A Song for the Road

by Kathleen Basi

  Almost sleeping with Hadley.

  She’d known she was a mess, but she hadn’t realized just how big a mess.

  Dicey cleared her throat. “The auto shop called. We can pick it up anytime. There’s a train headed up Pikes Peak at noon. I figured we could catch it.”

  Miriam nodded slowly.

  “But first, you need a shower. Badly.”

  A shower made her feel marginally human again. Miriam answered the knock on the bathroom door to find Dicey holding out a bundle of clothes. “Here. Figured I’d help you out.”

  Miriam stared at the black dress, red flowers splashed across it like blood.

  “You haven’t worn this yet. It’s pretty,” Dicey said.

  Miriam looked up. “I’ll get my own clothes,” she said shortly, and closed the door.

  Dicey showed her disapproval of Miriam’s rudeness by barely speaking a word all the way up the mountain. Not that they could have talked much, anyway; the noise of the cog railway all but buried the guide’s narration. Still, it smarted.

  The sunlight felt stronger on the summit of Pikes Peak. Miriam couldn’t tell if that was real, a result of glare off the snow that hadn’t yet melted at this altitude, or merely a figment of her imagination. She did know that, no matter what her inner ear wanted her to believe, the ground wasn’t actually moving.

  She gazed down over the plains. Blaise had promised her a view of five states, but there was nothing to distinguish one from another. She shivered, chilled by more than the cold at fourteen thousand feet.

  Miriam swallowed the last bite of her high-altitude donut. No doubt it was as good as Blaise had claimed, but a hangover had a way of making everything taste like dust. A hangover and regret. Regret for last night and for a lifetime of bad choices.

  She’d given Gus so much power over her: first as an obsession, briefly as a lover, and ever since, as the ghost in her bed.

  She needed someone to talk to. Becky, perhaps, although Miriam couldn’t imagine baring the gunked-up depths of her soul to her serene, competent friend. She needed someone who could see her for all that she was, good and bad alike, who would listen without judgment and still love her unconditionally.

  In other words, she needed Teo.

  The locket burned like dry ice against her chest.

  How she missed that man. The way he always pushed her tempos in choir practice and mouthed off when she pointed out the metronome markings. “The Bickersons,” her older choir members used to call them, laughing. The way he could figure out how to fix anything with a YouTube video and a trip or ten to the hardware store. The way he’d come home with the tiniest little thing—a vanilla Pepsi or a pint of Superman ice cream, something to show he knew exactly what would make her feel loved in that very moment.

  She wished she were more like him—exuberant and effusive, generous with affection. But fixing meals and doing dishes and working out meticulous schedules for a busy family and work life were the best she could do.

  How he used to laugh about those matrices, which she’d print out and mark with highlighters once a week. “It never lasts past Monday anyway,” he would say. “You might as well make it up on the fly.”

  Such a gentle man. So kind and considerate. Except that one glorious morning when she’d seen the passion he kept buried. Felt it in every nerve in her trembling body. In that moment, the one time in her life she’d allowed herself to be vulnerable to her husband, Miriam felt loved from the outermost tip of her hair to the deepest, most secret place in her soul.

  It scared her so much, she’d never let him in that deep again.

  This was the man whose wildflower petals she carried in this locket. She missed him with an ache that eclipsed the cold, the altitude, and even her hangover. Was Talia right? Had he been unhappy? Had he ever known how much he meant to her? Had he ever, in some deep, dark, unexpressed corner of his soul, resented her? Wondered whether she’d come to him that day in Philadelphia, calculating that he would offer a respectable way out of her predicament?

  Surely not. “You saved me,” he said.

  She shivered, as if the words had whispered on the cold wind rather than existing only in her memory. Doubt was a cold and lonely thing.

  Teo’s locket felt cold in her fingers. The chain swung in the wind, flashing the stark white light at the midpoint of every arc. She didn’t remember taking it off, but there it lay in her clenched fist.

  The chain whipped her arm. The wind wanted that pendant. If she flung it away, it would disappear into the great, clear blue. It might fall on late snow or newly exposed rock or be carried on a gust to snag on some twisted, tortured pine gasping for breath at the edge of the tree line. Either way, no one would ever see it again except maybe a marmot. She’d be rid of the reminder. Rid of the burden of guilt she’d been carrying around for the last year.

  And yet the locket was all she had left.

  “Miriam?”

  She turned. Dicey walked slowly toward her, her face white. The altitude must be rough on a pregnant woman. “Is it time?” Miriam asked.

  Dicey nodded. “The train is boarding.”

  Miriam slipped the chain back over her head and tucked it beneath her blouse, then slipped a hand beneath Dicey’s elbow. “All right,” she said. “Let’s get going.”

  “What’s in the locket, anyway?” Dicey asked as they made their way back to the red rail car.

  Every mistake I ever made. But Dicey wouldn’t understand.

  Miriam shrugged. “Just some dead flowers,” she said.

  36

  Saturday, May 7

  3:30 PM

  Manitou Springs, Colorado

  Cog Railway parking lot

  THE COIN ICONS ON the app were unresponsive. Miriam tried three times. She checked social media to make sure her photos had posted, but if that were the problem, Talia’s wagging finger .gif would have come up. It just wasn’t working. It was as if the app had seen her choices these past twenty-four hours and passed judgment on her for them.

  Beside her, Dicey began coughing so hard, the car shook. Miriam put the phone down and rubbed her back. “Dicey,” she said, when the attack eased at last, “let’s find a quick care clinic.”

  “What’s the matter with the app?”

  Not even an acknowledgment. Miriam wanted to shake her, but as always she butted up against the thing Dicey never let her forget: Miriam was not her mother.

  She stared out the window at the sunlight on the high elevations, debating. Dicey had made clear how much she valued her baby’s life. Surely, if she needed medical attention, she’d say so.

  Miriam capitulated. “It’s not working.” She handed over the phone.

  Dicey swiped and tapped for a minute or two, pausing only to cough again. “Hmm,” she said. “You know what I think? I think there aren’t any more destinations. She never finished putting in the content.”

  The words dropped, leaden, into the quiet car. A gaggle of college-aged girls walked past, talking over each other about the party they were attending tonight. Miriam stared out the windshield at the pines and aspen rising from the shoulders of the mountain. “You’re right,” she said. The words nearly choked her. She hadn’t realized how much she’d come to depend on those glimpses from beyond the grave, precious for their novelty. For a year, she’d had nothing but memories, fading quickly from overuse. The videos let her pretend there were still depths to plumb and discoveries to be made. It gave her children back to her, alive and well, if only for a minute or two.

  That was all over now. Miriam thought back to that last video, in which Blaise had been talking about Pikes Peak. He’d been wearing a sweatshirt, and the background had been unfamiliar. Had he recorded it while they were camping, that last night before …?

  Miriam put her head down on the steering wheel. It was like losing them all over again.

  Dicey rubbed her back. “What do you want to do? Head straight for the coast?”

  She should. Whatever was wrong
with Dicey, her best bet was to get her to her mother and this all-knowing doctor she kept talking about. Miriam could drop her off and go do what she’d come on this trip to do. Except, when she reached that beach, she would no longer be able to avoid the reality: her family was gone forever.

  Grief so heavy ought to come with tears. She had no tears. Only a vast, angry emptiness, ready to rebound on the world as bitterness, as it had when she’d played “Ring of Fire” at the congressman’s funeral. Her children had stranded her halfway across the country. Just far enough away to wreck everything familiar. Not far enough to provide answers.

  “We can keep going, you know.” Dicey gestured with her pink spangled phone.

  Miriam shook her head. “The point was to follow the kids’ directions.”

  Dicey made a guttural sound of half-amused disgust. “Come on, Miriam, that was never the point.” But at the look on Miriam’s face, her bemusement faded. “Is that really why you did all this?”

  Miriam sat up. “I did it because I was going to lose my job if I didn’t get my head on straight, and I thought maybe if I did this for my family, I’d stop feeling so shitty and get my life back together. But if the kids aren’t part of it, what’s the point?”

  Dicey leaned forward. “To live, Miriam. To find your joy again. Look what you’ve become, how you’ve changed. You’ve … you’ve blossomed. When I met you, you had this cloud of darkness all around you.”

  “And now I don’t?”

  “Not like it was. You’ve had fun out here. When you forget to punish yourself, you’re this amazing woman who touches everyone you meet. You of all people know how little time we really have. How precious every moment is. Just embrace it, Miriam. Don’t squander the gift.”

  “The gift. Like the trolls who passed judgment on my son?”

  “Screw the trolls. Who cares about the trolls? I just want you to devour this experience! Swallow it whole! Life’s too short to live it by halves. That’s all I’m saying.” Dicey’s vehemence overtook her in the form of a brief coughing fit. She unscrewed a water bottle and drank deeply.

  Miriam leaned her forearms on the steering wheel, thinking. “How would we go on?”

  Dicey opened her phone. “When you said Talia had been working on it the spring before she died, I wondered if we might run out of destinations. I found this site the other day that lists quirky, cool places to see in every county in every state. So I figure, we say heads is north, tails is south, and either way we head west. We make our own destinations.” She waited a moment. “Miriam?”

  Miriam stared at the mountainside beyond the glass. It would only delay the inevitable, but still, it was a delay. “All right,” she said. “Let’s do it.”

  Part 8

  Hooper, Colorado

  Grief is the price we pay for love.

  —Queen Elizabeth II

  Dicey’s intro to the UFO Watchtower, Hooper, Colorado

  H’lo, folks. I know, you’re thinking, “Who is this chick?” Well, the name’s Dicey. I’m the one who’s been making the videos. And just in case there’s any question? Yes. I’m totally preggers.

  Sometimes you forget that all good things must come to an end. We weren’t ready for it, but it turns out the Tedesco Twins weren’t able to finish planning the Great American Road Trip before they passed away. We discovered earlier today that we were out of destinations. But never fear, we rose to the occasion. With the help of a little site called Local American Treasures, we’re back in business. We’ve got our nose pointed southwest, toward an itty-bitty town called Hooper, Colorado. A few years ago, a woman decided to become a rancher there. Only, not all acreage is cattle-friendly. So, since everybody is UFO obsessed in this part of the country, she figured, Hey, we’ll just go with it.

  So tonight, we’re camping at the UFO Watchtower. We figured the Tedesco Twins would approve. We’ll be sure to report on any and all sightings, in real time. Over and out.

  37

  Saturday, May 7

  Sunset

  UFO Watchtower, near Hooper, Colorado

  THE CLOUDS GATHERED BEHIND them as Miriam drove south. The radio announcers warned of a major late-season snowstorm bearing down on Colorado Springs, but it looked like they’d dodged the bullet. Gradually, the clouds thinned and the sun reclaimed the sky.

  Meanwhile, Dicey slept. And slept. And slept. She’d nailed the introductory video, but within fifteen minutes, she’d crashed. She hadn’t moved a muscle since.

  Miriam wanted food, but she couldn’t rouse her companion. She grabbed drive-thru, figuring if Dicey was that worn out, it was better to let her sleep off whatever bug she was fighting.

  Except … Dicey had been with her eight days now, and the cough was no better. If anything, it was worse. Her mother’s admonition sounded more prescient every time she thought about it. But what could Miriam do, if Dicey wouldn’t let her help?

  By the time they arrived at their destination, Dicey’s burger was cold.

  “Dicey,” Miriam said, shaking her arm as she drove beneath the square timber arch marking the driveway to the UFO Watchtower. The handwritten sign proclaimed, “Come on in.” “Dicey, wake up. Come on, honey. Please. You’re scaring me.”

  Dicey stirred and took a deep breath—or at least, she tried. She started hacking instead. Miriam had never been so grateful to hear coughing in her entire life.

  The watchtower was a small, dome-shaped building with a metal platform around three sides and a rock garden in front. Across the valley, the sun was setting, orange light streaming across the flat ground to bathe the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in a light that made them live up to their name. It looked like something out of a Peter Jackson movie.

  Dicey emerged from the car, still coughing, as a sixty-something couple clanked down the stairs dressed in matching jogging suits. “You’ve missed the lady of the manor,” said the man. “She went home for the night. You can pay your two dollars in the mailbox over there, though.”

  “Is she okay?” asked the woman, peering anxiously at Dicey, who leaned over the hood of the Sonata, still coughing. Dicey held up a hand and nodded, but Miriam had reached her limit. First thing in the morning, they were going to find an urgent care clinic whether Dicey liked it or not.

  But for now, she focused on the immediate issue. “You said the owner is gone? I thought you could camp here.”

  “Oh, you can. She’ll let you pay tomorrow morning if you want to set up, but …” The woman was still eyeing Dicey.

  “What about bathrooms?” asked Miriam, looking around.

  “It’s primitive camping,” the man said.

  “Shit,” said Dicey, coming up for air at last. “I need to pee. Bad.”

  Maybe it was a divine prompting to go find a clinic tonight. Miriam gave her a sidelong look. “I don’t think we can stay here, Dicey.”

  Dicey set a stubborn face. “I want to see UFOs. I’m staying.”

  “There’s no water, honey.”

  “We have a couple bottles left. It won’t be any worse than the night of the storm.”

  “And you’re okay with just peeing anywhere?”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” said the woman, taking Dicey by the elbow. “Come use the toilet in our camper. We’re staying too. We’re going to sit up on the viewing platform until it gets too cold. Care to join us? Only … is that contagious? We’re on our way to see our grandkids.”

  Dicey snorted, which led to another, shorter bout of coughing. “Not contagious, no worries.”

  No worries? Miriam was feeling nothing but worry.

  The chatty couple, it turned out, hailed from Wisconsin and were on their way back north after spending the winter in the southwest. “You should take a look around the garden there,” said the woman, when they’d all returned to the base of the platform. “Supposedly there are two ‘vortexes’ in there.”

  “What’s a vortex?” asked Miriam.

  “Like a portal to another dimension,” said the man.<
br />
  “Or a convergence of spiritual energy.” The woman rolled her eyes. “We’re not really believers, but we’ve been driving past for years, and I finally told him we should stop before we get too old to climb the stairs. And we figured if we were doing it, we ought to do it right.”

  “Miriam, come here!” said Dicey, from the middle of the rock garden.

  Miriam joined her. There was a rapt expression on Dicey’s face as she surveyed the ground, but Miriam couldn’t summon much enthusiasm for the scattered array of junk people had left by way of an offering to … whatever. Hubcaps, pens, credit cards. Headless Barbies. “Wow,” she said. “That’s a lot of … stuff.”

  “This is the coolest thing we’ve done yet.” Dicey’s breaths buzzed softly, but the long nap seemed to have done her good. At any rate, her eyes were bright, and her cheeks had some color. “I want to be buried in a place like this.”

  “That’s a bit morbid.”

  Dicey scowled. “You can’t feel it, can you?”

  “Feel what?”

  “The energy in this place.” Dicey spread her arms. “It’s amazing.” She sighed at Miriam’s lack of enthusiasm and held out her pink spangled phone. “All right, whatever. Take a picture for me.”

  She had another one of her pink-and-brown lettered signs. Miriam framed the photo and then paused, looking between the image on the screen and its real-life counterpart: Anytime you need me, look in the mirror.

  “Your daughter’s going to love this book,” she said.

  “I hope so.” Dicey retrieved her phone and wandered off. Miriam opted to stay put and look beyond the garden. This great, vast emptiness was precisely the kind of desert designed for spiritual renewal. John the Baptist would have felt right at home here.

  Miriam, not so much. The quiet settled around her, but worry pushed back against any sense of spiritual awareness. She focused again on Dicey, wandering the pathways lined with trinkets, and gnawed at the edge of her lip. What could possibly cause such chronic, productive coughing and not be contagious? More importantly, how was she ever going to convince Dicey to go see a doctor?