Michael turned around. It was Harley Timmons, a sculptor who lived in Laramie, who worked in steel and found objects, who by all measures, in Michael’s thinking, was severely untalented, although not unsuccessful. Harley was a heavy man, brawny from lifting steel and working with welding equipment. He had wide-set eyes and an extremely narrow and large nose, which looked like a fin on his face.
“Michael Lawson,” Harley said. “I don’t believe it. I saw the truck and I said, hey, that looks familiar, then I saw this black guy getting in it and I said, hey, that must be, and it is. How are you doing?”
“Oh, I’m fine,” Michael said. “How are you, Harley?”
“Great.” Harley pumped Michael’s hand and showed big muscular teeth. “I’m just great. What brings you up here?”
“Came up to do a little camping and fishing,” Michael said, noting as the last word was out, that he had no camping and fishing gear in his truck. “Headed up to the Winds.”
Harley nodded, still flexing his smile. “Why don’t you spend the night here and have dinner with Sumiko and me?”
“I don’t know.”
“I insist. We’ve got a new guest room we haven’t tried out on anyone yet. Come on. You can tell me about the new work.” Harley’s face seemed so close.
Michael fell back, if not physically, inside. New work? The prospect of discussing the nonexistent was just depressing enough to sound intriguing, he thought. He said, “Okay.”
“Well, great, just great,” Harley said. “I’m sure there’s stuff you’ve got to do, so I’ll just tell you that dinner’s at seven, but come anytime you want.”
“Thanks.”
“Great.”
“Great,” Michael said. He watched Harley walk away and disappear into the Whole Earth Grain Store in front of which a young woman in a peasant dress swept an already tidy sidewalk.
Michael got into his truck, agreeing with Harley that he probably had some things to do, like maybe buying some camping gear or a fishing rod. That’s what he did. He went to a sporting goods store and bought a sleeping bag, a backpack, a campstove, a couple of bottles of white gas, a small tent, a canteen, a four-piece pack fly rod, a reel, two fly boxes, and an assortment of flies, stoneflies, Woolly Buggers, Royal Coachmen, Zug Bugs, sizes 8 to 12, and a fishing license. His bill came to 418 dollars and 47 cents. He paid with his American Express card and a young man helped him carry his new stuff to his truck.
After he bought all of this gear, Michael was eager to get on the road and do some camping; he felt an excitement he hadn’t felt in years. But he had told great big Harley that he would be there and, although Harley was not important to Michael, it would be impolite not to show up and awkward trying to explain why he was leaving Laramie just late enough to find a campsite in the dark of night. Michael drove out Ninth Street and into the canyon north of town where he pulled off onto a side road, sat in the back of his truck, and sorted the flies into the compartments of the fly boxes. He classified them slowly, by kind and size, and paid careful attention to their placement.
He left for Harley’s house just as the sun was nearing the top of the Snowy Range. He drove into Laramie on Ninth, then turned left on Grand Avenue over to Seventh where in 1913 or so a black man had been lynched on a pole that was still standing, now shouldering power and phone lines. The man had been dragged out of jail by citizens who were chastised the next day by the editor of the town paper for being such poor shots. Out of the hundreds of rounds fired at the hanging man only one bullet found its mark. Michael always looked at the pole as he drove by; the cracked and weathered brown pole pressed against the sky, which tonight was washed lavender at sundown.
At the door of the sizable, but modest house, Michael was met by Sumiko who was as small as Harley was large. Her smile was no less brutish or feral, in fact it was even more savage, coming like an ambush from this little creature.
“It’s great to see you,” Sumiko said, as her little feet somehow got her behind him. She pushed him into the house, into the vestibule floored with tiles that had been carved by hand, a fish here, a primitive bison there. Michael felt the unevenness of the floor through his shoes. He put down his suitcase.
“It’s good to see you, too, Sumiko.”
“Harley’s not back yet. He’s at the chiropractor. He’s got a bad back. You know, all that lifting.”
Michael nodded.
“Come on into the kitchen,” Sumiko said. “You can keep me company while I finish dinner. This is great.”
He followed Sumiko through the living room, walking past one of his early paintings. He realized that he had made it, but didn’t know how he could have.
“We move that piece around the house,” Sumiko said. “I liked it when you used more form.”
Michael smiled and hoped she heard.
In the kitchen, Michael found the light white and harsh, discharging from broad panels implanted in the ceiling and ricocheting mercilessly off stainless steel cabinets, stove, and refrigerator.
“What do you think of our new kitchen?” she asked.
“It’s very … metal,” Michael said.
“We like to think so.” Sumiko walked to the stove and looked into something she had simmering on a burner. “Sit down, sit down.”
Michael sat at the table and watched her tiny feet carry her from refrigerator to stove to cabinet to refrigerator as she tied on a little apron. “How about some wine?” she asked, suddenly.
“I don’t drink.”
“I remember not liking that about you.” She laughed. “May I get you anything to drink? Juice?”
“I’m okay right now,” Michael said.
Sumiko took a bottle of white wine from the refrigerator and poured a glass for herself. “A little wine never hurt anybody, Michael.”
Michael nodded.
“So, how’s Gail?”
“I think she’s well,” he said.
Sumiko looked at him over the rim of her wine glass. “You think?”
“We’re trying out a separation.”
“Here’s to a successful one,” Sumiko said, raising her glass, then taking a sip. “I never liked her anyway. She’s not strong enough for you.”
“What’s in the pot?” Michael asked.
“Oh, it’s cream of eggplant soup.” She rose to her toes to catch a glimpse of the activity in the pot. “It’s the first time I’ve made it. You’re a guinea pig, I guess.”
“I’m willing,” he said.
Then Sumiko’s face changed, she sighed, and her eyes, although not really softening, showed that they wanted to soften, and she walked to Michael and touched his face. “I’m so sorry. Poor, poor Michael,” she said, sitting at the table with him. “But isn’t this great? Sitting here, together and all.”
Michael nodded.
Harley came in through the front door, and said with his booming, smiling voice, “Some fool left a fortune of camping gear outside free for the taking.”
Michael stood up as Harley entered the kitchen. “Maybe that’s not a good idea,” he said.
“Oh, don’t worry,” Harley said. “This is Laramie, not Denver.”
Michael sat back down.
Sumiko handed a glass of wine to Harley. “What did he say about your back?”
“Well, he cracked it this way and he cracked it that way,” Harley said, twisting his body to indicate the treatment. “Then he stretched me and told me not to pick up anything heavy. I laughed in his face. I had half a mind to pick him up and laugh right into his face. Like this.” He grabbed Sumiko by her waist and she squealed and then he hoisted her to eye level and laughed right in her face and then they laughed together.
“Where’s your bathroom?” Michael asked.
“Down the hall,” Harley said, letting Sumiko’s feet down to the black and white tiles. “You’ll see it.”