He entered the bathroom and realized there was somebody in the stall, so Dave stood in front of the urinal and made like he was pissing while operating the cell phone one-handed. In the stall there was grunting, and Dave tried to pretend the other person wasn’t there. He pulled up the menu and navigated to reply, when the stall door opened and the man inside sighed and flushed the toilet. Aware he was pretend peeing, Dave put the phone away and made as though he was in the bathroom honestly.
The man from the stall stood next to Dave at the sink. He was wearing old Oakley sunglasses and had long, greasy back hair. The man was definitely Hispanic, probably one of the Indian people from Mexico or Central America, thought Dave, and the thin moustache and wisps of chin hair only made the look even more clichéd. Dave could have easily pictured the man in some ancient hunting garb on the hot jungle steppes. The man turned to Dave.
“HEY, BRONCO!”
The voice was almost as cartoonish as his look. It was a seriously thick accent, but Dave understood what was being said. The man was facing Dave, and he could see the well-soiled jeans and vintage shirt worn without irony, along with the overall sense of dirtiness the man conveyed. Somewhere, a rickety produce truck was missing it’s driver. Dave wasn’t sure the man was talking to him even though they were looking at each other, and didn’t respond.
“HEY BRONCO, YOU LIKE METALLICA?”
Every syllable was stressed, ME-TAL-LIC-A. The man had earplugs in, and there was an old CD player stuffed in his back pocket.
“HAMMER OF JUSTICE CRUSHES YOU! MASTER!”
Dave was speechless.
“ALRIGHT, BRONCO. HEAVY FUCKIN’ METAL!”
The freak threw up some devil horns and bobbed his head as he left. “OH SHIT, MAN…METALLICA,” he said.
Dave stood there befuddled for a moment. Invisible? No fucking problem. I’ll call her when we get to my parents.
---
Ivy’s father was an Air Force colonel, who was tasked with decommissioning ICBM missile silos and facilities when the Russians finally ran out of gas and dropped out of the cold war. Because he was assigned to domestic service, he opted to take his family with him from location to location rather than leave them in New Salem, Kansas, about an hour southeast of McConnell AFB where he was first stationed. It wasn’t easy at first, as they had trouble feeling like they had a true home, but after the first year it was like they were on a protracted vacation.
The RV held most of their essentials (as least, that which wasn’t left on the base in storage for their ultimate return), but the various officer’s quarters provided that hotel-like feel to their travels that added to the traveling experience. The number of sites to visit kept the family moving at least twice a year, but there were stretches in between that allow them to explore the surrounding towns and counties. Ivy’s father felt that she would have a far more enriching childhood seeing the country rather than growing up in one place, and with the time he was able to spend with his family already less than he wanted when they were in Kansas, to be circulating around the country would diminished that even further. Yet for all his efforts to be a good father, there was still a disconnect between Ivy and her dad. As you could guess, little girls and psychology of the military don’t quite mix.
At first, Ivy was withdrawn, but when she was old enough to understand why the family kept moving, she embraced the idea. She fancied herself an explorer, a visitor from another planet who was studying the customs and culture of Earth. Ivy didn’t like the jets and bombs and guns, so she pretended that she was secretly disarming their attack capabilities, using mind control to force her “Dad” to decommission the weapons locations. Eventually she would send a message and let them know if it was okay to make contact with the humans – friend or foe, they’d be disarmed and pose less threat. In the game she had created, the military was looking for her and she had to move every time they got close, which was always since she stayed on their bases and operated under their noses.
Ivy kept a diary once she was old enough to write, detailing mission successes and making observations on her travels. Even when she’d outgrown the nuisance of the framework, she still kept a log of her journey and wrote about her thoughts and particularly interesting dreams. She had just finished making some jewelry and had packed it to be sent to her friend Kayla back in Florida, and was settling in to write a little before going to sleep. When her father retired, they moved to Orlando, and the few years before she was legally able to up and go were difficult being trapped in one spot. Kayla was her one true friend back home, and helped her sell some jewelry online and to mall boutiques. Ivy hoped that it would take off more, so that she could worry less about selling at local swap meets and farmer’s markets and try to have a dependably steady income wired to her wherever she went.
For the time being, Ivy was staying at a motel, which was a little more extravagant than she’d usually spring for, but she’d been particularly tired the last few days, and given the warm British Columbia weather, a little air conditioning and a semi-comfortable bed wouldn’t be too bad. Since leaving home, it was a lot harder traveling, and with enough money saved, Ivy thought maybe she’d buy an old VW microbus so she could travel easier and have that nostalgic comfort like when she was a child, living on the American highway.
In bed, Ivy had already set the plain spiral notebook aside for the time she would put her thoughts to paper. She undressed down to her boy-shorts cut underwear put on a small men’s ribbed tank top, the kind her father would call an “Italian undershirt” before sliding into the sheets. Flipping towards the middle where her last entry had been, it was written nearly a week prior when she had just arrived in Seattle. When she took unexpected breaks between entries, Ivy would reread what she had done before moving on, but this time she didn’t even look back. There was too much to write.
I feels like haven’t had a few minutes to catch my breath in the last week, and seeing as how I have a lot to put down, I guess that’s right.
I really like the Pacific Northwest, and having been in Vancouver for three days now, I think that the northern latitudes are my favorite. I had not planned to leave Seattle so quickly, but I just felt…compelled? Lately, it seems as though I’m in a constant state of sleepwalking. Its like, I remember things but feel like I’m viewing them outside myself. There’s even been a couple of instances where I’m not sure I what I’ve done actually happened or was part of a dream – more on that later.So I partly accomplished what I wanted in Seattle, and that was to see Brother Dave. God, I was such a geek! “You really motivated me to try and make a difference and follow what I believe in.” – ugh! He totally must have though I was such a lame ass. Even his producer chick was looking at me weird. I really would have liked to talk to him about his thoughts on destiny and alternate reality. I guess I could swing back through and try and see him at the studio, since it wasn’t too hard to get in there.
Saw some beautiful places, although I really wanted to go to the top of the Space Needle, but didn’t seem to have the time. Another thing to put on the list “to do” before I die. Magnusson Park was great - saw the Sound Garden, which made such an odd, unearthly sound, but was calming. I probably spent half a day there, watching the sun set and listening to the wind playing the sculpture as my soundtrack. I’m glad I went there after Astoria and Portland, because the quaintness of those places would have been lost in the grandeur of Seattle’s presence. Yeah, Seattle and grandeur – maybe that’s a big much, especially compared to Vancouver, which has the same urban vibe as Seattle, but just, I don’t know…a Canadian twist? Like I said, the whole northwest is terrific.
Met up with the one and only Johnny Cabbage today at Zabba’s, which is a local electronics shop. We talked to Ms. Živojinović, who runs her late husband’s shop and she’s surprisingly on board to let us make a couple of videos to put on the internet that we hope will make business increase. Ms. Z. (can’t write that out again) is going to let us borrow some of the camera equipment and her grandson to shoot it. Johnny is being a good sport, since we’re going to make him do some pretty silly things in the name of art and commerce. He also spoke to her and they want to pay me for my help, which I didn’t expect at all. I don’t think it’ll be much, but anything helps. Me, I just saw his commercial and knew he had more left in him – even if it means being goofy! And I just hate to see the little guy lose.Johnny invited me to see The Big Dirty Band tomorrow night, and he said we’ll “drink some brews and talk shop”. Fortunately the legal age is 19 here, but I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I don’t really drink. He was with the Royal Mounties years ago, so I’m sure he’ll make with some stories once he has a few drinks in him too.
Last night I had another weird dream, and I say another because it’s starting to become a regular occurrence since I got here. I’m in a rowboat in the middle of a lake, and the water slowly starts to recede until the whole thing is just a dry valley. In the distance are some old wooden buildings, and it looks like a ghost town. The sky above looks like a storm, except it’s sunny out. It’s like a vortex of clouds and light, but there’s no funnel like a tornado. It just spins and gets bigger and bigger. The ground starts to shake and clumps of dirt and earth start to float upward towards the vortex, but suddenly it’s as if the ground rose up and got slammed back down like a blanket being shaken out. The dirt settles and the spinning vortex shrinks and disappears. I’m about to get out of the rowboat but I see that water is seeping through the ground, and soon the lake is filling itself back up.
It’s nighttime but the sky is a very bright purple. There’s no moon, but the night sky makes it bright enough to be able to see. There’s a current now and I’m watching the boat head towards the far end of the lake where two hills are. In the water I see two small dark points near the boat. As I move along, they follow, but they’re not fish or a reflection. Someone is talking to me, and knows my name.“Ivy, where are you going,” the voice says. I tell it “I don’t know”, and then I hear laughter. It’s not malicious and I’m not scared, but I don’t know that I trust whoever is speaking. The voice says, “I wouldn’t trust me either,” and I ask how it knows what I was thinking. I hear the voice again, but this time it’s like a thought, and it says to me, “You know what I’m thinking.” I talk back to it, but my lips don’t move, and I hear myself saying the words even though the sound is not coming out of my mouth. “No, I don’t,” and then I say “Ru”. “Yes,” the voice says. “See, we do know what the other is thinking.” The rowboat beaches itself on the shore where the two hills are, and I get out of the boat.
That was the first dream. And the next time I slept, it continued.
I’m walking up the path between the two hills, and I see behind me is Brother Dave. He speaks, but it’s in that voice again, not his. He says on the other side of the valley we will see his friends and enemies, and then he stops talking and keeps thinking at me. “If you take my hand and we cross together no harm shall befall you.” I think to him that I will protect him, and that without me he can not reach the peak. Over the top there is another vortex, and when I turn to show Brother Dave, he’s gone and I’m standing next to myself. I think “Ru, will they welcome us or want to us us,” but there’s no answer. I turn back to look at the peak, and I think to myself that I have to keep them from finding out that I know they’re coming, and when I’m thinking that, it’s like my thoughts and Ru are now one in the same, because I’m alone now. The closer we get to the top, the smaller the vortex is, until it’s almost gone. And as I crest the peak, the valley below fills with light that blinds us and I wake up.
Ever since that first night, I’ve been having “conversations” for lack of better term with “Ru”. Sometimes there will be a few words of information about something I’m looking at, or a suggestion of where to turn or direction to head in. When I ask questions they’re never answered but I seem to find the conclusions one way or another through Ru’s command. I want to be scared but somehow I’m not, even if that means I’m losing my mind. If that’s what it is, it’s strangely comforting and not jarring like I‘d expected it would be. Perhaps there will be more tonight, and I can’t shake that feeling that I’m sleeping with one eye open. Or not entirely awake during the day. There’s a surreal quality to the dreams, but in the last couple of days, there’s been a dreamy quality to reality. We’ll see.
---
After the Fallen Angel had been flooded and sustained considerable damage, a training class was set up for the various henchmen and lackeys. Dolph wanted to be certain that his “employees” were able to manage some level of reasoning and analysis in addition to utilizing their criminal backgrounds. Even though Harry had absconded with Angie, some things, Dolph felt, were unacceptable.
Marv, the top bootlicker in the organization, stood across from Dolph, who was seated at his large desk that was the base of a once mighty tree.
“Marv,” Dolph said, “as you know, we had a very serious security breech, and two of our guests left the premises contrary to my wishes.”
“Yes sir, I am aware,” consoled Marv.
And Marv, you know that I had big plans for those two, yes?”
“Absolutely, sir.”
“And yet,” he lingered on the word. “They did.”
“That they did, sir. That was terrible.”
“Marv, I want you to make sure that this training class we have is not another waste of time. If we can’t get adequate scum to do our work, we’re either not looking hard enough or we don’t belong in this business.”
“That’s right, sir.”
“Who was the guard assigned to our guests?”
“That would be Nunzio Nutzzi. He’s in the infirmary with a broken nose that Mr. Turquoise gave him.”
“Shoot him in the knee.”
“Sir?”
“In the knee. Shoot him in the knee.”
“Yes, sir. Which knee sir?”
“Use your discretion, Marv.”
“And, Marv,” he added, “call in Bronco.”
Marv was at the double doors of Dolph’s office and turned around to address his boss. “Sir, what should I tell him?”
“I want him to kill every member of Mr. Nutzzi’s family. But first, I’d like him to come here and find Harry Turquoise and that turncoat bitch-whore.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Oh, and Marv. I’ve changed my mind. Shoot him in the left knee.”
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