3/10 (driving to paducah)

“I will take you,” I mumbled into the dark, into the receiver of the phone, “but you have to buy me a pack of squares.”

Ten minutes later, your brother was kneeling by my window, knocking until I woke up.  He held the box against the screen, and I rolled off the futon and grabbed my keys.

You should be the one driving him down this dark stretch of highway, on this regretful midnight errand, but he says he’s not quite sure where you are.

It’s not like Paxton to be distressed.  From his demeanor, it’s hard for me to even diagnose this, but I know he has to be.  I feel terrible for him, because I know I would be devastated if I were the one getting a phone call in the middle of the night from the girl I loved, telling me what she told him.

“She’s like my cherry blossom,” he says.

Samurai were very big on comparing their lives to the flowers of cherry blossom trees.  The deeper meaning is that life is temporary and beautiful.  It’s the kind of thing we discussed in Japanese class, after watching Yojimbo and the Musashi Miyamoto trilogy.

I just nod and pack these cigarettes.  He could’ve done better than Camels, but I guess it’s my fault for not specifying.  I flip one upside down in the pack and put another to my lips.  I can hear the paper burn as I draw in, and we’ve got this unspoken pact to leave the radio off, in accordance with the solemnity of our pilgrimage.

“So how far away is Paducah?”  I ask.

“Something like four hours.”

You really should be the one driving him there, Melanie.  You would know the exact right comforting thing to say to cheer him up a little, or at least to distract him a bit.  At least, you would know better than I would.

This girl, the one we’re going to visit, her name is Magdalene.  She’s sixteen, one year younger than your brother.  You might remember her laughter creeping in through the wall that separates you and your brother’s bedrooms.  You might remember her watery brown eyes or her petite frame clinging to your brother’s faded green corduroy overcoat.

He’s wearing that overcoat right now.

Now that I notice it, he’s always wearing that damn thing.  I guess it’s just so convenient for him now, now that he’s got all the extra pockets sewn into the inside of it, now that the elbows are worn and two of the buttons are missing.  I guess it’s as much a part of him as the freckles or his curly brownish reddish hair.

“I think we should stop at this next exit to get gas and sandwiches,” he says.

It wasn’t something I was paying attention to, but it seems I’m almost out of gas.  Your brother has that kind of an aura about him, he just kind of keeps people on the right path in an off-hand way.

In response, I cough and smoosh out the cigarette in the ashtray.  I’ve only taken a few drags of it, but it’s just too harsh to finish.  That might have been a calculation of Paxton’s too, he’s sneaky like that.

This gas station we’re creeping up to, it’s a big fluorescent oasis about an hour north of the Kentucky-Indiana border on I-65.  We stop, and your brother saunters right inside, eager to eavesdrop on the conversation between the state trooper and the old lady behind the counter. 

Though he never participates, your brother is a vampiric connoisseur of small talk.

I’m standing next to this gas pump, waiting for my ten-gallon tank to fill, when the Tetris-themed ring of my cell phone pierces my pants pocket.  I can tell from the little LCD screen that it’s Janus who’s ringing me at 1am.  Probably he’s wondering where the hell I ran off to.

“Where the hell did you run off to?” he asks.

“Just taking your boy Paxton visit his woman.”

He’s not talking for a second, and I can just picture him scrunching his face up wondering how we ended up in this escapade.

“So what’s your boggle?” I inquire.

“Damien was just here a little bit ago, looking for you.  He said he had something to show you.”

“Knowing him, it was probably something foul and offensive.”

“Likely.”

“Is that all?” I ask.

“Mind if I raid your fridge?”

Always a catch.  Just when you think people are doing you a favor on their own recognizance.

“Sure,” I say, “knock yourself out…err, don’t really knock yourself out.  Grandma would skin me.  Just pace yourself.”

“Righty-o.  Later.”

“Later.”  And I hang up in time to see Paxton walking straight to my car, nodding slightly in the direction of the trooper still engaged in some kind of debate with the clerk.

‘Let’s go,’ he mouths.

I shrug and point to the 13.47 blinking on the pump.  I’m not about to pull a drive-off with a state policeman less than 20 feet away from me.

No, that’s something you would do, and probably get away with.

When I go in to pay for the gas, both the old lady and the cop eye me with definite suspicions.  But I try to keep my cool.  For some reason, I’m starting to feel a little nervous, a little edgy, and it’s not just the fact that I really have to piss. 

She hands me change and I give a polite nod.  Two seconds later I’m greeted by a warm blast of night air and I’m back in the car, ready to continue this adventure.  We’re barely out of the parking lot before Paxton starts parading his wares in front of me.

“I’ve got a Snickers, a king-size Kit-Kat, a turkey sandwich, and a bag of Fritos.  In what can I interest you?”

“How much of that did you actually pay for?” I ask.

“Kore shika nai n da yo,” he says as he produces a bottle of orange soda from another of his deep, hidden pockets.

What he said was Japanese for ‘just this,’ and I snatch the bottle from his hand and take a generous swig of soda.

Your brother still has a long way to go if he wants to become as socially deviant as you, but he’s got a good start.  At least you would have stolen me some cranberry juice, though.

Now we’re flying.  It’s just us, skimming in the left lane past an endless string of semi-trailers, and your brother has the sandwich cellophane spread across his lap and he’s ripping the crust off of the sandwich halves and placing it lightly on said cellophane.  He does this with the deliberate attention of an archaeologist freeing a seventy-million-year-old saltasaurus spinal column from the surrounding rock and debris.

After he’s done with the sans-crust turkey sandwich, he wraps the cellophane ball up and puts it in a pocket instead of tossing it out the window.  I hope he empties those trash-filled pockets at some point.

We’re still fifteen minutes from the Kentucky border, and two hours from Paducah, in my estimation, but I could be wrong.  After all, I haven’t been to Paducah in…ever.  There is no reason for sane people to ever go to a place with a goofy name like that, I think.

Yet here we are, hurtling past Columbus, past Seymour, past Austin, past Scottsburg, past Sellersburg.  What started outside Indy as flat, sloping hills is turning more and more into moundlike mountainous land covered with trees.  Paxton is saying something about a shorter way we could’ve gone that would’ve taken us through Evansville, but I’m all about simplicity.  Interstates all the way I say.

“You could take I-24, if you’re dead-set on interstates,” Paxton says, “but highway 62 would take us straight there and save an hour and a half.”

It turns out I’m not as irresolute as I might have thought.  We go around a loopy curve of highway and now we’re on a bridge that has opened up the view of the pre-morning glow of thousands of lights in office buildings.  Reflecting off the Ohio river, these are the collective night-lite of Louisville, Kentucky, a city nestled between mountains and knotted with the monolithic superstructures of highways 65, 54, and 265.

I feel more like I’m driving on a giant roadmap than through the heart of a big city.

Paxton isn’t paying any attention to this.  He’s pondering the succinct fortune written inside the metal cap for his glass bottle of orange soda.  He hands it to me and I read it:

‘Try to maintain those relationships you value most.’

I laugh out loud at that.  “That’s not even a fortune,” I say, “that’s advice.”

He shrugs and I ask him, because I can’t fathom it, “So why did they move to this place?  Why would they take the suckiness of D’Starkville and multiply it by moving to somewhere like Kentucky?”

“Magdalene’s dad was offered a job as Plant Manager in a factory down here,” he explains.

That’s a much nicer explanation than the truth, that her mom was sleeping with another man and her husband caught her, and part of the reconciliation was moving away to get a fresh start, but I don’t have any desire to throw that in your brother’s face right now.

He’s quiet, contemplative.  Your brother has apparated a Kentucky road map from one of his pockets, and he’s studying it.  There’s a little star representing a town, and it’s circled several times in blue pen, with an address written next to it. 

I want to ask him why now, why not yesterday afternoon, why not this morning, why is it so necessary for us to be making this trip during the dead hours of the night, but I pretty much know the answer.  This is how I think it happened.

I think yesterday afternoon, Magdalene’s mom got a call from the doctor.  She broke the sad news to her daughter after the girl got home from school.  Within five minutes, Magdalene was trying to call your brother, but Paxton was out roaming the streets, lurking in corners, or doing other Paxton-like things I can’t gauge.

When he finally did make it home, sometime around eleven, he called her on an impulse or she left him a message, or, whatever.  After they hung up, he checked his e-mail, and then he called you to find out when you were coming home.

After you didn’t answer your phone (a big surprise), he called me and explained the situation and asked to borrow my car.  Now, mind you, my car is not very nice.  It’s rusty, it’s old, and it’s missing some handles and valves and whatnot, but there was no way I was going to let your brother borrow it, since he has no license and no sense of ideas like ‘going 90 miles per hour is bad’ and ‘using a turn signal is a good idea’ and ‘paying for gasoline keeps you from getting arrested.’

So we struck our bargain and here we are.  

Now your brother is looking at me, and with all seriousness, he says, “I wish I were the one with ovarian cancer.”

I swear I don’t mean to, but I’m laughing at the ridiculousness of this statement. In one one-thousandth of a second, your brother has the knife edge of his hand at my throat and he says, “That wasn’t a joke.”

I am, of course, surprised.  A few second pass and your brother calms down.  “You should take this exit,” he says, “this is the highway we want to get on.”

And now we’re on this Highway 62.  The franchise gas stations and fast food places are starting to give way to the Mom-and-Pop diners and places that look like filling stations.  The road is bumpier, there are more hills, and the houses are in disrepair.  Through breaks in the trees I can see rusted cars in peoples’ front yards.

Somewhere, unless I’m imagining it, I can hear the opening theme of ‘Dueling Banjos.’

What really surprises me is that I’m still getting cell phone reception, because my phone is ringing.  And it’s Damien.  Of course, he doesn’t care that it’s four thirty in the morning.

“Moshi-moshi.” I say.

“Speak English to me, dammit.”

“Fine.  What do you want?”

“I dropped by your house a bit ago and Janus said you weren’t home.”

“Yeah, his psychic powers amaze even me sometimes.”

“Anyway,” Damien says, “I had a bit of fun tonight with this girl who just moved to town, and I videotaped it.  Thought you might want to make some popcorn and watch it with me.”

“Damien,” I say, “what makes you think I want to waste five minutes watching you and your skinny, naked ass poking some skank?  Don’t you have some drugs you could be out selling or something?”

“Fine.  Be a little bitch, then.  I just wanted you to see how the adults do things, you know, give you a few pointers so I can take a break from all these girls you used to date coming to me and saying how small you are and how unfulfilled they felt.”

“That’s awfully thoughtful of you,” I say with lots of sarcasm.

“Where are you, anyway?”

“I’m with your mom.  We’re working on getting you that little brother you always wanted.”

“You’re a sick bastard, Jonas,” he says, “besides, you know my mom got her tubes tied after I was born.”

“You’re right.  I forgot about that.  I have to go, though.  I’m stuck behind this guy in a tractor who’s taking up the whole highway.”

“Right.  Whatever that means.  Later.”

“Mata ne,” I say.

“What did I tell you about that sh—”

But I hang up on him before he can finish.  We really are stuck behind some farmer in a tractor.  This guy obviously can’t read the signs on every on-ramp that advise you not to bring farm machinery on the road.

Maybe in Kentucky this isn’t something that people care about.

We pass him on the shoulder though, and your brother is taking this opportunity to fall asleep.  It’s starting to become light out here, and there is dew on all the grass and fog in between the hills.  I still have a fierce need to pee, but we’re approaching our destination with rapid speed.

***

Two seconds after we spot the exit for Paducah, we’re rolling down Walter Jetton Boulevard.  It’s really starting to look like dawn here, with the sun almost one hundred percent visible and lighting an eclectic collection of license plates on the parked Camaros and Camrys that are lining the streets.  Indiana, Kentucky, Illinois, and Missouri are all represented, with the occasional Tennessee tossed into the mix.  Even though we can’t see the river, the smell and sense of a river town is pervasive, exposed by the many boats on trailers and the shanty décor of riverfolk.

I almost feel like Tom Sawyer or something.

Your brother, a symbolic Huckleberry Finn, has his window down and he’s scanning the street signs, looking for Oscar Cross Avenue.  After a few minutes he’s spotted it and he tells me to ‘Migi e magatte,’ or to ‘turn right’ in that English y’all are so fond of.

I can tell we’re close, and it’s now occurring to me that I have no idea what we’re going to do now that we’re almost there.  I’m sure Magdalene’s parents aren’t expecting five a.m. visitors, but people touched by the chaos of tragedy are often more understanding than under normal circumstances.

Either way, it should be interesting.

(c) 2004 jordan baugher