The high beams illuminated the dark gray asphalt road that stretched on for miles. The moon shimmered against the black of the night sky. It played a repetitive game of hide and seek with me. We never took turns playing each role. I was the seeker, and it only hid – coveting itself behind the tall sandy mountains of the California desert. It disappeared for 3 seconds and appeared in the next one. Hide and seek. Hide and seek. Hide and seek. I heard the engine of the car fighting to keep up with the quickness of the moon.
I sat in the backseat and dug around the faded and worn duffle bags on the floor taking inventory of all of the supplies we had. The gaps in the bags had grown larger. We were running out of everything, all at once. I let my fingers break through the greasy and unruly strands of black hair that sprouted from my scalp, and I tugged as my fingers made it through to the ends. My brows furrowed as I tried at the map again. No matter how hard I wanted to see the bodega it was never there. I shut my eyes and forced my brain to sketch the face of the man hidden underneath the yellow straw hat. I tried to sketch his face the same way he sketched our path to refuge in obnoxious red ink. It was easier for me to pretend that I imagined him, but that wasn’t the case. Travis warned me not to take directions from a stranger, and stubbornly so I ignored him. The man in the yellow straw hat was real. He lied. I believed him. Now, we are left with a fake map and no where to go.
“We aren’t going to make it,” I said. This wasn’t a surprise to me though. I knew we wouldn’t, everyone else didn’t.
“We are,” Travis debated. “How many more miles until we get to the store? Travis asked. I kept focused on the map. I rubbed my fingers against the torn edges, and envisioned the landmark of a small shop. I felt Travis staring at me through the rear view mirror, awaiting my response. My eyes stung with salty tears, and my head turned to the window. The dryness of the Mojave desert reminded me that my tears are just wasted water, and my eyelids fought to blink them back. I replayed it all again in my head. The man with the yellow straw hat. He ripped the map out of a book, marked where the bodega would be in obnoxious red ink, and handed it to me.
“Cameron,” he said again and his lungs sucked in air like a black hole, “how many more miles?” he repeated. This time quieter.
I could have pretended not to hear him again, but my silence was strangulating. My chest grew tighter and the air became less. I knew we were never going to make it. It was sheer luck we survived this far.
“There is no store,” I said.
He laughed as if what I said was a joke. It was melodic. I watched, through the rear view mirrors, how he smiled and showed all his teeth. I watched his dimples deepen like the craters of the moon. In the mirror I also saw myself. My frown lines engraved on my dry skin, and traveled my face like cracks in a stony pavement.
“There is no store,” I repeated. Those words escaped my lips with fluidity, but calcified in the air.
“What?” he asked, letting out a soft chuckle accompanied by a faded smile. I prepared myself to answer the question again, even though I’m sure he understood exactly what I meant. The lump in my throat grew, and my eyes were the dam that kept the tears from cascading down.
“There is no store,” I said again. This time my words tasted like death.
I stared at how the blue vein, matching the color of his eyes, pressed itself against the taut pale skin on his forehead. That always happened when he was upset, and I could read his face like a book. He didn’t say anything else after. It was quiet. Too quiet. I couldn’t hear the whistle that came from his deviated septum each time he inhaled. The song that lulled me to sleep. It was like he held his breath anticipating the end. Our end.
“We’ll figure something out, don’t worry.”
I woke up to the bell-like sobs of the fuel tank at its last ten percent. I stared out of the window disappointed to be greeted by the night time sky all over again. The tires of the car hummed with exasperation.
“A hotel…” Travis whispered. The brakes screeched masking his words.
I sat up and looked through the window straight ahead, and sure enough, there was a hotel. I rubbed my eyes in disbelief.
“A hotel,” I repeated after him.
Before I could say anything, else he slammed his foot down onto the accelerator and the engine of the car sputtered. The hotel was our last chance. Our last chance to hide. Our last chance to be saved.
We parked at the cobblestone roundabout in front of the broken stone pavers. I climbed out of the backseat, suffocated by the backpacks strapped to me. My body ached in fatigue and my legs shook with each step. Travis limped out of the front seat, with his makeshift branch for a cane, and headed toward the door of the hotel that was closed with a thick padlock. He smiled in triumph, and his dimples deepened. His euphonious laughs echoed in the vacancy of the desert. I had experienced every emotion. They shuffled like a deck of playing cards every minute. Travis had only two. Happy or nothing. He managed a laugh at least twice a day, although nothing about our situation was the slightest bit amusing. My own laughter had become a figment of my imagination. I wished to hear it again.
He began wrapping his blue thick jacket around his blistered knuckles to punch through the glass window. The sound of his laughter was muffled through the cries of the red siren. We had 5 minutes to hide. I immediately began counting our first 60 seconds in my head. He stopped and dropped to the floor. He stayed there stoned over like a statue. Once again he gave me only happiness or nothingness. I was ready to take over. I began wrapping my hand, trying to cushion it for the impact.
“I cant anymore,” I heard him say.
“You can’t?” I yelled back at him. The siren was in competition with me. It tried to silence me, erase me from existence.
He yelled out, ready to give up. I watched the red lights paint his face.
“We should have never taken the map,” he said.
120 seconds.
His words were sharp and accusing, and my heart panged in guilt. He blamed me. I got us the wrong directions. Now we have nothing, and nowhere else to run. He blamed me. I washed away his last bit of optimism, and he blamed me. He no longer followed the moon, but turned his back to it.
I broke through the glass and climbed through. Tears streamed down the sides of my cheek and dripped onto my faded red shirt. I began walking up the stairs, still counting increments of 60.
Travis winced behind me in pain.
“Just one more flight,” I said.
He huffed.
“You’re almost there.”
180 seconds.
The whistle from his nose grew louder. Louder than the thump of his branch for a cane punching the wooden stairs. Or the sound of his leg dragging against the wall. I made it to the top first. I dropped the bags down, and opened two cans of soup and sat them on the distressed dark oak floor.
210 seconds
I strained to push the mahogany bookshelf that whined against the wooden floor. The crown molding left large scratches in the floor.
Travis made it.
240 seconds.
He used the weight of his body to push the bookshelf in front of the door we entered through. The pain in his leg sharpened and he looked at me in defeat. He sat down and fumbled with the radio to get a signal, while I finished barricading with the few items left around me.
“They are going to find us,” he said as he pointed to the broken stained glass window. It was the moon. We were hiding. It was seeking.
“We made it this far.” I said, this time truly believing it. It was the last wave, this or nothing. We’ve hid in places like this before. The small gleam of light shimmered through the pink and crimson red stain glass roses warmed my face as the cool desert air kissed it. 270 seconds.
I sat down next to Travis. I handed him his cold can of soup. We hid together, holding hands patiently waiting to be saved.
“Everything will be okay,” I whispered.
He nodded unbelievingly. We hid under the pale moonlight next to the shards of broken glass.
300 seconds.
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