On the Rim

by Florida Ann Town

  Ellen jots down some times and dates and promises she’ll think about it.

  The long-distance riders invite her to come for a session with them.

  “I can’t go very far,” she tells them.

  “No problem,” an older man replies. “We couldn’t either, when we first began.”

  Why does she feel she’s already had this conversation? He assures her she can ride along with the group on their training runs. And she’ll be welcomed as a helper on the serious rides — keeping track of times and distances, helping out on the SAG wagon.

  Now she knows she’s had this conversation before.

  “You’ll be going the distance before you know it,” he concludes cheerfully.

  Once again, she jots down dates and times and promises to think about it.

  The next day Ellen finds a riding group by accident when she’s biking home from the post office. Five women wheel into the little park next door and begin stretching. She pedals over and watches them for a moment.

  “Hi. Come join us,” one offers.

  The others laugh. “Right. There’s enough agony for all.”

  Intrigued, Ellen dismounts, parks her bike, and asks the name of the group.

  “We’re the Middle of the Road Gang. Too young to be seniors, too old to be racers, so we ride just for the fun of it.”

  “Where do you go?”

  “Different places. Generally we do a loop somewhere. Last year we went to Victoria. Our husbands dropped us off at the ferry and we biked into Victoria. It was a great trip!”

  Smiles and laughter affirm her statement. Ellen is suitably impressed.

  The woman continues. “Our goal this year is to do Vashon Island. You can take the ferry from Seattle to one end and catch the ferry to Tacoma at the other end. We want to stay on the island for a couple of days. It’s hard for some of us to get away for longer than that.”

  One of the other women adds, “Even if we never do it, we can dream about it.”

  A flood of comments swirls around her statement, ripples in the flow of conversation, followed by a spatter of introductions.

  “You’re welcome to ride with us,” Penny adds. She’s a smiling blonde who looks like Ellen has always wanted to look — pert, perky, and pretty.

  “We’re working on conditioning,” she adds. “We do a couple of short sessions during the week. It makes the weekend trip easier.”

  “Do you always meet here?” Ellen asks.

  “No. We just came to get a yogurt cone.”

  One of the women laughs. ”Yogurt’s healthy.”

  “Sure. It doesn’t have any calories either,” another adds.

  “Why don’t you join us?”

  The moment teeters.

  “We aren’t going far.”

  The pattern kicks in again. Ellen automatically starts to say no. There are things she has to do. Then she stops. There is nothing she has to do. No one cares if she comes home in an hour, or a week — or ever, for that matter.

  “Sure,” she says. “But I’ll pass on the yogurt.”

  “We’ve already done that,” Susan says. She’s the one with the long ponytail hanging down from her helmet

  Penny agrees: “It’s a reward for good behaviour.”

  “Right,” Megan adds. “We celebrate burning off all those calories by taking on a whole new load of calories.”

  There is a general hooting at this.

  None is chubby, fat, or overweight. Two are big boned in a way that looks healthy, but not like they have a weight problem. Ellen is surprised that they even care about calories or weight loss.

  “We’re heading down the highway today,” Susan says. “There are some nice roller coaster rides just a few miles along.”

  “Yeah.” Megan smiles. “If we do really good on the roller coaster, we treat ourselves to carrot cake at the tea room.”

  “Yum, yum,” Penny enthuses. “Carrot cake. Everyone knows how healthy that is. Just like yogurt. I might even have two.”

  “Only if you pedal up the roller coaster backward,” Susan decrees.

  Laughter again.

  This begins to make sense. They’re making fun of themselves. No, Ellen corrects herself, they aren’t making fun of themselves. They’re making fun of women as stereotypes, or the notion that this is the way women behave.

  Ellen wants very much to be part of this group. She wants to know them. She wants to spend time with them. She wants to be friends with them.

  They push off, forming a single line in the right-hand lane.

  Susan takes the lead, Megan goes second. Penny, the lean blonde, goes third, followed by Patty. Patty has bright fluorescent bike pants and wears a matching helmet cover.

  “Visibility is my middle name,” she says, smiling, when Ellen comments on her outfit. “Anyway, I make them myself, so I can go a little crazy.”

  Megan slots Ellen into the lineup between herself and Penny.

  “It’s easier to put new people in the middle of the group,” she explains. “We’re used to riding together and checking to make sure no one straggles or has problems.”

  There is constant chatter among the women, with comments passed up and down the line.

  “Look out ahead,” Susan warns. “There’s some stuff on the road.”

  “Loose gravel coming up,” Penny cautions.

  “Extra-wide load behind,” Megan calls out. “Keep as far right as you can.”

  They cross a bridge, strung out in a neat line. The lanes seem very narrow here, but widen again once they pass the bridge, with a good shoulder lane. It’s comfortable riding.

  Ellen feels warm now. Susan is setting a good pace. It’s a little faster than she’s accustomed to, but she can keep up. She feels it in her legs and, surprisingly, in her shoulders.

  “There’s a little shopping plaza ahead, with the Golden Arches on the corner.”

  “Time for a water break,” Patty announces.

  Susan leads the line in, then turns to Ellen as they park their bikes.

  “How’s it going? Is the pace okay for you?”

  “Perfect.”

  Susan laughs. She has a wonderful laugh, warm, friendly, and genuine.

  “The next part is easy. There’s a bit of a hill going up — nothing that will give you any trouble — then a long, swooping downhill. We stay right over on that one. It starts as two lanes at the top of the hill, but converges into one, so there’s sometimes cars juggling for space in line. We’ll take it easy.”

  “What comes after that?”

  “We head over to the ferry.”

  Ellen is puzzled.

  “It’s a little free ferry,” Susan explains. “It goes back and forth more or less on demand. There’s lots of good riding on the other side. The roads don’t have much of a shoulder, but there isn’t much traffic either.”

  They set off again. Susan is right. The uphill is no problem and the long coast down is pure pleasure. Ellen stands on her pedals as they cross a set of train tracks, then turn down a side road paste a cedar mill. The saw buzzes and whines its way through a log, sending an invisible current of scent through the air, a scent that reminds Ellen of her mom’s cedar doily box. A few minutes later, they’re at the ferry loading zone, where an attendant waves them through.

  “Walk your bikes on,” she reminds them.

  They go ahead of the automobiles, moving with a couple of pedestrians. At the front of the ferry there’s a blocked-off area bounded by yellow painted pipes, where bikes can stand out of the way of traffic. The women prop the bikes on kickstands and themselves on the wide, breast-high rail, looking out over the river.

  The far shore shows sedentary rows of people. Along the edge of the water there’s a row of deck chairs and people fishing. Farther back, clusters of people sit or stand in little groups. A couple of picnics happen on tailgates of trucks in the parking lot.

  Little kids crouch down, digging trenches and building whatever it is kids build in the sand. Bi
gger kids run around, making mechanical noises while their parents ignore them.

  The ferry noses into its slip, unloads one group of passengers and loads another and chugs back to the other side.

  The women leave the ferry and push their bikes up a metal ramp. There’s a splintery wood sidewalk at the top of the ramp that keeps pedestrians and bikes out of the traffic. The cars have a wooden road, too. It hasn’t been there long enough to begin disintegrating, but it’s old enough to have weathered to a silvery base. Twin ribbons of black, reminders of thousands of tires, draw a line from the ferry ramp to the waiting highway. Ellen listens as the cars rumble pleasantly along. A loose board creates a mambo of thumps as the cars drive past.

  At the far end of the ramp there’s a washroom that draws the group like tacks to a magnet; facilities are hard to come by for bikers.

  As the ride progresses, Ellen feels more and more constricted. She wants to keep going. She doesn’t want to stop and wait for everyone else. She doesn’t want to stop and look around. She doesn’t want to comment on everything she sees. These are nice people, friendly and open. Another time, another place, and she’d be happy to be part of their group, but what she wants now is to be at one with the road, not be interrupted by the never-ending ripple of chatter that accompanies them.

  Later that afternoon, when they near Ellen’s apartment block, she peels away quietly and heads for home while the rest carry on, chirping like a flock of multicoloured sparrows. She changes gears and speeds away, pumping as fast as she can until the blood pounds in her ears and her breath strains and burns against her chest.

  That was bad of me, she acknowledges to herself, but I couldn’t think of another way to escape.

  Flushed and happy, she pulls into her driveway just as one of the others residents is leaving the building. He smiles, holds the door, and motions her in.

  “Good ride?” he asks.

  “Great,” she affirms. Her eyes flick rapidly over him. Hard to define his age — somewhere around hers, but maybe a few years younger. There’s a flutter of grey over his temples.

  “I’ve seen you go out before.” He smiles. “I ride too. It’s a great neighbourhood for that, isn’t it?”

  That explains the lean, fit look of him and the suntan that sets off his deep blue eyes. Sooty eyes, her father used to call them. Celtic eyes.

  She nods, pushing her bike into the lobby as he releases the door and gives her a cheerful wave.

  “Have a good day,” he says, as the door whooshes shut behind him.

  An hour later she’s surprised by a knock on her door. When she opens it, it’s the same man.

  “You should have put the chain on first,” he scolds. “Not a good idea to open the door before you know who’s there, so I’ll introduce myself. I’m Tim, your neighbour two doors down the hall.”

  “Ellen,” she replies, holding out her hand.

  He shakes her hand, then stretches his other hand forward.

  “There. You dropped this when you came in.”

  Her bike glove.

  “Thank you. I didn’t realize I’d lost it.”

  As he smiles, she’s struck by a sudden question.

  “How did you know where I lived?”

  “That’s easy. I followed your tracks down the hall.”

  “My tracks?”

  Laughing, he pulls her arm gently, leading her into the hall.

  “There. Over on the side. See the marks on the carpet from your tires? It doesn’t take a genius to follow them to your apartment.

  “Now in you go, back home again. And next time, put the chain on the door before you open it. Even for me.”

  Smiling, he repeats his cheery salute. She watches, bemused, as he walks two doors down the hall to enter his own apartment.

  — 7 —

  THE SOAP BOTTLE BLOWS a raspberry, spraying clusters of tiny bubbles onto the dishwater. A miniscule bulge of liquid sags from the end of the spout, swaying over the dirty dishes, then retreats back into the bottle. Ellen shakes it crossly, trying to squeeze out a few more drops. Her eyes flick to the slip of paper pinned to the fridge by a pair of magnetic pigs. What was once a short, orderly list is now jammed with scribbled reminders of things she needs.

  In those long-ago days before her life changed, she spent entire afternoons shopping. Now she shops only when she has to. Money is getting tight and she’s afraid to spend it. She doesn’t want to see things she wants. She doesn’t like to see things she likes. She buys what she has to, but only that.

  She unscrews the bottle cap, runs a little water inside and swishes it around to pick up the last traces of detergent before pouring it into the sink. Carefully, she caps the empty bottle and puts it aside for recycling before blotting her hands on the dish towel, grabbing a pencil, and adding dish detergent to her list. A missed droplet of water trickles down the underside of her wrist as she writes.

  In a moment of whimsy, she remembers last night’s decision and adds another word to the list: CALIFORNIA. She prints it in big block letters, steps back to look, and smiles.

  She’s going to California.

  She’s going to California on her bike.

  She’s going to California on her bike, by herself.

  Ellen repeats the words in her mind, like a magic mantra,

  then realizes there’s no one to overhear her. She can say it out loud. She does, first whispering, then speaking, and finally shouting: “I’m going to California on my bike, all by myself!”

  The sound rumbles through her throat and echoes in her chest. She likes the way the words feel, filling her mouth and tumbling from her lips. She half expects them to hang in the air, like words in a comic strip balloon. She’s surprised by her bravado. She’s never shouted out loud for no reason at all, not caring whether anyone hears her or not. So many things, she thinks, so many things she’s never done. Never been to Disneyland, never been to Universal Studios, or Knott’s Berry Farm. Never strolled on Sunset Boulevard or watched for stars on Rodeo Drive. Never been to Muscle Beach or seen bronzed and handsome surfers ride their boards on the curling waves off Ventura. But she’s heard the names and seen pictures in magazines, movies, and on television until they’ve become familiar in her mind, like the “old country” her father talked about in his stories until they became part of her memories.

  There are a thousand places she’s never been. Someday she’ll go to New York City, walk down Broadway, look up at the skyscrapers, and wander in Central Park. Someday she’ll go to Paris and see the Eiffel Tower. Someday she’ll visit a tropical island. But first, she’s going to California.

  She’s happy with her choice. Anyone can fly, or go by train, or bus, even drive. All that takes is money. She doesn’t want to be a conventional tourist. It’s too ordinary and too easy. This has to be something special, something memorable, something unique. If she were younger and it was thirty years ago, when life was gentler, she might hitch-hike, but hundreds of people have done that, so it’s no longer anything special. And from a purely practical point of view, it’s no longer safe. Going by bike is different. There’s something slightly wacky about it, something eccentric, and something deliciously scary in going alone. One is as important as the other. All her life Ellen has done only the things that other people do, and done them the way that other people do them. The expected things. The nice things. The safe things.

  All her life she’s been afraid: Afraid of the dark. Afraid of being alone. Afraid of strangers. Afraid of men. Afraid to walk down a dark street at night. Afraid to run down a wooded jogging trail. Afraid of too many things. She needs this trip to prove to herself that she has nothing to be afraid of anymore. That’s not quite true. There are still things to be afraid of, but those are legitimate things, not nameless spectres. She can be cautious, yes, responsible, of course. But she rejects the notion of fear for no reason at all.

  California. It’s a wonderful word. It leaves a special taste in her mouth when she says it — a golden brow
n, sweet, nutty taste, like the hint of chocolate across her tongue.

  Ellen wishes there was someone who could share the news and be excited with her. The kids would probably try to talk her out of it, so she’ll tell them later. She might not say anything at all — just phone when she gets there. Briefly, she considers telling Al, but if he knew she was planning any sort of a trip he’d decide she was getting too much money and find a way to make her give some of it back. But it doesn’t matter that there’s no one to share the news. She encloses the glow inside her, so she can touch it gently during the day. At that moment, her doorbell rings.

  Startled, she opens the door a crack.

  “Hi there. It’s Tim. I’ve got something for you.”

  She swings the door open and steps into the hall.

  “I’ve watched you go through the front door with your bike — you must have the patience of a saint to do that every time you go in or out. Here. Stick this in your pocket.”

  He proffers a small, inch-thick plastic wedge.

  “Jam it under the door and it will keep the door open while you go through. Just remember to pick it up after,” he explains. “Oh — and you can keep your bike in one piece in the elevator if you stand it up on the back wheel.”

  As she stammers her thanks, he peeks over her shoulder into the apartment and spots the piled up cardboard boxes.

  “You aren’t moving, are you?”

  “Oh, no. Well … actually, I haven’t really unpacked. I haven’t decided where to put everything yet.”

  “Ah. Well. If you’re needing help, feel free to ask.”

  “I’ll do that. Thank you.”

  He steps away slowly, then turns back.

  “I usually have a morning cuppa about this time. I’d enjoy a little company.”

  Her first impulse is to refuse. Then her California bravado takes over.

  “I’d like that.”

  He nods, smiling. “Right. Give me a minute to get the kettle boiling. You know where I am, don’t you? Second apartment down the hall, on your left.”