Nothing Special

by Geoff Herbach

  I just ate some of the Hickory Farms Sausage and Cheese Gift Platter, damn it. I’m weak! I’m also hungry.

  Thank God I showered at the hotel in Chicago yesterday, or Renee would be dead from my sweat, probably. She had her head on my shoulder and my face was asleep on top of her brown-hair head and we are both seriously spritzed, which was sort of embarrassing. (I might have drooled on her head a little.)

  We’re in the bus station because our bus doesn’t go any farther. Our new bus to Tampa leaves in two hours. I was just thinking: since Jerri and me left Bluffton like forty-four hours ago, I’ve slept probably a total of six hours. That’s crazy. That’s all. I keep flinching because I’m seeing things in my peripheral vision. (Little people, mostly.)

  Renee is in the bathroom. She told me to come find her if she hasn’t come back in ten minutes because there are some pretty weird, random people hanging out here, Aleah.

  Before she left, she also said, “You haven’t asked a single question about me. Aren’t you curious?”

  I answered honestly: “I am so hung up in my own crap, I don’t even think.”

  “I’m starting my senior year at Gainesville in a few weeks.”

  “I’m a senior too,” I said.

  “Gainesville is the University of Florida, Felton. I’m twenty-two. I thought you were a lot older on the plane.”

  “I’m a lot older since the plane,” I said.

  “I do enjoy your peculiarity.”

  Now I want to know why she was in Chicago, Aleah. Now I want to know her story. Now she’s in the bathroom.

  I’ll probably forget to ask her anything when she gets back.

  I’ve been hung up in my own crap my whole life, you know?

  It’s some pretty serious crap, though. I just don’t know if that’s a reasonable excuse anymore. Dad died a long, long time ago. Jerri’s in good shape. I guess I don’t know if Andrew’s okay, but I think so.

  • • •

  Gus and I went through Gainesville. (I actually called Jerri from there to tell her we’d made it to Michigan all right. She was relieved, as she’d been calling my dead cell. She told me she was having a great time in Chicago—your dad makes Jerri happy, Aleah). The University of Florida has contacted me about football too. They’ve sent me a bunch of emails. This is who I am. A top recruit. I’m not that little, shivering kid anymore. I have to get over the horror movie.

  Speaking of the horror movie: Gus and I arrived in Fort Myers in the middle of the night.

  Before we got there, as Gus’s Celica barreled silent through the Dangling dark, I began to realize that I’d never been so close to my dad’s people, at least not since he died.

  My dad grew up in Chicago, you know, but his parents already had a place down here when I was tiny. I didn’t really know where it was in Florida, but I remembered it a little. As we rolled, I figured it had to be Fort Myers. (It was, indeed, I found out.) Gus and I were barreling straight into the heart of my dad’s family, and this was not a place where me and Andrew were ever welcome.

  Why were we listed in Rose Reinstein’s obituary, I wondered.

  Talk about wanting to throw up, Aleah.

  I thought, How is this better than a damn football camp? You know how to play football. You can’t talk to people who hate you, who go out of their way to show you they don’t care, even though they should because they’re your grandfather…

  Around 2 a.m. Gus said, “Here’s the exit.”

  “Oh crap,” I said.

  “Where do we need to go?” he asked.

  “How should I know? I don’t know.”

  “Call Andrew. Get directions.”

  Gus tossed his iPhone onto my lap and I tapped Andrew’s number and I couldn’t breathe at all. “Are you serious? He’ll know we’re here.”

  “That’s the point, Felton. We’re here to keep him safe, to take him home if he’s not safe. He has to know we’re here.”

  “Right,” I said. “Right. I know.”

  I pressed Call. Why would he be awake? Two a.m. Andrew’s voice mail picked up, his high-pitched canary voice singing, “Leave a Message! Leave a Message!” (My God, I used to hate his little canary voice…so annoying—of course, things have changed.)

  I left a message: “Okay. Andrew. You’re going to be pissed. But me and Gus are here—I don’t mean at your orchestra camp, okay? We’re seriously here in Fort Myers, and I need you to call me right back and tell me where to find you. Thank you.”

  I hung up and shook my head. Half baked, you know, Aleah? What if Andrew never returned the call? He didn’t have to if he didn’t want to. Would I have to hunt down my grandfather myself? Would I call the Reinstein in the phone book? There probably wasn’t even a listing. Not good.

  “We didn’t really think about this part, huh?” Gus mumbled.

  Gus pulled off I-75 and aimed at downtown Fort Myers and “Beaches.” There were a lot of cars out on the road for two in the morning. Gus smoked, and heat poured in (like in the 80s in the middle of the night, like tonight).

  “We need to find a spot to park. I can’t drive anymore,” Gus said.

  We drove through a wide and curving sprawl highway that went past shopping mall after shopping mall and restaurants and gas stations, and CVS pharmacies that were right across the street from Walgreens pharmacies, and gun shops and castle-themed miniature golf courses, and dark, empty retail spots that were sort of overgrown with Dangling foliage, but nothing that looked like any place specifically.

  “There’s no way we’re going to find Andrew here,” I mumbled.

  “Yeah, man. Yeah. We have a problem,” Gus nodded.

  Finally, finally, after like a half hour of just sprawling crap (that looked exactly like the sprawling crap around Dubuque, Iowa, except with palm trees and thick shrubs), we pulled into a part of town that was older and sort of on a grid.

  The giant palms bent over the car. Ranch-style houses sat back from the road in darkness. The houses got a little closer and older, but not like a hundred years old, more like from the seventies or something, and there were more and more old strip malls, and then a cemetery, and then we came to a sign that had an arrow pointing to downtown Fort Myers and one to the Midpoint Bridge and Cape Coral. Gus took a right to head toward downtown, because we couldn’t leave Fort Myers.

  But we never got to a downtown. About ten minutes later, Gus pulled into the empty parking lot of a closed restaurant that had thick bushes and trees all around it. He parked and shut off the car. We both stared into the dark.

  “What are we going to do?” I asked.

  “I can’t drive anymore, man. I feel like I’m going to crash. We can hide in this overgrowth, man. We don’t have any place to go, anyway. Try your freaking brother again.”

  Andrew didn’t answer, of course. “We don’t know where we are, Andrew…”

  “McGregor Boulevard,” Gus said.

  “McGregor Boulevard…”

  “In Fort Myers,” Gus said.

  “In Fort Myers, Andrew.”

  “Edison Restaurant, right next to the country club.”

  “Edison Restaurant. The country club. My phone’s dead. Call Gus, okay?”

  Andrew didn’t call. We sat in silence for another ten minutes.

  “I’m going to sleep now,” Gus said.

  Gus stuck his hand next to the seat and pulled a lever, and the shitty Celica chair fell backward and then he was out cold, I thought.

  I breathed hard. My nerves sort of leapt. I didn’t want to meet my grandfather, Aleah. I also didn’t want to be stuck in a parking lot in the middle of the night in the middle of Florida where criminals might be hiding. (I’ve seen a lot of episodes of COPS.) I heard tree-creaking noises and cars driving past the entrance slowly. My muscles filled with j
uice. Had to do it. I got out of the car and pissed in a bush, and then I ran back and forth and back and forth across the parking lot like the total freak-show clown that I am.

  After awhile, Gus rolled down his window and shouted, “Would you stop? You’re like a freaking hamster on one of those wheels.”

  “This is what I do,” I shouted.

  “Freak, Felton. Wow,” Gus said.

  I ran back and forth until I could barely stand. What the hell? Where’s Andrew? Why am I here? I don’t want to see my grandpa. I don’t care about Tovi. This is stupid. Why aren’t I in Michigan? Jesus Christ. Jerri? I’m sorry. Why am I here? It took probably two hours, seriously. When I climbed back in the car, Gus was really asleep.

  It was so freaking dark, and those thick palm tree bushes were bent over the car blocking out everything…

  • • •

  Wait.

  Renee’s not back, yet. It’s been like twenty minutes. Should I really go find her? In the bathroom? Some more people just showed up. Like ten middle-aged African Americans. They’re all wearing Hawaiian shirts like Andrew wears. They all look like they’re going to fall asleep. I’m so tired too. There’s one dude working the ticket window, and he’s so tired he might not make it through the next couple of minutes.

  Where the hell is Renee? I’m passing out. I have to unplug my computer and pack up if I’m going to find her.

  August 17th, 3:41 a.m.

  Jacksonville, Florida, Part II

  Renee was smoking with a homeless guy outside. This station is just surrounded by empty parking garages and it’s dark out there. I had to walk to this back alley to find her (because she wasn’t in the bathroom when I called in for her). I crept around the corner, ready to punch and kick (my backpack on, which might have slowed me down). And there she was, smoking. I sort of freaked. I shouted, “What the hell are you doing?” at her.

  She said, “Cool down, man child.”

  The homeless man laughed. “That your beau?”

  “No, he is not,” she replied.

  I always expect the worst, Aleah. By the time I left the station looking for Renee, I expected I’d find her murdered body. Expect the worst. If things go wrong, I expect they will go very wrong. Yes, it will get dangerous. Yes, you will be terrified.

  I expect the horror movie, which is seriously messing me up.

  • • •

  You can imagine how I felt, then, out there in that restaurant parking lot with Gus when someone started pounding on Gus’s car window.

  Murderer!

  Okay. The passenger chair in Gus’s Celica is broken, so it doesn’t tilt back so I was asleep sitting straight up, my head lolled forward, drool flowing out of my mouth, I’m sure. And then, the pounding. Or, maybe, more like tapping. I flinched awake. “What?”

  “Shit,” Gus said, trying to sit up from his rolled-way-back chair.

  “Does he have a gun?” I shouted.

  “Cops?” Gus cried.

  “Open the window,” a voice came from outside.

  “Don’t. They might shoot you,” I said.

  Gus managed to get his seat up after kicking the steering wheel a couple of times trying. “They might shoot me through the window too. What’s stopping them?”

  “Let’s go. Let’s go. Drive out of here.”

  Instead, Gus rolled down the window. It was so dark in the lot that I couldn’t see who was out there. “You’re not a cop,” Gus said.

  “You’re not Felton,” a girl’s voice said.

  Gus reached up and turned on the dome light. I could see the girl had a hoodie on, but I couldn’t really see her face. She could see me, though.

  “That’s Felton,” Gus said.

  “Oh. Shit. Yeah,” she said. “That’s a big bruise.”

  “I punched him,” Gus whispered.

  “Okay. Are you Gus?” she asked.

  “Yeah.” Gus nodded.

  “You’re not even close out here. We have to go to Fort Myers Beach. It’s like a half hour. Follow me, okay?”

  “Okay,” Gus said.

  She left the window and climbed into a car parked a couple slots away from us. Gus turned to me and said, “Did you see that?” His eyes were wide.

  “Who was she?” I asked.

  “Has to be your cousin. I mean, cuter, but looks like your sister. I can’t believe she found us.”

  “How old is she?”

  “She’s driving. Maybe our age or something?” Gus said.

  The car, which I could only assume contained my cousin, Tovi, backed up and then slowly drove out of the parking lot. Gus followed. The Celica clock said 5:05, so it was 6:05 Eastern time. 6:05 in the morning.

  “She’s driving a Beemer, dude. You think she has a Beemer?”

  “Probably, since she’s driving it.”

  “Nice car if you like that kind of thing.”

  Down McGregor my cousin drove, ten miles under the speed limit. Gus was on her tail like a dog nose to a dog buttock.

  “Maybe she’s underage, man. She drives like a grandma.”

  The word “grandma” freaked me out. “Oh shit,” I said.

  “Wish she’d speed up. I have to take a piss,” Gus said.

  For about ten minutes, we followed her back through the neighborhoods we’d been through a few hours earlier and then, for another ten minutes, into ones we’d never been in. My heart totally pounded.

  Then at an open stretch of road, out of no place, the girl (Tovi) gunned it. She blew out to like 85 miles per hour.

  “Whoa!” Gus shouted. He hit the gas but was behind her a long way immediately. “Definitely a Reinstein,” Gus said. “Weird as hell.”

  I just nodded.

  “At least she’s moving. Bladder. Bad.”

  Tovi slowed down and we caught up. (Gus said, “Nooooo….”) The sun started lighting the sky all blue, orange, and purple. Tovi slid around a right curve in the road, gunned it like crazy on a straightaway, and then slowed way down so we could catch her as she slid around a left curve.

  “Another straight run of road now. Wonder if she’ll hit a hundred?” Gus asked. “Go, girl!” he begged.

  But she didn’t go fast. She went very, very slowly so we were right on her tail. There was enough light that I could see she was alone in the car, no Andrew. I could also tell that she was staring up in the rearview, on occasion. Looking at me?

  It was light enough that I could see we were on the water. Between little ramshackle buildings, great stretches of water appeared.

  The sight of it made my heart pound. (Even though I was plain freaked about this girl, I still felt excited.) “Is that the ocean, man? Is that what that water is?”

  “It’s attached to the ocean,” Gus said. “Or at least to the Gulf of Mexico. This isn’t really the ocean, you know.”

  We rolled past sort of dumpy resorts and then past a tennis court that was filled with eight old ladies whacking balls at the ass cracker of morning. “Lot better than the old ladies in the nursing home on your paper route, huh?” I said.

  “They’ll be there one day. We’ll all be there.”

  And then there was more water, everywhere, water on both sides of the land. “We’re on the ocean, man. Holy shit.”

  We were following my cousin, who I’d never met, out into the ocean, maybe to meet my grandfather who hates me or not…Crazy, Aleah. I was totally shaking.

  We came to a giant bridge that shot up like ten stories into the air. The actual sun, not just its light, came up over the side of the earth. Giant bodies of water rippled on both sides of us and under us. “This is awesome, Gus.”

  “Yeah. Pretty,” Gus said. “I don’t like water that much right now. Pee.”

  The sign at the end of the bridge
said “Welcome to Fort Myers Beach.” It was resort-y like the Wisconsin Dells, but with lots of palm trees and white sidewalks and lots and lots of swimsuit stores. A couple of old guys ran past on a morning jog when we stopped at a stop sign. They were shirtless and were tanned this dark orange color I’d never seen before.

  “Someone left the steaks on the barbie too long,” Gus said.

  Then Tovi veered to the right and there was a pier—which I recognized from a certain photograph of a pelican that had been on display on feltonreinstein.com—but I couldn’t see the water because there were some stores and some dunes and thick vegetation in the way. I really thought I might throw up.

  “I totally have to piss very, very bad,” Gus groaned.

  Just as he said it, Tovi pulled left into the parking lot next to a hotel called the White Shells.

  “Ah!” Gus shouted.

  He pulled into an open space a couple of cars down from Tovi. Then he shut off the car, burst out, and ran toward the hotel.

  Then I got out of the car.

  I could hear Tovi get out of her car.

  I didn’t want to look over at her. Instead, I looked at my feet, which were in my stinky running shoes (Ultimate Frisbee, running in that parking lot), which were on pavement that was covered in a thin film of sand and crackly stuff I later figured out is broken seashell.

  Dizzy. My throat felt like it might close down and kill me. Tovi didn’t say anything either. We both stood next to the cars for way too long.

  Then she said, “Hey, did you like my driving?”

  “Yeah,” I said, looking at the ground. “Pretty funny.”

  “I can’t help it. Papa’s car is so fast. It’s so fun. Sometimes I just got to go.”

  I lifted my head and turned to the right in time to see Tovi pull back her hood. “Papa?” I asked.

  “Our old granddad,” Tovi said. “You know it’s me, right?”

  We stared at each other. Seriously weird.