Out of the Darkness
A quest for redemption
A single star let itself be seen in a gap between the clouds.
I focused on it, feeling the distance between me and it. The cold air of the desert night felt thin. I wore it reluctantly, like it was an ill-judged coat. As I stood and goggled, marveling at eternity, so I wished I was up there with the star. If I was up there, I would be out in the inky darkness, away from everything, away from the mess and the confusion that was my life.
The distant hiss of tires alerted me to an oncoming car. White headlights bleached the world around me as it ate up the distance along the straight road. I slunk away, into the scrub, making sure that I remained unseen. When the car had gone, the stare of twin red eyes its only legacy, I rejoined the road. Flakes of silence settled gently around me and the night regathered its gloom.
This was how I liked it.
No-one.
Nothing.
Nowhere.
I had to walk then, right at that moment. I forced myself to begin to follow the road. I would end up somewhere, who knew where, but solitude had to end at some point.
The hard black asphalt was unforgiving beneath my feet. Its shock, the slap it gave me with each step, was a reminder of my past sins. Each jolt demanded contrition, nudging me to remember faces, expressions, pain and loneliness. My soles took the pounding my soul deserved. Under the dark sky, there was no sensation of distance covered. Yet I knew I was moving.
The diner announced itself as a glow peeking above a crest in the road. It grew until it was a fire of my destinies; growing, spreading and leaping higher until it filled my world. Despite the wink and blink of the chrome on the diner’s sign, there was a meanness to the flat roof and the pale walls as they squatted beside the road, but I walked onto the parking lot anyway. The sight of a pickup truck squatting in a space had me slinking into the bushes that had stubbornly pushed their way out of the meagre soil. The driver of the pick-up, a mountain of a man, sat at the counter with a coffee, staring at a TV mounted to the wall.
Now that I wasn’t moving, the still desert air chilled me once more. Even worse, in my desperation to hide, I had failed to notice the large spikes on the plants that hid me. Anyone else would have given up on the cold, choosing instead to move into the diner. But I needed to feel the pain, and I was desperate to stay out of sight. So I allowed the air to eat me and the thorns to stab me. I was going nowhere until that guy was gone.
When he left, he called out a farewell to someone. That someone turned out to be a slight young woman who came to clear away his mug. Her blonde hair shone like a beacon across the crumbling parking lot. She seemed to be working on her own. I caught my errant fingers grasping for my gun.
Not tonight, though. Not ever again.
I escaped the bushes and edged my way across the parking lot. She looked up when a bell announced my entrance.
“Can I help you, hon?”
She was so slight, so defenceless. I stood, stupid and wordless.
“I can get you a drink, maybe a meal?”
We were so far from anyone, so far from anywhere. Just the way I had always liked it.
She was frowning now.
“You OK, hon?
Behind me,outside the door, the darkness skulked. I heard its call. I felt its pull.
“Can I get a coffee?” I heard myself ask. “For now.”
She nodded and, with a frown, went over to the jug of coffee behind the counter. I followed her until I reached a tall stool.
And there I sat, right by the counter.
And there I sat.
Finally in the light.
