For the first four minutes of the trip, his mind stayed in his wallet. He didn't have the gas for the interstate which meant driving on the slower highway, which meant running late.
A mechanic once told him that the tank liner from the ninety-twos was a plastic that often broke off and floated on top of the gas. If it got too low it clogged the intake, causing the engine to stall or die. It would cost more than he had paid for the car to repair it, so on nights like this, he always took the highway.
The rain had been gone for days, but the air was still a strange sort of wet. He was tired.
Nashville was miles away it was late, and he only had twelve dollars. He knew that he would have to make friends quickly if he expected to get even half drunk.
Looking around the highway he was over come by the bizarreness of the evening. There were abandoned cars every where, nothing felt right. In fact, it didn't even feel real. He muted his iPod, rolled down the window and tried to place the feeling.
Without a hint of suddenness or urgency he began to slow the car. Pulling over to the side of the road, he ran his right hand -cigarette and all- through his unkempt hair and wondered what it was he was feeling.
What is this mood?
What is this weather?
He looked around. Even the air around him was unreal.
The fog was thick, yet not thick. It wasn't in front or behind but all around. It was in every breath, in every strand of hair. The light neither fought against nor thrived within the fog, it simply existed there. Warm, yet pleasingly cool. Diffusing gently, without dullness or ugliness.
The yellow glow of the street lamps was refracted in a softly innocent, almost juvenile, way. The whole of highway 109 seemed to glow without being bright. And the temperature was especially hard to place. The whole moment seemed out of a dream.
Suddenly, Tennessee in December was Albuquerque in July. He had felt this same night once, in this same car, but one thing had changed.
The car was failing as they pulled into town. Construction was everywhere but they didn't have to see it's ugliness in the soft, gentle fog. To them, it was an orange lightshow. A distant carnival.
He remembered how lucky they felt to have made it this far and how the bizarre isolation of the weather made them forget their tribulations With all the ugliness that the desert had pounded into them, coming upon the lights of Albuquerque felt like a coronation. It lay, a city of fluorescent diamonds set lovingly-like a newborn inside a crib- down into a valley of coal black mountains
Coming off the interstate, he let out a yell and felt her hand grab his for the first time in two days. As he turned right towards the first gas station, he thought of that morning's nightmare drive.
Fifteen miles at a time. A dying engine in the Rocky Mountains was nightmare enough, but this was supposed to be a special trip. A new start at life. But after that incident at the casino, they barely had the gas money to get home. They had been eating the last of his Cup o'Noodles in gas station after gas station using the hot water spout from coffee machines; stealing spoons when they could, and drinking the scalding hot noodles straight from the cup the rest of the time.
Atleast, he thought, that desert mechanic had been helpful.
He took one look at the two of them- tossled, young, lost- and seemed to understand what was at stake. His little sun-burnt children were running through the garage and handing him tools. He seemed was a very simple man. We liked him immediately.
"Seems like the fuel pump is shot," he guessed with a shrug. "But I could change the filter for a lot cheaper, that should at least get you to New Mexico."
"Do you think that's the problem?"
"Seems like the pump, yeah but hey, might just be the filter. If anything it'll still help."
"How much for both."
"The pump would take a few days to get out here and, you know Cadillacs, might as well add two, three hundred bucks to the cost of any repair for those parts."
"Fuck, I I have no idea how I could get-"
"But, like I said, thirty bucks'll get your filter fixed. Then there won't be nothing but a prayer between you two and Albuquerque."
The mechanic stared off towards the sun, wringing his hands while he thought through the situation. The boy from Tennessee looked over at his passenger, sulking bravely in the waiting room. She was trying so hard to be strong, but he knew it wasn't in her nature. She had been rereading On the Road by Kerouac for the last few days and while she loved to read about that world he knew she was only 19. It's gonna take more than a prayer, he thought.
Eight desert hours later, they sputtered and stalled their way out of Arizona. Their skin was dry and burnt. It had been a miserable day but the car was starting to drive better and the desert sunset was awe-inspiring.
And then, just as suddenly as the trouble had started, there they were. Drinking water and laughing. Wild eyed like children in the city. There was every chance that tomorrow would find them without a car, enough money to live, and stranded two thousand miles from home. They knew a beggars sunrise was probably on the way.
But the fog obscured the truth. For that one, last moment they were just two people, in a car, in a place. Neither in love nor out. That night they simply were.
They slept in the parking lot of a campsite six miles outside town. As the night turned to morning it grew cold but they kept each other warm. In the two years that followed they had better sex, more comfortable nights' sleep, but they never had a moment that triumphant again.
And there he was, pulled over on the side of a Tennessee highway worried about the price of beer. Defeated. Sober. Lost.
There he was, but where was she? For once, the question wasn't haunting. A genuine curiosity compelled him to wonder. Filled with Albuquerque air, he didn't corrupt the thought with sadness or longing. He didn't drift into anger or feelings of loss. He merely wondered where she was at that most imprecise of moments and if her hands were still as small. If she were asleep and kicking, or awake and laughing with wide eyes and whiskey breath. If her right eye had closed just a little more than the left from fatigue. He wondered if she were sitting on her front porch, smoking a cigarette, surrounded by that same unreal fog.
In that moment, he was neither three hours from her nor thirty from Albuquerque. He was just a man, in a car, running his hands through the fog that occupied the passenger seat of an overused Cadillac Deville. The part of him that never made it home from the desert was moving through his chest like wind through a tunnel. Like her words through his dreams.
"I love you" was the last thing she had ever said to him, and in that stolen, roadside moment he truly believed her.
He knew he'd never be rid of her in his mind. It had meant too much, gone too wrong, felt too important. The click of his Zippo felt familiar. He started the car with confidence, driving both to and away from her, both out of that Tennessee valley and into another place hidden by cold, black mountains two time zones away. A cradle of diamonds glowing in the desert air.
A mechanic once told him that the tank liner from the ninety-twos was a plastic that often broke off and floated on top of the gas. If it got too low it clogged the intake, causing the engine to stall or die. It would cost more than he had paid for the car to repair it, so on nights like this, he always took the highway.
The rain had been gone for days, but the air was still a strange sort of wet. He was tired.
Nashville was miles away it was late, and he only had twelve dollars. He knew that he would have to make friends quickly if he expected to get even half drunk.
Looking around the highway he was over come by the bizarreness of the evening. There were abandoned cars every where, nothing felt right. In fact, it didn't even feel real. He muted his iPod, rolled down the window and tried to place the feeling.
Without a hint of suddenness or urgency he began to slow the car. Pulling over to the side of the road, he ran his right hand -cigarette and all- through his unkempt hair and wondered what it was he was feeling.
What is this mood?
What is this weather?
He looked around. Even the air around him was unreal.
The fog was thick, yet not thick. It wasn't in front or behind but all around. It was in every breath, in every strand of hair. The light neither fought against nor thrived within the fog, it simply existed there. Warm, yet pleasingly cool. Diffusing gently, without dullness or ugliness.
The yellow glow of the street lamps was refracted in a softly innocent, almost juvenile, way. The whole of highway 109 seemed to glow without being bright. And the temperature was especially hard to place. The whole moment seemed out of a dream.
Suddenly, Tennessee in December was Albuquerque in July. He had felt this same night once, in this same car, but one thing had changed.
The car was failing as they pulled into town. Construction was everywhere but they didn't have to see it's ugliness in the soft, gentle fog. To them, it was an orange lightshow. A distant carnival.
He remembered how lucky they felt to have made it this far and how the bizarre isolation of the weather made them forget their tribulations With all the ugliness that the desert had pounded into them, coming upon the lights of Albuquerque felt like a coronation. It lay, a city of fluorescent diamonds set lovingly-like a newborn inside a crib- down into a valley of coal black mountains
Coming off the interstate, he let out a yell and felt her hand grab his for the first time in two days. As he turned right towards the first gas station, he thought of that morning's nightmare drive.
Fifteen miles at a time. A dying engine in the Rocky Mountains was nightmare enough, but this was supposed to be a special trip. A new start at life. But after that incident at the casino, they barely had the gas money to get home. They had been eating the last of his Cup o'Noodles in gas station after gas station using the hot water spout from coffee machines; stealing spoons when they could, and drinking the scalding hot noodles straight from the cup the rest of the time.
Atleast, he thought, that desert mechanic had been helpful.
He took one look at the two of them- tossled, young, lost- and seemed to understand what was at stake. His little sun-burnt children were running through the garage and handing him tools. He seemed was a very simple man. We liked him immediately.
"Seems like the fuel pump is shot," he guessed with a shrug. "But I could change the filter for a lot cheaper, that should at least get you to New Mexico."
"Do you think that's the problem?"
"Seems like the pump, yeah but hey, might just be the filter. If anything it'll still help."
"How much for both."
"The pump would take a few days to get out here and, you know Cadillacs, might as well add two, three hundred bucks to the cost of any repair for those parts."
"Fuck, I I have no idea how I could get-"
"But, like I said, thirty bucks'll get your filter fixed. Then there won't be nothing but a prayer between you two and Albuquerque."
The mechanic stared off towards the sun, wringing his hands while he thought through the situation. The boy from Tennessee looked over at his passenger, sulking bravely in the waiting room. She was trying so hard to be strong, but he knew it wasn't in her nature. She had been rereading On the Road by Kerouac for the last few days and while she loved to read about that world he knew she was only 19. It's gonna take more than a prayer, he thought.
Eight desert hours later, they sputtered and stalled their way out of Arizona. Their skin was dry and burnt. It had been a miserable day but the car was starting to drive better and the desert sunset was awe-inspiring.
And then, just as suddenly as the trouble had started, there they were. Drinking water and laughing. Wild eyed like children in the city. There was every chance that tomorrow would find them without a car, enough money to live, and stranded two thousand miles from home. They knew a beggars sunrise was probably on the way.
But the fog obscured the truth. For that one, last moment they were just two people, in a car, in a place. Neither in love nor out. That night they simply were.
They slept in the parking lot of a campsite six miles outside town. As the night turned to morning it grew cold but they kept each other warm. In the two years that followed they had better sex, more comfortable nights' sleep, but they never had a moment that triumphant again.
And there he was, pulled over on the side of a Tennessee highway worried about the price of beer. Defeated. Sober. Lost.
There he was, but where was she? For once, the question wasn't haunting. A genuine curiosity compelled him to wonder. Filled with Albuquerque air, he didn't corrupt the thought with sadness or longing. He didn't drift into anger or feelings of loss. He merely wondered where she was at that most imprecise of moments and if her hands were still as small. If she were asleep and kicking, or awake and laughing with wide eyes and whiskey breath. If her right eye had closed just a little more than the left from fatigue. He wondered if she were sitting on her front porch, smoking a cigarette, surrounded by that same unreal fog.
In that moment, he was neither three hours from her nor thirty from Albuquerque. He was just a man, in a car, running his hands through the fog that occupied the passenger seat of an overused Cadillac Deville. The part of him that never made it home from the desert was moving through his chest like wind through a tunnel. Like her words through his dreams.
"I love you" was the last thing she had ever said to him, and in that stolen, roadside moment he truly believed her.
He knew he'd never be rid of her in his mind. It had meant too much, gone too wrong, felt too important. The click of his Zippo felt familiar. He started the car with confidence, driving both to and away from her, both out of that Tennessee valley and into another place hidden by cold, black mountains two time zones away. A cradle of diamonds glowing in the desert air.
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So much art on your page. Do you dabble in everything?