I sat there in silence for a good minute. I didn’t know what to do with what he had just given me. I wanted to wrap it up, protect it, store it on the highest shelf of my closet so it would never break. I wanted to let it sink deep into me and fill all the holes he’d left behind.
I wanted to believe it.
Wholeheartedly.
Without reservations.
The way daughters are supposed to believe their fathers.
And maybe, just a small part of me did.
“Okay,” I finally said.
But, as it turned out, I was right to be wary. Because two weeks later, he was gone again. This time there was no reunited band to steal him away. There were no more excuses for him to hide behind. No brushes with success for him to cling to.
This time, he left without a reason.
And the hole felt so much deeper than the last one.
The note he left was an echo of the past. Like someone had rewound the tape of our history and played it over again.
I’m sorry. I have to do this.
The only difference was me. I was older. I was wiser. I was harder. At twelve years old, I didn’t feel sadness or abandonment or confusion. This time, I felt only anger.
I stared at the note for a long time, the rage building inside of me, the bitterness solidifying, before I finally ripped it from the fridge, crumpled it in my hands, and whispered aloud to the empty kitchen, “You lied.”
6:52 P.M.
SEASIDE, OR
INVENTORY: 1968 FIREBIRD CONVERTIBLE (1), CASH ($323.38), SEA GLASS (1 PIECE), LOST-KEY BUTTERFLY SCULPTURE (1), USELESS PHOTOGRAPH (1), SEAHAWKS TICKETS (12)
With a lurch and a horrible grinding sound that I know does not sound good, I manage to successfully inch the Firebird across the deserted parking lot of the Pacifica, a drive-in movie theater just north of Haystack Rock in the town of Seaside. Nico thought it would make the perfect place to teach me how to drive stick shift.
“Good,” Nico praises. “You’re almost there. Just a few more feet. Now press down gently on the accelerator.”
I push my foot against the gas pedal, and the Firebird engine roars like it’s on fire and is about to explode.
“And now shift into second,” Nico instructs.
I lift my foot off the gas, press down on the clutch, maneuver the gearshift into second, and return my foot to the gas. But I must not do it right because the car lets out another dramatic screech.
“Easy,” Nico says patiently. “You’ve got to release the clutch and compress the gas at the exact same controlled pace.”
I let out a groan. “This is impossible.”
“No! You’re doing better,” Nico tells me. “Much better than the last time I tried to teach you.”
I turn to flash him a dirty look, but in the process, both feet come off the pedals and the car sputters and stalls, sending us both slamming against our seat belts. I cringe. “Whoops. Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize to me. Apologize to the car.”
“I will not do that.”
Nico laughs and pats the console. “Don’t worry. Deep down, she’s really sorry.”
I swat his hand away. “Stop it! No, I’m not. I hate this car, remember?”
Nico flashes me a knowing look. “No, you don’t. You love this car.”
I catch his gaze and hold it tightly. “No. I hate this car. It’s a clone. It lied about who it was.”
Nico’s eyes narrow slightly. “Maybe”—he lets the word hang tauntingly in the air—“the car had good reason to lie.”
“What would be a good reason to lie?”
Nico shrugs. “I don’t know. There are plenty of good reasons to lie.”
“Like what?”
“Maybe the car only lied because it was trying to seem cooler than it was. Maybe it was just trying to impress you.”
“Impress me?” I repeat carefully, knowing we’re treading on uneven ground that could drop out from under us at any moment. “Why would it need to do that? Why couldn’t it just be confident in who it was?”
Nico rakes his teeth across his bottom lip, and I feel myself involuntarily holding my breath. “Well,” he begins haltingly, “maybe it didn’t want you to know the truth about who it really was—that it isn’t the car you thought it was—because . . .” Just then, I see something flash in Nico’s eyes, but I can’t tell if it’s anger or regret or some combination of the two. He runs a hand through his hair and glances down at his lap. “Because it was afraid you’d get rid of it.”
I let my eyes close for a moment as his words rush over me like violent waves, pulling me into their rough, wild current. “Why would I get rid of it?” My voice comes out as a shattered whisper. Barely audible. But it doesn’t matter. I already know the answer:
Because that’s what I do.
I get rid of things.
I throw things away.
Just like I did with every single piece Nico painstakingly made for me out of wood.
Just like I planned to do with this car.
Just like June said I would do when she gave me that beautiful scrapbook.
“I just know you. You’ll keep it for, like, a few months, and then you’ll go through one of your decluttering phases . . .”
Just like I did with Nico.
But that was different. He let me down that night. He lied about where he was. He was going to leave anyway. Just like Jackson did. I felt it. I knew it.
I . . .
I could have been wrong.
A lump forms in my throat. I open my mouth to say something, but no words come out. Because there are none left.
Thankfully, someone else speaks instead.
“You know you’re going to have to pay if you want to stay for the movie.”
I look up to see a man has approached the side of the car. He’s wearing a blue Pacifica Theater uniform with matching cap.
I fumble to start the stalled car again. “Oh, sorry. We’ll leave.”
“Wait.” Nico puts a hand on mine, stopping me from turning the key in the ignition. “We’re going to stay for the movie.” He reaches into his pocket and produces a twenty-dollar bill, handing it over to the employee.
I look at him in confusion. “We don’t even know what’s playing.”
The employee hands Nico two tickets in return for his money and flashes me a smile. “Tonight, we’re showing The Goonies.”
My mouth falls open, and I turn to Nico. “Seriously? That’s, like, a major coincidence.”
“Actually,” Nico says with a guilty grimace, “it’s not, really.”
My mind puts the pieces together. “Wait, you knew about this?”
He shrugs sheepishly. “I saw the movie was playing here when I was looking up Goonies stuff back at Haystack Rock. I thought it would be fun to see it on the big screen.”
“Enjoy the show.” The employee turns and takes off toward the snack stand.
As soon as he’s out of earshot, I turn back to Nico. “What about the Craigslist trades? Do we have time to stop and watch a movie?”
“C’mon.” Nico gives me a friendly nudge. “We’ve just hit the five-K milestone. That’s a big deal! We need to celebrate! The trades can wait for one more night.”
I laugh at his enthusiasm. “Okay, fine. We need to wait for another response anyway because there’s no way we’re trading the Seahawk tickets for that RV camper. I’m not ready to drive this thing by myself.”
“What are you talking about? You were doing great! In fact, you should drive us the rest of the trip.”
I scoff. “Yeah, right. Do you actually want to die?”
Nico shoves his fist in the air. “Goonies never say die!”
“Well, technically,” I remind him, pointing at the drive-in screen, “we’ve never seen the end. So maybe they do eventually say die.”
Nico deflates like a popped balloon. “You think they all die in the end?”
I shrug. “I’m just saying it’s a possibility. Ma
ybe they find that pirate ship with all the gold in it, and then it blows up and they all drown.”
Nico gives me a frustrated look as he slinks back in his seat. “Well, fungicide, Ali. You’ve just ruined a perfectly good movie.”
8:04 P.M.
SEASIDE, OR
INVENTORY: 1968 FIREBIRD CONVERTIBLE (1), CASH ($323.38), SEA GLASS (1 PIECE), LOST-KEY BUTTERFLY SCULPTURE (1), USELESS PHOTOGRAPH (1), SEAHAWKS TICKETS (12)
“This car was made for drive-ins,” Nico says as we settle in for another trailer.
I’m still sitting behind the wheel, and Nico is reclined in the passenger seat. The giant parking lot is already packed with cars. Almost every spot is filled, and the snack stand looks more hopping than a nightclub. I didn’t realize drive-ins were so popular these days.
“Just think about how many teenagers in the sixties got it on in this very car while sitting in a drive-in,” Nico marvels.
“Ewww!” I screech, dramatically leaning away from the back of my seat.
Nico laughs and reclines his seat back even farther, wiggling to get comfortable.
I point to one of the tiny rusty speakers that stands atop a metal pole on the side of the car. “Are we really supposed to hear the movie out of that thing?” I lean my ear out the open window, just barely able to make out the background music from the current trailer.
“No, watch this!” Nico turns on the Firebird’s old stereo and starts fiddling with the radio knobs, causing a little needle in the center of the console to glide across a spectrum of lit-up numbers.
Suddenly a deep, booming voice blasts out of the car speakers. “When you live in my city, you either fight for me . . . or you die.”
I stare in disbelief at the stereo, which is now completely synced up to the preview showing on the screen. “How did you do that?”
“The theater broadcasts the soundtrack over a radio frequency. You just have to tune in to the right station to pick it up. Now it’s like surround sound right in your car.” Nico flashes me a flirtatious smirk. “Much better than watching it on my tiny phone in the back of my truck, right?”
I bite my lip to hold back the smile that threatens to give me away. “Yes, so much better.”
Nico opens the car door and hops out. “I’m gonna grab some snacks before the movie starts. You hungry?”
“Sure, I’ll have some—”
“I know,” he interrupts. “Milk Duds and buttered popcorn. Mixed together. I remember.”
I feel myself blush. “Right. Thanks.”
Nico disappears, and I lean back in the driver’s seat, trying to focus on the images playing on the big screen. But my gaze keeps drifting back to the stereo. To the little illuminated numbers behind the glass.
“That’s called a tuner,” I can hear Jackson’s voice say as he proudly showed me the new cassette player he’d found at the dump. Trash turned into treasure. I shiver as the memory comes back to me. Jackson sitting in the driver’s seat, banging his head violently along with the new Fear Epidemic album. My father, the wannabe rock star. My father, the roadie.
I run my fingertips over the empty tape slot, remembering the cassette that Nico and I found inside when we first got into the car. The cassette that I stashed in the center console. And then, without thinking, my hands find their way to the latch. I lift the lid and pull out the tape, turning it around so I can study the handwritten label once again.
FE UNTITLED #3 7/17/10
Was this tape in the cassette player when Jackson died? Was this the last thing he ever listened to? Some random recording from the final days of the Fear Epidemic tour?
I sigh and am about to return the tape to the console when I remember something Nico said yesterday right as we crossed the California-Oregon state border. Something about how the band was writing a third album while they were on that tour. An album they never got to record in the studio because they broke up for the second and final time.
I turn the tape around again and read the label with new eyes.
UNTITLED #3.
Could this tape have something to do with that lost album that never got recorded?
I gnaw the inside of my cheek, staring at the tape in my hand. Then, before I can stop myself, I shove the tape into the player and listen to it click into place. The sound of the trailer playing on the movie screen cuts off as the cassette engages.
A second later, a loud, angry noise attacks me through the speakers. I quickly reach out and turn down the volume. The song sounds a lot like the noise on their other two albums, except less polished. More raw. It’s clearly not being recorded in a studio. There’s a loud, whooshing noise in the background. I recognize it as the now all-too-familiar sound of a highway whizzing by outside the window.
They must have recorded this while literally on the road. Perhaps in the tour bus.
Nolan belts out the final scratchy note, and the song blissfully comes to an end. But the noise is far from over. After that, someone on the recording says, “Well, that royally blew.”
To which Nolan Cook bitterly replies, “Thanks, Adam. Way to be constructive. How about when you start contributing lyrics, you get to have a say?”
Adam (who I assume to be Adam French) fires back with a stinging remark. “If I recall, my face is still on the album covers, and my name is still on the copyright.”
“Well, you know what they say,” Nolan retorts. “Change a word, get a credit.”
“You know what, Nolan?” Adam says, clearly pissed off. “Why don’t you go fu—”
“Guys! Guys!” someone interrupts. They sound far away, like they’ve just stepped into the room and are lingering in the doorway. I assume it must be the band’s manager or agent or something, but then the voice speaks again, this time closer to the recording device. “Calm down. You’re getting worked up over nothing.”
My whole body freezes.
Calm down.
I stare in awe at the tape player. Is that Jackson?
It has to be. I haven’t heard his voice in more than two years, and yet I’d recognize it anywhere. The sound of it—that soothing, amiable way of his—sends shivers up my arms. I can almost see the easy smile that accompanies what he’s saying.
I reach for the stereo to turn up the volume, but before anyone on the recording can say another word, I hear Nico approaching. “All they had was the small box of Milk Duds.”
I jab at the stereo to eject the cassette and glance up to see him standing next to the passenger-side door, giving the popcorn bag a shake. “Not sure if the ratio will be right.” He thrusts the bag at me. “You try it. You’re the expert.”
I try to read his expression to gauge how much of the recording he heard. But he doesn’t even seem to notice there’s a tape in the player.
“Thanks.” I give the bag another shake and reach in, taking out exactly two pieces of popcorn and one Milk Dud and popping the combination into my mouth.
They say scent is one of the most powerful memories humans have. But I disagree. I say it’s taste. The taste of a kiss. The taste of rain on your tongue. The taste of popcorn and Milk Duds—an unlikely match made in heaven. The moment the salty chocolate-caramel mixture hits my tongue, I’m no longer at this snack stand.
I’m back in the bed of Nico’s truck. Our legs tangled together. Our heads close. Our eyes devouring Footloose or Overboard or Ferris Bueller’s Day Off or The Goonies. Our fingers brushing against each other as we both scoured the bag of popcorn and chocolate for the last remaining kernels.
“So?” he asks, crashing into my thoughts and nodding toward the bag. “Good?”
I swallow the half-chewed lump of Milk Dud and popcorn, coughing slightly as it wedges its way down my throat. “Yes. Perfect.”
Nico smiles, content with my answer, and reaches for the door handle to get into the car. But a squeaky, high-pitched voice stops him short, causing us both to look behind him.
“Oh my gosh! Look! It’s happening! Just like I always said it would.
The Goonies is reaching the next generation!”
Suddenly, a woman appears next to Nico. She looks to be in her early forties, but she’s dressed like a teenager in a short white tennis skirt and a bright yellow letterman’s sweater. She also appears to be wearing a red wig. At least, I hope it’s a wig. Otherwise, that is some very waxy hair. She pops her head over Nico’s shoulder to study me. “How old are you?” she asks eagerly, like I’m a game show contestant and she’s the host.
“Uh—” I stammer, glancing at Nico for help. He just shrugs. “Eighteen.”
“Eighteen!” she calls back to some unseen person behind her. “Honey! They’re eighteen!”
“Excellent,” says a man who appears next to her. His outfit is even more outrageous. He’s wearing gray sweatpants with very small blue gym shorts over the pants, a gray sweatshirt that has been cut at the shoulders, and a red sweatband over his floppy brown hair.
It takes me a moment, but once I see them standing side by side, I realize that they’re dressed as two of the Goonies: Brand, the fitness-obsessed older brother of Mikey, and Andy, the cheerleader he has a crush on.
Were we supposed to come to this thing in costume?
The woman—Andy—leans over the top of the door. “So, tell me. I have to know. How did you hear about the movie tonight?”
“From the Internet,” Nico replies.
“Excellent,” the man says again.
Nico takes a step away from the couple and sizes them up. “You must be, like, really big Goonies fans.”
“The biggest,” the man says, putting his arm around his wife and flashing a toothy grin. “We went to see it in theaters on our first date. It sort of, you know, brought us together. We live in Maryland, but we’re here on the Oregon coast for our twentieth anniversary. We’re visiting every filming location from the movie. Today we went to Haystack Rock, and tomorrow we’re going to visit the Goonies house in Astoria.”
“There’s a Goonies house?” I ask. “Like a museum?”
“Not technically,” the woman replies. “It’s just the house where Mikey and Brand lived in the movie. We’re going to get some pictures and maybe some video of us doing the truffle shuffle outside the gate. Then we’re going to head over to the Oregon Film Museum in downtown Astoria where there’s apparently some cool stuff from the movie.”
The Geography of Lost Things Page 25
