Jerome's hunkered over by the edge of the campsite tryin to piss thru morning wood when Cap announces LISTEN UP FOLKS! This is it! If we can’t do it, can’t nobody do it in the whole United Stakes!
I’m about to pick up my club, found her this morning, she’s not rotten at all and has a good heft. Take a few practice swings.
Everybody pick up they shit and shake off they sleep and we clam into the back of Joey’s Terezl to go to the war.
The road is bumpy under the hot sun and I like that feeling of being jostled and swaying back and forth but not everybody does, somebody always gotta complain about something, like, hey Joey, why don’t you get some fuckin shocks on this bad boy and other dumb shit like that but whatever, the boys gotta talk shit on the morning of the war, well, they gotta talk shit all the time really, don’t matter if all we’re doing is going down to the corner for a coke.
Speaking of which, we’re almost there but first! (says Cap) a stop for see-gars at Gooney Maderfs, pull over here right quick Joey, here, right here! HERE! THE FUCK ARE YOU DOIN’ WHERE’D YOU LEARN TO DRIVE etc etc, and we all bump into each other as gravel sprays as Joey tries to park the Terezl all at once at the last possible second, by surprise like. Right there inches away from the railroad ties in between Gooneys and the creek. And most of us half fall on our asses gettin out the back, start millin around, a few at a time go into the store to buy up the place. Gooney don’t mind, he’s seen us all before.
Get them cheap cigars, cookies, 8-pack of cheese crackers, shit like that.
GET BACK IN THE VEHICLE! hollers Cap as if we weren’t already gettin ready to do just that.
So then we finally get to the woods where the war is supposed to be and everybody’s doin a pretty commendable job puttin on their wide-eyed this-is-it-this-is-the-real-thing face. Po’ Sal, the only resident religious in the bunch of us, does that pantomime cross thing, like he’s takin inventory of the contents of his chest cavity, just in case.
Looks like Joey knows how to park after all, cuz this time he rolls it to a stop real gentle, can’t even feel like we stopped and you hear the individual pieces of gravel goin crunch crunch under the tires and then he kills the engine and you hear nothing but the drawn-out click-click-click of him pulling on the emergency brake real slow and I guess if this ain’t a emergency then what is.
We all look at each other with the quietness pressin in on our ears, and then Cap says the only pep talk he knows, he says: SPLIT UP. That’s not only the only pep talk but the only command he seems to know as well, it’s the play we always make.
We open the doors and get out and close them again as quiet as we can which, what with the way the springs inside are shot, isn’t very. I figure Jerome’s about gonna shit his pants in startlement when a squirrel all of a sudden starts bitching at us from up in a oak tree overhead, and it’s all some of the guys can do to keep from bustin out laughing, but this ain’t no laughing matter. That squirrel is mad.
Everyone moves out in different directions, carrying what they got with them. I beat it straight up the hill cause my calves could use a stretch, they’re still sore from training the other day, plus also I’ve been here before so I kinda know where to go. Wish I had some coffee. I’m gonna find that one path that crosses the main path at the top of this ridge, and then my plan is to feather off down through the morning side of the valley and see what I can see without being seen.
Maybe I should name my club. Switch my grip a couple times, find that sweet spot in between the knots and what’s left of the bark. Swing her around a couple times as I tramp over the crumbly limestone of the path. Mary? Sue? Mary Sue? Yeah, I like that, Mary Sue and I give a tree trunk a good thump just to see how she likes it. Mary Sue likes it just fine.
Winded a little bit by the time I get to the top of the hill. Feels good though, good to be out here, being a part of it. A lot of these guys ain’t never been in a war before but I have. I grew up here. This is practically my back yard. Some parts of the woods has changed of course. Figure I ain’t seen anyone yet except a couple old turkey vultures doin their gangly thang, so I might as well look for some of the old landmarks. God damn it’s a good day to be walkin around, keepin a eye and a ear out, swingin a stick.
Leroy’s gate is still there! Haha, remember the time ol’ Leroy was actin the fool in the field on the other side of that gate, this was before it was falling down half off the hinges, and got hisself chased by a bull until he leapt right back over that gate, you shoulda seen his face, god damn!
Keep walkin, keep findin all the old places. Pepsi Can Junction — still there! But the pepsi can’s gone of course. Rocky Knoll — still there! Looks somehow not as high up and craggy as I remember it. Remember when there was hand painted signs stuck to the trees around here, for the benefit of the clueless city kids, PARTY — THIS WAY. Haha, try an get away with that shit these days kids, everyone knows where everybody is, all hours of the day and night. Woods used to be alive with bein alone together. Back in the day. Back before the war. Before this war, anyway.
Hey guess what, I found Trail #2! Pretty sure this is it anyway, one way to find out, follow it down the hill, still ain’t heard nor seen of anyone else yet, so it can’t hurt, keep lookin to my right as I amble down the grade, and yep, there it is!
The boat graveyard. Good place to have lunch. Perch on the fallin-apart bow of one of the old johnboats. How’d they get here, these dinghies and skiffs from who knows how long ago, nestled in the cleavage of the hills, rotting away, every year they sink a tiny bit deeper into the earth. I take out my pack of peanut butter cheese crackers. That shit’s godawful and sublime. The perfect lunch. Drink some water, take a piss, and that’s when it hits me.
I was looking for someone.
Bnabe. But these woods are — these woods are from before the time that he was from. Before? After. Before?
Nestled in the cleavage of the fern-clad hills.
I was — I’m still in Npydyuan, I’m —
City of my dreams, sinking into the earth, year by year, bit by bit, rivet by rivet, rivulet by rivulet.
The phaseouts happen more and more frequently these days. Some of them, I get so far in that I forget I’m even in one. But yeah, that’s right, I remember now, that’s usually how you leave Npydyuan.
Still looking over my shoulder, still on alert. The war —
That’s usually how it works, you find yourself in a life, and then, eventually, gradually, or maybe all at once, Npydyuan recedes and you’re just in that life. That’s your life. Until the next time. But this time it keeps phasing out but not all the way, the cycle never comes full circle, and I’m still here, waiting and wondering where everyone else is. Until I found evidence that Bnabe’s been here — and recently, too, whatever that means.
I guess I should find my way back out of the woods. If it’s anything like I remember, the edge of the city should be at the bottom of this trail. There should start to be some houses and then a culvert under a road, and as the sun begins to set, towards the horizon the everpresent orange glow.
Damn, I almost wish I hadn’t remembered! I was kinda liking that one, the looming threat of combat notwithstanding. Jerome and Joey and all them chuckleheads. Even Po’ Sal, bless his sad old sacred self. Whatever else you wanna say about him, he always hung in there. We never even got to the part where we all head home together, caterwauling like a bunch of loons in the back of the Terezl, singin together, letting off the unbelievable steam of still being alive, singin DO! YOU! REMEMBER WHEN! WE USED TO SING!
Those of us that made it out, of course. And singin even louder for those of us that didn’t. For now. The quiet part comes later.
Like now, as I’m walking up the empty road towards the orange glow, lake over my left shoulder. There’s a frame house under construction up ahead, I can sneak in there and sleep tonight, it’ll smell nice like raw wood and construction dust and condensation as the stars come out.
Maybe I could sing it for myself now, there’s no one around, nobody cares, we didn’t get to that part but I still got the song stuck in my head. My voice sounds gravelly, first time I’ve heard it in a while, it goes SHA LA LA LA LA LA LA, LA LA LA-LA, LA-LA!
La dee dah.
Well it’s just not the same, is it? I could laugh at myself but I’m not that funny. You ever get the feeling you’re being watched, but then also totally not watched, at all, like at all, at the same time? Like all the time?
Yeah, nah, me neither.