Image: Unsplash, downloaded (https://unsplash.com/photos/persons-hand-on-light-CT8NvobyYuk) 18. 5. 2024.
Heavy Tilt
1.
I was on a heavy tilt; I hadn’t seen a gas station. I was going to Los Angeles and there was an assortment in the cup holders. Scraps of paper and a ballpoint pen and a couple of loose coins. No cups. There was liquor in the glove compartment, a half pint I’d been sipping. My cousin James had died. I didn’t know him well. I liked him when we were young. But I was going to a funeral, and I was looking for a gas station.
The space below my eyes was soft and sweaty. The windows were dirty. There was nothing for a long while in any direction, just sand, and a red rock formation to the north. There was something fascinating about the rock. It looked as though slabs of stone had been steadily dropped from the sky, one on-top of another, until it was visible from miles away. An earth encrusted anvil.
My mom had called to tell me James was dead. I didn’t want to get the call, no one did, but I was curdling before I even picked up the phone. My unemployment had expired the week before, and a few days earlier, I’d been evicted. I was staying with a friend when I got the call. I didn’t want to talk to her, but I picked up, and she was crying. It’s always hard, hearing your mom cry.
The rock cast a long shadow over the road. Little green shrubs grew along the base of it. I never understood how things can grow straight from the earth in such a barren place. But it’s beautiful. It’s romantic.
The tires slipped over the yellow lines and the car buzzed over the rivets in the road and the glove compartment popped open, and the half pint fell down on the carpet. I reached down to grab it, and my gaze caught the edge of the plateau. I was just passing it. The light bent around its edge and shot off in yellow beams across the sand, and they glinted off my mirrors, stained the corners of my eyes. I couldn’t see except the light and shadow as the car slipped back over the yellow lines and—
2.
“He was a drunk and everyone knew he was a drunk. What did you expect?” Marshall’s aunt Nancy was speaking. She was dressed in all black. She held a drink herself and ate canapés sloppily over a paper napkin. She was talking to her friend Christine, but she spoke loud. People were beginning to linger around her corner. “You can never rely on a drunk.”
It was her son’s funeral. Marshall’s mother was there too, on the other side of the room, not speaking.
The word of the crash had traveled through the church lobby. People mingled and talked in hushed voices over crackers smeared with soft cheeses and cheap wine. But the people here didn’t know much. They knew cousin Marshall (if they knew him at all) had been in a car accident. They knew he was being held in some county jail somewhere in Arizona, or maybe Utah, or New Mexico, and they knew his mom didn’t seem to know where he had been. But she wasn’t saying much.
“Marshall and James used to get along well, no?” Christine’s granddaughter stood between her legs, tugging at the ends of her grandmother’s dress, sucking her thumb.
“Well James was a drunk too,” Nancy replied.
“Nancy, I think you need to put the drinks down.”
“I just can’t believe my sister would try to upstage me at my own son’s funeral.”
“Nancy—”
“She broke her leg on the day of my high school graduation. She revealed her pregnancy at my college graduation, and she didn’t bring her ex-husband to my wedding as a way to announce her divorce to the family.”
“Today should be about James,” Christine hissed. She reached for the glass in Nancy’s hand, but Nancy swung her arm back. A drop fell on the carpet.
“And Marshall couldn’t even stay sober long enough to drive the six hours to get here. It’s barely five. He couldn’t wait until five to start drinking?”
“Grammy, can we go home,” Christine’s granddaughter pleaded. She held the dress and swung herself back and forth, twisting at the hips.
“It’s fine that no one cares. All these people standing around talking. Not even about James. Just talking. Hardly anyone has even come over here to offer their condolences.” Nancy surveyed the room with bitter diffidence. Half the people here, she didn’t know. She didn’t know if James had known them either. They were just here.
“These people love you,” Christine said.
“Bullshit,” Nancy said. She finished her drink. “My son is dead, and everything is worse now.”
Christine didn’t say anything. She nodded and stood across from Nancy and they stared each other down until their blood ran cold. Then Christine collected her granddaughter and ushered her towards the appetizers.
“Always good to see you,” Nancy called, and Christine didn’t call back.
3.
“Did you hear?” Gloria asked.
“What?” Mark replied.
“Tabby Gorman, you remember her?”
“The short haired girl with the…” and Mark made a little gesture above his head with his hand. Neither knew exactly what he was referring to.
“Yes, her,” Gloria replied. She was holding her phone. Mark was sitting on the couch in their apartment, staring at a blank TV. Gloria was behind the couch, speaking over his head, looking at the wall.
“What about her?”
“She was in a car accident. Her husband and her newborn died.”
“What?” Mark turned around. Slung his arm over the top of the couch. “Did she survive?”
“Yeah, she’s in the hospital.”
“How’d you hear about this?”
“It’s in the alumni newsletter. She was hit by a drunk driver. Someone set up a GoFundMe for the funeral and the medical bills and…” Gloria trailed off. She looked at her phone.
Mark nodded, considered for a second a dirty spot on the floor, then turned back around. He was looking for the remote. He shoved his hands between the couch cushions.
“Do you think we should send her some money?” Gloria asked.
“We don’t have any money.”
“Well, we have some.”
Karter came out from their bedroom in a big t-shirt. “What are we talking about?”
“Tabby Gorman, the girl with the short hair—”
“And the…” Karter made a gesture. Neither of them knew what it meant. She was in the kitchen holding a cereal box. She turned to grab the milk.
“Her husband died, and her baby. She’s in the hospital. They set up a GoFundMe.”
“That’s… Jesus,” Karter said. She shook her head. She was pouring milk into a bowl. Mark turned around.
“Karter, what the fuck are you doing?”
“What?”
“Do you think we should send her some money?”
“Aren’t you gonna put the cereal in first?”
“I feel like we should send something.”
“Oh… well. Usually I do.”
“Are you stoned?”
“No.”
“We knew her right, Mark, you had that class with her?”
“Well then why the fuck would you pour the milk first?”
“She got married in the chapel on campus, didn’t she?”
“Oh yeah, I remember that.” Karter replied. She poured cereal into her milk and then brought the bowl to her lips and started to drink.
Mark threw his hands up and turned back around. “I can’t watch this,” he grumbled. “Why can’t you eat your food like a normal fucking person?”
“Imagine getting married in Weber chapel,” Karter said, and took another sip of her cereal.
“I know,” Gloria replied. She grimaced.
Mark was on his hands and knees, peering underneath the couch. He still couldn’t find the remote. The floor was dirty. Someone would have to sweep down there. They’d have to move the couch. And the end table. They’d have to temporarily displace the entire living room.
“You think you guys are ever gonna get married?” Mark asked.
“Prolly,” Gloria said.
“We don’t have any money,” Karter replied.
“Well, we have some.”
4.
They always put these things in such shitty rooms he thought when he walked in. He meandered to the refreshments table and picked up a donut with a napkin. He poured himself a cup of coffee from the thermos; the heat stung his fingertips. Everything was so here when he was sober. He was still getting used to it. The cloth over the table and the paper plates had sharp edges, and the smell of the cigarettes stuck firmly to the inside of his nostrils. The walls had texture, and the ceiling had texture, the carpeted floor had texture too. He wanted to take off his shoes. He wanted to be in an empty room, barefoot, scrunching his toes into this carpet. He wanted the walls to blur. He wanted to feel things he can’t see.
The plastic chairs had rivets in the backrests and Joey felt the fat on his back press into the gaps. He shimmied and tried to make himself comfortable. He tried to soften the plastic. He sipped his coffee. He tapped his feet. There were other people too, sitting, drinking, smoking. They ashed their cigarettes on the carpet. There were piles of plastic chairs along the back wall. Stacks, rows even. There were no windows. Light drifted down from the ceiling. Joey poured his head back and felt the pops in his spine and stared into the fluorescents.
A skinny man in a polo shirt, he was holding a clipboard, sat down.
“We have a new member joining us today. How about you introduce yourself?” the man said and gestured to Joey.
“Uh,” he looked around. When surrounded by other alcoholics he worried he was never enough of an addict to consider himself one of them, or he wasn’t one for long enough. Most of the men sitting around him had gray hair. “I’m Joey.”
“That’s good,” the man said. “Would you like to share what brings you to our group today?”
“Sure,” Joey replied. People shifted into their chairs. A man to his left spit into an empty coffee cup. The spit was brown. Joey couldn’t help but stare. “About a month ago—”
“You want some dip?” the spitter said. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a metal cylinder.
“Levi, please don’t interrupt. Joey is trying to share.”
“What? Oh, no, I’m fine, thank you.” Joey gripped his coffee; his palms were starting to sweat. The whole room smelled sour and bitter. “About a month ago I got a phone call from a friend. He was in some county jail. I don’t remember where. Not here. He was on his way to LA, I think, for a funeral. He’d been sleeping on my couch. His unemployment ran out, and he got evicted, but I still had my place. So, he was on my couch and,” the details were fuzzy. It was hot. He brought his fingers to his brow and pinched. “His cousin died.”
The room looked at him. They were confused. They didn’t know why Joey was here.
“Anyways we were drinking, we’d been drinking for a few days straight. And then Mac got a call from his mother, and the next day he got in the car with a fifth in his glove compartment. A week later I got a phone call—”
“Why do the new guys always get to share first?”
“Cody, please let Joey finish.”
“I just think that’s bullshit. You got people in here who have been coming to these meetings for fifteen years, and they don’t get to talk first?”
“You’re the only one here who has been coming to these meetings for that long, Cody.”
“I mean I could have relapsed. My wife could have left me, and I could have spent the last week getting hammered in the back of some bar room. I could be on the brink of complete and total fucking combustion, and you wouldn’t know because we’re too busy giving the new guy a rub and tug cause it’s his first day.”
“Cody, I—”
“No, Steve, it’s bullshit. Don’t you care?”
“Okay Cody. Did you relapse? Did you spend the last week in the back of some bar room? Are you on the brink of complete and total fucking combustion?”
Someone snickered.
“No?” Steve prodded.
“No.” Cody replied.
“Okay, then, Joey, sorry about that. Please continue.”
“Well, Cody, if you want to go now, I really don’t mind waiting.” Joey was nervous. He was grateful to have eyes elsewhere.
Cody let his chin drop to his chest and he pressed his thumbs together. “Well, I don’t actually have anything to share. I just think it’s bullshit the new guys always get to share first. Half of them don’t even come back.” Then he looked at Joey. “Are you gonna come back?”
Joey looked around the room. Everything smelled like coffee and tobacco. The spitter spit. Steve looked at him. He tapped the pads of his fingers on the back of his clipboard.
“I don’t know,” Joey said. “I hope so.”
“Would you like to finish your story?”
“Sure. Mac got in the car and somewhere along the way he drifted over the dividing line and hit a family head on. The husband was driving. He died. His face hit the steering wheel. Their baby was in the back. There was something with the car seat. I don’t know. It wasn’t in properly, or she wasn’t buckled right. She released on impact and flew through the windshield.”
There were footsteps on the stairs. A head poked out from the hallway, saw the gathering, giggled, and then turned around. Joey turned back to look. The figure was gone. He could still hear the laughter.
“Marshall said when he came to, she was resting on the space where the two hoods met. There was blood. She was covered in it. He told me he sees her every time he closes his eyes. He told me he can’t think about anything else. He told me the worst part is that he can’t drink. There’s nothing he can do to help him forget what happened.”
Cody watched Joey carefully. He tapped his fingers against his forearm.
“When we got off the phone, I decided to check myself into a clinic, to help with the withdrawal. And now I’m here.”
Steve looked at him and Cody looked at him and everyone else stared at the carpet. They sipped their coffee. The spitter spit.
“If it had been me behind the wheel, I don’t think I would ever recover.”
“Thank you for sharing, Joey,” Steve said. “I hope we see you again next week.”
Joey nodded.
“Okay, Al, you’re next, do you have anything to share this week?”
5.
I didn’t know what it was. There was something bloody on the hood. My head hurt. Vision blurry. When I drew breath, something rattled. I stepped out of the car and stumbled onto the road. I pulled my shirt up and looked at my side. It was a growing purple. I pressed my fingers into my ribs and shuddered.
The pavement was hot. I spit on the road and the spit sizzled. I was going to a funeral in LA. I was looking for a gas station.
The windshield of the other car was broken. The man behind the wheel, his head hung limp at his chest. He didn’t look like he was breathing. He looked still. There was a purple bulge on his forehead. The woman in the passenger seat had fallen back and her spine curved to the left, and her head hung against her shoulder. But I could see her chest moving. She was bleeding slowly from the neck.
On the hood was a pile of glass smattered in blood. There was a baby, sitting in the glass. It was bleeding. I didn’t know what to do. I could barely see, and my head pounded, and I couldn’t feel my hands.
For a long time, I looked at it. It didn’t feel real. I couldn’t conceive of what I’d done. Its face was flat and still. Its eyes were closed. The sun caught the broken glass. There was a rainbow in the shards.
The sweat was overwhelming. It was falling on my lips. I swallowed hard and coughed before I turned around and heaved onto the road. I didn’t know what to do. The woman in the passenger seat, her head rolled over, she opened her eyes and blinked hard. She looked at me.
I looked away, down at the child laying on the hoods of the cars. The plateau loomed at the edge of the desert. I felt if I could get to the rock face, I could slip between the cracks in its surface and I would never have to be seen again.
Every step was agony. My ribs shattered inside me, every breath was an earthquake, I was collapsing from the inside out. The sand was hot and soft beneath the soles of my shoes. Sweat dripped off my brow and stung my eyes.
The rock grew larger in my vision. I wanted to reach out and touch it. I want to climb to the top and lay face up against the earth and peer into the sky. I wanted something to take me and not bring me back.
It was all coming down, my vision went out, I felt myself collapse. I puked into the dirt. I rolled over. Sand stuck to the corner of my lips. I cradled my legs to my chest and tried to breathe. The pain kept me conscious before the heat overtook me.
The last thing I remember was hearing the woman scream. It was a guttural howl. It echoed over the sand. It bounced back against the rock and I heard it, again and again, circling in my mind, around and round, it rippled down my spine. It settled in my stomach. It swirled around inside me, until the light went out.
About the Author: Miles De Rosa is a 22 year old writer from California's Bay Area. He loves the books and movies and records in his room, and anything else willing to keep him company. He lives in Baltimore, with two roommates and their cat, Goose, who keeps him company too.
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