by Alexa Land
There was my opening. “I’m looking for somebody by the name of Tony. He used to come to this bar, back in the late eighties. Or, well, he did once.”
The bartender’s expression became grave. “He owe you money or something?”
“No, nothing like that. He, uh…he knocked up my mom.” I took another drink of beer, feeling like a complete idiot.
“So, you’re….”
“His son.”
“What the fuck are you playing at?” The man’s sharp tone startled me.
“Nothing!” I stammered. “I just want to find my dad.”
“Get out of here,” he growled. “Now!” He was furious, and I had no idea why.
The barstool almost fell over when I slid off it quickly, but I righted it and fished in my pocket with a shaking hand. I found a five dollar bill and put it on the bar for the beer, then took a step backwards as I asked, “Please just tell me, do you know him?”
“I said get out!”
My pulse was racing as I turned and fled, equal parts startled and baffled. When I got to my car, I pulled out of the parking lot and circled around Gala for a few minutes to try to calm down. I had absolutely no idea what had just happened or what I’d said to make that man so angry, and his reaction had really rattled me.
A heavy weariness settled on me as I drove around. The last few days had finally caught up to me, all that driving combined with barely sleeping or eating. I desperately needed to get some rest, then I could regroup and figure out what I needed to do.
The only place I could find in town was called the Gala Holiday Motel, right beside the I-90. It looked run-down and was adjacent to a truck stop, neither of which were good selling points. I was too tired to care, though.
When I checked in, my heart jumped as I was handed the key to room two-fifteen. As I climbed the stairs to the second floor, it was clear that the Gala Not-Holiday-Inn was worlds removed from the Whitman. In my room, its orange shag carpet was stained and the nylon bedspread smelled like it hadn’t been washed since it was bought in the 1970s. I peeled it off the bed and rolled it into a ball, which I deposited in the far corner of the room. Then I pushed my sneakers off and climbed onto the bed. At least they’d washed the sheets between customers.
I started to worry as I laid there, and sat up, pulled out my wallet, and counted my cash. I had seventeen dollars on me and another hundred-twenty hidden beneath the seat in my Honda, just in case I got mugged. I hadn’t planned on giving my brother that extra four hundred dollars, but then I hadn’t expected to find him living in squalor and existing on ramen noodles either. I calculated how many times I’d had to fill my gas tank coming here, and what I’d need to get back. This was the only night I’d be able to afford staying in a motel, and my food budget would have to be somewhere around five bucks a day. I fell back onto the pillow and stared at the ceiling.
Zachary had been right to try to talk me out of going. This trip had been such a stupid idea. My mom hadn’t even been home, my kid brother was a stranger, and the only lead I had for finding my dad had ended with some nut job screaming at me for absolutely no reason. I felt lonely, hungry, tired, and more than a little defeated. I curled up on my side and pulled a pillow over my head to drown out some of the noise from the truck stop. Fortunately, I was so exhausted that I fell asleep almost immediately.
*****
I slept for a couple hours and was awakened by a particularly loud shriek of air brakes from the truck stop. Ugh. I wanted to go back to sleep, but I was absolutely starving. No surprise, since my last meal had been fast food sometime around noon the day before. I rolled out of bed, slipped on my sneakers and used the bathroom, then pulled my phone out of my pocket to check the time. It was just past four p.m. There were two missed calls from Finn but no new messages. The charge indicator read seven percent. I’d used the phone to navigate to Gala and that had drained the battery. When I went to plug it in, I realized I’d left my backpack in the car.
I pulled my keys from my pocket, left my room and jogged down the exterior staircase to the parking lot. Then I stopped short and looked around. It took me a long moment to process the fact that the Civic wasn’t where I’d left it. It wasn’t anywhere. “Oh God,” I rasped, panic rising up in me.
I ran to the front office and exclaimed, “I think my car was stolen!”
The young guy behind the counter blinked at me. “Did you lock it?”
“Of course!”
“Don’t know what to tell you, dude.” He was utterly indifferent.
“Fuck!” I left the office, ran to the street and looked in both directions, not that I expected to see the car. I just didn’t know what else to do.
I felt crushed as the full reality of what had happened hit me. I dropped to my knees on the sidewalk and tears rolled down my face. It was gone. Oh God, I was so fucked.
My phone vibrated in my pocket. Finn’s name was on the screen, and when I answered it, a sob slipped from me. “Chance, what’s wrong?” he asked, sounding alarmed.
“Everything. Every fucking thing. They stole my car. Why the hell would someone steal a twenty-eight-year-old Honda? All my stuff was inside it. Oh God, my camera was in the trunk! And Bobo. Shit, Finn, Bobo was in the car!”
“Who’s Bobo?”
“My teddy bear. He was the only thing I brought with me when I ran away from home. I loved that bear,” I said, my voice breaking.
“Where are you?”
“Fucking Gala, Wyoming at the fucking Not-Holiday-Inn. They gave me room two-fifteen, Finn. It made my heart ache.” I doubled over, absolutely sobbing. I barely knew what I was saying.
“Chance, take a deep breath, try to calm down.” I just kept crying, curling up into a ball on the cracked, weedy sidewalk.
My phone beeped and I mumbled, “Shit, my phone’s about to die. The fucking charger was in the car. Everything was in the car. Oh God, what am I going to do?”
“Baby, just hang on. Everything’s going to be alright.”
“It’s not, Finn! Nothing’s going to be alright! They stole my fucking car in broad daylight! How am I supposed to get home? I only have seventeen dollars on me, the rest was in the car. I shouldn’t have given my brother all that money, but I thought he needed it more than I did.”
“Chance—”
The phone beeped again, and another sob slipped from me. I muttered, mostly to myself, “Fuck, I’m going to have to turn tricks at that truck stop to make enough money to get home. That’s gonna suck in a place like this. I think my odds are dead even on landing some jobs or getting the shit beat out of me.”
“Chance, no! I—”
My phone went dead in my hand and I wrapped my arms around myself. My whole body shook as I cried. Several minutes passed before I calmed down enough to sit up and drag my palm over my wet cheeks. My head was absolutely pounding, and I realized I’d attracted an audience. Several people stood at a distance watching me, but no one made a move to ask if I needed help.
I pushed myself to my feet unsteadily and went back to my motel room, where I curled up in a ball on the bed and pulled the covers up to my ears. I knew I needed to report my car stolen, but there wasn’t a phone in the room and I needed a few minutes to get it under control before I went outside again. I hadn’t cried like that in years. I hadn’t felt that helpless and scared in just as long.
It reminded me of how I’d felt when I’d first arrived in San Francisco, and the reality of what I would need to do to survive hit me like a ton of bricks. Sometimes I thought I’d left that frightened little boy far behind. Other times, I realized that was complete bullshit and I’d never actually stopped being him, not for a moment.
*****
I awoke with a start sometime later. It was nighttime, but the room wasn’t dark because the light from the motel’s garish neon sign filtered in through the thin curtains. I’d cried myself to sleep, which hadn’t been my intention. The dead phone was still in my hand, and I slipped it in my pocket as I got
up and went into the bathroom.
The person looking back at me in the mirror was a total mess. Washing my face helped, but only a little. My eyes were red and swollen, my pale skin mottled. I tried to fix my hair with my fingers, since my comb was in my backpack, and wished I’d taken the time to shave that morning. Some men looked good with a bit of razor stubble. I looked like I’d been living on the street, which I soon would be if I didn’t raise enough money to get myself home.
I pocketed my room key, walked over to the truck stop and called the local police department from a payphone. The indifferent voice on the line took some information, told me the officer on duty was out on another call, and suggested I come down in person to file the report. “You just heard the part where my car was stolen, right? How am I supposed to get down there?” I asked.
“That’s not my problem,” the dispatcher said. I sighed and hung up the phone.
I sat down on a bench and took a few deep breaths. Behind me was a twenty-four-hour convenience store and gas station, and ahead of me was a parking lot full of huge trucks. I’d never worked someplace like that before. When I was street hustling, it was pretty clear why I was there, and the customers would come to me. I’d worked clubs and bars too and done some active soliciting, but they’d been gay businesses so my chances of getting punched in the face for propositioning someone were pretty slim. A redneck truck stop in Wyoming was another thing entirely.
My left knee bounced nervously, and I wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans. I seriously needed to get a grip, but the day had left me rattled. I was still so fucking hungry, too, which was probably why my head was pounding. But until I earned a few dollars, I couldn’t worry about anything else.
I pushed off the bench and wandered among the trucks. I realized after a while that I was practically wearing a hole in my wrist by the way I was rubbing my tattoo and shoved my hands in my pockets. Whenever I caught someone’s eye, I’d smile, but that just earned me funny looks. Clearly subtlety wasn’t going to work out here. I spotted a younger truck driver that didn’t look like a total douche and took a deep breath, then went up to him and said hi.
“Hey.”
I tried my best to look flirtatious, which made me feel like an idiot. “Want a date?” Ugh, that was so cheesy.
He knit his brows and growled, “Hell no! Fucking faggot,” before pushing past me roughly to head to the convenience store. Well, hey, at least I didn’t get punched.
I wandered to a different part of the truck stop, trying the same line a couple more times with similar results. There were very few people around, since most of the truckers were bedded down for the night. I propositioned everyone I saw, even guys I’d normally avoid. I wondered how long it’d be before one of them reported me to the manager of the truck stop and the cops got called.
Finally, in the farthest corner of the lot, I tried the line on a big, tatted guy of about twenty-eight with a shaved head and a beer gut. He eyed me for a moment before asking, “How much?” I named a figure and told him that price was for a blow job. He considered it, then offered me a lower amount. Ugh, he was actually haggling!
I was too desperate to argue though, so I agreed to the price and climbed into the cab of his truck. As soon as the door was closed behind us, he started pawing at me and trying to unfasten my belt. “What are you doing? This was just supposed to be a blow job,” I said as I tried to push his hands away.
“I don’t want a blow job, I wanna fuck you.” His breath smelled like cigarettes and alcohol.
“That’s not what we agreed to.”
“So what? I’m changin’ it.”
“We can’t have sex. I don’t have any condoms.” I tried to slide away from him, but he grabbed my wrist and tried to climb on top of me.
“I don’t like fuckin’ with condoms,” he slurred, his hands all over my body. Shit, he was really drunk.
He had size on his side, but I had agility. I managed to wriggle out from under him as my heart pounded and somehow got the door of the truck open, but he grabbed my t-shirt and tore it completely off me as I jumped out of the cab. He wasn’t done, either. He followed me out of the truck and caught me before I’d made it five yards, grabbing me by my hair as he hissed, “Come back here you fuckin’ whore! You’re bought and paid for!”
“No I’m not. You didn’t give me any money and I sure as hell didn’t agree to getting barebacked!”
He slapped me so hard that my vision faltered and I fell to my knees. “You’re getting’ fucked, faggot,” he told me, and started to drag me back to the truck by my hair.
I fought wildly. He almost had me back to the cab of the truck. If he got me in there again, I was in trouble. I grabbed a bit of crumbled asphalt and kicked his leg, and when he spun on me I threw it in his face.
All that did was enrage him. He dropped me with a hard stomach punch, all the air leaving my body at once as pain shot through me. I tried to struggle to my feet, but he pulled something from his pocket, grabbed my hair again and yanked my head back. I froze as a long, thin switchblade caught the light from a distant streetlamp. “No! Please,” I rasped, fear overwhelming all my senses as my heart pounded in my ears.
“It’s too late for please, you fuckin’ whore,” he growled, his eyes glinting.
“Police! Drop your weapon,” a deep voice bellowed from somewhere behind me.
The man dropped me instead, then turned and hauled ass back to his truck. Not ten seconds later, the eighteen wheeler was barreling out of the parking lot. While the man retreated, I curled up on the ground, hugging my knees to my chest as I tried to come down from the sheer terror of what had almost happened.
I gasped and brought my hands up to defend myself when someone touched me. “Shhh, baby, it’s okay,” a familiar voice said.
“Finn!” I threw my arms around his neck and clung to him with all the strength I had left. As he carried me out of the parking lot I stammered, “But how? There’s no way you can be here right now! It’s absolutely impossible.”
“I came as soon as I knew you needed me.” We reached a white rental car and he unlocked the door with a key fob and sat me down on the passenger seat. Then he crouched down and brushed my hair out of my eyes as he asked, “Baby, are you hurt? Do I need to take you to a hospital?”
I shook my head no, then whispered, “It’s more than a thousand mile drive from San Francisco. How can you be here?” My body started shaking as the adrenaline drained away, and I wrapped my arms around myself.
“Gillette has an airport, I flew out of SFO. I was lucky, because I was able to catch a flight that departed at six. It had a layover in Salt Lake City though, otherwise I would have been here sooner.” I stared at him, completely dumbfounded, and he asked, “You sure you’re okay? Should we have you checked out by a doctor just in case?”
“I’ll be fine.”
“Okay. Tell me what you need.”
“A shirt,” I said, touching my bare chest. “And something to eat. Something cheap, I only have seventeen dollars. Wait, no, sixteen-fifty. I had to use some change to call the police about my car. Fifty cents seems high for a local call, don’t you think? Not like I had a choice, though.” I knew I was rambling a bit, but I couldn’t help it.
Finn got behind the wheel and started the engine, then asked, “Is there anything of yours back at the motel?”
“No, nothing. Everything was in the car.”
I put my seatbelt on and watched his profile as he pulled onto the interstate. “How did you know where to find me?”
“You told me exactly where you’d be, the truck stop by the only motel in Gala, Wyoming.”
“I…um…I didn’t do anything tonight. I mean, I didn’t turn any tricks. I tried to, but it didn’t pan out,” I mumbled embarrassedly. I didn’t know why, but it was really important to me that he knew that.
“We’re going to have a talk about this, later on when you’re not so shaken up,” he said calmly. “Actually, I’m going to yell at you fo
r about half an hour for endangering yourself like that. But now’s not the time.”
“I know it was dangerous to try to hook in someplace like that, but I really didn’t have a choice.”
“Yes you did. You could have called me back from a payphone. Or, if you didn’t feel comfortable asking me for help, you could have called my brother-in-law. Christian’s a good friend of yours, he would have wired you some money with no questions asked.”
“It didn’t even occur to me to ask for help,” I admitted.
“Seriously?”
I looked down at my hands, which were dirty from the asphalt. “I’ve always taken care of myself. When things go wrong, I just deal with them.”
“I can understand that, actually,” he said quietly.
We drove the rest of the way to Gillette in silence and I leaned back in my seat and closed my eyes. I hurt all over and couldn’t stop shaking. Finn pulled into the parking lot of a twenty-four-hour diner, and I got out of the car and steadied myself with a hand on the roof. He was unbuttoning his shirt when he came around the car and helped me into it, then buttoned it up for me, leaving himself in the pristine white t-shirt he’d been wearing underneath. His shirt was huge on me, but it was also incredibly comforting, since it enveloped me in Finn’s clean scent.
When we went inside the diner, I spotted a restroom and said I’d be right back, then washed up thoroughly. I took an extra couple minutes in there as I tried to calm down and stop shaking. Finally though, I felt bad about keeping Finn waiting and went to find him in the restaurant.
He was on the phone, and I realized after a moment that he was talking to the Gala police department about the theft of my car. Surprisingly, he was able to recite the Civic’s license plate.
The waitress came by while he was doing that and put a bowl of clam chowder in front of me, along with a basket of crackers. She gave me a critical once-over, frowning slightly at the way my hand shook when I picked up the soup spoon, and asked flatly, “Anything else?” She probably thought I was a druggie.