The Other Oregon

by Steve Anderson

  Now Tam was back out behind the bar, on her haunches, wiping something down. Greg hadn’t noticed the door swing open. He really needed to be more aware, he told himself.

  “So, just where are you from?” Tam asked him.

  “Portland,” he said. “I’m a native.” It was an awkward way of putting it, at best. His face had heated up, all red. “I just meant, I’m from there.”

  Tam stared at him, waiting for more.

  “That guy outside on the street? You can’t open carry like that in Portland,” Greg blurted instead.

  “That so? Well, you sure can here.”

  “At least, I don’t think you can,” he added. He told himself to look it up. He checked his phone and saw no bars.

  “No coverage?” Tam said.

  “No, but, it’s okay. I could use the isolation.”

  “Sometimes you do get coverage. It depends.” She took his plate.

  “Great sandwich, thanks,” Greg said, looking around the empty room. “Though I sort of feel like I’m The Prisoner,” he added, trying a joke.

  Tam didn’t smile. “I wouldn’t call it the state pen, though it can be like that for some.”

  “No, I just meant—dumb joke. TV reference.”

  “I get it. Patrick McGoohan—he was the lead guy in The Prisoner, right?” She showed him the smile he’d wanted, her teeth healthy squares.

  “Good one. I was going to look it up.”

  “If you had coverage.”

  “Totally.”

  Tam went back to wiping down. He emptied his beer. He waited a good half-minute, practically counting off the seconds.

  “I have a question,” he said. “You ever hear of the name Donny Wilkie?”

  “I sure haven’t.” She reached the end of the bar and stood. Her face was a little flushed, which brought out the gray in her hair. “I take it you’re not on vacation.”

  “I’m a writer, researching a book,” he said. He told her that the book, if the research panned out, would be about the urban-rural split in Oregon and focus on people’s stories over the history, the wonkish policies, the politics. This Donny Wilkie person fit one example. Donny Wilkie had come from rural Oregon and ended up in the city as a teen. Greg had known him, so he figured he should start with what he knew. The last Greg had heard, Donny had become a criminal. What had caused that? Did the city help, or was it already ingrained in this Donny?

  “Not sure about your whole city-versus-country deal,” Tam said. “People are just people. A guy like that, he might have been simply wired that way to explode at some point. Then again, as a teen you’re hardly fully formed. Any bad influence could bring out what might not explode otherwise.”

  “I suppose you’re right. All I know is, I got a lot of digging to do,” Greg said and paused. He’d probably told this Tam too much, but he couldn’t just hang around and hope for a clue. “In any case,” he added, “there’s an issue in all this I’m trying to nail—what does this idea of two Oregons do to Oregon as a whole?”

  “Good luck with that, professor.”

  Greg didn’t know if that was a joke. He smiled anyway.

  Tam smiled back. “You know I took you for one of those movie location scouts at first?—once I figured out you weren’t a Euro looking for turquoise. Scouts come through sometimes, but never choose us. Shows how much I know. Anyway, you find anything out?”

  What could that mean? Was she talking about the XXs? What if she was pushing him? “Like what?” he said.

  “You know, anything. Maybe just being here gives you ideas.”

  “No, not yet.”

  “You’ll figure it out, I’m sure.” Tam grabbed her rag and started wiping the taps.

  “Let me ask you something,” Greg said. “Were you protecting me from that guy back there? Helping me, I mean.”

  “I told you. Don’t let open-carry guy worry you.”

  “He’s not. He isn’t. It’s just that, how do you even know if it’s loaded, or on safety even?”

  “Who’s the good guy?”

  “That’s what I’m saying.”

  “You don’t know. And that’s just one part of the problem.”

  Greg wanted to joke about gun fanatics, but for all he knew she was packing a Glock under that skirt. “Man,” he tried anyway, “I guess I know what it’s like to be under an occupation.”

  Tam stopped wiping. She stared at him, stone-faced. “Mister, you got no goddamn idea.”

  “Oh!” Greg waved hands at her. “No, I didn’t mean … No, you’re right, I don’t at all.” His face flushed again.

  Tam laughed. She started wiping again, faster. “Just riding ya, take it easy. But, yes, I was helping out a stranger if that’s what you mean. You looked hungry.”

  “Okay. Thanks.”

  “What makes you think he was here?” Tam said. “Your friend, I mean.”

  “Someone told me. Plus, Donny had lived in Pineburg as a kid and when I knew him he used to talk about going back one day.”

  “Uh, and that’s it?”

  “Also, legal records have this as his last destination in the US.”

  “His last?”

  “About ten years ago. He’d fled to Mexico. But I had this wild idea that maybe he came back.” Greg stopped there, let Tam finish her wiping. He didn’t have much cover story left. He didn’t need to lie any more than this. And yet something about the possibility of making up more, of completely recreating himself, appealed to him in one warm, pulsating moment deep inside him. Why not say he was a movie scout? Why not the director even? He could probably get Tam and others to do all kinds of things that way. And then the moment was gone, leaving him feeling refreshed, breathing clearly. He guessed that was what heroin or maybe a women’s orgasm felt like. He got what the con man felt. He could go there in a place like this, where no one knew him. Why hadn’t he thought of it before? He had striven to be a better person, but if he had taken it in the other direction and simply become someone else entirely, maybe he would have ended up with no demons.

  Tam was staring at him with a curious half smile like someone watching a cat clean itself in weird places. He shifted in his chair. “Those pickles of yours?” he said. “You could sell those from a cart in Portland and rake it in.” Going with the first thing he could think of.

  “Nah. I’d have to dress them up. Deep fry them in batter, wrap them in pork belly or whatever. I been to Portland, seen your food carts that are all the rage. Why bother? It’s just a pickle.”

  “Yeah. I guess so.”

  She stared at him again, then at her bleach rag, and back at him as if she was thinking of wiping him down with it. “Ten years, that’s a long time. People come and go,” she said.

  “I know. I was thinking, though, maybe there are still people here that knew him, or who are still getting into trouble doing what he was doing.”

  He hadn’t mentioned a militia, and yet Tam was nodding her head.

  “Oh, there are still the same people, all right,” she said. “Only they think they’re all grown up now, and in a way that’s never any good. Thinking everyone else owes them. Like they deserve it.”

  “Like their time is ripe,” Greg added. He shook his head. He did understand that. He had felt that way once. The entitlement of the non-entitled could be a scary fucking thing. Infectious.

  Tam sighed and set down her rag. “Let me give you a tip, writer guy. If you’re looking for someone, especially for the story of someone like that, there’s a whole ‘nother part of town you probably haven’t tried.”

  11

  On the side of the road, sitting in fold-up chairs under a large umbrella fixed to the hood of their old Chevy Blazer, a young Native American couple was trying to sell fresh fish from a cooler. They eyed Greg passing in his car, he being the closest thing to an actual tourist. This edge of Pineburg was looking to him like yet another rural two-lane highway with a strip mall. Depressed, if not discontinued. Most shops were out of business, their windo
ws browned with road dust and last winter’s snow dirt and still bearing ads for cell phone deals, local artists, investment property, Your New Outdoor Paradise! Something called the Food Stamp Info Office was open and had people coming and going. A small chain market next door looked busy too, its windows papered over with posters announcing low prices in huge numbers and the products in tiny letters. One poster exclaimed that they always accept those same food stamps, which nowadays came as a barcoded plastic card called, with no irony intended, the Oregon Trail Card. American Dream or Oregon Dream, it sure was looking like the end of the road to Greg.

  The strip had roadside angle parking. Greg pulled in facing an empty, unleased storefront. It had a banner in the window: It’s Us or Salmon! Don’t Let Them Kill the Dam!

  Greg wondered what kind of property owner would allow a militant message like that on a space for lease. He noticed the For Lease sign was from the company called Callum Properties.

  At the end of the strip stood a former barn, low and squat without windows. It was now a flea market. Greg sat on a bench outside to get his bearings. Across the dusty road from the strip was a line of trees. To the right of the woods stood an abandoned diner. Its look was an odd mix of country cabin and mid-century roadside spot. The faux log walls and plank doors clashed with aluminum trim and windows that were boarded up—yet another relic from a time when, Greg imagined, this place could still let itself expect great things to come.

  Deep, clomping footsteps sounded from the side of the flea market. They rounded the corner. It was the man from the parking lot who had watched Greg. Without looking at Greg, he sat at the far end of the bench, which made it creak and seem to sink an inch, and for a second Greg grasped at the bench thinking he’d get flipped off his end like the smaller kid on a seesaw. He saw no rifle on the man. Then Greg saw he was wearing a holster of brown leather, the butt of a chunky black pistol sticking out. The man leaned forward, his forearms across his knees as if he wanted to spit out tobacco. All he needed was a badge.

  “Afternoon,” the man said.

  “Hey there,” Greg said.

  “Wayne Carver.”

  “I’m Greg. Greg Simmons.”

  Only now did this Wayne Carver look at Greg—he snapped his head sideways with such force he could have pulled a muscle.

  Greg offered his hand. Wayne studied it a moment, his dim eyes receding under his thick brow. He shook Greg’s hand and held it, squeezing for an uncomfortably long time. It wasn’t like a vise grip but rather a steady, moist smothering.

  “You a writer, Simmons? Reporter? What?” Wayne’s voice had an accusatory whine to it.

  “Both.” Greg showed a smile. “You the sheriff?” he added, trying to make a joke.

  Wayne grinned, and Greg felt the relief. The quip could have gone really wrong. In Wayne’s case it appeared to be flattery.

  “You got a place to stay?” Wayne said.

  “No. Not yet. I wasn’t sure where I’d end up.”

  With that, without a word, Wayne stood, smoothed the tuck of his neat and clean brown work shirt into his matching pants, and walked off. Greg watched him get into a pickup—the same one he had seen in town with the two rifles in the window and Carver Farm Supply on the doors. Wayne Carver was his name so he must be the son since Wayne wasn’t any older than him. And something about that made Greg wipe his hand on his pant leg.

  As Wayne’s pickup drove off, he noticed that far more people appeared, coming out from doorways and onto the street and sidewalk. An elderly couple hobbled past, each with canes and plastic bags hanging from their free hands. Each bag held a few cans and bottles. They approached a garbage can, and Greg looked away so they could poke around in peace. In the other direction, a kid was running circles around a primered, mold-splotched Yugo as the boy’s teenage mom popped the hood and fed the thing oil.

  Greg heard frantic whispers. Three teens stumbled out from a side alley, two guys in their late teens and a girl, their outfits of baggy jeans and hoodies, baseball hats and mud-caked high tops interchangeable. Greg pulled back to watch them as they passed. Their skin was pale, their pupils dilated, movements jerky. Sharp, stale smells like mildew and charred firewood followed them, passing over Greg. Meth tweakers were the same anywhere, he thought. Zombies.

  They headed off across the street for the line of trees.

  Greg followed, keeping his distance. Long before he was a reporter, he had learned that if you were after a secret, you didn’t ask those holding it but rather those on the fringes—the artists, cabbies, restaurant workers, and the users—those with lives little understood by others.

  The three kept up the same fast pace entering the woods as if having tread this route many times, traversing the same holes and logs. Greg would have stuck out inside the woods so he kept to the edge of the trees, skirting the three. He ended up at a riverbank lacking a real river. The bank lined a wide and rocky riverbed, but only a rope of water trickled on through—this was the Redpine River he’d seen coming into town.

  He crouched at the feeble stream. To his left, he could see into the woods. To his right and just yards away, stood the dead diner—what was once quite the riverside spot, he imagined.

  Inside the woods, the three teens were meeting with two guys who looked like would-be cowboys from a bad country rock band, their getups garnished with touches of leather and fur. One of the teen tweakers, a boy, passed the two country wannabes a small bundle.

  The girl tweaker had turned her head Greg’s way. The two wannabes turned and started for Greg, charging through the trees for him.

  Greg stayed at the bank. What else could he do? He wasn’t doing anything. He was just checking out the water.

  The two got in Greg’s face. “What you doing?” said one, and the other said, “Fuck you doing?” Their arms had cocked back for fighting but their gaunt, crooked faces made them look like they’d been beat on more than they’d beaten. They were sweating. One was shaking. Greg caught a sour smell.

  He stepped back, trying to smile. “Guys, come on. I wasn’t doing a thing—”

  “Listen up,” boomed another voice. “You two go and leave this here man alone.”

  The voice had come from behind them.

  Greg and the two turned to see a man. The man had stepped out of the dead diner and stood tall, wearing a crisp button-down shirt and new jeans.

  It was Donny Wilkie.

  Greg’s insides tensed up, his organs pressing together.

  It was Donny, but a bizarro version, a Donny who had gone to West Point, had nine awesome lives, later wrote a best-selling book, and could retire off his inspiring speaking engagements alone. This was what the figure of this man standing before him was saying, if not flaunting. His erect stance and hard-set look showed he was ready for anything, for more than even Greg had seen the man handle.

  One of the two said to Donny, “This guy here was following us.”

  “He is not your problem,” Donny said.

  Greg had frozen up as if the straps inside him were cutting off blood flow, numbing all.

  Donny handed the one who spoke a twenty. “You two need grub. Get some protein. If I find you didn’t eat, I’ll send Wayne Carver come looking for you.”

  The two straightened up.

  “They’ll have food coupons at the school tomorrow,” Donny said. “Right down the street. Best you two get in line there.”

  The two nodded and backed up, moving along. “Yes, sir, thank you,” they said as one.

  Greg was still frozen, but his neck could move and he could shake his head, and shake he did as Donny Wilkie turned to face him. Was it really him? Donny confirmed it by smiling, then grinning. He still had those faint acne scars and dimples, but it was all deeper, more etched now. His grin might have gone all wrong by now, yet it still brought out that sparkle Greg remembered—that charm Greg had urged Donny to use so they could get girls.

  “Here I am,” Donny said.

  Greg looked around, to make s
ure all had gone. The woods were empty and the street clear.

  “Coast is clear,” Donny added. “Well? You were going to find me anyway. Right?”

  Greg didn’t know what to say. “I don’t know what to say,” he said.

  Donny’s smile had fallen away, revealing those sandpaper cheeks, sharp lines, and peering dark eyes. “You could say it’s good to see me, but if you did I’d really want to go and bust your jaw,” he said. He turned and started marching up to the road.

  Greg sighed, which seemed to relax the straps inside him. He caught up with Donny, who whispered: “This here’s the way we play it. My name is Charles now. Charlie Adler, people call me. They have for a long time.”

  Greg walked in step, trying to make this fit in his head.

  “You got that?” Donny said. “Tell me you got that.”

  “Yes. Okay. I got it.”

  12

  Greg’s whole face felt numb, unable to make proper reactions. He couldn’t sort his colliding thoughts or figure out a next move. Which was probably a good thing. Because it could show on his face. Because Donny was eyeing him with his face so hard and set.

  It was ten minutes later. Donny drove Greg in a new king cab pickup on a narrow old road that skirted Pineburg. Donny kept eyeing Greg as he drove, knowing the road so well he didn’t need eyes on it—as if the pickup rode fixed on rails, Donny only needing eyes on Greg.

  “I should thank you for saving my ass,” Greg said finally.

  “Those two weren’t going to do anything.”

  “Who were they?”

  “Casey, Damon. Couple Darwin Awards candidates, but they mean well. Just need someone to tell ‘em what is what.”