It was from this image that he jolted awake. The cigarette had burned almost to his fingers, the ash falling upon his hand now and scattering across the seat. Dang, he said into the vacant interior of the Datsun.
He had just removed another cigarette from the glove box when the door in the fence opened, opened and then closed and at last swung wide. And there he stood. He looked, at a glance, just as he had that night in front of Grady’s, as if no time had passed. Not thirteen months. Not a single day. Thin. Freshly shaven. Even wearing the same tight jeans and rust-colored leather jacket. The dark curls of his hair cut short but otherwise the same. Holding a cigarette with the tips of two fingers as if holding a straw. And what a flood of relief. In an instant all those empty days wiped clean. Alone in the apartment watching lions stalk antelope across the box of the television screen. Marlin Perkins in the Jeep with his binoculars, Jim Fowler at his side. Nothing but an endless strip of empty days, broken at last as the guard shook Rick’s hand and Nat stepped out of the car into the drizzling rain. Hey hey, he said.
Rick said nothing at first, but his grin matched Nat’s own. The door closed behind him and he shifted the small bag to his left hand as they embraced.
Welcome to the free world, Nat said.
It’s free now, is it?
Nat shrugged as Rick threw the little bag onto the back seat and they both stepped into the car. Despite the chill, Rick rolled the window down immediately, the crank squeaking as Nat pulled back onto the highway.
Where’s Susan? Rick yelled over the wind roar.
Don’t know.
What’s that mean?
Means I don’t know. I haven’t seen her in like a week.
Shit, Rick said. I thought she’d be with you.
Me too.
Well, shit. He sucked at the cigarette for a moment and then held it in his hand and pressed his face to the wind, squinting as the occasional raindrop spiked through the open window. Then he cranked the glass back up again, the same squeak marking each rotation. The car silent now but for the hum of the engine and the rush of an occasional oncoming car in the southbound lane.
Beyond the windshield ran fast food restaurants, a grocery store, a run of gas stations all in a row. Above them: the dim yellow sweep of the mountains to the west, their crests backlit under a gray sky the texture of curdled milk. All beyond already in shadow: the town disappearing into itself and the desert opening into scrubby underbrush. An onrushing darkness. Jackrabbit. Rattlesnake. Digger wasp. The owl preparing for its night hunt. The mouse slipping into its burrow. To their right, outside Rick’s window, Washoe Lake: a dark strip taking on the color of the night.
So what do you wanna do on your first day of freedom?
I don’t know. Get a burger. Have a beer. I’d like to know where Susan is.
She’ll show up. She always does.
Yeah, well, she should’ve shown up already, Rick said. She don’t even answer her phone. It’s not like I can keep calling all day until she’s around, you know? He cracked the window enough to flick the butt of his cigarette through the gap and then rolled it closed again. What’s new around town?
Not much.
Who’s around?
I haven’t been out much.
Why not?
Working.
You’re not getting soft on me are you?
Let’s find out, Nat said.
Rick laughed. Then he said, I’m gonna need a job too.
Yeah, I figured.
You think they’d hire me out at the dealership?
Maybe. You mean in the shop?
Anything, Rick said. He was silent for a long time then, the darkness in motion all around them. Then he said, My mom’s gonna need another surgery.
Shit.
Yep.
What’s that gonna cost?
Six or eight thousand probably. I ain’t even worried about that. That’s Medicaid’s problem. What I’m worried about is getting her a nurse or someone to take care of her afterward. They said it’ll be like three months before she’s really up and around. State’s not gonna cover any of that.
Nat did not respond. The yellow line seemed to run through black space and the empty geography of thin clear air. From the edges of the road, a few scraggled and flashpopped shadscale bushes wheeled their skeletal shapes against the headlamps.
Ah fuck it, Rick said then. I don’t wanna deal with that shit right now. I just wanna get drunk and high. And laid, if I can find Susan.
Right on, Nat said.
And so they drove on into the increasing darkness in silence but for the quiet entanglement of guitars from the cassette deck, northward along the eastern slope of the Sierra, the temperature dropping so that the spattering rain turned to slush that thwacked against the windshield in uneven punctuations like diminutive gunfire. A grainy and disconsolate luminescence lining the scalloped and rolling clouds to the north. Soon the tower of the MGM Grand appeared in the distance, faintly glowing. Then, on the road before them, the Peppermill coffee shop with its modest casino room and motor lodge marking the edge of town. Beyond it came the towers and the lights, enormous clean rooms of clanging bells and tweedling sound effects. Everything a container for a possibility that would never actually materialize. That was why they had tried the Quik-Stop to begin with. Neither of them would speak such a thing — not then and not now — but Nat knew it was true. There was no getting ahead in this world. That much was true as well.
This the new Van Halen? Rick said. He had lifted the cassette case from where it lay near the gearshift and sat turning it slowly in his hands.
Yep.
Van fucking Halen, Rick said.
Van fucking Halen, Nat repeated. You wanna start at Grady’s?
Sure, Rick said. Fucking Grady’s.
Fucking Grady’s, Nat said.
A quarter mile on, he pulled to the curb and switched off the car. The engine sputtered and died. On the sidewalk beyond Rick’s window, a woman in a shiny dress moved up the street toward the bar. They both watched her progress in silence.
Goddamn it’s good to be out, Rick said when she was gone from view. Shall we?
Hang on a minute, Nat said. He cleared his throat.
What?
So look, Nat said, I know that it, you know, could’ve been me.
Oh man you’re not gonna get all sappy on me. Are you?
I just want you to know that I appreciate what you did.
I didn’t do anything.
Yeah you did. I know you came out because they were hassling me.
I just came out to see where you were.
Well, I’m glad you did. I just wish I would’ve done something.
They were dicks, Rick said. Nothing you can do about a couple of dick-ass cops. Better me than you anyway.
Why’s that?
Just because it is. Gotta take care of your people.
That’s what I mean, Nat said. That’s what I didn’t do.
Rick exhaled sharply as if laughing or coughing. What’s done is done, Natty, he said. Talking about it doesn’t change anything. He sat there in silence for a moment. Then he smiled. Let’s go get fucked up, he said.
Dang right, Nat said, and in the next moment they had both stepped out onto the curb.
WITHIN TWO hours Nat was so drunk and so high he could barely walk, the room hanging on an axis that seemed to shift each time he moved. Were it not for the cocaine Rick was offered again and again — and in which Nat was included each time — he likely would have passed out altogether. His face was numb from smiling and laughing.