Miriam Toews - The Flying Troutmans

Really? I said. That’s fantastic! That’s great. Wow. That’s really great.

Yeah, said Min. I seem to have gotten through to the second lieutenant. But they’ll only discharge me if there’s someone at home to help out.

Yeah, I said. Oh, yeah. Well, yeah! I’ll be there, obviously, right? I mean, of course I will be.

Are you at home? said Min.

Mmmhmm, I said.

We listened to each other breathing. I heard someone coughing on her end. I heard some other things.

Hey, um, Min? I said.

Yeah, she said.

Why aren’t you at the beach? I said.

Nice, she said, why aren’t you?

Good question, I said. I’ll meet you there.

Where?

At the beach.

Okay, she said, which beach?

You know the one, that very large one with all the sand, I said.

Oh, yeah…, she said, the one next to all that water?

Yeah, that one.

Sounds good, said Min. Sounds like a plan.

Scissor-kick, I said.

I am, she said.

Like crazy? I said. Ha ha?

Shut up…yeah, she said.

I am, too, I said.

We should maybe float on our backs for a minute or two, she said. Like, rest…

Yeah…I said. Very soon. We should try to get a little bit closer first…

More breathing, more treading. I heard a public announcement, something about breakfast being over in five minutes. I heard Min’s name being called.

What the hell is that? I asked her. You’re being paged?

They want me to eat, she said.

Oh, I said. You should go?

I guess so, she said.

Or like forty lashes or something? I said.

Worse, she said, I’d have to share.

Oh, like in Group?

Yep, she said.

You fail breakfast, I said.

I know, said Min. I fail Crafts, too, spectacularly.

Yeah, I said, I hear those skills skip a generation. Thebes is a master.

Yeah, said Min, what’s her latest project? Has she made you a novelty-sized cheque yet?

No, not yet. She’s more into performance art lately. I looked over at the kids, both fast asleep.

I told Min I’d call her later, the kids were great, the kids were happy, the kids were aces, and we’d all be reunited in the sweet by and by when we met on that beautiful shore…

Twentynine Palms is the proud host of the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, the world’s largest marine base, said Thebes as we were getting ready to check out.

Fuckin’ A, I said.

We’re meat, said Logan. And it’s pronounced “core,” dufus, not “corpse.”

We had to hurry. Thebes said yeah, now she did want to meet Cherkis, she felt better about it. She’d put on her least filthy outfit, the royal blue terry cloth shorts and top. Her hair was by now impossible to comb. But it didn’t matter.

Hey, do you ever brush your teeth? I asked her. She had her holster on, she’d patted her face a couple of times with a dry washcloth, whatever, she hated water. She leaned against the wall and said she was ready.

So, here we go, said Logan. Cherkis hunting. Let’s do this thing. He was using his knife to scratch inside his cast. His hickeys had faded to green and yellow and had all bled together so it looked like he’d recently been strangled. I felt like I had an ice pick stuck between my eyes, I could barely open them, it was the mother of all headaches, and I couldn’t take a breath without paroxysms of pain shooting from my brain to my chest and back again.

We were going to hit an art gallery on the main drag first to see if anyone there had heard the name Cherkis. While we were loading our crap back into the van, Rajbeer got out and ran around the parking lot, barking and pissing everywhere. A little girl, about three, came up to Logan and pointed at Rajbeer and asked, Can I ride she?

Her, said Logan, and no, I’m sorry, but I don’t really think so. Thebes was trying to round up the dog and this girl wouldn’t stop talking to Logan, about her socks, about her blanket, about her Barbies, about her grandma, about her baby brother, about her nightmares, about how her socks bothered her ankles, about a boy in her daycare named Ed. Thebes had wrangled Rajbeer into the van by now and I wanted to go.

Hey, do you have parents around here or something? I asked the girl. She pointed at the motel. Where? I said. Like, which room? She stared at me. Oh, for Christ’s sake.

I asked her to come with me and I took her hand and we started knocking on doors. One opened and the guy said yeah and I said is this your kid and he said no. She didn’t belong in the next three rooms either. Finally, a woman opened a door and said yeah, oh, sorry, the girl was hers, she did this all the time, thanks a lot.

Twentynine Palms, said Thebes, would be fourteen people with their hands out, going what? What? And one with one hand in his or her pocket.

Do we have anything to eat? asked Logan. Thebes fished around in the cooler and threw him a giant Oh Henry! bar.

I don’t see any soldiers, said Thebes.

They’re in foxholes, I said. I was in such a hurry, I was bumping into curbs and slamming my brakes down at the last second for red lights that jumped out of nowhere.

Shit, I’m burning, I said. I had dropped my cigarette but hadn’t bothered to find out where. Logan reached over and grabbed it and threw it out the window.

Do you want me to—

Yes!

Logan and I switched seats and he drove. His driving was improving but he still had this tendency to sail through stop signs and red lights. I told him to concentrate on seeing other cars and especially pedestrians and then slowly ease into seeing signs as well. And remember to brake going into the turn, gas going out.

Thought the rule was no smoking in the van, he said. Are you still burning?

I’m trying to stay calm, I said.

I appreciate the effort, he said.

Thebes had on her giant diamond necklace and she’d found her angel ring. What foxholes? she said.

You’re looking for somebody by the name of Cherkis? said the woman at the gallery.

Yeah, Doug Cherkis, I said. I was told that he might have been doing his art around here somewhere, or running a gallery, or something like that? I put my elbow on her desk so I could prop my head up and I squinted at her. Ring any bells? I asked. The kids were studying some abstracts on a long, white wall.

I’m so sorry, said the woman. You know, I just can’t…That name is not at all familiar to me.

Really? I said. Would it be all right if I poured myself some of that coffee?

Oh, of course, she said. I’ll get it. Would you like cream or sugar?

No, thanks, black is great.

Doug Cherkis, said the woman. Doug Cherkis. You know, a friend of mine might know if there was a Doug Cherkis around here. The woman gave us directions to her friend’s place, she had a studio in her house and it wasn’t very far from the gallery. Her name was Lilah.

I thanked her and she wished us luck.

Hey, kids, I said. Van. March, I said. I looked at the woman. Did I just say “march”? I asked her. She smiled and shrugged. She lived in a town filled with soldiers.

Oh, your cup, I said.

Take it, she said. She told me I could keep it as a souvenir.

I thanked her and we left.

On the way over to Lilah’s I whipped into a Discount Everything to buy a few groceries and some more pain-killers. The kids played Frisbee in the parking lot while I shopped. It was subarctic in there, air-conditioned down to zero. I had to keep moving or I’d freeze to death. I raced up and down the aisles throwing discounted everything into my cart, trying to maintain my circulation and stay alive. It’s fun to be challenged, I guess, to have even the well-documented evidence that human beings need a certain body temperature to sustain life discounted. On the way back to the van I saw a piece of paper lying on the ground with the word Faith written on it in big letters, so I picked it up. I turned the paper over and realized that it was an Account Close Authorization for a Miss Faith Mae Hopkins. I put it in my pocket anyway.