“Well, really I wanted to be that plus a theoretical physicist and an astronaut and I wanted to work for NASA, but I was a little delusional back then. Obviously.”
“Camryn,” I say, still so surprised that I barely know what to say. “Why didn’t you ever tell me this before?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know,” she says. “It just never came up. Didn’t you ever dream of being something other than what you are?”
“Yeah, I guess so,” I say. “But baby, why didn’t you pursue it?” I lift away from the blanket and sit upright. This calls for my full attention.
She looks at me like I’m overreacting. “Probably for the same reason you didn’t pursue whatever it was that you wanted to be.” She draws her knees upward and rests her hands over her stomach, her fingers interlocked. “What did you want to be?”
I don’t want to talk about me right now, but I guess I better answer her, since she’s brought it up twice.
I bring my knees up, too, and prop my forearms on top them. “Well, aside from the clichéd rock-star dream everybody has, I wanted to be an architect.”
“Really?”
“Yeah,” I say with a nod.
“Is that what you were studying in college before you dropped out?”
I shake my head. “No,” I say and laugh lightly at the absurdity of my answer. “I was in college for accounting and business.”
Camryn’s eyebrows draw inward. “Accounting? Are you serious?” She’s almost laughing.
“I know, right?” I say, laughing it off myself. “Aiden offered me part ownership of his bar. Back then I just had dollar signs in my eyes, and I thought that owning a bar would be an awesome opportunity. I could play my music there and… I don’t know what I was thinking, but I jumped at my brother’s offer. Then he started talking about how I’d need to understand the business aspects of it and all that shit. I enrolled in college, and that was pretty much where the idea ended. I didn’t give a shit about accounting, or running a bar or having to deal with all of the negative that comes with owning a business.” I pause for a moment and then say, “I guess, like you said, I was delusional, wanted all the positives but none of the negatives. When I realized it didn’t work that way, I said fuck it.”
She lifts to sit upright with me. “So, then why didn’t you pursue the architect thing?”
I smirk. “Probably for the same reason you didn’t pursue the astrophysicist thing.”
She just smiles, having no real rebuttal to that one.
I gaze beyond Camryn’s blonde hair and out at the field. “I guess we’re just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl,” I say.
Her eyes narrow. “I’ve heard that somewhere before.”
I smile and point at her briefly. “Pink Floyd. But it’s the truth.”
“You think we’re lost?”
I tilt my head back a little and look up at the stars behind her and say, “In society, maybe. But together, no. I think we’re right where we need to be.”
Neither of us say anything more for quite some time.
We lie back down next to each other and do what we came out here to do. As I gaze up at the infinite blackness of that sky, I’m in complete awe of the moment. I think I find some of myself up in those stars. For a long time I forget about music, being on the road, about the tumor that almost killed me last year, and the moment of weakness that almost killed Camryn’s spirit. I forget about losing Lily, and about the fact that I know Camryn stopped taking her birth control pills and didn’t tell me. And I forget about the fact that I stopped pulling out for a reason and didn’t tell her.
I really do forget about everything. Because that’s what a moment like this does to you. It makes you feel like something so small inside of something so massive that it’s beyond comprehension. It strips away all of your problems, all of your hardships, all of your worldly needs and wants and desires, forcing you to realize just how insignificant all of it really is. It’s like the Earth becomes completely silent and still, and all that your mind can understand or feel is the vastness of the Universe and you gasp thinking about your place within it.
Who needs psychiatrists? Who needs grief counselors and life coaches and motivational speakers? Fuck all that. Just stare at the night sky and let yourself get lost in it every now and then.
* * *
Something unpleasant wakes me the next morning. I sniff the air with my eyes still closed, my mind not fully awake but my body and sense of smell working ahead of me. There’s a mild chill in the air and my skin feels moist, as if covered by early morning dew. Rolling over onto my other side, I sniff the air again and it’s even fouler than before. I hear something rustling nearby, and finally my eyes open a slit. Camryn’s passed out next to me. I can just barely see her blonde braid lying on the blanket in between us. She seems to be curled in the fetal position.
What is that smell?!
I cover my mouth with my hand and start to raise myself from the blanket. Camryn begins to move at the same time, rolling over onto her back and rubbing her face and eyes with both hands. She yawns. As I sit upright and open my eyes the rest of the way, Camryn asks, “What the hell is that smell?” and her face contorts.
I’m just about to say that it’s probably her breath when her blue eyes grow scary-wide as she looks behind me.
Instinctively, I turn around fast.
A herd of cows stand just feet from us, and when they sense us moving around, they spook.
“Oh my God!” Camryn jumps up faster than she did that night the snake slithered over our blanket, causing me to do the same.
Two cows moo and moan and grunt, backing into the other cows behind them, stirring the herd that much more.
“I think we better get outta here,” I say, grabbing her hand and running with her.
We don’t wait long enough to stop and grab the blanket at first, but I stop and double back seconds later to snatch it up. Camryn shrieks and I start laughing as we dash away from the cows and toward the car.
“Awww, shiiiit!” I yell when I step in a huge pile of it.
Camryn cackles with laughter, and we both practically stumble the rest of the way through the field, me trying to scrape the shit off the bottom of my shoe while running at the same time, and Camryn’s flip-flops getting caught on the ground as they try to keep up with her feet.
“I can’t believe that just happened!” Camryn laughs, as we finally make it back to the car. She arches her body forward and props her hands on her knees, trying to catch her breath.
I’m out of breath, too, but I still relentlessly scrape the bottom of my shoe on the asphalt. “Dammit!” I say, rubbing my foot back and forth.
Camryn jumps up on the hood of the car, letting her legs hang over the front. “Now can we say that we did it?” she asks with laughter in her voice.
I stand still and catch my breath. I look at her, at how beautiful and bright that smile of hers is, and say, “Yeah, I think we can safely mark it off our list.”
“Good!” she says. Then she points behind me. “Do it on the grass,” she says with one side of her mouth pinched into a hard line. “You’re just spreading it around doing it like that.”
I hop over into the grass and start rubbing my foot back and forth again. “Since when did you become an expert on shit?”
“Better watch your mouth,” she warns, getting into the driver’s seat.
“What are you going to do?” I taunt her.
She starts the Chevelle and revs the engine a few times. There’s a cruel gleam in her eyes. She props her left arm across the top of the open window and next thing I know she’s driving slowly past me.
I give her the warning eye, but her grin just gets bigger.
“I know you won’t leave me here!” I shout as she goes past me.
Surely she wouldn’t…
She gets farther away and at first I call her bluff and just stand here, watching her get smaller and smaller…
Finally, I take off running after the car
.
29
The first thing that comes to mind when we make it to New Orleans is home sweet home. I get a rush when the sights become familiar: the great oak trees and beautiful historic homes, Lake Pontchartrain and the Superdome, the red and yellow streetcars that always reminded me of toys. And, of course, the French Quarter. There’s even a man playing a saxophone on a street corner, and I feel like we’ve driven directly into a New Orleans postcard.
I look over at Andrew, and he smiles across at me briefly. He flips on his blinker and we turn right onto Royal Street. My heart flutters and pounds at the same time when I see the Holiday Inn. So much happened here ten months ago. This place… a hotel, of all places… it’s so much more than that to me, to both of us.
“I figured you’d want to stay here while we’re in town,” Andrew says, beaming.
Because the memories are still figuratively taking my breath away, I can’t answer him, so I just nod and match his smile.
We grab our stuff from the car and head into the lobby. Everything looks exactly the same, except maybe for the two women behind the front desk when we approach. I don’t remember seeing them before.
Vaguely I hear Andrew ask about the availability of our old rooms while I’m looking around at everything, trying to soak it all in.
God, I missed this place.
“Yes, looks like both of those rooms are vacant,” I hear one of the front desk clerks say. “Would you like both?”
That gets my attention.
Andrew turns to me. I guess he wants to know what I think.
I switch my bag to the opposite shoulder and hesitate for a moment, pondering the question. I never anticipated this, or that it would be such a hard decision.
“Ummm, well…” I look to Andrew and then the clerk, still undecided. “I don’t know. OK, maybe we should just get the one we…” I stop myself, not wanting to make us look like two immature sixteen-year-olds this time, and then I eye Andrew with that knowing look. “The one where the deal was sealed.”
Andrew’s lips struggle to remain straight, but I clearly see the smile in his eyes as he reaches out his hand to the clerk and hands her his credit card.
We leave the lobby shortly after and ride the elevator up to our floor. On the way down the hall I’m still absorbing everything around me, right down to the color of paint on the walls, because it’s all part of a memory no matter how big or small or seemingly insignificant. The feeling of being here again… I almost feel like I’m going to break out in happy tears. But I’m excited, too, and that saves me from becoming a blubbering mess.
Andrew stops in between the two doors of our old rooms, two bags and the electric guitar I bought him hanging over his shoulders. He’s been meaning to buy a case for the guitar, but he hasn’t gotten around to it yet.
“Strange being here again, huh?” he asks, glancing over at me.
“Strange, but in a good way,” I say.
We stay like this for a minute, looking at each other and then at the two doors, until finally Andrew steps up to the one we paid for and slides the key card through the lock.
It really is like stepping into the past. The door swings open slowly, and it’s as if all the emotions that we experienced in this room were left behind and are now greeting us as we enter. As we step inside, I remember every night we slept here, apart and together, as if it happened yesterday. I look at the spot near the bed where I stood when Andrew broke me down and made me his. I glance toward the window overlooking the busy streets of the French Quarter. I envision the day Andrew sat on that windowsill playing his acoustic, and even when I was the one over there, dancing and singing to “Barton Hollow” when I thought I was alone. I turn to see the bathroom, and as Andrew flips on the light in there my gaze falls to the floor first and I recall the night, although vaguely, when he slept next to me.
I guess sometimes the greatest memories are made in the most unlikely of places, further proof that spontaneity is more rewarding than a meticulously planned life. A meticulously planned anything.
I turn to Andrew. “I don’t know why, but I feel… well, I feel like all these months on the road since December were to get to this place. This city. This hotel.” I can’t believe what I’m saying, and immediately I start questioning my reasons. It could mean so many different things, but the one I think it means most is that we needed to come back here.
Yes, that’s exactly it, or at least it’s what I needed. As this revelation hits me, I find myself standing in this room surrounded by thoughts rather than material objects. I look into Andrew’s eyes, but I don’t really see him. I see him in the past instead. Same magnetic green eyes, different year.
Why am I feeling this way?
“Maybe you’re right,” he says, and then his tone shifts to something more mysterious. “Camryn, what are you thinking right now?”
“That we left too soon the first time.” It was the first thing that came to mind, and only now that I’ve said it do I start to understand just how true it might be.
“Why do you think that is?” he asks, stepping closer to me.
I don’t feel like he’s asking me questions he already knows the answers to this time. It’s like we’re both thinking along the same lines, both trying to make sense of it all and seeking answers from each other.
We sit down on the foot of the bed together, my hands wedged between my thighs, just as his are, and we’re quiet for several long seconds. Finally, I turn my head to see him on my right and say, “I never wanted to leave when we did, Andrew. I knew our next stop after New Orleans would be Galveston. I wasn’t ready to leave this place… but I don’t know why.”
And this truth makes me anxious.
Why? Other than fearing that Texas meant the end of the road for us, or that I later felt like I knew something bad would happen there, why else would I want to stay here? I didn’t necessarily want to stay here forever, just that simply we left too soon.
“I dunno,” he says with a mild shrug. “Maybe it’s just because this is where we finally sealed the deal.” He elbows me playfully.
I can’t help but smile. “Yeah, maybe, but I think it’s more than that, Andrew. I think it’s because we found ourselves here.” I stare off toward the wall in thought. “I just don’t know.”
I feel the bed move as Andrew stands up.
“Well, I say that this time we make the most of it before we leave.” He reaches out his hand to me and I take it. “Maybe we’ll figure it out.”
I stand up and say, “Or… maybe it’s a do-over.”
Honestly, I have no idea what made me say that.
“To do what over exactly?” he asks.
I pause, thinking about it, and then answer, “I don’t know that, either.…”
30
I cup her face in the palms of my hands. “We don’t have to figure that out right now,” I say and kiss her lips. “I smell like cow shit and I need a shower. Hopefully, you’re not so turned off by that and will join me.”
Camryn’s thoughtful expression dissolves into that grin I was shooting for.
I pick her up, cradling her ass in my hands, and she wraps her legs around my waist, hangs her arms over my shoulders. The second I taste her warm tongue in my mouth, I’m carrying her off to the shower with me, both of our shirts falling onto the floor before we make it past the bathroom door.
* * *
The very first place we hit after sundown is Old Point Bar. When we walk through the front door, we’re welcomed by an excited Carla who practically pushes two big guys out of the way to get to me, her arms wide out at her sides. We collapse into a hug.
“It’s so great to see you again!” Carla says over the loud music. “Let me look at you!” She takes a step back and examines me from my shoes to my head. “Still as handsome as ever.”
She turns to Camryn now. Then she glances at me and then back to Camryn again. “Uh-huh, I knew he wouldn’t let you go.” She pulls Camryn into a hug and squeeze
s her tight.
“I told Eddie after you two left,” she goes on, looking back and forth between us, “that she was a keeper. Eddie agreed, of course. He said the next time you came around here that Camryn would be with you. He tried to bet me money on it.” She points at me and winks. “You know how Eddie was.”
In two seconds I feel my heart sink into the soles of my feet. “ ‘Was’?” I ask warily, afraid of her answer.
Carla doesn’t lose her smile, maybe just a little, but for the most part she doesn’t lose it. “I’m sorry, Andrew, but Eddie died in March. A stroke, they say.”
My breath hitches, and I take a seat on a bar stool next to me. I sense Camryn step up beside me. All I can see is the floor.
“Oh don’t you do that now, you hear me?” Carla says. “You knew Eddie better than just about anyone. He didn’t even cry when his own son died. You remember? He played his guitar all night long in Robert’s honor.”
Camryn’s hand interlocks with one of mine. I don’t look up until Carla walks around the bar and grabs two shot glasses and a bottle of whiskey from the glass shelf behind her. She sets the glasses down in front of me and starts pouring.
“He always said,” Carla continues, “that if he died before any of us did that he’d rather be woken up on the Other Side to people dancin’ on his grave than cryin’ on it. Now drink up. His favorite whiskey. He wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Carla’s right. Even though she is, and I know Eddie would hate it that anyone grieved over him, I still can’t let go of the bottomless hole I feel in my heart right now. I look at Camryn next to me and see that she’s trying not to cry, her eyes coated with tears. But she smiles, and I feel her hand gently squeezing mine. Camryn reaches out for the whiskey that Carla poured and waits for me to take the other. I slide my hand across the bar top and grasp it in my fingers.
“To Eddie,” I say.
“To Eddie,” Camryn repeats.
We touch our glasses, smile at each other and drink it down.
Our serious moment is quickly over when Camryn brings her hand down, slamming the glass upside-down on the bar. She makes the most disgusted, kick-in-the-teeth face I’ve ever seen a girl make and lets out a sound like her breath is on fire.
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