In the late afternoon, after getting off from work Ian would stop off at the land fill located close to his home; it gave him a chance to unwind. Most people would think of going to a bar or turning on the television after a long day. Ian liked to walk through the piles of tossed out rubble while he looked at discarded computer pieces for a computer he was building. He could tear out a mother board or anything else as long as it fit into his back pack. The owner of the land fill didn't mind his wanderings and the little that he removed made no difference in the overall scheme of things. He paid a token admission fee of one dollar and had to sign a “waiver of claims” form in the event he was injured while on the property. Ian parked his truck to the side and well off the main entrance so it would be out of the way where he put on a pair of heavy weight overalls on top of his blue jeans. He sat on the truck’s tailgate and changed out of his tennis shoes and into a pair of beat up steel toed work boots. Ian put on his back pack and walked up to the office. The young woman who sat behind the window recognized him and smiled casually. It occurred to him that he must look like some kind of bum, complete with five o'clock shadow.
“ ‘Evenin’ Ma’am.”, his
in the
“Here’s
your receipt.” She reached to hand him
the small piece of paper, while
putting the dollar bill and
the carbon copy in the cash drawer. It
only took half a second more for her to look up at him.
“You know, all this time I’ve been coming here and I
never thought to introduce myself. Ian,
Ian Rogers.” He smiled and continued
with the formality. “I apologize for
having forgotten my manners.” Ian didn’t
mention that his wife had passed away or that he’d been living alone for going
on six years. It had been some kind of
cancer, the kind that couldn’t be treated, pancreatic cancer had taken away the
love of his life.
“I’m Valerie.”, not sure how to reply. It was a rare day when anyone said a word to
her other than to grumble for her to open the gate or some other such
necessity. Those who came to the land
fill were not looking for social contact; it was more like flushing a toilet or
something as they dumped truck load after truck load of no longer wanted
junk. People came with their trucks
laden full of trash, things they couldn’t get rid of in a garage sale. They normally didn’t even notice that she was
there, other than to pay to use the dump.
She looked him over, this time with a shift in perception. He wasn’t particularly tall, just under six
foot with an average build. She
couldn’t help but notice that his eyes were fixed upon hers. “How old, mid fifties. That sprinkle of gray in his beard and the
deep lines in his face…”, she thought to herself.
“Pardon me if this sounds a little strange.”, trying to
figure out how to arrange
his words so that he wouldn’t
come off like a total idiot. “Are you
that beautiful or did
you cast a spell on me?” Ian smiled a boyish grin in her direction
and stepped half a step backwards so that she wouldn’t feel like he was
encroaching on her space. He didn’t
know why he had said it. He was a
natural flirt when it came to saying something to a pretty woman. He would wink at the young woman at the gas
station where he stopped in regularly.
The girl who worked at the Stop and Go store always smiled back when he
rambled on about how she looked like his youngest daughter. There was something about her, an
indescribable characteristic that had found a spot deep within. Because he had felt awkward when he was around
women and considered himself out of step when it came to expressing compliments,
he often quipped a short joke up just to have something to say.
“It must be the spell.”
Valerie laughed out; not figuring that he could be serious
about her being
beautiful. She wore her company blue
shirt that was too large for her with tan slacks; not exactly cover girl
wardrobe material. She had on a modest
amount of make up and her hair, thick and full bodied, was pulled back to keep
it out of the way while she worked. On
top of all that she wore a black long sleeve sweater because the air
conditioning duct in the office was directly over where she worked.
“That must be it then.”
Ian smiled again as he tucked the receipt into his pocket
and walked toward the large
open pit. A dump truck that was leaving
slowed as it
approached the gate; a
billowing of dust from under its wheels filled the air. Ian ducked
and shut his eyes until the
cloud past and he could breathe. He
wasn’t sure if it had been
the dust or his petrifaction
which had caused his lungs to contract at that particular moment. He looked over his shoulder; she was still
there, looking at him. He stumbled and nearly fell down the
embankment as his knees scrambled to find sure ground. He thought to himself how odd it was that he
would have such feelings.
He walked along the crest of one pile of junk and
followed it around to a point where he could no longer see the office. Once away from her presence he concluded
that his mind might return to a more stable attitude and he could get on with
the business of finding what he was looking for. His boots lifted and moved various objects
to expose
the next layer of junk. He had become quite adept at zeroing in on
electronic trash and
was able to recognize the
sound of certain plastics and thereby speed up the process.
He found what seemed to be a
discarded “two eighty-six” that appeared to be intact. Taking his back pack off and opening a small
tool pouch, he quickly cracked open the oyster and removed its pearl. The case was of no use to him; Ian was after
the green wafer boards. He could always
find a use for the memory chips and cables.
He was surprised to find that there was some kind of specialty board. It looked much like a Sound Blaster board;
but different than any that he had run across.
Ian took his screw driver and removed the pair of screws which held the
board in place. He held it up close to
his face and looked it over once it was free, “Sure is a strange looking hollow
tube. What’s it do?”, he thought to
himself. He then stowed it carefully in
his pack.
He sat
for a while on the stack of trash with the sun at his back, glad that Central
Day Light Savings Time was once again on his side. It gave him an extra hour to play after
work. Ian looked around the land fill
as another treasure hunter was pulling on something that was in the pile of
trash a little ways off; wondering what specific items where on his “treasure
list”. Ian had found his prize
relatively early as he sat on top of large empty plastic five gallon bucket at
the top of a long ridge of junk. He took
his pack off and handled each piece of treasure. He was particularly interested in the
strange looking board. He wanted to take
it to work and show it to a friend of his who knew more; maybe it was a fancy
board for 3-D games or some such
thing. Ian’s finger tip lightly rode
down the length of a cylindrical item that was attached to the printed
circuitry, not quite touching as he knew better than to get body oils and acids
on it. “What the heck is that for?” ,
he asked himself out loud. Even more
curious was that it seemed to be warm, as if it had been used recently and
still cooling down. It made no
sense. “How can it be warmer than. .
.”
The
fellow that he’d been watching had been tugging away on a length of cabled wire
that was stubbornly resisting all efforts to extract it from the pile. It would be a nice gesture to help him out
as he got to his feet and worked his way down the incline of broken water
heaters and rusting air conditioners. It
would not be prudent to jaunt his way down,
even with the heavy material of his overalls the sharp metal could
easily tear into him. He placed each
step carefully and made it to the base of the pile; looking for the other
surface miner.
It was
much the same as when he had been hiking in the
“What’s that stuff?”, pointing to a small dark patch of
something organic that was splattered across a flat piece of rock. She got down into a low squat and poked at
it with her walking stick. Ian enjoyed
watching her expressions as everything was a new experience.
“Buzzard puke.”
It was a simple answer and yet it had pricked her imagination. It was the kind of statement that would come
in handy later when she wanted to irritate her mother. The rest of the day they spent pointing out
more buzzard puke and laughing each time the words came out. “Buzzard puke!” They made it to the top of a small grouping
of rocks where they could see the entire
“That’s strange…”, thinking out loud to himself. “… I coulda’ sworn he was right over there a
minute ago.” Ian climbed over a
mountain of matted roofing shingles, making sure to avoid the nails. “Oh well, I guess he was able to get it on
his own.” He looked around again
wondering where the stranger might have gone; after all it was not a very large
place. Ian dismissed the thought and
decided it was time to head home. He
made his way over to the dirt road that ran down the middle of the fill. It would be easier to walk on the hard pack
surface of the road rather than plotting his every step through junk
heaps. Half way to the gate he turned to
check once more, still wondering how he could have missed meeting the fellow,
the one who had been pulling on the cable.
There; in the same spot as he
had been before, was the same man tugging on the end of the stubborn
cable. Ian stopped in his tracks and
could not figure out what had happened.
It was not possible that he could have missed him and yet, there he
was.
“ ‘ You need some help over there?” He let the question drift out in the
direction of the tug of war; wanting to go help while at the same time not
wanting to intrude. No answer came and
Ian finished the walk back to the gate.
He showed the pack to Valerie, giving her a cursory glance at best. “ Nice haul, huh ?” It was more of a statement than it was a
question requiring an answer.
“If you say so.”,
came her reply. She had no idea
what he had shown her as
he continued on towards his truck unbuttoning his overalls. “Ian, will I see you again tomorrow?”, she threw in while he was still within ear
shot. The sound of her voice teased the
hair inside the channels of his ear; not sure if she was saying goodnight or
hurry back.
“I come here often.
I suppose so.” Ian was afraid to
look back. The sound of her voice
reached inside to a place where he was reminded of his inability to deal with
such feelings. He placed the boots
behind the front seat onto a layer of plastic that protected the small bench
seat from dirt and moisture He waved in
the general direction of the office without looking as his truck headed out of
the land fill parking area. While he
waited for the light to change, his mind
was flooded with glimpses of Valerie’s face.
The images were incomplete at best, portions of a smile, a crease that
accentuated the line of her cheek, the
shade of her skin blended with the shadows cast by her hair; drawing his
thoughts and his fears out so that they lay adrift and scattered. A dump truck behind him gave a blast of its
horn, one of those earth bending air horns like fire trucks use to clear out
lanes of cars on their way to a disaster.
Ian bolted forward, acknowledging the green light, the one that had been
that way for more than a few seconds.
It was not at all like him to day dream at a traffic light.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ian
made his way through the winding streets of the subdivision and home. He could hardly wait to get inside as he
parked in the driveway. Dan Dunlavy, his
neighbor from next door, was parking his car on the curb next to Ian’s
driveway. Dan was a retired computer
geek and he was just now getting in from the local community college where he
taught a course on computer basics three days a week.
“Get
anything good?”, Dan asked, knowing of Ian’s late afternoon forays into the
junk yard. He waved while getting out on
the passenger side since the driver’s side door no longer worked properly. With a little effort Dan could pull the door
panel, re-attach the linkage rod to the door handle and have it the way it
should be. He closed the door, making
sure not to lock it, the passenger side lock linkage was also messed up.
“Yea,
come take a look.” Ian found it
difficult to contain his enthusiasm as he grabbed his backpack from behind the
seat. Dan held his hand up to signal
“time out” as he glanced inside the mail box and then, after determining that
there was nothing there, cut across the yard toward Ian’s house. Dan always kept his lawn mowed so short that
it never prospered under the hot
Ian
was opening the top of his backpack and had already reached in for the most
curious looking board; the one with the strange looking tube and coil of
wire. “I found this one a while ago, got
the rest of it in here too.” He was
sure it had to be something worth sharing as he held it out for Dan.
“So,
when did you start breaking into research labs?” Dan chided him as he gave it a quick once
over, not having a clue as to the boards purpose. “What kind of interface is that?”, pointing
to the harness that did not appear to be compatible with anything, IBM or
Apple.
“I
was hoping you could tell me.” Ian
smiled as he handed it to Dan. “Notice
anything unusual?”
“Hold
on a sec’; let me have a look see.” Dan
worked it over with a journeyman’s eye; following the printed lines of silver,
the curious coil, the coil that was radiating heat that could be felt from
several inches away. Dan held the card
so that his fingers were suspended above the coil without saying another word,
at least nothing that was intelligible.
His eyebrows lifted and fell enough to express his bewilderment.
“Neat
huh?” Ian was about to show Dan the rest
of the computer boards when he was distracted.
Across the street he thought he saw the form of a woman floating in mid
air. It was the same as when he had left
the junk yard to look back at Valerie.
“What
is it? Did you see something?”
“Tell
me you don’t see that?”, pointing to the image, the same image he’d seen
earlier at the dump.
“I
see that John has pulled into his driveway and that his garage door opener is
working, that he is pulling into his garage.”
Changing from talking with Ian, “Evenin’ John.” Dan waved at John in return as the garage
door closed and he disappeared from view.
“Then
you didn’t see a a woman dressed in blue floating in mid air in front of John’s
garage?” Ian’s hand was outstretched
but beginning to drop a little as his mind worked to put the puzzle pieces
together.
“I
thought you Mormon’s weren’t supposed to drink hard liquor.”. Dan was a card
carrying Catholic and they had discussed their individual faiths over the
several years that they had been neighbors; carefully avoiding any spirit of
contention.
As
quickly as the vision had appeared to Ian, it just as quickly vanished. “I tell
you that I saw something strange; no, really.”
“Damn!” Dan cried out, moving his fingers from where
they had floated just above the strange coil that was now glowing red hot. “Sorry”, waving his fingers about in the air
to cool them, “didn’t mean to swear”, placing his fingers to his tongue and
then blowing on them. The coil cooled on
its own and returned to its original color.
“What
do you suppose it is?” Ian held the
board up, turned it over and then back again.
“You
got me on that one/” Dan looked down at
his finger tips once more. “What was it
you saw, a ghost or something?”
“Who
knows, maybe it was just my imagination playing tricks on me.” Ian closed his eyes for a moment and tried to
picture in his mind what he thought he had seen. He was looking across the street at John’s
driveway, then there was something that looked like a piece of transparent blue
and yellow material; some kind of floral design. It looked like it was a woman’s dress, or at
least that’s what his mind saw, only there was no woman in the dress, just the
form of one. It took only a moment to
conjure the image, all the while his eyelids along with the rest of his facial
muscles tightened up. Ian opened his
eyes and took a breath of air to clear his thoughts.
“I
have some papers to grade. Let me know
if you figure that thing out.” Dan
walked back across the yard, his one elbow bent to keep his fingers up. Dan looked across the street and then back
to Ian. A light hearted smile crept upon
Dan’s face as he pretended to take a sip from an imaginary bottle while his arm
was crooked; shaking his head for effect.
“G’wan!” Ian whisked his hands toward Dan in sweeping
fashion. In the back of his mind he
recalled the musical, My Fair Lady. “I
ask you sir, what sort of word is that?”
His daughter would never have let him get away with such a word. She had watched the show on DVD so many times
or had listened to it on CD enough that she knew each line, each nuance well
enough to have fun with it. It was a
source of merriment for them to jerk a line from the shows they were familiar
with during their everyday conversation and insert it; knowing that the other
would pick up on it and they would both laugh.
What would his daughter think about a floating dress in the middle of
John’s driveway? “G’wan!” Ian walked to the back door and let himself
in, all the while letting Professor Higgins chastise him for having ostracized
the language. “This is what the British
population, calls an elementary
education…” The door closed behind him
as he was lost in thought still holding the curious green board.
Ian
placed his knapsack on the table in the nook on top of a stack of unopened
letters before tossing a couple of chicken pot pies in the oven. He would have something resembling a meal in
thirty minutes. He read his email,
mostly spam, and then read the news on CNN and Fox. He was going through the motions of being
home. The house was not much of a home
with all the kids grown and off on their own.
He turned on the local “oldies” station to have some noise. He took the morning paper, the one that he’d
placed inside the front door when he left for work, and read over the front
page. There was nothing new, only
things that he already was aware of. He
went back to the kitchen nook and sat down to take a good look at his newly
found treasure.
“Okay,
so tell me what you are and how you work.” Talking to the inanimate object was supposed
to be a sign of some kind of old people’s irrationality; if so, then he’d been
suffering from it since he was a child.
In his youth he had taken apart a radio to see how it worked. It had worked fine up until he took it
apart. The more Ian studied the strange
looking coil the less he understood its purpose. He had a set of magnifying lenses that he
could wear that would let him bump the power as much as eight times. There was adequate light from the overhead
chandelier as he traced the micro circuits the went out in all directions. To the best of his reasoning; the coil was
not served in any way because all of the leads were dead ends. It derived nothing from being placed on the
board; nothing, and yet it worked.
“What the heck.”, he bit down on his lip and clipped the coil from off
the board completely.
“Ian,
will I see you again tomorrow?” The
words filled his mind as if he had on a good pair of audio headphones. The sparkling lights emanating from the
crystal baubles of the chandelier danced their rainbow patterns on the
wall. He was reminded of the floating
vision from earlier as the prisms dispatched the refracted light. As Ian enjoyed the effect he noticed that
one by one the dots of light were all blue and yellow.
“That’s
impossible!” Ian stood up and looked
around to see how such a trick was being played on him. “Light can’t do that!” The coil on the table began to glow; except
now it was glowing shades of blue and yellow.
He placed his hand above it; the
air was chilled several degrees. Ian
sat down as he picked up the coil.
“Ian. . .”,
he could hear his name being called ever so softly, “. . .now, isn’t that
better?” He hadn’t noticed it but the
radio station was playing, “The Magical Mystery Tour”, the first cut on the
album of the same name.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
The
following day was not as busy as Ian would have liked. He had too much free time and his mind was
pulling up fragments of thoughts. “Ian,
will I see you again tomorrow?”, the words kept repeating. He found himself
trying to remember how she sounded, how she looked. It was unsettling as he found himself being
desirous of her company. His truck turned
down the dirt road and he was at the land fill. He sat there for a few minutes as if he had
been awakened from a dream; no, it was real.
He got into his jump suit and walked to the office, half way hoping that
the other woman would be there.
“That will be one dollar.” Ian was relieved to hear a stranger’s voice
as he forked over the entrance fee and breathed out some of his stress. He looked down the road the led to the
center of the land fill. Walking with a
brisk pace and kicking up dust with each step he went directly to the place where he had last
seen the guy tugging on
the stubborn cable. When he got there he studied the spot and
could find no hint that
anything had been
agitated. Rusted steel shelving units
from a small strip center that had been demolished lay as they had for several
months. Pine pollen coated everything
with a bright layer of yellow dust.
Only places which had been disturbed recently lacked the powder. Ian shook his head as he recollected the
previous evening; quite sure that he had not hallucinated it. He then began walking toward the area where
he thought he would be more likely to find the kinds of treasure that had
printed circuit boards. The climb made
his legs work and kept him agile. It was
like being a kid all over, playing in somebody else’s back yard. He would reach down and pick up something
once in a while, study it for a moment or two and toss it like a rock skipping
across a pond to the other junk pile.
Old lug nuts were a favorite as they bounced and ricocheted off other
junk making a huge racket. He found a
box of paper clips that had rusted together and a box of ball point pens. What he would do with a whole box of red
pens he had no idea; but they were the only thing of value that he could find
so far. The pens all worked as he tried
them on a piece of scratch paper so he placed them in the back pack. He had been walking around for the better
part of an hour when he heard his name.
"Ian, is that you ? " Valerie called out, standing at the door
that led into the
office at the top of the
road. It were as if she had known him
for a very long time, next
door neighbors or
something. He lifted his arm to wave
and then walked to where she
stood. He didn’t like to shout back at people, that
is unless he was in his truck. When he
was disturbed with the way somebody drove down the street Ian could be rather
hostile in
nature; unkind words flowed
like poetry from his lips. His wife
used to accuse him of being a Dr. Jeckle and Mr. Hyde when he got behind the
wheel. This was different; he hadn’t a
clue as to what to say.
“Hello, Valerie.”
Ian was slow to meet her eyes with his own. She was just as
attractive as she had been the
day before, maybe ever more so now that she had called his name out first. He was reminded of how he felt when he was a
boy in school. His teacher, Mrs.
Eggplant, had called his name and smiled at him. It wasn’t like he could put his finger
on. When she spoke his name it touched
his soul as surely as a surgeon opens a patient’s chest and massages his
heart.. She had a soft spoken way with
all the children. She would sit in the
middle of them all to read a story or teach them a lesson, never raising her
voice. Instead, she would sit quietly until
they were all ready to turn themselves over to her entirely and then she would
continue. Ian had always had a crush on
Mrs. Eggplant even though he had never been a good student, he had never
forgotten how he felt when she greeted him.
When Mrs. Eggplant would play the piano during singing time Ian could
see only her face. Her features made
him think that she looked like one of the angels on the Sistine Chapel
ceiling. He remembered misbehaving at
times just so that she would come over to him and quietly remind him, “Ian?”, placing her hand gently on his, “Ian,
that’s much better.” While the rest of the class sang he would get lost
studying her face. Ian thought about it
and then realized that her name wasn’t Eggplant at all, never had been. That was how he heard her name as a child; it
was some Scandinavian name that only sounded like Eggplant.
“Did you find anything good today Ian?” There was a flirtation of sounds; or at
least that is what he had
imagined. He looked back into the land
fill area, mostly to keep
from looking at her.. There on the side of the junk heap was a man
tugging on a piece of cable as if it were a projected image on a screen. The angle was such that it could not be
coming from anywhere but from within the land fill. He had already been down and investigated for
himself; there were no mirrors or flat surfaces that could be used for such a
cinematographic effect. His distraction
was long enough for Valerie to notice.
“I'm sorry.”,
pointing in to the general location of what he now perceived to be some
sort of holographic apparition, “Do you
see that man down there pulling on a piece
of cable?”
“I hardly ever notice what goes on down there.” Valerie's answer was simple enough and yet it
didn’t answer his question. Ian looked
at her and forgot what he was thinking
about. Her blue eyes were there in front
of him, almost as if they were commanding him to forget about the rest of the
world and be there with her only.
“I was joking about it yesterday; but I think you really
did put a spell on me.”
Ian tried to look away only to
find him self wanting for her to reach around him, to hold on to him with her
arms and never let him go.
“What's the matter Ian?
Do I have that much power over you?”
Valerie's voice was different now, much more direct as she toyed with
his mind. What the hell was going
on? Ian felt the pit of his stomach
twisting in confusion as reality and the unknown met head on.
“Are you,
real?” The words came out of
Ian's mouth. His thoughts became muddled
and confused.
“Real? Ian,
have you been reading too much Sci-Fi in your spare time?” Valerie's breath was warm on his ear as she
whispered so gently that he had to close
his eyes to hear.
“I suppose you’re right on that point. I grew up on Heinlein and Bradbury; always
looking for the fantastic among the mundane.”
Ian smiled as he thought about the many characters from the books he’d
read. The lines on his face seemed to
soften as he slipped into his past, momentarily enjoying the carefree years of
his youth.
“Who’s Heinlein?”
She asked, having no apparent idea who the author was. It really wasn’t so unusual for a non sci-fi
reader not to know who Robert Heinlein was.
Ian had placed Heinlein’s work above all others. It may have been because one of the first
sci-fi books that had been truly fun to read had been, The Past Through
Tomorrow – Future History Stories. Ian
had read the book so many times that he had to go buy another when the pages
started to fall from the binding.
“Robert Heinlein, one of the best when it comes to
sci-fi. You must not have read much
sci-fi at all have you?” Ian regained
his composure as the conversation moved into an area where he had more than a
casual knowledge. There was a certain flexibility
afforded by sci-fi that permitted modest leaps of faith when it came to
environment or technological prowess.
On the other hand, good sci-fi relied on the human spirit, the developed
traits to identify each and every character so that they became as real as your
next door neighbor. It was no different
than the old western movies that had delighted him on Saturday afternoons at
the local movie house. The hero riding
into town on a horse could as easily been arriving in a space ship.
“I never was a real fan of sci-fi. I thought of it much like I do comic books,
if you know what I mean?” Ian found
himself in a defensive mode. He could
not imagine how he could explain the appreciation he felt for some of the comic
strip art that he enjoyed. Ian had a
copy of The Fantastic Art of Frank Frazetta standing next to Michealangelo and
Degas on the book shelf. He considered
them as equals in their own right. Ian
shook his head and started to walk away.
“Well, I can see that your limited exposure to the arts needs to be
rounded out. Would you let me take you
to dinner some time; let me introduce you to some other forms that you might
enjoy?” Ian winked at her as he said it
and finished it off with a smile so that it wouldn’t sound as if he was
snubbing her.
“I’ll
have to think on that; but thanks for asking.”
Valerie placed her upper lip over her tongue, which then covered her lower lip in such a
way as to leave off the rest of the thought.
Ian wanted to know more about her, mostly he was trying to figure out
why she was so appealing to him. There
was something about her, something he was having trouble understanding. It was almost as if she was a composite of
all the attractive women that he had known.
He had seen a comical movie, Condorman, about a cartoonist who had drawn
the woman of his dreams into his work.
In the movie the woman’s likeness was, in actuality a spy and so when
they met the story line allowed for the cartoonist to become a master spy;
eventually winning the heart and the woman of his dreams.
“I better be going now.”
Ian forced his eyes closed so that he could turn away and get to his
truck. His pulse was rapid as he worked
to control his breathing. He put the
key in the door lock and got in without changing his clothes. As soon as the engine was running he put it
in gear. When he looked in his mirror he
could only catch a fragment of blue material, floating in the air, a human
form; but without anything solid to hold the shape. The tires left a cloud of dust as they spun,
finally catching hold of solid ground.
Ian turned his head to look
back, not trusting the mirror’s image.
The office was empty now, nothing.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ian pulled
off the road after having driven only a couple of miles. His thoughts were going off much like a
string of firecrackers; a flash here and there mixed with lots of noise without
much meaning. He turned the motor off
and sat while gathering all of the events together. He retraced his going into the junk yard the
day before, finding the odd computer board, his acknowledged infatuation with,
with what? Ian wasn’t even sure that
Valerie was real or some kind of holographic image. If she wasn’t real then what was she? He turned the motor back on and decided to
investigate a little more.
The traffic was heavy with so many
people headed home after work that it took a while to find a spot in which to
cross over. Steubner-Airline had once
been a farm road that led into the boonies.
Now, with suburbia stretching its
tentacles farther out, it was a main
artery. The feeder road that led back
into the dump ran along side of a driving range that had a beer shack that also
served burgers. Ian pulled into the
oyster shell parking lot and locked the truck.
After getting a large Dr. Pepper and an order of fries he then began to
walk down the dirt road. The darkening
sky was closer to night than evening as the huge driving range lights
illuminated the contrasting lush green grass that was now off to his left. There was a mesh wire draped along the side
to prevent stray golf balls from leaving the range that also prevented people
from accidentally wandering into the path of one. Ian strolled casually along the middle of the
road enjoying the over salted fries that were now beginning to cool from the
chill in the evening air.
“Ian,
have you been reading too much sci-fi?”
Valerie had asked earlier. Ian
let the thought run free as he could see the gated entrance to the dump. During the day he never paid much attention
to how they would secure the area at night.
It was much like the way he had seen used car lots lock their units up
at night. They had used a large pipe,
three or four inches in diameter that was on a pivot that could be swung across
and then padlocked to a fixed post on the other side. It wasn’t meant to keep people out, at least
not entirely, mostly to prevent the passage of vehicles either in or out. Ian looked about and could see no signs of
anything going on. The moon was nearly
full as it hung there against a gun metal blue sky; larger in appearance because of its position
low on the horizon and, with a piece of the Texas Piney Woods as a backdrop, it
looked like it was sitting on a pedestal carved out for just such a
purpose. Ian was never one to let the
beauty of the moment escape without acknowledging the Creator’s hand in the
mix.
“Thank
you Sir; You’ve outdone yourself.”, speaking while nodding his head. Ian wondered to himself how many of those
hurrying on their way home had missed the masterpiece because they were too
busy watching the tail lights ahead of them.
Ian got to within about fifty yards of the entrance. The same type of pipe used to block off the
road had been used along both sides of the road; also to prevent vehicles from simply going
around the gate by jumping the shallow drainage ditches that ran along side the
dirt road. They were solid and suspended
about a foot and a half off the ground; perfect for sitting on while he
finished off the French fries. When he
was done he folded the cardboard container and slipped it into the back pocket
of his blue jeans. Just because this
place was a dump didn’t mean that he should toss a piece of garbage on the
side. He could place it in a trash
barrel later on after he had enjoyed his Dr. Pepper. Ian listened and watched, turning his head
slightly after a few moments for a different angle.
Except for the sound of a light
breeze passing through the tops of the pine trees, a most calming sound if any
there was, Ian could hear nothing to indicate the presence of anyone. He looked down at his hands that now
appeared ghostlike as the moon’s light peaked through a passing cloud, not entirely
covering the bright orb, only limiting its intensity.
Ian
wasn’t particularly afraid of the setting.
He had grown up only a block from an old Revolutionary War cemetery on a
scary sounding street, “Seaman’s
The night
air began to catch up with his lack of planning. Normally Ian would have had sense enough to
wear a light jacket this early on in Spring.
He felt a shiver run the length of his back and down again. His shoulders shook off the feeling and he
drained the last few drops of his soda.
Ian walked the short distance to the gate where he carefully surveyed
the area in front of him. He looked
into the booth, the booth where he paid his fee, the booth where he glimpsed
something unexplainable in his rear view mirror. His hand reached into blue jean’s
pocket. Ian had brought along the coil
from the computer board, not understanding why; only following through with the
hunch that it held answers to some of his questions. The booth was empty with only shadows from
the trees against the naked walls. Ian
eased himself over the gate, carefully avoiding contact with the rusting
pipe. The coil temperature spiked
causing his hand to release it to the ground.
Ian reached to pick it up; but, was distracted as he heard his name
being called out softly.
“Ian,
you’ve come back?” A quiet voice
arrested Ian’s forward movement, freezing his footsteps so that his bent leg
was caught in mid stride. It hadn’t been
said in a manner meant to be alarming; if anything it was sensually beckoning
him. Ian looked, his neck turned in such
a way that his view was obscured by his own shoulder. Valerie was standing a few feet from the
booth, closer to the road that led down into the junk yard. Ian could not understand how he could have
missed seeing her as he had taken time to look the area over prior to hopping
over the gate. “Ian, its all right that
you came back, its all right.”
Ian’s mind
was drowning in familiar sounds that didn’t fit. “Its all right, its all right”, was what his
wife would whisper into his ear when he would wake from having a terrible dream
in the middle of the night. It wasn’t as
if it sounded the same, it was exactly the same. “How can this be, that voice, I know that
voice from so long ago.”
“Ian, I can
explain all of this.” Valerie walked to
within arm’s reach of Ian. “Come, sit over here. This must be quite overwhelming for you.”
“Who are
you?” Ian straightened up, squared
himself with respect to her apparent position, for he wasn’t even sure that she
existed, at least not in any reality that he could understand. “What are you?”
“Ian, do
you remember the first time we met?” Her
voice was soft and relaxing.
“I suppose
you mean the other day when I came in and paid my dollar to walk the
yard?” Ian swallowed as he thought how
incredible an impact she had on him that day.
“No, think
back.” Valerie’s smile matched her eyes
as they surrounded Ian. “Can you
remember?”
“Remember,
remember what?” Ian began to feel a bit
uneasy with the open ended question.
Had he met Valerie in high school, college or during the course of some
everyday event? All the same, it made
sense; there was something so intimate that made him feel at ease, as if she
were a familiar spirit.
“I have
known you forever. Do you understand,
forever?” Her eyes met his, looking
deep inside his soul.
“You,
uh,” Ian was staggered at the suggested
thought.
“That’s
right Ian, you recognize the truth even if it doesn’t all fit” Valerie’s voice smoothed the deep wrinkled
lines on Ian’s forehead as she spoke.
“We have always been together.
Remember looking into the mirrors at the temple and how it looked as
each image reached out, one upon the other until the images disappeared into
eternity?”
“But that
was…” Ian felt tears welling up in the
corners of his eyes as he thought about his wife. They had been married thirty two years until
she was taken from him by the cancer.
“This is
how I looked before I came down the first time, try to remember.” Valerie turned around slowly as the black
sweater, the blue work shirt, the tan trousers blended to become a shimmering
light blue and yellow floral print dress.
“Each time you had a pleasant thought a part of me came back, to guide you back to me. I am all of those thoughts and more for you
now.”
“But how is
this possible. Did I die and not know?”
“Not
exactly. This was one of those
“Twinkling of and eye” kind of changes.
A few moments ago you were there, now you are here.” Ian looked down to find that he was no longer
wearing his work clothes. Instead he had
on a sleek fitting tuxedo. It was much
the same as the one he’d worn to his daughter’s wedding.
“What do we
do next?”, Ian’s voice trembled as he became aware of the import of the
situation.
“We go
home, together.” Valerie lifted her arm
for him to take, as if at a grand ballroom waiting to be led to the dance floor. The two of them rose, their spirits giving
off beams of light into the night sky as they were sealed up into the heavens.
