The Golden Fleece.
He has to sit down on the nearest bench from how the Mustang’s brightness slams into him, weakens him in the knees. Although finding it’s no more than he expected. Yeah, expected. A world ahead of “hoped.”
He stares into its window-glass reflections. Granite courthouse, too-blue sky, maples with buds swelling on their twigs, Danny himself sitting on the bench. Bitch’s got no idea what he looks like. He can wait here in the open till she shows up and drives away. Rarely do you get to watch where they can see you. It’s as much a luxury as good food or a clean, soft bed.
Except not this time. Because it isn’t over yet. The highway leads in two directions from the courthouse square. North toward the turnoff to the cabin, south to the freeway and gone. He sprawls out on the bench, arms stretched along its slats, his eyes half closed. Sits where he sees both halves of the highway. Sits so relaxed no passerby would ever guess he’s got a pile driver inside him where there ought to be a heart.
9
Lonely. Home
.
T HE SQUAT BRICK POST OFFICE SMELLS OF STAMP PADS AND STALE cigar smoke. A round-faced woman behind the counter looks her up and down as if she doesn’t often see a stranger.
“May I help you?”
Katherine ponders each syllable individually, as though it were a perfect swirled-glass marble falling from the woman’s mouth. They are the first words anyone has spoken to her since she walked into the forest.
“I need to rent a mailbox.” She shapes her own syllables precisely.
The woman hands her an application and she completes it in a shaky hand. The clerk looks it over, checks her driver’s license, and hands her a key. Katherine stares at it. P.O. Box 2609. She has an address now.
Even if she’s never coming back, she’ll need it. Everybody comes from somewhere and she’ll need it to show where she’s been. With thecracked ballpoint pen chained to the counter, she draws a line through the first item on her list. Her headache’s growing worse.
The Elkmont National Bank’s institutional blue-green walls and carpet, coupled with muffled voices that set off a roaring in her ears, make her feel as if she’s under water, drowning. On the lapel of the teller’s dark blue jacket is a small red enamel pin shaped like a drop of blood. A sign on her counter says she participated in the bank’s annual blood drive. “I gave life. I gave blood.” Katherine tries hard not to stare at the sign or at the blood drop. She is dizzy, feels unwell.
“I need to open a savings account.”
Yes, even if she’s leaving on this very day. Because the cashier’s check clutched in her hand is all the money she has in the world and it is for a fairly large amount and she might lay it down somewhere and just forget it. She is capable of that. She meant to deposit it on the drive up and forgot. She will deposit the check here today and transfer the money when she gets down to Atlanta; that way she won’t lose it. All this was clearer on the trail; now it’s all jumbled.
Except that soon she’ll climb back in her car and drive back to Atlanta, that much she is sure of.
Isn’t she?
During the transaction she stares at the teller’s nimble hands, her stubby fingers so like, and yet so different, from her own, these first hands that are not her hands that she has seen in weeks.
Her next stop, the grocery store, is old and dark, with cracked linoleum that stinks of Pine-Sol, rotting vegetables, and an unpleasant suggestion of dry-cleaning fluid from the laundry next door. Her list says
dried beans, rice, cabbages, winter squash, cornmeal
. Staples; they’ll all travel well. At the last minute she grabs a can of salted peanuts for the trip. She’ll tell them at the agency that California didn’t suit her, something, couldn’t stand the air. They’ll hire her back, to do illustrations if for nothing else. While she waits for the garrulous woman in front of her to charge her week’s worth
He has to sit down on the nearest bench from how the Mustang’s brightness slams into him, weakens him in the knees. Although finding it’s no more than he expected. Yeah, expected. A world ahead of “hoped.”
He stares into its window-glass reflections. Granite courthouse, too-blue sky, maples with buds swelling on their twigs, Danny himself sitting on the bench. Bitch’s got no idea what he looks like. He can wait here in the open till she shows up and drives away. Rarely do you get to watch where they can see you. It’s as much a luxury as good food or a clean, soft bed.
Except not this time. Because it isn’t over yet. The highway leads in two directions from the courthouse square. North toward the turnoff to the cabin, south to the freeway and gone. He sprawls out on the bench, arms stretched along its slats, his eyes half closed. Sits where he sees both halves of the highway. Sits so relaxed no passerby would ever guess he’s got a pile driver inside him where there ought to be a heart.
9
Lonely. Home
.
T HE SQUAT BRICK POST OFFICE SMELLS OF STAMP PADS AND STALE cigar smoke. A round-faced woman behind the counter looks her up and down as if she doesn’t often see a stranger.
“May I help you?”
Katherine ponders each syllable individually, as though it were a perfect swirled-glass marble falling from the woman’s mouth. They are the first words anyone has spoken to her since she walked into the forest.
“I need to rent a mailbox.” She shapes her own syllables precisely.
The woman hands her an application and she completes it in a shaky hand. The clerk looks it over, checks her driver’s license, and hands her a key. Katherine stares at it. P.O. Box 2609. She has an address now.
Even if she’s never coming back, she’ll need it. Everybody comes from somewhere and she’ll need it to show where she’s been. With thecracked ballpoint pen chained to the counter, she draws a line through the first item on her list. Her headache’s growing worse.
The Elkmont National Bank’s institutional blue-green walls and carpet, coupled with muffled voices that set off a roaring in her ears, make her feel as if she’s under water, drowning. On the lapel of the teller’s dark blue jacket is a small red enamel pin shaped like a drop of blood. A sign on her counter says she participated in the bank’s annual blood drive. “I gave life. I gave blood.” Katherine tries hard not to stare at the sign or at the blood drop. She is dizzy, feels unwell.
“I need to open a savings account.”
Yes, even if she’s leaving on this very day. Because the cashier’s check clutched in her hand is all the money she has in the world and it is for a fairly large amount and she might lay it down somewhere and just forget it. She is capable of that. She meant to deposit it on the drive up and forgot. She will deposit the check here today and transfer the money when she gets down to Atlanta; that way she won’t lose it. All this was clearer on the trail; now it’s all jumbled.
Except that soon she’ll climb back in her car and drive back to Atlanta, that much she is sure of.
Isn’t she?
During the transaction she stares at the teller’s nimble hands, her stubby fingers so like, and yet so different, from her own, these first hands that are not her hands that she has seen in weeks.
Her next stop, the grocery store, is old and dark, with cracked linoleum that stinks of Pine-Sol, rotting vegetables, and an unpleasant suggestion of dry-cleaning fluid from the laundry next door. Her list says
dried beans, rice, cabbages, winter squash, cornmeal
. Staples; they’ll all travel well. At the last minute she grabs a can of salted peanuts for the trip. She’ll tell them at the agency that California didn’t suit her, something, couldn’t stand the air. They’ll hire her back, to do illustrations if for nothing else. While she waits for the garrulous woman in front of her to charge her week’s worth
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