by Craig Birk
Chapter Twelve
Barstow
6:25 p.m.
“Well, all I'm saying is that I want to look back and say that I did the best I could while I was stuck in this place. Had as much fun as I could while I was stuck in this place. Played as hard as I could while I was stuck in this place . . . Dogged as many girls as I could while I was stuck in this place.”
– Dawson, Dazed and Confused
Anyone who has ever driven to Las Vegas from Los Angeles or San Diego knows that a certain amount of anticipation builds to get to Barstow, California. Not because there is anything remotely redeeming about Barstow, but because it is a milestone which marks the fact that you are halfway to Vegas. It is otherwise difficult to get excited about a city of just over twenty-one thousand on the outskirts of the Mojave desert which ranks as one of the ten poorest in California with over twenty percent of its citizens below the poverty line.
Many people stop at one of the seemingly infinite fast food choices, though if one was feeling particularly fancy, he may choose to hold out for gyros at The Mad Greek sixty miles away in Baker. Since the guys just had In-N-Out a half an hour ago, and Roger was fully loaded up on Kodiak, there was no reason to stop now. Alex blew through Barstow at eighty-two miles an hour as 2Pac sang about the merits of living and dying in Los Angeles. Out here, Los Angeles was already another universe. The sky behind them had evolved into a collage of purples and oranges as the sun prepared to relinquish her role for the day.
Alex looked out the side window and noticed a new housing complex going up at the edge of town. “You could be home now!” a billboard promoting the complex announced. “Yeah, fucking great,” Alex said mostly to himself, wondering where one would likely be coming home from.
“Can we turn the game on?” Roger asked.
Alex complied and hit a button on the steering wheel which changed the audio from auxiliary to AM preset. After a few minutes of a stalled Stanford drive resulting in a punt, the score was announced. The Cardinal was down 13-3 midway through the first half.
Roger combined his displeasure and motivational speech into one concise statement: “Come on – pull it together, you fucking cum-guzzling fucks!”
With that the group passed the last cluster of fast food joints on the eastern edge of the town. This one included a Carl’s Jr. (with a Green Burrito add-on), Jack in the Box, Burger King and Taco Bell. Immediately past the exit was a green sign indicating that Baker was fifty-nine miles away and Las Vegas was now a hundred and fifty-two miles away.
“Rock n’ roll,” Alex said.
In the back seat, Mike decided to bum a Kodiak from Roger after all. He clumsily packed it as a Stanford cornerback intercepted a pass and returned it sixty-seven yards for a touchdown, eliciting a round of applause from Roger. Mike pulled his lip out and inserted the tobacco, spilling about a third of the grains down the front of his Caminiti Padres jersey. As the extra point was kicked, he spit once in his In-N-Out cup and brushed the spilt chew off his chest and stomach and onto the leather seat between him and Roger.
