West On 80
By: Ré Harris
Tags: Life Lessons, Relationships, Prose, Intimately Intricate, Fiction

Photo of a two-lane highway in the Nevada desert with a deep blue sky and wispy white clouds above, brown dirt and dry brush along the sides, and low mountains in the distance, by jplenio via Pixabay.

On a cold desert highway in Nevada, the sun shining way over on the other side of the Earth, no moon, she was clutching the wheel of a small boxy car piled high with everything she and her boyfriend decided to take with them to San Francisco. When they left Chicago, it had been snowing on top of the salty, gray speckled gunk that lay on the streets and sidewalks. It had been cold and sunless for weeks, so although it had sounded like another of his impulsive ill-thought-out schemes, it hadn’t been difficult for him to talk her into leaving.

She thought maybe life would be better in or around San Francisco, better or at least a little different. Hadn’t there been lots of hippies, you know, free thinkers, there in the sixties and seventies? If they were still there — if their children were still there — maybe they wouldn’t act like she’d be better if she was someone else.

Besides the intense chill of the Chicago winter and of her life there, her salary from the deli wasn’t enough to pay the rent by herself on the apartment he was leaving. And living full time in her parents’ house again, although possible would have meant a return to the kind of uncertainty she already knew, as welcome an experience as morning breath in a tight space. She didn’t just say yes, she was excited to go.

The day he drove up to get her, her father had waved her off from his easy chair in the living room as if she was going out to get a gallon of milk at the Jewel. Her mother had been standing at the window watching for the car, because she was the kind who wanted to know everything first. Just before he honked, her mother announced him loudly, then followed her daughter as far as the porch and stood there with her arms crossed, as if it wasn’t already understood from all the years before, that there wouldn’t be anything so silly as a hug between them to go along with this unsanctioned goodbye.

“Well,” her mother said, “I guess you’re going. And I can’t stop you.”

Her daughter didn’t know how to take that. Nobody had tried to stop her from leaving town or even said they’d miss her. Her mother had nosed around during the few days that she knew her daughter’s plan, hovering and staring as if she wanted to know everything, but couldn’t ask and let it show that she didn’t already. She never asked her daughter any real questions while she watched her sort things and pack. She only muttered about friend’s lives and all the things they’d done to mess them up.

The only way her daughter could think to respond as she stood on the sidewalk in front of the house, holding bags and a box, and wondering why her mother found it so hard to talk to her, was to shrug and say, “He loves me.”

Her mother’s head jerked back a bit and her eyes narrowed. She said, “What makes you think that?”

The daughter didn’t answer. She turned away, put her bags in the car, and got into the passenger seat. Once they’d driven off, she tried not to think about being a daughter again.

Days later, on the road headed west, her boyfriend was hunched in the passenger seat, shifting every couple of minutes, trying to sleep. He had been teaching her how to drive in Chicago, at his own insistence. “If my mother can learn to drive,” he had told her, “then any idiot can learn.” He said it had been like torture for him because, “She does everything upside down or backwards.” She was surprised he didn’t say the same about her. She was happy to learn and had studied The Rules of the Road, though she was sure she’d never be able to drive in heavy traffic and had no intention of getting a license.

He had told her he was getting too sleepy to drive and since they were on the desert, in the middle of the night, she should be able to take the wheel without any trouble. She had tried to protest, “Can’t we just stop by the side of the road for a while?” But he had stopped the car, fussing at her with the engine idling, and forced the issue. So she was driving, sitting up as straight as she could, clutching the wheel tight. He made fun of the way she did that. He didn’t understand that she wasn’t really uncomfortable behind the wheel, he just thought she just looked that way.

She thought the road looked like a dark stage with a spotlight in the middle, the reflectors along the pavement like flying diamonds. Lucy in the Sky. After a while, she realized she felt like talking, the self-amusing, road drunk thoughts piling up in her head. A few minutes later, he sat up and announced that he couldn’t fall asleep. He reached over the back of the seat and got a lemon lime soda out of their small cooler. He put the bottle between his thighs as he opened it, and turned to look at her before taking a drink. He purred, “Talk to me, babe.”

Great, she thought. “You know what I was just thinking?” she asked out loud. She heard him slurp a gulp of soda to answer. “I was just wondering, I mean, you know, people like, Charles Manson, what did they eat for breakfast? Know what I mean? Like Jeffrey Dahmer, what kind of cereal did he eat for breakfast? Rice Krispies? Oatmeal? Frosted Flakes?”

She had an inquisitive look, her eyes wide though still trained on the road. He stared at her, holding the bottle in midair for a moment, and said, “You are the only idiot on the face of the planet who would think of something like that.” He held the bottle down on one knee and burped. “What makes you say stupid stuff like that? Who cares what kind of cereal Jeffrey Dahmer ate? If you start saying shit like that in San Francisco, you’re gonna have to figure out how to get along on your own. I don’t want people thinking I’m as weird as you.” He took another swallow of soda. Then he said, “Man!” The way he stretched it out sounded as if he was letting the air out of something.

She started to speak, but thought better of it. A long moment passed, and she had to try to explain. “Sometimes we forget that they’re people, too. I mean, they’re so evil or sick that we get scared to think that they do regular stuff just like we do. I was only thinking…”

“Well, you should stop doing it. It’s obviously too much for you.”

Her face went hot, and she could feel all the words she’d ever tried to say to him or anyone else sticking in her throat, one on top of another, trapped, like communication was a sin and it was damn time she stopped dabbling in such things. She didn’t feel like talking anymore and, mercifully, he didn’t either. He finished his soda, leaned his head back and stared out the window. Soon he was asleep.

It was getting harder for her to remember any of the good things between them. Memories were getting jumbled around inside her as if they were little children playing a naughty game. Yet, driving that night, playing her part on one of the world’s tiny stages with the diamond footlights flashing hypnotically before her, she managed to bring up a memory. A pleasant one of a day off from the deli and him coming back to the apartment an hour after heading out to work. He’d come back with a fragrant bunch of lilacs stolen out of someone’s yard and a surprise cheese and vegetable croissant for her breakfast that made her cry for happy. He’d kissed her on the cheek. He’d only ever aimed for her lips before. Then he said goodbye. “Gotta get back to work.”

Who the hell was that guy? Why did he turn on her? She couldn’t remember if there was any reason besides him getting tired of her. She was used to not being someone who held other people’s interest. Her conversation wasn’t sought out, and when she spoke, her view was often misunderstood and rarely considered with the kind of curiosity she felt about things. Ever since she was old enough to work she had lived without any part of the world taking her into account as more than a blip on a work schedule, or worse, the weird one whose very presence asked for more than they were capable of giving. The ache inside her had begun to feel like a sneak thief snatching away important things before she could understand what they were. Now it felt like air itself was being snatched away. She was tired now, too.

There was a halo of light up ahead, to the right. It got bigger and soon there were streetlights again. She had probably missed a sign saying what town was coming up. I’ve got to stop for a while, she thought. She wondered if there would be traffic, or stop and go lights. It didn’t matter. I can do this, she thought. Her only problem would be if he wasn’t quite asleep—if he woke up and started yelling at her. Where the hell are we? Why did you stop? You can’t just stop somewhere in the middle of the night! She didn’t want anything terrible to happen to them either, but she wasn’t as scared of things as he was. She was used to nothing going according to plan or working out right, so she made a different decision. Anyway, she wasn’t sleepy, just tired. The doors were locked and she knew how to start the car. She would stay awake and guard him and all of his precious stuff.

She turned toward the town, watched her speed on the off ramp, smiled as she finessed the stoplight, then turned left onto a deserted but well lit block with a Western souvenir store in the middle and a closed gas station on the corner. She parked close to the gas station because of the lights, but didn’t get out to see how far she was from the curb.

He didn’t wake up. She looked over at him sleeping, his face turned away from her, his head leaning against the window. By the end of the next day they should make it into San Francisco. A little more time, then something new. She thought about turning the radio on low, but didn’t want to take the chance of waking him. She hoped he wouldn’t wake up until after daybreak. Whatever place they were in would have to look safer in the sunlight. Maybe then he wouldn’t throw a fit.

She was very still for a while, not thinking about anything. Then she remembered her serial killer question. Which cereal would Jeffrey Dahmer choose for breakfast? What cereal would a serial killer eat? She started to smile. Then she looked at the man sleeping in the passenger seat. The empty soda bottle was still between his thighs. I don’t know what a serial killer eats for breakfast, she thought, but I do know what kind of soda an asshole drinks. Her head fell back against the headrest and she laughed convulsively, but without a sound, for a full minute. Then the loneliness welled up inside her and tears came. They washed something away inside her and made space, a sinless, clearer space that let her think and revise the plan.

She had coveted his huge, whiskey-colored messenger bag since the first time she’d seen it. Every time she saw the old leather shine in the sunlight it looked like something a cowboy would have slung over a saddle a century ago, and she’d fallen for him again every time she saw him carry it. She realized how naive she’d been to think that was a sign they were made for each other and that his taste and hers was a shared attribute.

She pushed the seat back a little, lifted the bag onto her lap, and ran her fingers over the cool leather as she sat thinking, wondering how anyone could really tell if someone loved them. It felt like a question without an answer. The only thing that came to mind was all the time wasted between believing, being left, and leaving.

He was still sleeping heavy as she emptied the messenger bag and figured out how to consolidate her most important things into it and her big nylon backpack.

Later, the cool wind, soon to be hot along the desert road up to the highway, was drying her tear-soaked collar fast, and though she knew the dangers of hitchhiking, she still decided she was much more comfortable with those risks than with the ones in her ex-boyfriend’s car.

If her life was a country song, she’d be holding his keys or they’d have landed as far from the road as she could have thrown them, being covered slow and steady by windborne sand and dirt—but she didn’t take them. They were on the floor of his backseat, under the plastic box of t-shirts and jeans that was beneath the cooler, giving her a head start, but findable if he was smart enough to look.

The sun was beginning to light up the sky behind her as she walked west. And though it crossed her mind for a second, for curiosity's sake, she didn’t look back to find the name of the town she'd left him in.