Our Path is Paved in Echoes

by Michael Bonady

  The next morning I walk outside and look from my small balcony down onto the city below. The pollution is a dull haze that makes for pretty sunrises. Between last night and now I’ve aged 20 years. I have seen more than I was supposed to see. I pulled back the curtain of my own consciousness and didn’t like what I found. The needle gave me a glimpse into all that’s wrong, and all that’s right in my life. The plates were stacked higher on one side than the other. I smoke a cigarette and try to focus on the reality before me. It’s too early and I need some food. I find five dollars in my pocket and start the long walk down the exterior stairs. I’m only three flights up and I think the walk might do me some good. If I can find a Waffle House I’ll be in business. At the bottom of the steps I feel weak, I stumble and take a seat on the curb. It’s turning into a gray day, the passing traffic and the ensuing air is stifling me. I breathe deep and figure this is just part of it. I can push through it, I don’t have any more to fill the needle so I have to push through. I shake my head and get to my feet. There’s a guy on a bench with a newspaper blanket and a three month beard. I promise myself that’s not where I’m headed but I have my doubts. The man stirs and looks at me, his gaze piercing, his eyes narrowed but razor sharp.

  “Does this beard make me look fat?” His voice all gravel and he laughs.

  I don’t know how to respond and I’m too blurry all over to focus. As I try to look away his eyes find mine and I can’t move.

  “You’re blowing it kid…you’re blowing it and you know it. That’s the worst kind of regret.” He looks down and I keep going. I want to rough him up, I want to grab him by the beard and drag him into the street but I can’t. Somehow I know that behind it all he could take me for everything I’ve got. I speed up with renewed determination to find some breakfast and pretend this day hasn’t started yet.

  His voice is behind me now, all tires on rocks, effusive.

  “Your palms are full with the spoils of this earth and you turn them over to watch it fall,” he says, quieter than before.

  I nod and keep walking, slow and steady. Waffle House. Five dollars. Consciousness unraveled.

  Scrambled, Diced, and listless, with cheese.

  I see my destination up ahead and plod forward. Traffic is loud and surrounds my senses. Distortion is all I know today. The breeze is cool and it chills my bones. The haze is slowly spending its time burning away by the light of the sun. I am the haze and I’m slowly burning away. My focus is singularly on hash browns now I wish I had some hash I would smoke it until the world was blurry and then fade into the lighted glow of the evening like a cowboy leaving town on a trusty old steed, a wise equine who knows the world for what It is, what it was, and what it could be. My wisdom is not in the trees but in the sap, it’s all sticky and as much as you try to wash it away it stays along for the ride. I’m just a carriage horse with blinders on, moving forward seeing nothing but the straight ahead when a voice from the side pulls me out of my mind and back to life.

  “Hey, do you know where 35th and 6th intersect?” Her voice is the chorus to strawberry wine, saying so much with so little she is a magnet and I’m the note on the refrigerator, we’re out of innocence and I’ve been missing it, please get some next time you go out. The guitar solo is short but it matters and says what the words miss. I stumble over the words, my head still stuck in yesterday and last night and last year and everything in between.

  ‘’Down that way somewhere I think, I’m not from around here though so I might not be the best person to ask, sorry,’’ I try to smile but I know I look like hell put me on a waiting list for further background screens just to be sure I wasn’t going to ruin the place.

  ‘’Is anybody from around here? You’re the third person I’ve asked. I’d say it must be a tourist district but it’s way too depressing for that.’’

  An awkward silence descends as they have a way of doing just when you don’t want them too, one person (me) trying to keep this going and the other (her) trying to end it. I want to cling to this, my soul is on empty and she, the filling station in the middle of nowhere when the light is on and you can tell it’s only fumes left in there, nothing substantial, last ditch effort time, close to walking, close to relying on a kind passerby in the middle of the Nebraska night with no lights and only big gigantic mile wide twisters in the evening forecast, the stars so pretty though so pure and so vivid, life is in those stars, they shine bright in the dark like we all want to, we all want to shine bright in the dark, let me show you the light I want to tell her, I’ve got no light left to show, it’s all out and needs replaced, the bulb is burnt the halogen leaking the power lines down the brownouts are rolling like thunder rolling like tiny snowballs down monstrous mountains rolling gradually gathering girth rolling bright red shiny gorgeous beautiful tomatoes rolling out of a fast moving truck on its way uphill they’re going downhill rolling. You surely get the idea now the tomatoes are gonna break when they gather up some steam and speed they are surely never gonna make it in a nice lady’s salad or on an old man’s chicken sandwich, most are already broken beyond repair like me maybe she can come by to pick them up, wipe off the dirty spots make them clean again.

  I have a moment of clarity after being swept over by the silence.

  “My dad always used to say we’re all just tourists here, spending a little time, having a little fun, then the vacation’s over,” I say, pausing in the middle for dramatic effect and hoping it works.

  ‘’Sounds like an optimistic guy. Let me guess, he was a motivational speaker?’’ She laughs and enjoys her own sarcasm. I enjoy it too.

  ‘’Yeah, you got it, right on the money… Listen, I can run over to that gas station, it’ll be easier than you turning the car around to get there in this traffic, I’ll see if they know where it is. Cool?’’

  ‘’Very cool. You’re nicer than you look, and I mean that in the best way possible,’’ smiling now her smile euphonious the intro to Like A Hurricane, Neil young with Crazy horse, my life devoid just moments ago now magically full and optimistic I am the definition of crazy I’m afraid and I may be getting blown away, blown away, she is my hurricane.

  Be right back, I smile to her, start the walk across the street. Traffic’s tight and four lanes I actually care now that I don’t get hit by someone, run down in my new found prime, hoping that my haggard outer shell won’t scare the gas station clerk, he’s surely seen much worse. Tons of motorcycles out today, flying by, throwing off my timing. It can’t take too long, she could just get impatient and leave then I’d never see her again and all this would be wasted, my funny dialogue and our playful banter all for nothing if I am not there and back before she starts the second guessing, before she starts the what if game, what if this guy is crazy, what if this guy is dangerous, I can just go find another gas station, it’s no big deal, I’ve got time, he looks shady anyway, maybe he’s one of those smooth talking psychos you always hear about on TV, the women all say he was just so charming, he really had a way with words, I can’t believe what a monster he turned out to be, cue the ethereal music. I am not a monster but how can I prove this? Maybe my general sense of confusion and hopeful eyes will help, they speak for me, I can take you where you need to go, let us go there, we’ll make the world bend to our bend, it will shape and shift to please us, just you and me, my newfound bliss.

  I make a run for it across the first two lanes and despite a few mean glances from passing cars and angry energies from the motorcycle guys, who can’t show me their dirty looks from behind the helmets and visors, I am safely at the median. Everything is moving fast like sped up film reel and there’s some jazz playing, walking back and forth like Frogger I go to and fro, a rhythm in my step through the final two lanes, a nice spin move onto the sidewalk and now I’m in the clear. A little piano solo plays I swing my elbow back to front and front to back then smile across to her. Inside the gas station I catch a glimpse in a mirror and ho
pe it’s just bad lighting, feeling my chances at any further interactions with my shining angel across the street are gloomy indeed. The clerk doesn’t seem scared of me at least, so that’s something. I get all the directions, good fortune shines upon me that 35th and 6th intersect literally about 300 yards away, he tells me, an older guy, probably in his 50s, too old to be working in a gas station, his life probably hasn’t been easy I tell myself but he seems nice enough, ‘’You’ll know you’re there when you see the waffle house, the street signs are hard to read, the other day some punk kids tagged them , spray painted over the 6 so you really have no way of knowing unless you already know.’’

  I thank him and leave, directions now committed to memory I am ready to be her saving grace. Full of promise I am a knight at the top of the mountain, ready to claim this land as my own, to the victor go the spoils. Across the street I don’t see her car anywhere. My chest hurts I can’t breathe I can’t believe it, she must have found it the perfect opportunity to get away, I thought we were bantering and flirting somehow, what a fool I am. Just like that I’m back to the dark places in my head and I just want to curl up in a tiny little ball somewhere, never mind those stupid Waffle House hash browns, I don’t want anything diced, melted, I am listless now, languid, depleted, all used up, missing the kind clerk’s peaceful voice. I am clinging to all the little things as my own, needing something to make sense, tired of striking out, swinging for the fences at the big fat knuckle ball and missing with all I’ve got. I sit down on the curb and look back to where her car was. I lean forward raising my hands to my face, a voice behind me.

  ‘’You miss me that bad huh? You don’t look as delicate as you are.’’ It’s her, she drove over anyway.

  She speaks again.

  ‘’I didn’t want you to have to make that trip across again, you had a few close calls on the way over, though I thoroughly enjoyed the spin move.’’

  I speak.

  “What can I say, I have a flare for the dramatic. It’s true, I thought you may have left… I especially thought so after I caught my reflection in the mirror there,” pointing into the gas station. “Anyway, I’ve got your directions, it’s just down the street really, by that waffle house.’’ I decide to go for it, what do I have to lose now anyway?

  ‘’ You have time for some coffee, maybe a bit of hash browns, covered, chunked, chipped, baked, bamboozled, all that stuff,’’ I ask.

  She hesitates and I can see her weighing everything in her mind.

  ‘’Listen,” I say,’’ no worries either way, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to spend a few more moments with you though. I kinda dig you right now. ‘’ I picture a feisty badger digging a hole in golden dirt, headed for the bottom. I know that I’m headed for the bottom too, I want to ride that badger down, save my energy for when I get there. I don’t want to drag her down.

  ‘’Okay, why not, but I want you to know I’m not in the habit of giving rides, of any kind, to complete strangers just because they have sad pretty eyes and spin moves.’’

  I smile, she smiles, and we make our way 300 yards into oblivion.

  A Letter resting silently in my pocket, August 16th.

  I miss you as you know, I’ve only said it one thousand times so far. Every day I hope you find what you’re looking for and come back. It’s cliché but you’re all I’ve got. Do you think it’s easy for me? Like I have something figured out that you don’t? Do you really believe you’re the first person to decide you’ve got ‘a lot to figure out’? You’re an ass and you know it. Dad is doing better. Last week his white blood cells were lower and he kept some applesauce down. He took it like a champ too. Said it reminded him of Vietnam, that they used to serve that shit all the time and one guy in his unit loved it, would trade cigarettes and joints for it, would trade fucking bullets for that stuff. It didn’t even have cinnamon on it over there, Dad said, it was just the applesauce, and low grade at that. Not smooth at all, like it had bunches of soft tiny pebbles in it.

  My head hurts from the lights in his room, I don’t know what he did to them but they hurt my eyes. He says he didn’t touch them but I know he’s lying. Whenever he uses a specific word like ‘touch’ it usually means he can explain later after he gets caught in a lie that he didn’t technically ‘touch’ them, because he had gloves on or used tongs or some shit like that. For all his problems he’s still a crafty old man. I don’t even know why I’m still writing, I don’t even know where to send this, I just wish you were somewhere definable. Somewhere real. Somewhere I could go find you and make your stupid motherfucking dickhead ass come home. I want to hug you and smash your face. I want to break a bottle on the back of your head then drink the remains with you until we’re both buzzing and then watch espn together and talk shit about all the guys on the plays of the day, how they got lucky or how they’re on roids, or how they married some hot bitch who doesn’t know shit about the game, doesn’t give a shit about the game. I think Dad may have chipped little bits of the light bulbs away because there’s a weird sparkle in the air. Maybe he’s just crushing up his happy pills and putting them in my cereal or something. I don’t feel too happy though so that can’t be the case. He loves Judge Wapner repeats, says the world could use a few more like Wapner. Maybe it’s because he thinks his time is running out, or because he sees me falling apart (I don’t know which is worse) but he keeps telling me stuff I never knew about him. I hope it’s all true. It sounds pure , makes me think he used to be a great guy, used to be out there making things happen and not taking shit from anyone. He says in Vietnam he had a little Vietnamese girl, called her Fay ling, she cooked him pho whenever he was in town , they listened to records together and she didn’t speak any English but they loved. They loved pure and true. Called her my pretty thing, my fay ling. Told her he was gonna bring her back to the states, they’d get married , they’d have kids, told her about their future together, the American dream circa 1973, bell bottoms white picket fences 2 dogs 2 kids a condo at the beach and they could lay on the sand together, they would watch the sunrise and sunset not from dusty villages but from dusty sands with tropical drinks and full bellies. She, understanding not a word but understanding every sound from his lips, she allowed herself to believe in that truth, in his truth until that inevitable day like any other day that brought hot fire and death to that little town , to her little café, to his little world, she was gone amidst the chaos, he didn’t get to say goodbye, was grabbing his gun and looking for someone to kill, looking for someone to blame, the ruiner of his futures, the destroyer of his all. He held her close in his arms like we all would do, ran his hand over her open eyes to close them, let her body rest as his body collapsed on hers and when he woke up she was gone, he was in a single bed missing a piece of himself.

  We’re watching Cheaters now, he loves this show too, he yells at the TV the way he yelled at us, loud but peaceful, just yelling, it seemed appropriate each time so he did. Never mind the reason, just feels good sometimes, he says. The applesauce is really helping though it keeps him happy and takes him back in time. He tells me about that guy and the applesauce in Nam again each time I refill the cup, I pretend it’s new to me, I can’t tell if it’s new to him or if he just wants to keep the other memories out, keep them buried below, covered deep in layers of the sauce and cinnamon. They didn’t have it in Nam but we have it here, he loves the cinnamon.

  I guess that’s it, you know where to find me, if you find yourself. Come home.

  5 skipping rocks and jesus

  Your father’s a coward, that’s why they named him Howard, she would say to me, all the time, at least once a day, and I can say with certainty that it began before I can remember. Howard the Coward. Genghis Khan. King George VIII. Joseph Stalin. They were all presented to me equally, his name with alongside other historical figures of dubious reputation. History. No wonder I didn’t like him growing up. It wasn’t the drinking, or the f
ighting, or the open disdain for my lack of athletic gifts. Nope. It was the rhyming. Works every time. Mnemonic devices were the death of my childhood. I blame them for hating my father, I don’t blame the drinking, or the fighting, or his open disdain for my lack of athletic gifts. Nope. I blame the rhyming.

  She used to take me down to the lake, with its tiny rocky beach and cold wind to skip rocks, she taught me to skip rocks like no one else I knew. Keep it nice and light, your father’s so uptight, she would say to me, all the time, at least once before each throw, until the rocks would float on top the water like Jesus, and when I said that the first time she slapped my face and took my rocks away, she cast the first stone, I would reflect later, she cast the first stone and slapped my face hard with intention.

  Yesterday we were out of bread so I went to the store to get more bread, but Mother wasn’t feeling well so she stayed at home, watching her favorite programs on the television in my living room, she likes medical dramas most, though I have never cared for them. My father told me not to backtalk her, when he was in the hospital the first time, for his arm, he had broken it by falling down our stairs, he said that it was easier to go along with things. On the car ride home she told me he had two left feet, I saw her push him, people shouldn’t fight at tops of stairs I thought, but I didn’t want to backtalk so I kept that to myself. Then I couldn’t help myself, we were sitting on the couch together, I asked if she felt bad, about Dad, his arm, and the harm she had done, I was proud of my rhyme, I was just like her, it’s nice to feel like that sometimes, she slapped my face with intention and left the room. I did not worry about eating dinner that night and she did not worry about making dinner that night. Still, yesterday, when she was watching her medical drama and said we needed more bread I went to the store and got some more bread, it was easier to go along with things. The way she said it was normal too, so matter of fact, your father is dead, we’re out of bread. So I went to get more bread and decided not to backtalk. He would be really proud I think.