“How far is it?”
“Oh not far. It is not far, but it is deep. Takes you to the ocean, right to the beach.”
“Perfect. How do we get there?”
Macon thought this was exactly what they needed and hoped Erin agreed. He hadn’t run barely at all this week. In fact, he had been running less and less, resting up for tomorrow’s Rock N’ Roll San Diego marathon, and his legs were begging to be set free.
“This street you took to get here, just keep following it. It winds down the way and dead-ends at some baseball fields. A path winds through them, then down into a valley, behind the highway bridge.”
“Thanks, sounds great. What do you think?” He turned to Erin.
Erin didn’t answer, but instead addressed the hotel clerk.
“How many miles is it? To the beach, I mean.”
The hotel clerk had small pockmarks on his big cheeks and spoke with the Hispanic flair so common to the area. His eyes were half-moons and nearly hidden when his cheeks gave even the slightest hint of a smile. Macon imagined inking a tattoo of his smiling face on somebody’s forearm, just like it appeared before him, and how the details would bring his vibrant looks alive. Mr. Mex, Macon named him in his brain, knowing what a racist white-trash he must have sounded like, but this fellow was the cartoon figure of the happy-working Mexican, busy stocking the coffee bar full of tea packs and wiping an already-clean counter.
Mr. Mex had a name. It was Marcos. A name badge was pinned to his Comfort Lodge uniform.
“Oh, three or four miles,” Marcos said with a shrug. “Who knows? Lots of people don’t get there in a straight shot, but you can make it in two. Two miles there, and maybe five miles total by the time you get back.”
Erin cocked her head toward him with a confused cocker-spaniel look.
“The beach,” Macon said. “How sweet to be at the ocean before the sun rises?”
She remained unconvinced and poured half a cup of coffee, mixing it with a stirrer even though she took it black. Jetlag meant that their usual waking time of 7:00 a.m. eastern was now 4:00 a.m. pacific, and they were not used to the dead-of-the-night silence. They whispered a bit, and it made Macon sleepy and anxious.
“Listen, hun,” she said after one sip. “You go. Why don’t you just go? I don’t want to take Lyric out. She’s awake, but it’s a bit chilly out there. I’ll take a shower, read the paper, have coffee, and when you come back I’ll go for a run. You can take Lyric to the pool by yourself.”
“There are other places we can go,” Macon said, lightly grabbing her pinky in his hand. “We don’t need to go there. I don’t want to. Let’s just run down the sidewalk, do a loop around the IHOP, and come home or something.”
“Come on, don’t do that.” She pulled away. “You know I hate that. Just go. It’s okay.”
Yes, he was stuck, because insisting on changing the route after showing so much excitement for running to the beach would really piss her off. It would be a cold, angry, and silent run. Besides, pool time with him and Lyric sounded fun.
“My last training run, without you. Do you trust me to do this and not blow it?”
“No, I’m sure you will blow it. But go ahead. You’ll learn. Go ahead and run more than a few miles today, and run them fast, as fast as you want, and you’ll be toast and regret it during the last few miles of the marathon.”
This was another challenge: an invitation for him to fuck everything up and blow up their plans for the rest of their lives. This run was just to loosen his legs, and if he ran it too fast, he would be tapping into energy and muscles being saved for tomorrow. He needed everything he could to finish the marathon. At the finish line, he had big plans.
“Okay, but I’ll run four miles at the most, and slow enough that it will seem like I’m crawling back. Maybe I’ll take a few hours—whatever it takes to show you I’m going to run it slow. So, you good? You okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine. I’d rather wait until the sun rises anyways. Just be ready to watch Lyric when I come back. She’ll have breakfast in her, and her suit will be ready. I’ll go for a longer run in the heat of the day.”
Ah, this is part of her motivation, he realized. She wants to run more than the three or four miles I’m putting in today, which is perfect. She was always full of great energy and steamy, sexual testosterone after a raging longer run. Of course, today was an all-family day, but maybe there’d be a chance at nap time.
“Okay, I’ll check out the route, and maybe you can take it later, in the light of the day, when it’s not so dark and we don’t have to run by faith, rather than by sight.” He quoted the hotel clerk Marcos loud enough that they all could hear.
Lyric got out of the stroller, and Macon knelt down to look at her eye-to-eye. Lyric’s eyes always sucked out the best of him—such divine, piercing blue innocence. The moment she was pulled out of Erin’s belly through a C-section, those blue eyes were little treasures buried under puffy eyelids. Macon had stood by in scrubs, hands in the rubber gloves and his head in a daze. They said the blue eyes may change color, that they may just be temporary. Not possible, no way. She’d always have blue eyes; he knew it. As long as she was alive, they’d be ocean blue to him. They were a warm gulf, not the cold Pacific, and a whole sea of life lived within them.
The blonde hair she was born with had grown a darker shade of brown over the last six years as time had its way with her.
“We’re going to go swimming, and we’re going to do some cannonballs,” he said, one hand on her shoulder.
“Cannonballs?”
“Yep, big ones, except don’t let this man know.” He motioned toward the hotel clerk with his eyes. “Because we are going to make splashes so big, all the water will fly out of the pool.”
Macon took her arm and pretended to tattoo her shoulder, tracing a slow but definite heart, and then wrote I on top of it, followed by the letter U below it. It was the tattoo he said he’d give her when she graduated high school.
Lyric pushed herself out of the jogging stroller and reached for the white UP button on the elevator.
“Just a few miles, and slow,” Erin repeated, and Macon gave her a hug. He felt the muscles in her back tense as he squeezed her a little too long and tight for the audience, but then the ding of the arriving elevator sounded, and mother and child were soon swept up and away.
Just a few miles and slow, he thought he heard her say again as the door closed, but he wasn’t sure.
The image of her face stayed with him long after the elevator door closed, like the bright image you stare at and then remains on the inside of your eyelids when you close them tight. That was how Erin had imprinted herself onto him.
“Such a sweet child and wife you have,” the hotel clerk said in the leftover silence. “You like this place here? You like San Diego? You come here on purpose?”
“Yes, they are sweet, but she’s not my wife—not yet at least. And hells yes, I love it here. It has all the elements: the mountains one way, the sea the other, and a nice fiery sun burning down. You can feel this place being squeezed in between.”
“Squeezed real tight. You do see well. What have you seen so far?”
“Going to take our daughter to the zoo, maybe Sea World, but first I’m resting up for the marathon tomorrow.”
“Oh you’re one of those? Our shuttle driver, Maria, will drive you to the start in the morning if you’d like. Good driver, Maria is.” He motioned to a quiet woman with dark hair and a meticulous uniform cleaning the lobby. “She will drive many of you. You pronghorns are all over the place.”
“Pronghorns?”
“Yes, pronghorn; second-fastest land animal. You look for them at the zoo. I’ve been there many times. The Pronghorn’s not as fast as the cheetah, but they can run faster and farther. A cheetah sprints fast and looks pretty, but a pronghorn can mock them running farther. And did you know,” he leaned forward, “when they get scared, their family can smell them. The whole herd smells their fear and
runs. You look it up. I know these things, you see. You won’t make a living trying to eat pronghorns.”
“You sound like you know the zoo,” Macon said, hoping it would conclude the conversation. I made a mistake letting Erin go, Macon decided and even eyed the UP button on the elevator. He should have ran a mile and then played tag with Lyric. Then they could have stayed in the hotel room, read the USA Today, drawn Crayola cartoons, and taken a long trip to the breakfast buffet.
Instead, he was standing there being held hostage by Marcos, this Mr. Mex man. Macon looked away and focused on the green Comfort Lodge logo on a pile of matches while listening to the bubbly tirade.
“You will like the zoo. You will like it. We have maps. We have shuttles. We have discount tickets. You come see me. The fffaaaamooous San Diego Zoo! You know what? If you ask me, the animals are so happy there, because the place is not a zoo—it’s animal heaven. You think a wild animal would want to live at this zoo if given the chance? I don’t know. Once you are born wild maybe you stay wild, and you are born in heaven and stay in heaven. But the zoo—everything an animal could want, content for life, no worries. All is provided for. It is like the United States we came here looking for.”
“Where are you from?”
The question seemed stupid coming out of Macon’s mouth, but here he was, a misfit with sleeves of tattoos up and down his arms, a nearly shaved head, wearing running gear at a time when the only folks awake were drunks stumbling in from the bar looking for a late-night fish taco. Tacos—the whole place beamed with taco joints, produce markets, and large families outside at dusk. He needed to have one, a fish taco, but not before his race. He could not put anything new in his gut, just bland bananas and pasta, but tomorrow afternoon, he’d eat some fish tacos.
“I came from where you are going, or where you will go if you get lost—Tijuana, born and bred. Raised there, more or less.” He chuckled. “You have your Detroits that look like a preschool compared to my place. Babies are born just to be dead bodies to scare the cops. Uh-huh, more dangerous to be a cop there—safe to be a tweaking meth-head. You know those. You see those tweakers. ‘Tweakers,’ you call them, right?”
“Baseball field at the dead-end, right?” Macon asked, indicating he wanted to be on his way, but Marcos ignored him.
“You know Tijuana, you guys call it TJ; it has tunnels, tunnels all into this place. All those dead bodies you hear about, the ones you see from drug wars with heads cut-off, tortured, dismembered, decapitated and burnt up—the ones found in cans of gas and set aflame. Well, they litter the place… start to smell; they rot. Used to be guys like me come here to make things better. Guys like me come here to take care of their families back home—that’s what I do. I come here, and I take care of my family with the money I make. But things are different. People used to think they can come here and be like me, but they can’t anymore. They should stay home. But the bad ones, the ones who are like litter—well, they stink, they rot, and they overflow.”
Macon shook his head, sipped his tea, and arranged the coffee creams in a little tower that was sure to topple at the first touch.
“Yes, sir, I came through in a maze of drainage tunnels, half-mile tunnels, dark places. But don’t worry; you won’t slip in them. You’ll smell the trash. They bring the drugs and the trash over.”
“Thanks. You have a good day. Got to go,” said Macon with a departing wave, but the man wasn’t done.
“When you take your daughter to the zoo tomorrow, you know, after your little run, you tell me this…” Marcos leaned forward over his own hot cup of tea. “Tell me this; would you rather have a life of heaven, like the animals at the zoo, where everything you could ever dream is provided for and you have no worries in your life ever? Or would you rather have a life of adventure, where you have to prove yourself each day to survive and are never sure how long you will live and if you will be eaten. You, an animal in the zoo, you want to escape that? No-no-no-no, probably not. You go.”
“I can answer that now. No bars can keep me in. Heaven is having to prove myself every day. So, my friend, there’s my answer. Cheers.”
Macon started on his run down the road toward the dead-end street. Past the baseball fields, down the path, and just go straight, he thought to himself. Pronghorns should run free.
Chapter Two
Erin loved tents, and she loved hotel rooms. Nothing beat the freedom of carrying your own house on your back and living basic and free for a weekend, but hotels were the opposite and let her wallow in excess. There were three fluffy white towels after each shower. She could mess up the sheets as much as possible, have hot coffee in bed with no fear of spills, and always had new pillowcases to rest her head on every day. Erin didn’t mind when Lyric scattered her toys all over the stained carpet. Hotel living brought out the mass consumer hidden in her vegan, hemp-wearing self.
And now there was another guilty pleasure: the longest, hottest shower she’d ever endured with massive water pressure pounding down upon her body. Steam fogged the bathroom, making the air just as moist as the fire hose of water that beat down on her, and she moved back and forth, rocking herself gently to let it massage her skin until it was raw.
The bathroom door remained cracked so she could hear Lyric playing and talking back to the Dora show. “Backpack, backpack… the map… swiper no swiping…” The smug, cheery voice made her smile and know her little girl was safe and she could enjoy this moment longer.
Her ivory skin was turning red, her whole body becoming colored, and the contrast to the flower tattoo that wrapped from her side to just under her left breast faded. Her flesh had turned the same crimson red.
Outside, Macon was running but should be back soon. He will go too far, too fast. She knew that. But hopefully not too much. Every bit over a few slow miles is just energy from his legs taken from tomorrow.
He doesn’t listen, won’t listen. He has that sharp edge that cuts up any comment given to him and tells everyone to fuck right off. But it’s been rounding, and his new marathon training is giving him focus, drive. It is directing his energy and making him shine. She could see the Lyric in him.
Don’t be disappointed if he doesn’t finish tomorrow, she told herself, and don’t console him so much that he feels like a little boy. Don’t judge if he’s crawling and walking.
Macon’s training was intense, and he had run plenty of miles including a couple twenty-mile training runs. That was as much as she did during her first marathon five years ago. But he was made of different material than her, material with unknown elements. Of what, she wasn’t sure, but she had been waiting to find out because the time had come to either cut bait or hold him forever.
Marathons squeeze you and force out what’s inside. She knew this, and she was about to see his guts squished right out, cut out of him, and she would see what he was made of. He never let her do that. He was always holding something back; despite their cutting honesty, parts were always left hidden.
Where does he go sometimes? She had no clue.
She rotated in the shower after her back felt scorched and let it massage her stomach, then down to her thighs. Her muscles were loose, warm, fluid, and the pain and pleasure mixed until she could not tell which was which. She felt the phoenix on her back rising from the burn, and the mermaid swimming through the soothing, tropical water on her belly. She looked at her arms, where Macon had inked the phrase, Mother is the name for God on the lips and hearts of all children. It was written in italics, but the reddened flesh made the words seem to blink. The hot, streaming water made her ink come to life, vibrating with feeling, much like the day they were born. Her first tattoo was born on the day of her first child’s funeral. It wasn’t just a funeral—it was a funeral weekend, for three days to harrow hell.
How terrible—what torture, to live one second longer than her own baby, and her whole mission was to somehow bring that child back to life. A tattoo of the name Max was near her heart, just under her right breast,
with birth and death dates. Macon had made flash art of a portrait of Max to tattoo onto her, just a sketch, but it would have been too much to have his face in the mirror everyday looking back at her. She already saw him in her mind’s eye when she closed her eyes at night; sometimes he was smiling at her, sometimes he was in a hospital NICU lying helpless with tubes sticking out of his body, and other times in her dreams he came to her. But she could never stay awake—never. It always jolted her, as if seeing his face felt the same as that last second of falling before you hit the pavement.
Her parents flew in for these three days and flew out before the airline could even find their lost luggage. She dropped them off at the airport and came home to her apartment, which smelled of four-day-old, stale air. With the feigning family closeness over, she returned to her home where the silence hurt to listen to. Her insides felt like the pit of a peach, hardened and shriveled. She wanted to curl up and perpetually hug her own soul, to take away the gnawing pain that ate away her insides. There had to be a way to stop it, to control it, to wash it away.
When she was fourteen, after her grandmother’s funeral, she had locked herself inside the bathroom, still in her black floral dress, and watched as the safety pin and then the razor cut into her skin. It was the best way to make her body feel; the blood was so rich and the rush that filled her so sweet. She swore she could hear a buzz in her ears. Thick, red blood made her nerves feel on fire. Different sharp objects would find their way back to her hands. It became a common scene, and by sixteen, she had a lot of scars.
She needed that feeling again after Max’s death. She was twenty-eight years old with an empty apartment, empty life, and empty insides. It was a Sunday evening with no life to it.
When she found the tattoo parlor open that night, she had no idea what she was going to have done. Make me bleed and feel alive, was all she could think. The man behind the counter seemed silently wise––a picture of still life, a constant, but his skin was aglow with a spectrum of colors up and down his arm. A sparkling piercing danced in his brow when he smiled.
On the Lips of Children Page 2