Now Is the Hour

by Tom Spanbauer

  George and I in the rain in the mud. The wet red tie. The beads of rain on his face.

  I hate the tears. I can’t wipe the tears away.

  You said you’d be at Granny’s house, I say.

  George’s perfect dark, black eyes. The gold bars.

  I waited, George says. All that day and the night too. When you weren’t there in the morning, I took off.

  What I say next are words that spit out of me all over George’s face.

  I would have waited for you, I say. I wouldn’t have ever stopped waiting.

  George lifts his knee off my chest. He lets go of my arms. He sits back on his haunches, looks up into the rain.

  I started shaking again, George says. I couldn’t stop. I didn’t know what to do.

  The rain beads up on George’s face, rolls down.

  You didn’t get drunk, did you? I say.

  I had a couple, George says.

  Two beers, George says. Then I just said, Fuck it, and hit the road. I was in Salt Lake at a truck stop when I opened the Idaho State Journal.

  Rig, George says. Why didn’t you tell me you were in trouble?

  That wasn’t trouble, I say. You were trouble.

  Then: What’s with this rain? I say.

  Thunderbird, George says. He ain’t through with us yet.

  What’s going to be left of us when he’s through? I say.

  My hand inside George’s brown hand. He gives me a pull up. Mud all over on us.

  Come on, he says. Let’s get in the car.

  The car. Both doors open wide, the windshield wipers going. The radio’s on.

  George has to rock the car back and forth while I’m on the back bumper, pushing. It takes us awhile, but we get out of the hole. I get in the car quick before we get stuck again. George floors it through the rest of the sagebrush, and once we go into a fishtail I don’t think we’ll ever get out of.

  We do, though.

  After I pick up my backpack, we’re driving down a shiny black ribbon of road.

  West. California. California. San Francisco, California.

  George reaches across, opens the jockey box. Inside is a carton of Camels and matches. George gets out a pack, opens the pack with his teeth. He taps a cigarette out. I put the match to the cigarette.

  George’s perfect French inhale. A couple times. Then he hands the cigarette to me.

  Our fingers touch.

  I take a deep drag. I wasn’t going to smoke no more, and here I’m smoking.

  How’d you find me? I say.

  Your girlfriend was at the hospital, George says. She said to tell you Simone sends her love. She said to tell you that she’ll always keep her promise. And she told me you were on your way to San Francisco.

  There’s only two ways from Pocatello to get to San Francisco, George says, the short way and the long way. I figured you’d take the short way.

  Maybe it’s a miracle I found you in the desert, George says. Like the Mormons.

  George’s face is real serious. Even when you laugh real hard, he doesn’t crack a smile.

  Outside my window, through the rain, way far out on the horizon, a big old ray of sun.

  I’m seventeen, I say. And you’re thirty-five.

  That’s right, George says.

  I’m just a kid, I say. Won’t be long, and you’ll be bored with me.

  Or you with me, George says.

  I hand the cigarette to George. His drag is long. We’re going to hot-box this one for sure.

  I’m a minor, I say. And I’ve already spent a night in jail. The police could be looking for me.

  Could be, George says.

  I could get you in a lot of trouble, I say.

  You already have, George says.

  That’s when I notice.

  George’s head is shaved again, slick and shiny. The red tie around his head.

  I put my hand on the top of his head, let my palm lie there.

  I thought I lost you, George says. At this rate I’ll never have any hair.

  George hands the cigarette to me.

  Our fingers touch.

  Moments of gesture.

  Things are dizzy, the way they look when your breath is knocked out.

  I’m not going to Vietnam, I say. That’ll mean the feds will be after me too.

  There’s a way we can get around that, George says.

  Under my hat, there’s nubs of hair. I check the knot on the red tie.

  You hate white people, I say. I’m white people.

  You’re more pink than you are white, George says.

  I hand the cigarette back to George.

  Our fingers touch.

  The windshield wiper on George’s side is a regular swipe back and forth. The windshield wiper on my side lies there and twitches like something trying to die.

  The heat’s on too because we’re wet. The heater’s so loud you can’t hear yourself think.

  What about your drinking? I say.

  What about yours? he says.

  I’m not the one who said he was going to stop, I say.

  Quiet. Like you’ve disappeared quiet. Just the windshield wiper dying and the heater.

  You’re right on there, George says. I fucked up. I won’t be doing it again. Promise.

  Static on the radio. I’m flipping through, trying to find a station.

  George has never lied to me so far.

  He hands me the cigarette.

  Our fingers touch.

  The ash is almost an inch long. I flick the ash off into the ashtray.

  I’m free, I say. I’m an artist, and I’m traveling the world to discover what’s inside.

  Me too, George says.

  Then: Don’t worry, he says. I’m just taking you to San Francisco.

  After all, George says, we’re solitary warriors of love.

  But what about Thunderbird? I say. You said he wasn’t through with us.

  We’ll have to wait and see, George says.

  As fate will have it.

  Then I just can’t stand it any longer. I’ve been all cramped up in my two layers of pants, hot and wet and hard and uncomfortable. I unbutton my Levi’s, undo my cutoffs, reach in, pull my shorts away, pull out my cock.

  There it is sticking straight out, bobbing around like it’s listening to music.

  George’s big smile comes up from the right side first. His laugh is just like Granny’s laugh, only he’s got all his teeth. Never seen him do that before.

  On the radio, out of the static, all of a sudden, it’s Jimi Hendrix singing “Purple Haze.”

  Both me and George say at once: Oooh! I love this song.

  I reach over, turn the radio up.

  George reaches down, puts his hand around my cock.

  A gust of Idaho wind gets inside me and blows me around.

  Actin’ funny, but I don’t know why.

  George keeps his hand on the wheel. He lowers his head, puts his lips around the head of my cock. Then he’s back up, looking me in the eyes. Gold bars in his black eyes. Nothing in between.

  ’Scuse me while I kiss this guy, George sings.

  This guy.

  When George smiles, after all this time, when George smiles, it’s a miracle what happens in his eyes.

  They go a little crazy. One pitched south, the other east.

  Another gust of Idaho wind, this time outside the car.

  The wind through the windows is a sigh. Deep and quick. The way you catch your breath. Before something happens. You can’t do anything to stop.

  My exhale settles my body deep into the seat.

  I loved God so much right then.

  Acknowledgments

  My deep appreciation to my editor, Anton Mueller. Thank you for loving this book so much.

  Thank you, Neil Olson of Donadio and Olson, Literary Representatives—twenty years now, Neil, can you believe it?

  My thanks to Grey Wolfe and thegolden catalpas, Clyde Hall un son baisch, Mendala Marie Graves—how old
Mendy Graves? Steve Taylor, Carol Ferris, James Bolton, El Boy Joe Rogers and Kate Callahan, Ellie Covan and Dixon Place, Philip Iosca, Luisa Quinoy, Kathleen Lane and Jelly Helm, Geri Doran, Ken and Jane Leeson, Emily and Rachel, Charles Lawrence, Joe Modica, Paulette Osborn, Maria Kozmetatos and the staff at Multnomah County Health Services, Leslee Lewis and Corepilates, Ken Gordon of Ken’s Place, Suzy Vitello, Michael Sears, Leslie Sears, Kally Thurman, Jim Erdman, Kathy Hanson, Ashleigh Flynn, Mark Weigle, Larry Colton, Diane Ponti, Ward Green, PK Kozel, Tomas and Liz, Murray Edelman, Robert Hill, Carrie Hoops, Liz Scott, Joanna Rose, Joanna Ponce, Stevan Allred, Kate Grey, Chris Fadden, Queen Butter, Muthani and Jim, Kahunya, Damani, Diane Greenwood, Martin Mueller, the Dickie family, Andre Pruitt, Stevee Postman, David Weissman, Gregory Saks, Ampersand, Jerako, David Ciminello, Ari, Pikkul and Vetivert, Shanna Germain, Jared Germain, John Hinds, Kevin Meyer, Darin Beaseley, Charles Dye, Shannon Chaffe, Tom Chaffe, Zuna, Leo Gulick, Lynn Salcido, John dePasquali, Steve Arndt, Ruth Füglistaller, Paulann Petersen, Elizabeth Snyder, Cupcake and Vicki, Alex Cadell, David, Thomasina, Isolde, Benny Mendez, Julieta Lionetti, Federico and Isabella, Steve Dearden, Sheena, and Ella May, Eric Baudot, Eva Gastiazoro, Juan and Wilfred, Jimene, Robert Vasquez, Joe Wheat, Kerry Mooseman, and Harold Richards.

  My thanks to Jayne Yaffe Kemp.

  Thanks to Tin House magazine.

  Thank you, Powell’s on Hawthorne.

  Thanks, Donna Meyer of Baker and Meyer Attorneys at Law, and Karen Berkowitz of Legal Aid Services of Oregon.

  My thanks to the Naraya Community, the Portland Faeries, and the Dangerous Writers.

  Big thanks go to the neurologists and the cardiologists and the hematologists at Oregon Health Sciences University.

  Thank you, Jackie Czerepinski. Old Friends/Bookends.

  And to my family—Barbara, John, and Jerry, and my father, John. Jamie and her Lily, Cody, and Nick, and their mother, Trina Green. You too, Karen.

  Pocatello, Idaho, my apologies for the fictional liberties I took with my hometown.

  My love and special thanks to Thomas Soames. I am blessed to have your friendship.

  And most of all, my love to Michael Sage Ricci, my beautiful friend. It is my pleasure to rest in your company.

  This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted inwriting by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Epub ISBN: 9781407014289

  Version 1.0

  www.randomhouse.co.uk

  Published by Vintage 2008

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  Copyright © Tom Spanbauer 2007

  Tom Spanbauer has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work

  “Now Is the Hour” by Dorothy M. R. Stewart, Clement Scott © 1946, 1975, 2003 by MCA Music Publishing. All rights administered by Universal Music Corp./ASCAP. Used By Permission. All Rights Reserved, “Now Is the Hour” by Maewa Kaihua, Dorothy Stewart, Clement Scott. Copyright © 1956 by Southern Music Publishing Co., Inc. Copyright © Renewed. International Rights Secured. Used By Permission. All Rights Reserved. “San Francisco Be Sure To Wear Flowers In Your Hair” by John E. A. Phillips © 1967, 1995 by American Broadcasting Music Inc. All rights administered by Universal Music Corp./ASCAP. Used By Permission. All Rights Reserved.

  First published in Great Britain in 2007 by Jonathan Cape

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  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN 9780099506959