It stinks. Something in this car is rotting, dead or dying.
“Are you alright?” she asks me, without looking over.
I want to strangle her and then myself, but she is driving my car and I’ve just woken up. We’re going to a wedding, I guess; they’re some friends of hers from high school that are far too young to be making such large decisions. I’ve been drinking since we began the trip.
“Yes,” I say.
“Okay.”
Wyoming feeds my hangover, and it’s a hungry beast tonight. All these shit hills and dry grass make this god forsaken state look like exactly like the wild west I’d always imagined, if the apocalypse had already come.
“Is there anything here that isn’t barely hanging on?” I ask, with my head on the dusty dashboard.
“I saw a couple of deer a mile ago.”
“Doesn’t count.”
“...”
“What if we were the last people on the planet?”
She looks at me in mock despair; she knows I love this game—mostly when I’m aroused, or trying to be. I haven’t seen a car for miles. Apparently it’s getting late. The shadow of that other side of the world I know nothing about stands over everything here that’s almost dead and the only two things I know that are almost living. It’s a beautiful summer night.
I continue, “But wait, listen, it’s a blessing in disguise. We can just forget about this wedding and pull over to the side of the road. I can grab the blanket and you can put the seats down, we’ll settle into the back and just look at each other. No words for a while, until you decide to tell me what you want me to do. We’ll fall asleep with the windows down and the doors unlocked, nobody is around to rob us, honk at us, arrest us, or stare at us. And then tomorrow--”
“You’re going to keep going?”
Like she could stop me if she tried. “Listen. Listen, we need to plan ahead. And then tomorrow...and then tomorrow we can make a couple sandwiches and grab the blanket, put on bugspray instead of clothes, and then run through the high grass here until we get to the top of one of these hills and stop for lunch. And then we’ll be on top of the world! Not the real top of the world, of course, but as far up as we’ll ever need to be. We’ll look out over everything that looks dead now and realize it’s more alive than we would have ever known if we hadn’t been forced to realize that life has nothing to do with other people. But you and I...” I’m an unhappy liar, “and then we’ll travel. We have all of the gas that we’ll ever need, and it will be as free as we will be. We might be eating canned goods until we get enough books to learn how to farm and maybe raise livestock, and I’ll learn how to barbecue. I’m sure we can do it! Shit, our kind used to have to! We just need to find that. And that brings me to the first step in this process...”
She looks at me, in the way I had hoped—damnably bemused. Is that going to work?
I lay back in my seat and fire up a cigarette as she starts the car again. I think about the first time we met, nothing worth remembering out loud. She waits for a car to pass and pulls back onto the road.
“I’ve developed a cough since I’ve met you,” she says.
“It’s cute,” I say.
“There’s a word for people like you--”
She pauses for effect, I think, but then says nothing else. I love it when she does this. I love... a few things. I love having her sitting next to me driving my car, but sometimes I don’t. But I’m not yet up for taking the wheel.
“You’re driving beautifully,” I say quietly.
She smiles just a little, Wyoming’s fucked hills keep rolling into and out of the headlights. “Thank you,” she says, and then a second later “I need to use the restroom.”
She pulls off the highway and into a gas station, which is also a bait shop. Laramie, apparently. Somehow, it’s still open at 10:34... no wait—fucking clock—10:21. We get out of the car.
“Why do you always slam the door?” she asks.
“My car.”
She walks in first, the bells jingle as she opens the door—“do that!” yells a voice inside. She holds it open a little and looks back for a second before taking in her surroundings quickly. She beelines for the back corner. I look left toward the counter where a younger guy, early 20s, is standing in front of the cigarettes. To his right—and to my surprise—is a gun rack. Talking to him, before we came in at least, is another guy about the same age and several inches taller whose face is bruised. They’re both looking at me... well, staring.
“Hello,” says the clean one behind the counter, obviously a little discomforted by the arrival of what I’m sure looks like two unkempt strangers.
“Uh, hey,” I say quickly, at the same time making a turn to the right. I walk all the way back toward the soda and bullshit section and stare at the Cokes. In the reflection of the glass I can see that the two dudes at the counter have resumed their conversation, albeit in a much quieter tone than it had been carried on just a minute before. What is this about? I look at them carrying on in the glass and I see his black eye staring back at me.
“Hey.”
“Fuck!” I say a little too loud, the girl’s managed to scare me, and then turn around a little too quickly. Suddenly it’s blinders and all I can see is those two fellas, framed by an aisleful of cheap candy and potato chips, looking at me a little uneasily. I make a quick apologetic shrug.
“So that’s just a hallway,” my lady whispers, “do they have even have a restroom?”
“I mean, they have to right?” I say.
“Well, where the fuck is it?” She stares at me blankly...
Outside. “Outside?” I ask rhetorically, looking back at the counter. “Want anything?”
“No.”
I reach for a Coke and turn around and walk toward the counter, grabbing a Twinkie midstride, unwrap it and take a quick bite. The guys stop talking about whatever it is I’ve decided I don’t want to know about as I make my way up to the counter.
“Is that it for you?” the one behind the counter asks.
“Sure. Do you guys have a bathroom?”
“Yes, it’s actually outside and around the corner on the left.”
“Thanks,” I say, turning around to where the lady is still standing, staring blankly. I nod at the dudes and lead her outside.
We go around the corner and open the doors to the restrooms simultaneously. As I open mine, a tiny black cat springs out into the open. I follow it with my eyes and see that it’s stopped, turned around and is looking directly at me.
“Hello,” I say, shyly closing the door behind me. It’s a dirty yellow bathroom, the kind I’ve seen more times than I think I should have. And out of paper towels.
When I step back out onto the pavement, I see that cat in the same spot as before, lifting its tail and laying its tail back down at an absurdly slow rhythm. I sit down on the curb and wait for the girl. The cat is still staring at me. Huh.
“You’re an alright cat, you know that?” I say. It blinks. “No, but really... you’re just roaming, huh? I’m not sure how I feel about Wyoming so far. Culture’s damned me, I think, but up here you guys do it right. I mean, shit, you guys can buy guns and worms at the same gas station and then go kill some shit for dinner. Of course, if you’re getting Friskie’s and I’m eating gas station hot dogs then we’re both rolling around in our plainly adorned domesticity aren’t we?”
The cat lifts its tail, sets it down again, licks its lips, and nods. I inch a little closer, seeing if it will run away. It’s sitting on the edge of the grass about five feet away.
“Huh. Y’re alright cat, y’re alright.”
Where is that girl?
“It’s sad though isn’t it? I mean, it’s sad though isn’t it? I mean, it’s sad that you and I are fated to see each other for only such a brief moment in time. I wish I could run off into these hills with you, though it’s clear that neither of us are equipped with the instincts necessary to survive the adventure. But we could learn! Well, I mean, it’s sad that won’t happen.”
I hold my hand out as if, and I’m surprising myself here, my heart is in it. The cat starts purring Sigur Ros (or something... I think...) but otherwise remains as calm and controlled as before.
“I wish you’d come see me,” I say.
“...” the cat is listening, still not thinking too much of it, just playing it cool.
“Maybe... maybe I’m making an ass of myself here,” I say, knowing there was no maybe about it but not being able to help it.
I nudge a little closer just as the door is thrown open behind me, “Shit!” I yell and as I turn back around I see the cat has scampered off into the grass.
“Hey,” my lady says, “ready?”
I keep staring out into the grass. “Yeah. I’ll drive.”
She hands me the keys, “are you alright?”
“Yeah.”
As I get in the car I feel something brush up against my leg quickly. I pull the door closed and look out the window, and... and there’s the cat. It’s on all fours, alert, looking right at me. I roll down the window and give it a small smile.
“What are you looking at?” the girl asks.
I don’t look back at her. “It’s uh, this cat I was trying to be friends with,” I say.
“Don’t do that! It’s a kitten, it’ll think it’s yours and then you’ll have a cat.”
“That’s fine, I can raise it.”
“No you can’t.”
I whirl around at her and just about reach for her throat before restraining my hand. I make the worst glare I’ll make for a decade or two and then look back around. The cat is gone... I look straight ahead for a second, still mad as fuck but drained. The guys inside are both looking at us. I start the ignition and put the car in reverse.
bump.
I brake and clinch the steering wheel, white knuckled. The guy with the black eye makes for the door quickly. I hit the gas and get the fuck out of that gas station and Laramie, WY, not getting a chance to check the rearview mirror until it’s all far, far behind us.
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