clock in.
I park in the lot above Empire Burgers, wanting to take a little stroll before seeing Billy. I called him as soon as I woke up, not really knowing why. Maybe it’s the same urgency that normal parents feel when they find their child has done something either good or bad. They want to confer and share so they don’t experience it alone.
I walk down the steps to the sidewalk, past the boys eating burgers and drinking beer, aware that everyone loves to people-watch and right now I’m people. I watch them back, narrowing in on a tribe of kids in bright, toxic outerwear. I remember Cully called these neon kids with their skinny jeans “skittles.”
I ate here once with him. He met me after a shoot. We noticed a lot of old people, then found out it was Senior Discount Tuesday. That’s all I remember. And that it was a really good burger. Cully had such a hearty appetite. Maybe he was stoned.
I’m patient with the tourist family in front of me and don’t bother to pass them. I look at their asses, all identically large and undefined like cumulus clouds. The father is studying the town map, holding his hands out wide, walking slowly.
“I’m telling you,” his young son says, looking at his phone. “We went too far. We passed it. Dad. Dad. Dad.”
“We passed it!” the daughter says. I’d say she’s around six. “I want to go home!”
You are meant to be lost, I want to tell them. The walkways are designed to confuse; there are inlets and levels so you’re always wanting to see what’s up, down, through, or around the bend. There are alleys, some which connect, some which end in parking lots—all so that you feel like frontiersmen, like you’ve discovered something off the trail, off the map. Tourists will spend more this way. I know the backstories, the histories, the plan of this place. I imagine the settlers and the whores, the pastureland, the miners and dredgers, the few wives and women, the Ute Indians, my ancestors and Cully, all in perfect, silent geological layers.
The family stops in the middle of the sidewalk to gather around the phone. The little girl sees me and flutters her eyelashes and raises her hands above her head in a ballet first position. I don’t smile. I will leave it to other people to tell her she’s cute. My son was a shwaggy pot dealer and I’m off to tell his father.
At the crosswalk I go around the family. I pass Shirt and Ernie’s, almost to my destination, when I see the owner of the shop, Lorraine Bartlett, making a beeline toward me. I pretend I haven’t seen her and try to find my phone in my purse so I can do the Hi-I’m-on-the-phone walk-by, but she gets to me before I can get to it.
“Sarah!”
“Lorraine!” I say. “Hi there.”
She approaches with that dreaded look of reverence.
“How are you?” she says, her voice syrupy. She looks around like we’re on a stealth mission.
“I’m okay,” I say. “You?” I take a step back.
“Hanging in there,” she says. “Well, more than hanging. I’m doing well, actually. Pete got into law school. Danny found a new pet project—the garage, so we’ll see how that . . .” And so on. One question launches a thousand ships.
I cross my arms over my chest and grin. I look around, as if for help. I feel like a trapped bird.
She too had a son who was killed in an avalanche years ago. Cully was in eighth grade when it happened and her son was a senior in high school. His body was never found. Lorraine came over a few days after Cully died and tried to recruit me into grieving the way she had grieved, which was by wearing pins stamped with her son’s face and giving interviews to the local newspapers advertising her club, PAAD, Parents Against Avalanche Disaster, as if by not joining PAAD you were promoting avalanche disaster. While I seek common experience, at the same time I hate it, how it weakens my own pain, which I cherish. I cringed as Lorraine stood at my front door and said, “We need
I park in the lot above Empire Burgers, wanting to take a little stroll before seeing Billy. I called him as soon as I woke up, not really knowing why. Maybe it’s the same urgency that normal parents feel when they find their child has done something either good or bad. They want to confer and share so they don’t experience it alone.
I walk down the steps to the sidewalk, past the boys eating burgers and drinking beer, aware that everyone loves to people-watch and right now I’m people. I watch them back, narrowing in on a tribe of kids in bright, toxic outerwear. I remember Cully called these neon kids with their skinny jeans “skittles.”
I ate here once with him. He met me after a shoot. We noticed a lot of old people, then found out it was Senior Discount Tuesday. That’s all I remember. And that it was a really good burger. Cully had such a hearty appetite. Maybe he was stoned.
I’m patient with the tourist family in front of me and don’t bother to pass them. I look at their asses, all identically large and undefined like cumulus clouds. The father is studying the town map, holding his hands out wide, walking slowly.
“I’m telling you,” his young son says, looking at his phone. “We went too far. We passed it. Dad. Dad. Dad.”
“We passed it!” the daughter says. I’d say she’s around six. “I want to go home!”
You are meant to be lost, I want to tell them. The walkways are designed to confuse; there are inlets and levels so you’re always wanting to see what’s up, down, through, or around the bend. There are alleys, some which connect, some which end in parking lots—all so that you feel like frontiersmen, like you’ve discovered something off the trail, off the map. Tourists will spend more this way. I know the backstories, the histories, the plan of this place. I imagine the settlers and the whores, the pastureland, the miners and dredgers, the few wives and women, the Ute Indians, my ancestors and Cully, all in perfect, silent geological layers.
The family stops in the middle of the sidewalk to gather around the phone. The little girl sees me and flutters her eyelashes and raises her hands above her head in a ballet first position. I don’t smile. I will leave it to other people to tell her she’s cute. My son was a shwaggy pot dealer and I’m off to tell his father.
At the crosswalk I go around the family. I pass Shirt and Ernie’s, almost to my destination, when I see the owner of the shop, Lorraine Bartlett, making a beeline toward me. I pretend I haven’t seen her and try to find my phone in my purse so I can do the Hi-I’m-on-the-phone walk-by, but she gets to me before I can get to it.
“Sarah!”
“Lorraine!” I say. “Hi there.”
She approaches with that dreaded look of reverence.
“How are you?” she says, her voice syrupy. She looks around like we’re on a stealth mission.
“I’m okay,” I say. “You?” I take a step back.
“Hanging in there,” she says. “Well, more than hanging. I’m doing well, actually. Pete got into law school. Danny found a new pet project—the garage, so we’ll see how that . . .” And so on. One question launches a thousand ships.
I cross my arms over my chest and grin. I look around, as if for help. I feel like a trapped bird.
She too had a son who was killed in an avalanche years ago. Cully was in eighth grade when it happened and her son was a senior in high school. His body was never found. Lorraine came over a few days after Cully died and tried to recruit me into grieving the way she had grieved, which was by wearing pins stamped with her son’s face and giving interviews to the local newspapers advertising her club, PAAD, Parents Against Avalanche Disaster, as if by not joining PAAD you were promoting avalanche disaster. While I seek common experience, at the same time I hate it, how it weakens my own pain, which I cherish. I cringed as Lorraine stood at my front door and said, “We need
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