I stamp out another cigarette.
Man, I don’t ever want to leave.
I stare off—my eyes burning slightly.
I stare off until something suddenly whacks me upside my head.
“Hey, Nic, come on.”
It’s Megan’s voice.
I mean, it’s Megan.
She laughs. “Get it together, space boy. Shit. Are you ready, or what?”
“Uh, yeah,” I say. “I’m ready.”
She grabs my arm, pulling me toward the driveway. “Well, they’re here.”
I look over.
Of course, she’s right.
We divide up, get into the two rent-a-cars, and take off fast.
Since Tim insisted on me taking shotgun, I’m sitting up front with him, resting my feet on the black imitation-leather dashboard of the Chrysler Sebring—lighting another cigarette, even though there’s a big NO SMOKING sticker on the passenger-side window.
I gotta say, man, driving in an actual car is surreal as hell.
And maybe even a little scary.
It just feels like, I don’t know, like the outside world—like freedom. It’s a reminder of what waits for me. A reminder of decisions, responsibilities, negotiating the fucking craziness.
“A plague seems quite feasible now.”
David Bowie was right.
So I stare out the car window.
I tell Tim, “This is so weird.”
I can’t see his reaction.
“No shit,” he says. “When I first got the car, it was like I’d totally forgotten how to drive. And sleeping by myself in the hotel room? Shit, man, I never thought I’d say this, but I missed being up at SPC. It just wasn’t the same as listening to Brian snore at three o’clock in the morning, then going to the lodge to make hot chocolate and reading till Marion caught me.”
That gets a smile outta me. “Come on, you can’t miss Marion. She’s a troll—biding her time till she can eat us up—grind our bones to make her bread—that sorta thing.”
Tim laughs. “Yeah, whoa, I never thought of that. A troll… totally. Or maybe a witch—with that wart on her face, and the way she walks all hunched over.”
Marion’s one of the counselor’s assistants. She’s known for being a real hard-ass, though she’s always been pretty nice to me, despite her resemblance to a troll—or, uh, a witch, right?
Mostly I’d say the reason she likes me is ’cause I keep trying to speak to her in German, her native language.
The only two phrases I know are “Do you like my ass?” and “You are a monkey face.”
For some reason she thinks that’s just the funniest thing ever.
Plus, we play gin rummy together.
“I don’t know,” says Kevin, startling me from the backseat. “It’s the accent that really gets me. She’s like straight outta some German fairy tale.”
She’s Austrian, actually, but whatever.
“Tim, go to yar room. Da funniness is ovah. I’m da party poohpa.” Kevin’s imitation is more Arnold Schwarzenegger than Marion, but it gets the car laughing.
“Yeah, well,” says Tim. “Maybe I don’t miss Marion, but I do miss being up there. All you guys gotta really make the most of it, ’cause when it’s over, it’s over. You know?”
“Sure,” I say, studying him. “But, uh, you’ll be bahk.”
Tim laughs at my bad imitation, though his eyes don’t change much—remaining dull, almost vacant-looking.
“Yeah,” he says. “I know. But it’s just not the same.”
I watch him watching the road in front of him.
I think for about the thousandth time just what a handsome kid he is.
I mean, handsome.
“Hey,” he calls out kinda suddenly—to me more than anyone else. “I forgot to tell you, I went and bought all these CDs. This Al Green one was only five bucks. Can you believe that?”
I smile. “Well, I’m not sure how popular Al Green is nowadays, but, yeah, that’s a good deal. What album is it?”
He hands me the all-white cover of I’m Still in Love with You, with Al Green’s dark skin as the only contrast. It’s actually one of my favorite records ever.
“Right on,” I say.
Tim pushes the CD into the player, clicking the button to advance two or three tracks. Al Green’s voice sounds clean and beautiful coming through the car speakers.
A love song.
Of course.
I wanna say that these kinda songs make me think about Sue Ellen—make me long for her. But honestly, I don’t think about Sue Ellen at all. I mean, I can’t even make myself do it. Listening to music like this, I see Zelda in front of me. She’s there at the back of my eyelids. She’s standing against the sky, the glaring sunlight, the flat, bare desert. She’s standing against mountains jagged on the horizon, jagged like her shoulder blades, her spine, the bones jutting from her hips.
Tears come hot in my eyes—blurring everything—the sweet, salty liquid running down my jawline.
Megan notices from the back.
She puts a hand on my shoulder.
She leans forward, her mouth parted slightly, not even an inch from my ear.
“Hey, sweetie, it’s gonna be okay. You’ll move on. I promise. It’s a big world out there. And there’s a whole lot more to life than you even know.”
Somehow Kevin must’ve heard, ’cause he yells out, “And we’re going horseback riding. Who woulda thought?”
Tim shakes his head. “I know, right? I mean, hell, I haven’t seen a horse in, man, I don’t even know. This is a far cry from shooting heroin in a hundred-dollar-a-week hotel room.”
I breathe in, then exhale long and slow. “Thanks, you guys. You’re right. I mean, we really have come a long way, haven’t we?”
Megan’s hand
