“I’m going to talk to someone” he thought, attempting to reassure himself, “or my name isn’t William Dylan”. Every person who had entered his life had eventually been driven away by the sycophantic tendencies he possessed. It was not so much greed as a reaction of impending doom were he not to adhere to a routine schedule of internal vandalism. If he were turned inside out, the disfigured remnants of his dastardly affliction would reveal a precise calculation of the moments used bringing substances in to banish the blatant clues reality drops at our doorstep, trying to lure us with unresolved inquiries to venture outside. The perfect day may not be so if we are not there to proclaim it as such, open to the meeting and melding of mental magnificence.
He commenced torching up a smoke to take his courage to a place it would work best. For our distractions allow us to relinquish that attentiveness to certainty, so we reach a peak performance when concentration is no longer compulsory for a vividly engrossing delivery. Content merges with nuance in a seamless symmetry, which both defies and reinvents geometric orders of pre-eminence. The inhalation was nearly meditative, bringing simmering waves of circulatory tingle, drooping down his limp frame. He had to make contact with anyone, or else the chasm that had developed between William Dylan and the others would have become impassable terrain.
We are not the observed events done reluctantly, nor regrets of omission that are pondered on by the sheer influence which they could have altered the course of a life. We are remembered for the outcome of our volition, the earliest tool to unlock an existence filled with more than mere want and its corresponding succumbing response.
After tossing his cigarette, William Dylan stepped on it to make sure it was extinguished. Left behind was a streak of fine black powder and the flattened filter.
“Someone might complain” he internally remarked, checking to see if any passersby had caught him placing litter on the walkway.
He found the expectations of his incomparable peers frivolous and arbitrary. The more he thought about it, there was not so much a society as a combination of distinct choices, a culmination of the numerous striving (or plummeting) towards the path of last resistance. Conditioning aside, instinct ensnares us from declining a sumptuous offer, with so many taking the bait made first available, distributed by the intermediaries to fulfillment, pirouetting over the pursuit portion of goal attainment, straight to the congratulatory feast. But there is no way to return the moments we steal from ourselves when we skip to the good part, missing all earnest anticipation or the release of determination’s strenuous burden.
“Perhaps them” William Dylan mulled over.
He was striding beside the refined tastes of squatters, where who you are being is not conducive to your very own survival.
“Might I be slightly too well garmented to approach?” he worried, noticing how the perception might be construed that he was of a different standing then the chaps protecting their refuge in the abandoned warehouse. In William Dylan’s mind, he was the one who dared to challenge agreements that divided totality into the expendable and the privileged. Why is memory served better to those whose constraints were voluntary rather than imposed? Misfortune bodes well with the empathizing public. Give me grief and I will surely be inseparable to the cause for which it stands, because of the imaginative capacity of commonality. Then this reflection was broken by a meager entreaty from underneath his field of vision’s focus.
“Would you happen to able to give some change?” was chirped, as if by habit, from a man whose appearance was so vulgar it was pitiful.
It wasn’t the type of interaction William Dylan had been longing for. He had come here to feel connected to something greater than himself, not be besieged by ramshackle requests of solicitous intent. He wanted the panhandler to search within, instead of extending a hand out to commandeer the funding for his next tobacco.
“I’ll tell you what…” William Dylan returned the patronage. “Have what’s in my back left pocket” he offered.
It was an appointment card for the meeting he was already twenty minutes late for, with the social worker who was supposed to get him help him get off the beaten road and onto the right track. After glancing at the message as if it were a secret code, the homeless man tucked it into his shirt pocket like it was a fifty dollar bill.
“Thank you kindly!” the disheveled wreck concluded the conversation, verifying that the transaction was complete.
William Dylan scurried away as the procession of traffic created an inescapable uproar, infiltrating and scrambling his senses. Every chaotic note constituted an onslaught, beckoning his consciousness to wither in face of shared lanes and toxic exhaust. He could feel the hydrocarbons dampening his chi, leaving an uncontainable despair that his lungs were becoming a breeding ground for the contaminating mixture.
From the rest of the vehicular frenzy, a black pickup emerged, pulling up to the curb with speed and purpose. The passenger’s side window was already rolled down as the pilot pronounced his prerogative.
“I am in need of direction” he stated without introduction, “Where is Lake Fecundity?”.
Information, unlike quarters, he could dole out freely. “You know there’s no campsites round there” William Dylan retorted. “It’s tough to visualize the way your supposed to go”.
“I have a reunion of sorts, thus its really very important that I get out there!” explained the damn near delirious driver. “I know the distance is riddled with unmarked service roads, it would be easier if you just showed me. There’s a case of beer in it for you should you decide to come.”
Conflicted between self-preservation and a thirst for disengagement, William Dylan weighed the risks against the promised gains. In no position capable of refusal, he leaped with all due faith of an unacquainted score into the cab of the truck as the motor undulated, more softly at rest before it began to rev up, bringing the two into the street’s current. The inclusion the traveler let him sample was satisfying that day’s mission to confirm sentient life in the galaxy. He was along for the ride northeast with a newfound friend.
“Oh yeah” the one controlling the steering column mentioned, “call me Geronimo.”
It is impossible to maintain a decent conversation with someone while they are driving badly. You don’t want to cross or undermine them, lest they take it out on the gas pedal. Some people careen headlong towards the precipice, accelerating at every juncture until we peer over the edge, then every fibre of the body yearns to return to the boundless options of young harmony. Geronimo gunned it like a bat out of hell and never quit. William Dylan was jostled into the centrifugal lean of the corner, his eyes bulging beyond the brink of the drastic drop, with all the inherent physical forces favoring them being flung fast off the veranda. A little lucky, the scales had not tipped too far, hence their galloping pace continued.
“My prime, unfortunately, was in the past. The only life event I have to look forward to is an exit with dramatic flare” said Geronimo, who was convinced that he must make up extraneous time for the detour they were taking to get some alcohol as per the initial arrangement.
A dead stump covered in fungus and lichen thwarted any attempt to glamorize the last act of passing. As the material components break down molecularly, new and vibrant organisms swiftly take up occupancy where it once used to be, invaders to the space in which a shadow once remained. Replacements, eagerly pouring into the vacuum left by an untimely departure. William Dylan wondered about the begging man, and how he would be swapped in for that position as circumstances permitted.
A dozen more reckless kilometers and the truck came rolling into the parking lot of the government operated liquor store. Geronimo handed William Dylan a pair of twenties and advised him to select anything that struck his fancy except hard bar. The automated doors slid open, as if commanded by sorcery, inviting the overwrought navigator to a superfluous assembly of inebriating elixirs, the closest thing to home he had ever known.
The language of beverage has many regionally specific colloquialisms and variant pronunciations. For connoisseurs, there is always a chance to match the flavors amid the dent the present has made in their ongoing saga. William Dylan was at first contemplating what would be a good pairing with the hotdogs stuffed in the cooler, maybe Grolsh since its bitterness is enough to accentuate the seasoning of the supplemental condiments. Although, he didn’t want to return with such a cheap import, it was not befitting of such an ominous excursion as the one Geronimo had goaded him into. The green, translucent hue of Stella Artois caught his gaze, the familiarity unchanging as a top pick at any given pub environment. But they were going back country camping, and something so distinguished would be misplaced in a wilderness situation such as this. Staropramen would bring that rugged Czech intensity, just right for roughing it out there. However, at two fifty a can it would leave him a little short on overall volume for consumption, therefore he couldn’t have that. The assortment he saw next left him doing an about face to the front of the store so he could gather one of those ridiculously miniscule shopping carts, arriving at the aisle again, jogging briskly. Tallying the price as he put each hefty bottle into the wagon, William Dylan stocked up on La Fin Du Monde.
“What the hell” declared the sipping specialist, “On the edge of empire, we will never be as close to what the end might resemble.”
Left to their own devices and charms, can they manage to thrive without the conspicuous comforts of the regulated realm, only a heavy grog to soothe the qualms to be had through the obstinate observation of contractual obligation?
Sometimes you need to get lost to rediscover a truth stored within. Away from all the formations which of us it is comprised and the endless chain of hierarchical authority. Not a customer or an employee, but a human in search of one more moment on earth, a chance to cherish being here for any reason. Nature washes off the titles and entitlements we have constructed and carry around, clinging to the explanation of our presence.
Well after arrival, William Dylan’s perception of motion was perpetual. The canopy of the trees made the forest floor feel cavernous that night. Geronimo yanked a tarpaulin past the edge of the truck’s cargo bay, pinning it firmly in the ground with several pegs, creating a makeshift lean-to for his guest.
To William Dylan’s receptivity, this form of cover appeared horrendously uninspired, “At least I can stretch out flat on the ground instead of being hunched over in the seat of the cab” he said, timid yet rambunctious, hoping the zeal of his inner most wishes for padding would broadcast to Geronimo’s antenna, revoking the need to ask.
“I have some business that needs attending to…by myself.” said Geronimo, sternly dictating the course of the proceedings. “Can you entertain yourself for a while?” he asked in a way that was not so much a question as a measure of control.
William Dylan was alarmed when Geronimo produced a disproportionately long wooden staff from the back of the truck, finding it surprising that he had not noticed it there sticking out of the mounting clutter. The bark had been shaved away, leaving only knots in the grain of the timber, standing close to seventeen feet tall.
“What’s that for?” William Dylan remarked inquisitively, imagining a bear or cougar being kept at safe distances with a lunging prod of the lance. Maybe he needed to vault over a wall to get to one of the park’s protected zones. Did he have delusions of grander stature that would enable his necessitation of such a large cane? It was anybody’s guess, not a soul to be seen except the harrowed cross examiner and target’s refutation of any prior involvement.
Geronimo replied “Soon it’ll be a walking stick”, nonchalant in his deliberate ignoring of the rod’s indubitable size.
“If you say so” said William Dylan, suspicious that an element of the equation was being hidden, but fully aware that letting Geronimo abscond by his lonesome would leave himself beneficent to the entire bounty of beer. Besides, people often get silly when they drink, and tonight he was predicting a drift into the kind of stoic solemnity one could not attempt to engage in whilst sober.
No farewells were exchanged as Geronimo lurched deep within the temperate jungle, balancing the pole in his calloused hand so it would not deposit any trace if it scraped the dirt. It wasn’t long before William Dylan came to the conclusion it was refreshment time.
The expulsion of the cork was like the bang that created the universe, nebulas of putrid foam trickling down his shirt and fingers. Trying to rescue as much as feasible, he sealed his mouth around the bottle and let the pressured contents, shaken vigorously on route to the lake, infuse with his awaiting innards. This was the remedy sought after for the incredulities of life. Disregarding his body’s feedback, urging him to take a break, William Dylan forced down the brew irreverently. Soon the image of who he thought he was became irretrievable, which left only a hyper-vigilance for the titillating wind, postulating that it was causing the alternations in the area’s confident hum. The container had quickly been depleted. Refraining from opening another, he could reclaim some much needed composure, before Geronimo could come back to witness what a debacle he had become.
Sleep interrupted by a conniving spider piercing his flesh, William Dylan permitted the fangs to extract sustenance from his very being, hopeful that this creature would imbibe some of the excess toxicity corroding his arteries, so it too would bask in the pejorative splendor of one’s own demnity.
William Dylan woke up wondering where he was, swearing a silent yet facetious oath never to touch another drop again. Yeast had congealed on his gums and the rest of his body was sticky with perspired residue. He walked to the periphery of the vista in order to relieve himself. It stung slightly in a way that let him know the worst of it was being excreted. Examining the remainder of the supply, he promptly renegotiated his settlement, opting for his own version of the breakfast of champions, a bowl of corn flakes with fermented broth in lieu of skim milk.
Until four hours from then, David remained immobile, his placidity demonstrative of the hardship he had previously encountered. With his settings adjusted more to a classic southern rock output, the talk radio’s accentuation of the bass was resounding within the cab of the truck, but not enough to disturb David’s slumber.
William Dylan wanted this guy to begin stirring so they could both get out of there. He knew that you were not supposed to be out past where the provincial trails brought you, and he wouldn’t be able to pay any fine if they were caught. After a while of listening to the indistinct blurriness the debate David had tuned into reeked of, the truck door swung ajar and his entry into that particular morning was buoyant and meticulous.
Informing the hung over gentleman that his captivity would be extended indefinitely, David said “Not done what I came to do. You’ll just have to sit pretty for a few more days.” The words felt like a life sentence delivered as the verdict in a trial.
The recapitulation of patterns William Dylan found unnerving. To dilute the majesty of intrinsic spontaneity and substitute it with the rigidity of convention, he felt took abnormal leaps of insipid bashfulness. That is why it was so agonizing for him to fall into the designed delineation of duties that David had prescribed, to guard the truck during the solitary excursions into darkness and curtail all curiosity while drinking alone. Keeping up with this façade was causing William Dylan to languish and fester. “The cycle must be broken” he thought. Having never learned how to operate a motor vehicle, he was depending on David’s haphazard driving skill to return him home after everything was taken care of. Unsure of what he was even doing here, William Dylan decided to follow David on the third night of their residence, keen on discovering what had brought him to these outskirts of the earth.
Posted like a sentry, an owl looming on a branch above provided a cautionary hoot to the traversing trespasser as he made his approach, considerably shaky on his feet from that night’s binging. David had left in the same direction every time, so it was deducible that unless he was feigning his intention in an effort to lose any stragglers, he going even further northeast.
Creeping along, William Dylan suddenly ran out of room to walk on, a sheer drop to the lake circumventing his progress. A rising mist converged with the silver hue of the lunar phosphorescence, above the placid gesticulation of the tarn. David was there rowing a tiny boat, with his immense stick lain across the tip of the hull. As the vessel drifted to a graceful halt, the pole was plunged into the abyss in a systematic fashion, David gyrating around the perimeter of the boat then moving to new coordinates before another rotation could be launched.
Although he thought it best to stay hidden and frozen in place, William Dylan had forgotten his level of drunkenness. A proclamation of territorial assertiveness from a vicious raccoon caused him to spin and shuffle. Lacking much dodging room, a rock he tried to brace himself on withdrew its support immediately, falling with its reliant patron towards the lake.
William Dylan submerged into the glacial runoff, gasping as his nerve endings notified him of the abrupt change in heat. Cold water filled his nostrils, and if the water had been chlorinated it would have stung more. Had he dived in by choice, the rush would have been exhilarating, but presently he felt clumsy and uncertain what would happen next now that his cover was blown. The splash had been disruptive of the eerie nocturnal hush, and all thoughts of a reasonable explanation for his espionage had been evacuated along with his core body temperature. He sunk down, feeling the resistance of the water decelerating him. William Dylan contacted something that compressed then rebounded back into its original form on his left foot, a sleek slanted surface on the other.
When he floated up for air, he could not decipher the expression on David’s face. Agitation, concern and a faint twinge of schadenfreude.
“I don’t think you have what it takes to be an effective spy!” he said, chased by a bellowing laugh that came from deep with the diaphragm. “It’s just as well. Figure would be more difficult keeping secrets than asking for help.”
William Dylan still was not sure what to expect, sensing his role as guide was about to be adjusted. “Hadn’t showing him the way here been enough?” he thought, his mind blaring like a trombone when it reaches crescendo coupled with the application of a brisk vibrato.
David gave him something to go on that would situate him. “I’m searching for a family heirloom, the last picture left behind of my late Yiayia.” he said, no clarification of what a Yiayia was, but making it exceptionally clear how important one could be to a person like him.
To seek confirmation of hitherto unknown truths can be one of the most tormenting yet vital tasks that a person can pour their being into, pining for the articulation of the unspeakable which can only be encountered in fond glimpses. It does not matter, if your conception is not provable, who will believe in it. Public acceptance is what turns opinion into fact. Thus the pursuit of any verification for the convictions entire moralities consist of is rampant, albeit not very comforting when it reaches a demise. Just as stores make one hundred dollars in change inadmissible for purchasing power, the dispersed outcries for equitable peace must amalgamate into a crisp bill in order to conduct their enterprises.
David did not portion out his revelations the same way a puzzle is assembled piece by piece, rather delivering the panorama as a singular unit.
“My daughter is getting married in two weeks and what she wants most is to see what her grandma looks like, to see where she came from” he said. “Her car, I figured, is somewhere in this park, and the search and rescue looked everywhere except the lake bed”.
“There was something down there”, said William Dylan, feeling this fellow’s plight enough to divulge what he knew.
David laid his plan out like a quarterback in a huddle. He was going to hitch the sunken car to the truck as to drag the whole thing out, but he had to get to the flatter beach section of the shore. Driving through dense brush as to reach the other side, William Dylan heard each individual twig, support beam and mast crumple before the torque heavy momentum of the truck. It was a concerto of percussive pleas for mercy and a trail of evidentiary carnage resulted that would soon be detected by the Forest Stranger.
For now, it was David plunging into the water and swimming out to where William Dylan had fallen in. Vanishing below the surface for thirty-seven seconds, it made the spectator tense to see his way back home in such jeopardy. When he returned into view, it was as relieving as smoking a cigarillo to its last vespers.
“Addiction is the bubonic plague of our time, transferred from an afflicted person to a receptive hostage, flattening all progress. Not enough doctors to cure the sick.”, he thought to himself.
David gave the aforementioned signal indicating William Dylan should hit the throttle until he could see in his rear-view mirror that the boat was onshore. Lacking confidence from never having driven before, he did a commendable job directing the truck in a straight line for seventy-five metres. Leaving the truck where it was he galloped to the landing site, where liquid gushed from the gaps in the fixtures much like a family files out of the car after an arduous road trip, a reunion with the daylight from decades in the nether regions of the lake. Gathering the contents of the car was an unopened booster pack of collector’s cards. There would be several items so commonplace they were negligible, some not matching the type of deck being played, but always one or even two gems that would make it all worthwhile.
Aside from the driver’s license, which had the faded likeness of a tough hippy chick with a spunky haircut, there was an antique mirror that appeared to disclose the inner workings of the reflected and could not be convinced through any ploy of subterfuge. Accompanying these were a medic alert bracelet belonging to one Graham Herman and some old cassette tapes, each showing a side of YiaYia’s personality.
The evocative voice of a talent that took it too far too soon (take your pick), the mournful decorum of the Latin masters, and still another artist whose overwhelming fear from unfathomable sources caused them to control their reaction, rather causing damage to oneself than being part of the public problem. David found a blemished silver dollar that he said would need to be quavered down so it would be at full value. The mission was entirely accomplished, but William Dylan noticed he was despondent and detached. Emotional distance, so forgone.
Nothing could elude the keen observation of the Forest Stranger, let alone a blatant bulldozing of protected habitat. This was his playground and he was responsible for its guardianship, and he had the firearm to back it up. There was an environment and a mystery to defend hence the Forest Stranger had taken up being the warden of this provincial park. In especially egregious summers his uniform became cumbersome, so he would don informal wear. Despite his lack of demarcation, he was maniacally dutiful, taking his job far too seriously. It enraged the Forest Stranger that someone could disregard the natural sanctity so ruthlessly that there was detection of urgency in the swathe through the forest. There was only one reason he could think of why anyone would go though such an ante, and if his deduction was aligned with precision, they must be stopped at all costs from discovering his twenty year secret.
The catastrophic aftermath of the revved up rampage was easy enough to follow, and as the square footage of destruction accumulated, Forest Stranger’s temper would flare voraciously. The hunt was happening, for he had to catch them before they caught on. Tracks were left behind to be pursued, and whatever lay at the end of the path was an enemy combatant to the park and his privacy. The Forest Stranger approached trail’s end where he would make a rendezvous of unparalleled rivalry. He knew the prey were close when a plume of smoke was visible floating towards the cosmos.
William Dylan was busy attempting to justify his infatuation with cheap tobacco, to which he could not yet bid a final farewell.
“It’s the blemish on the inside portions of your teeth, the part of your soul that you can never reach to brush. And you resolve to do better, contrive a way around it. But the vestiges of your longing grapple with your judgment and bully your merit
into backing down once again. Every time you give in, the yearning only gets stronger. The problem is still there and you are even less equipped to deal with it. Anticipation leads to an expectation that you deserve what you desire.”
The pleading of his case was interrupted by occasional drags until he made eye contact with the hawkish glare of the Forest Stranger who, with gun drawn, had a murderous intent about him. William Dylan had never seen someone in a Hawaiian shirt look so pissed off.
“Is this how it ends, you die alone and away from home, hoping that any person finds your decrepit heap while you’re still dimly recognizable, wishing that the memorial is less burdensome than your animate debacles of debauchery. Will we be remembered as vignettes of virtue against a backdrop of incorrigible unruliness?” pondered the already grief stricken man.
The Forest Stranger led them in a procession away from the car and its contents lying on the beach, with the slender lake waves clutching wryly toward the amassed artifacts then retreating back into the retention of the water body. Thereafter he cited provincial law regarding preservation of wild sanctuaries, issuing one violation after another. The suspense of being caught and swindled out of the memorabilia racked David’s brain as he pleaded with the Forest Stranger to exclude the picture identification from the relinquishing of his pocket storage.
“Do you know when someone is missing, and you feel more connected to them than ever, the recollection serving as a marionette to fill the lacking in your life.
The very recapitulation of the experiences shared, to obsess about what can not be held tangibly until the summer day, which melts away the dullness of solitude and dismantles the clouds that were a lion gold, cascading down.”
The stress was getting to William Dylan too, and accordingly he set the flame to the final smoke in his pack. He snuck a couple puffs before that hostage was waylaid and asked to put it out in a manner more befitting of an airline stewardess than a subjugating captor. With a cheeky grin William Dylan blew the last cigarette smoke he would ever have and flicked the burning ember behind him, much to the chagrin of the Forest Stranger who didn’t have time to take the rest of the objects into custody for he was forced to tend to the smoldering flare-up that would sure to convey him demerits were it to get out of control. This gave the nervous explorers their cue for flight, the truck barreling backwards down the path it had created, occasionally veering off and creating an impetuous new indent in the sculpture of the flora.
When Geronimo dropped him off at the same spot he picked him up at, the exchange of glances showed that although their cavalcade had been cherished, they were likely never to see each other again, and that was acceptable to both parties. Without much adieu the truck was barreling off into the urban labyrinth and with it the certainty of purpose that the proposition had instilled. William Dylan had come around full circle and now he needed to score a smoke before the doubt had a chance to creep in.
He saw a possible target for a donation request, and meandered his way towards the visibly exuberant fellow who must have been up to no good at this intersection at this time of night.
“You wouldn’t have a dart on you , do ya?” William Dylan spouted irreverently.
“All I can spare is a smile and a hug, but I owe you so much more than that,” the clean shaven man replied with an air of familiarity which was more surprising than it was irksome. He went on:
“It’s been one week since I quit smoking, quit everything. And it’s all because of you.”
William Dylan wasn’t clueing in, and he wondered what kind of elaborate ruse this was to burn him of what nothing he had left. The man pulled out the appointment card he had been gifted when he was down and out and it all came together.
“I went in there and I just said I was you, they got me in a 48 hour detox bed followed by a 72 hour observation at the funny farm, really got myself sorted out, and they are saying if I can stay clean I can get a place of my own , so you won’t see me bumming around the skids any more.”
The recovering addict was expecting him to be proud, but William Dylan only found himself jealous of the bombastic manner by which this man had turned an empty gesture into a life-changing windfall. There was no time to react when a cab tore up to the curb and the door slammed, brandishing the Forest Stranger pursuing as maniacally as one could when given a reason to seek vindication. Closing in, William Dylan froze up under the duress.
“Not on my block!” the other guy snarled as he unleashed a back heel kick to the Forest Stanger’s jaw that was immediately devastating upon impact. He wasn’t incapacitated, but his eagerness to fight had all but dissipated. When his dental records were updated in the hospital, it was discovered he had been working under an alias at the park, an identity he had stolen from the owner of the car at the bottom of the lake. He was arrested while in care for grand larceny. Geronimo got his truck impounded for too many unpaid speeding tickets. William Dylan was inspired by his experience to keep reaching out to the downtrodden and no one knows if the other guy’s sobriety is still intact.