Business Trip

I knew a kid who was on The Price Is Right.  He won two bicycles, a treadmill, a queen-sized bedroom furniture set, a 42-inch TV and he won his showcase which included:   speedboat, a six-person hot tub and a trip to Turks & Caicos.  He lived in a dorm at the time, so he sold everything except the trip.  He was on his way to the airport with his girlfriend when an oncoming car (driven by a sleepy bookstore clerk) drifted into their lane just in time to kill the kid I knew.  The Price Is Right changed his life. 

I was relieved to finally pull into the long-term parking garage of the San Jose airport.  I found a reasonable spot on the third level.  I was going through my entire trip to figure if I had forgotten to pack anything I would need.  It was far too late to go back for anything, but I continued with the mental activity. 

My mother had drowned in a river two miles from my childhood home six days ago.  My younger sister died in the same river while trying to save my mother.  Their deaths made the front page of the newspaper, along with a picture of my father and older brother, both crying.  I hadn't cried on any of the six days since I heard the news.  I was sad, sure, but not that broken up about it.  I don't know why.  

I lacked the intensity that my brother and father seemed to experience.  The same intensity that my girlfriend apparently found necessary in a mate.  I packed for my trip this morning in a room with two empty dressers drawers and a note explaining my shortcomings as a normal human being.  I was sad she left me, sure, but I wasn't broken up about it.  She said she couldn't bear to be with someone who was "so emotionally dead inside."  I thought her use of the word dead was a tad insensitive, even for someone like me.  My mother and sister were the ones who were dead now.  My father and older brother were the ones who were crying.  I was the one running through a parking garage trying to catch a flight to Cincinnati.

 I saw the reverse lights for just a split second.  In that time, I managed only to consider changing my path to avoid a conflict with the much heavier SUV.  I knew they (the driver of the SUV) couldn't have seen me at all.  Maybe I didn't know they would pull out of the spot so quickly.  Well, they did.  I felt the cold of the pavement on my cheek just before it became dark.  The last thing I thought was that I didn't move out of the way.  I was sad that I didn't move, sure, but I don't know if I was broken up about it.   

Blink

I fucked with the radio knobs some more.  Good music is hard to find.  It is harder to find in Nowhere, MT.  Grain fields on the other hand... I turned the radio off.  The purr of the car’s motor remained. 

            “Good music is hard to find.” I said.

            “Yes it is,” she offered, “if you’re a music snob.”  She didn’t look at me.  I could see the better half of her left breast in that dress.  She looked inviting.  Her hair on her exposed shoulders.  Her thighs, what I could see of them.  What I couldn’t.

“How much should I spend?” she asked.

“If it’s good shit, get as much as you can.  If it isn’t, don’t.”  Her gaze remained straight ahead.  In the three years we’d been “us,” I had come to know her profile the best.  I could draw her profile perfectly from memory. 

She slowed to a stop and shifted into park.  She looked at me.  I blinked and regretted it.  She was meant to be admired.  I handed her all the cash I had.  She added it to her own modest stack and threw the wad into her purse.

“I’ll be right back,” she said without much thought, “I love you.”  She was out of the car before I could respond.  I watched her walk half a block.  She stepped up to the door and paused for a brief second.  I thought she might turn to the car and smile.  I wanted her to.  She opened the door and was gone.  I settled in and rolled a fat solo to pass the time.  I looked outside the car for witnesses, lit ‘er up and took a hit.  Switched hands.  Took another.

“I smoke two joints in the mornin...” I sang quietly to the smoke swirling inside the car.  We’d be okay, I thought.  We just need this little score to get through the weekend.  We aren’t dumb.  We’ve discussed how much of our lives our habit had claimed.  Not to mention the money.  We’ve agreed to stop after this weekend.  We’ll get our shit together then.  It’ll be like it was. Happy. I looked down to find a roach in my hand.  It could’ve been five minutes or fifty.  I looked up and saw her walking towards the car.  How long had it been?  I sat up straight in my seat.  She got in and started the car.  Her gaze straight ahead.  She pulled a corner bag of crystal from her purse.  She handed it to me.  It was more than I was expecting. 
"How much?" I asked.
"It was a good deal," We were only a few blocks away when she pulled into the gas station.  “I need to use the bathroom.” she explained.

“We’re gonna be okay, right?”

“Yeah.” she said without looking.  She left.  I sat there, roach in one hand and a sack of crystal in the other.  I opened her purse to deposit our cache.  I noticed a wad of bills inside.