Sidney I

Imagine having your person squashed down so thin. Like you are a smashed fly. Like you are a black smudge of gum on the sidewalk. Then being scraped off and re-sculpted into a disgusting caricature of yourself. Not a fun one you get done at a theme bark. A blackened smashed, mini of yourself. That's how I felt. 

It wasn’t especially painful. But disorienting and empty. When I regained control of myself I found myself safe in my dying Subaru hatchback, Chewy rolled over on his back snoring in the back seat. The world around me was flat and painted with shrubs. We were among rolling hills of dead grass and a highway that cut inbetween it. I was off on the shoulder of said highway. I waved away the smoke that was drifting in through my rolled down windows. It was obvious where it came from. The hood of the car was up against a wood power line pole. I popped open the door and dragged myself around to inspect it. I see, the car was wedged up against it and had dented and knocked off the bumper as well as broken something loose in the screaming engine. 

I took the keys out before the whole engine caught flame and dropped the keys in my pocket. 

“What the fuck.” I said. 

Chewy stirred and hopped through the window. He pissed on the pole. “Well.” He stated. “Don’t have to worry about the car dying,” His leg was still up and his pissed pooled at the weeds at the base. “You killed her.”

“This was a moon rover.” I said. Chewy’s blank look was enough to realize we were not on the same page. 

“Do you want me to say something to that?” He asked. “Is this like a road trip game?” He looked around. “This pole is an igloo. That rock is a bird. Am I doing it right?”

I ignored him. I had faint recollections of playing roulette. And when I counted my bills stuffed in my wallet I found I had done pretty well. Over two thousand dollars in hundreds and twenties. I plopped down. Exhausted. My twisting and turning world was making me woozy. I couldn't trust what I was seeing, where I was. Was I really that fucked up? Did I need to be medicated? How could I trust my stomach to keep down food if I couldn’t trust my own reality? 

“You look sick,” Chewy said. “Those doorways really have you messed up. And that shit you were sniffing all night probably didn’t help.”

What stuff? I wanted to ask but a jet of bile and rice krispy treats poured out from me. 

Chewy cursed and spun around before slowly drawing near and smelling the puddle I was making. I shooed him away. 

My head was split. I remembered the wisps of two different memories. One of me gambling and winning and buying drinks. One of me with Tim in a far off land. Like a waking dream of the future. Could both have happened? Did it even matter anymore? This had be over soon. At least the money was real enough. And what I spent it on was real. Goodies from that sketchball dealer in the parking lot. 

“What was I doing?” I asked through a haze.

“Driving. Mostly. We’ve been driving forever. I had to hold that piss in so long. You were really out of it.”

“Like I wasn’t really here?” I asked through half squinted eyes. I blew out vomit from my nostrils. 

“I’ll say.”

“I don’t think I was. Tim tricked me again. He messed with my mind. He took me somewhere. Showed me stuff…” I had looked up to the fading moon in the afternoon sky. Ghostly.

“I knew I should have pretended to be your seeing eye dog and went with you.” He saw me zoning out. Curiously he stepped closer. “Do you think he lied to you?”

“Yeah of course I do.” I replied. 

“Hmm,” He scoffed. “No you don’t. You’re a bad liar. So he showed you stuff you chatted and he got away. So what? More of the usual really.”

“Yeah.” I rubbed my head. I guess you are right.”

~

It definitely wasn’t cocaine. I knew that much. But it was hard to tell from the few crystalline crumbs left in the little clear baggie.

“What the fuck man.” Chewy said as he sniffed the bag. “I think that’s ketamine. Horse tranquilizer. What the fuck were you doing that for while DRIVING and I’m back here having a beauty sleep.”

“I. I. I don’t know. I wasn’t myself. I don’t even remember using this shit.” I dropped the baggie into the grass trying to get rid of my shame. 

“Well you are gonna remember my teeth in your thigh if you pull that stunt again.” He gave me a soft growl. 

I was about to launch in on him and his antics in the past but a car was approaching. It had been the only car we had seen in an hour since I woke up. We were long off the main highway as far as I could tell and the approaching car was the only way we were going to get back. 

As it got closer it had the clear paint job, although it was rather worn, of a police cruiser. No, a sheriff’s car. That’s what it said scrawled on the side. 

“Oh shit,” I kicked at the baggie stuck in the tall grass and hoped they hadn’t noticed. 

“Be cool.” Chewy said.

“Act like a dog.” I replied.

“Don’t talk to me. Well. I mean. Talk to me but not like a person.”

“Good boy.” I said and took a step towards the crawling cruiser. Chewy growled at that. 

I hope it's not like Shades. For a brief moment I wondered if he had gotten away that night. Not that he deserved to. I don’t know. 

The seesaw in my head was cut short. A plume of dust and the halting of the sheriff's car had pushed any thoughts away. Out stepped a plump white hair woman who’s hairstyle was akin to a cotton ball. She had rosy cheeks on tanned skin and wrinkles from years of sun that had sunk deep into her bones. 

“Howdy mister sir,” She said and let loose a small giggle. She stepped around using pitter pattering steps in a space I could have cleared with two strides. “Boy looks like you had a little fender bender. From the smoke it looks like you might be stuck now? I’m sorry sweetie.” She slapped the hood of her car and looked around. It was nothing but open country around us. Then she looked back to the lone power line pole I hit. 

“Yeah, it came out of nowhere.” I said and smiled. Chewy sat down next to me wagging his tail. Giving his best doe eyes as I shrugged. 

The woman's eyes narrowed. Looking me up and down. She trailed her hand past her gun slowly before placing it on her round stomach, held in by a belt with a few belt holes cut into it, then she guffawed. She laughed long and hard and the whole action made me nervously giggle. 

“I suppose it jumped right out at you huh?” She patted the hood of the car again. “Well, don’t be a stranger, let's get you fixed up.” She waved me forward and I obliged. Thankful for a little help in a time like this. 

If time was even real. If I even existed. If space was ever not deteriorating and ripping and letting me fall through the cracks like those grains of sand. 

Maybe a little hospitality would let me forget all that. 

~

“No, I'm not religious but I believe in the devil.” I said and she liked my answer enough. 

“Smart man. Smart man. But you might want to reinvest. It's the only thing that’s gonna save your soul. Devil has a grip on everyone. Day you're born. You have to fight him everyday. Don’t I know it. I always say the cross on my neck shows my path and this badge that I wear keeps me from straying.”

I smiled at that. She continued.

“But you best start going to church. And I mean a Catholic church, not any of that hooting and hollering those Israelites do.” She shook her head. “But you find what works best for you, something is better than nothing, is all I'm saying, because your prayers were answered out on these roads. You could have been stranded for days. Ain’t no one comes out in those backroads unless its quail season. And it ain't that sugar. Not by a long shot.”

“I guess you’re my guardian angel huh?” I said and could feel Chewy rolling his eyes in the back seat, his nose squished up against the metal divider, like the irate criminal he was. I smacked my hand against it to push him back and get his hot breath off my neck. 

“I am just a public servant is all. Doing my rounds. Strange cars from strange cities are the only folks that cause trouble around here.”

“Well that’s not me ma’am. I just want to get my car running and head out of here. I got the cash.”

“Mhmmm. That’s why I'm taking you to Blackie. And don’t get your skirt all tied up we don’t call him Blackie because he’s negro. We call him that because he's Indian and that’s his name, he's a real lifesaver with a wrench and a sweetheart to boot. He’ll take care of you.”

I didn't know if she meant he was from India or was Native American but I had a hunch it was the latter. “That sounds grand to me. And I stifled a yawn. The sun was already going down. 

How long was I out? Or how long was I in that other world? How long had I driven in a drugged up fervor. Time was slipping from me. Spaces I couldn’t recall. It dragged and then went short. Leaving me with pieces I couldn’t quite fit together. I wonder if this is how all people felt at the end of their life. Old bones and an old brain trying to trick the age away with its last neurons firing in all the wrong places. 

But I ain’t that old. 

The woman who’s name was Sharon nudged me, she went by Sherri. We had parked and dust clouded around us. Wisps of smoke trailed past an old rusted sign that no longer held letters. We were in a gravel parking lot in front of an old car dump. It had rusted vehicles parked around an overgrown field surrounded by chain link fence and razor wire.

“Boy you out of it or what?” She said, looking at me like a mother would. “Have you been smoking that dope?” 

“What? No.” I said. “I’m just... tired. I…” I sighed. 

“Heck we all are. Smoking that marijuanna only make it worse. You stay away from that devil's taint. I ain’t ask questions why you crashed that car. I don’t wanna know. But it don’t make sense, you out there in that field how I found you.”

I nodded. “You are right about that. It doesn't.” She wasn't truly scolding me, there was something else there. “I think I fell asleep.” I said. “I’ve been driving a long time. My wife died last year. And I've been... Well I've been chasing her ever since. Out on the road, it’s the only time I feel I'm going anywhere. Without her I just feel stuck. Alone. You know? I don’t know, maybe that doesn’t make sense.”

She smirked sadly. Her petunia lipstick smudged her teeth. She placed a wrinkled hand on my shoulder. “You are wandering son,” 

I nodded with my eyes downcast. 

“Let me pray for you. Come here.” She closed her eyes and bowed her head, grabbing my hand with both of hers. I let it happen. I couldn’t remember when someone had touched me like that. Trying to connect with me and the pain I had. “This wandering son of Jesus Christ comes to you. He looks for peace and respite and to be with his beloved again. To be in matrimony, with selfless love and God's love in his heart, knowing it’s one in the same. Show him to the valley. Protect him in his journey so he may find that starbright field in your domain and he will have wholeness again.” She nodded to herself and released me. 

Starbright field. Wholeness again. I like that. 

I remembered the empty plain The Imminent Man showed me. What it was like to sit there and dream and as I rolled out of this car with myself and Chewy I looked across this new horizon I tread across. The sun was lower now and I saw nothing but flatland splayed out around us with low clouds that looked like runny cream atop a pie. I breathed deep and felt clean air enter my lungs. A coldness and bite to it that was unfamiliar. It told me I shared it with all. It was not made for me. And in the shrubs and the few trees, the animals felt that same bite to it. That toughness. The reminder that informed them with every breath the baseline of strength they had to have to truly live out here. But it was a peaceful moment. An understanding. The sun spewed so many shades of purple and orange that I had never seen before. Chewy’s brown eyes looked like marbles of rye as he held his head high, stretching in the sun beams. Getting the last warmth of the day. 

It might have been the scene before me or the kindness I was shown or even the words she had said for me. But I thought about the phone calls I had ignored. The other nice words I had missed when I first began this mad dash. And with all that crashing down on me, I bit back some tears and introduced myself to the bronzed skin man known as Blackie. He came out to greet us and I was struck with how calm and strong he was like this land around us, reminding me it was everything I wasn’t. 

“Wow, it's beautiful.” I muttered. It must have been just loud enough for Sherri to hear. She spun around and smirked 

“This is God's country out here. Or were you just talking about me?” She snickered and blushed after doing a small curtsy. 

~

“Alright Blackie, I'm gonna stick around until you get back.” Sharon said, hoisting up her pants over her fupa. Pulling her holster closer to her profile. 

The tall man looked back to where the stranger had entered his shop. He saw through the swinging door the man sat down on the couch he had thrifted from the dump.  His dog had followed suit. Laying by his side. He wished he could put that couch outside. Somewhere that wasn’t in the garage. He hated being watched while he worked. But he didn’t have the luxuries of a waiting room. His home was a trailer out back and his shop was a two car garage. His land was many acres, but it was mostly junk strewn and fenced off with a fence that had more difficulty standing straight up then keeping people out. He turned back to Sherri in front of him. Slowly like everything he did. He nodded.

“You think the man will be trouble?” He asked, accounting for her suspicion she held.

“Well. He’s a city slicker. And he crashed into a pole a good fifteen feet off the road. Bet he was using dope or something. I’ll watch your shop until you get back with his car. How does that sound?” 

“Thanks.” He gathered the rest of his tools. Loading them up into his tow truck. The only tow truck in one hundred square miles. He paused. Thinking. Wondering. Something was speaking to him. Was it the cicadas that were buzzing as night crawled along this land? Was it the lack of it? He panned across the road. Out into the gathering blackness. Soon the only illumination would be from his store sign. One of two lightbulbs that worked that pushed back the pitch black darkness on these plains. 

It was out there. He remembered when he felt his vision fall on him before. The smell of it. Was it back to finish his job? To lift this curse or claim it? Claim him after the fall of his tribe? He did not know. But the stranger was touched as well. Maybe he had brought it here. 

“Sherri,” He said. She turned back from kicking stones around and pulling up her belt. 

“Yes, sugar?” 

“Maybe you should come with me. It would be. Safer.” He spoke low.

She paused. He knew she wanted to. But she was working and she had to push her frightened small self away. She straightened her badge. “No can do. I’m here to protect your property. You know what a bunch of looters his kind could be.”

He nodded. She had made her choice. It wasn’t his way to stop a person from their path. Even if it leads to the beyond. “Be careful,” he said. “I see darkness in the corner of that man's eye.” He started up the diesel truck and pulled onto the dirt path. Leaving Sherri behind who slowly creeped to that soft light in the doorway. Knowing she wasn’t scared of the dark. But telling herself she just wanted to keep an eye on the man who was now asleep on the shoddy couch. 

And in the darkness around this garage the wind rattled the chain fence. Giving her shivers. She called out. “Hello?” And felt stupid in doing so. It was almost twilight now and no one was around. You would see a car approaching a good ten miles out here. She steeled herself. 

But across from that wind. Inside of the noise from the shaking chain link fence was the sound of hidden footsteps. Or maybe the footsteps had brought the wind and mayhaps it had brought the shivers? The dandelion weeds were pressed into the hard packed mud by those footsteps. Carried by those footsteps a body moved forward and stopped. Watching and waiting for the last sliver of sun to fall beyond the beyond. Those two eyes watched, peering out from under the edge of a wide brim black hat. With a feather in the band.