Saint Claudia of Reseda

“I gots some stray capigool and prosciut in my purse if ya hungry.”

These words floated out of my new friend’s mouth about seventeen minutes into our cross-country road trip. Her name was Claudia, and she was an Italian American woman in her late forties from Reseda, California, and she was driving me from the West Coast back to Ohio for Christmas. She was equal parts all her idols: Madonna, Marisa Tomei’s character in My Cousin Vinny, and Sophia from The Golden Girls. We were basically strangers, tied only by the fact that she worked at an optometrist’s office with my buddy Heather. Heather knew I wanted to get back to the Midwest on a budget and heard that Claudia was driving cross-country to visit her ex-boyfriend (Evan) near my hometown, so I strapped in for an adventure with a woman I’d just met who carried deli meat in her purse and drove a 2001 Montero Sport.

“I packed a Kind bar and some fruit snacks, so I’m okay for a little while, thanks,” I replied.

“The meats should stay good through Colorado. I brought an ice pack for ’em. And I know a bunch of restaurants on the way we can stop at if you get hungrier.”

The drive across the country is brutal, and I’m not sure what I was thinking spending days in a car with a woman I didn’t know, convinced the couple of hundred dollars I saved would be worth the multiple days I had with Claudia, whose purse-meat aroma was quickly spreading throughout the car with thirty-four hours left on our expedition. I could barely focus on the scent as my senses were preoccupied with listening to her sing along to the Christmas with the Rat Pack playlist she’d programmed. Maybe the vocals would’ve been bearable if her nasally voice weren’t singing “joyful all yeast onions rise” instead of “joyful all ye nations rise” during “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing.”

“Are you singing…‘yeast onion’?” I asked her.

“Yeah, ‘yeast onions.’”

“The lyric is ‘all ye nations rise.’”

“No, yeast makes things rise, so they are singing about cookin’,” Claudia corrected.

The meat and the singing were both red flags, but being the people pleaser I am, I decided to ignore these signs and instead try to make the best of it. I sang along to Frank Sinatra while eating my packaged fruit snacks. The upside was that Claudia had a zero-f’s attitude, reminded me a bit of my grandma, and could probably help me let loose a little before I spent a week with my family.

“So you’re going to see a guy in Ohio?” I asked.

“Yeah, an ex-boyfriend and a real charmer. He’s a real estate agent, he drives an H2, and he’s packin’,” she bragged.

When she said he was “packin’,” I assumed she was talking about his penis. Something that happens when you’re an out gay man is that people talk to you about sex and men’s bodies a lot. Women will open up about the men they date almost instantly upon meeting you. I’ve met gals at bars who are telling me about their husband’s junk while waiting in line for the restrooms. Every interaction between a gay man and straight woman becomes a scene from Sex and the City, and the Charlottes become Samanthas as soon as they find out you’re homosexual—and it’s one of the best parts about being a gay man.

“Congrats, girl! Does this guy know what to do with what he’s packin’ though?” I asked.

I admit my response was a little cringe, what with the girl and suddenly asking about how good this man is in the sack, but life is short, and we had a long drive ahead.

“Yeah, he points it at my forehead when we hook up. It is so hot.”

Okay, now I was a bit confused. Sure, I could picture the logistics of a man pointing his Jack Nicholson at a woman’s face, but the way she said it made me think we were on two different pages.

“So, like, when you’re going down on him, he stops to point it at your forehead?” My question was gross but necessary.

“Sometimes, but sometimes he gives it to me when I’m riding him on top. He loves it.”

I was officially lost. I didn’t necessarily want to know more, but I needed to understand the logistics of what Claudia was talking about.

“Wait, so when you said he was packin’…”

“A gun. My man takes out a gun when we have sex.”

My body immediately tensed up. I could feel my shoulder blades tighten and my butthole clench. Sweat dripped from my brow, and my eyes went wide as she continued.

“We point the gun at each other. It’s not loaded, but it’s so hot. Ooh, I better turn on the air—”

I don’t want to kink shame. At all. However, I hadn’t met anyone who was into gunplay during sex, so it caught me a bit off guard. Couple that with the fact that I was just meeting this woman, and I was a teensy bit concerned.

DANNY: Heather, who is this person you set me up with? Do you know anything about Claudia?

As I waited for my buddy to respond to my text, Claudia changed the subject. She started telling me about the gifts she’d bought for Evan’s kids, whom he shared with an ex. Claudia was bringing them two toys inspired by Disney’s Tangled as holiday presents in hopes they would like her. I say inspired by, because when I saw them in the back seat, it was clear they were knockoffs. The doll Claudia bought for her ex-boyfriend’s daughters looked more like Michael Moore than Mandy Moore. There was dirt on the princess’s face that resembled stubble, and instead of a cute chameleon sidekick like the character has in the movie, there was a generic plastic frog with a voice box that unleashed barks instead of ribbits.

“Aren’t they cute?” Claudia asked.

“Yeah, but these aren’t actually from the movie. They look like other characters,” I said.

“SHIT!” she yelled at the top of her lungs.

I thought Claudia was yelling because of something on the road or because she forgot something back home, like turning off the curling iron or closing her garage.

“Shit, you think my gifts are trash? Fuck! Shit, shit, shit!” Her voice kept getting louder and more antagonistic. Just as my confusion was turning into fear, I got a ding on my phone. It was a text from Heather…

HEATHER: lol she’s new at work, the only thing I know about her is she was driving to Ohio and she’s on medication to quit smoking. Same one my ex took to quit. Made him nuts! Mood swings like crazy. How’s it going?

At least I had an explanation for Claudia’s shifting behavior, but we were still just on hour one of our drive! How was I to survive thirty-something more hours with this deranged human with a meat locker and affinity for gunplay?

“Omigod, no, Claudia! These gifts are so cute. Seriously way cuter than the regular Tangled toys. These are, like…unique,” I lied.

“Okay, good, because I wanna impress this guy’s kids. I haven’t met the daughters yet.”

Claudia then reached into her purse, felt her way through the pastrami, and pulled out a pack of Marlboros.

“Mind if I smoke? I’m trying to quit.”

I don’t like the smell of smoke, but I’d endure anything to keep the rage at bay.

“Go ahead! So how long have you been seeing this Evan guy?”

“Off and on for twenty-five years,” she said as she took a drag.

“Five years?”

“No, twenty-five years. I met him in high school on a family vacation to Hilton Head.”

I’m no relationship expert, but it seems to me that if someone hasn’t been a good fit in twenty-five years, it may be time to move on, let the relationship go, but instead, Claudia packed up some deranged dolls and drove twenty-three hundred miles to see him. Different strokes for different folks, I suppose!

“He must be excited to see you,” I said.

“He don’t know I’m coming.”

“So you’re surprising him and his two daughters…”

“Five. He has five of ’em total. And a son.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize. I just saw the two toys back there—”

“Oh, I only got gifts for the two girls. Six would’ve been too pricey, and I thought one would’ve made me look cheap.”

“You’re surprising him and his…six…kids on Christmas?”

“Yeah, he’s gonna flip!”

I admired the audacity, even if the gift logic was questionable. As a Libra, I rarely take leaps of faith or go out of my comfort zone, so I can only imagine how nervous I would be to show up (uninvited) somewhere and spurn two-thirds of the children I wanted to make a good impression on. But Claudia was wired different.

“I just hope he got me something because it’s my birthday today.”

“Your birthday is today? Omigod, Claudia, I feel bad you’re driving when you should be celebrating.”

“Don’t feel bad. I got drunk earlier.”

“Oh, you went out last night?”

“No, this morning I had some cocktails. Forty-seven, here I come!”

Whoopi Goldberg once said, “Molly, you in danger, girl,” a quote that reverberated in my head as soon as I learned that Claudia was maybe drunk driving me across the country. I spent a moment trying to figure out what her blood-alcohol level might be by this point in the drive—and I optimistically assumed it was at least a little below the legal limit—a thought that quickly got derailed when I started thinking about it being her birthday. December 19. Of course she’s a Sagittarius! And she was the most Sagittarius of Sagittariuses I’d ever met. Spontaneous, adventurous, a traveler. This explained Claudia to a tee. I’m not quite sure what the charts say about the driving drunk part (which we DO NOT condone and is inexcusable), but I said a silent prayer and offered the only two words I could think of…

“Happy birthday!”

The kind regards left my lips, and I began plotting my way off the highway of hell. Perhaps I’d fake an emergency and ask to be dropped off at the nearest airport, or maybe I’d just ghost her. She would get in her car at a rest stop after picking up some grub, and I would be gone. She’d assume I was the ghost of Christmas past, and she would prep herself for the present and future to join her as she drove the rest of the way while fighting a nicotine addiction.

By the time we reached Arizona, Claudia had sobered up, and it was time to stop for gas. We pulled up to the pump, and I went inside while Claudia filled the tank. My great escape would have to wait as this location was a little too sketch for ghosting purposes. It was in the middle of nowhere, and I couldn’t risk being stranded at a gas station located on the side of a highway or trust that an Uber would find me. Somehow, I concluded Claudia would be safer, so I looked for snacks to last me until our next stop. I picked up some Doritos and a Diet Coke, then walked over to the red-cream holiday Oreos when suddenly—

“Don’t move,” Claudia whispered, lips literally grazing the back of my ear. She’d snuck up behind me like the quietest chaos agent. I didn’t even hear her come in, and I certainly wasn’t ready for what came next.

“I thought you pay at the pump. Why are you in here—”

“Shh! Don’t say anything,” she commanded.

I caught my reflection in the small mirror attached to the sunglasses stand and noticed both the fear in my eyes and that some of her maroon lipstick had rubbed off on my lobe.

“I’m gonna stick some stuff in your pocket. Act natural,” she said.

“Claudia—”

She stuffed something into the back of my jeans, something big and round.

“Please, I—”

“QUIET, DANNY!” she shouted loud enough that the clerk could hear, but the gentleman behind the counter only briefly looked up from reading his ESPN magazine before deciding to ignore the hoopla.

Claudia’s words left me shell-shocked. I was somehow mid-theft, against my will, but I was afraid that if I resisted, she would make things worse.

“Go to the car, and I’ll pay for the gas. Go!” she instructed.

“But I can pay for my stuff. I just want a Diet Coke—”

“Go!”

I listened to her marching orders, but I set down my chips and pop, then scurried back to the getaway car. I figured I should only steal what she was forcing me to steal and not the items I had planned to purchase.

The next couple of minutes felt like a lifetime as I waited in the passenger seat for Claudia to join me, wondering if some local authorities would book her and then come for me. I was so nervous she wouldn’t make it out of there, I almost forgot she had slipped the goods into my back pocket.

I reached back, nervous about what I’d find. Had she stolen another patron’s wallet, or maybe she had taken something from inside the store when I wasn’t looking? It felt like something round and papery, and it was. It was literally balled-up paper towels from the dispenser near the windshield washer.

Claudia finally arrived back in the driver’s seat and turned on the car. “Ready to get back on the road?” she asked with a smile.

“Claudia, what did you put in my pocket? Did you wrap something up? Because all that’s here is paper towel. Did something fall out? What if—”

“Yeah, I was just freakin’ you out. I put some garbage I found in your pocket. You shoulda saw your face!”

“So I didn’t steal anything?”

“No, but I stole a Snickers. You want half?”

“No, I wanted the Doritos, Diet Coke, and Oreos that I was going to pay for!”

“I have meats in my bag if you want.”

“So you get to eat your stolen Snickers, but I’m supposed to just eat your purse meats?”

“Snickers is a sweet. You were buying savory, and that’s a waste of money when I got perfectly good meats.”

Some people are impossible to figure out. They zig when you think they’re gonna zag. Claudia was like that, and I couldn’t take it any longer. But unfortunately, every time I would think of a way out, she would bamboozle me into staying with her. We stopped in Kansas to spend the night, and I was convinced that was when I would leave her and catch a flight, but she somehow convinced me to put my belongings in a safe at the motel we stopped at and then dragged me to a local dive bar for Long Island iced teas. The next morning, I was so hungover that I didn’t have the energy to find a way out. I was even desperate enough to eat some of her aged meats as we made our way through Missouri.

Somewhere along the way, before I could devise a proper exit strategy, I began to sorta like Claudia. Sure, she was a hot mess, her car smelled like antipasti mixed with White Diamonds, and her mood shifted quicker than I could keep up with, but she kept me on my toes! She was brass, bawdy, and honest, and I always keep my life very controlled. It was nice to be with someone different.

Everywhere we stopped, she would make both friends and enemies, but she was content with either. If I feel like someone doesn’t like me, I stress to the point that I lose sleep over it, but Claudia just kept on driving to her destination without a care in the world. There was a bartender who gave us free drinks because she thought Claudia was a riot, a waitress who called Claudia the c-word after she stole the waitress’s pen, and a police officer who let us go with a warning for doing eighty-five in a sixty because Claudia made him laugh. It was a roller coaster of interactions, and I was loving the ride.

By the time we reached Ohio, I was cramped and tired but enamored with Claudia’s steadfast sense of self. She drove up to my parent’s house, and I prepared my goodbye, a goodbye I’d planned on making much sooner but was glad I waited until we reached the finish line. In A Christmas Carol, Scrooge is visited by three ghosts who teach him a bunch of stuff about life, and Claudia was that for me. She drove me to my past, taught me to enjoy the present, and showed me what life could be in the future if I stopped caring so much about trying to be the person I think everyone wants me to be. Yes, she was a thief, a liar, and a person who enjoyed her sex with a side of firearms, but no one is perfect.

On December 24, I got a text.

CLAUDIA: Hey, going back to LA early. Turns out Evan’s married. Oops! Lol. Let me know if you need a ride. Merry Christmas!

Of course Evan was married. And of course Claudia drove all the way across the country for him without knowing if he was single. I took a return flight back to California a week later, and the next time I texted Claudia, her number was out of service. Heather said Claudia stopped showing up for work, so I don’t know where she is now, but every December, I think about my Sagittarius queen and hope she’s doing what she loves…shoplifting, singing old-timey Christmas songs about yeast onions, and having (consensual) violent sex with a man she doesn’t know well at all.