I
remember one time back in junior high, some woman came in doing research on
career paths in small towns. She seemed mighty taken aback when most of the
guys told her we wanted to work in the mine, and most of the women said they
didn’t want to work at all. She pressed us, asking why, and didn’t we have any
dreams, and didn’t we want more out of life and all that sort of thing. She
just couldn’t get it through her head, you’re born in Fordston, you work in the
mine, or you’re a housewife, and that’s it. I don’t particularly like it any
more than she did, but it isn’t my place to challenge the one real rule that
holds this place together. Plus, if I recall correctly, I told her I wanted to
be a poet.
In a
way, I am. I’ve had thirty seven poems published. The problem is, this day and
age, being a published poet doesn’t make you a professional poet. As far as I
can work out, the most poetry has ever funded for me is a nice bottle of Scotch
once in a while. No, I’m not a professional poet, in fact, as far as money
goes, you could say I’m a professional janitor. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not
complaining. Sure, the money isn’t great, but the hours are flexible, and
there’s nothing better for cultivating an artistic mind than standing around for
hours on end with nothing better to do than sniffing heavy duty cleaning
supplies.
Right
now I’m cleaning Herb’s Hardware, one of a few places in town I work for.
Things are a little quiet tonight. We had a pretty damn impressive storm roll
over us a few hours ago. The thing about Colorado weather is that it hits hard
and fast, without much warning. It beats down with a heady intensity, an almost
human desire to make hell for any living thing fool enough to get caught out in
it. Anyway, whatever the poetic ramifications of our weather, it certainly
limits the evening rush on Herb’s.
Of all the things I have to deal with
as a janitor, my favorite is probably mopping. It takes just enough physical
exertion to keep me focused, but little enough mentally to give time to really
reflect. I’m not sure how I came upon that incident from junior high, but
somehow the past always seems so much more relevant during a rain storm. It
probably also helps that my boss has once again decided to blast Meat Loaf over
the store speakers. He’s always seemed a bit young for that particular icon of
70s cheese, but I suppose there are worse things to play. The smaltzy pop-rock
vocals create a lovely contrast with the grim weather and the dreary everyday
of my job. The music switches off. I look up.
My boss, Herb, a former miner who
bought this shop with the blood money the union negotiated from the company for
the leg he lost, hobbles towards me. He looks oddly troubled.
“Neil... you know James and Marie don’t
you?
“Yeah...”
“I just got a call... they went off the
road into the river, driving into town from the trailer park. James is fine...
but... Marie is dead.”
“Oh.” It’s the best I can manage. I
look down at the mop. Herb looks at me like he wants to say something, but
reconsiders and walks away.
I
remember James and Marie back in high school. They were the sort of couple we
all knew would get together someday. They were also the sort of couple we
expected to see old and wrinkled, arguing down at Rosie’s Diner sixty years
down the line. James and I never really saw eye to eye on much... I had a bit
of a reputation, I guess. Six and a half feet tall with the body of a boxer and
the face of a movie actor, but more prone to self-imposed isolation than sports
and parties. James always kind of resented that, I think. He was a damn good
football player, but at well under six feet with a face that’s kind of...
off... he really had to try to attain the popularity he held. I guess he
figured if you had what I had, you ought to use it, be a man, as he would’ve
said. Meat Loaf croons away in the background. I’ve never figured out if he was
in on the joke or not. And then it cuts out again. Again Herb walks up to me,
clears his throat.
“Its... Jesus this storm...”
“Yeah...?”
“Apparently a forest ranger found a
body on the ridgeline south of town. Lightning... rumor has it that it was
Max... the two of you were friends, right?” I can only look at him. I let the
air out of my lungs and push the hair back from my face.
“Thanks for telling me.”
Two in
one night... I never knew Marie too well, but I can’t imagine what James is
going through... and Max. Jesus Christ Max. As different as we were or are or
however you handle the verb tense for someone dead for not more than a few
hours, back in highschool, we were all we had. Outcasts of a unique breed, not
the self imposed isolation of the nerds, not the hatred of everything fun of
the punks or goths or emos, something entirely different. Among all of us, the
entire forty person graduating class, we were the only ones who wouldn’t accept
our fate, who didn’t want to be what Fordston made us.
All
that we said in high school though... it ended the way high school rebellion
always ends. We became little beyond what was always expected of us. He became
nothing more than a thug and me, with all my artistic inclinations, just a
janitor. I can publish all the poetry I want, but that doesn’t change what I
am.
Rain is
really coming down now. This part of the country, rains like this maybe once,
twice a year. Sheets, they say, it’s coming down in sheets. I hate going to
visit her fucking brother. That damn trailer park. All those inbred hillbillie
motherfuckers, leering at my truck, my pretty wife, my well adjusted old
fashioned American life. I still got values. I work for my money. And yet here
we go again. She’s railing at me about her wanting to work or some shit. I can
take care of this fucking family, and she god damned knows it.
“... and James if we want a kid in a
few years...”
“We will.
“Yeah, but you know full well we don’t
got the money, which is what I’m trying to tell you.”
“You ain’t workin’. I can take care of
this family, just like my dad took care of mine, his took care of his, how its
always been.” If its possible I think the damn rain’s coming down harder. I can
hardly see the side of the road any more. God damn Colorado weather. And here
she goes, still talking at me. She needs to learn when to shut the fuck up.
Women...
“Are you even listening to me?
“Yes honey.”
“Well like I was saying, I think
Harmony down at the bookstore is looking for some help and...”
“You ain’t workin’ for that... that...
whatever the hell he is. It ain’t right.”
“What ain’t right?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Sometimes James you can be the most
ignorant son of a bitch.”
“Don’t you talk that way to me.”
“We need the money.”
“I can take more hours at the mine,
you’ll see, I’ll make it work.”
“Do they have more hours to give you?”
“I’ll ask Max down at the union... I’ve
known him since... since Christ knows when... he’ll help me out.”
“Isn’t he just some thug the union
sends after guys ain’t paying their dues?”
“Something’ll happen, I’ll get it
figured out... five years out of high school Marie... we still got time...”
“For what?”
“...I don’t know, now would you shut up
and let me...” You always think it won’t happen to you. Last time I remember
was senior year. Couple kids from the trailer park coming into town for Prom.
It was raining like this. Every time someone says to build up the guardrails or
something. Every time we vote against it, we don’t want to pay for it, we say.
It won’t happen to us. It won’t happen to me. Then it does.
I don’t
rightly remember how exactly it started. All I know is I see the guardrail
rushing up to the hood of my Dodge. Then the water coming up towards us.
Somewhere in there I get my seatbelt off. Put my hand out to protect Marie. Not
that it’ll do much good. We smack the surface of the water. We’re sinking fast.
I manage to force my door open. I’m not a real strong swimmer, but instinct takes
over. I kick for the surface. Rain’s comin’ down hard and fast. I can’t see the
shore.
Then it
hits me. Marie. God damn it where the hell... god damn it no! Like I said, I
ain’t a strong swimmer, but soon as I don’t see her, I dive down. The water’s
cold and dark. I see the car in front of me. Red 06’ Dodge Ram. I remember the
day I bought it, from one of my classmate’s dads. I felt so damn proud, big
truck, beautiful girl on my arm, good job at the mine. The future promised to
me. Back when I was young and... God damn it feels like it was so long ago.
I
immediately swim to the passenger window. She’s in there, her dark brown hair
floating up, obscuring her face. I pound on the window. Maybe I can break it,
maybe something. She turns to look at me, brushes her hair out of the way. She
looks at me and smiles. I swim around to the other side. I pull myself into the
cab of the truck. I can feel my lungs starting to burn, but I ignore it. I put
my hands under her arms. Seatbelt. The seatbelt is still on. I point to it, and
she just looks at it. I try to get it, but its stuck. Wouldn’t you fucking
know. I stab at it a few more times, and it pops free. I always promised I’d
get that damn thing fixed. Or that I’d fix it myself. She isn’t looking good. I
don’t have time.
Without
warning, bubbles explode out of her mouth, and she’s floundering. I hear her
screaming dull in the back of my skull. And all of a sudden I lose it, I can’t
hold my breath. I push to the surface. I take in breaths quick as I can. I’m
ashamed. What it all comes down to. All that bullshit about protecting her
and...
I dive
back down. I push myself to the bottom, but I can’t see the truck. God damn
where the hell could it go, it’s a big fucking... There. I swim over to it. I
already know. I knew when she didn’t break the surface next to me. Still, gotta
check. And there she is. Her body floats in the cab of the truck, her beautiful
auburn hair all up about her face. I take her body in my arms. No, Marie. I
pull my way to the surface. I can see it above me. I still got a chance, maybe
someone... CPR or somethin... just gotta reach the surface. God damn please not
her. And all at once I’m there. The rain beats down around us. I pull her body
in close. I remember back to high school. In the summers, we’d come down to the
river here and just lie together, for hours sometimes. We ain’t done that near
enough lately.
A lone figure climbed up the ridge, his
shadow blinking through the trees, stretching long down the slope. He was short
but moved with a sense of violent purpose. His eyes were dark and set deep into
his head, his bone sculpted into the hard lines of a classic American bad-ass,
big chin, hard lines, deep set eyes, high cheekbones, with a proper matt of
slicked back brown hair, scrappy moustache and beard to match.
That’s
what I figure I look like anyway, what I want so damn bad to look like, hard,
strong, untouchable, that quiet, old fashioned American tough guy, the Clint
Eastwood, Steve McQueen, Paul Newman type, all snarls and grimaces, hard as the
land we grew up on.
I’ve
always told myself all I got is my brain and my body, and my brain ain’t worth
too much when it comes down to it, weak and chaotic, all speed, no muscle, none
of the raw intelligence or drive of those men I try to tell myself I emulate.
I reach the crest of the hill and look
out across the valley stretching away before me, shadows pulled out long with
the late afternoon light. Looks like there’s a storm coming in down the valley,
fast, I still have time though, admire the view, get off the ridge, no problem.
Closest to me the molybdenum mine, the James and Sons Mine, fate of half my
classmates since long before I could crawl, then the first rows of houses, home
to the likes of the teachers and town politicians and union bosses, as rich as
anyone ever got in Fordston, then the town, a proper one-everything classic American
small town, town hall, bar, diner, book store, hardware store, the union
offices, not a whole lot else, then more houses, more down to earth, the miners
and the shopkeepers, then the schools, then forest, tall and dark and
intimidating, a real and a symbolic wall before the trailer park, the white
trash hell at the gates of the valley, unemployed smack heads and drug dealers,
that place you never went to when you were younger and never went now without
some sort of weapon on you.
I look out on my life, third person
like that earlier bit of introspection, all that potential they always promised
us, we can do anything, everything, whatever the hell we want but its not true
because the most I was ever gonna be was what I became, a union grunt, a soldier
for whatever the hell it is I’m soldiering for, just like my father before me,
threatening those that don’t pay their dues or those that don’t want to deal
with our brand of bullshit any more.
I look farther out around me, the
world I was born into, the one I’ll die out of, no hope, no promise, no love,
any kids I may or may not ever have looking at the same damn fate, a father who
every morning goes to work, beats people up, comes home, drinks, then passes
out on the couch, his body battered and damn near broken.
That
there is one vision of the future but me, I see another one, without that damn
mine, without the diner and the bar and the town hall and the fucking union,
just me and a bike beneath my legs, a .44 Magnum proper Dirty Harry gun
strapped to my hip, my saddle bags full up of food and ammo and none of the
limitations of this life, just me and a thousand miles of horizon, the harsh
black of the roadway cutting a path through the empty desert landscape and the
endless loneliness of the post-apocalyptic haze, most of the population, all
the fucking assholes I know wiped away in some sort of disaster, nuclear or
chemical or a plague or whatever the hell it is that finally wipes us all the
fuck out, just me and the landscape, my future mine and not the town I was born
into, not the parents who bore me, just me, a bike, a gun, and the road. But
that ain’t the future.
I look
out across the valley to the storm clouds rolling closer, dark and grim, rain
and thunder and lightning and right then the wind picks up and I taste that
smell, that taste, rain, soon, and hard, and I know I gotta get off that
ridgeway, but I don’t really want to, I don’t wanna go back to my fate, my
shitty house, my awful, violent for the sake of violence job, all the girls
down at the bar who won’t talk to me because of my broken nose and my
reputation as nothing but another thug, who I won’t talk to because I’m more
intimidated by a pretty woman than the big, self righteous miners and drug
dealers and fucking union bosses I have to deal with day by day, five years out
of High School and this is my life ending one minute at a time.
Town
like this, end of highschool, everyone talks about up and leaving, but no one
does. We could’ve all left for something better, but we didn’t. I guess that’s
our fate, trapped in this town, this mindspace, Fordston now and forever, all
pain and misery and casual American poverty, and the clouds are directly above
me now, me on a bare ridge line, the tallest thing for half a mile, and the
rain opens up and I feel the cool water washing over my face and watch the
sharp bolts of lightning snake down to the valley floor and the lightning is
ever closer but I don’t leave because just like it was five years ago, just
like it is every morning when I get up and go to work and hate myself all the
more for it, leaving ain’t my choice, I was born here, and god damn it won’t
bother me if I die here.
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