The night another without sleep, a wasteland to cross. He’s walking the streets all the way to the airport, which is quiet now, no planes moving. He stands at the fence and looks at open runways, vast stretches you could walk forever, trailing into the ocean and more darkness, and the tails of planes all huddled around the terminals, shark fins waiting.
He would climb the fence and wander the runways but there’s razor wire. He wants open space, without clutter. That was the point of Alaska. Fairbanks on a flatland stretching hundreds of miles, interrupted only by rivers. He might take his cross-country skis and just go. Ski all day and into the night and never turn around, and then it won’t be clear there was ever a suicide. His body might not even be found. Such empty places, endless thin paper birch trees. At sixty below, he won’t last even through the day, probably. Won’t have to suffer another night. This is far better than the pistol, and freezing to death is easy. He’ll feel warm in the end and won’t understand a thing, won’t even know he’s dying. Easiest way possible.
The road he’s on now lined with Dumpsters, and the pavement wet from rain. Cold but not cold enough for snow or anything clean. Runoff of waste and trash and too many people, every airport and city a sore. He’s always hated them. No ground he can touch here, no grass, no tree, not a single living thing. Only back lanes leading to nothing, service roads.
The garbagemen are the first to join him. Driving as if using a stick for the first time, jolting and stopping over and over and dragging metal across pavement, making the most outrageous noises, no effort at all to be quiet. The sky starting to hold light, and the first jet engines spinning up and roaring off over the water. Jim can’t see them from where he is now. He should have planned better. He’s cold and exhausted and so hungry and thirsty.
He returns to the hotel for the breakfast buffet, has to hang around another forty-five minutes waiting, and then it’s only continental, which has always disappointed everyone. Europeans are supposed to like it, but is that possible? He chews through cold rolls with jam and butter and thinks it should be better in the end. If they knew, they would make more effort.
He takes the shuttle to the terminal and does more waiting. How much of his life was waiting?
All these people around him, and he has no connection with any of them. He could vanish and it would all be the same. When he boards the plane, also, he sits next to a stranger who will remain a stranger, and it was never any different, really, in the rest of his life except for his kids and wives and family, just that small handful.
He’s so tired he falls asleep on the first flight, then feels groggy going through the Seattle terminal, tries not to fall asleep while waiting for the Anchorage flight. He doesn’t want to miss it. He has a plan to finish, his assignment, his homework. Those words seem different now. It was everything that happened related to home that brought him to this point, and it does feel assigned rather than chosen.
He sleeps on the Anchorage flight, too, wakes at the end to see coastline and islands, beautiful from above. Only scattered clouds. Glaciers and ice fields looking so soft. He should do something spectacular, go skydiving and not pull the cord. Go for the highest dive possible and enjoy what time there is.
At this altitude, humanity is erased. No sign of any building or boat, mountains miniaturized, waves flattened, the world innocent. He could live in it from this far view, if he never had to come any closer. The inland waterways especially idyllic, small blue mirrors and always calm.
He waits again in Anchorage, so much smaller, and cold even inside. His big jacket on now, thermal underwear and boots. He has to walk outside to board the plane, and he wonders what happens to someone who didn’t know, just passing through from some tropical place, wearing shorts and flip-flops. Do they die of exposure? But everyone seems to know, all wearing parkas like his, gloves and hats and snow boots.
A plane with props and seating for less than twenty, and not much warmth, thin walled. All sitting in their full gear. It does feel like they’re going somewhere wrong, somewhere close to the edge of the world. Billions of people but you’d never believe it here.
The plane so light it’s thrown constantly by turbulence, sinkholes in the air, sudden drops, and yawing side to side, as if refusing direction. And dark, always dark, though now, in mid-March, sunset isn’t until after 7:30 p.m., which is fine. It’s only the middle of winter that gets really depressing, and he’s past that now. No excuses. He can blame only himself, not the place.
They pass countless mountains unseen, Denali out there somewhere on the left an enormous white mound dwarfing normal ranges, and then the few lights of Fairbanks below and they’re landing.
No one to greet him at the airport, and it’s late, almost eleven. He’s managed to set up a life here completely alone. It was never his plan, really. We don’t make plans and don’t follow plans. That’s only an idea.
His truck has been plugged in the entire time he’s been away, a heater keeping the engine from freezing, and this strikes him now as tremendous waste, since it’s only fourteen below at the moment, but everything up here is like that, and the pipeline erases all concern. Boom times. So much like a western, all the men who have come here for a black gold rush. Fairbanks even has saloons, which is where he should go now. Why go home?
He unplugs the truck and starts it and crawls away on studded tires. Everyone moving slowly, the roads packed snow. Jim heads downtown to a saloon where he knows there are prostitutes. He’s not going to waste time looking.
The walls made of logs, and inside there are peanut shells on the floor. Small round tables, two dancers on stage. Warmer in here for them, so he has to shed his jackets and wishes he didn’t have the thermal underwear. Sweating already.
One of the dancers looks pretty good. A body never seems real in this light. It looks made out of wax. But still he enjoys the show. The waitress, topless and young, asks what he’d like.
“You,” he says. “I know you’re not a prostitute and don’t usually do it, which is why I’m asking. How about five hundred bucks if you go upstairs with me for twenty minutes?”
She has long dark hair pulled back tight in a ponytail. Slim and new and busty.
“Five hundred?”
“Yes. A one-time offer, right now.”
“Okay,” she says. “But you owe another fifty to the bar, for the room and my time.”
“I’m fine with that.”
“Cash right now.”
Jim pays. He’s been carrying a lot of cash, but there’s so much more in his account. All unused, and it will be taken by the IRS. He should buy a hundred rounds of drinks and have everyone toast to “Fuck the IRS.” No Alaskan likes taxes or the government. He wouldn’t find a single dissenter.
He follows her upstairs. The room is meant to look like the old West. Rough plank flooring and walls, stained dark, a four-post bed with a satiny red cover that says brothel, and oil lamps. A spittoon in the corner. He doesn’t have the magnum with him, and no belt and holster for it, either, or he would hang that around one of the bed posts.
She stands in front of the bed, and it’s clear she doesn’t really know what to do. She’s not asking him to shower.
He walks up close and puts his hands on her breasts, cool skin from working bare, a bit clammy. He can smell her sweat. She lets him run his hands along her back and belly, then he unbuttons her cut-offs and lets them fall. Wearing granny underwear beneath, just pale beige and full fitting, so he pushes those down quick and tries to forget the stains on the crotch.
He pushes her onto the bed and spreads her legs but she just looks and smells too womanly and real.
He unbuttons his jeans and pulls them down a bit and stands there limp.
“You’re not even hard.”
“I know. Sorry.”
She sits up and leans in to take his dick in her mouth dutifully, and they could be married, the feeling of obligation without any real desire left. He watches her pretty face, because it should turn him on to see her doing this, but his dick is so loose and blank and he’s feeling no pleasure at all.
“Never mind,” he says. “Just lie down and I’ll get behind you.”
She turns away from him on the bed and he finishes stripping, lies down behind, spoons her. A bit cold in here, and they’re on top of the satiny cover instead of underneath. He knows he’ll never get an erection again. He can feel his time ticking away.
“What are we doing?” she asks.
“Shh,” he says. “Let me just hold you. You feel good. I know it’s only twenty minutes. I know my time’s up soon.”
He breathes in the smell of her hair and neck, her sweat, feels grateful for something real in the end. He closes his eyes, pulls her as close as he can, and tries not to feel alone, but it’s only moments before he’s starting to weep. He tries to keep from moving or making any sound, but she can tell.
“You’re crying?” she asks.
“Sorry,” he whimpers.
“This is too weird,” she says, prying his hands away.
“Please. Please just five more minutes. Let me hold you.”
She relaxes then and he no longer has to hide. He holds her and his body is shaking and face drowning. The crying comes in heaves that he feels from far away, like watching waves crash on some other shore.
She does something unexpected then. Turns toward him and takes him in her arms, holds his head against her breast, mothering him, a bit of generosity. “It’s okay,” she says. “It’s okay.” She doesn’t get up to leave but stays a long time just like that, her hand stroking the back of his head and neck, his face wet and buried in her breasts. He’s been surprised so many times now by generosity, by all that everyone is doing for him, even this stranger.
But he wrecks it, of course. “What if I offered to marry you,” he says. “Right now. I’d sign something that says you get everything, my house and business, all my cash, if we ever separate or if I die. I’m a dentist. You’d be safe financially, and if you held me like this, I’d be safe also. I can tell you’re a good person, generous. It’s all I need to know.”
“I just wanted to help you,” she says, letting go of him and sitting up. “Because you seemed sad.”
“Yes, and I appreciate that.”
“I don’t want to marry you. Jesus. I have a life.”
“Sorry.”
“You don’t just offer to marry someone, like buying a sandwich.”
“Sorry.”
She’s pulling on her shorts, and there’s no shirt to put on, so she’s out the door quickly. He knows she won’t talk to him again when he gets downstairs. A bouncer will intervene or something. She’ll be giving everyone warning right now.
He lies back down and closes his eyes. Desperation is truth. He would in fact be lucky to marry her, and she would be better off having the security. He’s going to kill himself now, and she’s going to struggle through shitty relationships with younger men and not have enough money. She should have taken his offer.
All that’s left now is to go home. It will be his last drive. He gets up and walks downstairs knowing these are the last people he will ever see, all strangers. The girl hidden away somewhere, of course, and the other girls and bouncers looking at him, just as he thought. The customers oblivious. Old men at the bar, far older than he is, worse lives no doubt, and yet they are managing to carry on, even though they’re probably drunks. Fat or too skinny, with destroyed noses.
A young guy at one of the round tables, a woman on each side of him. He’s chomping on peanuts and tossing the shells. Dark mop of hair and face too round, young enough to still have zits, and where did he get his money?
But no one’s story matters now. Jim pulls on his parka, steps back into the cold and dark and crunches across the snow, the music muted. He climbs in his truck and drives out of town on a road that hasn’t been plowed. He locks in the four-wheel drive. No streetlights out here, almost no neighbors. The place he chose.
The front tires carving snow, veering on a narrow path, close to an edge that falls not far but far enough to get stuck, about ten feet down to a meadow and stream. The truck would roll and he’d be trapped and it would be only an accident. But the problem is time. It would take hours to freeze or suffocate, longer if the truck was still running with its heater, and he might be rescued.
He climbs along the hill, knowing the road more from memory than sight. Trees still without leaves, white trunks and arms so thin. He reaches his own driveway, finally, up another slight hill, and his house is there, two story and empty, with a basketball hoop mounted, some dream of playing here with his son, but his son isn’t coming, and most the year there’s snow anyway.
He hits the garage door opener and it dutifully rises and he’s inside, bare space brightly lit. Workbenches with only a few tools, a few boxes of his stuff not unpacked yet. Three sets of cross-country skis leaning in the corner, Tracy’s pair so small. Fishing rods and nets. The zodiac parked on its trailer, tubes deflated, waiting for summer.
The concrete so clean, unstained. He lets himself in the kitchen door and puts his valise down on the folding card table. The place where the magnum will eventually be, so it might as well be there now. Economy of movement. Some efficiency at the end.
He’s hungry, should have ordered food in the saloon. So it will be canned goods now, soup or chili. He opens the cabinets and stares at the choices, unable to decide. Bright labels and all unwanted. He decides finally on the chili, gets out a small pot and opens the can, so much like dog food, and waits for it to heat.
There’s no stereo, no TV. No couch, no comfortable chairs. Nothing hanging on any wall. No one living here. Only a kitchen that extends to the wide-open living room with a fireplace at the other end, made of green stone he brought from the ranch in California, a reminder of home. Upstairs three bedrooms, all empty, and their bathrooms and a hallway. A place that can make sense only if it’s filled.
He doesn’t want to wash a bowl, so he brings the pot to the table and puts it on an oven glove and eats directly. A bit spicy, and hunks of meat, steaming in the cold, not bad. Pulls the magnum out of the valise and sets the valise on the floor, reaches down for the box of shells. He slides this open on the table in front of the pot, the fat copper casings lodged in Styrofoam, .44 rem mag stamped on each ring outside the firing pin. Beautiful in their arrangement, and he pulls one out to look at it. The impossible weight of something so small. He can never get over how blunt the end, not coming to a point as rifle slugs do. This one is meant to tear and tumble and not go through easily at all. The plate of his skull will be smashed, not drilled.
He gets up to bring the phone over from the counter. A long enough cord to reach the table. Lifts the handset and starts to dial, then puts it back. He’s not sure what to say.
He finishes the chili quickly, wonders if he should have another can. But that seems like too much work. So late and completely silent here, and the house freezing. He’s still wearing his parka and gloves, waiting for the heating to do its job.
He’s too tired to do it tonight. That’s the truth. And it’s not like there’s any rush. Who cares whether he does it today or tomorrow? She might be asleep already anyway. He doesn’t want to hear Rich in the background. He’ll catch her tomorrow.
He finds a bag of chips and some peanuts and finishes his dinner with those. The brown vinyl of the card table, thin but slightly puffy, some sort of padding beneath. He sets the magnum perfectly in the center, as if mounted on display. Long barrel, and the grip looks stubby because everything else is so large, the enormous cylinder.
His head hurts so much in the cold. Unbearable to just sit here. So he walks upstairs to his bedroom and grabs codeine from behind the bathroom mirror and has two. Not something he can do all year or even all month, but he no longer has to worry about long-term effects. He should have tried all the recreational drugs. So many things he should have done.
He takes off his boots and parka, lies down in a big army surplus sleeping bag on the floor with an old pillow from hunting. Wears a beanie and also pulls the sleeping bag over his head, smelling his sour breath in close. All he can do is moan, the painkillers not kicking in yet.
He sees his thoughts begin, just setting out on another night of insomnia, one of thousands of nights like this, his body so exhausted and as soon as he rests his mind starts up. It’s a small building, concrete, with a low ceiling, and the long line of thoughts that have been waiting outside patiently begin shuffling in. There’s no room for them but they keep coming. That line is endless, and there are no rules about pressure, no limits. A thousand can pack into a space that should hold ten, and then a thousand more.
No clear connections, only crowding. Rhoda, mostly, desperate plans and regrets that still sting. Moments of decision. This last day not his first time seeing prostitutes. In such denial he could almost believe the ones in San Francisco were the first, but there were several here in Fairbanks, including the one that gave him crabs right before he visited Rhoda. Trying to lie to her, making up some story about the locker room bench, and of course she wasn’t fooled. Only his kids were fooled. But the moments when he took steps forward, calling the prostitute for instance. Why there was nothing to hold him back.
And the best moments with Rhoda, why there was nothing to make that remain. The summer in Gold Beach when they were building the boat, renovating a small house and working hard, always tired, but happy, too, dreaming of something together, fixing deviled ham sandwiches at the crappy little kitchen counter and playing grab ass. Sleeping on the floor then, too, in the same sleeping bag but too hot for summer, always throwing it off and sleeping naked wrapped around each other, the closest he’s ever been to anyone. Her daughter, Cinamon, down in California with the grandparents, so he had Rhoda all to himself.
His kids visited later, but only part of the summer, David making coffee at the yard and getting hooked on caffeine, which Elizabeth was not happy about. Ten years old and a caffeine junkie, with about ten spoons of sugar in every cup. Tracy only five then and stayed for only a week, but he took walks with her, held her hand, and she was always saying she loved him, so easy and full.
A summer he only wanted to get through at the time, the construction late and fishing season passing, but if he could go back he would make it last longer, extend that summer a few extra months, because maybe that was the last time he felt hope.
After the launch, it was all struggle at sea, the boat sabotaged with small holes drilled through the fish holds, so the fish never froze and earned only half price. Then the drum crumpling in the Aleutians and having to sell and go back to dentistry. It wasn’t all the struggle and disasters at sea but the return to dentistry, the return to the life he didn’t want. That was when the end began, and all the moments between now and then might as well be erased.
His former lives: a kid in the water, in the lake, then old enough to hunt, the ranch and bucks and birds, then high school and dating, college and meeting Elizabeth, dental school and the navy in Alaska and having a son, being a dentist in Ketchikan and cheating when Elizabeth was pregnant with Tracy, living in California separate from his kids, then the commercial fishing and Alaska again, Fairbanks this time, and how does one map onto the other? So different, each life. They can’t speak to each other. Even the times living in Alaska, each so different.
He doesn’t want this set of lives. He wants a new set. So tired of going over everything. Regret is finally boredom as much as anything else. If he could erase his memories, he would. And maybe that’s what he’s doing, maybe that’s the point of suicide.
He still doesn’t believe he’ll do it. That’s a fact. No matter how many times he holds that pistol, he doesn’t believe he’ll actually pull the trigger.
The sound of the heating, the air getting warmer, and the refrigerator coming on. No other sounds. No neighbors, no cars that would pass here, no animals at this time of year, everything hidden away. No wind even. All still. The only movement is the pain in his head, spiral after spiral, deadened a bit by the codeine and accompanied now by that pukey, sweaty feeling of the drugs. Some hollow disbelief at the lack of sleep, even after so many nights. And he’s too tired to get up and do anything. So he lies here a kind of waking mummy wrapped in despair. He weeps and weeps and his whole body hurts and the crying just will never end.