Just North of Nowhere

by Lawrence Santoro

  The plate felt cool in Ruth's hand. Still the shadows slanted across the street in afternoon light. All the same, nothing diff. . .

  There was a thing. A depression in the snow. A hole, half drifted in. As though something had been there, then was not. The place where she had been. Once, for three moments at the beginning of the old century, she stood in that spot in the snow. Then Burroughs had taken the picture of the place. After she had gone. If she had turned in the slender moments when she had been there, she would have seen him alive. Burroughs. The famous man. Who would later take this plate back to his house on the bluff and. . .and do whatever he did to make it real, then write the date on this frame with his steel nibbed pen. She ran her bare fingers over the wood. She could almost hear the scritch of the point.

  Burroughs had been there. Implicit in the picture was the photographer. Implicit, now, was her. Ruth Potter. Implicit by the empty place in the snow. Implicit by the hole her absence had left.

  Hillary poured the last trickles of aquavit into their glasses. “That was one Goddamn party, Ruthie, New Years, turn of the old century. You wouldn't believe who was there. Right here in Bluffton!” Hillary's licorice warm smile flowed across the table.

  “Who?” Ruth said. “Who?”

  “I’m not saying. You got to go sometime!”

  Chapter 8

  BETWEEN SEASONS

  The season ended. The show was canceled. Eugene fled L.A.

  He took his time in New York—three months—then slid into an agency job. Those cowpoke pooches wrangling that herd of Maxi-Beef Steers® to the Full-Feast Corral? That was Eugene’s. The German rats swilling DAP® at the Rathskeller? His, too. The lady jocks sniffing like a pack of wolves in the guy's locker room? Almost snagged a Clio with that one!

  Cancel him? Huh!

  Money was good.

  Life sucked. L.A. ruins people for living anywhere but, he figured. But Christ, cranking out 22 per season and sweating renewal? That wasn’t the dream. That was not what took him into the business of show.

  Every day on the subway Eugene wondered why everyone near him was way too stupid and talked way too loud about it. Took him less than a year to realize: it wasn't him. All conversations were loud. Everyone was stupid. How else could he sell French toast mix (“Just add your egg, your milk and DIP!”) to anyone with a brain?

  In a few months he hated everyone. In less than a year he hated himself. That’s when he started worrying. He sensed, yes, in every face-time exchange, part of him was close to . . .

  He was close to taking action! That was it: He was cHelose to doing something.

  One evening on the subway (it hadn't been a great day), he was trying to read. A kid's book. He was tired of big lit, “serious” books. The jerk behind him was way too loud, talking about. . . Well, about something. The guy's voice was off: nasal, he sounded like he had a cold – but he didn't. Throaty, he sounded definitive – having experienced nothing! Without looking, Eugene could tell. Every fifth word was “game” or “ball,” that kind of jerk.

  Finally, Eugene turned, looked the dude right in his fucking eyes and. . .

  . . .Holy Christ, he knew him, a guy from way back, freshman year. A guy – no friend, just a guy – who’d dated Leslie, for crineoutloud, dated her after. After.

  Then, no. Of course it wasn't him. The subway guy was a frat rat. Just out of school, heading uptown from one of those downtown jobs they handed out to kiddies with their MBAs these days (eighty-five klicks out of the gate figuring the guy'll credit-out at hundred and twenty per, Christ!). No. This guy wasn't anything like the school guy who'd dated Les. That guy’d be, well, his age, Jesus! Eugene still wanted to leap over the seat and bite the guy's nose. . .

  That was it! The something he wanted to do! Clamp teeth on this guy's – anyguy’s – rhinoplastied toker and feel the thing snap, crack, and spurt.

  Eugene’s laugh was so unexpected he damn-near snotted the guy. The sudden laugh from a stranger shut the moron up, anyway. Made him look. Made him wonder! Eugene laughed again, a chuckle; pretended he saw something going down in the back of the car.

  He turned back to Uncle Wiggily but couldn't stay burrowed in with the old bunny. Who the hell could believe in that crap? Monsters in the deep woods? Monsters dispatched by an old rabbit gentleman?

  Who could believe in monsters, period! Who could believe anything, jaw muscles bunching as his were, laughing aloud to himself? Who could focus even on Wiggily while feeling that kinesthetic nose between his too real teeth: crunch, crackle, squirt.

  A month later, maybe less, he ditched the agency and started driving. Something said: Feminine Hygiene ain’t the dream, Eugene! He drove and drove; had no goal other than to stop somewhere, sometime and write the perfect something: perfect book, screenplay, even, fuck, the perfect poem. Some perfect anything. Get his statuette, medal, whatever they gave for poetry, and go never near L.A., New York or places like them, ever again. The Award (whichever it was) didn't mean a thing. “Not a damn thing!” he said nodding to the evening. It was just The Thing: the thing that would let him work anywhere. Anyplace he wanted. The thing that would light his chops; show he could do what he wanted when and where. Even in a place like. . .

  . . .a road sign resolved out of the twilight. . .

  . . .Bluffton. Even in a place like Bluffton – Pop 671.

  He swerved off the road (fishtail squeal, a slo-mo gravel spray) and shot down to the main street and. . .

  Jesus Christ! Pretty place! Victorian jewel box! He started drafting in his head:

  EXT. EVENING. Wide shot: A small town… The place is BLUFFTON. High bluffs enclose the place. It is a Victorian jewelbox…

  ANGLE ON: A RIVER. IT wriggles through, late evening light twinkles from the…

  Cut the cute crap he said to himself

  A SMALL RIVER cuts through town. IT runs parallel with the main street, COMMONWEALTH.

  Cliché name. He’d come up with something better. Later. Later

  Side streets intersect.

  MONTAGE: EXT. EARLY EVENING. PAN: COMMONWEALTH STREET (he had to come up with something better!) Old shops with clean, fresh facades. THE WURST HAUS, THE AMERICAN HOUSE – EATS… Sidewalks are raised. Covered boardwalks like a western town.

  You’re kidding me. This is all restored? Right? Who lives here anyway? Swedes. Indians? They use that river? Too many rocks, rapids, whatever.

  MONTAGE: EXT. EARLY EVENING. LONG SHOT A TOWN PARK at one end of town. A white gazebo casts a long shadow.

  EXT. EVENING. A small hydroelectric dam. The spillway roars.

  Who stays in a place like this after he grows up?

  EXT. EVENING. COMMONWEALTH.

  Amish carriages make their way toward the bluff as night begins.

  Eugene spoke to his pocket Perlcorder: “What secrets are we looking for? What mysteries hide behind those pretty facades? Those farmers? What the hell are they? Amish, Mennonite, whatever. What do they really? They’re leaving town. It’s sunset. What do they have to do with this?”

  It was perfect. Big old houses. Catholic church on one hill, Protestant something on another. People in flannel. People who'd lived here all their lives. “Do people ever come back here? To retire? Do they come back here because they can’t hack the real world?”

  Eugene walked past the real estate office. For sale. Prices? Good. Good? Great! Huh, Eugene thought. He spoke into his Perlcorder: “course real estate values stink in, what is it? Bluffton. What's to do here? You can't eat beauty. Where the hell is this, anyway? Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa?”

  He clicked off the machine. He looked around. He pressed record again: “It’s just Bluffton,” he said.

  EXT. BLUFFTON STREET. EARLY EVENING. Evening light is cool blue. Twilight is red on the high horizon.

  He pulled up to the hotel:

  ANGLE ON HOTEL SIGN: “THE BLUFFS BED AND BREAKFAST”

  The Bluffs was perfect. Victorian. A little clutter, no dust.

  He c
hecked in. No problem. Plenty of rooms. “How come?” he asked.

  “We’re between seasons,” the clerk said. “You’re lucky.” Nice. So nice.

  Eugene threw his valise on the bed, changed into walking around clothes, and went out to find the beauty shot.

  Evening cooled his nose and lungs. “Between seasons,” he said to the recorder, “on the edge: the head of one, tail of another.” He had to think a moment to remember which edge he was on.

  Whatever, the air tasted good. He put the recorder in his pocket.

  He walked easily. The sidewalk felt right. People ignored him or nodded and smiled. Passing conversations were quiet, serious but with smiles. They spoke of food, business, or small problems. He went into a bar. THE bar, so far as he knew.

  INT. EVENING. THE WAGON WHEEL INN. The place is dark, friendly. Neon above the bar and on the wall casts warm, flowing light over the people and place. The crowd is scattered and quiet. Private. These are farm workers and shopkeepers… You can almost smell the. . .

  Eugene breathed deeply.

  . . .pleasant remnants of stale beer, old smoke, and sweat. The place smells like work and friendship.

  He stopped thinking and breathed again.

  …and the past!

  The smell of the past?

  What the hell, he liked it.

  Ah! There they were! The electric sign on the wall behind the register. His rats, the one’s he’d invented, sloshing DAP in their rat-built. . .

  He figured to keep quiet about his part in that piece of millennial brewery art.

  The beer that was in front of him was not DAP. It was cheap, cold and the third one was free. The juke box?

  FOLLOWING. ANGLE ON: A WURLITZER JUKE BOX, circa 1945…

  Eugene wandered over. He leaned on the juke with both hands. There was himself, reflected, bent over, front-lit by bubbling neon…

  EUGENE thinks about. . .

  Christ! The selection! He could have stayed all night, punched every button. And these? Hot. Warm. Cool. Scary. Wet. He took a note to ask.

  Instead, he left. Checked one restaurant.

  Faux!

  Another.

  Generic.

  Then, at the far end—the river end—of town:

  EXT. EVENING. THE AMERICAN HOUSE – EATS restaurant.

  The place was bright, white, and advertised Great American Pie.

  He spoke to the machine: “Note: Everything you need to know about a diner, a town – no, no: You can tell everything about a people by the pie they make, the pie they love.” He waited a moment before rewinding and listening. He’d made it up on the spot but it was authoritative. Eugene was back!

  Then he took another note to check the source.

  But, fuck! The pie was good! He had cherry. He tried the Apple and it was so good it was a Goddamn Americana cliché. Jesu Joy! He sucked it down. Peach was next and he damn near ordered a fourth (banana cream) but stopped when he realized people were watching.

  He went with it. “This. Is. Just. Great. Pie!” he said to the room. Should have been a clap line! Everyone smiled at least. One or two almost laughed. The old guy in the front booth – must have been a hundred – he ignored him, but, fuck, he’s deaf, Eugene figured.

  The bill came to: Christ, less than a New York macchiato!

  That wasn't the point, for Christ sake. The owner – he figured the old lady was the owner – thanked him for stopping in and asked if he was passing through or was he here for the hiking, camping, or what?

  “For the living,” he said, “Just for the life is all,” he said.

  She smiled. That was a good thing, she said, “wouldn't want to be feeding another dead man,” she said.

  Half the joint laughed out loud at that one! Eugene couldn’t figure it but what the hell? He relaxed and joined her. When she left, he took a note about the ‘another dead men’ line. It was, well, interesting.

  It had gotten night dark while he was going pie hog. The street was quiet and he felt gentle. He walked toward the river to listen to the water and to test whether it spoke to him.

  EXT. BLUFFTON STREET. NIGHT. Dim light. Starlight. The river is heard in the near distance.

  Beyond the restaurant was a parking lot. At the far edge, a barn: “The Compass Playhouse.” Except for a few cars parked near the theater, the lot was empty. A slit of light cut from the barn doors. Passing, on his way to the river, Eugene heard shouts, cheers. He listened: Shakespeare in the night; fictive passion, rehearsed. The river rippled over the words. The moon rested on the bluff. A bird swooped from there and the rush of its passing moaned in Eugene’s heart.

  The voice spoke from the barn: “If we shadows have offended, think but this and all is mended. That you have but slumbered here whilst these visions did appear.”

  It wasn't a dream. He was home. This was home. Home again, home again.

  Then Leslie ran past him in the moonlight. She screamed then laughed. Running full from the river's woods, two kids nearly scooted into him before they realized an adult stood in the night in their way. Twelve years each, maybe. No apologies. They jigged around the pillars of his legs and gut-shrieked toward town.

  It was Leslie. Really.

  And it was he, Eugene himself, aged 13, who followed, hooting.

  Eugene, aged, mature, left behind and silent in the parking lot, watched the children thump up the boardwalk steps to the American House—Eats. They grappled the door, the door screeched, banged shut. Then the night was quiet with distant Shakespeare.

  Oh, Jesus. It was she. Truly. It was he.

  Eugene waited in the shadows across the street from the restaurant. He couldn't go in. He couldn't go in, sit, and watch them. Not after his pie frenzy. He was noted. He'd be remembered.

  He consoled. Children take no longer than that with anything. He remembered: A soda pop – gulped in a flash. A piece of pie – three chews and gone. At twelve, he could watch a two hour movie in a minute and a half. He remembered. Life was a full-out run when he and Leslie were kids.

  Well, ha! They still were kids, he reminded himself. Through the plate glass, at the counter, there they were. They quivered with life. That was she: flame red hair, cut ragged with big shears and fury. Yes, it truly was. He recognized her. More, he knew her by her energy. He knew her by her rhythms. He'd caught it in her passing. Her scent was the same: a rich mixture of sweaty girl, day-old dirt, week-long clothes.

  And himself. A billion little things fit. That boy at the counter in the American House in Bluffton, the one debating: Should I? Chocolate or vanilla fudge? Vanilla fudge or chocolate? Cone or Cup? Should I at all? It’s what time? Will I be home on time? Will I dream? Will I wake? It was Eugene, aged 13. He'd get the fudge in a cone. She was Leslie, aged 12 and she'd have butter pecan in a bowl, no spoon!

  They were out in four moments flat. Another two moments and the boy looked at his watch for the fourth time. He quivered, sucked his ice cream, looked again at the watch, rocked back and forth, then rocketed up the street in a panic of time and darkness, running half backward, half forward, both ways at once, “See you tomorrow. See you? Yes? Yes.”

  Leslie sat on the steps where Eugene’s rocket trail began.

  She never tried to follow. He’d always wondered what she did when he’d gone.

  She sat and sucked ice cream from a paper bowl. Leslie did that. She hated cones. Soggy, drippy, leaky. Bite the bottom off to suck the melt (you have to do that, for cripes sake), it runs all up your arm. Lookit! Jesus!

  Old Eugene – he knew he was ‘old’ – couldn't wait. Had to see. Old Eugene crossed the street.

  Light spilled from the restaurant’s bright interior. She sat in silhouette lapping from her paper bowl, a shadow that watched Eugene’s approach. When he neared her the restaurant light bounced off him and lit her face. She squinted at him, right eye shut, lip curled, head cocked. Her look. Always. When Leslie gave herself to thought, her face gathered at her nose. It wasn’t attractive, but it was she.


  The pressure of her stare touched him. In a heartbeat, he stopped.

  She put down the bowl. “Hi,” her voice sounded like a “You’re the pie guy everyone’s talking about.”

  “Leslie?” he said.

  “Yep.”

  “What are you?” He couldn’t finish it. This was silly. She was NOT. Could not be. This was another girl who looked like. “I'm sorry,” he said, “this is a mistake. You remind me.”

  She picked unconsciously at a scab on her arm. “Huh.” she said, “I remind you? That’s cool. Around here no one reminds anyone of anyone. Stupid, huh? Too small, I guess. Everyone’s just, you know? What they are.”

  Eugene nodded. That was she. Had to. . . “If I were dumb enough to ask, you, you’d tell me you’re a foreign correspondent, right? Covering hotspots and war grounds of the world, right?”

  She grinned like an imp. “You read minds. I like that.” In the next moment she gave the scab her full attention. “No. I WAS going to be a war correspondent and cover hotspots and battles. Now, I’m a witch. I’m being trained!”

  In another moment she had the scab off. She bled and the blood swept a clean streak in the dirt on her arm. But she'd already forgotten about it by then.

  “Well,” he said… How many times had Eugene watched, disgusted, as Leslie picked herself bloody?

  A million.

  He resisted making HIS face and telling her what a crud she was.

  They had fought every day, about everything. They'd thrown mudballs, snowball, clods and rocks at each other. They’d rammed each other with wagons, bikes, and with themselves on skates. They hit each other with balls, sticks; lashed with rope whips and cold hose water. Whatever there was to hurl, had been hurled by one at the other.

  He'd once, in a passion, stuck his pencil into her arm and the point had broken off inside. Until the last day of their lives together, Leslie carried the small dark smudge under the skin just below her right shoulder, a tiny tattoo.