Election Day

My nostrils register the stranger before my eyeballs get a chance. The morning breeze, warm for early November, wafts a musky scent, along with a faint hint of woodsmoke, across the mountaintop. My fingers head straight for the canister of bear spray attached to my belt as I scan the clearing. About twenty yards away I spy the origin of the odor; a man, perched like a bird, on a decrepit old log. He stares off over the eastern rim, the sky awash in swirls of pinks and reds, as the sun gets ready to peek out over the horizon.

I take stock of his clothes and gear. His pack sits next to him, covered with the grime and dust that one can only get after serious time on the trail. Matted hair sprouts out from under his knit hat. Though filthy, it all appears to be top of the line, expensive stuff. I have no idea if he knows that I am there. I try to figure out whether or not to beat feet back down the trail when he jumps up, arms outstretched, like some sort of crusty-chic Christ, his crucified silhouette a sharp contrast against the sanguine sky.

“How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains,” his voice booms and cascades down the valley in front of him.

I turn to run. The snap of a twig under my foot sends him spinning around.

“Oh, shit.” He tumbles backwards off the log, his face turning a shade of pink not altogether dissimilar from the early morning sky.

“Are you okay?” I ask, my hand still on my bear spray.

He responds with a cackle as he claws his way back onto his perch.

“I think so,” he says. “Nothing busted but my pride.”

As I approach I get a better look at him. White male, probably early forties. His eyes dance behind Burberry frames and his beard, brown shot through with flecks of gray, frames a beatific smile. There is something oddly familiar about him.

“How about you?” he asks. “Sorry for my little outburst there. Sometimes I just can’t help myself.”

“I’m fine.” I decide that I like this stranger. “What was that? Thoreau?”

“Not a bad guess, but no. John Muir. The grand old man of these hills. And boy did he get it right. Not a better sunrise in the world that the one up here. It hits me everyday.”

I glance again at his gear. It has seen a lot of miles.

“You doing a thru-hike?” I ask.

“Nope. Just kind of wandering.” He bends over and reaches out, his fingers gingerly caressing a delicate orange flower that I hadn’t noticed until now. He pulls it close to his face and buries his nose in it. There is something about his innocence that is staggering. “You?”

“Just looking for a little peace and quiet.”

He inhales deeply from the flower again.

“And you had the misfortune to run into a crazy like myself.”

“You’re a whole lot less crazy than what’s going on back down there today.” I jerk my thumb towards the metropolis I fled well before dawn. “It’s election day. Time for the people to roll their bones and cast their stones and decide the fate of the free world.”

The stranger stands up, his face switching from serene to sullen.

“Oh wow. I guess I lost track of time.”

He looks at me and it suddenly hits me who he is. The face staring at me, sans beard, had been plastered all over every screen I’d looked at for the past month. A high ranking official in the Democratic Party, his disappearance had fueled wild conspiracies from both sides of the campaign. Especially when his car was found, ransacked and vandalized on a lonely stretch of Highway 30 up near Big Bear.

Before I can say anything, he speaks.

“My first job after college was in car sales. And man, I was good at it. It got to the point that when a real pile of shit car would come onto the lot, everybody bet on how long it would take me to unload it onto some hapless rube. And then one night, I’m driving home, I see this young girl on the side of the road. I recognize the car as one I’d sold. And I remember her dad, how he’d scraped together everything he had, all to buy her a ‘dependable’ car so she could get back and forth to college. I remembered the look of pride in his eyes, and the look of love in hers. And I remember the laughter in the sales office after they left.”

He reached out for the orange flower again, his fingers tracing the petals.

“Seeing her stranded, I got this pain in my gut. Worst feeling I’ve ever had in my life. So I pulled over, wrote her a check for two thousand dollars and never went back to the car lot. And the pain eased up. I decided to dedicate my life to public service, to help people instead of fleecing them.”

He takes a deep breath and continues.

“And so it went for a number of years. Just like at the car lot, I found my niche, and I leapt up the rungs of the ladder, all the way to inner workings of the party. I felt like I was making a difference. But then one day, a couple of months ago, I opened my eyes and the message seemed to have changed. Somewhere along the way we switched from being a beacon of hope to a machine that churned out nothing but fear. And my job went from telling the world about the good we were trying to do, to feeding into some sort of collective anxiety. And all of a sudden, the pain returned and I felt like I was selling used cars again.”

“So what are you going to do now?” I ask.

“I guess that depends on you,” he said. “Are you going to go running off and tell people you saw me?”

I laugh.

“There’s a reason I hike alone,” I say. “I’m a man who values privacy.”

He smiles and picks up his dusty rucksack.

“Well, if that’s the case, I will once again quote the estimable Mr. Muir, 'The mountains are calling and I must go.'”

Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Fabrice Poussin

The Fortunate Beasts

Heights aren’t really my thing, so I only look down briefly. Just enough to get the gist. Some crazy motherfucker, spinning in circles, riding his bike on the walls. A blur that defies both gravity and sanity. I’m not here to watch a sideshow though.

I shift my gaze to the assembled crowd. A lot of families. Honest, wholesome people. Curiosity seekers who love the spectacle, the magic. The type who hold their breath and offer prayers even though basic physics says what these daredevils are doing is relatively safe. Especially for skilled professionals.

And there are the others. Gawkers, I call them. Those that want the rider to fail, that want to see the carnage. The type of people who get off on pain. A couple of them recognize me, they point and smile and whisper to each other and I know they will be here later too, after the fair closes to the public. They will be here to watch me.

***

The walls don’t look as tall from the bottom of the wooden pit. The air tastes like burnt rubber and gasoline. This is definitely a first for me, but it doesn’t really matter. I’ve fought in all sorts of places. Rundown boxing rings. Empty swimming pools. Old warehouses. Cement pits still slick and sticky with the blood of unfortunate animals, forced to fight for the amusement of the most fortunate beasts of all.

I look at the crowd. It’s mostly men, though there are some brave females sprinkled throughout. I see the guys that recognized me earlier and give them a nod. My eyes continue around the makeshift ring until finally, I find her.

We met at a party in L.A. a couple years back; both part of the evening’s entertainment. I was there to fight. She was there to fuck. It’s not pretty but it’s what we do, how we survive. We make our way with blood and sweat. It’s all we have, the tears dried up long ago.

She tries to smile. She doesn’t want to watch me fight. I know how she feels, the hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach that’s slowly creeping up her throat until it almost chokes her. It’s why I can’t watch her videos. But tonight, I need her here. I don’t trust anyone else, and neither does she.

* * *

My old man used to say that once you get used to the taste of blood, you’ll learn to like it. Maybe he said it as a way to cope with some deep down guilt about smacking me across the mouth. Maybe he had no guilt and just said it to try and toughen me up. Either way he was full of shit, I’m used to it, but I still hate the taste.

I hate the pain too, but there’s no getting used to that. The throbbing knuckles, raw and swollen and disjointed. The short, stifled breaths as my lungs try to expand and contract in a cage of broken ribs. The electric jolt as my nose breaks for the hundredth time. There are no romantic notions here. None of that Tyler Durden, fighting makes me feel alive bullshit.

I fight because it is my gift, beaten into me by a man who was supposed to love me, who was supposed to take care of me. In a sad, sick way, I guess he did. My gift will be my escape.

I glance back up at her. She gives me a weak smile. She understands. In the dark of night, she fell prey to her father too.

* * *

I stare across the wooden pit at my opponent. The last of the gypsy kings, champion of the Irish bare-knuckle brawlers. One hundred ninety pounds of pure gristle and bone. Stories of his fights have reached near mythic proportions in the dimly lit backrooms where such things are spoken of.

But most of this blood-thirsty crowd isn’t here for him. He isn’t the one with millions of views and thousands of followers on Youtube. He isn’t the one dubbed by the media as the “Lord of the Underground.” In this world, he is a relic, a boxer who has never studied the militaristic martial arts of sambo and krav maga, who couldn’t tell you the difference between jiu jitsu and a jujube. Tonight is being promoted as a crossroads, a generational shift, the passing of the torch from the old school to the new. 

The murmurs of the crowd begin to build. I hear the bookies screaming, taking last minute action. The odds have increased. It’s up to seven to one for me. I try to shut out everything and everyone.

The referee brings us together. He explains the rule. The only rule; we go until one of us can’t.

I study my opponent’s face. His scars are a roadmap of hell. I look into his eyes. I don’t expect to see fear, but it’s right there, in plain sight. Has it been too long? When was the last time he fought?

We shake hands and start to cirlce. My jab fires quickly, mashing his lips into his teeth. I jab again and swing for an overhand right but his uppercut collides with my chin. I crumple to the ground. He swarms quickly and I can do nothing but cover up as he rains down punches. His fists dance, finding their mark again and again. I look towards the referee. He won’t interfere until I’m out cold or I submit. Another punch lands flush. I tap and the ref pulls him off me. The crowd erupts, some cheering, most jeering. I look up and find her in the crowd.

I read her lips. “Are you okay?”

I spit blood on the ground and nod.

* * *

As we sign the papers on the RV, I look at her. It was all her idea. Not long after we met, I asked her what would make her happy.

“The open road,” she said as she weaved her fingers into mine. “Just you and me and the open road.”

“And how exactly do we do that?” I asked.

And so she figured out a way. The videos. The internet celebrity. All her creations. She saved every dime we made from exploiting our bodies and when the right time came along she bet it all.

On the other man.

Losing doesn’t hurt bad at all when it pays so well.

Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Daniel Vidal

Just Let Go

October 1972

Heck Hansen gripped the wheel so tight that his knuckles were as white as the snow swirling around him. With visibility down to mere feet, he was driving more on instinct and adrenaline that anything else. Despite the freezing temperatures, sweat soaked into the band of his Stetson and dripped down his forehead. The wind whipped down Rabbit Ears Pass in frenzied gusts, hitting his beat-up pickup truck head on with the ferocity of a boxer swinging for a knockout. Heck knew he should turn back, that his chances of making it up and over the pass in weather like this were slim to none.

But he couldn’t bring himself to do it.

The call had come early. Too early. Sarah wasn’t due for another six weeks. It was one of the main reasons they had decided he should hire on with the C-Bar for the fall round-up. The timing seemed perfect. The wages he earned would be enough to pay for all of the hospital bills and see them through the winter in their little place near Stagecoach. As rough as three weeks away would be during her final trimester, if it assured him of the next four months at home, it would be worth it.

Heck tried to keep his mind on what little he could see of the road ahead, but his thoughts kept drifting back to the past few hours. He had been riding nightwatch, making lazy and slow circles around the herd. The cows were restless. Heck figured it was because of the full moon, so bright it cast long blue shadows on the ground. He heard the chatter of coyotes off in the distance, eerie and beautiful, but they were too far away to be a threat. He stopped on a rise, admiring the immensity of the land. It was then he spied the dust trail, kicked up by a truck hightailing it towards camp. Deep in the pit of his stomach, Heck knew the truck meant something was wrong. There was no other reason for anyone to head out here at night. He put spurs to his horse and raced back, choking on fear the whole way.

When he got there, Mr. Carson, owner of the C-Bar, was standing around the fire with a few of the hands. Heck swung down from the saddle.

“We got a call from the hospital in Steamboat, Heck. Your wife’s gone into an early labor, and she’s having complications. Grab your gear. I’ll drive you back to your truck so you can head out,” Mr. Carson said.

“Is she okay? Is the baby okay?” His words laced with fear, Heck didn’t recognize the sound of his own voice.

“I don’t know, son,” Mr. Carson replied, putting a fatherly hand on his shoulder. “Get whatever stuff you need.”

The cowboys offered prayers and words of encouragement as Heck quickly packed his things.

“Watch out,” said Tell, a grizzled old cowhand who had been herding cattle in Northern Colorado since the Depression. He looked off towards the mountains, and the clouds gathering behind them. “There’s a storm moving in. Pass could get tricky.”

Tricky it was, but Heck plowed on, his resolve as firm as the bunched up muscles in his forearms. He searched for any discernible landmark, but his headlights showed nothing but a white blur. Even the moon, so full and bright earlier, had been erased from his view by the storm. Exhausted and afraid, he inched along.

His tires found the ditch on the side of the road before his eyes did. Heck threw the truck into reverse and tried to back up. The tires spun wildly. He got out and assessed the situation. He tried to dig out the right front tire but the snow was already building up in drifts. He knew he was stuck. Heck grabbed his gear out of the bed and climbed back into the cab. He shook out his bedroll and climbed in, and piled his saddle blankets on top. The wind howled and raged. Sleet and snow battered the window above his head. Sprawled across the bench seat, quivering with cold and fear and exhaustion, he thought of the ocean.

Heck had only seen the ocean once, seven years back. That once had been more than enough.

Fresh from high school, and unsure of what he wanted to do in life, he had tramped across the land, hitchhiking and hopping trains, and seeing what there was to see. Drawn West by the summery sounds of the Beach Boys and Jan and Dean, he ended up just north of LA.

Hypnotized by the mighty expanse of the Pacific and the slow undulations of its waves, he was taken by surprise when the undertow sucked him in. For three long minutes--minutes that felt like forever--he struggled, tumbling end over end as he searched for blue sky and sun. The waves, thunderous cascades of churning white water, crashed down on him. His lungs burned. His limbs ached. And then, just when he thought he couldn’t survive another second, he felt someone grab him, pull him to the surface, and swim him back to shore.

The lifeguard hovered over him.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I … I think so,” said Heck.

“That was a close one,” the lifeguard said. “Now this might sound weird, but if that happens again, don’t struggle. When you get stuck like that, you lose your bearings and sometimes you’re fighting the whole time to go the wrong way. So instead, just let go.”

Heck thought of the lifeguard’s words. He closed his eyes and let his exhaustion overtake him. He dreamt of the ocean, of tremendous waves that battered him, that pulled him under. But in his dream, when the water pushed him down, he let go, and was lifted out of the water by a giant invisible hand.

Heck awoke six hours later to sunlight, stillness, and a silence so profound it resonated in his soul, like the voice of God himself. The storm had passed. He climbed out of his truck. The snow had drifted into a giant wave that engulfed the passenger side. He looked around. Beartooth Peak sat off to his right. He had almost made it to the top of the pass.

A faint rumble cut through the quiet, growing louder by the second. Heck watched as the plow truck worked its way up the road. When it pulled up next to him, he could barely hear the driver over the roar of the diesel engine.

“You Heck Hansen?” the driver yelled.

“Yes.”

“Climb on in. There’s a woman and baby girl anxious to see you.”

Written by: Ben Cook

Photo by: Samuel Zeller

A Change of Plans

Japan is her idea. A way to reconnect. A second honeymoon, even though we never really had a first. Only eighteen when we married, it wasn’t in the budget. Besides, in our situation, we had more pressing matters. A couple of kids having a kid. But then we didn’t. In a way I don’t think we really fell in love until we were comforting each other over the loss.

We didn’t try again for a couple of years. Happy years, the way I remember them. But the next time it happened the sorrow seemed to push us apart instead of bringing us closer together.

She joined the Church after miscarriage number three. She did her best to get me to go with her, but my attendance was spotty, my devotion even more so. It wasn’t the people, they seemed nice enough. I just didn’t find any answers there. Maybe I was asking the wrong questions, but the building felt as hollow and empty as her womb.

I sought solace in a different way. Long hours, weeks spent living out of a suitcase. The punishing grind of sales, rewarded with quarterly bonuses and awards banquets held in smoky barrooms that tend to turn ugly as the liquor flows into the night. My willingness to forfeit a personal life for a professional life does not go unnoticed. The youngest regional director of sales of in company history, I try to placate her, and maybe myself, that it will all be worth it in the end.

And then she proposes Japan.

The trip is organized by a group at her Church. Each year they go somewhere new. Italy. Greece. Israel. And each year her friends return and we listen to their stories and admire their pictures and purchases and she pretends to be so happy for them. They ask us to join them, but we tell them of the plan, our plan, that more hard work now means an earlier and better retirement later. Free and unencumbered, young enough to still enjoy it, we will have it all. But it eats at her. I know it does. So I relent.

We spend our first night in Tokyo. To me, the city is beautiful, a futuristic forest of metal and glass and neon. I understand its tempo, its pulse, the hurried existence of its citizens. I love how the city straddles the edge, teetering between ragged chaos and an ordered, almost military-like structure. I feel safe in its frenzied cocoon.

She does not.

She wants tradition, history. She wants cherry blossoms and wooden temples, tea ceremonies and tranquil gardens. She wants to feel the past. She doesn’t understand that the past is littered with pain and death.

Or maybe she understands it better than me.

The sun is barely up when we drive south and leave Tokyo behind. The trees glisten in the early morning light. When we arrive in Kamakura, the air is already hot and thick. Swarms of mosquitos buzz about, as do the crowds of people at the great Shinto shrine of Tsurugaoka Hachimangu. I find a place to sit in the shade as the rest of our group scales the stairs to the Senior Shrine. I long for the central air conditioning of our room. When they descend, I look at our itinerary. One more stop. The Daibutsu at Kotoku-in.

We round the corner and I see him. He sits nestled in the hills. Humble, yet profound. Open and ready for whatever the universe brings. He is not afraid. He is not happy, or sad, or angry. He just is. And in his shadow, just for a moment, I too, catch of glimmer of what lies beyond the mysteries. It changes everything.

The truth, in all of its simplicity, is laid bare before me. Everything I know is an illusion, the life I have created is nothing but a series of calculated distractions. The fancy clothes, the newest gadgets, the Best in Sales plaques that dot my walls, all are mere band-aids, failed attempts to cover the gaping wounds in my soul. The overtime I put in at work is not a sacrifice to get ahead, rather it is me trying to avoid the unavoidable. I know that now.

I cannot run from suffering, I cannot escape it. It is inevitable.

I see her standing a few feet away, studying the great statue with reverence. It hits me that someday I will lose her, and she will lose me. Instead of terrifying me, I realize that I am okay with this, that I have to be okay with this. That if you are not willing to let your heart be broken, you cannot love. And a life without love is worse than death.

I walk up behind her and put my arms around her. She’s startled by my sudden affection.

“Are you alright?” she asks.

I smile at her.

“Yes,” I say. I pull her closer to me and kiss her. I kiss her like I used to when we were eighteen. “As a matter of fact, I haven’t been this good, in a long, long time.”

“Wow,” she says, and she means it.

Together we stare up at the giant bronze Buddha. I feel an electricity between us that has been long absent.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” she says. “It’s hard to believe that it’s been here for over seven hundred and fifty years.”

I look at his face, calm and serene. I wonder how many others have stood in just this spot, how many others he has shown the truth to, how many others he has saved.

“It’s… It’s magical. I can’t really describe it.”

The tour guide announces our departure. Our group starts to shuffle away, back to the bus, back to the city that suddenly holds no appeal. We turn to go.

“Thank you,” I say, mostly to her, but also to him.

She looks at me.

“For what?”

“For everything. For not giving up on me, on us. For bringing me here.”

She squeezes my arm.

“You’re welcome.”



Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Rob Gregory

Bonus Time

“Meredith. Over here.”

Meredith turned towards the sound of the voice and saw Catherine waving to her from the table in the corner. She shuffled her way across the busy cafe and flopped her weary body into the booth. Hot coffee sloshed over the top of her cup, singeing her hand and staining the sleeve of her sweatshirt.

“Shit.” As she reached for the napkin container she upended her purse, dumping the contents onto the floor.

“Double Shit.”

The two women scrambled to pick everything up and sop up the coffee. When they were done, Catherine took a sip of her herbal tea and smiled a perky smile.

“Mondays. They’ll get you every time,” she said.

“My entire life is a fucking Monday,” replied Meredith. She surveyed her friend. Baby weight gone. Hair styled. Clothes unwrinkled and unstained. Makeup. Who in the hell has time to put on makeup? It’s like she isn’t even a parent.

“I’m sorry,” said Catherine, her voice chipper and grating.

“Catherine, you know I love you, but seriously, some days I want to stab you. What is your secret? How in God’s name do you find the time to put on makeup when I can’t even manage to brush my hair?”

“Well, you know, you’ve got to manage your time.”

“Seriously? That’s it? I spent an hour today removing M&M’s from the heating vents and your answer is ‘to manage your time’?” Meredith’s voice seethed with frustration.

Catherine glanced around to see if anyone was eavesdropping. Her face got serious. She motioned for Meredith to lean in close and dropped her voice to a whisper.

“Do you really want to know? I use Bonus Time.”

                                                                                                       ***

Meredith glanced at her phone, double checking the address on the GPS against the piece of paper Catherine had given her. Everything seemed to be entered correctly, and Catherine had warned her about judging the place based on its appearance, but this still seemed like a mistake. She worked her way down the dilapidated white fence until she came to a gate. Behind the gate was a small overgrown yard and a house, rickety and paint-starved. Just as she was about to flee, a woman, young and comely and draped in a delicate gossamer dress, opened the door of the house.

“Meredith, please come in.” The woman’s voice was like a cold breeze, raising the little hairs on the back of Meredith’s neck and turning her exposed flesh into dimpled chicken skin. Meredith took a deep breath and thought of Catherine and how relaxed, how together, she always was. She wanted that. She needed that. She took another deep breath and stepped through the gate. Once inside the house the woman closed the door behind them.

“How did you know my name? Are you…” Meredith started to ask, before the woman cut her off.

“No. I am his assistant. He is in there.” She pointed towards a door. “He is expecting you.”

The man behind the desk looked to be in his early fifties. He wore a navy blazer with a crisp white shirt. His dark hair was beginning to gray on the sides. Neither ugly nor handsome, he was the type of guy you could see ten times a day and not remember.

“Not what you were expecting?” he asked, and once again Meredith’s skin turned to goosebumps. “Would it be easier if I had on a black hooded cloak, scythe in one hand, hourglass in the other? Or perhaps if I looked like Brad Pitt?” The man laughed, a throaty chuckle that almost made Meredith regret coming here. But she stood, silent and terrified yet firm in her resolve, staring Death in the face.

“I am assuming that Catherine filled you in on how this works?” he asked.

She thought back to their hushed conversation in the cafe.

“What is Bonus Time?” Meredith asked.

“This is going to sound crazy, but hear me out. You get this watch. And on this watch is a button, and when you press the button, everything stops. Like Zach used to do on Saved By the Bell. But for real.

Everyone and everything is frozen in time. And you can use that time, Bonus Time, do whatever you want. But there’s a catch.”

“What catch?”

“For every twenty-four hours of Bonus Time you use, you lose one month at the end of your life.”

“An entire month? For using just one day? That’s seems like quite the markup.”

“Give up a month of sitting around a nursing home, drooling all over myself, for twenty-four glorious hours all to myself right now?” Catherine took a sip of her tea. “Doesn’t seem like such a bad deal to me. Just make sure you don’t go overboard.”

“Yes, she explained everything,” Meredith said.

“Good,” said Death. He pulled a silver pocket watch from the inner pocket of his blazer and dangled it by the fob. He pushed a contract across the desk. “Just sign here, and you’re all set.”

                                                                                                       ***

“My God, Meredith, you look fantastic,” said Catherine as she sat down at the their usual corner table.

Meredith smiled, and with a steady hand, raised her coffee in a mock toast.

“To Bonus Time,” she said.

“You haven’t been overdoing it, have you?”

“No, not at all. I only use a little at time, and I’ve been keeping track.” She pulled out her phone and looked at her notes. “I’ve used just under four days so far. And besides, I’ve got good genetics on my side. All my grandparents made it to their nineties.”

Meredith took a bite out of her scone just as she saw the two people enter the cafe. The man she wouldn’t have noticed right away, but the woman she would have known anywhere.

Meredith gasped.

“What is it?” asked Catherine.

Meredith tried to talk but fear gripped her throat. Frantic, she pointed towards the two people that were headed towards her, but Catherine didn’t seem to see them.

“It’s time to go Meredith.” The woman’s voice was frigid.

Catherine put her arms around Meredith’s mid-section and pulled up and in repeatedly, trying to dislodge the scone from Meredith’s throat.

“I’m sorry it had to be this way, Meredith,” said Death. “But if it’s any consolation, this is better than the car accident you were originally scheduled for.”



Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Jennifer Stevens

The Commons

Darius broke right and sprinted down the alleyway, but deep down he knew even his best effort would be futile. Athletic endeavors had never been his strong suit, and the three boys chasing him were older, faster, and stronger.

“Get back here, you fat little motherfucker,” shouted their leader, a hulking monster of a teen whose real name was Terrence, but went by T-Dog. If the rumors floating around school were true, this past weekend T-Dog fulfilled his lifelong ambition, metamorphosed from wannabe gangbanger to a full-fledged member of the Baseline Crips after emerging triumphant from a cocoon of fists and stomping feet. His two acolytes, Peanut and DeRay, were no less menacing.

“You keep running, we’re gonna beat your ass even worse,” yelled T-Dog.

But Darius, faced with the first flight or fight moment of his life, kept chugging along as fast as his stout little legs and asthmatic lungs could go.

It wasn’t fast enough.

DeRay was the first to reach him. He grabbed Darius from behind and slammed him to the ground, knocking his glasses off and ripping the sleeve of his shirt. Peanut slapped him across the mouth, turning his lip raw and bloody.

“The fuck you running for?” T-Dog asked, shaking him. “Huh? Answer me motherfucker! Peanut, I thought you said this motherfucker was smart. Don’t seem so smart to me.”

“Wh-wh-what do you want from me?” Tears poured down Darius’s cheeks as he stumbled over the words.

Before T-Dog could answer, a voice, booming and gravelly, called out, “Let that boy alone.”

Darius, glasses gone and eyes clouded with tears, watched unfocused as a blur of a man hopped a dilapidated, white fence and confronted his attackers.

DeRay rushed at the stranger and was thrown headlong into the fence. T-Dog took a swing at him. The man caught his punch and pulled him close, twisting his arm awkwardly behind him. The man slid his other arm across T-Dog’s throat.

“I said, let that boy alone.” He held onto to T-Dog for another few seconds, choking him and cranking up on his arm, before pushing him down to the ground. “Now, get out of here.”

T-Dog got up slowly and brushed himself off. He and the others backed down the alleyway, bristling with teenage rage, staring at the man.

“I’m gonna get you motherfucker. This ain’t over.” T-Dog yelled, before shifting his gaze to Darius. “You either. See you around school.”

“You alright, son?” the man asked Darius, brushing him off and handing him his glasses.

Darius was pretty far from alright.

“Umm. Yes, sir. I guess, sir.”

“What’s your name?” asked the man.

“Darius.”

“Darius, I’m Theo. You live around here?”
“Yes, sir. We stay over in the Commons.”

Theo glanced up at the ten-story public housing unit that dominated the neighborhood. He put his arm around Darius.

“It’ll be ok. Come on, let’s get you cleaned up.”

                                                                                                 ***

After he finished washing up, Darius scouted around the little house. He noticed a large picture hanging over the mantle. It was a younger version of Theo. Darius didn’t know much about sports but he knew the iconic baseball uniform.

“Did you really play for the Yankees?” he asked.

The voice that answered him was not Theo’s, but the hoarse rasp of an elderly woman.

“Yes, he did. My baby pitched three seasons with the Yanks, until he blew out his elbow.”

Darius turned and looked at the woman. She was wrinkled and weathered, but had gentle, warm eyes.

“Still lives up in New York, too. He’s just down here taking care of me.” The woman coughed. “I’ve been sick lately.”

Theo came in from the kitchen, carrying a pitcher and three glasses.

“I see you’ve met my momma. I’ve been trying to get her to move out of this neighborhood and come live up north with me for quite awhile.” Theo smiled. “But she’s a stubborn old woman.”

“I love my boy, but the only way I’m leaving this house is in a body bag.”
                                                                                                 ***

“Good morning. Is there anything I can help you find?”

The man behind the counter eyed Darius suspiciously. Or perhaps it was just Darius’s guilty conscience. He had never skipped school before, and he had never ridden the bus to this part of town before, either. He felt very out of place, but baseball card shops didn’t exist in his part of town.

“Yes, sir. I was wondering if you had any Theo Jackson baseball cards?”

“Theo Jackson?” The man furrowed his brow. “The name doesn’t ring a bell.”

“He played about ten years ago, for the Yankees.” A proud smile spread across Darius’s face. “He’s a friend of mine.”

“Hmm, let’s see what I can find,” said the man. He pulled out a worn copy of Beckett’s Ultimate Baseball Card Guide. “Now, not all players get cards, you know,” he said as he thumbed through the guide. “Alright, here we go. Jackson, Theo. Looks like he was a common in 2004.”

“What’s a common?” asked Darius.

“Well, with baseball cards, about eighty percent of them aren’t worth much. Maybe five cents or so. Players who most people wouldn’t recognize on the street.”

The man walked over to a cardboard file cabinet. He slid out a drawer and started rifling through it.

“It’s the superstars cards that are valuable, but to keep the value on them up, and to keep them rare, they have to fill the packs with commons.” He walked back over to Darius, card in hand. “Like your friend here.”

                                                                                                 ***

Darius couldn’t wait to show Theo and his mother the baseball card, but he forgot all about it the moment he rounded the corner. Blue and red lights swirled, lighting up the street. Three police cars were parked haphazard in front of the Jackson home. The people of the neighborhood ringed the area, watching and whispering amongst themselves. Darius’s heart dropped into his gut. Even from a distance he could see the rumpled white sheet on the lawn, covering the body.

He could see Theo’s mother sitting on the front step, crying and shaking. Two police officers were doing their best to calm her. Darius ran towards her. The baseball card slipped from his hand, mixing in with the fallen leaves on the lawn. As he got closer he could hear her wail.

“Oh Lord. I didn’t have no choice but to shoot him. I swear it. He was gonna kill my baby.” She took a deep breath. “He was gonna kill my baby.”

The front door opened. Theo walked out of the house. He knelt beside his mother and offered her some water. When she finished he set the cup on the top step and put his arms around her.

Photo and Words by: Ben Cook

So Full of Loving Echoes

“Do you remember that little glass house?” he asks, taking a break from the faded magazine splayed across his lap. “The one with all the different colors, on the banks of the Seine.”

Of course you remember the little house. The way the light from the nearest streetlight danced through the stained glass, illuminating it from within and shooting refracted beams of color that bathed the whole area in an otherworldly glow. You remember the busker belting out “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” and him grabbing you and holding you close, spinning and dancing as if you two were the only people in the world. And you remember him singing the words of the song in your ear, his gesture sweet, his voice comically off-key. You don’t have the heart to tell him it was the Hudson, not the Seine.

“What made you think of that, dear?” you ask.

“Oh, I don’t know,” he says. “It just popped into my brain, I guess.”

You watch as a sublime smile spreads across his face, lost in thought and time and place.

“We should go back there, after the kids are grown,” he says. “A second honeymoon. Just the two of us.” His wrinkled hand wanders across the little table that separates your two recliners until it meets yours. “We could try to find the lock that we put on that bridge.”

Your body betrays you, a sigh rushes from your lungs like air escaping an untied balloon. A single tear wells in the corner of your eye and hangs a moment before dropping down your cheek.

We have never been to Paris.

“What is it?” he asks. “What’s wrong? Is it because I haven’t done anything romantic lately? Honey, I swear…”

You have to think quickly. You have to get yourself under control. For his sake, just as much as yours.

“No, it’s not that,” you answer. “The other night, on the news. They had to cut off all of those locks. It was just too much weight for the bridge to bear.” A feeling you know all too well.

“Oh, really? I don’t remember that.” He pats your hand. “That’s okay. We’ll put another one on there.”

You want to grab him, you want to scream.

We never put a lock on the Pont des Arts in the first place. That was our daughter. On her honeymoon. Why can’t you remember that?

But you don’t scream. Instead you get up and lock the bathroom door behind you and stare at yourself in the mirror. You swallow hard, trying to keep down all of the pain, all of the sadness, but today there is just too much. You run the water to mask the sound of your sobs.

When the storm has relented, you crack the door. You watch as he rereads the same magazine, the one he has read countless times before. Watching his eyes track across the page, you drift back to those nights so long ago, entwined in his embrace, listening to the rhythmic swings of his voice as he reads aloud to you. You never made it more than a chapter before you were fast asleep. And you recall eavesdropping in the hallway outside your daughter’s room, listening at the way he brought her bedtime stories to life; the low, lumbering voice he would use for dragons and ogres and the eruption of giggles when he would break into a shrill falsetto for the princess. These are the little things you are going to miss, that you miss already.

A passage from Vonnegut creeps into your mind.

…the big, hollow man so full of loving echoes.

That is what he is becoming. Hollow. Nothing more than the husk of the man who has been your everything for forty years. You never thought it would be like this, never thought that it could be like this. This was not what you envisioned when you vowed in sickness or in health.

After the stroke, when his motor skills started returning, you had so much hope. The doctors tried to warn you, to tell you the truth of it, but you wouldn’t listen. They showed you the CT scans and MRIs, pointing out the gaps in his temporal lobe, little black holes that looked like scattered buckshot, but you couldn’t bring yourself to see them. And now the doctors were saying there was damage to the hippocampus as well. That soon even his muddled memories would start to fade.

You don’t know which is worse: the man that you love getting your entire life together wrong, or the thought that someday he wouldn’t recognize you at all. That you were going to sit helplessly and watch as he disappeared, day by day, memory by memory.

Jesus, why did it have to be his mind? Why couldn’t it be his heart? Something quick, painless. Hell, even cancer had to be better than this.

The realization of what you are thinking makes you wretch. Is this really what you’ve become? So selfish that you are wishing pain on the person you love the most just to ease your own torment? You are sure this is not the bargaining phase they talk about in the grief books piled up on your bedside table. Or maybe it is, maybe you are on your way to acceptance. Or maybe it’s you who is becoming hollow.

You look out the crack of the door again. He is humming to himself. It takes you a minute to place the tune and for that you are ashamed. The words come to you. You close your eyes. Once again you are dancing in the night, the glass house shimmering behind you.

When evening falls so hard
I will comfort you
I’ll take your part
Like a bridge over troubled water
I will lay me down

You splash water on your face. You breathe deep. You can do this. You can be strong. You have to remember. For both of you.



Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Anthony Delanoix

Under the Desert Moon

Jasmine felt a sharp jolt of pain as her ankle rolled beneath her, twisting her foot at an awkward angle and sending her crashing to the ground. Her heart thumped furiously, slamming around inside her chest like a grasshopper trying to escape the cupped hands of a child. She pressed her back against a stone outcropping and tried to melt into the shadows of the cold desert night. Tears cascaded down her cheeks and bile rose in her throat as she watched the scene unfold in front of her. In the pale moonlight, she could barely make out Alec, twenty yards away, lying on his stomach, trying to crawl back towards the car. The blood pooling around him had the color and sheen of spilt motor oil, and the creatures--small, shadowy, and elusively fast--danced around him in a loose ring, taking their time as they toyed with their prey.

From what she could see, the creatures seemed to be about the size of chimpanzees, but looked much more human than ape. They would dart in and out, stabbing at him with their little spears. With each jab, Alec would let out a low moan and they would respond with a wild high-pitched yip. Soon their voices took on a cadence, building up to a crescendo of demonic shrieks and cackles somewhat reminiscent of the nightly songs of the coyotes. And then silence as one of them stepped forward.

The creature wore a loincloth, but no shoes, and its skin appeared leathery. Coarse, dark hair covered its arms and legs, and it had nappy dreadlocks that hung to its waist. Jasmine guessed it was a female from the look of her swollen belly and pendulous breasts. A jagged scar ran across her upper chest from shoulder to shoulder. The creature let out a sharp yip and was soon joined by another one, this one smaller, a juvenile. It raised its spear above its head. Jasmine could just make out the savage sneer on the young creatures face. Alec tried to push himself up.

“Jasmine, run, get help.” Alec’s voice was muddled. “Please Jasm…” His words ended abruptly as the spear flashed down, again and again.

A scream, shrill and piercing and full of loss and pain, escaped from between Jasmine’s chattering teeth.

The creatures, swift and sure in the darkness, scampered towards her, screeching and hissing. As they got closer, she could smell them, their pungent musk making her gag. Once again they started to sing, their voices reverberating in the stillness of the night.

Jasmine closed her eyes. Sobbed prayers poured out of her mouth. She whispered apologies to her parents, hoping that by some magic they would carry on the wind. She took a deep breath and prepared for the end.

The bellowing BOOM of a shotgun startled and scattered the creatures. Jasmine opened her eyes and could see the outline of someone racing towards her. She saw the second shot, a stab of flame leaping out of the barrel, before she heard the sharp report. Something landed next to her with a heavy thud. It was one of the creatures, its lifeless eyes staring back at her, its innards splattered all across the rocks.

Jasmine looked back towards the armed silhouette. She could barely make it out as her rescuer kicked one of the creatures in the chest, sending it flailing backwards. A dark hand reached down and grabbed her, pulling her to her feet.

“Come on, we’ve got to get out of here quick.” Jasmine was startled by the surprisingly soft and feminine voice.

“Alec,” Jasmine said, her eyes searching in the dim light for her boyfriend. “We’ve got to find Alec.”

Her rescuer grabbed her by the arm and started towards the road. Jasmine saw a truck parked next to their car, running with its headlights off. She heard the creatures scurrying around in the underbrush surrounding them.

“Forget it. He’s dead,” the woman said. “And we will be too if we don’t hurry up.”

One of the creatures suddenly appeared before them. The woman let go of Jasmine’s arm and swung her shotgun like baseball bat, the stock end of the gun hitting the creature’s head with a sickening thwump.

“Let’s go, NOW,” the woman shouted as she grabbed Jasmine’s arm again.

Pain lanced up from her ankle as she hobbled to the truck as fast as she could. As she hopped inside she was greeted with the soothing sounds of Joan Baez and the faint scent of patchouli incense. The woman jumped behind the wheel and slammed the truck into gear. Gravel launched into the night as the truck accelerated and raced from the shoulder of the road to the worn asphalt of the old highway.

When they were safely down the road, the woman clicked on the dome light and Jasmine got her first good look at her savior. Two long, silver-streaked braids framed a soft and delicate face that was just beginning to show signs of aging. Little creases encircled her gentle brown eyes and her smile radiated a motherly warmth. The woman grasped her hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. Jasmine’s mind flashed back to the way she swung her shotgun, crushing the creature’s skull. She pulled her hand away and recoiled in horror. She tried to look out the back window but saw nothing but her own scared reflection.

“We need to go back, we need to find Alec.”

“I’m sorry, there’s nothing we can do for your friend.”

“What the fuck were those things?”

“Did you know that every Native American tribe has legends and stories about a race of little people? Not some, not most, but all of them? Every single tribe, did you know that?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about those little demons that just sliced up your friend. Every tribe has a different name for them. Around here the Shoshone and Paiutes called them the Nimerigar, the People-Eaters.”

“What? Who are you? How do you know all this?”

“I used to teach anthropology at the University of Nevada. Folklore of indigenous cultures. I’m Gaia. Gaia Garcia.”

“We need to call the police,” Jasmine said.

Gaia stared at the long, straight Nevada highway stretching out in front of them.

“Calling the police won’t help,” she clicked off the dome light and turned up the radio, letting darkness and the voice of Joan Baez fill the cab of the truck. “The cops around here aren’t really big on helping with things they don’t understand.Trust me.”


Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Caleb Ekeroth

Fifteen to Life

Most days I eat my lunch outside. There’s a break room with a vending machine and microwave and everything, but I bring my own chips because the machine don’t carry the ones I like and I don’t need to nuke my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches anyway. And the break room always smells like bleach. Whole place actually smells like bleach most of the time, but other than that, it’s not bad as far as jobs go.

There’s a nice bench that I sit on when I eat. It’s made out of wrought iron and looks uncomfortable as hell, but it don’t hurt my back or butt at all. Plus it’s right next to this table where two of the fellas that live in the nursing home play dominos all of the time, and they don’t mind if I watch. They don’t play the same way that we used to on the inside, though. They’re real quiet and don’t slam the dominos down or keep score or anything.

It’s funny, watching them play, almost makes me miss being in. Crazy, huh? Spend ten years of your life locked up, dreaming of freedom, and once you get it, you sit around missing the times you had. I guess good memories are good memories though, no matter where you make them.

I hope you got some good memories. I’m sure you do. Probably none of me, though. That’s ok. I wish it was different but I understand. You were only five when I got locked up. I don’t remember much from before I was five, so maybe you don’t either. I kind of hope you don’t, because it will give us a fresh start. I wasn’t a good person back then. I hope I am now.

Your mom says you’re doing great in school and have lots of friends. I think that’s one of the hardest things about being out so far. Inside, I had all sorts of friends. Like Preacher and Demetrius, the guys I used to play dominos with. Preacher wasn’t his real name. We just called him that because he was real loud and was always saying “Jumping Jesus Christ”. Except when he said it with his thick southern accent it was long and drawn out. Like when he’d slam the domino on the table and shout out “Jump-in Ju-eee-sus Ca-rist boys, thats a-nudder fi-deen for me.” I would crack up every time. That’s why they called me Giggles. Everybody gets a nickname on the inside. Except Demetrius. He was just Demetrius. He was in for killing a couple of folks. It’s funny, he was a bad man but a good friend.

My friends from school--because being locked up at twenty, that’s all I’ve ever really had, school friends and prison friends--were always guys I had something in common with. Girls. Cars. Fights. Drugs. Whatever. Inside it wasn’t like that. Preacher and Demetrius and me, we were all complete opposites. Preacher was white and loud and his hair was long and scraggly. He was about sixty and so short and wiry that it looked like you could fit two of him in his jumpsuit. He was doing eight years for burglary. Demetrius was black and bald and thick. It was like his muscles had muscles. He didn’t talk much, and when he did, his voice was real soft and low. Like thunder off in the distance. I don’t know how old he was. Probably in his late forties, I guess. We were like the weirdest Three Musketeers ever, an old white thief, a big black killer, and a young vato drug dealer. But it was all good. And now who knows, I’ll probably never even talk to those guys again.

I don’t even really know how to make friends anymore. Most of the people who work at the home don’t really talk to me. I think they get a bunch of ex-cons through here, and most of them don’t last long before they screw it all up and get thrown back in. And I’ve been trying to stay out of the bars and stuff. I don’t need any of that temptation.

I went to church last Sunday. The sermon was all about how only God can judge somebody, but when I was talking to the preacher afterwards and told him I just got out, I could see the worry in his eyes. Made me miss my friend Preacher even more. I think he could show them all a thing or two about judging folks. It is what it is, though. Guess I better get used to it. But I don’t want you to feel bad for me. I’ll be okay. I promise.

I can’t believe you’re going to be fifteen next week. It’s funny, when I was in, time seemed to drag on forever. Probably because I wanted it to go fast. Like when you’re waiting for Christmas. But now I realize how fast life really goes, and if you spend your time looking forward to the future you miss what's going on right now. I don’t want to miss anything that's going on now anymore.

Fifteen can be a pretty tough age. Remember to be a kid, okay? You don’t need to be a rush to grow up. You’re going to get there someday, and when you do, you’ll probably wish you had a chance to go back and be a kid again. I know I do. And remember to be safe out there. Make good decisions. I know I don’t have the right to tell you how to live your life, seeing as how bad I messed up mine, but try to learn from your mom’s and my mistakes. Not that you were a mistake. Far from it. Matter of fact, you’re pretty much the only thing ever in my life that I’m proud of. Hopefully someday you’ll be proud of me too.

Anyway, I hope your quinceanera is amazing. Your mom says you look beautiful in your dress, and I believe it. I wish I could come but I understand why you don’t want me there. I would love some pictures of it though. Maybe we can have dinner next weekend? For now, I’ve got to get back to work.

Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Daniel Vidal

Touch of Grey

I glance at the stack of messages my secretary just handed me. The name on the top one hits me like knuckles to the solar plexus.

“Are you okay?” she asks.

I stare at the name, scrawled in her barely legible scribble. Walt Bowman.

“Mr. Willett?” Her voice wavers. “Did I do something wrong?”

I shift my gaze to her. She’s a temp, but besides her poor handwriting, she has been doing a fantastic job. Sadly, this makes her one of the few bright spots of my life at the moment. I do my best to regain my composure.

“No, Darlene, you didn’t do anything wrong.” I try to smile at her to put her at ease.

“Whew, you had me scared there for a minute.” She lets out a nervous laugh. I know she needs this job as much as I need some sort of stability in my life right now. She puts her hand on my arm, a warm grandmotherly touch. “I know I shouldn’t pry, but is it something to do with the divorce? I know how hard it can be.”

I shake my head and hold up the message.

“No, this is just a name I haven’t seen in a long, long time. It’s probably just a coincidence anyway, I’m sure it’s not even the same guy I used to know.”

I close the door to my office and think about the first time I saw Walt Bowman. In his torn jeans and ragged Grateful Dead t-shirt, all eyes were on him as he came sauntering through the door of Ms. Faber’s freshman English class. As he searched for a seat, he scoured the class, taking in all the Beverly Hills 90210 clones in their Z Cavaricci jeans and Oxford shirts. And then he spied me, sitting in the corner, about as non-descript as you could get.

“What’s up, I’m Walt,” he said, sliding into the desk next to me.

“Eric,” I replied.

“You like to get high Eric?” he asked, eyebrows raised, a pimply grin spreading across his face.

“Uhh…” I glanced around the room, full of kids that I had known most of my life, but who seemed to have forgotten my name through the years. I thought of my mother and the look of quiet sadness she would get whenever she asked why I never invite any friends over after school. I turned to Walt, and tried to sound as cool as possible. “Yeah, I love to get high, who doesn’t?”

“Good,” he said.

My God, Walt fucking Bowman.

I notice my fingers tremble a little as I punch the numbers into the phone. My heart beats faster with each ring.

“Hello?” My stomach drops, the voice doesn’t sound familiar at all.

“Is this Walt Bowman? My name is Eric Willett.”

“Eric! How are you doing? You remember me, right? Hayward High, freshman year?”

“Of course I remember you. I just never expected to talk to you again. What happened to you? You just disappeared.”

“Yeah, sorry about that.” He chuckles. “My dad was pretty mad when the cops brought me home. He moved us to Albany to live with my grandparents.” He chuckles again. “Man, what were we thinking?”

Thinking? I remember us thinking Spring Break warranted something more exciting than sneaking a half of a joint in the alleyway behind my house, like we had done most days during our three month friendship.

I looked above me at the two street signs above me, in awe of the fact that I was standing on the corner of Haight and Ashbury.

“What did that guy say to do?” I asked.

“We put it under our tongues and let it dissolve.” Walt looked at me. “Ready?”

I took a deep breath and popped it into my mouth. After a minute I spit out the soggy remnants of the paper.

“Feeling anything?” Walt asked.

“I don’t think so,” I responded. “You?”

“Nope. Damn it, that fucking hippie ripped us off, man. Come on, I want to go check out City Lights Bookstore.”

By the time we had walked the three miles, my world had turned into liquid dream. I stared at the historic building in front of me as it melted and swirled in a kaleidoscope of color. It was too much.

“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit,” I mumbled to myself. I grabbed Walt and threw my arms around him. “I can’t handle this shit. Help me. Please, help me.”

My paranoia sent Walt into a fit of maniacal laughter.

I fell to my knees. Walt tried to pick me up.

“Cool it man, or you’re going to get us busted.”

I scanned around me. I saw the horse, but not the policeman on top of it.

“Are you okay, son?”

I screamed. “The fucking horse is talking, Walt. It’s talking.” I collapsed to the ground.

By the time I got out of rehab, Walt had vanished, never to be heard from again. Until now.

“So how have you been?” Walt asks.

I look at the pictures on my desk. I want to tell him, to unburden my soul on this stranger who once, a long time ago and for a very short period, was my friend. Well, let’s see Walt. Ever since my soon to be ex- wife found out I was fucking my now ex- secretary, my life has turned to absolute shit. I’m living at the Motel 6, my kids won’t talk to me, and just this morning I found out my former secretary/lover is suing me for sexual harassment so I’m probably going to lose my business. My life is just grand.

“I’m okay, I guess. How about you?” I say.

I try to picture him as a forty year old version of the fifteen year old kid I knew. I imagine him sporting a graying Mohawk, chain-smoking Camels and quoting Nietzsche. More than anything I want him to say “So do you like to get high?” But he doesn’t.

“I’m good,” he says. “Actually better than good, I’m great. Wife. Kids, the whole bit. I’m in the insurance game these days. Speaking of which, how are you doing with life insurance these days? I was wondering if we could sit down and discuss your portfolio sometime. You can never be too careful these days.”

I put the phone receiver down and lay my head in my hands. The tears fall from my eyes and form little pools on my desk. I faintly hear Walt’s voice.

“Hello? Hello? Eric, are you still there? Hello?”

Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Steve Harlow

The Ghosts of Santa Fe

Porfirio Soriano lowered the brim of his hat and did his best to straighten up in the saddle. Jutting up from the desert floor in front of him was a series of sandstone ridges. Mostly shaded, their jagged peaks still caught the late afternoon sun, making the pink rocks look like serrated, bloodstained knife blades.

“El Espinazo del Diablo,” Porfirio said aloud, the rasp in his voice startling both himself and his horse.

He first heard about this place from Miguel, a salty old vaquero who was well travelled on both sides of the border, and both sides of the law.

“Down in Mexico, south of Agua Prieta, there’s a maze of red rocks that sits between the Sonoran Desert and the foothills of the Sierra Madres off to the west. The Devil’s Backbone they call it.”

He cast a knowing glance Porfirio’s way.

“It’s a good place if you ever need to hide out.”

A good hideout is exactly what Porfirio needed right now. He glanced over his shoulder at the barren expanse of chaparral that he had been riding across all day. As he twisted, pain lanced through his body, radiating from the festering bullet hole in his side. He didn’t see anything behind him but the tall spires of saguaro cactus and scrub brush, but whoever shot him in that dark alleyway last night could still be out there.Porfirio turned his attention back to the rock formation in front of him. He could see why Miguel called it a maze. What looked like a solid wall of rock from afar was riddled with breaks. And according to his old friend, only one of these offered an escape.

“There’s only one way through, and you’ll never find it, unless you know what you’re looking for. The entrance looks like a cave at first, but it’s really more like a tunnel. The Spaniards called it La Puerta del Infierno. It’s a rough trail, for the most part, and it’s narrow as all hell. But then all of sudden the canyon opens up and there’s a spring fed pool, sparkling like a gem. You’ve never seen anything like it.”

Porfirio had to stifle a painful laugh. Here he was, once again following the advice of Miguel, a man who brought him nothing but trouble during their years of friendship. And he was following through a place called the Gateway to Hell, no less. But desperate times call for desperate measures.

Porfirio found the entrance to the trail just as the sun dipped behind the horizon. He sucked in his breath as he ducked under the low overhanging rocks, the pain like someone pressing a branding iron into his ribs. The last remnants of daylight faded, blanketing the canyon in utter darkness. He knew the temperature had dropped, but sweat poured from his head. He let his horse guide them through tight, labyrinthine path as it twisted and turned, praying to a God he didn’t believe in that around the next bend would be something to quench his thirst. Porfirio lost track of time. How long had it been? How many miles had he gone? At last, he caught a glimmer of moonlight reflected on water. He dropped from the saddle and tried to run, but his legs failed him. He crawled to the edge of the pool and managed a few gulps of the cool water before he collapsed into a fevered heap.

When he awoke, he was startled to see a small fire burning. A man sat across the fire from him, his young face vaguely familiar. Porfirio’s hand flashed for his gun but he found his holster empty.

“Not very trusting are you?” said the stranger. He motioned at Porfirio’s ribcage. “Guess you have your reasons, though.”

“You took a gun off an injured man, what’s that say about you?”

The stranger chuckled.

“It says I’m cautious.” The stranger’s eyes narrowed. “You think I would let the legendary Porfirio Soriano get the drop on me?”

Porfirio flinched at the way this youngster said his name. Once you get the reputation of a gunfighter, valid or not, there was a line of people willing to take you on just to build up their own name.

“Are you the one who shot me?” he asked.

Porfirio took the stranger’s silence as a yes.

“Only a coward would shoot a man from ambush.”

The stranger wasn’t fazed by Porfirio’s taunt.

“Tell me about Santa Fe,” he replied.

“Santa Fe?” Porfirio had only been to Santa Fe once.

“You’re nothing but damn cheaters,” Miguel roared as he shoved the card table and stumbled to his feet. Porfirio tried to calm his friend.

“Come on Miguel, let’s go outside, you’re drunk.”

“Don’t tell me what to do, kid. These no good…”

Miguel spun back towards the two gamblers. They were spread out, hands wavering over their pistols. Porfirio saw the one on the left drop his hand. He drew his own gun and fired twice. Miguel stood there, empty-handed, and stared at the two dead men on the floor. He shifted his gaze to Porfirio.

“Thanks, kid.”

Porfirio began to quiver, shocked at what he had just done.

“I didn’t mean to kill them. It just happened so fast.”

“It was them or us, kid.”

Porfirio looked at the stranger again, his wide-set eyes, his narrow, hook-like nose, and it hit him. The gambler on the left, the one that went for his gun, had the same face, but older. Porfirio knew his fate was sealed; this wasn’t about some youngster out to make a name for himself, this was about revenge. He looked around him. Light from the fire danced on the water and bright stars shone overhead. Porfirio smiled. There were worse places to die.

“Well, once at poker game Santa Fe, I had the pleasure of shooting two gutless, cheating bastards.”



Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Sophie Stuart

Mr. Memory

I found him sitting in the sand, watching the waves bob and weave their way through the rickety timbers that held up the decrepit old pier. His top hat and tails, the clothes that made him an institution up and down Venice Beach, were thrown next to him on the ground, ragged and threadbare. Smoke from his cigarette curled around his bald head, noxious little ringlets that replaced hair long vanished. The years had not been kind.

I didn’t think he noticed me until he spoke.

“You know what the Mexicans say about the Pacific? They say it has no memory.”

Before he even finished talking, the images started to flash in my head. I saw a used bookstore I frequented during my teenage years, and Mindy, the older woman who owned it. I heard her voice, sweet and kind. “It’s different from anything Stephen King has ever written. It’s not scary at all. It’s so good, especially the first story, the Rita Hayworth one.” I saw the book, a dog-eared copy of Different Seasons with a slight tear on the left of the cover. Mentally, I flipped it open, scanning page by page, line by line, until I came to the part he quoted. The words unfurl across my subconscious like a banner towed behind a plane.

Other images popped into my mental slideshow, Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman, conversing in the prison yard, and Tara Milner, who was gracious enough to let me touch her boobs that day in her parents’ darkened basement, the movie playing on her old TV. The same Tara Milner who, seventeen days later, would scratch the word virgin off my life’s resume and who, fifty-four days later, would break my heart and crush my ego by breaking up with me for Brian Rivers, because she had heard a rumor and wanted to know if “bigger was better.”

This rapid-fire flood of memories--nostalgic, mundane, painful--passed through my brain faster than the time it took him to take a drag of his cigarette. It is something I have long grown accustomed to. Hyperthymesia, the doctors call it, a superior autobiographical memory. Every detail of every day of my life, nestled snug and secure in my brain, to be thought about, again and again.

“The first time I met you it was Ray Bradbury, now it’s Stephen King,” I respond.

He turns and looks at me. And though many years have past, I see recognition creep into his eyes. A wave of relief washes over me, and I know that I have found somebody who will understand.

“So, how was Medieval Times?” he asked with a grin.

                                                                                                    ***

The waves crash onto the sand with a thunderous clap and mammoth storm clouds hang over the Pacific. It is the first time I have ever seen the ocean and I am surprised by the sour tang of the briny sea air. My parents shuffle us along, prodding us towards our next stop on our whirlwind vacation of California, the infamous Muscle Beach at Venice. My brother, full of raging teenage hormones, is ogling the bikini-clad woman rollerblading up and down the boardwalk. For me, at this point still a good six years away from my summer dalliance with Tara Milner, these wheeled beauties are more safety hazard than sexual titillation. I spy a street performer on the pier. Dapper and debonair in his full-dress tuxedo, he is standing on a small stage in front of a hand-painted canvas sign emblazoned with the words:

The Incredible--The Indisputable--The Omnipotent

Mr. Memory

I mix into the small crowd gathered around him. He hands a woman a three-year old calendar. He asks her husband to pick any date.

“February twelfth,” the husband says.

Mr. Memory puts his hands to his temples. An image flashes in my mind. The word Wednesday, neon pink against a black background.

“In 1992, the twelfth of February was,” he pauses for dramatic effect. “A Wednesday.”

The woman checks the calendar and gasps in awe. The crowd roars its approval. He picks up another calendar, this one from 1990, and hands it to a teenage girl. He asks her mother for a date.

“June thirtieth,” she responds.

Once again he puts his hands to his temples, and once again I see a vision of a word.

“In 1990, the thirtieth of June was…”

He looks directly at me. I silently mouth the word Saturday. I see the shock in his eyes. He clears his throat and regains his composure.

“The thirtieth of June was a Saturday.”

“My God, that’s amazing,” says the girl, as the group breaks into another round of applause.

“Now for my final act, I need a volunteer.” He points at me. “You, young sir, could you please come up here?”

He motions towards a trunk sitting on the corner of the stage.

“That trunk contains books, forty-nine of them to be exact. Would you please open it up, select one, and turn to a random page?”

I rummage through the trunk until I come across one with a burning man on the cover. I pull it out and flip open the cover.

“Ah, Fahrenheit 451, a great book, that one. What page did you open it to?”

“Sixty-seven,” I mutter.

“Sixty-seven,” he whispers to himself. He closes his eyes, and begins to nod his head.

“They read the long afternoon through, while the cold November rain fell from the sky upon the quiet house…”

As my eyes follow along with the words he is reciting, I feel a hand on my shoulder and hear my father’s voice.

“There you are, don’t wander off like that. Come on, we have to go, we have dinner reservations at Medieval Times.”


Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Nathan Mansakahn

The Hallways of Always

I remember thinking to myself that we shouldn’t be doing this, that even though the weather forecast said no rain, the ominous thunderclouds gathering in great bunches to the south were singing a different tune. I remember wishing I had worn my other shoes, the ones with the good rubber souls. I remember cursing out whoever decided that the trail should follow the thin shelf along the ridge. I remember the panic in my friend’s eyes when the first raindrops hit us, heavy and cold.

I remember falling, the wind whistling past as I outraced the rain on our way to the valley floor. I remember the sun starting to peek out from behind a cloud. Then nothing.

It wasn’t like I had always imagined. Images of my life didn’t flash before my eyes. There was no tunnel, no bright light. There were no voices of loved ones beckoning, calling me home. There was no choir of angels and no pearly gates and no clouds. There were none of the things I had been taught to expect.

                                                                                                        ***

I am in a long corridor. Angular and sterile, it looks like a Museum of Contemporary Art. Doorways open at odd intervals, each emitting a light of a different color. I wander down the hallway and come to an intersection, each direction the mirror image of the others. I choose the left. I come to another intersection, same as the first. This time, I choose right.

I have no idea how long I amble down the labyrinthine passageways before I start to see and hear them. At first they are just murmurs and shadows, vague notions that something else is here. Then they start to come into focus. The first one I see is a medieval knight, clomping down the hallway in his armor. I try to talk to him, but he doesn’t seem to hear me. I motion to him, but he passes me as if I don’t exist. I turn around just in time to see a small Asian girl in a school uniform running straight at me. I brace myself for the collision, but she darts right through me. I come to another intersection and panic as a tiger, snarling and ferocious, rounds the corner.

“Don’t worry. It can’t hurt you.”

The voice is cool, serene. But I don’t know where it’s coming from.

“Excuse me? Who said that?”

“I did.”

I follow sound the voice and turn around. Standing in front of me is a human form, but unlike any that I have ever seen. Radiant and shining, as if made by pure light, the being seems neither masculine nor feminine.

“Who are you? Where am I?”

“I am Sidpa. I am your guide to the Hallways of Always.”

“My guide to what?”

“This place you have entered. This is the Hallways of Always. It is where souls go to transmigrate as they pass from one body to another.”

As Sidpa speaks the corridor grows ever more crowded, like the hallways of a high school in between classes. But instead of teenagers, it’s filled with people of every nationality, every age, from every time period. There is every type of animal. And there are the other things, fantastic Dr. Seussian creatures, like the seven-legged, two-headed beast shuffling it’s way towards me.

Sidpa sees the look on my face.

“In an infinite universe, you don’t think that life only exists on one minuscule planet do you?”

“I… I guess not.”

“I know. This is not easy to wrap your head around.”

“So I’m dead?”

“Yes… And no. Your soul is everlasting. It has been here before, an innumerable amount of times. When you are done in one body, you come here and choose another. See, watch him.”

Sidpa motions towards a man sauntering down the passageway. Clad in the rigid, formal wool uniform of a Russian World War II soldier, the man pauses at each colored doorway, as if window-shopping. Some he walks away from quickly, others he stays at longer, as if pondering whether or not to enter.

“He’s getting a feel for them, choosing where he wants to go next, and who, or what, he wants to be. Time and distance do not exist here. You can go wherever you want. You can be your favorite leader from history, your favorite animal. You can even be the parent of the person you were last time. The only life you can’t choose is the one you just lived. Unless you were taken before your time.”

The soldier comes to a another doorway and peers into it. Electric blue light reflects on his face. He exudes peace and understanding. We both know this is the one. Right before he steps through the threshold, he discards the incarnation of the soldier, leaving it on the doorstep like a snake shedding its skin, revealing the luminous soul beneath. I watch in awe as it disappears into the neon-tinted void.

“But what about you?” I ask. “Do you ever go through a doorway?”

There is no answer. I look around, but Sidpa is gone. I stand and watch as others slip through doorways. I gaze into the closest portal. Through a vibrant orange haze I see a collection of yurts on the Mongolian Steppe. I see a man and woman and immediately feel a pang of familial love. I walk to the next and I feel like I’m transported underwater. I see a pod of dolphins swimming all around me. I hear their squeaks and am surprised that I understand what they are saying. I continue down the hallway, surveying each door, and each life contained within.

Down the long corridor, I see a vivid green doorway that seems to pulsate. As I get closer I feel it pull me in, like a magnet. Before I even get there, I know. This is the one. I let the emerald glow swallow me up as I walk through.

                                                                                                        *** 

I see a bright, white light. I hear a voice with a slight Indian accent. A shadow cuts across and a man’s face comes into focus. I try to lift my head, but can’t.

“Don’t try to move,” the man says. “I’m Dr. Sidpa. You were pretty lucky to survive a fall like that, we thought we lost you.”

I lay there, my mind wandering, trying to separate truth from illusion, memory from myth.

“Yep, pretty lucky.” Dr. Sidpa continues, giving me a wink. “Or maybe it just wasn’t your time.”

Written by: Ben Cook
Photograph by: Daniel Vidal

The Smith-Corona

 

 Jake Thayer paced back and forth, taking in the breadth of his studio apartment in just a few short strides. Every fourth step or so, he would do an about-face, take a swig of Pabst, and throw a derisive glare at the typewriter that sat on the desk.

The typewriter stared back. Silent. Smug. Mocking.

And as evidenced by the growing jumble of beer cans heaped on the counter and the shallow groove being worn into the shoddy wooden floors, the typewriter had been mute a lot recently.

But that wasn’t always the case.

The typewriter was a 1954 Smith-Corona Travel Deluxe. With its pristine hard-shelled case and unique cursive script, it could probably fetch a pretty penny at any of the antique stores downtown. But no matter how destitute, Jake would never consider selling it. Its value went far beyond money. It was both a link to his past and his ticket to the future.

A gift from his doting grandmother, it was a relic from her own younger days. Always a restless youth, she wasn’t content to stay in the south Chicago neighborhood of her Irish forbearers. So she spent her youth criss-crossing this great expanse we call a country, devouring every new city, every new experience, the typewriter her sole companion until that day that her wanderlust was finally satiated with a chance meeting in the least likely of all places.

His grandmother would regale him with that story, the story of how she met his granddad, every Sunday, during their weekly ritual of banter and pancakes. And every week he listened with rapt attention. So much so that by the time he was ten, he would finish it with her, holding her hand as they looked at the photo on the wall of the man they both loved and missed so much.

“…and it didn’t matter that I was a big city girl. I took one look at that shy, young farmhand, standing there in the cold on that forlorn train platform in the middle of absolute nowhere, and I knew that my traveling days were done.”

It was those moments, sitting at her little farmhouse table, listening as she spun magic with nothing but words, that became the seed of Jake wanting to become a writer. And as any good farmer would, his grandmother fed that seed. She fertilized it with tales of all of the places she had been, describing how each place had its own personality, its own cadence, its own smells, and she nourished it with the works of the writers she loved, giving special attention to local-born Willa Cather and Weldon Kees, just to prove to him that even those from small town Nebraska could blossom into great writers.

She presented him with the typewriter after graduation, along with a check for three thousand dollars. Tears blurred his vision as he lifted the sleek, hard cover, making it hard to read the piece of paper tucked into the roller. On it was just three typed words.

Go. Live. Write.

And write he did.

Oh, how that old Smith-Corona used to sing! His stipend was long gone by the time he hit New York City, used up on long rambling train rides and nights of jubilation, but that didn’t matter. He spent his days doing whatever menial tasks it took to pay the bills and those hours of drudgery became perfect fodder, giving his brain plenty of time to ferment. By the time he got home the words would be bubbling up and ready to pour forth, frothy and delicious and intoxicating. His fingers, like a chorus line of tiny madcap dancers, would kick and stomp across the keys, filling his little hovel with a cacophonous din of rat-a-tat-tats and clickety-clacks.

Times were good. The economy, and a certain White House intern with an affinity for blue dresses, were humming along. In the city, Jake fell in with a bohemian crowd of artists and writers, like-minded spirits who didn’t mind his shy Midwestern ways and who seemed to love his vagabond prose. Together they laughed and loved and fucked and cried. It didn’t matter that they lived in the shadow of the ghetto, or that no one bought their paintings or published their words. It didn’t matter if they were black or white, gay or straight, penniless or just playing poor. Like the generations that came before them, the only thing that really mattered was that they were young and alive.

But that was then.

Now, with the smoke still rising from the rubble at ground zero and a specter of dread hanging in the air, it wasn’t so easy. Most of his friends were gone, scattered in the winds to the safety of the well-known bastions of the weird--Austin, Asheville, Portland--seeking somewhere easier on both the wallet and the soul.

But Jake was steadfast in his resolve. Just as his grandmother knew that long ago day that her travels were over, Jake too, knew where he belonged. He knew that on these streets he was home, that there was nowhere else in the world for him to be. He knew that city would soon rebound and regain its pulse, its rhythm. That it would rise up with a tenacious resilience and proclaim once again “FUCK YOU WORLD. THIS IS NEW YORK CITY.”

And when it did, he and the Smith-Corona would be there, and he would once again have something to say.

Written by: Ben Cook

Photograph by: Jen Smith