THE STRANGER SAT ALONE IN A BOOTH INSIDE LARRY’S Large Lad diner in Red Bluff, a California town about five hundred miles north of Los Angeles. The day was sunny, and from his booth he had a view of both the I-5 freeway and the Sacramento River. He still wasn’t sure how he felt about rivers. He liked the flowing water, but they were all crooked and bent at funny angles. Too meandery, he thought. Maybe something needed to be done about that.
Around the diner’s ceiling were pictures and knickknacks from Red Bluff’s early days as a Gold Rush and then a railroad town. Directly over his table was an autographed photo of Leo Gorcey of Bowery Boys movie fame.
The stranger was tall and slender, with the kind of dramatically sculpted cheekbones that you only see on Greek statues and rich people who’ve paid a surgeon to make them look like statues. His shoes were expensive black Oxfords, but badly stained with road grime. Though it was warm outside, he wore a long coat that in another, more nervous locale would have made people, well, nervous. Like he might be hiding something, which, in fact, he was. When he took off his sunglasses the stranger revealed his most striking feature: that he had one deep brown and one glittering blue eye. In his opinion, it made him look dashing. A great number of other people often thought it made him look like he needed medical attention or perhaps a good burning at the stake.
He took a menu from the holder on the side of the table and opened it with the reverence befitting a Gutenberg Bible.
The stranger liked the menu. He liked all diner menus. They were invariably plastic and shiny, and covered in colorful photos of edible delights. He thought of photos as the hieroglyphics of the modern world, which made him think of each menu as a kind of greasy spoon Egyptian Book of the Dead. The menus were a truly perfect system. You didn’t need to be able to read or even speak English. Just point to the jalapeño and salsa omelet with ham and two kinds of potatoes or the bacon and avocado triple-decker burger with wedge or curly fries and you were instantly transported to a sublime, artery-shattering wonderland.
The stranger liked to see how long he could go without talking to anyone on the road. It was a kind of game, like Burn the Church or Sack the City. Not talking wasn’t as exciting a game, but it was one where he could vary the rules any time he liked. Take today. Today, he might just speak to someone. The thought of it was exciting. He looked around wondering who it would be.
A waitress in a red-and-white-checked uniform and blond wig that matched the hair on the life-size statue of Larry’s Large Lad outside the restaurant walked over. The diner was an obvious rip-off of Bob’s Big Boy, a more famous burger restaurant in Burbank, but that’s what had attracted the stranger to it. The diner wasn’t trying to hide its petty depravity. The theft was pure hubris, and the stranger loved hubris.
The waitress’s name tag said CAROLINE. She set down a glass of water on the table and said, “Welcome to Larry’s Large Lad. What can I get you today?”
The stranger smiled and held up the menu. He pointed to a chocolate shake and a steak sandwich that came with garlic fries. The waitress spoke each item out loud as he pointed to it and he gave her a thumbs-up each time to let her know she’d gotten it just right.
“The food’ll only take a few minutes. Can I get you anything else while you wait?” He shook his head, so Caroline moved off with his order.
He took out a map of California that had been folded and refolded so many times that some of the creases had torn or worn white. Spreading the map on the table, he ran his finger down I-5 until he came to Red Bluff. He was on foot now. He liked going on foot. It made everything feel like it wasn’t just a walk, but an Exodus. Luckily, it looked like he’d still be able to keep to his schedule. Even though the stranger didn’t know how to drive, he sometimes wished he had a car. Driving seemed like fun, and stealing one seemed like even more fun. He was good with all kinds of tools, so he could probably hotwire one, but stealing was against the rules. Plus, he was still stuck with the driving problem. Even if he could drive, he couldn’t take a chance on being pulled over and arrested in a hot vehicle, since his main goal was to keep a low profile all the way south.
One thing the stranger hadn’t quite grasped yet was that strolling down the side of a major California freeway without, say, holding a gas can was as inconspicuous as riding a white elephant pulling a cart with LOW PROFILE spelled out in road flares. Still, he’d been lucky so far. The stranger was almost always lucky that way.
Sometimes on the road, people would stop for him and he’d accept a ride. Mostly it was from truckers or lonely long-distance travelers alone in cars. In general, though, he tried to avoid rides. Many people found his silence unnerving and insisted that he talk. Some even became aggressive. Those drives always ended the same way. Upside down in a ditch. Fire. People screaming. Then he’d be back on foot again, with dirty pants and bits of windshield in his hair. That’s why he always carried a comb and a clothes brush.
The stranger sighed, folded the map, and put it back in his coat pocket. Timewise, he was doing fine. He just had to keep moving. There wouldn’t be any need to check the map again for days. He could just enjoy the scenery. The river, however, was beginning to bother him more each time he looked.
Caroline soon came back with his food. When he looked up, she flinched, but composed herself in a second. He knew it was his eyes. It was always the eyes with these people. The waitress set down his sandwich and shake and went back to take an order at the counter.
The stranger hadn’t eaten in a couple of days, so he dug in greedily. The shake was better than the steak sandwich, so he sipped it slowly, trying to make it last. When he finished, he wiped his mouth and hands on the napkins the waitress had left by his plate. He looked out the window and watched the cars on the road and the river beyond. Really, someone needed to do something about it. A few minutes later the waitress returned.
“You must have been a hungry boy. You put that away in record time,” she said.
“Indeed I was,” said the stranger, deciding to break his silence. He pointed over his head. “That photo of Leo Gorcey. Did he eat here sometimes?”
Caroline looked up at the ceiling and shook her head. “No. He never ate here. But he retired in the area. A real live movie star from Hollywood.”
“Hollywood,” he said. “Thank you.”
As she gathered up his cutlery and plate the waitress said, “Are you staying in Red Bluff or just passing through?”
The stranger took a moment before answering. Eventually he said, “Just passing through. It’s a pretty town.”
“‘The Victorian city by the river.’ That’s what folks call it.”
“Then the river doesn’t bother you?”
“Why would it?” she said.
“It’s so . . . crinkly.”
She shook her head. “I’m not sure I quite understand.”
“Never mind. Just a personal quirk,” he said, smiling.
“Are you ready for your check?”
“Yes, thank you.”
She put it on the table and took his dishes back to the kitchen. He took the check to the counter and put some money down by the cash register. The bills were old and creased like the map, but still good. He’d made sure of that. The waitress came out from the kitchen, rang him up, and handed him his change. “Thanks. Come again,” she said.
“Thank you,” the stranger said. He started outside, but stopped and turned around. “Have you ever heard of a restaurant called Bob’s Big Boy?”
“Oh my, yes. That’s what gave Bob, the owner—isn’t it funny that his name is Bob, too?—the idea for this place.”
“Yes. Hysterical,” he said.
“Are you going to go there on your trip?” said Caroline.
“What makes you think I’m going to Los Angeles?”
She shrugged. “Just a guess. You asked about Bob’s Big Boy.”
“Of course,” said the stranger. “Of course.” He looked around the restaurant one more time. He wanted to remember it all, every molecule of it. Then he nodded to Caroline and left.
Outside, he put on his sunglasses. As he walked back to the freeway he thought, Two waitresses. One cook. Ten customers scattered between the counter and tables. Thirteen. Always an interesting number. One can take it so many ways. It would be something to think about on his long walk.
At the edge of the parking lot, he stopped and breathed in the fresh morning air. Then the ground began to shake beneath his feet as the several hundred yards of the Sacramento River visible from the restaurant window straightened itself. He waited a few seconds so that everyone inside the restaurant could get a good look at his work. When he was certain they had, Larry’s Large Lad exploded. An orange fireball spiraled into the sky and with it dining booths, a milk shake machine, burning money, Leo Gorcey, and sundry body parts. The stranger didn’t turn around. He didn’t have to. He’d seen it all before and knew there wouldn’t be any survivors. It wasn’t until something thunked into the ground behind him that he turned around.
A few feet off to his left was the charred and battered statue of Larry’s Large Lad. Its blond head was scorched, but it was still grinning. The statue had come so close to beaning him that he wasn’t entirely sure it wasn’t a coincidence. The stranger looked around but didn’t see a soul in sight, just cars passing on the freeway. Many were slowing to enjoy the unobstructed view of the burning restaurant and newly renovated river.
As he started up again, he thought about Caroline. If only she hadn’t wanted to know where he was going. Who was she really? She could have been working for anyone. Plus, his fries had been soggy. They’d obviously been microwaved, not properly cooked. The stranger loved hubris, but he couldn’t stand bad fries.
He walked across the freeway overpass and down again so he was back on the road headed south. In the distance, he heard sirens.