by Lorraine Ray
I walk a block from the Busy Beehive with Oliver’s stink. And white, white, it is in the sky, all bells and hopes and nuns. A bright light of holy beneficence and wonder in the dark surroundings. The lit cathedral sits in the almost night and these creepy towers look down on a parkway littered with needles, pointing in different directions. Damn addicts. With Oliver’s stink beside me I’m suffering acutely. Walk slowly because Oliver has a fake leg which he has to swing out every step. How will he ever climb into a mountain to find this gold if he can barely creep along a sidewalk? Isn’t that something to think about? Isn’t that logical? Even when I’m drunk I can be fucking logical. It comes bubbling up like a stream, logic. Bubbles through the thick thoughts of a drunk.
“Goodnight, old timer,” I call, holding a stiff arm out at him as a good-bye sign. I feel some genuine interest in him at that point, after we have had drinks together. Though he stinks, he’s all right. He’s a nice old gentleman.
“Night. Back to my damn sister’s go I. Weep for me.”
“Sure, dude, sure as shit!” I call.
“Yeah!”
“But we gotta plan,” I say.
“We sure do! And it’s gonna work, too! We’re the smart ones, Vig.”
“Getting smarter every day,” I claim.
Nice old fool, I think as we part. Nice way of considering others. This sounds like madness, what he has said to me. Who would have believed this old man’s tale of a tale? A fool. That’s who. A desperate fool. What a bunch of crap he spun, ugh, horrible image, and he was not to be believed, I think, unless I’m a total fool. If he knew about this for so long would he be waiting around for someone to tell it to, for me to come and take an interest? It seems at least unlikely to be true that he’s not told this story before to others and they’d laughed at him, scoffed, as they should have. These lost gold stashes are a dime a dozen out in the west. Pick a mountain and somebody thought treasure is stuffed in a canyon there. The lure of easy riches seems to haunt men and make them do ridonkulous things. Why should I fall for such garbage? The answer is I shouldn’t at all; I should take it for what it is, a tall tale, a wonderful tale meant to amuse, but not to fall for, no, not to let yourself blunder into his kind of thinking. You have to keep your distance from this, I remind myself. Write about it, but don’t do it.
I pull out my phone and summon an Uber cab.
But what will it cost me to go along on a jaunt into the mountains? Not much to prove him right or wrong. I will get out in the desert and do a little hiking, but with a stinky old man. My cab shows up. I’ll leave my car at the museum and tomorrow I’ll take another cab to work.