Untitled
New Year’s Day, 1999
“Hey, Jim” the cashier said.
Immediately I recognize her: it’s June. She was an old friend from high school; we used to smoke together under the bleachers during free periods: her, Mike, Chris, and I.
“Hey, how’ve you been” I said fumbling for my wallet
“Eh, I’ve been alright” she said, looking at me the way old friends look at each other after not having seen each other in awhile. “When was the last we were all together, god, must have been-”
“It was that week in July we spent camping together, remember, when Chris accidentally lit the tent on fire so we had to use a tarp from Mike’s truck” I interrupted
“Oh yeah! That was fun, we should do it again some time.” She said. I was unsure of how to reply, I would like more than anything to go back to the day where I could smoke behind the school or do something interesting.
“We’ll have to see how it goes, I’ll keep in touch” I hand her a fifty and say keep the change.
It would’ve been in ‘92, the year we all decided to go camping in the woods. We were supposed to book a cabin, but we all kind of forgot. We had all gone off swimming in the lake after pitching the tent and we had forgotten completely about the need to make a fire. None of us really knew how, so we drew straws. Chris, the least outdoorsy of all of us drew the shortest one. We went to camp and watched, and when Chris got a fire going after like an hour, maybe two, we all cheered amidst the clapping and celebration. We didn’t notice that he had it not feet away from the tent we had set. We went to skip stones at the lake, we were there for what felt like minutes, just existing, but we were probably there for hours just throwing rocks into the lake, annoying the fish. You know that feeling you get, you know the ones you get only when you are in the woods and the light shines perfectly on everything and for a moment the world makes sense and the puzzle fits? Those moments when life feels so good you can almost cry?
Anyway, when the sun started to set we walked back to camp and started to sober up. The fire at this point had burned out because we settled in a real big clearing and Chris had used anything around us as kindling, but the whole tent had been burned.
We counted our lucky stars when Mike came back from his truck with a tarp we tied to the trees. It was around ten at this point, we got back to the camp at nine, and me and June had decided to go look at the stars and drink coffee while Mike taught Chris how to actually make a fire and they built a fire pit. Me and June may or may not have “accidentally” gotten lost. We ended up meeting by a cliff face and laying down to look at stars.
“So what do you want to do, Jim?” She said to me
“I’ve always wanted to play music. One of my fondest memories was seeing Nirvana in ‘89.” I said, she started giggling.
“What?” I said, laughing too.
“You’ve just always seemed too serious for music, you’ve never striked me as someone to chase after art where you may end up penniless in a gutter somewhere”
“Wow, I know who I’m giving my money to when I’m sitting in a mansion in Cali.” I said sarcastically.
“What about you?”I asked taking a shift to the serious.
She looked at me confused for a bit, as if I asked her to jump off the overhang with me. We sat there silently for too long, far too long, and she finally said something, but still seemed unsure of it.
“I want to teach”
“You hate children, though?” I said.
“What do you mean, I was child!” She said.
“Whenever children are around you start making this weird face and try to get out of there.” I said
“I guess you’re right. Maybe I’d teach high school.” she said
“And end up like Ms. Gerald?”
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” she said jokingly.
“Hey, I'm just trying to crush your dreams, Ms. “Penniless in a Gutter.” I said through a smile.
“Hey, shhh! Look, what’s that?” I said quickly. There was a doe walking by right in front of us, prancing about like she owned the place, and for all we knew she did.
“Where do you think she’s going?” I asked.
“She’s probably on her way to eat someone’s garden.” June said.
“Yeah, I guess.” I said. June never paid too much attention to what the world threw at her, she’d just shrug and keep going. No one would expect someone like her wind up working a minimum wage job with no prospects for the future.
“Jim! June! Hello!” We’d clearly been gone too long. I looked at my watch and realized it was one in the morning.
“There you guys are!” Chris found us. “You guys missed dinner” He said as we began getting up.
“I’m gonna go for a walk” I said.
“I’ll go with you.” Said June
“Nah, I’d rather just go around, I’ll be back before you put the coffee on.” I said
“Alright, have fun” Chris said pulling June towards camp. Making my way to the car, I reach in my pocket and light up a cigarette. I should quit, but I just haven't yet. You ever had one of those moments when you feel like trash and you can’t really figure out why? I remember seeing June, I remember the leaves in her hair from early, the sunlight bouncing off her face by the lake, and I remember wanting to tell her something, but I couldn’t remember what it was, but I remember seeing Mike on my way to the car.
“You're always supposed to bring someone with you when you go out in the woods.” He said to me seriously
“I know, I just… I just needed to think for a bit.” I said back to him. Mike was always the responsible one, kinda like a father in that way. He was usually watching out for us and cleaning up after Chris, who could find ways to get in trouble from breathing. No one guessed he’d die at twenty, let alone of a heroin overdose.
Mike was the one who was actually going to do things with his life though, he wanted be an architect and “build his way up to the top” as he put it. Chris was perfectly content with doing nothing the rest of his life, I was going to likely be a failed musician, and June never seemed to know what to do with her life after high school. Michael Benjamin Davis had a plan in life, like he did with everything except dying, and who would? There’s no contingency for death, it’s just something that happens.
I go into my car, grab the other pack of cigarettes I left in there and my guitar It’s probably the most expensive thing I own to this day. Allegedly it was John Lennon’s when he was a kid, but I’ve never believed it for two reasons: first, when you work in a music shop you see a lot of Lennon “signatures” and I’ve only had the pleasure of seeing three real ones in my six years of working there, from 1989 to 1994. This looks nothing like how he signed his name. Second, I got it for a low price for a John Lennon artifact; the only real signature on this thing is mine.
I slung the guitar on my back and begin walking to camp with Mike.
“Why’d you bring that?” Mike asked with that typical vaguely detached face he had.
“I’ve always got this thing in my car, I’m just bringing it to camp.” I said, like a child justifying having brought a stuffed animal into a gas station. It’s true, though. This guitar was, and always has been the connection to my dreams; this is the only thing I have to make music with and so it’s been like an arm or a leg to me. I don’t remember how, but we found ourselves on the topic of building against gravity. Mike’s telling me how in the next few years buildings will be revolutionized so much that going to New York City or London wouldn’t cut it anymore, there’d be nothing to build.
“There’s no space in New York, man.” He said with passion, the kind of passion that you only feel when you legitimately believe in something. “The great cities of the world are dead in terms of building, we have to find somewhere that’s untouched, somewhere we can build modern buildings.” He said with this almost childlike wonder.
“I can’t see New York City being replaced with… anything.” I said.
“It will be, the new world requires these pre-designed cities, man. They’re beautiful, nothing done without reason, it’s like someone gave Picasso a brick and mortar.” He said to me, at this point I couldn’t tell whether the stars in his eyes or the ones in the sky were brighter. “Look at this for second.’ he said, pulling out his wallet.
“That’s Washington.” I said to him.
“Yeah, look, everything has its place. Everything has a reason for being where it is and can explain why. These are the future, cities that have been carefully planned, plotted and designed, cities that are so precise they’d make sharpshooters cry.” He said, his eyes definitely brighter than the stars now.
I found that picture he had in his wallet, the one of Washington. This was a little bit after his death. It was between a picture of all of us and his mother. On the back it said “through careful planning, we have control. Through control we have stability.”
Mike was too adventurous, too willing to do what seemed fun at the time, but he was nice and I’m not sure he deserved to die. He just wanted to try new things.
After making our way back to camp, I sat down and started playing. I don’t know what I was playing, but I thought it sounded pretty good. It was a good way to end the night, of course, by then it was four in the morning, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was the fire and the guitar. After that, I kinda just sat there, thinking about the future and what was going to happen. I remember thinking at the time how it’d all be alright if we just stuck together, that we could all figure it out if we stayed with each other. I don’t remember going to sleep that night, but I remember waking up that afternoon. I was right where I was before, but covered in a sleeping bag.
“Where’s my guitar?” I said groggily.
“June brought it back to the car, we were listening to Mike’s radio and it said it’s supposed to rain tonight.” Chris said, using Mike’s knife to sharpen a stick.
“There coffee?” I said rolling over putting my hands over my closed eyes
“Yeah, but we forgot to pack cream or sugar and I know how you like your coffee.” He said.
“At this point, man, I don’t care, I just want to wake up” I said.
“Whatever you say, my man, just don’t spit it out at me when you do.” Chris said as it sounded like he got up. He began moving and pouring me coffee in a plastic cup and bringing it over to me.
“Here ya go, man.” He said handing me the cup, I took a sip and immediately spit it out, but I made sure I didn’t hit Chris.
“You were right, man” I said defeatedly.
“I always am, my guy.” He said back to me, getting back to his stick.
“I’m gonna go hope the lake is cold, wanna come?” I said.
Chris weighed his options in his head for a bit, briefly looking like a statue you’d see at a museum, fixated in that position, just staring at a sharpened stick. He looked cold, emotionless. It was as if someone had sucked the life right out of him, head slumped down, eyes gazing drearily off into the lower distance. His arms were only still within his view because they were on his knees. His shoulders had slumped down so that his arms would fall over had he not been sitting with his elbows on his thighs. He looked dead. After thirty seconds he said
“Sure thing.” And suddenly, this corpse bounced onto his heels and almost skipped to the lake. We began walking to the lake.
“You remember when we found this place, man?” Chris said.
“Yeah, we were here on a hiking trip for cub scouts and got lost, why?”
“Well, look over there.” He said to me pointing to his left. He was pointing to a tree with a carving on it, the jaggedly written comment said:
“This is property of Chris Silas. All trespassers (Except for Jimmy) will be punched.”
We just started laughing as we picked up the pace to the lake, and when we got there I immediately splashed water on my face and Chris just sat there on the beach, sharpening the stick.
Out of all of us, Chris was the most affected by Mike’s death. He didn’t leave his house for months, and when we finally got him out, he was pale and scared of the sun. We tried to comfort him, but it wouldn’t work. I ended leaving Mike’s wallet on the table and leaving. I couldn’t watch Chris destroy himself. He called me a year later to thank me. He had moved to Georgia and reinvented himself. Became a Christian and was trying to become a priest. We talked for a bit, but it was kinda like talking to a ghost. It was Chris’s voice on the other end, but it didn’t sound like him. The habit he had of ending every few sentences with “man” was gone. He didn’t sound like a surfer anymore; he had the commanding voice of a pastor and used it. When he talked, I could almost hear the fact that he was wearing a suit, something the old Chris would never do.
Chris despised organization, hated the idea of wearing a tie and going to church every Sunday. The closest thing Chris had to a job was working at a movie theater to buy cigarettes and now he’s a born-again accountant, hoping to become a priest. It was as if the Chris I knew died. Chris became that lifeless corpse I was talking about before, arms slumped over. I remember one time after a bouncer called our bluff on being twenty-one and he called this guy, who had to be at least 7 ft and built like a truck “A mindless drone who wouldn’t be able to wipe his own butt without the government telling him he could first.” Chris got a black eye and a big lip from that exchange, but beatings didn't dissuade Chris. He was a glutton for punishment. The one thing I remember is that he always moved as though nothing was wrong. The sun could be engulfing the Earth and he’d still light a cigarette as if it was a boring Sunday afternoon. He’d still walk with a slouch and his hands in his pockets.
“I’m gonna go ahead back to camp, man.” He said.
“Give me a bit and I’ll follow you.” I said back.
“Ok, man.” He said to me as he turned on his heel and began walking into the distance. I always admired Chris; he walked around as if he owned the place. He sternly believed in basic human goodness. He built an image of what the basic human good looked like inside himself, built humans up to be inherently good creatures, leading himself with this idea that he could build a better world, if only he tried and had the resources. If only. Chris’s belief in this human good never really left him; it just shifted to some form of religiosity.
The morning was warm and the rest of the day we hiked and messed around with each other. Mike and Chris were talking about cars while June and I were just walking around pretty far back. It was fun until the wind picked up. It had a biting chill, uncharacteristic for late June and killed us, who packed for a week long camping trip with short sleeves. Mike was wearing his team jacket, the one with a big yellow “B” on the right side of the zipper; it’s usually the first thing moths get to when it’s left in an attic somewhere. I guess it’s the fabric or maybe the little monsters are attracted to sentimental value.
As I’ve said before, unlike the rest of us, Mike was going places. He had a football scholarship to… some big school somewhere, not a big name, but it was a school he was really excited about, it was a school, as he put it, “that would get you hired on the spot.” It was in New York… or California, one of those big name states that everyone knows. I don’t remember much from the second day besides that simply because it’s so overshadowed by the third day, but I remember Monday, June 27th, 1994 was a good day, a day in which all the cares vanished, a day when I remember friendship and comraderie ruling, and one of the last days I remember actually being happy, before this damned pen and paper ruled my life, before the heroin took Mike, before Chris became some suit, and before June became some cashier at a grocery chain, and I became some idiot writing a paper.
On the third day it rained, and rained hard. We kept the tarp up by having each of us on one side holding it over our stuff. The darkness of the cloud covered us, water rolling off our noses and chins, faces drenched, all of us screaming and laughing. Everyone standing apart and yelling over the rain, competing with the thunder for who could be louder. Mike was the only one who didn’t have to worry about hair falling into his eyes because he had his hair buzzed the week before. Chris and I both had fairly long hair, and June’s hair went all the way down her back when it was down. What I remember most was the aggravation of your clothing clinging to you. It’s a mundane thing, I know, but isn’t that what life's about? The little mundanities that no one pays attention to? The movements you make when lighting a cigarette? The way we move when we walk? Between the clothes and the rain we did something we probably should’ve done long ago and gave up on holding it up. Chris gathered up all our stuff and we laid the tarp on the ground, then Mike tied the tarps end together.
We decided we’d just sit in the rain and relax, if that was possible. There was no way to get the fire going so we decided to go wait out the storm in Mike’s truck. Mike had brought Chris here and I had brought June, but theoretically both vehicles could hold four people. My car was in a perpetual state of soda cans, cigarette butts, receipts, candy wrappers, and other assorted bts of garbage. Mike’s truck, however, was like his church. He kept it polished, cleaned and shined. It, like the future, was his and he cared for it obsessively. I remember seeing it for the first time after he died; it was rusted and decrepit, like some kind of sacred ground to all of us, but to everyone else it was a bunch of rust on cement bricks. For us, it was Jerusalem, but to everyone else, it was something they’d forget while looking at. The blue paint was chipped, the upholstery was ripped and the yellow foam was showing. The dashboard was covered in a half inch of dust at least and the mirrors were broken and the windshield cracked. Between wind and some idiot kids, the truck had been hit hard and resembled more of a ruin than the pristine temple that it was a few years earlier.
The rain roared against the roof and we’d make bets on how close the lightning would come to the truck and laugh every time June jumped when it caught her by surprise.
“Hey, can I smoke in here?” I asked Mike
“Yeah, just get me one.” He said as I lit a cigarette and passed him the box.
“Thanks, man.” He said pushing the cigarette lighter to life and taking a drag. He blew smoke into Chris´s face.
¨What the hell, man!¨ Chris yelled in between coughs and I just chuckled and put the cigarette to my mouth and took a drag. June turned her head over to the window and looked longingly out it, as if waiting for something, anything. As if watching for some creature to walk out of the forest. She wasn’t anxious, if anything she was happy. Her smile was ear to freaking ear and her eyes were big and bright. I looked over her shoulder to see what it was she was looking at. The rain falling outside? The occasional lightning strike? The raindrops rolling down the window? What was it?
The more I looked, the weirder it seemed. She wasn’t looking at anything, she really wasn’t. I took one last drag from my cigarette before opening the window and flicking the butt out. We just kinda sat there, like that for a few hours, just existing.
“You know what?” I sighed “I’m going to go get some milk, before I snap” I said laughing a bit.
“No! Don’t leave me with these idiots!” June said jokingly.
“Hey! I represent that statement!” Chris said, laughing. Mike chuckled a bit at that joke and I opened the door to a barrage of rain. Immediately, I tugged my sweatshirt over my head and ran to my car, then I heard another door slam behind me.
“Where do you think you’re going?” June said, chuckling and swinging a pair of keys on her index finger
“I forgot to bring milk!” I yelled over the rainfall “I’m going to go get some” I said, continuing onwards.
“Not without these.” She said, chuckling, jangling the keys in the air.
“Those would help.” I said, maybe a bit too loudly.
“You aren’t getting these unless I get to come with you!” She said.
“Alright, c’mon” I said, motioning her to come closer with my hand as she began to walk to the passenger door and I walked to the other side, opening it. The car sounded off in the high pitched sound signifying the door was opened and I slammed it shut as she got in the other side.
“The keys, if you please.” I said mocking a French accent at the end. It was the fakest thing ever, and I felt really cheesy immediately afterwards, but she smiled and handed me the keys. The drive wasn’t long, but the rain was hard and I still wasn’t a great driver. The slippery roads had me paranoid and I was choking the wheel the whole drive.
“Calm down, Jim.” June said quietly, laying her hand on my shoulder. “Would you rather I drive?” She asked calmly
I didn’t answer, I didn’t even hear her. I just kept driving as we pulled onto pavement, going as fast as I could. I started panicking and wondering how far it was to the nearest gas station. June looked at me like I had six heads and eight arms.
“Maybe it’ll be better if we put on the radio.” She said as I relaxed a bit, finally
“WWKG, one-oh-eight point four!” The radio sounded in that gravelly voice radio announcers put on when they read the name of the station.
“John Gotti, also known as ‘The Dapper Don’ or ‘Johnny Boy’ has been apprehended under charges of loan sharking, tax evasion, obstruction of justice and conspiracy to commit murder.” Said one of the hosts
“What I wanna know is how we don’t catch these guys, right? I mean, we know they’re associated with the mob, in fact Gotti was the boss, why didn’t we go after him sooner?” Says another
“Well, it’s the case of the obstruction of justice, it was the same with Capone or… what was his name? Lucky… Lucky something.” The first oe trails off
“Luciano? Yeah, but his case was different, he ended up strikin’ some deal with the feds during World War II and gettin’ out.” Said the second one “But that isn’t important, what is important is the fact that we did nothing to bring this guy down until a few days ago!” He said again, emphasizing his point
“Even he has rights, we can’t just arrest someone and put them in jail for no reason we need evidence against them.” The first one said as the debate heated up a bit.
“Evidence? Anyone with half a brain knows this guy is associated with the Gambinos and the Commission, why wouldn’t we invest-”
“Investigate? Justice is blind, why would we investigate an innocent man? Guy number one interrupted
“Maybe for our safety, justice should be nearsighted” Guy number two says back clearly feeling like he won
“Those who are willing to give up freedom for security…” The first man chimes in a sing-songy way. The road is still going off into the unseeable distance through the fog and the rain pitter-pattered violently on the metal roof of the car. Finally, I relaxed and even though I wasn’t a great driver, I like to imagine I did alright
“On that note, let’s get back to some tunes.” A third person finished as “Just What I Needed” started playing.
“I love this song!” June said as she turned up the radio.
“Hey, you wanna decide what plays on the radio, get your own car!” I said jokingly as she reached over and turned it up. She looked at me, rolled her eyes, and turned it up louder as the guitar began to play and June’s head began to bang every time the guitar would hit. Her hair would bounce around her head gently as it jerked forward. She sung along, strangely enough a lot more passionately then Ben Orr did, and stared at me with these wide eyes the whole time, occasionally coming in close to singing into my face.
“I don’t mind you comin’ here and wasting all my time, Time,” She sang energetically
“‘Cause when you’re standin’ oh so near,, I kinda lose my mind… yeah” she went on, putting her hands to the side of her head and shaking her head.
“I always knew you very well and you look so fancy I can tell” She kept going, continuing to look at me as we pulled into the gas station and I turned the car off.
“You want like a pack of smokes or something?” I asked opening the door
“Nah, this is my last pack.” She said, lighting one of her few remaining cigarettes.
“Want like a soda or something?” I asked.
“Here, I’ll come in with you” She said as she opened her side door and threw the cigarette to the ground, stepping on it, and we walked in. I walked to the fridges while she immediately went to the sunglasses rack and picked up a pair she liked. They were black aviators with a gold rim, nothing fancy, just a ninety-nine cent pair of sunglasses while I got some whole milk and we both walked to the counter. We pulled our collars over our heads to avoid the rain, but I don’t think it did anything, but make our waists wet. When we got into the car we looked at each other, sitting in the torn cloth seats, sopping wet and laughed. The car began moving again as I grabbed the wheel, but suddenly, as if by some great miracle, the clouds parted. It was… it was beautiful. Imagine the sunniest June day you can, than imagine it even brighter. I turned off the car air conditioner and rolled down the windows and lit a cigarette.
“Why you quitting?” I asked, curiously. As June’s brown hair blew in the wind and her purple t-shirt ruffled in the breeze.
“Have you read how they make these things? Not to mention what smoking does to your lungs. If you want to be talking like uncle Paul, then be my guest, I am keeping my voice.” She said, smiling, as her sunglasses kept the sun out of her eyes. June’s uncle Paul was a lifelong smoker; he’d been smoking since he was ten, a pack a day since he was fourteen, and chain smoking since he was twenty, and you could tell by looking at him. Paul wasn’t really her uncle; he was a family friend that her parents met at church. He was one of those friends you just knew since you were young and didn’t think anything of it. He was a skinny old man, a “bag o’ wrinkles” as his wife would call him. He had to be in his eighties, and looked it and he had to use a throatbox to speak.
“I guess you’re right.” I said, as I took a drag from my cig and we drove along the highway.
______________________________________________________________________________
This part of the country looked nice on a good day. Some days, like the day before, you’d cry to look at it. That day the rain gave it a gentle beauty that seemed to damn the rest of the world with its luster. Even the Aurora Borealis would be jealous of the Wyoming woods on a day like today. The woods were a nice enough distraction from life, I suppose. You could almost forget you barely graduated high school out here. As we pulled back into camp, I threw my cigarette butt to the ground and smothered it to put it out as we walked back to where our camp was.
“Did you get the milk?” Chris asked sorta hopefully.
“Yeah, not sure how good it is though, that gas station seemed kinda sketchy.” I said, walking over to the cooler and putting the half gallon in it.
“Are you sure that’s gonna be enough for the week?” Mike asked, knowing we were out for a week and a half at most.
“I don’t think we need too much, there’s only one of us who needs it.” June chimed in, her sunglasses hanging on her shirt by the frame as the trees obscured the sun.
“Fair enough” Mike said as he went back to longuing on the camp chair and smoking.
I know it doesn’t seem like much, but that day was huge for me personally. I have an issue of building things up to bigger than they are, but I swear to you, that picture of us, assaulted by rain in Mike’s truck, or the one of June singing along to Ben Orr’s detached lyrics with such an unironic passion hit me hard. I really can’t describe it in a way that does it justice. You know that feeling you get on roller coasters? When you peak up to the top and the mixture of the view and the sudden change from going upwards to downwards drops your stomach seemingly to the ground? Imagine that feeling, but it’s constant.
The next morning, I felt… weird. You know that anxious feeling you get deep inside you sometimes when you know something will end poorly, but you feel compelled to do it anyway? It began easy enough, really, I sat around under the tarp, tried playing “Just What I Needed” for a bit. After awhile I got tired of playing the same few notes trying to get them right over and over again.
“Hey, we’re going off to the quarry to go swimming, wanna come?” June asked, barging in.
“I don’t have a swimsuit.” I said.
“None of us do, you idiot.” She said happily as she grabbed my hands and pulled me up. “Put something you don’t care about on, I won’t peek.” She added, walking out of the tent as I opened my bag and started putting some new clothes on. What I pulled out was a pair of shorts and an old white t-shirt.
“You ready yet?” She asked, jokingly pushing the side of the tarp as I came out of the side. You ever just felt straight up dissociative? Like where you were wasn’t right and something was wrong? You end up feeling like there’s this second layer of skin between you and everything else, you feel like you’re drowning and can’t get up for air. The sun was bright and it was really hot. Had to be at least eighty degrees; some places you could see the heat dancing, begging you to sweat. June was wearing a pair of red shorts with a white stripe on the sides and an off white t-shirt. The air had a cool breeze to it that would hit you sometimes fairly unpredictably, it was usually a surprise, but a highly welcome one given that it felt like mid-July.
“Did you get the beer?” Chris yelled up seeing us. Chris stood at the edge of the cliff face, waving his arms in the air, while Mike sat close by in a folding chair with a pair of sunglasses on.
“Yeah, I got them.” Said June, rolling the cooler down behind her.
“You didn’t bring chairs for the rest of us?” I asked jokingly as we got closer to the rock they were standing on. It must’ve been an old quarry because of how deep it was and how flat the rock we were on was.
“Get your own, ya’ freeloader!” Mike joked as he got up to get a beer out of the cooler. He pulled out one can and retreated back to his chair and sunk far back into it as he dug his finger under the pull-tab and took a sip, going into that similar relaxed position with his arms and legs extended far out, his arms resting on the blue armrests of his chair.
“Psst, hey!” June whispered loudly to me and motioned to Chris, who was now sleeping in his chair. I nodded back and we both walked behind his chair and lifted it back up.
“You can’t sleep now, Chris!” I said grunting, while lifting the chair.
“Yeah, even Mike is awake.” June continued as we walked him to the edge.
“C’mon, be reasonable guys!” He said loudly before we tilted him out of the chair and into the water.
“What’re we waiting for? That looked fun!” Said June, getting a running start into the flooded quarry, screaming and laughing as she fell. A loud splash followed and she resurfaced and yelled up. “Come one, Jim! What are you? Scared!”
“Mike, you going in?” I asked looking over
“Nah, I am perfectly content to sit here and chill” Mike said, taking another sip from his beer.
“Suit yourself.” I said going back to the edge of the woods, spinning on my heel and bolting to the edge before pushing off hard. The water was surprisingly cold, cold enough that I shuddered when I got in it at least.
“When did you start being interesting, Jim?” Chris asked sarcastically as I struggled to keep my eyes from rolling out of my skull and splashed him. What ensued was a back and forth between me and Chris until June came between us.
“What’s wrong with you two? Are you gonna sit there and act like children or are you just gonna enjoy the water like adults?” June asks. There is a moment of silence as we look back at each other and smile, before we both splashed her and she started laughing and splashing back.
It was a quiet summer day, the ones you only see when you watch summer coming of age movies about teens in the eighties and think “that can’t possibly be real, days are never like that” but I’m telling you it was like a movie watching us swim that day. The old quarry filled with rain water that was slowly draining from the summer heat, the sun beating down on us, the wet clothes clinging to our bodies, the white stones, clean cut squares that would never exist in any natural environment, and our hair darkened by the water and hugging the sides and tops of our heads.
When you look back on it, yeah, I guess we were all stereotypes in our own way, Chris as a surfer, Mike was the dad, June was chill one, and I’m not sure what I was.
I guess I was just there.
I’ve noticed that a lot. Even when you’re directly involved in things that happen around you, you never look around and think that you’re directly affecting things. You always feel like an outside observer. Maybe that’s just me, but it really does feel like that all the time. I can keep writing, but that will hardly pull the landscape into your mind. I don’t have a picture of that day at the quarry, I don’t have a picture of us camping, I really don’t have anything to prove this actually happened and I didn’t just invent it. I can’t prove to you June exists, I can’t prove to you Chris is down in Georgia right now becoming a man of God, I cannot prove to you that Mike died of an overdose.
Truth is, over writing, I can’t really prove anything, but I can give you a story, and I can hopefully give you this time to sit and read me blubbering about times long past on a piece of paper that I stained with tears remembering my failures, but I hope even more that you look to me and you do not make the same mistakes I made.
I wish I could say we all left the camp that week and stayed in contact, that we met up with each other every so often and just existed, but we didn’t. June went on to flunk out of college and make ends meet by working a couple day jobs across town. Chris dropped out of high school together him and Mike started selling pot, but Mike died of an overdose and Chris bounced around, and I am still going through college. I went to college for business and not a day goes by when I don’t think about dropping out, buying a van and just driving into the horizon until I burn in the sun.