />
<br />
“Alyssa’s nice a girl. Good. Honest.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah,” I said. “She is.”<br />
<br />
“So sad though. You can tell she’s had a hard go of it. Gone through some messed up shit. Know what she needs, she needs a guy to come along and treat her right.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah, you’re probably right. You’re always fucking right.”<br />
<br />
And I should have left it at that. Return to the car, drive straight back to the motel and a nightcap of Crown and coke, congratulate ourselves on a safe, success journey this far and quickly pass out into a good, heavy sleep. The last two nights I had had a total of three, four hours of sleep, and was running on pure adrenaline since Canmore. It had gotten me this far but I was libel to give out soon, and in a big way. <br />
<br />
But no. We went back. <br />
<br />
The crowds had thinned out. It was near closing, and we made our way to a back corner, where Alyssa was at a booth nursing a beer, Curt and the lisping guy seated at either side of her. They had been anticipating our return and we approached, heads hung and hands in our pockets, like accused men brought before a tribunal. We stood before them. They stared ahead at us and we back at them. A showdown and surrender all at once. Somebody said something. Words were spoken. There was mention of this being our only night, that we were leaving in the morning. This was enough to start the lisping guy off.<br />
<br />
“Well in that case,” he began, digging in. “I have got to tell you of some good places I know to stop for breakfast. First, there’s the Smitty’s on the highway. Oh my god, they have the best hashbrowns you’ll ever have. Seriously. So good. Absolutely to die for. Or else, let’s see, there’s the Open Chest restaurant at the, now which is it—oh yeah!—the Uptown Plaza—off Fifth Street, hang a left at Pirate Lane. It has a buffet including make your own omelettes. And then there’s also the Fritter Café, downtown. Now they don’t have much of a menu but their French vanilla lattes are simply divine. ‘Nuff said. You <em>must</em> be sure to try it before you leave. Oh, and also if you’re interested in a spicy breakfast, if that’s your thing, there’s the—”<br />
<br />
He went on and on, elbows up on the table, limp wrists fluttering and flipping about in front to animate his speech. But I had tuned him out and was focusing in on Alyssa. Her eyes were downcast, rubbing the side of her glass, an air of resignation as she slouched behind the table like a wounded doe. I wanted to tell her something but I had no words, and, even so, by the time I'd have managed to pull some together and get them out they would no longer mean anything. And it was just as well. <br />
<br />
“—so there are a few options for you guys to consider.” <br />
<br />
He went quiet, folded his hands under his chin and looked on with no real interest in our replies. Curt looked at us apologetically but said nothing. There was nothing to be said. We waited the moment out in silence, then sadly said our goodbyes and left.<br />
<br />
We slumped back to the car. We drove around listening to an Eric Dolphy free jazz album Nick put on. At one point I turned into a large empty parking lot, for a mini mall or something, and somehow got stuck and had to do a three-point turn to get us out. We drove back to the motel, drank our whiskey, and slept the sleep of the dead. No dreams, no wakeup calls. It was wonderful.<br />
<br />
There was a quote I came across during my research. It was by some obscure seventeenth century philosopher, I can’t remember his name. I never ended up using it for anything but always had it close at hand, to refer back to. It’s a simple enough message. But the truest things always are. “Don’t invest hope or longing in an arena where you have no power.”<br />
<br />
Sunday morning. I was the first one up and had a shower and dressed. Nick woke up shortly after, all groaning, groggy and shitty, and was about to fall back asleep until I told it was almost checkout. While he took his turn in the shower I packed my bags and lay back on the end of the bed listening to a recording of Allen Ginsberg reading his poetry. <br />
<br />
<strong>“The world is holy! The soul is holy! The skin is holy! The nose is holy! The tongue and cock and hand and asshole holy! Everything is holy!”</strong> he proclaimed in a pained and straining joyous bellowing voice. And I believed him. <br />
<br />
There was a knock at the screen door. I opened my eyes and raised myself up. The little Korean proprietor was there saying, “Checkout time! Your checkout time now! You leave or else pay another day!” I pulled out my earbuds and said, “OK. OK. We’re as good as gone. Soon as my friend’s out of the shower.”<br />
<br />
This seemed to satisfy her and she walked away. I looked at my watch. It was 10:57. I took the bags out to the car, mine being the only one in the lot. Nick emerged from the shower shortly and I returned the key. <br />
<br />
We decided to forgo a full breakfast, grabbing a couple coffees and fresh fruit from the store where we gassed up. The sun was high and heavy and the temperature was headed the same direction. It was going to be another hot one. We slopped on the sunscreen in preparation, and with the sun racing up the sky behind us, merged onto the highway along the lines of semis. Setting out on the road one more time. It wouldn’t be long now. We were on our way.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-67983134167132437072009-07-31T20:47:00.000-07:002009-08-02T12:39:56.063-07:00Wrong Turn“Where do you go when there’s nowhere to go, and the death you might have died belongs to you no longer?” <br />—Joy Williams, “Breaking and Entering”<br /><br />Thursday, 4:55. The class pours in, another Greenburg lecture set to commence. <br /><br />Today, Greenburg’s got a trick up his sleeve. <br /><br />He wants to mix things up a bit. After everyone’s seated he tells us to change seats. A little experiment in “altering perspectives,” he says. “Seeing things from a different angle, in a different light.” <br /><br />Another one of his crazy exercises. <br /><br />Even though there’s no assigned seating, after the first couples classes, everyone more or less fell into a set seating pattern which got carried on for ever class thereafter and which he’s now, apparently, trying to break us out of. Who knows why this is. Maybe because it’s a first year class and everyone is still stuck in old habits, have yet to throw off the old routines, the rigid structures deeply ingrained after the previous twelve, thirteen years of formal education. Maybe. Myself, I’m still enjoying the novelty of hunkering down in the back of class with a wad of Berry Burst Double-Bubble to chew on, pass the time, without Ms. Retzing, that ancient dishcloth of a teacher (“Old rumbled Retzing, none too fetching” went the oft-reprised playground chorus) who’d been put in charge of the music and health departments since the invention of the recorder or the female contraceptive, whatever came first, instructing me to dispose of my load before my chomping further disturbed another one of her endlessly fascinating expositions on the intimate workings of the female reproductive tract.<br /><br />The class shuffles and re-shuffles again, table and chair legs squeaking along the tiled floor, and then there she is, seated next to me. No not Retzing, God rest her haggard soul, but Wendy Meadows. So far I’ve only admired her from afar, safely across the class, gapping out during heavy periods on those long curly locks that run down her neck, covering over some tattoo she has on the back of her neck. Some words, still not exactly sure what it says, and haven’t got up the gumption to go over and ask. <br /><br />What can I say, that’s just not what I do. Not one of my talents. Some guys are all skills and chutzpah in that department. Not me. Not so much. But such deficiencies I try not to dwell on. My old man, if he was still around, he’d say it’s that line of deep-black brooding that makes a good man bitter, and a bitter man a damn waste. He said a lot of things I’m still digesting, my guts weakened by the heaps of unprocessed, unsorted, and unverified bulk. My old man. How thoughtless of him, leaving when he did. The fucking nerve. But what did he really know anyway? What had been holding back, keeping secret? Beats me. Must have been a good one. That’s what I tell myself. But then again, who knows. When it’s all on the line, who can we really trust to set us right? To my feckless eyes, truth and lies form the same outline. <br /><br />I’ve got Wendy in my eye line, and she’s right there, looking back, smiling her smile that sets the world afire. Hold steady, steady. I can feel the blood drain from my face, as if I’m disappearing right in front of her. Going ghost. Turning translucent. The forever fade. If only. Except the gleam of awareness in her true blues says I’m all right there, in the flesh. The edges of her lips curl. Part.<br /><br />“Hey.”<br /><br />I wait for the spontaneous charm to kick in, take over, free me from my own mass ineptitude, turn me into something better, but nothing’s coming. Time’s ticking. Something else my old man used to say. No one, he said, who ever uttered the words “no rush” ever said it and meant it, not in full knowledge. The bulk builds.<br /><br />“Hi…”<br /><br />The word more a crude imitation of a relaxed, casual greeting: hanging there limply, as it were, with an expectation that instantly turns and eats itself, finding immediate rejection and spat out with final disgust. <br /><br />The professor begins to address the class. Lecture underway. Next to me, vexed by my feeble one-note performance, Wendy’s reply is all but a short, swift breath, equal parts pity, amusement and utter unconcern. So much for cool under pressure, but at least this reminds me to take a breath before I really do keel over, and then we both turn to the front, note-taking pens at the ready.<br /><br />The lecture is a short one, and for the second half of the class we’re instructed to group up for a brief discussion of some of points he touched on. Joy. Now usually this means grabbing others in closest proximity, a low-key gesture, a pointed look is all it takes, and we’re on our way. But because of the bit of musical chairs, my group, the usual guys, are all scattered about the class. I start looking over at Wendy, thinking maybe here’ll be my chance to shine, to show off some mad analytic skills, which is about the only time as of late I can seem to get the words to flow, to say what I mean—if indeed there’s any meaning in what I say. How did it get like this? <br /><br />Well, first there was Mindy, and her decision, the week after graduation, while we were staying at her parents cabin on Diefenbaker, to end things after two-and-three-quarter years because, in her words, she wanted a year to “figure things out” before her future came calling. Right. Real original. I even had the ring and everything. But she said it, and she meant it. Then there was that thing over the summer. I’m still trying to figure out the meaning behind that one. And now here I am into my second year of post-high school studies with so far only one class failed (damned math!). And that’s all the explanation I’ve got. But who’s asking anyhow? <br /><br />The seat next to me is empty, like the head of the dinner table when I was back home for Christmas, and I catch Wendy, having rounded up her books and things, making a B-line for the exit.<br /><br />“What’s with her?” I say to the guy next to me, a sad-eyed fellow with soft, lumpy features and a swollen red goatee of acne. <br /><br />“I heard her talkin’ with Greenburg before class. Something about an appointment she had to get to. I think. I don’t know.”<br /><br />“Hope it’s nothing serious.” I watch her give a little wave to the professor on her way out the door, which he returns with a nod of acknowledgement without interrupting the set of directions he’s giving to a group at the front in his usual casual yet authoritative manner.<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />My neck snaps back around to him. <br /><br />“H’uh?”<br /><br />The discussion is off to a fantabulous start.<br /><br />And so she’s gone, and another opportunity lost. Opportunity isn’t the right word, but thankfully neither is hopeless nor oblivion, and meanwhile life goes on between the two. <br /><br />Myself, the pimply guy and a couple others are having our little discussion about one of the discussion questions printed out on the sheet in front of me, but I’m still on Wendy and my lack of extra-curricular female fraternizing and not contributing a lick. Then the professor decides, mercifully, to dismiss us early and all talk cuts off like a terminal patient’s life-support, and everyone’s picking up, clearing out, done for the day. <br /><br />As I’m bent over putting my books away, others passing by me on their way out the door, I feel a slap on my shoulder, and look up to see one of my old group partners, Mike Rembolt. How I know Mike is we both share this class along with a compulsory Art History course. That was the ice breaker of sorts. “Hey there fellow, gee you look awfully familiar, aren’t you also in…” That started it, and he’s been prodding me to meet up for drinks with him ever since. And I’ve avoided it pretty good, until now. <br /><br />“So listen. There’s this new place, just opened. It’s where the old burger joint used to be. You know, that fifties throwback place. I’m headed down there now. You should come.”<br /><br />“I don’t know. I’m pretty loaded down. You know how it is.”<br /><br />“Aw, come on. Last class of the day over. Time to relax. Chill out a bit.”<br /><br />“Yeah, it’s an idea. But…”<br /><br />“But what?”<br /><br />“But…nothing.”<br /><br />“Great.”<br /><br />“Sure.”<br /><br />So I accept, and we go. <br /><br />The place is nearby, only a couple blocks from campus—hidden in the corner of a recently expanded strip mall—and real busy when we get there. It being the end of the workday, the loose tie crowd is out in force. He orders us a couple drinks to start. Something hard. I put my book bag down next to my stool. Two glasses of the queer, browny liquid, like mom’s molasses watered down with lemonade, with the same sort of sting, are plunked down on the bar. <br /><br />“To fire-cooked steaks, fast cars, and sweet-loving ladies,” says my man Mike, holding up a glass. “Not necessarily in that order.”<br /><br />“Cheers.”<br /><br />Our glasses smash together and we both down our drinks. <br /><br />I get up.<br /><br /> “Gotta hit the head.”<br /><br />“Don’t think you can sneak out that easy. They’ll be another waiting for you when you get back,” my man shouts at me over the noise, and I register it with a thumbs-up as I drop in the door of the john.<br /><br />When I get back the drink is there but my bag is gone. And so is my man.<br /><br />I do a quick scan across the bar, side to side, and then over the whole establishment. The place is big, weird, and gaudy, and I don’t know my way around for anything. Mirrors arranged in every corner skew perspectives so, looking up, everything seems a million miles away. Here but over there. Get a few pints in you and stare up at it long enough, there’s a good chance of your face turning into a hamburger submerged in a double side order of greasy-tipped cigarettes. It's true. Up on one wall, images of James Dean and Marilyn Monroe, presumably left over from the previous occupants, coolly watch over the proceedings, and the black-and-white floor tiles makes it so that it’s like you’re walking on a chessboard. <br /><br />And making my way through the crowded, rowdy bar, manoeuvring between bodies like caught in a well-placed block, I feel like I’m the fucking pawn, though for what, whose game, I’m not sure. <br /><br />Then I’m at the back of the bar with others milling around. A long, cavernous hallway stretches back into some ill-defined blackness, far off. The action around me makes it hard to gauge what we’ve got going on. But I don’t know where else Mike could be unless he left, and I start out, passing one door and another and another. A whole series of labyrinth-like rooms connect to this never-ending hallway. My path gets blocked by a couple fondling and flirting and generally carrying on in an altogether intimate manner. <br /><br />“Excuse me. Excuse me.”<br /><br />No dice. Nothing will break their erotic embrace. I’m wishing I had brought my drink with me form the bar, if only to put out their fire. Fight fire with fire, that is.<br /><br />Instead, on a whim, for lack of anything else, I grab the nearest doorknob, twist, swing it open. <br /><br />The pungent scent of lust and stale sweat fills the small room. Movement draws my eye. In one corner two bodies are plunging for each other’s love jewels. As naked as the cracked cement walls, the man and woman flail and jerk on the ragged bed in a violent display of want and release. The draft coming in behind me through the doorframe brings the man out of it, pausing momentarily the battle of the flesh underway to turn to me.<br /><br />“Hey, buddy! You mind!”<br /><br />The woman under him covers her mouth with a free hand, giggling like a schoolgirl who’s just been passed a dirty note as I close the door. Following that comes “What you laughing at?” from the man, and the door is shut. More people fill the hall, what suddenly occurs to me, as I look around at them in the dim hall light, are all couple in various stages of making it, have conglomerated, clustered around the hallway, as I weave around them and duck into another room. <br /><br />This time I slam the door behind me, back leaning against it, and close my eyes. In a second, I feel a pair of hands grasping my arms, cinching on tightly with the cold embrace of a crab, shaking them with great urgency. I open my eyes, and am met with the reflection of a gaunt face bordering on the skeletal, wild-eyed, alert, blinking madly like the wings of a housefly. <br /><br />“Oh man. Oh man, oh man. You gotta help me, man. You just gotta. I doing know what happened. I mean, I do, but, shit, it happened so fast. She said she liked it rough. Said it was what got her off.”<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />He lets go of me, arms drop, dangle beside him helplessly as he steps aside.<br /><br />“Oh, man, would you look at her,” he says running a worried hand through a few wisps of hair. “Jesus, just look at her!”<br /><br />The naked body lays spread across the bed, the head falling over the side, hanging unnaturally, a pale icy blue, staring up at the ceiling, the features frozen in an expression approaching vengeful satisfaction, the eyes bold and determined, inching out of their sockets as if reaching for something they’ll never get to. Or maybe they already did. A purple necklace of bruises wraps around the awkwardly distended throat. <br /><br />“Goddamn it all. That stupid fucking cunt! It’s all her own fault. We had a safe word! A fucking safe word! She was supposed to say ‘alligator’ if things got to be too much. Alligator! Goddamn bitch!” His weak, shrinking frame trembles in a sore fit of contempt and indignation. He drops to his knees and starts visibly weeping. Like a motherless child, it all comes pouring out, freely, without sense or direction. His words, barely audible, stifled as they are by the tears and sobbing, waver in a high-pitched wail. “Goddamn bitch.”<br /><br />I look at him on the ground and then at her and then at him. Impossible. I beat it out of there.<br /><br />I continue down the hallway, which has now extended way past the goings on of the bar into somewhere else entirely. Where, I don’t know. Beyond the atmosphere of jolly frivolity, and into someplace wholly different, unrelated, disconnected, and bleak. My pace quickened, moving faster and faster, almost breaking into a gallop, the dark emptiness ahead becomes a more and more welcoming sight. Then I’m brought to a dead stop, running smack into something, someone. And all at once a pressure comes down hard on my foot, the shock of impact launching me to one side, connecting with the wall with the same hard, unforgiving impact. Momentarily dazed, I collect myself and push off the wall in a quick, pitching motion, which is followed instantly by a pinch, more than a pinch—a stab—on my right side. I struggle to come loose, stunned as I am by the pain—which I don’t feel so much as anticipate like an oncoming swarm of killer bees—shaking my arm frantically, but my jacket is snagged on something, holding me up. I make one all-out gesture, like I’m delivering a right-hook, and then there’s a rip. Only I can’t make out what exactly it is, what caused it—a loose nail, an unfortunately placed rail, who knows. It’s dark, so dark. But I’m freed, and without looking back, push on.<br /><br />Then it ends. I come up against something that’s again blocking my path. A steel door. An exit. A sense of either great relief or great loss overcomes me as I punch down on the metal handle and step outside.<br /><br />Past the doorway light, all is dark, as dark as the hallway was. Early December darkness. Under the red buzzing EXIT sign, I look down and discover my left boot is gone, had come off at some point, and, along with my backpack, got left inside. I try the door I just came out of but it’s locked. <br /><br />I come down on it with all my weight, pounding my shoulder into it, then a couple times with the side of my fist.<br /><br />“My fucking boot, asshole! I need my fucking boot!”<br /><br />I rest against the door, and feeling a stinging breeze cut through my exposed side, move a hand over the tear in my jacket, and pulling it out, watch droplets of blood, thick and warm, ooze from my palm to the ground. <br /><br />Shoeless and bloody, I take a few tentative steps out into the dark night, snow crumpling under my bare feet. <br /><br />I stop, cold and uncertain. There’s a rattling coming from somewhere ahead of me, and then the sound of footsteps approaching. Nothing, anything or anyone, I can see in front of me. A grim odour seizes my senses. I feel a presence more than see any. Whoever or whatever it is crosses my path, drops something in the snow, and shuffles off, the crunch-crunch trailing into a fade until the only sound is the whistle of the wind. I move in closer to inspect. On the ground, a pair of shoes, wooden and with straps, in a Japanese style. <br /><br />“Thank you,” I call out to the mysterious delivery man but only the wind answers.<br /><br />Not my missing boot but I’m not exactly in a bartering position. I try them on. They fit snugly, my heal spilling out, bare and braced, over the back, but I manage to get them on my feet and start off into the snowy night. Slow and cautious, I turn up an alley as narrow and dark and long as the hallway, expect that there’s a light at the end of this tunnel. Coming out onto the street the lights flash all around, from high up above, like wondrous glowing honeycombs. The comfort of the light quickly gives way to the dread of the unfamiliar surroundings. Where I am? The back area of the bar having ran back so far it must have come out on a completely different area of town, far off from where we entered. So I think. But my reason I left behind some time ago. Panic grips my bones like a new skin; that and the coldness. <br /><br />My attempt at a run through the freshly snowed over streets ends in my taking in a mouthful of the stuff. Damn ill-fitting shoes. I rise with weary resolve. A red blotch in the packed snow made by my outline marks my path and my defeat. So weak and cold now I can’t hardly feel anything, and then less than that, and just as the soft creeping numb feeling starts to take hold I hear music. Far away and muffled, soft and gentle, indistinct and cryptic, like the music you hear in dreams after falling asleep with the stereo on, and all I can think to myself is: I didn’t know death had a soundtrack. Then I recognize the sounds. “Nightmare,” an old-timey Artie Shaw song, made new in this confusion. I look around, searching out the sound. And there parked on the street a block-and-a-half up, a camping trailer sits humming its song to the night. I go over to it, the bleary blast of the music growing louder and louder as I approach. I rap on the door, and when nobody answers I open it and go inside. <br /><br />The music explodes in my face, the light so bright it takes my eyes a moment to adjust. They come into focus but nothing is set in place. The old furniture is all cloaked in a messy layer of cobwebs, the whole trailer is—entangling and sticking to me as I move in the direction of the stereo on the other side, arms swinging wildly to beat them off. <br /><br />The stereo is set up high on a shelf and I have to climb up a step ladder to reach it. I brush back the cobwebs, scanning the buttons and dials. I hit the button marked OPEN and a disc pops out. <br /><br />Still the music keeps playing. <br /><br />I take the disc out and put it in my pocket. I hit it again and another disc is released. <br /><br />The music keeps right on playing. <br /><br />I do this again and again, each time another disc snapping out, which I promptly remove and deposit in my pockets until they are filled with all these discs. <br /><br />And the music continues to play. <br /><br />The same Artie Shaw song, over and over, his voice so raw and emotive and true it’s like he’s back from the beyond and right there in the room.<br /><br />I jump off the ladder, clear away more of the cobwebs and exit the trailer.<br /><br />On the street again, and I’m off in whatever direction my feet care to take me. Peeling off more invisible cobwebs I round a corner and then another corner and then there’s my school. I let of a deep frosty breath. Back on firm ground. Then I notice there’s some movement over by one of the entrances. I zero in. Hanging out on one of the benches, a couple guys, three guys, yap it up, a paper bag bottle being shared between them.<br /><br />They see me limp past, trudging along in my pathetic excuse for winter footwear, hand on my side, holding me together, while the clattering discs fall out of my over-stuffed pockets, spilling out around me to form, along with the dripping blood, a path from the trailer. They fall silent and then one of them shouts over to me, “Hey buddy, you look like shit. Where the fuck you just come from?”<br /><br />Not breaking stride, I say to them, my voice pained but direct, “Took a wrong turn.”Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-42719630249606275732009-03-15T21:11:00.000-07:002009-04-05T19:01:31.465-07:00Everyone is Always Leaving All the Time“I, only I, am the spectator in the orchestra.”<br />—Kafka, <em>Diaries</em><br /><br />He moved over the bedcovers in his graceful, stalking way, pawing at the blankets as he surveyed the soft, lumpy texture in search of the perfect place to lie. Seamus. He was maybe four or five, a long hair, black all over with some puffy white fur around his face that spread down to form a patch over his throat. He was a nice cat, despite his imperfections, because of them. Running a hand over his head and down along the curve where neck meets back, he purred with lazy satisfaction, arching his back and tilting his head, his little legs taut and trembling, before settling into his selected spot. <br /><br />A dog can only belong to one person, but Seamus was ours. He made me feel good about things like few things did. Laying there listening to his low, mantric purring, his half-open eyes suggesting a contented tiredness, limbs huddled up under his furry round shell of a body, it felt like it would be all right, even with all the shit, some of the time. Like there was a little less hate, conflict and uncertainty in the world. And that was enough.<br /><br />There wasn’t much else. The afternoon slipped past like a secret that couldn’t be kept. I wanted to hope, I wanted to believe. I really did. But it had been settled. She was leaving the next day. <br /><br />That night we would sleep together for the last time. Our life together had started over two and a half yeas ago, most of it documented in a blog we kept regularly updated with photos and short entries recounting experiences we had had. Like the trip to Dublin where we had our passports and credit cards stolen and spent the weekend of the annual Bloomsday celebrations camped out in Phoenix Park amid the thousands of sloshed and surly locals. The time we stayed at a cabin on Waterton Lake and I got bit by a snake, an endangered Massasauga Rattler, after a swim, and almost had three toes on my right foot amputated. There were our two cats we rescued, Seamus and Stokes, who no one wanted them on account of one having lost an eye and the other having a stub for a tail. <br /><br />We had shared a lot, and even the sour times I wouldn’t have given up for anything. <br /><br />Over that time we had also befriended many new people—more than I had ever known on my own—a lot of them couples like us, and the thought of telling them she was no longer a part of my life, and I a part of hers, seemed unfathomable. I didn’t know how to tell myself.<br /><br />We slept on separate sides of the bed, our backs to each other for most of the night save for when I woke to the sensation that everything was too real and rolled over on my side, wrapped my arms around her and held her close like I used to, those first couple months we were together, before she moved in permanently and would only stay over and in the morning, with the fresh light trickling through the half-drawn curtains, we would make it until both us didn’t feel anything, eventually getting up to shower, and, one hunger giving way to the next, I would make us three cheese omelets while she read from a piece of writing she was working on.<br /><br />But before long it got to be too hot and uncomfortable, and we were back in our original positions, together in the same bed but divided by an impossible gulf of bitterness and longing that best intentions could never fill. <br /><br />A while after that she got up, went to the bathroom and when she came back she was wearing only herself. She crawled across the bed and, her breasts dangling in front of me like ripe pears on the bough, asked me if I wanted to have sex. But I told her there was no point and rolled over on my stomach and swallowed a mouthful of pillow. <br /><br />In the morning I laid in bed watching her get ready. She packed the rest of her things and then checked herself one last time in the mirror. She started for the door but came back to give me a kiss on the forehead, and was gone.<br /><br />I continued to stare at the door. One of the cats hopped up on the bed and tried to curl up at my feet but I kicked it off. I smoked a joint she had left on the bedside table and went back to sleep.<br /><br />It was a Saturday. That night there was a show at the Elks Hall. All of the bands on the bill were of either the screamo or metal persuasion—all of them except my friend’s band, O’Malley’s Alley. They had a sound about as far removed from those types as you could get. I didn’t much care to go but a buddy of mine, Paul, called me up and insisted I get out of the house. What the hell. So we made plans to meet for drinks and then go check it out.<br /><br />When we got there the first band was already on stage. The music was deafening, the sound of the instruments bleeding together into a raw metallic roar. I hung back with Paul, observing the action. Bodies in the first few rows flailed and shook with abandon. On stage, the singer was possessed, striding back and forth with a snarling expression, occasionally taking up the microphone he clutched, while assuming a fighter-strike pose, and breaking into a hysterical shrieking fit that could have been in Turkish or Swahili. It didn’t matter. Words meant nothing. The expression was all.<br /><br />Three bands played after them and for most of it the intensity of the crowd didn’t let up. I’ve never been to any live UFC or NWA events, but I get the idea. And this wasn’t much different. <br /><br />Between bands, while we were outside having a smoke, I told Paul that during the next set I was going to go up front and join in. He said that would be as good as suicide and I said, “Exactly.” <br /><br />Sure enough, while the next band was on stage, someone got laid out by a forearm shot to the face, but only suffered a broken nose and chipped tooth. Most of the crowd didn’t notice him until the song ended, when some guys working security came over and helped him to his feet. He was good and dazed, eyes glazed over, and he probably couldn’t recite the alphabet to save himself, but as they escorted him out the fucker was grinning like a snared hyena. All the blood made him look like a circus clown with epic snot nose, or a rodeo clown who forgot his armor. <br /><br />After that the band played one more song and the spilt blood got cleaned up. O’Malley’s Alley was next to go on. While they were getting ready there was a noticeable change in the room’s vibe. It was still a good size crowd; most people remained or were replaced by others who had just showed up. And though there were still lots of long hairs in the crowd, most of them were now female.<br /><br />The stage darkened. The band was introduced by the single ringing notes of a lone guitar that was soon joined by an acoustic guitar, followed by an electric—the sound building until it was filled out by the rest of the band, and then the gentle wail of the keyboard player on top of it.<br /><br />I looked around at others in the crowd. Compared to the overt displays of angst and aggression from earlier they were downright calm and attentive, faces peering up at the stage, focused on the intricacies of the music. Without glancing over for acknowledgement, a girl pressed herself close to me. I turned my eyes back to the stage. <br /><br />It didn’t hit me until a few songs in, during a cover of The Loved Ones’ “Sad Dark Eyes,” that it was at their first show, all those years ago, that I had met Candi.<br /><br />I went out into the lobby and ran into my sister. She asked me if Candi was with me. I told her she left this morning. She says “Oh, OK” in an affectless tone and goes into the washroom. <br /><br />I took a seat on a bench. Next to me were two guys and a girl. The girl was standing pacing in little circles in front of them. They were in the middle of a heated discussion, their voices raised above conversational pitch, the girl’s especially, so I couldn’t help but catch certain details. Mostly it had to do with one of the guys’ getting shipped out the next week. The girl made it known how against this she was. But to her opposition the guy would only say in response, “It’s just something I gotta do,” over and over, which only made her more boisterous, more animated. Her wild eyes lit up like hot coals.<br /><br />“If you don’t come back, if you don’t fucking come back, I swear, I swear, you bastard, I am going to hunt you down and fucking KILL YOU!”<br /><br />“No choice, something I gotta do.”<br /><br />“Goddamn you, Markus, goddamn you.”<br /><br />She collapsed down next to him with her head in her hands and started to sob, in mourning for something that would always elude her. She had a shiny nose ring and her long curly blond hair was showing dark at the roots, in need of a dye job. <br /><br />So was I.<br /><br />I got up and went back to watch the rest of the set. But by this time they had finished playing. The show was over. <br /><br />Over by the stage I caught sight of Bradley’s sister, who played bass in one of the bands, and was packing up her gear. She had long black hair and tattoos for days. I congratulated her on a good performance even though I couldn’t make out any of her playing.<br /><br />“You still play much?”<br /><br />“Me? No, not really,” I said. “Maybe should get back into it.”<br /><br />“You should. Come by the house sometime. I’ll show you a thing or two.”<br /><br />“Like when?”<br /><br />“How ‘bout tomorrow?”<br /><br />“Sundays aren’t good. Sundays are bad.”<br /><br />“It’s not like it’s a commitment or anything. Just stop in for a couple hours. Learn something new for a change.”<br /><br />“You’re right. See ya then.”<br /><br />“Sunday,” she said, lowering her head.<br /><br />“OK. Sunday.”<br /><br />She slung a bag over her shoulder, picked up her bass case.<br /><br />I had had enough, was ready to leave. I was anticipating the ringing in my ears that would keep me up most of the night, among other things.<br /><br />The crowd had thinned out. I looked around for Paul but couldn’t spot him. Some of the guys from O’Malley’s Alley were hanging out off to one side of the stage, but that wasn’t my scene right now. <br /><br />I was standing there helplessly, repeating to myself “I got to get out of here,” when Sheila came up to me. I hadn’t seen her all night. The expression she was wearing, she looked about how I felt but not quite. I was starting to say something to her but barely got out two sentences as she took me by the arm and started leading me somewhere. “Come with me,” she was saying, “right now, just the two of us.” I didn’t know where we were going but her boyfriend Dan was nowhere in sight, and next thing I knew we were out the door and down the street. <br /><br />As we walked along I started to notice that others were following us, had joined us. I didn’t know where they were coming from. <br /><br />“Where are we going?”<br /><br />“Never mind that. Keep moving.”<br /><br />We made the steep climb out of the downtown and I realized we were headed for her house, a new place—she was always moving—I hadn’t been to yet. By now there was a line of people going back almost a block, some of whom I recognized from the show, and even more once we reached the top of the hill. We were surrounded by people, the streets filled with them all drinking and shouting and having a good time with it. Somewhere in the confusion I lost Sheila and was off on my own, another stranger in the crowd.<br /><br />I was at the center of something I couldn’t name. Something overtook me and I started back in the direction I came, away from everyone.<br /><br />I didn’t know where I was running to or why but it didn’t matter, and that was the point. <br /><br />Everything was like in a dream. The song “Where the Streets Have No Name” could be heard playing from somewhere, some invisible stereo, like a movie soundtrack. The downtown businesses passed by on my left and up ahead I could see another person, a girl, coming directly toward me, also running, her long hair flapping behind her like a frayed, cut-off cape. She got closer and closer. She was coming straight on with no sign of let up, her eyes fixed on something beyond me. She kept coming and coming, and I waited until she was within near breathing distance before stepping off the sidewalk onto the street to avoid crashing into her. She flew past and I hopped back up on the sidewalk, narrowly escaping another head-on collision, this with a street cleaner my attention had been drawn from. <br /><br />The streetlamps beamed down weak light. The night sky was black nothing. There were splotches of pink scattered along the cement, a regular pathway to nowhere. Nothing made sense and everything was as it should be. If life was like one of those mad Joyce novels I read my only year of college, this would be my divine moment. <br /><br />But then it was over before it happened.<br /><br />I cut left at the next block and found myself back at the hall where the show had been. In the parking lot, I slowed up, flushed and perspiring, bent forward with my hands on my legs above my shaking knees, trying to find my breath, regain some composure. <br /><br />A girl I knew from someplace and a friend of hers came up to me.<br /><br />“Hey, what are you doing? Surprised to see you here. Alone. Where’s Candi?”<br /><br />“I don’t know.”<br /><br />“Oh. Well what are you doing?”<br /><br />“I don’t know.”<br /><br />“We heard there was something going on up at Sheila’s.”<br /><br />“Yeah. There is. Something.”<br /><br />“I think that’s where we’re headed now. You want to come with? or you got other plans?”<br /><br />“No. I’ll go.”<br /><br />They started walking away and I pulled myself up, straight.<br /><br />“We can take my car.”<br /><br />“Are you sure? You alright?”<br /><br />“Yeah, I’m fine. Let’s go.”<br /><br />The car was around the other side of the building, in the middle of the lot, the only one there.<br /><br />“Your car’s not that nice,” said the girl’s friend.<br /><br />“Wait till you see the inside.”<br /><br />I took a needless turn on the way and ended up down an unfamiliar side street. I turned into the parking lot of a convenience store, meant to be a shortcut, but a semi appeared out of nowhere, blocking the far exit.<br /><br />“Watch out for the Handy Van!”<br /><br />“I see it. I see it.”<br /><br />I hit the brakes but the downhill slope we were on made them slow to respond and the eighteen-wheeler, seeing this, hooked it and managed an impossibly tight U-turn as we came to a stop barely a couple feet from it.<br /><br />Coming out of the parking lot I took the next right. I felt lost but knew we were close when I saw stragglers from earlier bumming around, and swung into an intersection. <br /><br />The first thing I caught side of was its sharp, wicked eyes flashing in the oncoming headlights like two small, concentrated candles burning in the night. Then the rest of its startled figure emerged, a sinister black statue in the street, and I stopped dead and turned my head to the passenger side in time to catch my divine moment shining at me, bright and perfect. And this time it wouldn’t pass me by.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-86912336096565688842009-02-27T17:49:00.000-08:002009-10-19T18:24:02.871-07:00The PatientWe took our seats at the back of the hospital’s lecture hall as they carted it in on a gurney, though what <em>it</em> was was as of yet not completely clear. It was hard to get a good look at it from my vantage point, concealed as it was behind a thin drawn curtain. What I could make out was but a shadowy outline, the general form of what appeared to be a rounded, semi-transparent case, possibly filled with a fluid of some kind, with something moving, that is to say, floating inside it. <br /><br />A whole slew of wires, presumably attached the case in some fashion, ran out from behind the curtain and connected up to a small machine positioned on a nearby table, resembling a portable radio with an elaborate, glowing interface, the small patch of light shining brilliant and profound in the darkly lit room. <br /><br />Out of the handful of lab coat-clad doctors and researchers standing before the small assembled crowd, one eager gentleman with a shock of white hair stepped forward. <br /><br />“Velcome, velcome, everyone. And thank you for joining us today on dis, a very special occasion. My name is Dr. Verloop, and I ‘ave the ‘umble privilege of presenting to you the latest advancement in consciousness preservation. This device behind me vich my colleagues an’ I ‘ave vorked tirelessly on, spending years perfecting, represents nutting less than a revolution in human consciousness as ve ‘ave come to undastand it.” <br /><br />Dr. Verloop used the platform to explain to those in attendance, many of whose faces were transfixed by the curious curtain behind him, how the mysterious machine functioned. <br /><br />He explained how it could maintain the brain’s vital functioning without the need of cumbersome flesh-and-blood encasing. Through the use of specially configured sensors that allowed it to receive incoming sound waves, it was able to then transmit those same sound waves back to the bodiless brain bobbing around safely in its new solid shell compartment. Once received—and this was the part he was most excited about, as indicated by his animated face, broad gestures and booming voice—a counter signal, generated from the electro-induced stimuli, would then be sent out, to create a response which the device could then convert into discernable speech, translated into any of hundreds of different languages. Taken together, this new device would in effect act as the free-standing brain’s ears and mouth. <br /><br />Some time after the presentation drew to a close, to a rousing ovation all round, I found myself seated in the hospital’s waiting room. With me from the event was a friend from school, a fellow Ph.D. candidate, and our Professor, who had brought us along at his urging, and had since spoken with one of the presenters and arranged for us a meeting, a face-to-face of sorts. A nurse soon appeared and escorted the three of us down a long corridor.<br /><br />Inside the room, a curtain was drawn around the bed, the device from the presentation arranged behind it in some unseen, undisturbed fashion. The only signs of life came from the voice that echoed through a nearby set of speakers. The voice spoke clearly and precisely in perfectly formulated sentences. Refined really. Its nuanced inflections and authorial tone were like that of a television or radio announcer, only without the self-conscious projecting to a large, generalized audience—to entertain, to capture, to draw in others with a conceited display of elevated oratory. It was a cold voice, computerized. But there was also the hint of something else, something that could almost be construed as human.<br /><br />My professor, a double Ph.D. in the field of philosophy and critical theory, began by conversing with the voice, engaging it in matters related to everything from history to linguistics to psychology to analytic philosophy. The voice never missed a beat, was there to meet all of his points and opinions with a quick, informed response, and, moreover, had its own share of original knowledge and ideas to impart.<br /><br />A nurse came in. She leaned in behind the curtain, making a few adjustments before sealing the curtains tight with a sharp flick of her wrist. She played around with a few settings on the machine next to the bed, and as quickly as she had appeared, was gone. <br /><br />Silence. <br /><br />I looked over at my friend and he looked back at me with an expression hard to read but insistent all the same. It was my turn to speak. Nervousness overtook me. I felt something I to this day cannot fully explain. Was it just nerves, being put on the spot like this, or something else entirely? I wish for the life of me I knew. <br /><br />Or maybe not. Maybe some things are better left unknown, left to operations beyond our honest comprehension. Cosmic strategies long ago put in place, since time immemorial. Who’s to say? Discretion is a tricky mistress. At the time, all I could do was work at a nonexistent itch behind my right ear.<br /><br />Sudden movement from behind the curtain. A shadow stretched up along the thin fabric and curved along the ceiling. But it was an empty shadow, indistinct; like it was waiting to be filled with something, given form.<br /><br />I addressed the voice finally, as best I could, in all my scattered incoherence. And it responded in turn. It responded automatically, without much in the way of forethought, its general language sinking back into the soft seas of complacence, the turtle receding into its shell. I pressed on, trying to coax it out, attempting with everything I had to generate some form of meaningful discourse. <br /><br />It was no use. The voice continued to respond but its pop was gone; the sense of intellectual curiosity it showed earlier had weakened, grown flat, bored. I kept on talking, trying to fill in the gaps, but it was all for naught. Like trying to resurrect the dead, hold up a crumbling structure, as if my words were the pillars supporting a collapsing expanse of impenetrable silence.<br /><br />I was growing desperate. My words spilled out carelessly like so many pieces of a jigsaw puzzle tossed out at random in preparation of the tedious task of being fitted together into a connected whole. What could be said to correct this, set things straight? Nothing seemed to make sense. I could feel the heat rise in my cheeks causing them to flush as I became acutely aware of the others, my friend and our Professor, in the room with me, the thoughts and judgements they were forming about my performance. My hurried speech, now verging on hysteria, careened forward, word upon word spit out with reckless abandon, toward some unforeseen end at which point—my hope held out in vain—all would be made clear, lucid. <br /><br />“But what is thought, insight, all the powers of the intellect at your disposal, what is its worth without, without experience. You are limited to yourself and yourself alone. Don’t you see? Without some connection to the world how can you measure your theories, go about implementing them into concrete reality? How can you even conceive of a concrete reality? How can anybody except to be in it, a part of it? This is the point where theory is put into practice, the theoretical measured against the actual. I ask of you now, how can you speak with such certainties about matters that only ever operate within your own mental self-conception? Every theory seems pure and infallible until it inevitably meets with the chaotic, murky waters of life. Life as it is lived not just imagined.”<br /><br />I cut myself off. Breathless, spent. It had all tumbled out of me at once, out of my control or reason, as if I had been overtaken by a force outside—or even inside—beyond myself. <br /><br />The room again fell silent.<br /><br />I waited for something, anything in the way of a response, from either my Professor or my friend or even the maddening figure behind the curtain. No one spoke. The shadow shrunk down from the ceiling like it had been dropped into a hole, a grave. The light from the machine's interface went off and the room was thrown into darkness.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-33762775962838026502009-02-19T22:47:00.000-08:002009-02-20T01:44:05.338-08:00RenovationsI am woken up by a group of musicians rehearsing in the next room. There are maybe four or five of them and they are jamming out Metallica songs. They are excited because James Hetfield is supposed to come over later. Other than that I don’t know what they are doing here. I am mad they woke me up. Their presence irritates me. I pass by them in a daze and shuffle upstairs. I am shocked to discover that all my stuff, furniture, books, everything, has been removed. The rooms are empty. The floor is covered in dirt and debris. There are extension cords and wires running down the hallway and through all the rooms. I’m confused. I go into the bathroom. While hanging it out I accidently knock a pile of hot wires into the toilet. They hit the water and come alive like pissed off electric eels. I drop the seat but don’t flush. I go back out into the hallway. My landlord is there. He is not happy about the loud music downstairs. Neither am I, I say, and tell him I’ll make sure they leave soon. He informs me he’s going to be doing some renovations. He is a licensed carpenter and plumber. He tells me the renovations will take four or five weeks, working on weekends, if they are diligent. <br /><br />I leave my apartment. I go to a movie with a friend I’ve known since we were ten. It’s been about six years since I’ve last spoken to this person. Something to do with a girl both of us liked. I was with her and he wanted to be, I guess, but wasn’t. In their MSN conversations he told her what a big loser I was. Later she printed off these conversations and showed them to me and I took them over to him. He denied having said anything despite the evidence to the contrary I held in my hands. This is what happens. The hazards of life. At the concession, instead of giant watered down sodas and buckets of gooey yellow popcorn they hand out cushions and pillows so we’ll be more comfortable. We take a few and go to our seats. The theatre is very small by average theatre standards. Cineplex’s they’re called now. Everything has gotten so big they now must be referred to as “plex.” Imagine going down to the Bowlingplex on a weeknight and tossing rock hard balls down one of the hundred-and-fifty slicked up hardwood lanes all running the length of a football field to a set of itty bitty pins that resemble a row of bleached white front teeth. Even though it’s a small theatre there are two screens playing two different movies at the same time. On one screen a movie is showing that stars Benicio del Toro as a charismatic political radical not Che Guevara. On the other screen is a comedy starring a chuiwawa or maybe Dane Cook, it’s hard to tell the difference. I’m not sure what part of the audience came to see which movie. After the movie we hang out for a while, then go get something to eat. We have a good time and agree to hang out again sometime soon. I am glad we are friends again.<br /><br />I go back to my apartment. As I approach my street I see that large crowds have gathered and traffic has been blocked off. Police have been brought in to keep things in order. The reason for the excitement is the Cohen Brothers are in town to direct my home renovations. To get in closer I decide to go undercover. I disguise myself as a telephone booth. I make my way through the people undetected. An officer waves me in, and I’m home. Inside, the renovations are complete. I go in and look around. The apartment has been drastically transformed. For one thing, the walls are red. There are more rooms then there used to be, all of them divided into snug little compartments designed in perfect geometrical dimensions. There is one room that is rectangular like a hallway only it doesn’t lead anywhere. A dead end. Also the floors are on a downward slope so that when you stand in the front hallway you have to brace yourself against the wall so you don’t fall forward. At first I am no at all happy with the new design. Then I slowly start to warm to it. It is a unique apartment, I think. Nobody else has one quite like this one. And besides that, I have a newly renovated apartment and am still paying the same rent as I used to, the Scottish part of my brain says. I tell my landlord I am happy with the changes, I will stay here. We shake hands. He leaves and I go upstairs into a large, perfectly squared room. All my furniture is back, including my bed and desk. I plug my phone in to charge it. I never got to meet the Cohen brothers.<br /><br />I’m in my new house. I have moved from my old apartment. I’m with a girl. She has dark hair and dark skin and blue eyes that are as big and inviting as her smile. I tell her, where I used to live I was close to the ocean and almost always alone. Now you’re in the middle of the city, she says, and surrounded by people. I know, I say. She smiles at me. I laugh for no reason. I look out the window at the rows of houses along the block and recognize some of the people outside. That night we will go inside some of those houses and drink and eat food and laugh for no reason.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-16147691182652440452009-02-09T21:05:00.000-08:002009-02-12T19:16:00.461-08:00This is a Poem, This is a PlaceThis is the door that opens wide<br />This is the hall that fills with light<br />This is the cat that paws the air<br />This is the child’s toys left strewn <br /><br />This is how birds announce the day<br />This is how sun breaks thru the clouds<br />This is how trees green in the yard<br />This is how flowers come to bloom<br /><br />This is the bed that sags and creaks<br />This is the tap that drips and leaks<br />This is the lamp that flickers off<br />This is the fridge door hung open <br /><br />This is how cracks form on the pane<br />This is how dust grows on the sill<br />This is how silence fills the dark<br />This is how clocks no longer toc<br /><br />This is a purpose without aim<br />This is a will without belief<br />This is a faith without passion<br />This is a mercy without love<br /><br />This is the street where blind men meet<br />This is the bridge where jumpers leap<br />This is the field where cold wind blows<br />This is the spot where lovers go<br /><br />This is a poem that slips from me<br />This is a heart that breaks for you<br />This is a day that runs and fades<br />This is a night I give to youJonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-36493563481606998712009-01-15T19:08:00.000-08:002009-01-15T19:09:55.783-08:00Winter PoemI trudge through the snow-packed streets,<br />grey steam pushing across the sky,<br />behind me a fresh path of feet.<br /><br />I open my mouth, try to eat<br />the flakes that circle like white flies;<br />I trudge through the snow-packed streets,<br />grey steam pushing across the sky,<br />in search of a small room with heat<br />where I can find a bed to lie<br />down and dream of the next time we meet;<br />I trudge through the snow-packed streets,<br />grey steam pushing across the sky,<br />behind me a fresh path of feet.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-47938914822182021422008-12-11T21:05:00.000-08:002008-12-11T21:29:14.498-08:00The FearWhat do you say to this face that you meet?<br />Eased in by simple smile, those dark, searching<br />eyes: how they pull you in, hypnotize. You<br />cannot, you must not, you don’t want to look <br />away…until they become too much, too much<br />to take; break through like frozen earth by a spade.<br /><br />Those eyes! Like the piercing laser light that<br />cuts right to the zero point, locked in, so <br />precise. Staring into the abyss, even <br />the abyss would open its darkened fist <br />and readily step into the warm glow<br />that shows like bright vapors on thawing snow.<br /><br />And suddenly it’s there, the moment that<br />you share. And everything seems so perfect,<br />so right, like the day’s first dawning light, that<br />pours through the windowpane and takes away <br />your sleep. A new day! As if born again. <br />The freshness is the essence that you crave.<br /><br />More than anything<br />More than nothing<br /><br />But time weighs like a rock, the ticking of<br />the clock. It can never last, always drifting <br />into the past. Hurrying to action, the <br />need for satisfaction, it becomes so <br />overwhelming! Maybe, just maybe, you’ll<br />take the leap, maybe something will strike, this<br /> <br />could be the time. But you hold back, why? What<br />is this fear that you hold so near? Why not<br />go for it, risk it—the leap—to land on<br />your feet? But weighing indecision and<br />there is the fear, threatening an early<br />night to fall, causing it all to disappear.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-51978492029497056642008-12-01T20:35:00.000-08:002008-12-07T22:18:03.170-08:00End of SummerI was quite drunk. Even by my own high tolerance standards. Stacy had just run off late to work, and as her sad lovely image receded into the night and the vague whispers of an all too familiar nostalgia mixed with an unnamed loneliness began to fill the chilly night air like the sifting plumes of smoke from the embers of a dying flame, I found my mind reeling, rushing to think of how to spend my last few hours in town, the last of the summer, as it were. What exactly did I still <em>need</em> to do? It didn’t take long to remember the first thing, and I turned, rounded the corner of The Pub, past the Bus Depot, and made the short strut down the block to the loft located above the fitness center. <br /><br />Once inside, having climbed the long winding creaky staircase, I was met with the familiar faces of Mike and Booney, who had wandered up there earlier from The Pub and were lounging in the living room with beers and some unknown program running on the small screen across from them. They were making little jokey comments between the action while Frank sat in his big relaxing chair holding court in his calm, stoic manner. There was also another guy there with them. I only vaguely recognized him at first but then very quickly, as my scattered mind began working the pieces of the past back together, realized it was an old friend from pre-high school days, a guitar player who I had played in some early bands with. Someone who I hadn’t seen or so much as spoken to in years, I was momentarily stupefied, having only briefly, in recent times, thought back to that period while writing the introduction to a short retrospective story before hitting the road in late June. Now here he was. We chatted briefly in the kind of excited, summarizing way that is customary for people long out of contact, as if trying to construct bridges over the ever-expanding waterways of time. <br /><br />This went on for a while and I became so could up in it that I almost forgot my original intention for going over there. And so when the program ended and the beers were finished and everybody was getting up to leave, I took Frank aside and in grave, earnest tones reiterated my regret over an episode that had taken place back on the night of his birthday when, in a moment of indecisiveness had allowed an unwelcome guest to crash his party, briefly, and make a whole big drunken scene. He coolly reassured me though that all was forgiven, laughing the whole thing off, along with the gravity I brought to the matter, and at that moment I had the palpable sense of a great weight being lifted. The rest of us made our way down to the street where I said my goodbyes to and continued my journey through the night.<br /><br />From there I stopped off at home, trying in stumbling, bumbling disorganized fashion to get the last of my things in order, until, noticing the lateness of the hour and my promise made earlier on to Raven to go over and make personal—in person that is—goodbyes to her before I left. How could I not?<br /><br />So back downtown I went. <br /><br />When I got to her house the place was dark and quiet. She was somewhere in the front of the house listening to music, waiting for my eventual arrival. I apologized for the lateness of my getting there and she seemed to silently forgive the jumpy, boozy state I was in, inviting me to partake in a late night vaporizer bag session. Once flopped out on the her way-too-comfortable couch in the patio, enjoying a couple clean, calming tokes and relaxed talk it didn’t take long for the adrenaline, the ceaseless energy I had been running on all day and the day before preparing everything in anticipation of my imminent departure, to give out, and within minutes, seemingly in mid-conversation, mid-sentence, I was out cold—<br /><br />The next thing I remember is waking on her leather couch in the living room, not knowing how I got there, a blanket spread out overtop me, and the sounds of random noises, movements, coming from the kitchen followed by the sound of Dino’s distinct drawl—which is not exactly the first thing you want to hear upon waking any day of the week, and only slightly less annoying then the distorted blare of my old junk alarm clock. I let out a groan, turned over on my side and thought for a moment of continuing on with my slumber. Then suddenly the reality of the day and the long journey I was to embark on dawned on me, and all at once I pulled my half-conscious carcass off the couch and made the first gestures towards making the day. <br /><br />It was as I was grimacing at the harried, beat mask glaring at me from the mirror next to the couch that Dino and his goofy hangdog mug appeared. I turned to face him with a sleepy, wearied grin.<br /><br />“I was hoping I’d catch you here,” he said. “Since you’re leaving today I came over before work just to check and see if you were still around so I could smoke you up before you left.”<br /><br />“Yeah, sure thing,” I said before retreating to the kitchen to pour out a tall glass of hang-over water to guzzle. <br /><br />On my way back to meet him in the patio I popped my head into Raven’s bedroom, having assumed she was still up after letting him in, only to discover she was back asleep, or at least half-asleep, and tried to delicately but insistently remind her that I’d be going soon and she should come join us for a last going away toke. She mumbled something like “Yeah, I’ll be right out,” and I slipped back to the patio where Dino already had a bag inflating. A few minutes passed and then a few more and Raven still hadn’t showed, and Dino finally decided to go ahead and start smoking without her. While he did this I glanced at my watch, thinking, in how many hours can I make it to Canmore? My concern over time given to the fact that I was informed by the proprietor of the Motel at which I had booked in advance (having been unable to find a single free room during the earlier drive out and forced to sleep outside in a park somewhere on the edge of Kamloops) was a 10 or 11 o’clock cut off time, with my chances of claiming my room any time after that substantially diminished. In other words, the sooner you get there the better. <br /><br />The bag is almost finished off by both of us by the time Raven had finally dragged herself into the room, all bundled up in blankets and heavy, downcast features. An argument of sorts unfolded over whose decision it was to not wait for Raven before smoking, with Dino saying over and over, “It was mutual. Come on. It was decided between the two of us,” and repeatedly nudging me with, “Hey back me up on this.” Incredulous, hurried and generally exhausted with the whole scene taking place before me, I stole away to the kitchen to start putting a big breakfast-on-the-fly together: eggs, toast, coffee, juice, the whole bit. <br /><br />It’s after cracking off a couple eggs in the frying pan with a crackling sizzle that there came a knock at the door. With a sudden jolt of surprise I nervously and uncertainly turned in the direction of the sound. Before long Raven was there informing me that it was her landlord come over for a check up of sorts and that I should go back and join Dino in the patio while she handles it. “But I’m cooking my eggs,” I said, holding the shells in my hand helplessly. <br /><br />“I don’t care,” she said. “Get back there. <em>Now</em>.” <br /><br />So I did, abandoning my half-cooked eggs in the process. Meanwhile, back at the patio, Dino was rushing around packaging up the vaporizer, brushing ash off everything, and conspicuously concealing all ashtrays from sight. “We’re not supposed to be smoking anything,” he said. “Pot or cigarettes.” <br /><br />I anxiously paced around the small patio, occasionally stretching myself out against the door to peer through the high small window to see if I could gauge the situation. About ten minutes later, after I’d settled down and it became clear he was not going to be coming in to do a survey of the house or whatever it is that landlord’s do when they “pop over,” Raven came back to tell us coast was clear. Back in the kitchen my eggs were burnt black and so I went about frying up a couple fresh ones. <br /><br />“Raven says sorry for ruining your eggs,” said Dino as he re-entered the kitchen. <br /><br />“Its fine,” I said, “I don’t really carry. I just don’t get why it’s such a big deal that other people were here. Since when is having friends over to visit a crime?”<br /> <br />He shrugged, put a cigarette between his lips and shuffled out of the room. <br /><br />When breakfast was all made up I went back to join them in the patio and ate hurriedly. <br /><br />“I got to go use your shower before I go to work,” said Dino.<br /><br />“What?”<br /><br />“There’s no hot water at my place,” Dino continued, “and I figured I could just as easily use your one downstairs. What’s the big deal?”<br /><br />Raven let out an exasperated sigh and relented. <br /><br />“You know,” I said once he had left, “if you don’t cut ties and make a clean break he’s always going to be around like this, always finding a reason, some excuse for stopping by.”<br /><br />“I know that,” she said, “but he, he’s so persistent. He refuses to take no for an answer. I tell him it’s over. I tell him over and over that he’s not getting anything more out of me, that there’s nothing left here, between us, but he just stares at me unbelieving. Like, ‘Kay, whatever.’ He just doesn’t get it.” <br /><br />She turned her head to one side looking out the window at something, perhaps at a low-flying bird, wings outspread, gliding by majestically, or perhaps at nothing, at something only she herself could see, and took a drag of her cigarette, serene, composed, as if it were a kind of meditative act from which she was able to gain a newfound mental resolve, strength.<br /><br />I didn’t know what else to say. There was nothing more to say. The time was up. The summer was over. The only thing left to do was hit the road and make my way back west. Weigh the gains against the losses, brood over the results, begin from scratch, rebuild, start all over again. <br /><br />While the shower ran downstairs, we said our goodbyes. Outside, in the bright light of day, I adjusted my eyes, turned with sad sullen smile and took one last look at her standing in the doorway at the far end of the hall, still clutching the blanket she had draped over her slender shoulders. And as I pulled the door shut and it snapped closed, her figure all but disappeared, vanished, and through the reflection in the glass I was left with only my weather-whipped face staring back at me.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-66814844897949359742008-11-26T23:06:00.000-08:002008-12-12T00:58:25.258-08:00All That Could've BynIt’s on reflective nights when so moved I <br />Sometimes think back to all those plans<br />We made, that toast to our future lives as<br />The day broke across the sky, and think,<br /><br />No more. The canvas is empty now;<br />Your brushstrokes no longer fill the<br />Page. And all your past works, <br />They’ve been put away.<br /><br />Was it a temperament you couldn’t control?<br />Or did sober days simply take their toll?<br />Who knows? But even though your life has<br />Changed I still wish it was different, somehow.<br /><br />If only it could all start over!<br />Act in a different way,<br />Step up above the fray,<br />Instead of let silence rue the day.<br /><br />Not so. But though dreams may be dashed,<br />Thrown aside like life’s discarded trash,<br />You’ve found your true destination:<br />Your very own Haven. A child of your own.<br /><br />She is your art, your masterpiece—<br />The saving grace I could never be.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-8735769527046046462008-11-17T20:35:00.001-08:002008-12-11T21:33:26.495-08:00KerouacThe road was long, the road was full.<br />Loaded rucksack on your back and <br />Thumb pointed north, you bummed your way <br />Across the country back and forth. <br />Down to Mexico and Old Bull,<br />Chasing visions of love down old<br />Dream sidestreets, fish markets, brothels,<br />Scribbling in notebooks tales of trips<br /><br />With N.C., of morphine queens, by<br />Candlelight on rooftops of piss<br />Rank junkie hovels. And then the <br />Return to the States, spending days<br />Banging away at that big black <br />Underwood, during those weeklong<br />Coffee-fuelled sessions, onto<br />Scotch-taped teletype rolls stretching<br /><br />Hundred miles, spring of ’51, <br />In downtown apartment, you and <br />Joan, her quietly expecting, <br />Soon to be left there, abandoned. <br />Restless, you fled to the West Coast <br />To seek out salvation with mad <br />Dharma poets. Trying to find<br />Mind Essence at the bottom of<br /><br />Wine bottles, instead found yourself<br />Alone, frustrated, staring at <br />Fir trees and snowy peaks atop <br />Desolation. It suddenly<br />Struck you, mourning the hut mouse you<br />Killed out of fear, learning of death<br />For the first time, truly knowing<br />You could never bring back the years.<br /><br />(Driven by the need for constant <br />Movement, the desire to make it,<br />To break free of convention and<br />Attain starry-eyed connection;<br />Taste, savour the rich exotic<br />Flavours of reality, to <br />Go go go, burning out of sight<br />With the electric fiery night.)<br /><br />To Tangiers, Morocco, Paris<br />And Madrid, it was in New York<br />With Joyce, fall of ’57, <br />When you finally hit it big.<br />Month-long celebration ensued,<br />What proved both your ascent and your<br />Doom, singling the end of youth<br />Beat down, howling for a lost moon.<br /><br />In that cabin at Big Sur, three <br />Years on, paranoid, hung-up, your <br />Mind snapped, way gone. Wanting to<br />Run away, hide, you retired <br />On the fly to Florida sun <br />And sky. Beloved Memere and<br />Third wife there, watched as, bitter and <br />Broke, soul-dry and empty as the <br /><br />Steady succession of bottles <br />Of scotch that lined the walls of your<br />Study, you bashed out another<br />Batch of slapdash manuscripts, <br />Blew and told all, in a last sad <br />Dash towards immortality. <br />Sporadic interviews, aired for<br />The world, all but confirmed what the<br /><br />Critics said: He’s washed up, done in,<br />Finished, a hack, nothing left but<br />Bloated imitation, poor cat. <br />But you knew what was coming, first <br />Neal now you; last letter to <br />Nephew little Paul, it said it <br />All. Sign it away, the papers, <br />The house, and most of all the fame.<br /><br />But what if that wasn’t the last? <br />What if, like Neal, you too grew a<br />Beard, changed your name, disappeared to<br />Some far off place in Spain, living<br />Out your eternity writing <br />Long buoyant letters to Memere <br />With hardly a care—and breathing<br />In sweetly the fresh morning air.Jonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7555999323952390164.post-87120878430984986662008-11-14T14:01:00.000-08:002009-03-05T22:23:28.039-08:00Bright Moon Sings the Blues"Hope, love, create, or drink and die:<br />These shape the creature that is I."<br />—Theodore Roethke, <em>Long Live the Weeds</em><br /><br />Pour another drink, get<br />up out of your seat, the night<br />Begins to hit on that perfect smoky beat.<br /><br />No calls coming in, disconnected,<br />But that’s OK.<br />Who needs phone love anyway?<br /><br />I communicate with the dark.<br />She is my mistress, the black<br />Robed lady who haunts my desirous heart.<br /><br />Through her I speak my words<br />In voiceless nervous utterance,<br />And so lift my spirit and heart, up and up and up.<br /><br /><strong>November</strong><br /><br />Cool November is here,<br />A cold without despair.<br />It is the safe turning in<br />From a world grown gray.<br /><br />It is the hiding away,<br />So why complain?<br />Make your own world<br />Out of the inner, where it’s at.<br /><br />For who wants summer<br />All year? The green and blue<br />And yellow, ripe, immodest, grows dull. <br />In its own way it is false, unreal, why stay?<br /><br />The colors of fall<br />Work on the senses a different<br />Way. Alive, they are nevermore to fade.<br />Perceptions grow out and fly off into a breeze,<br /><br />The chill that carries<br />Along our silent dreams<br />To be frozen, sealed, locked,<br />In the coming winter months.<br /><br /><strong>Living</strong><br /><br />It is nothing really.<br />The waste. I heard<br />My mother once say<br />That all days are sacred<br /><br />But every morning<br />I rise in good faith<br />Knowing milk not sour<br />Cereal no expired play-doh smell<br /><br />And I shower in hot water<br />As hot as I can get it<br />And play my music with feeling<br />And spread mustard on sandwich<br /><br />And when I meet the world<br />I know that what waits for me<br />Is the same as before and<br />When I end it will still go on<br /><br />Just as before. <br /><br /><strong>What flut?!</strong><br /><br />Whizz chiff sneeze<br />The monkey calls to thee<br />Eek, creak, boheez stiffy<br />Sucking knocka cheese<br /><br />Eep cheep the sunken drunken<br />Lunk nut thar breakin the whomp bat<br />Choking on hibernating bearskin<br />In shoop shop hastin case made lacin.<br /><br /><strong>Drilling</strong><br /><br />Conservative dentist drilling<br />Tar-stained molar. This will<br />Hurt and you cry out MERCY!<br />Hits you quick a shotta gas<br /><br />There it is, the GOOD stuff.<br />Start to go under…this aint<br />So bad. Crazy cast iron dragon<br />Shield, protector of Morheed<br /><br />Mountains, where Princess Anapas<br />Awaits your return with shining eyes<br />And long golden hair. Fight against<br />Sprays of winged beast flames and climb<br /><br />Scaly flesh to get at the heart flap<br />That proves Achilles heal even to<br />Such a mighty creature. Pull back, swing<br />Penetrate thru that thick skin, digging in<br /><br />With hard thrusting side to side till he done in.<br />Triumphant, make your way back<br />To castle atop mountain where princess<br />Show the gentle touch to your ache and tender.<br /><br />Jam and grind in that last tooth-capping <br />Snap and suddenly you come to,<br />The victory in vain and nowhere to go<br />But the car for joint with numb gum painless pain.<br /><br /><strong>Fruit Tree</strong><br /><br />In dreams I eat from your fruit tree<br />And bite in, bite after succulent bite,<br />Sweet to savour, cupped in hand, to <br />Chew down to core and still want more.<br /><br /><strong>Shining Music Gold</strong><br /><br />"Bright moments is like<br />Making love to a moonbeam." <br /><br />Yeah, yeah, make it with that swirling beat.<br />Play that flute, toss off the weight.<br />Blow! Blow! Awake the heavens—<br />Magic comes alive like gold dust<br /><br />In the energy of the stage light<br />That beams down on sweating<br />Brow. Work it. Swinging, hip,<br />All for the nighthawk crowds, appreciative, elate.<br /><br />Fancy fingers, puffy cheeks, spitting lips<br />Whip smack and beat behind cool<br />Black eyes that see beyond the hall<br />Into the deep halls of eternity, yes right!<br /><br />Mr. I Don’t Need Me No Label,<br />I got the soul to burst the sad <br />Swollen world of woe that cries<br />Tears of CO2 gases and black smog, pitiless.<br /><br />Our love is pure and will carry<br />Us on this cascading wave to a <br />Place without shame and decay<br />That will reach out and touch the sun’s rays.<br /><br />Hurray! Hurray! We all make love today!<br /><br /><strong>This House</strong><br /><br />In this house I give myself.<br />In this house I give to you.<br />In this house I ask myself<br />What do I mean to you?<br /><br /><strong>Please Don’t…</strong><br /><br />Please don’t say no, I know<br />Nowhere else to go.<br />Please don’t give me cold shoulder<br />I have no shoulder to cry on.<br />Please don’t put on coat and go<br />I have black roses to give as show.<br />Please don’t fight with the landlord<br />It is the Lord’s land that we share.<br />Please don’t hate what maybe, really<br />Was, could have been fate.<br />Please. No? Why not wait and stay.<br />Give it a chance, just one more day.<br /><br /><strong>The Other Tenants</strong><br /><br />Why do they do that, every night?<br />Leaving on the hallway light only<br />After final load of laundry complete.<br />I used to go out there, walk the length,<br /><br />And turn it off before bed or click it off <br />When coming in for the night. But now I <br />Cease caring, let it shine in thru crack <br />Between door bottom and floor and wonder<br /><br />What bugaboo they so scared of that comes<br />Creeping in the dark night hallway and eats<br />The mothballs and hides in the furnace vents but<br />When push comes to shove is terrified of harmless florescent light.<br /><br /><strong>I Got a Love for You Blues</strong><br /><br />I got a love for you yes I do yes I do<br />I got a love for you yes it’s true yes it’s true<br /><br />I got a love for you that runs laps round the equator<br />I got a love for you that towers over the space needle<br />I got a love for you that shines brighter than starry nights<br />I got a love for you that cut left and right down diverging paths<br /><br />I got a love for you that sings with the heavenly minstrel<br />I got a love for you that does handstands across the Atlantic<br />I got a love for you that turns snake’s poison to ointment<br />I got a love for you that tamed the snarling hounds of hell<br /><br />I got a love for you that laughs at the secrets of the universe<br />I got a love for you that saw death coming and did not turn and shudder<br />I got a love for you that dug to the earth’s core and came out shivering<br />I got a love for you that made even Buddha jealous<br /><br />I got a love for you that out-blew Miles Kirk Dizzy Trane Coleman Bird Dolphy Young<br />I got a love for you that out-blues’d Blind Howlin’ Muddy Son Elmore B.B. Bo Johnson<br /><br />I got a love for you that ate the sun and came back for seconds<br />I got a love for you that drank up the oceans and was still thirsty<br />I got a love for you that kissed the angel’s virgin lips divine<br />I got a love for you that sealed shut the continental divide<br /><br />I got a love for you that beat back the furious winds of the South<br />I got a love for you that fed the starving countries of Africa<br />I got a love for you that emancipated the Chinese people of China<br />I got a love for you that brought democracy to Mother Russia<br /><br />I got a love for you that rewrote the holy scripture<br />I got a love for you that never thought twice<br />I got a love for you that danced and danced with the night<br />I got a love for you that is forever<br /><br />I got a love for you that they all want <br />All of them, my love, except for you<br /><br /><strong>She Don’t Know Me Blues</strong><br /><br />My baby says she knows me<br />But she hasn’t got a clue<br />Came to get me after work<br />And went home with the boss, it’s true<br /><br />No she don’t know me<br />She never has<br />Said she would make it up to me<br />I’m still waitin’ for her come back<br /><br />If my baby was an island <br />She’d be out in the middle of the sea<br />I’d swim all the way to be with her<br />And then she’d sink away from me<br /><br />My baby says she know me <br />We go out about the town<br />But when the night’s over <br />She ain’t nowhere to be found<br /><br />My baby she says she knows me<br />I ain’t got me no doubts<br />Except for the other guy she’s livin’ with<br />I’m the only game in town<br /><br />No she don’t know me<br />She never has<br />Told her that I loved her<br />She said that’s a bunch of jazzJonny Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15543086275377260927noreply@blogger.com0