(Circa 1953)
It’s going on full dark when the car turns off the highway into the motel auto court. A ’48 Studebaker Commander careening through one last pothole, running roughshod since Fresno, on fumes since Old Town Calabasas. But it made it.
They made it.
Just past the red “VACANCY” sign, the car slows then creeps down the gravel drive to the front office, coming to a stop in the light fall of a bare bulb. It sits there for some time with its engine running, coming in and out of the sea mist. The sleek blackness of her now a car. Now, the night. Now a car again. She’s a real beauty.
At least she was once.
The engine cuts. A shadow inside moves. Slender arms behind glass emerge from the darkness. As fingers pluck at fingers tip by tip until white gloves are removed, deflating like ghosts slipping from a body.
Now, the click of a pocketbook unclasping.
The clink of keys dropping.
The clank of the door opening.
Out slides a black patent leather heel, trailing a shapely leg along with it. Followed by a pencil skirt just kissing the knee and a set of hips that had somehow managed to maneuver their way inside. But only just. The bare hand comes next, a simple gold band around the finger, pressing on the window. Pushing wider the door. Revealing a sleeveless silk blouse aflutter in the breeze at the hollow under the arm. You can see a face coming into the light now. A pretty face. Almost a Garbo face, pale as the moon, tranquil as a summer’s sky. It belongs to a young woman on the brink of her prime. But on closer inspection, you can tell much of her is already gone, save some stubborn residue left in the eyes. Themselves mere puddles, where once a wild river.
She climbs the steps to the main office and tries the door. It’s stuck. A bump with one of those hips does the trick. Inside a young clerk stands at the front desk busying papers, an old ship’s wheel mounted on the wall behind. He looks up. She walks over. She says only a few words. She fiddles with the latch on her pocketbook. She counts out the money and lays it on the counter. He pulls a key off a peg. It’s attached with a string to a piece of driftwood that had been sanded and varnished some time ago. For the lacquer is now yellowed and peeled, and the whole thing looks covered in fish scales.
She turns it in the light to see.
She tries to put it in her pocketbook, but it won’t fit.
He smiles and says, “It even floats.”
She leaves and gets in her car, then drives around back to cottage number 7.
In the dark, she climbs the stoop and opens the door.
She feels for the light switch on the wall and flips it on.
She smells the dank room.
She opens the front window.
She sets her suitcase on the bed and flicks open the latches.
She takes out her dressing gown.
She takes out her sandals.
She takes out her sundress—the polka dot one with large pockets, all neatly pressed the day before. And lays it over the chair.
She takes out her hairbrush and hand mirror.
Her toiletry kit.
A bottle of vodka.
She reaches into the side pocket and takes out a piece of crisp white paper, folded in thirds razor sharp.
She takes out an envelope and fountain pen, the one he gave her the Christmas before last.
She takes out her bottle of little yellow pills and sets it on the nightstand with the rest of her things.
After unpacking the last few articles, she slips into her dressing gown, takes her pen and paper, and goes into the kitchenette. She lays the pen and paper on the Formica table, then goes over to the freezer and removes a tray of ice. It’s covered in hoarfrost. She sets it down on the counter and pulls the lever to release the cubes into the sink. She watches them fall. The empty metal insert reminds her of the skeletal spine of some fierce dinosaur she saw in a museum once. But that was long ago. From the cupboard above, she finds a tall glass, drops in three ice cubes, and fills it with vodka. Then goes back to the corner table and sits down.
The chair’s too far out. She scoots it in some. The table wobbles. She moves it a smidgen. The arrangement of the paper doesn’t seem right. She adjusts the angle till the square becomes a diamond. Then sits for some time, sipping her drink, feeling the shape of the pen in her hand, watching its burled wood barrel catch the kitchen light. At one point, digging the nib into her palm, seeing how far it’d go in before she could feel it. All the while forgetting how to start. Where to start.
She gets up and goes over to the front window. Bracing herself on the sill, she leans way out and smells the sea. She hears something skitter off in the bushes. And looks too late. She watches a cloud pass in front of the moon. And waits to see if it catches on a crater. It doesn’t. She takes another deep breath then comes back in, her face damp with the night. And writes it out. All of it. All the reasons that could explain it. In her most careful hand. Like she’d practiced in her head so many times. Not missing anything.
How this thing in her head never goes away.
That where her heart should be, is just a hole. And soul, an empty sack.
That she’s lost, lost in the darkest of nights.
With all the stars going out . . . one by one.
And that she doesn’t know what’s real anymore. Or true. If anything, ever was?
But mostly, she’s sorry.
. . . Yes, I’m sorry. If I’m certain of anything in this world, it’s that I’m sorry.
With that, she sets her pen down, folds the letter, and puts it in the envelope. Licking it closed, her lipstick smudges the corner. She doesn’t clean it off. She turns the envelope over and writes down the address. And licks a stamp and sticks it on. Then sets it down till morning.
She gets up from the corner table and goes over to the nightstand. And propping a mirror against the wall, sits on the bed brushing her hair, tilting her head this way and that, watching her own eyes watching her. Counting out the strokes, she remembers seeing a bait and tackle shop on the drive in that evening. Yes, that will make things easier. When she gets to one hundred strokes, she goes again, counting backward. But then stops. You can’t go backward.
Going on midnight, she turns down the covers and lays naked in bed, feeling the cool of the night crawling over her body, listening to the waves crash on the beach across the road. Waiting for morning…
She wakes at dawn.
She puts on her sundress, the polka dot one with the large pockets.
She sits on the edge of the bed and puts on her sandals. First, the left foot, bending down, slipping her toes in, pulling the strap up over her heel with the tip of her finger. Now, the right.
She stands up.
She goes into the bathroom and splashes cold water on her face.
She runs a comb through her hair.
Takes a sip of water from the faucet, sloshes it around her cheeks, and spits it into the sink.
She goes back out, takes the bottle of little yellow pills from the nightstand, and slips it into her pocket.
She then collects the letter from the table.
And goes out the door.
At the main office, the man is back behind the front desk, busying papers again when she walks in. She hands him the letter and asks if he could please post it for her. And make sure it goes out first thing.
“You won’t forget, will you?”
He takes the letter and puts it in a stack with others. And says something about her being up early. And that, “There’s nothing like a sunrise beach walk to start your day…”
But she’s already out the door. Heading across the motor court to Wylie’s Bait and Tackle.
The shop is no more than a shack. It has the words BAIT, TACKLE, and 1/2 DAY BOAT written in faded block letters on the wooden clapboard siding. When she gets closer, she can also see a starfish mounted on the door, one of its rays pointing to some hand scribbling that says, Beach. Another ray pointing to, South Pole. Another, Heaven (along with a drawing of a note tacked onto the pearly gates that says, Gone Fishin.’ And one more pointing to, Far Away. The last ray is left blank.
The door’s ajar. She gives it a push.
“Good morning. Can I help you, Miss?”
A burly-looking man sitting in an old director’s chair behind the cash register looks up from his newspaper. He waits a moment, then lays it in his lap.
“I said, Can I help you, Miss?” his face awash now in the light of a gooseneck lamp.
“May I?” She motions with her head to look around.
It’s an old face but possessing young, alive eyes. With crow’s feet so faintly imprinted aside their orbits, it’s as if they tiptoed there. And deep wavy lines girding his neck, like seafoam marking the tides.
“Yes, of course,” he says.
Then a few moments later, “Up early for some fishin’, are you?” But changes his mind. “Nah, you’re not dressed for fishin’. A pretty girl like you ain’t going fishin’.” He sneaks back behind the pages again. “Anyway, you missed the half-day boat. Departs at 6:00 a.m. in season.”
“Oh,” she says.
“Out for the johnny bass today.”
“Oh,” she says again, ducking under a stuffed blowfish hanging from the ceiling.
She wanders the store, touching things. A pile of sand dollars in a display case. A gaff with its long wooden handle. A plastic container of #6 fishhooks next to a cigar box full of different color grubs. Spools of monofilament, running a fingernail across the line and listening to the sound it makes. She pulls a fishing pole off its hanging hook. She has a hard time putting it back up. Then, it catches its tip eye in a ratty fishing net tacked to the wall.
“Is there something in particular I can help you with?”
“Um, I’m just looking.”
“Well, let me know if I can assist.”
She goes over to a shelf full of lead weights. She picks one out of a box and holds it in her left hand. Then, she grabs another with her right.
“Those are drop weights, Miss.” He looks at this slight woman standing in his shop. He looks at her face. He looks at the lead weights in her hands. He looks at her pink and white polka dot sundress with the large pockets.
“Drop weights?”
“Yes, three-pounders used for bottom fishing. No bottom fishing this time of year.”
“Do you have a basket? I think I’d like to get four of these.”
“Oh, not to worry, Miss. I’ll carry them weights for you when you’re ready. Just set them down for now.”
He goes back to reading his paper.
“Says here a little boy got lost in the woods.”
“What?” She stands there, holding the lead weights in her hands.
“In the paper, here, says a two-year-old boy got lost. Seems his mom tucked him into bed. Led him in his prayers. Switched the lamp off and kept the door cracked so he could still see a sliver of hall light. Everything real normal, you know. But in the morning, when the mother goes to wake him, she discovers he’s gone missing. Vanished. I mean, just like that. They go out looking for him in the woods out behind the house. Sheriff, search party, dogs. The whole works. They take the boy’s scent from his teddy lying on the floor by the empty bed. Even send a chopper up.” He thumps his hand on the page. “Says all that right here.”
“Really, what happened? I mean—”
“Well, eventually, they find him. After three days and three nights of searching.” He lets out a deep breath. “I tell you, them hounds will do it every time.”
“Was he OK?”
“Well, yes, that’s the thing. He was miles away in the wilderness, cold, hungry, and dirty with bits of broken twigs stuck in his hair. But otherwise, unharmed.” Then, reading down a few more lines, “And not afraid.”
“No, not afraid?”
“Apparently. He was just sitting quietly atop a fallen tree when they got to him. Says here how he’d traveled so far from home is a mystery. And how he survived the elements without food and water and warm clothing, no one knows for sure.”
“How? Out there all alone?”
“No, Miss, not alone.” He dips the page down and looks at her. “The young’un says a bear kept him company.”
“A bear? Well, that’s just the make-believe of a little boy. It can’t be true.”
“No? It’s too beautiful not to be true.” He watches her. The way she cocks her head thinking. The way she presses her lips together. “And besides, no one can prove it didn’t happen.”
Finally, after some moments, she says, “Well, that’s just silly.”
“Is it? He was lost, Miss. A bear kept him company. Then found.” He lays the paper on the counter. “It’s all very simple, really.”
“All alone and not afraid?”
“No, not afraid. And never alone.” The man gets up from his chair and goes over to her. “May I take those weights from you, Miss?”
She stands there for the longest time, holding them, one in her left hand and one in her right. But finally gives them over. And watches from the middle of the store as he puts them back in their place on the shelf, then walks back behind the counter by the register and sits down and picks up his paper again.
Then watching him lick his finger and turn the page, she says, “Would you mind if I stay a little longer?”
He keeps reading and doesn’t look up.
“Take all the time you need, Miss.”
