Wildman

by J. C. Geiger

  “Go away,” Meebs says. “Just go away!”

  “Andrew!” Dakota says. “What the hell are you doing?”

  Andrew? Who’s Andrew?

  Lance plunges into the brush. Thorns and nettles rip his skin. He’s fighting through, hacking at the forest until it loosens his grip and dumps him onto a path. He can’t swallow the thickness in his throat, can’t move it down far enough to breathe.

  And someone is crashing after him.

  He turns, but cannot fight. Can’t protect himself from what’s coming.

  Dakota.

  It’s Dakota, and she’s carrying his horn.

  A flood is coming, choking off his voice, and Dakota is wrapping her arms around him and there are no words when it all comes crashing down. They hold each other through a long, hard wave, and when the worst is over, they wipe their faces dry and breathe.

  Lance expects someone to come for them. Someone must want him to finish his story. But when he and Dakota go, no one follows. There is a new numbness. Novocain in the moonlight. His arm is around her waist as they stumble down the path, cuts scabbing over in the breeze.

  He smells the flowers before he sees them.

  Honey, lavender, and that singular smell that will always be his first night at the Trainsong. The path spills into a field Lance has only seen from an open train car. White flowers, holding the moon in their petals. The breeze comes fast and cool, and he clutches Dakota with both arms, pulling her to his chest.

  “Will you stay for the trainsong?” he asks.

  “Yeah.”

  “You aren’t mad?” he asks.

  “I don’t know what I am.”

  They find a patch of bare earth. The dirt is still warm. Her hands, still electric. He breathes clean air and holds her left hand. He focuses on her thumb. This thumb is a world that makes sense. A world he can climb inside and build walls around. The ridges on her nail, the softness of a knuckle. The way it can be pinched between his fingers. This tiny piece of Dakota. If he looks and holds on long enough, maybe he can understand just this.

  She sees him looking.

  “Your thumb is a clue,” he says.

  She smiles. “Yeah?”

  She pinches his thumb back.

  “I was thinking maybe they aren’t clues,” she says. “Maybe they’re gifts. They just never felt like gifts, because I couldn’t share them. Like I never saw this field.”

  “Or a hand,” Lance says.

  “Or a hand.”

  They hold each other. At the first sound of the train, Lance sits up straight.

  The headlamp comes like dawn to the field, swallowing the flowers in a blaze, unclasping their hands, filling his eyes until they burn. He blinks, gobs of color turning solid, becoming a yellow car with black letters.

  Larson’s Lumber

  It coasts down the tracks and shudders through a curve. Next, a silver flash.

  Mandalay Motors

  They’re coming. He feels them before he sees them, and then their car is drifting past in slow time. Mason, feet perched on the car’s edge, holding the metal handle. Meebs, right beside him. So close he might’ve been leaning on Mason’s shoulder. Rocco is farther back, in shadow. They’re staring out at the field, expressions fixed and flat.

  Lance is right there in front of them. Dakota is right there. But the group does not see them. They’re looking for something else, watching the horizon. Their car takes the curve and folds into line behind the others, twisting off through a tunnel of trees. The rumble echoes, then is gone.

  Lance stands and unsnaps his hard case.

  Dakota follows him, wading through the tall grass, climbing the slope to the crunch of ballast. Lance’s leg is shaking when he places it on the nearest tie. Or maybe that’s the train. Maybe the tracks here always hum a little.

  “What are you going to play?” Dakota asks.

  “A request.”

  He puts the brass to his lips and plays Stone’s song.

  According to the sign, the Trainsong office opens “most days between 9 and 10,” but today Cheri doesn’t show up until eleven. Turns out she still has his mother’s card on file from the first night. He can sign all the charges over to Mrs. Hendricks, and has no trouble doing so.

  “You sure, Breakdown?” she says. “Is this really goodbye? Want to throw your key at me again?”

  He throws the key at Cheri. She catches it.

  “Good arm,” she says.

  “Good catch.”

  “Police still after you? Is that why you came bat-outta-helling down the stairs yesterday?”

  “No,” he says. “I think I’ve settled things with the police.”

  “How about her?”

  “Who?”

  “The one leaning against your car. Like she’s waiting for a ticket.”

  “Dakota.”

  “She’s nice. You should take her with you.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure. What’s the worst thing that happens? She’s pretty and she wants to ride with you, even in your broke-down old car. I’d take her.”

  “You want to, Cheri? I can tell her you’re interested.”

  “Don’t start. Hey. What happened to your cheek?”

  “I got punched.”

  “By one of them boys?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Just means they like ya.”

  “Maybe.”

  “You are a wild thing. You can stick around. I’ll give you a discount.”

  “Do I still have to clean my own bathroom?”

  “Bet your boots!”

  Lance walks out the door and a bell rings overhead. The air smells like sunbaked leaves and freshly trimmed grass. The smell of early June, like a clear runway into summer when anything is possible and days don’t end and nights don’t end and nothing good will ever end.

  Dakota is standing beside the Buick.

  Their goodbye has chased them on trains and across fields, over long winding roads and through cemeteries and motel rooms and has finally caught them here in this parking lot.

  She holds one hand up, shielding her eyes. The sun shines in her hair and he wants to press his face there, breathe in how that hair smells in the sun. He has never done that, and may not have another chance. His hand is moving through the warm air, reaching up to brush her hair, her cheek, but her hand comes up first. She’s holding something.

  A worn envelope that says lance.

  “I found this in your room.”

  “Did you read it?” he asks. A flutter of panic.

  “No,” she says, handing it over. “But you keep leaving it behind. Are you sure you still want it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “That’s why you came back, right? Yesterday?”

  He looks at the ground.

  “I was wondering if I’d get my own letter.”

  Her eyes. They won’t stop looking.

  “I couldn’t even write your name,” he says.

  “Yeah,” she says. “I tried to write you a letter in my book, but it didn’t belong. Maybe if we can’t find the words, we don’t say goodbye.”

  “We’ll have to sing it. Write a song.”

  Her lips curl down, trembling.

  “Dakota.”

  “What?”

  “We can’t.”

  “Can’t what?”

  He sighs. “We don’t have any money.”

  “Okay.”

  “I didn’t get into Seattle.”

  “So?” she says.

  “So?”

  “So it’s one school. Are you going to stop playing music?”

  She is not hiding now. Her face is bright in the sun.

  “What do you expect me to do?” he says.

  “Yeah? What do I expect? Oh, part of me—” she starts. Takes a breath. “Part of me expects you to go to Oregon State. Give your speech about stars. Catch some shit from your friends. Become a successful businessman who plays his horn on the weekends. Or maybe never.”
/>
  “So what about you?” he asks. “Work at The Float? Give Mason a try?”

  “No. I saw too much,” she says. “I have to buy an RV now. Recording equipment.”

  “Waders.”

  She closes her eyes. “Fucking waders.” She looks over him, toward the road.

  “I can come back. I’ll call and—”

  “Don’t,” she says. “Please.”

  He wants to stitch this back together. He leans in past the point of no words, and Dakota does something she has never done before. She turns away.

  “I can’t kiss you, Wildman,” she says. “Our kisses are like a million hellos.”

  “I don’t know what to do.”

  “That’s what awkward hugs are for,” she says.

  So they hug. He squeezes her so tight he expects her to gasp, tell him to stop, but she doesn’t. Her lips are beside his ear. Breathing. She hangs on until it’s over and he’s climbing into his car. He turns the key and the engine fires. And he will leave now and not look back.

  But he looks. Then he waves. Then he rolls down his window. The Lance Hendricks Machine is not following orders. He cannot make it drive away.

  The engine hums, his foot on the brake.

  “I hate this ending,” he says.

  “Classic fade-out,” she says.

  Those eyes. His memories will be worthless because they can’t be her, and they can’t be now. Dakota is real fire, and he’s driving back to Bend with a suitcase full of ashes.

  “You got an alternate ending?” he says.

  “I do. You ask me if I’ll come with you.”

  “And what do you say?”

  She’s staring and he is biting his cheek. Eyes, stinging.

  “I think I say Yes. Then you say: Grab your bag, Dakota. We’re leaving.”

  “And you come running out your door?”

  “Like I’m on fire.”

  “And jump in the Buick.”

  “Yep.”

  “And then?”

  “Music.” Dakota smiles. “Roll credits. That’s the end of the movie.”

  Lance nods. It’s like he’s back under the willow tree. He can’t say what she needs him to say, or touch what she needs him to touch. He must leave. His nose and eyes are stinging and he just needs to feel the wind through his hair and play some music. He’ll drag this shitty goodbye over mountains and swing it around turns for six hours until it pulls its claws out. He’ll leave this goodbye on the side of the road, and bury it in the wilderness.

  He is nodding. She knows this cannot work. She moves her hand away from the window so he can roll it up. And he’s just driving.

  She is not leaving. Not walking out of the parking lot. His turn signal is clicking. She will never walk out of the parking lot. She will never climb out of his rearview mirror.

  The Lance Hendricks Machine keeps moving. He is on rails to Bend. A speech, a summer job. It has always been this way. Nothing has changed. The Buick is running like a dream.

  He is barely out of the parking lot when the shaking starts. It begins with his hands. They tremble on the wheel until the tremors move up his arms and shoulders, spreading down to his knees and then his foot stomps the brake.

  One quick U-turn removes Dakota from the rearview mirror. He can barely breathe as he presses the pedal until she is real again, right in front of him, and he is shifting into park and leaping out of the car.

  “Say it,” she says. “I need you to say it. Say it.”

  “Grab your bag, Dakota. We’re leaving.”

  She pinches him.

  “You’re supposed to ask.”

  “Will you come with me?”

  She looks at him. He stares back.

  “Yes,” she says.

  Her eyes brighten until they aren’t the same eyes, won’t ever be the same eyes, and she walks back to her door and disappears. He waits halfway between her and the Buick. Inside, things open and slam. People talking too low to hear. He rubs his hands on his jeans. Remembers to bend his knees. Can’t pass out. The door swings open and Dakota has a suitcase. He’s never seen her run before, and she’s breathing hard when she reaches him.

  “You’re packed?” he says.

  “I’ve been packed.”

  They race to the car. Their footsteps are a two-piece arrangement of light percussion, and it sounds like a symphony. Dakota is in his car and she has a suitcase.

  It’s all terrifying. It’s all possible.

  “What happened to We don’t have any money?”

  “We do have money,” he says, turning the key. “I have a thousand dollars.”

  The Buick’s slamming door is the only sound in The Float’s parking lot. The echo skips across pavement and crashes into the woods. Dakota sits behind the wheel. She rolls down the window.

  “How long until I need to worry?” she asks.

  “Five minutes,” he says. “This will only take five minutes.”

  He unzips his orange duffel bag and upends the contents into the trunk. Folders, packets, applications. He shuts the trunk and carries the empty bag across the parking lot. The sign on The Float’s front door has been changed.

  cld. private party.

  Lance’s hand wraps around the cool brass knob.

  Unlocked. He opens the door.

  A wash of cool air chills the sweat on his back. The wooden pirate is solemn, and The Float is empty. Vacant booths stare back at him, stools like polished stumps. A few center rounds have been draped with table coverings that resemble medical-examination paper. There’s a frosted rectangular cake on gold-laminated cardboard with a string of pink letters: we will miss you. Letters spaced with blue and green hearts.

  Lance moves as quickly as he can, but the room stretches out. He’s walking through a bog, mud to his knees. He just needs to get to the register, but it’s hours before he reaches the bar. There’s shuffling in the kitchen. Someone is coming. Lance finds the gap where the bar-top door opens. His fingers curl beneath wood.

  “Blower?”

  Mason stands in the kitchen entrance.

  “How did you get in?”

  “Door’s unlocked.”

  “Yeah? Well, we’re closed for Stone’s party. You’re not invited.”

  He stares back at Mason.

  “I’m here for my thousand dollars.”

  “What?”

  Mason walks toward Lance.

  “Want to repeat that?” Mason says. He flops his arms on the bar.

  “I’m here for my thousand dollars,” he says.

  “You want a thousand dollars? Take off your shoes and spin the wheel.”

  “No.”

  “You know your problem, Blower?” His breath hits Lance’s face. Mason’s been drinking. “You don’t know when to leave.” Mason turns away from him. He’s holding something in his right hand. A pair of black boots, laces knotted.

  “Mason.”

  “The door, Blower. It’s right there. Bye.”

  Mason’s got one boot by its meaty, rubber sole. He’s using it to spin the other in wobbly circles. Clockwise, then counterclockwise. He searches the rafters, pacing the length of the bar. Lance has seen those boots before.

  “Those are Stone’s boots,” Lance says.

  “Ding, ding, ding! You’re a genius.”

  Mason stops behind the cash register. Lowers his arm once, twice. Lance makes a choked sound. All he can say is:

  “Don’t!”

  Mason lets them go. Heavier than they look, the boots barely make it to the rafters. For a moment, it seems like they might tumble back to the floor, then the laces catch between a jumble of sneakers. One boot chases the other, toe after heel. A slow-motion dance. They spin until they’ve webbed themselves to the beam, turned outward with the tension.

  “I wonder what I’ll win?” Mason says.

  He walks past Lance and stops at the prize wheel.

  “Those aren’t your boots. You don’t get to spin.”

  “You’re hilari
ous, Blower.”

  Mason cranks on the wheel. The sound fills the bar: clickclickclickclickclickclick. The pointer stops on free beer. Mason grabs a pint glass from a stack. It makes a sharp ring, like the unsheathing of a blade. He fills the glass with dark beer and puts it on the bar.

  “That’s not your beer,” Lance says.

  Mason takes a long, loud slurp. He belches and blows the air in Lance’s direction.

  “Everything here is mine,” Mason says. “Don’t you get that? Go home.”

  “Pay me and I’ll go.”

  “Oh yeah? Anything else?”

  “Yeah. You’re not going to finish that drink.”

  Mason takes a giant gulp and gets foam on his lips. He wipes it off, and flicks the liquid at Lance’s face. Beer on his own lips, in his eyes. He blinks, wiping it off.

  Mason laughs. “You look great, Blower. Just perfect.”

  Lance turns and walks toward the front door.

  “That’s right, big man. Go back to Bend. Tell Dakota hi for me, okay? I’ll take good care of her. Don’t worry. Hey. What the hell are you doing? Blower. Hey! Hey—Wildman! Don’t touch the pirate! That shit’s antique. Step the fuck away! What’s wrong with you!”

  It takes a few twists to loosen the glue, then the sword’s handle comes free. A soft pull and it’s his. A real sword, heavy as a fistful of baseball bats, snapping into his hands like it was meant to be there.

  He walks toward the bar.

  “You owe me a thousand dollars,” Lance says.

  “You owe me a thousand dollars for wrecking my statue! Put that shit back.”

  Mason reaches for his beer.

  “Don’t,” Lance says, raising the sword.

  Mason’s shoulder moves and Lance swings. The beer explodes. A wet confetti of glass sprays across the room. There was a pint of beer, and now there isn’t. Lance cocks the sword to the ready position. Using his elbow, he flips open the bar-top door and steps forward, feet squishing onto a rubber mat.

  Mason throws back his shoulders. Makes himself big.

  “Think you’re tough, Blower? I think you’re a piece of shit.”

  Lance steps forward. Mason stands his ground, glances over his shoulder. Lance takes another step. Mason steps back.

  “Get in the walk-in,” Lance says.

  “You don’t have the balls. You won’t cut me.”