Road to Nashville 

I think the worst thing a person can lose is themselves. But haven’t I said that before? 

It’s all so very confusing now. How long was I on this road? How far gone from any semblance of who I was? My life was scattered to the roadside. Really it had been buried with her. As I wanted it to be. I was like those wailing widows crying atop a coffin. Pleading to God to take them too. I made that wish too but with less spectacle.

 But maybe not. Maybe this was who I was all along. The real me. The one waiting to break free when my love was taken from me. The person I was before she came into my life. I was known for my downward spirals before her. My benders too. Maybe I hadn’t lost something but found it again. Revealed it with pain, like a crucible. The grief made it stronger. I always had these powers, half awake dreams, in tune with the world under shadows. I was finally going down this road and seeing it through. Discovering so much more everyday. 

Maybe she was my tether and I would have killed myself a long time ago without the distraction of her. God, isn’t everything worth interest just a distraction from the end. 

A brief breath that eases the fear away. 

That hides it. Isn’t love the strongest one there is? The most distracting thing? Old lovers could live 50 years and it still wouldn’t feel enough. They’d die of a broken heart after one of them passes. 

I get that now. 

I remember before her I was going to go to Alaska and fish for the summer. I had this idea that I'd work in a cannery and save my money. In the winter I’d rent a small cabin outside Juneau. Drink beers till the snow melted. It had to be cheap right? That would make me happy, wouldn’t it? That would be the change I needed. Get me out of my own head and out of my depression and anxiety and panic attacks from the things I’d feel.

But then she came into my life and loved me. 

How can you love someone so rawly? So unafraid to be hurt? It's a bastard thing to do. A world-changing thing to throw at someone. It’s so unfair to me to be loved, and held, and talked with till the morning hours. There might be an iota of resentment now because of it. She didn’t know what she gave me, and I didn’t know what I would lose. But then… At that time, I felt like I had found out what living was for. Like the road before me opened up with the sun spread across her ridge. Where dusk is a dream and the day is never done. I followed her signs and never strayed from the broken dashes along the roads like heartbeats. The power lines on either side held me close. Their arms outstretched like hers after a hard day's work. ‘Come to me’ They echoed her words. Each one after the next, one always farther away, calling to me. Full of lightning life in their embrace. Like hers was.  

What a great distraction. What a beautiful respite. It’s a journey that is truly more important. It’s the trip you must pay attention to. I know the saying is true. And that's how love works as well. No matter how short or long you feel it. It turns this long trip into a sight to behold. And the road is long and rough and dangerous in many places if you gander too much. Or find yourself thinking about how every road in this country is connected. They go round and round a thousand times. Circling each other. Entombed by themselves. Like how a caterpillar falls apart in its cocoon and into itself to become a butterfly. There is only one stretch of asphalt in this country, and if you think that is a beautiful notion, you would be right and you would be wrong. Because if you follow that road long enough, in the million concoctions of turns, you’d eventually come to where it ends. 

My life was a long meandering road with turns I’d never thought I'd take. It brings me to now. It took my breath away. It really did. The size and breadth of it were awe inspiring. It was all around me, a reflection, through the plains and misty mornings, winding up mountains and across trickling streams. I looked at my life in the rockface, her smile in the willows. I was thankful for everything else but I wasn’t thankful for the pain; only a fool would say such things. The scorched roadkill, the shades amongst the burnt bark of trees. It was all fleeting and a struggle, immaculate and ugly. Does life hold some intrinsic value? It’s just mold on thrown out bread. Things make little sense when under the scope. It’s a lie that abuse made things better somehow. 

No, no, puzzling about those things didn’t matter anymore. I was going to the end now, I knew. In a place where the power line prophets were ushering me too. They no longer held her touch. They were cold as cactus. Waving me onward, to find where they no longer held the landscape captive, where the road was beaten and dimpled. Where it became not a road or path at all. The end. The true end.

I’d meet him there.

I’d feel my truest self there, and see if I was brave enough to end a life. Without her here to blind me, I think I could.

I know I can.

Without her here to stop me…

What if she could come back? 

~

I was outside of Nashville. The farthest East I had ever been in my life. 

“What you thinking about?” Chewy asked. I was having a hard time getting over the way his lips moved when he talked. Or his accent. So deep but still so posh. I was nervously rolling the leather wrapped charm around in one hand, steering with the other. 

“Hmm,” I clicked my haggard eyes back to the road. They kept wandering. Looking at things that weren’t really there. Looking at the wires hanging between the towers on the side of the road. Really they were focusing on my thoughts. Rattling around my head. “I’m just looking out there.” I pointed a finger over the steering wheel to the side of the road. “Zoning out,” I added.

Chewy crawled across my lap. His legs propped up on the door handle. One toe nail rolled down the window slightly so he could stick his nose out. He shouted back at me over the wind whipping into the car all of a sudden. “I like to look out the window too! Sometimes you can find a postman lingering in the woods!” He barked. 

“Okay, okay.” I grabbed his collar and pushed him back to the passenger seat. 

“Mailmen aren’t lurking everywhere, you know.” I rolled up the window and hoped it worked. Surprisingly there was no grinding and breaking noise. Strange. 

“The good ones are,” was his retort. He went back to looking out the front window. Happy in his role as co-captain.

I rolled the window down and up a couple more times. “Hmm I thought this window was all fucked up? Must have fixed itself.”

“It is working because it never broke. It’s just not your exact same car.” He still stared out the window.

“What’s that mean? This isn’t my car? It had all my stuff in it. And it had that same hole in the back.”

He shook his head and tsked to himself. “No, It is your car. It’s just not your exact car.”

I looked at him a couple times. “What does that mean? You can’t just sit there and not explain.” 

He rolled his eyes. “Look it's really not all that important. I can hardly even really explain it. I mean I could but I might be wasting my time explaining it to you.” 

“Okay, that's a shitty way to put it.” I scoffed. He was so rude for a dog I raised from the bottle. 

Pups should respect their elders. 

He snickered. “Look, let's just get to Nashville, take me for a walk, I'll get some attention from some ladies, then I can sniff out this Tim guy, you avenge the dead wife, we are back in Phoenix by the time the asphalt doesn’t burn these little paws.” He smiled. “Where would you wanna start? In Nashville?”

“Well he was all over bourbon street in New Orleans, He is probably in a popular area. Maybe a little dive bar off the beaten path? We could find some less fortunates that might know of his nefarious moves.” I was picturing him hanging out in a smoky bar. Whispering to little ladies in his big white cowboy hat. Offering… well, I didn’t rightly know. In truth, I hardly knew why he was hauling ass across the country. Just that he was a businessman dealing in underworld affairs. Supernatural stuff. 

Chewy panted and nodded. “I like that, somewhere popular means lots of attention!”

I side-eyed him and that made him grow more serious.“And of course, the better chance of finding Tim’s smell on folks. That’s why we are going to Nashville! I haven’t forgotten, don’t worry.”

“I mean, don’t you wanna find Tim too? Don’t you want revenge?” I asked.

He shrugged. “What I want is a little more nuanced. My kind are a little more sophisticated and complex. I want to help you though, of course.” 

“Sophisticated! You’d smell butts all day if you could!” I felt the car slowing down, my foot off the pedal as I exclaimed. “I thought you were so gun-hoe at the start of all this. Back in Phoenix?” His tail dropped as he grew deadpanned.

“What? I said I’m excited to be a part of this and back then I was really excited to go on a road trip with just the two of us!” He was silent for a second. I could tell he wasn’t done. “But, I think you might have been projecting a bit at the start of things. Don’t you? Putting emotions and motive on a dog who couldn’t speak yet… Don’t you think that’s kind of... crazy?” He smiled, ears back. 

I had to look away from him. I almost felt betrayed. “You loved her right?” I said plainly. Firmly.

“Oh man I did,” He smiled a sad smile as he put his head down on top of his front paws. “I love anyone who loves me back, that’s how we do things from where I’m from. Everyone has flaws, you forget that when you work yourself up. When you withdraw.” He nodded to me. “She could love, hard, you know?” He raised his eyebrows. “Almost aggressively. You know sometimes I feel like she almost held it over you in particular. Beat you over the head with it. Used it like a bludgeon. She knew how much she meant to you.”

 “Where you are from?” I guffawed. “I raised you since you were this size.” I held out my hand. “When I first found you I could hold you entirely in this hand.” I turned it over and placed it on his head. Giving him a scratch behind the ears. He wagged his tail and the tension in the car rose and was siphoned away out the cracked windows. I thought about his other words. “Perfect. I don’t even know what that word means.” I sighed. “Memories aren’t perfect, but they are all we ever get. Just a series of fading film that winds down to the end. That’s what life is.” 

We were silent for a while as the car picked back up to the speed limit. 

“You’re scared I would trade my life for hers?” I asked. 

He nodded but couldn’t make eye contact. 

“Hmm.” 

He knows me as much as I know him. Smart dog. 

I smiled, changing the subject. “You’re just holding a grudge because she wouldn’t let you on the bed.” 

“I was replaced!” He exclaimed. He clapped his jaw tight and turned in a circle. “And those costumes she would make me wear. I hate the water and she made me dress up as a sailor! The audacity!” I laughed at his tirade as he went through the entire list of halloween costumes he had to endure. Calling it ‘degrading’. Finally when he settled down I focused his attention. 

“Alight. Now. Please tell me how this is and isn’t my car. Just what the hell is going on?”

He laughed that Hyena laugh of his and my skin prickled. He knew me well but he knew everything else better than well, I could see the glint of that fact in his eyes. “Okay,” He replied. “I’ll do my best.” 

~

You huff a little paint thinner and what’s hidden in this world becomes crystal clear.

But then your dog starts talking and muddles it up again.

He told me about different dimensions and how we had actually been crossing through them. Well. Not really different dimensions but parallel ones. He said I had this power for a long time but now we were fully using it. The road we were driving on were gateways. Not only did they lead to different places across land. But across realities as well. Each turn we took, each exit, things were changing. We were entering into new worlds. Worlds that were slightly different. 

I know it was mental. But thinking back to even the start, I had noticed things. I remember growing up and things being different. Small things. Like that book series I read growing up. They were called the Berenstein Bears. I remember it clearly, going over each letter to decipher their names. Beren-Stein. But, in a bookstore as a twenty something I saw it was actually spelled Berenstain! With an A not an E! I knew that was wrong! 

Chewy nodded at all of this. 

“And Mr. Crock who lived next door?” I asked. 

“Yep, he was there in one world and the Reynolds lived next door in the other.” 

“God my parents were so confused when I told them I met the new neighbor. They thought it was an imaginary friend the whole time. They wouldn’t listen to me.” I slapped the steering wheel with vindication. “Then they thought he was some creep coming round. I was so confused. And. And. And…” I snapped. “The Louisiana Superdome!”

He nodded. “In our timeline it was called… what was it called?” He asked.

“It was Mercedes Benz Superdome. They changed it a decade ago I think.” I responded.

“Right.” He said. “Little things like that! You see there is a plethora of worlds that are so similar to ours. Just small changes to them. There are actually infinite worlds all in different dimensions. I'm sure there are worlds where Dolphins are the ruling species. Or worlds where America doesn’t exist.”

“Holy shit Chewy.” I said astonished

“I know. This is why I didn’t wanna tell you. Didn’t wanna freak you out. It’s the reason things have been more and more strange. You. You are special. Always have been. You can see flashes of these other worlds. See where things get thin. Those men in the suits. They exist between all worlds. They are supposed to stop us. Like a dimensional police force.”

“That explains why they wearing their sunglasses at night. All mysterious like...”

“Yeah,” He said excitedly. “Wait, actually. I don’t see the correlation.”

“Why can I see this shit? Why can I cross into it?”

“I don’t know why you can. And if anything it’s more accidental. You haven’t even realized that you have been doing it! You just willy nilly exit and cross into a world where Obama is on the fifty dollar bill. Then you enter a doorway where on the other side things are normal but Norman Rockwell was named Theobald and he painted smut.”

Things were clicking for me. All the stress on me, all the hurt. I thought I was slipping into mania like before. It was comforting to know I wasn’t, I was just a dimensional traveler instead. Of course. It explains how I would walk into new places without an understanding of how I got there. How I could hear things. See people who weren’t there. Ghosts. Were these people just echoes? Were they glimpses into a world where I had come from or where I was heading? People able to warn me like Zeke? I talked to him and he ushered me on. To him he must have been dreaming or imagined talking to a ghost. But it was just a world where Tim hadn’t got him yet. 

I could use this. If only I could control it. I couldn’t try and hide it away like I had in my younger years. Covering it up with substances and pushing it down beneath my psyche. It might leave me more haggard but that didn’t matter anymore. 

Chewy explained more. “Madame Lyra told me to bring you to your car. But unfortunately the wheels were stolen off of it and it was in a tow yard. So I sniffed out a path that would lead us to another one. Still your car. But one we could use. It was an alleyway that was all blurry and after crossing you threw up. But in the world we entered the car was here and its window worked fine and there was still that hole behind the seat with the stuffing coming out.”

“Does that mean I was also there? I mean another me? Did I steal my own car?” The thought of facing myself did not excite me. It was a reflection I didn’t wanna see.

“Maybe.” He shrugged. “Maybe you were in New Orleans drinking your troubles away. Maybe you had sold your car to a Louisiana man. I don’t know why it was there. I can tell you it was. And we took it.” He smiled and wagged his tail.

“Well you did good Chewy.” I rewarded him with a pat on the head. 

“Well that means she is here!” My breath caught in my throat. “Can you find a world where I died and she…”

He looked sullen and shook his head. “No. She’s gone. That’s the lynchpin. It’s the connecting force between all these worlds. You see, before you were just catching glimpses. Looking through windows. Now, we can only cross over into worlds that have a connecting line. An event that tags them as the same, one that tore your psyche apart. This car has the same hole that your nephew dug into it. That’s what links them. Each world needs something holding them together or we would be ending up in some really strange places. Like dolphin world. If it was someone else with this ability it might be something else entirely. Like for example all the worlds have to have their favorite oak tree to pee on in it cause their roots connect across planes. But your grief is so strong. She’s the connection here. Her death is. She’s dead in all the worlds. I’m sorry buddy.”

“That’s why it feels like she's following me. Like every turn we take it still feels so empty. God. that’s a bummer.” I bit my lip. “Tim.” I said. “He’s in all these worlds too?”

“I think he is. I don’t know if he’s shifting into them like we are. Or if he’s in all of them aware of what’s going on. I’m not sure. He is a weird force. I can’t get a smell on him that makes sense.” His ears fell back. “He’s scary. He’s dangerous. I know that. But we can handle him. Together.”

I nodded and smiled. “We will.”

I thought for a moment. Letting the fact that my wife was dead in all the places I could go. What a racket. What good are superpowers if they don’t let you be happy? “Which universe, or well, dimension is the real one? Our original one I guess?”

“Hmm. I think those days are far behind us. I don't think I could track our way back after all the roads we’ve taken. You are gonna have to get used to where we are going. But don’t worry they are similar enough it won’t make much of a difference.”

“But there's gotta be one basic world. One where everything is in the right place?”

“No there doesn’t.” He took a deep breath. “They are all different and they are all right. Just because they exist out there in places you can’t see doesn’t mean they are any less than the one you have beneath your feet. Hell, there is a world exactly like one you can imagine. Whatever you could think up, it probably exists. You’re only able to enter in with a pathmaker like yourself. I mean what's bigger than billions?” He thought. “Chillions of combinations. Anything you can think of! They are all out there. In your head. You need to let go of this one simple little belief.” He got close and wide eyed. I imagined him tapping my temple with his paw. 

“Just because you can’t perceive it doesn’t mean it’s not real. It’s as real as shit on your shoe, you just can’t smell it yet. You can’t smell half the things I do. I can’t see half the spectrum you can. We are just scraping the surface too. One little portion of the world that we show ourselves. And now we can cross into different spectrums. Not all of them. But one small iota that your heartbreak was strong enough to carve out. There are frequencies man. Frequencies across all this space and time mumbo jumbo that we can’t even pick up. We don’t have the tuner. It’s all happening. All around us. Every option we’ve ever had spilled out among the cosmos echoing over and over again. Passing through us. Taking and completing bits of our beings at all times. Weird stuff.” He was done and seemed happy enough about his enlightening moment. He saw I was not so excited. “But it’s not so weird. You shouldn't worry about it.” He added.

“What? How can you say that? It's awesome I mean… It’s cool. But… Now I'm kinda scared.” I swallowed, still stunned. Not even realizing I was ten miles under the speed limit now. The cars passing by were very far away from my headspace.

“I mean you can only pick up and do so much. Just try and do that well. It’s the only thing that matters really. You and how you interact with the world around you. Whatever that world is. That’s yours. Pick what’s real to you as long as it helps you. You’ll be fine.” He sniffed the air. “Oooh. This is a great example of that!  Get off on this exit!” He shouted. 

“What?” I looked at the exit sign that said Spring Hill. “This is still outside Nashville by like twenty nine miles.”

“Do it! Trust me!” He hopped down and was digging at something under the seat. Tail wagging with his butt up into the air.

“Okay!” I said as I accelerated and overtook the car on my right who honked at me. I swerved across another lane and found myself passing under the exit sign. As we passed under the shadow I felt lethargic all of the sudden. A wave of worry hit me and my head pounded. Like that flashbang went off again. 

God, I could down a whole bottle of Tylenol. 

Hopefully I forget that fiasco in the next world. 

After slowing down a second to yield onto a side street everything caught back up. The pain bounced away and weariness and changing shadows took their place. I was sitting at a stop light with three cars honking at me to go. I swear I had been looking left abiding by the yield sign for merging traffic. Now it was a green arrow screaming at me to turn right. I followed just before it turned yellow. I got a couple honks for such a delayed reaction. 

“Woah. Chewy I think it just happened.” I said. 

“Yeah now roll down the window!” He said excitedly. 

I did so as one car that was honking and breezing past me rolled down their window and a half eaten slim jim flew into our backseat. It was accelerating off and swerving in front of me, a tattooed hand flipped me off through the blacked out window of the oldsmobile.  

“What the hell was that…”

 Chewy already had the long piece of red wrapper in his mouth and was chewing. “I couldn’t resist. It smelled so tasty even passing through all that time and space hubbub. Makes it even tastier I think.”

“So we just did it? And that was… that was?”

“That was where the slim jim always lands. Now you get it. Good lad, now you understand.” He finished eating. “Splendid, that was divine. Your wife is still dead though, the beefstick was the difference.” He pushed the greasy wrapper off the seat. “Oh, sorry did you want any? I should have asked.”

“No. I hate beef sticks.” I had eaten too many on a road trip as a kid and threw up for eight hours. Wouldn’t touch them now. Which made it all the more surprising when he pulled one out of my car. Well, I guess not really my car. 

He laughed. “Well I'm thankful some people like them.” He licked his lips. “How did it feel crossing?”

I squinted as I took a frontage road to get near the city proper. “Not terrible. Like I just ate some bad mushrooms. Or took a shot of hot whiskey.” 

“See. You can see now why you wouldn't quite notice it all the time.” He pointed out. And he was right, I was prone to all sort of weird pinches and body aches and migraines. Always had been. 

“Yeah I just thought it was bad acid reflux back in the day.” I pressed on my stomach and burped. 

“Yeah well you have that too. Don’t confuse them with each other. Sleep apnea too. You should probably lose some weight.”