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In Places on the Run Ch. 01

By: Adrian Leverkuhn



Part I

It's hard to fathom how much we change as we amble onwards through life, but I reckon that's why we have memories. Who knows where we'd be without memories to keep us company as we cruise along the home stretch? It's a thought worth pursuing, but I'm unusually grateful for my mine but have you ever notices how easy it is to hold onto good memories? But then again, it's usually pretty hard to get rid of some of the really bad ones, too.

Anyway, I was lost in such puzzles while jump-seating across the Atlantic one July evening not too many years ago, lost in the effort of trying to figure out where I'd been headed in life the past few years. I'd just concluded I had no idea, really, just what the hell I'd been doing. Sitting on high, looking down at the clouds made trying to figure out where life might take me over the next few years really quite problematic. Troublingly so, I think, given the circumstances.

And excuse me, but I really shouldn't have said jump-seating, either. Not really accurate anymore. I'd been flying L-1011s for almost twenty years, first as an FO, with the last twelve in the left seat for TWA, but only a few months previous it had become apparent we were going to be absorbed by American. No big deal, I guess, but older Tri-Star crews were going to be retired, as it looked likely the L-tens were finally going to be phased out of service. 

Retired? Don't you just love that word. I was included in that number, by the by, which officially (and clearly) made me an 'old fart' -- despite my holding onto the absurd notion that I was still somehow just twenty one. I have to say now, looking back on that none too subtle matriculation that the whole 'getting old' thing was beginning to make me vaguely uncomfortable. Too old to be retrained on a new type, but still too young to retire, at least that's what they told me. Disposable is a better descriptive when you find yourself in these straits, even though that word hurts a little more -- when you get right down to it.

So, yes, I was firmly in the 'approaching 60' bracket when I'd booked this flight, and with more than a little spare time on my hands (re: no wife, no kids), I began to look at my options. Royal Jordanian and Gulf Air, two Middle Eastern carriers, had both offered me jobs -- and I have to say that while the pay looked good, the idea of living 'over there' really put me off my French fries. The more I asked around, too, the worse it seemed. Scary may be too much a word, but 'why risk it' always came to mind when I thought of living there. ATA, the US charter carrier, was still flying L-tens and so was a 'maybe', but their finances always seemed more than a little shaky to me. Still, the balance of my career would only last three more years, so maybe that carrier would be worth the gamble.

Still, I've never been much for betting. Especially with my career on the line.

Yet even with all these thoughts ranging around up there, there was one other thing bugging me. 

My gut. 

For months I'd had a bothersome pain in the lower part of my belly, and to put it delicately I'd had a change in pattern down there, and more than one FO had griped about flatulence issues in the cockpit. Small, enclosed spaces are, generally speaking, not the greatest place to float dank air muffins, and flying west across the Atlantic in daytime will earn you a place in the doghouse, no matter your seniority, when you're 'cutting cheese' every ten minutes. Air conditioning systems struggle to cool a cockpit when flying into the sun, and nice, ripping farts tend to linger in the system. Anyway, when you fart and your FO starts to gag -- then the Flight Engineer reaches for a barf bag, you know you've made the World Series. When you fart and your own eyes start watering -- well, it's time to get help.

So, one of my last acts while still on the corporate payroll was to see the Flight Surgeon, and she palpated the region and promptly scheduled a colonoscopy.

So, you say you've never had a colonoscopy? Well, at age 50 you're supposed to get one. I say 'supposed to', because from what I understand perhaps ten percent of us actually do, and I think that number is so low because having a colonoscopy is supposed to be, supposed to be, mind you, about as fun as having anal sex with a porcupine. You go to a gastroenterologist to have this done, by the way, and you go to his (or her) office for a pre-exam screening to see if the full procedure is warranted. So you fill out the paperwork then go to an exam room and wait. And it's a fun wait, because you know this whole thing (sorry) is going to be so much fun, and as a result your anxiety level is, well, elevated. But a fun kind of elevated, because odds are you have no idea who this new doc is. And so now there's the usual anxiety that goes along with having some strange dude taking a long, leisurely look-see up your asshole.

Let's take a pause here for some pertinent observations, and this is intended for the uninitiated - so hang in there. 

First things first: hands make a difference where assholes are concerned. If your doc's hands are nice and small, score that a ten out of ten. Women docs rule here, but finding a female GI is about as easy as scoring a date Gwyneth Paltrow. Medium sized hands are tolerable, but only just so. Large hands ought to cause you to break out in hives, while if you have any sense at all, hands the size of an NBA forward's should send you running from the room in outright despair.

Why, you might ask, should you be concerned with hand size if all the guy is going to do is ram a Roto-rooter up your ass?

Well, you'll soon find out during this initial "pre-procedure screening exam".

Another issue to ponder while you wait: if you want to remain on good terms with your GI, make sure you take a nice big dump before you go in to this first exam. And do not under any circumstances eat Mexican food right before your appointment. Really, that's just wrong.

Because after your nice, polite GI asks you all his endearing questions, he's going to go over to that little cabinet across the room and put on a pair of those nice purple gloves.

And you have a pretty good idea what's coming next, don't you?

Women at their Ob-Gyn have it nice, I guess, in comparison. There they are up in the saddle, legs in stirrups, having a polite face to face chat with their doc while having a large hard 'thing' shoved up their vaginas, maybe a pinch here and there as biopsies are sampled, and then it's all over but the waiting.

Not so during this first GI exam, because it'll go something like this.

Stand up and drop your drawers, begin contemplating life's various indignities. Turn around and lean over the exam table, try to ignore all thoughts of that last anal sex video you watched. Hold your breath, close you eyes. Shriek in terror when that cold glob of K-Y hits your clinched chute.

And try not to crack that nice joke, you know, the one where your doc's getting your cherry and you haven't even kissed. Listen closely as ignores you, try not to worry that he's already heard that one four times today, and hope he has a good sense of humor.

As the cold K-Y runs down your legs the guy is actually going to have the temerity to tell you to relax. Right. Like that's really going to happen. At this point your replaying every XXX anal fisting video you've ever seen, and just now breaking out in a cold sweat. You say you haven't seen one of those videos? Well hell, Paco, you just got no clue what's coming your way, do you? Hang on tight, and...

Enjoy. Those. Last. Few. Moments. Before...

...the first finger goes in, because unless you've been living with a dominatrix for the past fifteen years (sorry, not in my job description) you're in for a fun surprise. Hopefully you'll not have to endure much more than the one finger, unless your doc has very short fingers. If he does, then hang on, 'cause it's Star Trek time, meaning your doc is about to boldly go where no one has gone before. 

So, why all the anal action this first time on the table? Well, he'll palpate this region to feel for tumors inside the rectum, an area where the colonoscopy camera can be unreliable, and believe you me, when a fat fingered dude starts massaging the inside walls in that neck of the woods, well, you're going to know it. You're also going to want to kill your physician, but the mood will pass. Sort of.

Another thing you'll learn that day: back in the 90s colonoscopy cameras were huge -- like elephant butt-plug huge; these days they're still uncomfortably large, hence the first bit of news you'll receive is this: anesthesia is good. That's right, you'll be asleep. Not the same kind of 'asleep' you'd be if you were having "real" surgery, but asleep nonetheless. Blissful ignorance may be a better description, but ideally you won't remember anything.

So then, what's all the fuss about having a colonoscopy, you ask?

Indeed.

Well, let's add a new word to your vocab. "Prep." As in preparation for this little adventure, because this is where the real fun begins.

When your doc finishes his preliminary exam, and you'll know this when you hear those purple gloves (now covered with that dump you failed to take) hit the biohazard disposal bin, he'll give you some papers to take home with you filled with all the exciting the 'dos and don'ts' that apply starting about a week before your procedure. Common sense stuff like don't drink red colored fluids the day before, and no chunky jalapeños up to a week before, because all these things will interfere with getting a valid result. Not to mention keeping those in the procedure room from passing out in horror.

Anyway. He'll also give you a list of things to buy that you'll get to drink the night before your colonoscopy. My list included something called Go Lightly, and I sincerely hope whoever was responsible for naming this product roasts in Hell. Go Lightly? There's nothing lightly about the way you'll be going after you drink that shit, unless you want to consider this in terms of your movements between bed and toilet. You'll definitely want to go lightly then -- but really quickly, too -- beginning about a half hour after you drink your first container of that crud.

And now, here's some more really good news.

You're going to get to drink gallons of this stuff, and at timed intervals over a few hours. The stuff tastes like licorice flavored windshield wiper fluid too, in case you're wondering, which only adds to your general appreciation of the proceedings. Your first 32 ounce jug goes down with all the grace of a seizing epileptic whore; if your reaction is anything like mine you'll see Linda Blair when you look in the mirror. You remember Linda. The Exorcist's sweet little Linda "Your mother sews socks that smell" Blair? Rivers of split pea soup spewing from her rotating head? That Linda Blair?

Well, 30-45 minutes after you quaff that first jug you'll be directed to drink another, and I promise you'll look at that second jug long and hard before you do, because at about the half hour mark your stomach starts to rumble. Not those pleasant rumbles that come when you're a little bit hungry; no, this will feel and sound like you've just eaten out a Bolivian whore's ass. Your gut will be in full-fledged mutiny as you drink that second jug, and your very next fart will be somewhere north of earth shattering...but don't worry...because that fart will be your very last fart, and for quite a while, too.

So, do you know what a 'shart' is?

This is an important question as your second fart will, more likely than not, run down between your cheeks straight for the floor. This is a 'shart'. And I guess by this point you'll know why that disgusting prick named his sludge Go Lightly. Oh, if you're smart, you'll have checked into a hotel, and you'll have packed several boxes of pre-moistened ass-wipes -- along with twenty pairs of underwear. Yes, underwear. You'll need them to keep the goop 'up there' while sprinting from the bed to the toilet. It's disheartening when it runs down your legs. Take my word for it.

Jug three goes down a half hour later, but you'll probably drink this one while still seated on the throne. Your alimentary canal by this point is a one-way, non-stop chute, only when you poop now it will look and feel like an ICBM launch. Pure flaming water. Pure flaming high velocity water, about the color of fire, which is, you'll be thinking at this point, most fitting.

While jug three gets to work you'll begin to understand what it must be like for Catholics attending Mass. Up-down-up-down ad infinitum. As you put on fresh undies and sit on the bed in a cold sweat, the rumbling will begin just moments after you relax, then you'll debate the merits of 'sharting' one more time -- but recent experience will tell you otherwise -- but by then you'll be wondering if you have time to make it back to the toilet. Up you go again, on your tippy toes as lightly as you can, and you're already counting down to the next launch after this one.

After jug four, launches start coming as soon as you drag your sweating ass back to the bed. Oh, don't forget to change underwear between ascents, and do not, repeat, do not bend over to put them on. That high velocity water is hard to get off the walls.

+++++

So, I was sitting in business class thinking about my colonoscopy, remembering how I'd always thought Preparation H was for old people only, and thanking God the stuff really does work. My results were inconclusive, by the by, which turns out to be a polite way of saying there were suspicious lesions 'up there' -- and that another colonoscopy would be required in a few months.

Joy to the World. Can't wait. And that hotel has me blacklisted now, too. I guess all that shit on the ceiling was just too much.

So, I decided to drop off the radar for a while, to mull things over, and in the end (sorry) called my roommate from college. Sam Weiner. Yeah, I know, great name. Anyway, we talked for a while, three or four hours, I think. He'd had a hair up his ass (again, so sorry) about motorcycles for years, so of course that's all he wanted to talk about. I wanted to talk about my asshole, but he seemed resolutely uninterested. Imagine that?

Sam's wife had given up on him the year before, which was predictable, I think. Sam was a big man. Like 6'5" and 250, with really big (ahem) feet. He was big, like football player big, I guess you'd say, because he had been. First at Cal, then for the LA Rams. He'd gotten a few roles in the movies after he 'retired' (blown knee, concussions), but he was really more a writer and eventually got into screenplays. Oddly enough, he was good at that, too. Real good, as a matter of fact, and he had a sweet little house in the Palisades looking down on the PCH -- which he'd somehow managed to hang on to after 'le divorce'.

And he'd just finished his long bout with 'middle aged crazy' (red Porsche 911, penis shaped motorboat, gold chains over hairy chest) and felt ready to try something seriously insane, like buy a motorcycle and take a really long trip.

What, I asked him, did he mean by 'a really long trip'?

Turns out he had two versions of insanity in mind. North slope Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, or a simple circumnavigation. As in...pick up bikes in Munich and head for India, then Tibet and China, ferry the bikes to Alaska, then ride to New York and ferry them to France, then finish up in Munich.

"Are you out of your fucking mind," I think I said. Terrorists and kidnappers aplenty waited for anyone idiotic enough to try either route, not to mention a few extra war zones to traverse along the latitudinal route.

With these preliminaries out of the way, I asked about how long these trips might take?

The Americas trip? Maybe five months, though six or even seven seemed more likely. And the equatorial option, I asked cheerfully? Better count on a year, he said sheepishly, but hard to tell because the routing might turn out to be rather "fluid". 

Fluid, I asked? Just what did he mean by fluid?

Roads, he said. Wars too. Time off for hookers was mentioned more than once, and I mentioned something about taking time off for another colonoscopy -- and the prick actually laughed.

So now here I was, ass firmly planted in seat 14 A, looking out the window as Iceland approached somewhere in the ink down below, a shitload of riding gear in two checked duffel bags down below, a carry on bag loaded with cameras, helmet, and way too much medication for one white boy to be taking. Munich was still five or so hours ahead, and I was already feeling pretty nervous about the whole idea.

Sam was aft in one of the heads, by the way. Fucking the nineteen year old girl he'd asked to come along.

+++++

I know all this sounds improbable. Hell, being almost sixty years old sounded terminally improbable to me as I sat up there in that ancient 747. Being virtually unemployed, using up the last of my paid vacation and now burning through my retirement fund only added to the thrill. Being the odd man out in Sam's sudden triptych hadn't bothered me at first, yet now the thought of him screwing a teenager back there was beginning to grate on my nerves a little.

Not a good sign, if you know what I mean. 

I thought about that time when Sam was wooing me, that is trying to convince me to take this hair-brained trip, and how he'd kept up with variations on a single theme: "you only go around once" seemed to be the gist of his mental gymnastics, followed immediately with that oh-so-guilt-laden challenge, the one which happened to follow the contours of my thinking. This was the "better do this while we're still healthy enough" scalpel-thrust, which not coincidentally is like waving a red cape in front of a bull for someone who has just 'retired'.

And to think, it had been twenty years since I'd done any serious riding! This was a shining example of the mental acuity of any testosterone unhinged teenaged male taking charge. But at my age?

Which is, I think, where that inconclusive colonoscopy had begun fucking with my head. 

Hell, maybe I really was running out of time. Maybe it really was time to do something completely unhinged. Hells bells, I thought, let's go all out here. Maybe what I really needed was my very own nineteen year old girl to fuck back there in the lavs -- and all the way around the world.

And just as I was starting to think about a nymphomaniacal red-headed cheerleader sitting on my face, right in the dawning moments of a really nice daydream, two teenaged cretins began fucking with one of the flight attendants.

+++++

Her face was kind of familiar to me, now that I think about that day.

Her name was Rhea Petersen, and she'd worked more than a few flights with me back in the mid-90s, back when I was flying the New York/JFK to LAX run. She was cute back then, I remembered, and she looked cuter than ever as I watched the drama unfold. She was maybe 30 now, her long sandy blond hair braided in a thick bun. She was wearing glasses now, and had gained a couple of pounds but, like I said, she still hit all my buttons. She had been working up in First, but I'd seen her come back to the main galley when it was time to feed the rest of the cattle.

Anyway, there were a couple of true assholes across the aisle from me and one row ahead, and as Rhea came down the aisle the kid in the aisle seat held out a camera and fired a burst right up her skirt. The flash went off, Rhea screamed while she jumped back, and the kid held up his Canon and fired off another long burst on motor-drive, the flash cycling fast enough to keep up. The cabin suddenly looked like a disco, then people dead asleep woke up just in time to hear these bozos spouting off some really nice commentary about what they were going to do when they got this roll developed. Rhea asked the cretin to put the camera away, and of course he refused, thinking all this uproariously funny as he fired off another three round burst at her legs. I was unbuckling my seatbelt by that point, and could feel Sam standing in the aisle behind me when Rhea reached for the kid's camera. 


In Places on the Run Ch. 01



The kid yanked it back out of her hands and told her to 'fuck off', then stood and took a swing at her face. I was already up and hooked his arm in the crook of my elbow, and Sam had the kid in a snot-lock by the time I twisted him around. 

"Who the fuck are you?" the companion-cretin said at this point, taking time to add that they were both school and would 'sue our fucking asses off' as soon as they got home.

I think I told cretin number two my name was Roger Ramjet, and to be sure to bring the pictures to court, while Sam said something about the likelihood of their becoming lawyers after this was presented to any bar association in the country. Rhea put the camera in the overhead, then turned to me and asked me to follow her back to the galley.

"Anders?" she asked. "Captain Anders? Is that you?"

"Guilty as charged, darlin'."

"I thought so, but I couldn't tell for sure. Thanks for lending a hand. I'll need to fill out a report, and I'll need your help with that."

"No problano," I said more casually than I felt.

"Have you lost weight?" she asked.

"A little," I tried to smile, but that's never a good question to ask someone contemplating cancer.

"Wow, you're looking good!"

"Yeah? It's that new pizza and ice cream diet I started last month. You know, the Fat Beach diet..."

She laughed, pointed at her midsection and nodded agreement. "I know it well," she said.

"You're looking great," I said, and she blushed a little.

"You going to Munich," she replied. 

"In a way," I began, then I filled her in on Sam's idea of crazy.

"You are crazy!" she said as she laughed. "Did you quit flying?"

"Retired, I think, is the politically correct terminology these days. American doesn't fly L-tens, and doesn't want to train us old farts, so they bought us out instead."

"Me too, I guess. I couldn't reach the target weight by the deadline, so I got pink-slipped two weeks ago. This is my last go round."

"Sheesh," I think I managed to say. "How many years?"

"Eight."

"I'm officially out next month, mid-August. Just using up accrued vacation time now. Listen, you staying out at the Marriott?"

"Yes indeedy. Why?"

"We have a couple of rooms at the Bayerischer hof, and are planning to tear down the Hofbräuhaus tonight. Why don't you join us?"

"John, I can't afford that. Wish I could, though. Sounds fun."

"Afford what?"

"A room there, for one thing."

"I'll get you back to the Marriott, and if you're too toasted for that, I'll take the sofa."

So, there it was. Sometimes life turns on an impulse.

And then she said "You're no fun," and yeah, there it was again, all falling down right there in front of me.

"Well, alright then," I said with my widest grin flashing away like a neon light. "Why don't you get back to it. Let me know when you need me to fill out that paperwork, and we'll work out all the rest on the ground."

She came to me then and hugged me, said something about me being a lifesaver then melted back into the galley. I went back to my seat, intending to fill in the details for Sam, but I found him with his seat reclined, eyes closed, and a nineteen year old hand under his blanket pumping up and down like a West Texas oil well.

+++++

I hung around outside Customs waiting for Rhea, but when she hadn't shown up after a half hour I was about to hang it up and grab the U-bahn into the city. I'd just grabbed my duffels when I heard her calling my name, and I turned to see a red-faced, very distraught gal headed my way.

"I think they were going to fire me right there," she said when she'd caught her breath. "Only thing that saved my fat ass was your version of events. Thank God you were there!"

I leaned over and looked at her undercarriage. "Your ass ain't fat, darlin'. Far from it," I said as I looked at her legs.

"You're incorrigible," she said, grinning.

"And you're so cute it makes me weak in the knees." Point, game, match. Bigger grin, too.

She leaned into me and hit me with a kiss. A little tongue hit my lips, and it was like an electric shock opened me up. She pulled away after an hour or three, then looked me in the eye. "We'd better do something about that stiffness, don't you think?"

"You do that to me again and we'll be married by noon."

"Why don't you wait until you've seen me without my clothes on."

"Because I don't need to, darlin'. Now, let's go find a taxi."

+++++

Jet lag took care of the rest of that morning, and we napped 'til noon then walked the seven blocks to the Hofbräuhaus. Sam and his nymphette promised to uncouple long enough to join us in a few hours, but he winked at me as I pulled their door to. And I was going to head off around the world with this lunatic...

It had been a few years, to say the least, but I've always liked the simple atmosphere inside the Hofbräuhaus. The beer's always decent enough, the food workingman simple -- hearty and good. A few years after I started with TWA back in the 70s, I'd been FO on 727s flying from Munich to West Berlin for a few years, and had shared an apartment near the university with three other pilots. I loved this city as a result of many wild nights there, and felt more at home here than I had in LA or Boston. My German had held up over the years too, and like everywhere else I've traveled the locals warm up to you quicker if you make an effort to speak the local lingua. Being near fluent almost makes you family, however, and as a result I'd really enjoyed my time in Bavaria. The girls in München are something else, too. 

So Rhea and I settled in and ordered sausages and pretzels and enough beer to kill of a few dozen Marines, and before our food arrived at the table in walked Sam. Alone, too.

"Well, that was quick," I think I said. "Why don't you grab a litre and stick your dick in. You might be able to reload that thing quicker."

"No need. She's gone."

"Gone?" Rhea asked.

"Yup. Flown home to mommy."

"Nice, dedicated gal, I see." Actually, I think I did. "What did her in?"

"My dick," Sam replied with a wink.

"Remind me," I said to Rhea, "to tell you about his dick someday. King Kong ain't in it with this guy."

"No wonder she ran," Rhea laughed nervously.

"Y'all ordered food?" Sam asked, apparently too hungry to be upset.

"Wurst, kraut and pretzels," I said in kind.

"White ones, or the pink kind?"

"Every kind, I think," Rhea said as our waiter set a platter of sausages down on the table, along with huge bowls of hot potato salad and red cabbage. "Jesus!" she said as she took in the heaping platter.

"You better grab a stein, buddy, if you plan to keep up with us," I said as Sam grabbed a plate and loaded it up. He asked the waiter for a two liter stein, and the old fella rolled his eyes as he walked off.

"They got apple strudel here?" Sam asked.

"Count on it, slick."

"Any good?"

"If you've just come from America it'll be better than anything you've ever had. By local standards, it's decent."

"That's right. You lived here once upon a time..."

"You did?" Rhea asked. "When?"

"Late 70s. Munich, Berlin, Hamburg and back."

"Ooh, that must've been exciting."

"You're exciting," I said as I looked into her eyes. "Berlin was fun."

Rhea blushed again.

"What's going on here," Sam said. "Do I smell love in the air?"

"You smell sausage and mustard in the air, Sam. And the sauerkraut you smell is, well, it's the sauerkraut in your mustache."

"Damn, this is good grub," he said as he picked the kraut off his upper lip.

"It ain't LA," I shot back, glad to be back and feeling better by the minute.

"Amen to that," Rhea said.

"Oh no, you ain't going to go all Jesus freak on us, are you?"

Rhea smiled and leaned back in her chair. "Doubtful," she said, grinning.

"So, you known Anders long?"

"A few years, back in the day, right John?"

"Something like that," I said as I put two more death bombs on my plate, then another heap of potato salad. 

"You're not eating enough, John. Better take some of that red shit, and another one of those dildos."

"Plate's not big enough, Sam. And remember, He Who Stuffeth, Puffeth."

"I'm planning on puffing a lot, then."

"Are you two trying to kill yourselves," Rhea asked, grinning.

"Not with food, sweetheart'," Sam replied as he quaffed half his stein. "We're gonna use internal combustion engines for that trick."

"You picking up your bikes here?" she asked.

"Yup, at the factory."

"Beemers?"

"Yup."

"Then what?"

"We're taking an organized tour down to Greece," Sam began, "along the Croatian coast for a ways, then on to Athens. Then we're on our own to Istanbul. I guess we'll see what routes look good after that."

"You're seriously considering going to India? Overland?"

"Yup. No major wars in the region, now that the Russians are out of the picture."

"Iran?"

"We'll probably skirt north of there. Maybe try to cut through Afghanistan to Kashmir, then through India to Nepal."

"You guys are nuts, but it sounds like the trip of a lifetime...provided you can pull it off."

"You oughta come with us," Sam said, and Rhea laughed out loud.

"No way, Jay. Not this white girl."

"What are you going to do when you get back," I asked.

"Oh, Delta or United, I guess. They're both hiring."

"Shit, you get a pink slip too?" Sam asked.

"Yes."

"You like it?" Sam asked. "The work, I mean."

"Once you get used to it. It's even fun every now and then."

"You look like a nurse," he said. "Compassionate eyes."

"You know, she does," I remember saying. 

"Funny. That's kinda what I started to do," she said, "back in college. But TWA was recruiting on campus and I signed on the dotted line."

"So? Go back to school."

She chuckled. "Too much dinero, Sam. And I'm too old."

"You gotta be kidding. What are you, like thirty, thirty two?"

"Thirty."

"Oh, yeah. You're fucking ancient, that's what you are."

We laughed, but I could see gears and levers working up there in her head. We plowed through the platters of food, drank way too much 'weissbier', old German guys came by and flirted with Rhea -- who loved every minute of it, then we had strudel and coffee before walking back to the hotel. Sam went looking for hookers, so I took Rhea downstairs to Trader Vic's and we each had a couple of Suffering Bastards. We were by then well and truly bombed out of our minds, and held on to the walls all the way back to the room.

I don't know how many years it'd been since I'd had sex with a woman as well put together as Rhea, but it was fun for a while, then things got real serious, real quick. All of a sudden we were making love, not having sex, and soon our eyes were locked in deep conversation.

"Okay John. No clothes on now. You still wanna marry my fat ass?"

"Turn over."

She turned over, her glorious cheeks basking in the moonlight. 

I took them in hand and leaned close... "Okay, ass," I began. "What'll it be? You think an ass like you could live with an old prick like me? You wanna get married, or what?"

She was out of control at that point, laughing so hard she started to pee, so she dashed for the toilet, a little stream trickling on the carpet in her wake. I heard laughing for a while, then came the tears I knew were just waiting for her in the darkness, so in I went there too. I filled the tub with water and got in, then asked her to join me. 

She'd been watching me, I guess wondering what I was up to, but she came to me. She knelt in the water and cuddled-in beside me -- and we fit like a glove; I ran my fingers through her hair, felt her face on my chest as I rubbed her temple. She relaxed, and after a while I felt her letting go.

"What's on your mind, darlin'?"

"You weren't serious, were you?" she said at last, fighting through the beer and the rum, trying to laugh a little at her flailing insecurities.

"About getting married? Seems a little soon, don't you think?"

"Do you think you could love me, John?"

"You're lovable, that's for sure, and given some time, maybe a few more hours than we've already had, and maybe the L word would be the way to go..."

"So...you were just kidding?"

"No. No, not really. I like you, a lot. Always have," but on hearing that word I felt her tense up. "But Rhea, we haven't even spent a whole day together, and let's just ignore why Sam and I are here in the first place."

"I know, but I feel disposable right now. Get the old stew drunk, fuck her, toss her out the door with a 'goodbye and good riddance.'"

"That's not really how I feel, or what I want, kiddo. Because just maybe there's something between us worth holding on to."

"I hope so."

"Are you scared? About getting home and all?"

"A little, yes. It's hard to walk away from almost ten years of your life...and not know where you're going."

"Tell me about it."

"What are you going to do? I mean, after the trip?"

"I have a few ideas. Nothing firm yet. But, could I tell you something...?"

"Sure, John..."

"I'm kind of scared, really, about a lot of things, but I think I'm running from something I can't beat. A bad colonoscopy, as it turns out."

She lifted her head a bit on hearing that, and turned to look at me. "Bad? What does that mean?"

"Oh, just something, possibly something, they want to look at again. In a few months."

"Cancer?"

I shrugged. "Pre-cancerous lesions, I think they call them. Anyway, it's something I'm worried about."

She leaned into me, kissed my cheek. "You think I should try nursing school?"

"What's your background? School, I mean?"

"Bachelors in Biology. I was, well, a pre-med. At Tulane."

"Grades weren't good enough for med school?"

"No, they were fine, and I did well on the MCATs too. I just decided I wanted to do something fun."

"Now?"

"I still wonder if I'd be a good doc, I guess. It's like this huge question mark that hangs over my head all the time."

"What would you need to do to apply again?"

"Some academic refreshers, take the MCATs again."

"Are you okay on money? I mean, could you afford to take the time off to do that?"

She shook her head. "Not really. But I need to look into it a little more."

I held up my wrist, looked at my watch. I'd have to take her out to the airport in a few hours, and then what? Say goodbye, walk away from her? Oddly enough and against all reason, I really didn't want to -- not yet, anyway. There was something about this girl that had grabbed me by the heartstrings, and watching her leave was now the last thing I wanted to do.

And then she leaned in again and kissed me...and that was it, really. The intensity of the emotion hit me hard and left me breathless.

"I do..." I whispered. "Oh God, I do..."

"You do what, fly-boy?" she said so softly, almost lovingly, then she gently bit my lower lip.

"I can't let go of you, Rhea. I just can't."

"So don't," she said, and right inside that moment I was convinced I never would.

We talked the night away, you see. I asked her to think about school. I let her know my house in LA was available, that she could move in and in-effect house-sit while I was on the trip. I told her I'd be back there in a month or so for my second colonoscopy, and that it would be good if she was there. I didn't ask for any decisions or commitments, just offered her a way forward -- together -- if that's what she decided she wanted.

And as such, we made our way to love that night. Everything happened so fast, both our pasts had come undone so completely, and so quickly, and in that rush there was hardly any way to come to terms with what we had found. Certainly not in the time we had left that night.

The ride out to the airport was difficult, and we sat in silence all the way. I went with her to dispatch and got the low-down on the report she'd filed, and when we walked out of there we were both glad this part of her life was drawing to a close. 

The other funny thing? As we were both so used to being alone, neither of us was very good at 'saying goodbye'. Things were so 'up in the air', too: would she get home and change her mind, move on to other opportunities? Hell, would I get so wrapped up in this trip that I forgot about her? As I walked with her to the screening area all I knew was that she had really gotten to me. Sure, she turned me on physically, but more than that...she suddenly felt like 'home' to me, and that was really the most unexpected thing that had happened. I knew now I wanted to know her better, and was prepared to spend a lifetime doing just that -- if she was. I told her that, too, and she started to cry.

We got to the screening line and I kissed her cheeks. We whispered sweet nothings to each other, then she was gone. I watched her walk off down the concourse and suddenly felt hollow inside.

"So, this is what it's like to feel alone," I said, perhaps a little louder that I knew. "Well, better late than never."

+++++

Sam and I met up with the folks from the motorcycle touring company we had chosen to take us as far as Athens, and from there we went out to the BMW delivery center and picked up our bikes, big, brutish looking R1150GS off-road models, both white with blue accents on the tank. Mine had two-tenths of a mile on the odometer, and was spotless. Extra cases had been added, extra lighting too, and a towering tank bag was already strapped in place, ready to load.

I walked up to my beast and walked around it a few times, guys from the delivery center looking on expectantly. 

I turned to Sam, who was similarly engaged. "These things are huge!" was about all I managed to say before I climbed up onto the saddle.

"Fuckin'A!" the ever articulate Sam replied. He wrote action movies...what can I say?

The delivery team checked that our licenses and insurance were in order, then we followed the tour company rep through the city back to the hotel.

"We'll meet you here at 0800 Friday," a burly, red-faced fellow named Gunther Strauss told us, then he roared off through traffic on his company Beemer.

"I think we ought to try to get these in a garage somewhere," I said to Sam as the enormity of the trip ahead began to sink in, "then try to pack our gear on board."

"Yup," he replied.

"We've only got tomorrow to iron out the bugs, know what I mean?"

"I need to get laid," was his only concerted reply. "Soon."

"Dude, have you had your testosterone checked lately? You're unfucking-believable."

"Hey, Ace, I don't get off two, three times a day I start to get weird."

"Start to? You serious? Find any good hookers around here last night?"

"A couple."

"That all? Did you get separate checks, or do 'em together?"

He grinned, winked at me before shrugging his shoulders playfully.

"This is going to be an interesting trip, Sam. Hope you brought lots of rubbers."

"Couple hundred, Amigo. And I might loan you one, too, if you ask real nice."

The hotel had a parking garage, as it turned out, and we ended up strapping lots of smaller bags onto all three of our hard cases. When Gunther and company picked us up Friday morning our bikes looked like elephants getting ready to cross the Alps...which is precisely where we were headed.

*

End C1 [(c)2015 Adrian Leverkühn | ABW] 



In Places on the Run Ch. 02



In Places on the Run

II

We left Munich on the E45 towards Rosenheim, bound for Salzburg – and though Austria wasn't all that far away this short ride would give Sam and I time to get used to European roadways – not to mention the riding habits of the fifteen other riders in our group. Most were Brits as it turned out, though there were a handful of Americans along, as well. Two women were making the trip, both riding their own Beemers; one from Cambridge and the other from the Copenhagen. Sam had already scoped out the Dane and had a serious case of lust growing before we left the hotel.

Which was appropriate, really. After being with him the better part of a week, he'd nailed at least seven different women that I knew of, four of them probably hookers. Sam was a weird one, I guess I think I'm trying to say. Not simply because he couldn't keep his zipper up, either. He and women had a peculiar relationship, and a simple understanding developed between he and his 'female friends' almost immediately. He was alpha, if you know what I mean, as in alpha male. Almost a decade in the NFL had given him a sort of name recognition too, at least in the states, but that alone didn't account for his single-minded interactions with the opposite sex. I always thought it was some sort of weird animal magnetism, because Sam usually exuded a type of wolfish confidence that seemed to drive the women he met either right up the wall or right into his arms. Whatever it was, I didn't question it, really. That peculiar attraction was always on hand, whether it was convenient or not. And while it was rarely convenient, it was always entertaining, and had been since we were teenagers.

Riding on German autobahns after having not ridden at all for twenty years was an eye opener, too. Usually three lanes wide, the outside lane for trucks and cautious drivers only, the inside lane was a land unto itself, the prowling ground of hypersonic Porsches and S-Klass MBs. That left the middle lane for our group, and though we were rolling along at a constant 120 KPH we were being passed regularly by missiles to our left. The border crossing was a non-event and we were into Austria before our coffee had time to make it through the system. As we approached Salzburg, Gunther signaled and our group tightened formation, then we were on surface streets headed into a little village called Grödig. The village was on the outskirts of Salzburg and we'd be there for one night only, and after Sam and I got to our room and changed we headed out to ride the cablecar up the Untersberg. The Dane was on that cablecar, and Sam made his first attempt to scale that summit. Crash and burn time. She wasn't his type, obviously, or so he said, but I wasn't so sure.

Great view up on the mountain, no doubt about it, but it was windy as hell and cold too; not so good for people stupid enough to make the trip wearing shorts and a polo shirt, I guess. Anyway, we had dinner as a group that night, and it turned out to be another one of those interesting intersections we come upon every now and then. La forza del destino, and all that.

All this was going on, mind you, in the years before iPhones and the ubiquitous texting and emailing we take for granted these days. That said, I called Rhea and she was not doing very well. Very depressed. Almost flat broke. And she'd gained a couple of pounds after our blowout in Munich and had to get them off before she applied with either Delta or United.

"What about heading out to LA?" I asked, and that seemed to set her off – big time.

"John, I just can't move in to your house, you know, and I sure can't afford to take time off and go back to school right now. And who knows where I'll end up being based, assuming I can even get on with either of them."

"You know, to me it almost sounds like the perfect time to cut the cord."

"And how would I afford that, John?"

"You can pay me back someday."

Silence.

"Rhea?"

"I heard you."

"Are you broke? Is that about the size of it?"

"Close. I'll get a few months severance, but I'll have to make my insurance payments, COBRA I guess they're called."

"How much?"

"Insurance is about 200. My car payment is close to 300. With rent and student loans, my overhead is close to 1200 a month."

"So, without rent and all that other BS, your liabilities are under a grand?"

"Yup. Maybe six or so."

"Did you do your homework on the med school stuff?"

"Not yet. First thing tomorrow."

"Is that something you still think you'd like to do?"

"If it was affordable, yes. I guess I think I've had all the fun I can handle."

"Okay, let's see what it looks like. We'll be in Athens a week from tomorrow, assuming no road rash or other fun stuff. Another week to Istanbul, maybe less, then I'm heading back to LA. Why don't you plan on meeting me there two weeks from Monday; you can help me get through this GI stuff and then we can work out all your options. That sound good to you?

It almost sounded like she was crying, then she asked me why I was doing this, taking all this on.

"Look, Rhea" I said, "I never married, never had kids, and I'm actually pretty frugal, for a guy, anyway. The worst thing that can happen here is that I help bring another doctor into the world, you know? That's good for everybody...you, me, well – everyone. It's a win-win situation. And I end up married to a doc. See, I'm being selfish, when you get right down to it!"

She laughed at that, and I told her I'd call before we crossed into Croatia, probably tomorrow night if things stayed on schedule – from the city of Villach. We rang off and I went to dinner.

The Dane was next to Sam at our long communal table when I got back to the dining room, and there was a huge bowl of goulash soup waiting for me. Some sort of schnitzel followed, and of course – lots of beer. I spent the evening getting to know the other group members, and it looked like Sam was making headway with the Danish gal. Unfortunately, Sam and I were sharing a room which of course meant if he got lucky I'd be in the lobby sleeping on a couch.

And I met the Brit, the other lady in our group. Deborah Green was from Cambridge, taught biochemistry in one of the colleges there and also at a med school in London. She was about my age, that is to say she was quite adventurous to be riding a motorcycle in the first place, and she was obviously smart enough to know better, so I was – curious. She was about my height, too, over six feet, anyway, thin as a rail, and bless her, she looked as though she'd just bitten into a rock hard lemon. Her pale lips seemed to be locked in some sort of weird pucker, her eyes watered constantly, and I had never, ever seen anyone with bonier hands. I swear the skin on the tops of her hands was almost completely transparent, and the veins on the top stood out like nothing I'd ever seen before.

I dwell on her appearance now to offer some idea of the contrast between her appearance and her personality, for as these things so often turn out, she was without a doubt the nicest, warmest person I'd run across in years. And yes, I was immediately taken with her. Not romantically, of course, and not just because it felt like I'd known her for years – after just a few minutes, or because after about fifteen minutes together I knew she was beginning to feel the same towards me. We had a certain chemistry, and after dinner we slipped into the small bar and ordered Irish coffees – that is as soon as it became apparent Sam and the Dane were headed upstairs together. Well, yes, it turned out the two women had been assigned the same room, and were in effect roommates now. Stranger things have happened, I guess, and like random stones tossed in a still pond, ripples have a way of spreading in unpredictable patterns.

So we sat and watched ripples form and disipate, and we discussed the problems of the world until Sam came down for a nightcap. Sam was very happy indeed, and a while later we were all off to bed for an early departure the next morning.

There were two routes mapped out mapped out for us, one down a serene autobahn directly to Villach, while the second provided a more, ahem, twisty option: the Grossglockner Highway. Of course everyone decided to do the latter, as it's one of the premier alpine roads in all the world, as well as the highest in Austria. We were off before 0800, headed for the entrance.

As these things usually do, the Dane paired off with Sam, while Dr Green tucked in behind me at my four o'clock, and the four of us made great time on the straights. I was beginning to have my doubts about the Dane as we hit the curviest bits of the highway, but as we began the serious part of the ascent near the summit she consistently picked the wrong line through the curves and ran wide a couple of time; luckily there was no oncoming traffic. We stopped off at the Kaiser Franz Joseph visitor center near the summit for coffee and a pit stop, took in views of the surrounding glaciers, then mounted up for the ride down. I have never been on a road quite like the next stretch we encountered, and I had done the Beartooth in Montana and Alberta's Columbia Icefield Parkway with Sam while in college, so I feel qualified to say that the Grossglockner put both of those premier alpine roads to shame. However, and this is a biggie, this first pitch was not a road for the inexperienced or the faint-hearted, as 'serpentine' doesn't do this stretch justice. No, this road was a roller coaster, and in the course of arcing through one of the most bizarre, undulating curves I'd ever traversed, the Dane missed the line and went down. Hard. 

Deborah, being a doctor of some sort, called it: the Dane's left humerus and clavicle were toast. An ambulance was summoned, and Gunther set about organizing her evacuation, as well as her motorcycle's, and that was that. One down, sixteen to go. That's the thing about motorcycles: they're actually really dangerous in the hands of people with little real world experience. Or people who pretend they have a lot of real world experience, which we surmised was the case with our Dane. We followed our chase vehicle down the pass then made for Villach, getting there much later than expected. Our little group was quiet that night, but after dinner Sam set off in search of company. Deborah rolled her eyes; she had him figured out already.

I called Rhea, and she was in a real funk. She was going to need to retake five courses, as well as sit for the MCAT again. Probably a year involved, academically at least, and assuming she pulled down high enough grades she'd need time to study for the exam, so maybe 12-14 months, then the balance of the second year to wait for admissions interviews and then, hopefully, for classes to start. So, call it two years. We talked about the logistics and I tried to be as upbeat as I could, and maybe I left her feeling a little better about life, but she had her work cut out for her.

Deborah was waiting for me when I got off the phone and I told her about Rhea, and her dilemma. She had a few ideas, as it turned out, about trying to get into a school in the UK. As we talked, I noticed she was looking at me a little differently. A little more, I don't know, analytically, like she was wondering what the Dickens I was doing with a thirty year old girlfriend, and trying to help get her into med school.

+++++

Our third day on the road promised to be our most 'interesting' yet; we were leaving the EU so we were in-effect leaving NATOs "protective umbrella", and though active hostilities had ceased between Serbia and Croatia, we were headed into what had been – not so long ago – a war zone. Lingering resentments in the region were simmering, and even if we were 'just tourists' passing through, there was supposed to be real risk riding through the area.

We made Trieste by mid-morning and crossed into Slovenia, then cut south for the Croatian coast, bound for port town of Sibenik. Once we hit the Dalmatian coast in Croatia the world around us changed dramatically: forests, lakes, waterfalls everywhere, hundreds of islands just offshore, and very light traffic...so we made very good time, if you know what I mean.

Sibenik was something altogether new in my experience. The feeling about the town was simply medieval: narrow cobbled streets, an ancient cathedral at the center of the town, a waterfront that seemed purpose built to accommodate renaissance-era Venetian merchant ships (which was true, I learned), but the people there were struggling to rebuild their city after a war-time siege just a few years earlier. Tourism was 'new' here, too, at least as far as westerners were concerned. After decades under communist rule, 'free enterprise' was still something new to these people, and facilities were modest, though seriously lovely. This mystery, this unpredictability, seems to me to be part of the magic this kind of travel affords.

Sam was off the bike and on the prowl almost immediately; it had been two days since he'd been laid and he was getting grumpy. I unpacked and grabbed my Nikon and was about to head off towards the waterfront when Deborah caught up with me and asked if she could walk along with me.

Riding with a group brings people together in a hurry, whether they want to or not. I guess it has something to do with shared experience, combined with the ever present risks of riding a motorcycle. Whatever the reason, as Deborah had pretty much attached herself to me while riding, we were as a result spending more and more time together...at gas stations, at scenic overlooks, when eating meals, and now, when off sight-seeing – as she was with me just then – and she was always talking. Not annoying really, but it was apparent to me she was lonely, and beginning to take certain things for granted. Like me wanting her company.

Yet she was bright. More than that, really; she was educated – in the classical sense of the word, and in a way, she was a real change from the women I'd been with over the years. Being single has it's advantages, I guess, and being in places on the run all my life I'd rarely formed lasting attachments, and I assumed as we walked along Deborah would fall neatly into this way of being. After all, within a week we'd be parting ways and that would be that, but she seemed to know everything about the area, and she didn't mind me stopping to photograph the little things we ran across. In short, she seemed to me a classic Brit; insatiably curious, impossibly well educated, and a born walker. 

Me? I didn't know, at the time anyway, much about the classics, and what I'd seen of the world I'd seen from from six miles up while passing over at five hundred knots. I was conversant in FMS programming and how to navigate using inertial navigations systems, I could talk endlessly about redundant electrical buses and ruptured hydraulic systems, but if you put me in a conversation about gothic architecture or Italian opera all of sudden I became a listener, not a participant. Deborah was a bridge to that world, I soon learned, and I began to enjoy listening to her. I began to see that world out the window.

So it hit me as we walked along...how much of the world I'd 'seen', and how little I'd learned along the way. Now here I was in the thick of things, and with a particularly good teacher leading the way. She talked, I began asking questions, and she led me deeper. We went to the Cathedral of St James and I had my first lesson in sacred architecture; I'd gone through life completely oblivious to the geometry and symbolism of these structures, but then, under Professor Green's tutelage, I grew more than a little interested. What amazed me most was her understanding of seemingly everything around us.

We made our way from the cathedral to an open air market, walked through the stalls looking at all the various flowers and foods, then found a sidewalk café and sat in the sunshine and had coffee, and Deborah never really stopped teaching.

Something odd happens between first impressions and getting to know someone a little better: you get used to all the imperfections and flaws you thought you saw on first glance, and things you hardly noticed begin to take on new, more interesting aspects. Deborah had kind eyes, compassionate eyes, eyes like Rhea's, though the constant watering troubled her. And another thing: she wasn't skinny. She was lean, fit, and had a serious walker's legs. She was a biochemist, and also a physician, though she spent most of her time working in the laboratory or teaching, and rarely saw patients.

She'd been married once, back in the eighties she told me, but it hadn't lasted long and she'd retreated into the solace of all encompassing work after the dust settled. Time worked it's magic and now here she was, just turned fifty and taking a six-week holiday for the first time in years. She'd taken up motorcycles at college and had always loved riding; it was her one vice, she said, 'the thing she did' to get away from all the cares of her world, and she told me she planned to take a ferry from Athens to Izmir after the tour, then work her way back through eastern Europe to Calais, then home.

We walked back to the hotel and up to our rooms; when I unlocked the door to my room the first thing I saw was Sam's hairy ass pile-driving up and down into some gal, her legs over his shoulders. Deborah was behind me and saw the spectacle; she rolled her eyes and opened the door to her room and started to go inside, then asked if I wanted to come inside with her. I declined, told her I needed to call Rhea, and that I'd see her at dinner.

And of course, I didn't. She didn't handle rejection well, I guess.

+++++

We had a short ride to Dubrovnik scheduled the next day so got a "late start"; Deborah paired off with another couple from the UK and ignored me all morning, and I wasn't surprised. Maybe I'd ignored the signs, or maybe single men and women can't pair up and not have sexual tensions develop. Or maybe I'd given off signs? If I had, well, I was clueless if I had, or maybe I was too caught up in the scenery... 

If you've not been to this part of the world, you've missed out seeing one of the most scenic coastlines in the world. Medieval villages line the coastal road, each more gorgeous than the one before, and we stopped on the outskirts of Split for coffee – which must have been one of the most scenic places on earth – until modern development hit, anyway. Gorgeous medieval neighborhoods had been consumed by high rise hotels and apartments, and the waterfront area was being industrialized. Change breeds change, as the saying goes, but still...it was hard to see such beauty pushed aside.

Deborah must've worked it out of her system because she rejoined me for coffee. We talked as if nothing had happened, for indeed, nothing had, and her running commentary seemed to take over where she'd left off. Sam, on the other hand, seemed to be taking an active dislike of the woman and ignored her, but I couldn't, not really. I actually enjoyed listening to her, and I guess that's what she'd picked up on the day before. As we left town, she was once again tucked in close on my four o'clock – like that's where she belonged, or where she really wanted to be. When Sam saw that, he passed me and sped off to the head of our little convoy, and I could see him shaking his head as he roared by.

We pulled into Dubrovnik late that afternoon, after one of the most exhilarating rides of my life. Surreal roads, sharp twisties and long sweepers in a roller coaster succession, all dotted with more villages, more forest waterfalls, and one absolutely brutal thunderstorm that ranged up the coast and just missed us, leaving gusty conditions that made for an 'interesting' ride...really wild, as a matter of fact.

We entered Dubrovnik as the wind and rain cleared, leaving a wild, storm tossed sky to frame the medieval wall that surrounded the old town on the waterfront. To say I fell in love with the town would be an understatement, and the tour company had us in a small seaside hotel right outside the wall. They'd also scheduled a day off for the next day, giving those who wanted a full day in that magical setting time to explore. 




In Places on the Run Ch. 02



With only an hour before dinner, Sam and I settled into our room and he showered while I loaded more Kodachrome in my F5, but I felt light headed, more than tired. After I showered I went down to the dining room and found Sam was already AWOL, off in search of more interesting company. I sat and moments later Deborah was sitting down beside me. Soup, fish, more fish, and before dessert came I felt her hand on my thigh, tentatively at first, then more frequently. I tried to ignore the first few incursions, but as she moved up my leg the sensations emanating from my groin became harder to ignore. C'est la vie, I suppose.

"Are you okay?" she asked me at one point, and her hand came off my thigh and went to my forehead. "You're pale."

"I've felt better."

And her demeanor was completely different as we left the dining room. A caregiver, very concerned at that, sat beside me now. The air was cooler after that storm moved through, and as we walked outside the sun was just setting. I looked at the evening sky, flickering torchlight dancing on vast medieval walls, and then at all the little boats in the harbor...it all conspired to create an unbelievable canvas of sight and sound, and as Deborah walked out with me she took my arm. I knew where this was going, I said to myself. She knew enough about Rhea to make her move; I think she assumed Rhea and I were so 'new' that she had room to maneuver, that we weren't yet a committed couple and I might slip up.

If that's what I thought she was thinking, I was so wrong.

We settled onto a bench by the breakwater and she started talking about Rhea, how she'd been thinking about the problem and how she might have a solution. She could, she said, help her along, in effect sponsor her, and if she was bright enough, she might take her on as a research assistant to help her gain experience before school started.

Why, I asked, would she do this? Why would she do this for someone she'd never met?

Because, she said, she liked me, and didn't want to lose me as a friend.

"A friend," I replied. "What does that mean?"

"Well, maybe more than a friend, from time to time."

I really didn't know how to respond to her. So what. she wanted a part-time lover, and wanted to help my girlfriend in order to achieve that? Up to that point I'd not mentioned my gastrointestinal adventures, so I thought it was about time to get her up to speed. She listened, carefully asked me questions, guided me past all the bluff and bravado and on into a long talk about my concerns, my fears, then on to my retirement and what I might do if I remained healthy enough to work.

About halfway through our talk she took my hand in hers and held it gently, and she never once let go. When we started to get chilly, when a cool evening breeze swept down from the mountains, I told her about flying home from Athens and undergoing another colonoscopy, and she leaned into me and kissed me. On the cheek that first time, but she kissed me on the lips a moment later, then she sat back and soaked in the last of that glorious sunset.

"I want to go back with you, to Los Angeles," she said. "I want to meet Rhea, and I want to be there to ask questions after your procedure. If you're up to it, we'll fly back together and we can head to Istanbul together."

"But..." I began...

"And don't worry about Sam. I'll take care of him."

"You're pretty smart, aren't you?" I whispered. "I mean, you don't miss very much."

She smiled, a gentle, knowing smile. "Thanks for opening up to me, John. I think you needed to say these things as much as I needed to hear them. Now, let's get back to the hotel before I freeze to death..."

Of course, Sam was wild at it again so I went to Deborah's room. I felt a little light-headed again and lay down; Deborah reverted to physician mode and began palpating my belly, now asking physician's questions. Did my belly feel full, had I been making poo regularly. Yes, and no I said. Could I try and go now, she wanted to know. I could try, I said, and she walked with me to the bathroom, got me situated, then left me to it. 

"Let me know when you're through," she said, "and don't flush. I need to take a look."

This turned out to be easier said than done, but nature took it's course and when I asked her to come take a look I stood aside like a proud father and we looked down into a toilet full of blood.

"That's about what I expected," she said. She got me back to bed then left the room. I was half asleep when she came back, and Sam was with her, and Gunther, too. They helped me downstairs, and into the waiting taxi. 

It was a short ride to the hospital.

+++++

My perspective duly altered, we left Dubrovnik as scheduled, but I missed the day of sightseeing. 

I was transfused, x-rayed and generally molested by a platoon of slavic speaking physicians, but they didn't have the imaging technology on hand to make a definitive diagnosis. They concurred with Deborah: get me back to the states and to an MRI facility, preferably within a few days, a week at most. They cleared me to finish the ride to Athens and cut me loose, and by the time that happened I found that Deborah was now Sam's best friend. 

No, I realized, not that way. She was my protector in his eyes now, and he saw she wasn't competing against the idea of our trip. Besides, Sam was simply unable to contemplate sex with anyone older than 30. Under 20 seemed his preference as far as I could tell, so Deborah was safe. Even so, it was fun to see the change in him, for she had indeed taken care of him.

The next segment of our trip was to take us into Greece, to Thessaloniki, by way of Albania and Montenegro, and this segment was to be the longest, most difficult of the ride so far. As we made our way inland the temperature rose steadily, the roads became rougher, and the landscape relatively speaking more drab. Rolling hills, lakes, farmland, sheep walking in the road, long distances between stops, and though I was feeling decent enough I knew by midday this stretch was going to take a lot out of me. To make matters even more interesting, my ass now felt like it was on fire, but then again so did Sam's, Deborah's, and everyone else's in our group.

Deborah kept us hydrated all morning, which was crucial as it turned out, but when we stopped at the crossing into Greece we ran into an overtly officious type who wanted to know what was wrong with me. Language difficulties made things worse, but after an hour we were cleared. The roads improved somewhat, we made better time, anyway, but made it into Thessaloniki well after dark. Sam bunked solo and put me in with Deborah, and that was that. She had truly become a part of our little family when that happened, but now he was free to head out in search of hookers.

Deb filled me with juice and a lemon-orzo soup that I couldn't get enough of, and all I recall about falling asleep that night was that she was by me in bed, scratching and rubbing my head. I put my hand on her leg at one point and I sensed what might have been an orgasm pass through her body. Needless to say...I had a few interesting dreams that night.

The remaining trip to Athens was by way of Volos, and there were plenty of side trips scheduled along the route for those so inclined, but I wasn't up to it by that point. The ride the day before had really wiped me out, and I could tell Deb was getting more concerned about me with each passing hour, and Gunther was now riding near me, the chase van behind me...just in case.

While in Volos I rescheduled my flight to LA and got Deb's ticket arranged, then called Rhea and told her what was happening, and what the new plan was. She asked if she should come to LA, and I told her she'd better be there or else. That seemed to settle the matter, but I could see the contours of a messy triangle shaping up. Even then, however, I didn't see Deborah as some naïve provincial bundled up in a careless wad of neuroses, but her motives continued to elude me. Still, what do men really know about women?

I vaguely remember the ride into Athens, and Gunther led us straight to our hotel. He and Sam got my bike into storage, Deborah's too, because I was out of it by that point. I learned later I hit the bed in that hotel and went straight out, but I had no idea, no memory of the day. I woke up in the middle of the night, got to work on our flight to the states; as I was still, technically, employed by the airline I was able to get Deborah seated with me from Heathrow to JFK and on to LA, but we were apart from Athens to London. Sam helped get me to the airport and checked-in, and airline personnel helped me onto the plane, but what I do remember most was how frantic I became when it hit me I was not seated next to Deborah.

I think about that moment a lot now. How quickly I'd became so dependent on Deborah, and how that shaped events in the weeks and months to come. 

We arrived in LA well after midnight the next day, and made the short hop to my house by taxi. I'd half expected Rhea to be there by now, but the house was dark and I wondered what had happened to her. I was passing a lot of blood by then, light-headed most of the time and Deborah was certain my blood pressure was down in the weeds. Instead of waiting for my doctor's office to open, she decided it was time to head to the ER, so another taxi ride later we arrived at UCLA Medical Center in Westwood. Deborah relayed the past week's history and a resident went about ordering tests. Four hours later, with labs in and my MRI reviewed by radiologists, the verdict was in. Tumor markers were present now, and the MRI revealed one very suspicious area, an area the colonoscopy had missed completely, and in the opinion of the radiologist, it was cancerous. The prudent option was immediate surgery; Deborah agreed, and in fact so did I. 

I was admitted, taken upstairs and scheduled. They wanted to take a day and transfuse me once again, start some medications, but I lay there looking at the contours of my life, how rapidly every expectation I'd ever had about growing old was shattering right before my eyes. I woke up the next morning unsure whether I even wanted to have the procedure, and I put it down to having almost always been in control of everything consequential in my life – and now 'control' was proving to be at best a hateful illusion. My fate now rest in the hands of people I didn't know, had never met, and the very impersonal nature of this most personal event left me feeling more and more vulnerable with each passing moment. Deborah was gone too, home I suspected, but the nurse on duty didn't know and I grew more depressed as the morning went on. A gastrointestinal resident came in, asked questions I couldn't answer, then a nurse-anesthetist came in and gave me the low-down on what to expect beginning around three the next morning.

Deborah arrived mid-morning with Rhea in tow, and I told Deb about the resident and his unanswered questions. There were dark circles under Rhea's bloodshot eyes; she'd been sleepless since Sam called from Athens and was beside herself she'd been unable to get to LA in time to meet our flight. 

And I'll tell you the damnedest thing about that morning. Like it was the most natural thing in the world, these two women were on either side of my bed, each holding a hand, each encouraging me, each promising to help me through this, and I was left wondering what in the world was going on. Looking at them both by my side was completely surreal. A week ago I was living a completely different life...and now? 

Yet the three of us spent the day talking about Rhea's future, but I drifted out to the surreal fringes of the Twilight Zone. I watched these two strangers blueprinting lives, somehow including me in their calculations, but what got me in the end was Deborah's encouraging Rhea to go for her dream. And to stand by me while I went through this. Like watching a tennis match, my head went from one side of this evolving conversation to the other, but I had a hard time keeping up with the score. I listened as Deborah explained all the differences between medical educations in the US and the UK, and what she, Deborah might be able to do help should Rhea decide to pursue a degree in the UK. Rhea volleyed back with concerns about how she might or might not fit into the UK's scheme of education. It was a fascinating discussion, really, like watching two competing Wills coming to terms with a constantly shifting reality, but what they were talking about really didn't concern me now. Or so I thought. 

Deb excused herself at one point, said she was going to talk to that resident and answer his questions, but I suspect she wanted me to have some time alone with Rhea. I watched their eyes during this exchange, and Deborah seemed to hover over the knife blade of her own indecision. 

"She loves you, you know," was the very first thing Rhea said to me after the door closed behind Deborah.

"Maybe," I managed to say. "But the only thing I want to know is do you love me? Enough to go through this, I mean?"

I watched her face as I asked that question, and the first thing I saw was her eyes. They filled with tears and she flew into my arms and everything I felt for her in Munich came screaming back and hit me square in the heart. I held onto her so tightly it hurt, and before I knew it I was crying, then our lips got into the act and soon we were saying the most incredible things. She moved to sit beside me on the bed and I moved into the deep green pools of her eyes. 

"So," I began, "about Deborah."

"You just answered all my questions, Captain Anders. It'll never come up again."

"I don't know what's going on with her, not really. We were tossed into a very adventurous situation, and we grew close, but that's not all there is to it. She saved my life, too, in all probability, but what's more important to me right now is she may be able to help you along your way. She seems to want to, anyway."

"She told me she doesn't want to get between you and I, but that she doesn't want to lose you as a friend."

"She did?"

"I'm telling you, John, she's in love with you. Deeply, I think, and I sure don't know the how or why. It may not make any sense to you either, and I don't know what she expects from you, but there it is. Something big happened to her when she med you."

"I think I saw it coming, Rhea, even before the blood thing started. At first I thought she was just a lonely spinster, but there's something more complicated going on with her. Or who knows, maybe she's just a big-hearted soul. Anyway. How do you feel about all this?"

"I don't know, John, I just met her a few hours ago. She seems open, I mean she doesn't seem to want to conceal anything, and given the circumstances I find that really unexpected. I also respect her for it, but I'm not sure where she thinks this is going."

"What about school? And her ideas?"

"I haven't had time to think about everything she said, but if I could save a few years? Sure. Why not?"

I nodded. "I'm worried, Kid. About tomorrow."

"I know you are, John. I am too. Deborah was crying when she picked me up, then we were both crying and hugging and carrying on like a couple of teenagers." She sighed and looked away, then back to me. "It's been a very confusing day."

I was getting sleepy again, and yes, I guess it had been very confusing – for all of us. Deborah returned a few minutes later, told us Sam would arrive around midnight and that it was time for me to rest. She planned, she said, to take Rhea out to lunch and then shopping for groceries, and they'd be back in a few hours.

I don't know. Maybe they did come back, but if they did I missed it. A nurse woke me up well past midnight and everyone was there in the room. Deb, Rhea, Sam, and a couple of captains and first officers who'd been good friends over the years. I felt oddly detached from my life as I lay there, like I was still here, but whatever was left was more a bookmark, holding my life open on the last page of a chapter.

+++++

An anesthesiologist came in just before three in the morning and talked to me a bit, then he plugged something into my IV and a wave of warm relaxation rolled over the remnants of my consciousness. Sam was right there with me, bless his heart, despite being so horny he was about to explode. There was a good looking nurse in the room, so I mentioned Sam had played with the Rams once upon a time and he winked at me, shot me a covert thumbs-up. Of course Deb rolled her eyes, but she was holding my hands then, telling me everything would be fine in just a few hours, but I think she was hoping Sam would score soon – whatever got him out of the room and into someone else's pants.

Rhea, the poor girl, was almost beside herself. Her grandparents were still alive so she just hadn't experienced intimate death before and had little frame of reference as she watched me fade in and out. She was upset, that much was plain to see, but was trying to hold it together for my sake. I said something mundane, like this was good training for her, and she laughed.

A large gurney rolled in the room and orderlies helped me slide over and get situated, then someone tucked a warm blanket under my chin. Another syringe went into my IV, a deeper layer of warmth settled over the room. I watched Rhea and Deb recede into a cloud, then a parade of florescent lights in the ceiling slipped into the distance.

Parabolic lights hanging from the ceiling, green tile on the walls, then a voice in the ether telling me to count backwards from one hundred...I remember feeling like I was awake inside a dream, and I saw my motorcycle headed towards a vast mountain range, mountains taller than anything I'd ever seen in my life. I was on tiny sliver of road riding into a deep valley, and it was growing very, very cold – and then even the dream slipped from my grasp.

(C)2015 AdrianLeverkühn | ABW



In Places on the Run Ch. 03



There's a voice. Far away. Far away, but I'm floating. Floating on a very calm sea.

"Can you hear me? Open your eyes if you hear me?"

Everything's a blur, and my throat's raw. It burns, and that's all I can think of.

I feel a finger pinching my left earlobe. "John? Wake up, John!"

Open eyes reveal blurry light, indistinct moving forms. "How do you feel now?"

I try to talk but my throat! It's like a lava flow...then I feel ice pass my lips and I chew.

"Better," I croak. Someone wipes my eyes and things are clear again.

A surgeon walks into my cubby and looks at my chart, then he looks at me and walks over.

"Captain Anders? How're you feeling?"

I shake my head. "Not sure."

"Know where you are?"

"Not exactly where I'd like to be."

He chuckles. "Where would that be?"

"Back on my bike."

"Oh?"

"Back on my trip."

"Where to?"

"Everywhere."

"That sounds like a good trip. Okay, John, it looks like you're going to get off easy this time. Couple of isolated tumors, one was kinda big but it hadn't perforated the colon. Cells are, well, let's call it Stage I, and no nodes are involved. I think we got it all, and we did a simple resection so no colostomy bag for you."

"No kidding?" 

"Yup. Generally speaking this is the way things'll go. Your oncologist will keep an eye on your labs for a while, maybe we'll do another colonoscopy in six months, but the good news is no chemo, no radiation. You'll be on a very restricted diet while things heal down there, but you ought to be back on the loose in a couple of months. You okay?"

I was crying. I mean crying like a baby, and the doc put his hand on my shoulder. It's hard to relate this kind of emotional upheaval if you haven't experienced anything like it before, but it's kind of like you've been led up to the steps to the gallows and they've just slipped the noose around your neck. The lever is pulled and you feel yourself falling – then the rope breaks and you land in red Cadillac convertible full of naked women. Life is sweet, life is limitlessly good again as the Caddie hurtles off into the sunset. In Sam's case no doubt one of those girls would be impaled on his pecker while he ate out the other, but to me it felt like nothing less than an epiphany.

"So, I'm going to..."

"Yup, you sure are. This is about as good as it gets, John, and I don't get to give many people news as good as this. Now, if you feel up to it, I'll go get those people waiting for you up to speed, and maybe we can get one or two back here to see you..."

Hell, I was still crying when the girls got back to recovery.

+++++

And I was home five days later, still on a bland liquid diet, still as confused as I had been about Rhea and Deborah, but something vast, vast and limitless as an ocean had happened to me in the hours after that procedure. I was in effect 'born again' – not in a religious sense but in my desire to experience life as I never had before. I wanted to live, to love, to see everything I possibly could and experience all the nitty-gritty aspects of reality I'd spend a lifetime avoiding. Sure, I know it sounds trite – and perhaps it was – but I was suddenly, and for the first time in my life, quite in love with the idea of being alive.

You can take waking up tomorrow morning for granted just so long. 

+++++

Sam's was another story, however. He was always alive – in the truest sense of the word, out there everyday pushing the envelope of his existence to the very limits of his imagination. About a week after I got out of the misery ward he wanted to come over, telling me he needed to talk about life and love and, of course, motorcycles for a while. He seemed a little too excited, and I felt 'something was up'.

He'd given up his Porsche during the divorce and had settled in with a worthy substitute, a '69 Aston Martin DBS, deep metallic blue-gray with slate leather. I shuddered to think of the upkeep, but admired his willingness to embark on any path that led him towards wretched excess, and this latest car was certainly a testament to that willingness. Surely, I thought, he'd had to hire a full-time mechanic just to keep the the thing running, but I had to admit the car attracted all kinds of attention.

We sat out on the little flagstone patio in my backyard, deep in late afternoon shade, and he toyed with a beer while I looked at the goop I was supposed to be drinking. I'd have killed for a glass of orange juice, but that wasn't on the approved list just yet.

"What do you want to do about the motorcycles?" Sam asked, getting right to the point as he finished his first beer.

"What do you mean, what do I want to do?"

"Are you done with the trip?"

"Not unless the doctors tell me I can't travel anymore."

He smiled. "You mean it? You want to carry on?"

"Fuck yeah," I said, grinning.

"Well, that's a load off," he said, smiling his old smile, the same smile I'd first admired as a freshman in college.

We'd been best friends for forty years, and my guess is it showed. When he came into the recovery room after I woke up, he cried more than Rhea had. He was the one who'd contacted my airline buddies, and the one who drove me home from the hospital. I remembered his sullen reaction when Deborah intruded on our companionship in Croatia, the anger as he passed us that day on the road after she rejoined me. We were like an old couple, I thought, together so long we knew each other's every mood, and could anticipate each other's needs.

The idea of abandoning the trip had been bothering him, but he'd never said a word, and I assumed he didn't want me to feel any guilt if continuing didn't work out. I told him unless I heard otherwise I thought we should resume in late September, and that would probably work out better anyway as it'd be cooler by then.

He told me he'd been in contact with a few people that had made the trip between Turkey and India, and he had some good ideas about the safest way to make the crossing. We talked about all the possibilities, all the options he'd uncovered, and a few modifications he wanted to make to both our bikes, and he talked about going over before me to get work done on the bikes. 

"What about those women in there," he finally asked, getting to the heart of the matter without wasting a word.

"Deborah's about got it worked out. Rhea's applying to Cambridge. A year there, then into med school. Deb will be nearby and can lend a hand while we're on the road."

I heard the back door open and close during this exchange, saw Deb coming out with a watered down lemonade, one of my few guilty pleasures these days, and she sat down by me.

"What if I wanted to come along on part of this trip?" she asked, and Sam looked at her, then at me with a kind of possessive uncertainty I found amusing, if not touching. 

"Like which part?" I replied. 

"From Athens to Turkey, maybe more?" she said.

"But your vacation time? Won't it be up?"

"I'm taking Rhea to Cambridge in next week. For an interview, and to get her settled before the new term begins."

"Assuming she gets in, you mean."

"Oh, she's in. Just a formality really." She sighed, looked at me for a moment. "Her transcripts are excellent, you should know. Brilliant girl, really. Why she didn't go on to school is beyond me, but there'll be no problem now. A year from now she'll be in one of the medical colleges, I have no doubt."

"And you? How would make part of this trip?"

"I've asked for a years sabbatical," she said, dropping the bomb out of the blue.

"I see," Sam said, his voice unsteady. "Just how much of this ride would you like to make, Deb?"

"As much as I can, Sam. Assuming I can get the time off and that I don't hold you two back. I'd like to go along for the ride, mainly to keep an eye on John. I want more time off, and once I've got Rhea enrolled I'm free. You know, I was enjoying the ride with you both and want to do some more. Besides, I've colleagues in Pakistan I'd like to visit, and who knows, they might be able to help us if something goes wrong."

"Uh-huh," Sam said, clearly neither impressed nor happy with the way this chat was going. "You know, once we leave Turkey there aren't going to be many hotels. We'll be in the rough most of the time..."

"And not many hospitals, either, Sam. Might be good to have a doc along, don't you think?"

"John's fine now, Deb. Out of the woods, right?"

She looked down, then at me. "Just call it insurance, Sam. My being along won't hurt your chances of making India."

"What about Rhea," I asked.

"She's thirty years old, John," she replied. "She's got to do this on her own. I'm getting her in the door; after that she's got to get the job done. No hand holding."

All the time I'm thinking...and you'll be with me while Rhea is thousands of miles away. You'll be taking care of me while Rhea studies. You'll be counting on me falling in love with you while Rhea falls in love with someone more her age.

I knew it. Sam knew it. And before long, Rhea would know it too. How would she be able to focus on her studies if Deb and I were on this trip together? How would Sam handle dealing with Deb day after day, for weeks on end? And did I need a physician leading me around by the hand, taking control of my life? If I did, should I even go?

"You know, Deborah," I began, "Why don't you count on coming along as far as Istanbul. Let's see how you feel then."

She looked at me with questioning eyes then, nodded her head slowly. Rejection wasn't her thing, I remembered, hoping she wouldn't take her anger out on Rhea. I looked at Sam; he was looking at the house, looking at Rhea, and I guessed he was thinking the exact same thing.

"Drink that lemon juice, John," Deb said without blinking an eye. "I don't want you getting dehydrated."

Sam excused himself, went into the house.

"Tell me, Deborah, why do you want to come along? Really?"

"I don't, John, not really. But I'm afraid something will happen to you if I'm not there."

"That's not a very good reason, Deb, and you know it."

"It's going to be a hard trip, John. You may not be ready for this type of exertion, not yet."

"And you might help me, how?"

She shrugged, just kept looking at me. "I want to be with you, John, in case something does."

"So, you're with me and Rhea is in school. You know, once upon a time you talked about helping her along, maybe have her work with you in the lab?"

"If she does well, sure. It might be good for us both, but John, I have no intention of coming between you and Rhea. None at all."

"Really."

"Really, John. She's so in love with you, and anyone can tell you're mad about her. Why would I step between you."

"Good question."

"I hate to say it, John, but you don't know me well enough to make these kinds of assumption. You have no idea what motivates me, do you."

"That's probably true. Should that worry me."

"Whatever I say won't change your mind, or what you think. Or Sam, what he thinks. But Rhea understands, John. Talk to her. She might help you understand, too."

"No, Deb, I want you to tell me what this is all about."

She looked at me for a long time, then finally she shook her head slowly as she looked down at her own shaking hands. "You can't run forever, John. Even you must realize that our pasts always come back for us, and there is a price to pay for ignoring her."

"What?" I said, but she was standing already, walking back to the house before what she said had time penetrate the cold mist of shock that had settled over my soul.

Sam came out a few minutes later, concern clear in his eyes. "What did you say to her?" he asked as he sat down.

"I told her I was concerned she was trying to come between us, I mean Rhea and I."

"Oh, shit. I bet that went over real nice."

"Yeah. Nice."

"What did she say?"

"She said my past is coming back for me, and there will be a price to pay."

"Fuck."

"You took that one right out of my mouth, Amigo."

+++++

For the next two weeks it was business as usual around the house. Deb tended to my recovery and never said another word about 'the past' – or the price I'd have to pay for some unknown transgression she remained unwilling to talk about. If Rhea knew what was up with all this, as Deborah seemed to imply, she sure didn't let on – and I didn't push the matter. Sam was at home writing most of the time, but one minute he sounded excited, the next unsure of himself and very upset about something. Even so, he came over every now and then with piles of maps and possible routes through or around Afghanistan and Pakistan, but Deb always hovered within earshot of those discussions – putting a damper on things. 

If all I'd wanted was a nice, uncomplicated life in semi-retirement, well hell, this wasn't it, was it? Now it seemed Sam was afraid to come over and life was about as pleasant as living in a forest full of hornet's nests. Sitting there looking at all this nonsense unfold left me more confused than ever. I wanted a relationship with Rhea, but I was flying headlong towards my sixtieth year and she was about to become almost completely inaccessible as academic commitments took over her life. Deborah? Hell, who knew what was going on with that woman. I had no idea what went on in her mind, and anyway, I was pretty sure I didn't really want to know.

Then a friend, Rob Fellows, called. I'd flown 727s with him for years, first in Germany then later out of Kennedy. He'd transitioned to 767s years ago, and then moved on to the Flight Academy in Kansas City. He'd just talked with reps at a large company involved in the development of rockets, a private company not affiliated with NASA, that was planning to purchase several L-1011s. Was I interested, he wanted to know.

Hell yes, I was interested! Get your resume ready, he told me, and stand by for a call later that afternoon.

He called an hour later. The company was looking for five, three man crews. Probably be based in Arizona, maybe Alabama. As long as I was cancer free, that wasn't going to be an issue, and operations were due to begin within nine or so months. Flying under a different set of regulations than airlines, I'd be able to fly a few years longer. A rep was going to fly out to talk to me the day after tomorrow, but my qualifications were ideal, Rob said, and I ought to have no trouble getting in the door.

I guess that's the miracle of friendship. A helping hand when you least expect it.

Anyway, I didn't mention any of this to the girls, or to Sam. Superstition, I guess. I didn't want to jinx anything by talking about it, or mess up any of Rhea's plans.

Oh, yes, Rhea's plans. We were fast approaching her departure for the UK, Deb's too, yet I was fast approaching a decision point of my own, and I had to admit something to myself as pressures began building to please both Rhea and Deborah. I like being unattached. I liked being on my own, responsible to no one but myself. Yet over the past month I'd grown used to having one of these two women with me almost all the time. That was nice too, in a way, and the idea of being with Rhea was still an attractive option. But Rhea, with Deborah in the mix? I could feel all kinds of grief coming from that mixture. Still, it ought to have been easy to get Deb out of the picture – until she'd intervened and taken Rhea under her wing. Now what could I do? 

Well, I thought, taking that job would provide an easy way out, wouldn't it? Let Rhea move on, get Deb out of my hair, start flying and within a few months everything would fall into place – again. Like I had so many times before, when girls started to push their way too far into my life, when they grew too close for comfort, I'd simply flown away – and now it appeared I could do that again, one more time. But was being alone again what I really wanted?

No, not really. But why all the sudden doubt? What did I really want?

I was watching an old movie on cable, a flying saucer 'epic' – a real masterpiece of 1950s flimflammery. Paranoia all the way, but the hero had his one true love by his side all the way through the story. Another channel, another movie, and there she was again, the ever faithful one true love by our hero's side. Is that what life's really all about, I asked myself. Man, woman, mortgage on a house, a dog, then a couple of kids? Had it always been that way? Is that all there is?

Then it hit me. Everything about life conspired to make me feel guilty for even considering a departure from such an ancient, time-honored script. 'Oh, he's just an old bachelor, a weird old Flying Dutchman, he's nothing but an old coot – no need to bother him.'

Sam called. He wanted to hit West Hollywood, hit some titty bars on Sunset and he wanted some company. Sure, I said, why not. Can't hurt, right?

I guess once upon a time a depraved heart could find anything it desired in West Hollywood, along Sunset Boulevard, America's Boulevard of Broken Dreams. Failed actors and actresses, down to their last dime and desperate, found ready cash in the back seats of the cars of those who'd 'made it big' in the city, and Sam had trolled these streets for so long he knew all the best places to visit. Not tonight. He was pensive, restless and sullen as we drove through Beverly Hills. He found a parking lot once we crossed into Hollywood and we walked a block to an old hangout, a titty bar that had been around since Mickey Cohen ruled these streets.

The place wasn't as run down as it should have been. Someone was dumping money into the operation, keeping it nice, and while the booze was overpriced the food was good. Inside there were several small lounges; there was a single stage in the middle of the smallish main lounge, and though it was vacant now the room was crowded with men – and a few women, too. Sam looked at his watch once, and again a few minutes later.

"You expecting someone?" I asked.

Still the distracted, sullen air: "Yeah. A girl. She comes on at six."

"Friend of yours?"

"You could say that."

"Anything else I need to know?"

He looked at me just as our drinks arrived – and as the lights dimmed – and there was real sorrow in his eyes. Then it hit me...all the anxiety I'd heard in his voice the past week was somehow linked to what was about to happen on this stage.

The little stage was circular, and apparently it rotated. I could still see men and women surrounding the stage as the room grew dark, then brilliant spots came on, flooding the stage with intensely bright light. There was a single cane chair on the stage, a small sofa and a tiny table by the chair. Neatly arranged on the table were dozens of sex toys, of every kind imaginable as far as I could tell, and suddenly, in the chair? The most incredible looking woman I guessed I'd ever seen.

Tall, flaming red hair, opalescent skin freckled intensely. Lingerie, jade with black lace trim, black stockings, very high heels, black, leather. A strap-on phallus mounted high, black and massive, and a brutal looking whip in the woman's hand. She looks alternately menacing and alluring, like the snake looking on as Eve handed Adam the apple.

Then a demure looking girl walked on the stage, bottle-blond hair and skin too long in the sun. White lingerie and fishnets over lucite platform hooker heels. The stage started to rotate slowly, affording everyone a view as events played out. The redhead pushed the blond down on the stage floor, put a foot up on the chair and pulled the blond's face to her vagina, into her deepest need. I watched, fascinated, as she ground her lust into the blond's face, her pelvis thrust forward obscenely, rotating slowly at first, then grinding with sudden fury. She whipped the blond, and I could see red whelps rising on the girl's sunburned skin, and suddenly I wanted to leave the room – but I couldn't. 




In Places on the Run Ch. 03



I'm a moth to her flame now, caught in helpless attraction, unable to look away without violating the precepts of thousands of cycles of instinct. I feel the power of her lash in my groin, and with every flick of her wrist my cock twitches, begging for release. She grabs the blond's hair and savagely pulls her to the sofa, then she spreads the blond's legs and falls onto her, the black phallus penetrating like a spear. White fishnets ensnare jade corset, blond hair and red entangle within grasping hands, flailing arms – they are fucking, kissing, licking and kicking their was to massive orgasms when – a man walks onto the stage.

His cock is massive. Massive. More than a foot long and almost as big around as his muscled wrist. He pulls the redhead away from the blond and drives his cock into red pubic hair; the redhead drives her tongue into a blond pubic glade now dripping with lust, and the three are now linked in blind faith. Faith in the certainty of their need, faith in the certainly that watching eyes feel what they feel, need what they need.

The man roughly pushes the redhead off his cock and slides it down the blond's throat; the redhead joins the blond, and soon they are taking turns, licking, deep-throating, jacking in their place until we can see all the signs building. The man's thighs tremble, then he's on his toes – penis in hand as he guides a thick tidal rush into the redheads open mouth. She seems unprepared for the sheer volume of his semen and struggles to contain it all within her waiting mouth, but soon it is running out the margins of her lips, running down her neck and between her breasts. When at last he stops the redhead hovers above the blond's waiting mouth and lets his semen run slowly onto the waiting tongue, and then downward into her mouth. When the redhead finishes she mounts the blonds face, and we are all watching as the man's cum now runs down the redhead's black stockings. The blond has the final say in this act, and she begins licking semen off the redhead's legs. 

I am emotionally spent after this, wide-eyed and hammer-pulsed. I look at Sam; his face is downcast but he looks up reluctantly, expectantly at the actors as they take a bow and walk off the stage. Applause breaks out, the few women in the audience I can see appear stunned. Horny, but stunned. Men are wiping brows, rearranging their slacks, signaling waitresses to bring fresh rounds of drinks, while Sam appears to be hesitating on the crest of a wave, waiting for the fall, afraid of the darkness below.

I have watched the redhead during all this. Watched as from time to time she made quick, covert glances Sam's way. Our next round of drinks arrives; there is a third, for her – I assume – and she arrives a few minutes later, scrubbed, perfumed, her lips still full, her face still flush, and Sam stands when she joins us. As do I, but I am for once quite speechless. What does one say, I wonder, to an 'actress' after such a performance? 'Well done?' 'That was amazing!' 'May I fuck you up the ass now? Please?'

She made to kiss Sam on the cheek but pulled up short and backed-off, but she stood aside when he pulled out her chair. She spoke now, and I was shocked at the accent. Irish, if I wasn't mistaken, all fiery and suspicious. And small talk wasn't her thing, apparently. 

"What are you doing here?" she said to my best friend, my friend of forty years.

"Excuse me," I said. "My name's John. What's yours?"

"None of your fuckin' business, John. Sam? What are you doing here?"

"I want to take you to Vegas. I want John to come along. To witness. Like I said yesterday, I want to marry you. I'll never be happy without you."

Well, okay, I was almost speechless, but then again, knowing Sam I wasn't all that surprised.

"Sam," she said, her voice dripping with, sarcasm, "I told you to fuck off yesterday, and I'm going to tell you to fuck off again, okay. If I'm not getting through to you, I think there are some boys back stage who can...get through to you..."

"Uh, Miss None of My Fucking Business," I said, throwing all the charm I could her way, "but I'm a stranger here myself and haven't the slightest idea what's going on. Think you could get me up to speed?"

"John? What do you do for a living?"

"I'm a pilot, why?"

"Well John, why don't you fly your friend right out of here before something really bad happens to him."

"Sure, I can do that, but could I ask you one question first?"

She glared at me, but didn't get up to leave.

"You see, I've known Sam a long time and he's never, not even once made a fool of himself quite like this. I'm curious. Do you, or did you ever have any feelings for Sam, or is this just an unwarranted infatuation on Sam's part?"

She looked pensively down at the table, looked at the drink there. "Is this mine?" she asked.

"Yup," I said, "all yours," and she took a long pull from the martini, then relaxed, leaned back in her chair.

"Well you see, John, a couple of months ago we, well, I thought we fell in love. Yeah, I loved him. Then a month ago he just disappears. Nothin'. He's just gone like, ya know?"

I looked at Sam, could only imagine what had happened. Things got too heavy, he picked up that nineteen year old and ran. Kind of like I was, getting ready to run, I mean. I looked at the girl's eyes again. She was mad, she'd been hurt, and I'm not blind. She still had feelings for Sam.

Yeah, this is where friends come in. It's a give and take world, isn't it?

"Look, what's your name?"

"Brigit. And your name is really John?"

"Wanna see my driver's license?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact I would!"

I fished my wallet out of my windbreaker, showed her a bunch of stuff.

"You're really a pilot?" she said, looking up at me with soft green eyes.

"Yup. Listen, Brigit, I'm afraid this is all my fault." Sam was looking down, lost, hoping against hope... "I was in Europe on a motorcycle tour and I got in trouble." I briefly described my GI issues, the trouble in Croatia. "The docs there said I needed to get home fast and, well, Sam is the only person I know that will always come through in a pinch. I called him, he came and got me back to UCLA. He's been taking care of me for the past few weeks..."

Her eyes were growing softer, more understanding with each passing lie. 

"You're not bullshitting me, are you?"

I pulled up my shirt, exposed all my neat new laparoscopic scars and she came unglued, flew into Sam's arms, smothered him with kisses as she cried, and while Sam was hugging her he looked over her shoulder at me, then he shot me that 'thumb's up' that told me all I needed to know.

I was probably going to roast in Hell for this one, I thought, not knowing if I'd just done a 'really good thing' or set the girl up for an even harder fall. If history was any guide, I could see a long trip to Hell in my future.

Then Brigit turned to me, her eyes full of happy tears, and she hit me with a really hard kiss on the lips, and she hugged me too.

"So," I said when she peeled herself loose, as I contemplated the hereafter down yonder, "we heading to Vegas, or what?"

Brigit turned to Sam, looked at him hard for a few moments. "Did you mean it, Sam? You want to get married?"

"Sure do, babydoll. Right now, right this read hot minute!"

They were hugging and kissing like they were serious about all this nonsense, and I told Sam I'd get a taxi home and they were off to the races like a herd of turtles, rolling down Lover's Lane headed for all kinds of trouble, but that's life, ain't it?

It's just grand, until the bill comes due.

(C) 2015 Adrian Leverkühn | ABW



In Places on the Run Ch. 04



What was that line from Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven? Ooh, it really makes me wonder?

Like, ooh: just what the devil was Sam up to now? He had probably, on average, been screwing hundreds of women a year – for several years now, though most had more than likely been prostitutes, and yet I remembered his wife had been promiscuous too, terribly so. So, his one marriage collapsed in on itself, collapsed under the weight of all the smoldering infidelities two people could visit on one another. Had they simply decided to ruin each other? Had marriage led them to that precipice, or was it something outside their union that led them to the edge? If so, what had caused them to jump? Really, what set them off?

Ooh, it really makes me wonder.

Extrapolate this, John, if you can. Can you imagine being married to Rhea? Can you imagine being faithful to her, forever? And...can you imagine being married – and unfaithful? What's the point of that, the voice in your head says? Marriage is trust, you think, you hope. If your partner can't trust you, how can you reasonably expect to trust your partner? What goes around, comes around – you reap what you sow – and all the other trite expressions of trust people sell themselves when they get married. 

This is the script we were handed, after all. We read from that script all our lives too, didn't we? Society's success depends on it, we're told. What if we abandon the script? Well, things fall apart, don't they? The center can not hold...and mere anarchy is loosed upon the world. Isn't that what the poet said? Or is this something a little more personal than a poem?

So what? Back to Sam. Putting the pieces of the puzzle back together, here's what I'd surmised so far. Sam runs into the 'sex-performer', Brigit, and he probably did what he does best and talked his way right into her vagina. He probably swam the backstroke in those deep green eyes of hers until he was sure she was IT, the woman of his dreams. He sweet-talked his way into her heart, he fell in love and made sure she did too, and that was that, another conquest, another cunt full of his semen and he was ready to move on – and hallelujah, praise the Lord! – just before we left for Munich. Voila, suddenly it's time to grab a nineteen year old snatch, er, snack for the trip and then dispose of her when he'd had his fill. So what, you say? Well, now he was free to roam the back alleys and brothels of Europe, to wallow in Eastern Europe's proverbial all you can eat buffet.

Okay, I think I had that part down, but why all of a sudden had he decided to run back to Brigit? And after all the craziness he'd worked so hard to release on his world, why did he want to return to the woman he'd run from – and now – what the fuck – marry her? She was cute, stunning really, but Sam ran in a different crowd. Would he take his stripper to the Oscars? Would she leave him in peace to write, or would she tear him to pieces fucking other men so he'd pay attention to her instead of writing? Assuming Sam still wanted to finish our ride, would she let him? Or if she let him, would that set off the train of mutually assured destruction that seemed likely to follow? 

Ooh, it really makes me wonder.

+++++

I got back from Hollywood in time to talk with Rhea about Cambridge.

Is it what you really want to do? Do you think there'll be time for us? 

She seemed coy. Not distant, not unloving. More like she was in on a joke, a joke I naturally assumed was going to be at my expense, but no one was laughing yet.

Another thing hit me. We'd not been intimate since Munich. Not her fault, not mine, either. Doctor's orders, for ten days post-op. Well, that night marked day ten, and I'd been hinting for days that I was ready when she was. She smiled, very coy again. And that was that. Not even the whisper of a thrill. No headache. No 'that time of month' excuses. No nothing, and while that hurt, it made the next day's events and outcomes all the more inevitable.

The rocket company rep arrived right on schedule that morning, and we had lunch at a place by the Santa Monica Airport before he looked over my paperwork one more time, before he offered me the job of a lifetime. Chief Pilot, and I'd be in charge of a large, growing fleet of aircraft, flying as often as I wanted, training new pilots when necessary, and be directly involved making some outrageous aviation history.

Did I want time to think about it, he asked.

No, I didn't need any time, I said as I signed on the dotted line, and that was that. Employment would begin now, he said, though I wouldn't be needed in Arizona until January. I'd pick up benefits today and be on half salary until January 1st, then we shook hands and I drove him back to the ramp where a company Gulfstream was waiting to take him back to Virginia, and that was, like I said, that. I was gainfully employed again, and very happy about it. I was free to run. Again.

Now I had a few people to tell, so I drove over to Sam's place, hoping he'd be there and not in Las Vegas – but then again he'd said he wanted me there as a witness.

He lived in a sprawling – if somewhat compact – house on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Coast Highway and Malibu Beach. Magnum, P.I. lived down the street, if that means anything. A car was out front, a beat up Chevy, not always a good sign, so I rang the bell and waited. And waited. I heard a commotion inside and tried the door; it pushed open and I walked inside. Sam was by the pool. Alone. I heard glass breaking, then Brigit was storming through the living room headed for the front door when she ran into me.

"You two queer or something?" she asked as she shuddered to a stop.

"Excuse me?"

"Are you fags? The two of you?"

"Uh, no. What's wrong, if you don't mind me asking?"

"Well, first thing he tells me this morning is he and you are off to ride motorcycles around the world! He wants to get married then ride off into the sunset!"

"Sunrise, darlin'!" Sam yelled from the patio. "I keep telling you, we'll be riding east about, INTO the sun. Sun'll be setting ON our backs!"

I rolled my eyes. "I see," I said conspiratorially to her. "Why don't you go find a wedding dress while I talk to him?"

It was her turn to roll her eyes. "Pretty damn weird if you ask me!" was about all the girl said as she stormed out, though I heard a few choice adjectives and adverbs under her breath as she chuffed by.

"Wow. I got here just in time," I said. "Marriage still on, or did I miss that too?"

He was writing on a legal pad when I walked out and sat at a table by the pool.

"I don't know what I was thinking," he said. "Irish and a redhead. She'll demolish the house within a week."

"Sam, as long as I've known you, you've never once thought about the women you screw, but Brigit? She'd get pre-cum from a doorknob ."

"She is pretty cute, isn't she?"

"Cute? She'd make Winston Churchill horny, and he's been dead a while, last I heard."

He chuckled. "So? You approve?"

"Approve? Hell, I'm green!"

"You know, she's right about one thing. I love you, John. I never had a brother, but if I had, I'd want him just like you. I know you know that, but thanks for helping me out last night."

"Yeah, me too, bro. Best friend I ever had."

"Good, glad we got that out of the way. You look happy. What's up?"

I told him about the job, about not starting 'til January, and he nodded his head, took it philosophically. "So, that'll give us about three months, maybe a little more. We'll have to skip the Himalayas, maybe head to Bhutan, then north. Maybe get to Hong Kong by December."

"We could air freight the bikes here, to LA, then dash for New York..."

"Miami would mean warmer weather, less snow."

"Okay. So Air France MIA to CDG, off load the bikes then dash for Munich. Be there in time for Christmas."

"Might be doable," he said, "assuming we can get going in September."

"I think we go ahead and book flights to Athens for the 10th. A few days to work on the bikes, maybe add some gear, then off by the 15th."

He nodded. "I like it."

"What about Brigit?"

"What about Deborah?"

We laughed, and all was right with our little world.

+++++

Deb and Rhea were in the last stages of packing when I got home, so I asked them to take a break. It was time for dinner anyway, so we jumped in my car and drove over to the Marina, to an old Polynesian place I like, and that's been around forever. I ordered three 'Barrels of Rum' then sat back and waited for the 151 to take effect.

I asked how their day had gone, told them about Sam and Brigit, leaving out her place of employment for obvious reasons, then I listened to them talk about packing and paperwork and all the endless things needed to get Rhea into the UK on a student visa.

"And what did you do today," Deb asked as she started in on her second barrel.

"Oh, not much," I said as I sipped my water. "Went on a job interview, that's all."

Silence. Stoney glares all round the table.

"Oh, with whom?" Deb said casually.

"An aerospace company."

"Doing what?"

"Chief pilot. Flying. That kind of thing."

"Oh," Rhea said, her lip trembling. "When will you hear from them?"

"Oh, I already have. I start January first."

"What!?" You'd have wanted stereo to get the full effect of that reply.

"I start in January. I'm heading to Athens on the 10th. Planning on Christmas in Munich if either of you are interested."

Deb excused herself, got up and left the table. I looked at Rhea; she was pale and wide-eyed, and I noticed she'd not touched her drink.

"You didn't even think to ask me what I thought," she said, looking hurt. "Like I have nothing to do with it at all."

"I thought after last night you were pretty much done with me, darlin'."

"I'm pregnant, John." She was looking down at her hands when she said those words, and I'll never, ever forget the image of her sitting there. I reached for my very own barrel of rum and against doctors orders slammed the whole bloody thing down in one go. 

+++++

They, Deb and Rhea, were pretty quiet when Sam and I drove them to the airport the next morning, and Sam got their bags checked while I walked with them to the ticket counter. It was kind of déjà vu all over again as I walked with Rhea to security, but she kissed me warmly and said she hoped I'd come over soon, that she couldn't stand the idea of being away from me for very long.

"I wanted it to be a surprise," she said as she started to cry again.

"I was surprised alright."

"Are you happy?"

"I am, yes."

"What about us?" she wanted to know, and it was a reasonable question.

"Rhea, I'm not going to evade your question. I am going to ask that you wait until the next time we're together before we talk about this. Now's just not the time. Okay?"

"Okay, John. I think I understand."

Deborah was standing back from us while we spoke, Sam beside her at a safe distance, and I saw mixed emotions in her eyes. Compassion and fury, I think, best describe what I saw, but I thanked her for all her help, and told her we'd get our flight information to her in case she still wanted to join Sam and myself in Athens.

"Oh, I wouldn't miss that for the world, John. But I want you to come to London on your way. Plan on two or three days, okay?" Before I could say a word she walked off to the security line and was gone. Rhea kissed me again then she too disappeared into the ebbing wall of people.

"Now that was weird," Sam said.

"She's pregnant, Sam."

"Fuck."

"Right out of my mouth, Sam. You took the word right out of my mouth again."

"You wanna know something even funnier, Ace?"

"Fire away, Sam. Seems like a good day for funny."

"Brigit. She is too."

"Fuck," I think I said, but by that point I was laughing so hard I could hardly breathe.

"Yeah, it's almost biblical, ya know what I mean. Two old farts, old enough to know better, anyway, about to go off around the world, and we're gonna have babies. Ain't life rich!"

"Yeah, I can't wait to walk beside you in a park somewhere, pushing baby strollers."

"Fuck you, Anders. Just...fuck you."

We laughed all the way out the airport, though I'm not sure why.

+++++

So, I booked my flight to London for the 5th, and that gave me a few weeks to get paperwork done for the new job, and hopefully get a few medical issues attended to as well. I took Brigit out to lunch, got to know her, and there more I talked with her the more I liked her. There was a lot under the veneer, I learned quickly, like she'd wanted to be an actress in Hollywood and she loved sex. When mainstream movies didn't work out she drifted over to the valley and began making porn, made a few of 'em, too, but then she had trouble with a few of the directors. Rape, she called it, fooling around, they called it. Too many drugs, too many addicts were in the movies now, and she felt life slipping from away into a heroin induced haze. She kicked the habit, tried commercials, print media, but by then she had been marked as a porn worker, and legitimate work dried up fast after that. There was no way to keep a roof over your head in this city, she told me, working minimum wage, and she'd tried escort work, then dancing, trying to make the most of her looks while she still could.

Her's was a sad tale, but one all too common in this city, hell, probably in this country too. Once you cross the line it's hard to get back on the straight and narrow, too many forces out there to hold you back or keep you down. She'd just about decided to head back to Ireland when she met Sam, because something weird happened with him. He responded to her like a man should to a woman, she said, not like she was a walking, talking vagina. He took her to nice places, opened doors for her, kissed her gently and spoke softly about strange things related to a future together. She like that, then a door closed and he was gone; she'd then seen the whole affair as a game, a sick game, and she hated him for playing her.

Then he was back, then there was that night at the club, and her world had been turned upside down all over again. She'd drifted for days between disbelief and confusion, then fear and anger...until she missed her period. Sam had been wonderful about it, she said, and that only confused her more.

"I'm sorry," she said, "about the gay thing, but I was upset. I still don't get it."

"He was my roommate in college, our first year anyway, pretty much best friends ever since. I went into the Navy, he went into football after that, but we always kept in touch. Brigit, that's forty years. Best friends – for forty years. We rode bikes in college, always talked about doing something wild-assed and crazy like this. Now it's time, and I can't tell you how much I appreciate your letting him do this. It means a lot to him, and to me too."

She understood, she said, but I could tell she was a little bent out of shape by the whole thing. At least she'd have money now, and a roof over her head, and I could tell she was smart enough not to fuck it up. This was her chance, for good or ill, to have a piece of the American pie. And she thought of me now as a friend and ally, not someone who was going to take Sam away from her. I only hoped I could live up to that.

+++++

The day of our departure for the UK was on us soon enough, and Sam and I took a taxi to LAX from my house. Our flight was one of TWA's last, and the old 747 looked sadly out of place at Los Angeles now. Frank Carpenter, an old friend, was at the controls and I sat up front for the takeoff, enjoyed the feeling of being in the middle of the action once again, then I went back and sat with Sam while he poured over maps and guide books. He had a new GPS too, one of the very first portable units small enough to use on a motorcycle, a flat gray unit made by Trimble, and I was impressed as the machine spit out our ground speed while flying along over the ocean. We stopped in Gander for fuel then finished the flight to Heathrow, arriving just after midnight, and I was seriously tired. 

A couple of train rides later and Sam and I were standing on the platform in Cambridge, worn to a frazzle and not at all enjoying the light drizzle falling on our heads. Though it was five in the morning Deb was waiting out front, and we piled into her white Volvo wagon just as a heavy rain started. A few minutes later we pulled into a small drive that led through a deep wood, then we were at her house. Larger than I expected, too, and then I saw Rhea out front, a couple of dogs too, and a younger girl, perhaps, twenty, maybe twenty five years old standing in the doorway, lost in shadow.

Sam grabbed the bags, I grabbed Rhea and held her for the longest time, ignoring the rain and the staring faces. She held my face, I looked in her eyes and everything felt so right...so good.

We walked to the front door, curious dogs sniffing my legs, Deborah now with the other young woman, waiting for me by the front door, with Sam bringing up the rear. Deborah seemed to be guarding the young woman, barring entry to her house, her arms crossed, her eyes stern and forbidding. 

I stopped short, looked at Deborah, then at Rhea.

"What's going on," I asked.

Deborah seemed to hesitate, then she put an arm protectively around the young woman's shoulder.

"John," she said, "I'd like you to meet my daughter, Lucy. Lucy, I'd like you to meet John Anders, your father."

"Fuck," Sam said.

+++++

She was twenty one, as it turned out. And the math worked out quite nicely, too. Here's the gist of the story, at least as Deborah told me later that day.

When Deborah Green, then a freshly minted physician, traveled to Berlin as part of a public service obligation, she made her way to Hamburg on BEA, then on to West Berlin via TWA, where inclement weather grounded traffic just after they landed. Waiting for her luggage, she struck up a conversation with one of the flight crew, a tall young man who appeared distracted, and very, very tired. They hit it off, rode into the city to his hotel, a new place on the Ku-dam where they had dinner. She was enjoying herself, she said, and decided to take it to the next level. They woke up the next morning and had breakfast, and a short time later he left for the airport, and that was that. His name was John Anders; she remembered that much about me, I suppose.

And many years later, just this year as it happened, Deborah had signed up to take a motorcycle tour, and on a Friday morning in Munich she spied a certain John Anders once again – for the first time in twenty two years. At first she was almost in a state of shock, then she remembered the man he'd been that night in Berlin, and she saw the man he appeared to be now. They talked again, she felt herself falling under his spell again, but time had changed them both. They were no longer young, she was no longer consumed with marrying and starting a family. No, she had her family, her life and all the love she'd ever need. She'd done quite well, thank you very much, without a husband, but now she thought it time that Lucy, their daughter, learned about the existence of her father, and the truth of that existence.

Deborah and Rhea led the young woman into the truth of his coming, true enough, but no one did me the courtesy of letting me in on the story. I was, in effect, led into what felt like an ambush. Indeed, I was too shocked for words, and after a nice long day of travel, feeling jet-lagged beyond belief, now had to deal with a rapidly decompressing sense of myself. I wasn't only going to become a father in seven months time, I'd been one for twenty one years, and if what Deborah said was true I had a lot of ground to cover in just a few days. Unfortunately I was dog tired, could hardly stand on my feet and keep my eyes open at the same time, and I begged off further revelations until I'd had at least a few hours rest.




In Places on the Run Ch. 04



"That was a nice Kamikaze attack," Sam said as he walked behind me into our room. "You know, kinda sweet in a way. Sudden, but sweet."

"Sweet, if you like cobras. Notice the way the girl kept to the shadows, like maybe she's learned how keep out of danger?" I was angry, and now all I saw were two lumpy beds in a tiny room, and that's all I needed to cap off my day. It didn't matter, however, because I was already asleep as I fell into lumpy oblivion. 

It was early afternoon when I awoke, and Sam was gone. I struggled up, found the head and took a shower then got dressed. I heard talking, faraway, laughter too – and fought the impulse to run, to get away from any further attacks, then it hit me.

I have a kid, a daughter I've never known, and she's out there, waiting. Hell, for all I know she's been waiting all her life for this moment, and I'd – what? Gone to bed? Sam's bed was made, so I quickly spread mine into some semblance of order, then brushed my teeth again, hoping to rid the foul taste that lingered in my mouth.

Then a simple knock on the door.

"It's open, I think."

"Dad?"

I'm speechless. I'm almost sixty years old and for the first time in my life someone has called me 'Dad'...

"Dad, can I come in?"

"Lucy? Sure, come on, it's open."

She's a pretty girl, I see, and for some reason that's comforting. Not quite as tall as Deb or myself, slim, athletic even, sandy colored hair, gray-green eyes...I look at her and just know she's making a similar inventory, trying to make sense of this, our new world.

"She didn't tell you?" 

Those were her first words to me.

"No. I guess she thought it would be more fun this way."

"I'm so sorry, Dad," and she came to me, like it was the natural thing in the world for a daughter to come to her father for a hug. 

And it is, isn't it. I took her and held her and cupped my hand around the back of her head

"Don't be sorry, Kiddo. Not your fault. Not mine. Not your Mom's. People do what they think best, ya know."

She was crying, crying faraway tears, I could only imagine, that had been a long time coming.

"It's alright, Luce. I'm here now. I'm not going anywhere..."

Her hands grabbed my shirt, and I felt her fists ball up on my chest. 

And there I was, in the opening moments of what was likely to become a new life with my first kid, and already I'd told my first lie.

+++++

Deborah's house was on Grange Road, across the river from the old college, so it was not quite a half mile walk to the Chapel at King's College, and that's where Lucy wanted to walk that afternoon. Just the two of us, she said. We'd just finished lunch at the house, Deb and Sam and Luce and myself; Rhea was in classes for the day, still excited to be back in school, but her schedule was full.

It was a gorgeous late summer day; warm, a line of towering clouds north of town, hints of a cooling breeze ahead of the storm. We walked in silence for a minute, then like a sudden summer's storm – the silence broke.

"You never knew? Really?"

"Really, Luce. I didn't even recognize your mom on the trip, or back in LA. I was stunned, completely. I still am."

"Stunned? Bad stunned?"

I looked at her, heard the caution within her words, the traces of uncertainty in her voice. "Luce, I look at you and there's no way I could feel anything bad about life, this life. I'm not religious, but right now I see my life as a miracle. You, you are the miracle of my life. So no, I wasn't stunned in a bad way, and I'm as happy as I've ever been right now."

She stopped and looked up at me, and I could see a little happiness in her eyes dancing around the edges of a big question.

"But...?" she said.

"But I feel like I've missed out on something grand. Watching you grow up, being with you on your birthdays, all those Christmas mornings. Helping you grow up, I guess. Being there."

She nodded her head. "I never missed you. I never knew you existed. There's a part of me that wants to be mad at you, but it's impossible. Like it's impossible for me to say I love you. I don't even know you, yet I'm supposed to love you."

"I don't know about that, Luce. Babies trust their parents, I guess. Love comes later, when all those years of trust begin to make some kind of sense. When you know your mom and your dad are there for you, and..."

"And when I'm there for you?"

"Yeah, I guess that's the deal, in the end. Love is a two way street. Always has been."

"So, will I be able to trust you? Will you be there for me?" 

"That's the deal, Kiddo, but we've got a lot of livin' to get caught up on. You and me. Love and trust are words, good words, but actions always speak louder than words."

"Could you teach me to fly, Dad?"

"Could I...well, hell yes, I can teach you to fly. Anytime you want."

"You know what's funny, Dad? Ever since I was a kid, I mean like five years old, all I've ever wanted to do is fly."

"That's not funny, Luce. That's me in you, and my father too. He was a pilot, in the war. That's who you are, darlin', maybe what you were meant to be, I reckon. And I bet that drives your mother..."

"Crazy!" She skipped ahead, smiling, really smiling for the first time since I'd arrived. 

She was a little rebellious, I saw in that moment, just like my grandmother. It was time for me to smile, too.

+++++

We went to dinner that night, not to one of Deborah's faculty clubs but to a sweet, if rather ancient pub deep in the old town. Sam got acquainted with the man pulling the taps, then started looking at all the stockinged legs and fulsome breasts drifting by carrying soups and sandwiches.

He'd never change – I knew then – and wondered why, for a moment anyway, I'd ever considered he might. We are what we are, right? Old dogs and new tricks are bullshit.

So what was I? A bachelor so set in his ways that running away was all I knew how to do? Well, if ever there was a reason to run – or not to run, for that matter – here it was, gathered around a beeswaxed oak table that had to be hundreds of years old. How many families had gathered around this very table over the centuries. How many important decisions had come and gone with elbows planted right where mine were. How many break-ups and make-ups had these posts and beams been silent witness to? What would they witness tonight?

Lucy was on one side of me, while Rhea – and what I just had to assume was daughter number two – sat on my other side. Deborah prowled right across the planks from me, her elbows firmly planted too, and I couldn't take my eyes off her. This was all her doing. Bringing us all together, trying to build something new out of fragments of memory and the burning core of her own humanity.

And it was strange, my presence at that table. In a way I suppose I should've been the center of attention that night, yet I couldn't help but feel very peripheral to the action, almost incidental. Yet Rhea was excited. Excited about being in school again, excited about Cambridge. Excited about being a mother. Excited, I assumed, about getting married sometime soon. And Lucy. Excited about finally finding out about her father, about the possible changes this might bring into her life.

And then there was Deborah. Completely unreadable – as always. Excited? Not that I could tell.

No, she appeared the exact opposite of excited. Inert. Implacable. Set on her course, no deviation allowed. 

And I still didn't have the slightest idea what her back game was. And I guess the song remains the same, eh, John? Ooh, it really makes me wonder... 

(C) 2015-16 Adrian Leverkühn | ABW



In Places on the Run Ch. 05



The Conclusion

There remained one more bustle in her hedgerow, one more spring clean for the May Queen. 

The trip. This trip, our trip, the fabric of our lives ripped apart and rearranged, the storm ravaged journey that had carried Deb to my side once again -- after twenty two years. I wondered, could she still hear the wind blow? Did she know her stairway waited in whispering winds we'd walked away from once before? I didn't, not really, not just then, and still I wondered. Could there ever be happy endings for people who've never believed in them, or would our forests echo with laughter?

+++++

My next walk belonged to Rhea, and everyone knew it.

I could follow the script I'd rejected a thousand lifetimes ago, or -- not. I could settle down and settle in, prop my feet up and start reading next week's TV Guide, or I could ramble on down the same road I'd been on all my life. How many Deborah's had there been in my life, I wondered, how many close encounters had I walked away from. Now when I thought about Deb I remembered that night in Berlin, that night at Tempelhof. How tired I'd been as we landed and shut down the aircraft as dense fog rolled in, then there was that tall girl by my side -- asking me about the city -- what was it like, she wanted to know, and -- not knowing what to do or how to get there, would I accompany her. How dinner had led us onward, how she'd been a passable lover, nothing special really, but how much I'd enjoyed her company, even then. How I'd left the next morning, really nothing more than a goodbye, maybe there'd been a kiss on the cheek, maybe not -- I couldn't say. Just another girl in a series, really. One more brick in the wall, one brick like all the others. Nothing and nothingness, always becoming.

And now what? Rhea? Was she really the one? I thought of that flight in July, when that sniveling law student took all those pictures up her skirt. How protective I'd felt, how when we were back in the galley she held on to me while winds of uncertainty blew through her life. How she left me breathless when she kissed me in Munich, how electric her skin felt on mine as we lay in that bathtub.

I'd gone to Tiffany's in LA, got a simple white gold band for her, and one for me. The little box burned in my coat pocket, yearning for release as we sat in that ancient pub. Deb just looked at me, measuring me, I guess wondering if I'd learned anything over the last twenty years. Or would I revert to type and run?

I looked at Rhea, at Lucy, then at Sam. All our lives bound together, right now, in soft candlelight. Bound in quiet expectation. This one action would, I knew, bind us all together -- forever. If I walked away everything and everyone would be carried off on the wind. Dissolution. Emptiness. Darkness. 

Nothing and nothingness. Never being.

"It's time you and I took a walk," I whispered in Rhea's ear. Oh, her face was so lovely in the soft glow of that night, her eyes liquid and alive. It's the script that binds us together, isn't it? That's all I wanted to know.

There were thunderstorms all around us, lightning within clouds shimmered in the night sky -- yet just above I saw starlight. We walked through the village, students with books walked from libraries to dorms, all very studious, all very serious. This was part of the script, too. This thing called progress, working towards a better future. A better future, the script reads, for our kids. We, the old farts, provide guidance and love, that's in the contract too, right? When that breaks down, when we stop reading from the script, it's game over. The whole thing starts to unravel.

And what about my feelings about my past, why I'd chosen to live almost like a vagabond, why I'd never married? It all came down to this moment, didn't it? I either believed in where the script was taking me, taking all of us, or it was time to jump off the merry-go-round and fade away into the night. I could go and lay down in a ditch, for all anyone might care -- if I abandoned the script.

We walked to the chapel, walked around the quad looking up at the graceful lines and towering spires, walked among the lightning and the stars, and I asked her the same question men have asked women since the beginning of our time in this universe.

And she said yes.

I thought of Bogart and Bergman, and I finally understood that a sigh is indeed but a sigh, as time goes by, and that there's no better feeling.

+++++

We walked on to Deb's house, we walked hand in hand over the graceful little bridge that crosses the River Cam, then onto the lane where Rhea lived. Winds whipped treetops as we walked, thunder followed flashes in the sky, I felt rain drops every now and then as the amber glow of home reached out to us, as the door opened and Deb and Lucy stood in their own pool of warmth. Their eyes focused oh Rhea's left hand, on the ring they'd hoped to see, and Deb smiled the smile of one who knows her plan has been followed. She hugged Rhea, Lucy hugged Rhea, then Deb and Lucy were on me, all over me, and as we three stood in this new fusion I knew I'd have been lost forever without Deborah. That there would never have been this future without her. And I loved her then. Loved her as much as I loved Rhea, or Sam, or anyone I'd ever loved.

"This is the most impossible family that ever existed," I whispered in her ear, and she pulled back from me and looked at me and smiled that benign, all-knowing smile at me.

"And this is your family, John. All of us, all of this. This is yours now. It's where you belong now. Your family needs you now, and believe it or not, you need us."

+++++ 

Which, believe it or, made a certain kind of sense to Sam as he and I sat on Deb's back porch -- glasses of twenty year old port in hand. "I've been thinking a lot about Brigit today," he said, "and I don't know how or why, but I love her."

"So tell her, you daft pig!" Deb said as she joined us, a glass of sherry in her hand. "I mean it, go inside right this minute and call her. Tell her, before she comes to her senses and runs, tell her before you run out of chances to tell her. Tell her, for God's sake, if that's what you feel. She'll never know if you don't, because the only thing women like to hear is that they're loved..."

"I think I asked you this once before," Sam said, sitting up in his chair, "but do you always get what you want?"

"Always, you lout!" she bellowed. "And before you ask why, it's because I'm smarter than you. And because I know what I want."

"And you think I don't?"

"Sam," she said, only more softly now, "I love you like a brother, so don't take offense, but you have no fucking idea what you want. You've spend your entire life running from what you want, and I doubt you'll ever know what that is."

"That's kind of a conundrum, isn't it, Deborah?" he said. "I'm running from something, but I don't know what it is I'm running from?"

"You're running, Sam, because that's all you know how to do. You're running because you love falling in love, but that's it, that's the end of game. Once you've fallen you're all done, aren't you? You've had your high then, so it's time to move on to the next high, to the next girl." She took a long pull from her glass, then looked at me. "You too, John. I saw that in your eyes twenty years ago, and I thought I saw that in your eyes two months ago, but not now, because you surprised me. I saw something different. Unfortunately, I saw Rhea."

"But you know what, John?" she continued. "What hurt the most? Once I realized who you were, all I wanted was for you to recognize me, to finally fall in love with me, but that wasn't going to happen. But you don't know why, do you? Because I wasn't going to let that happen. Not again. And then I met Rhea. Then I learned she was with your child, and you know what, John. I wasn't going to let you run away from her, run away from life. Never again."

"Let me?" I said. "That's a little obtuse, wouldn't you say?"

"No more than you fucking one girl after another, then running away. Think of it, John, you too, Sam. Ever wonder how many other kids are out there with your genes? How many kids are out there with no father?"

No, I hadn't, and I was pretty sure about Sam, too.

"I guess that's why there's the pill, Deb," Sam said. 

"And you ask every girl, right Sam, every time? That's why Brigit's pregnant, right? And John? Why Rhea's pregnant. Why I got pregnant?"

Sam laughed. "Jesus H Christ, Deb, why don't you go get a knife and chop 'em off. All of 'em."

"What?" she said, clearly offended.

"You carry on like women don't like sex, don't have a say in any of this, like women are simply victims, falling prey to every cock out there, and you know what? That's just simplistic bullshit, that's a world where everyone wants to become a victim. But sure, I get it, we live in a paternalistic society. Men do lot's of evil shit, too. They rape girls, hell, they rape little kids, too. But you know what, Deb? I've never raped anyone, and women do some evil shit too. I've paid for a lot of sex, true, but that's actually a fairly honest transaction compared to what you're accusing me of. And I know John pretty well, so feel pretty good about it when I say he's no rapist, either." He sighed, took a deep breath. "So. Answer me this, will you? That night in Berlin? Who picked up who? Who made the first move?"

She closed her eyes. "I did."

"Well thanks, Deb. For being honest, I mean. Now tell me this: did you want to sleep with him, or did he get you drunk and then, what, seduce you? Did he rape you?"

"I wanted to fuck him, Sam, and I get your point."

"Do you? Because you just claimed to have roped John into marrying Rhea..."

"No, I didn't, Sam. I said I wanted him to recognize what he's doing when he runs away. I said I wanted it to stop here, now. Because I want him to own up to his responsibilities as a father, and as a lover, a mate. Running is a child's way of avoiding responsibility, Sam, in case that hasn't occurred to you."

"Or it's simply a way to avoid getting bogged down in a relationship you know is doomed to fail. You seem to imply that wanting to have sex with someone is the same thing as wanting to spend the rest of your life with that person, so tell me this. When you and John had sex, did you do so hoping you'd get married?"

"No, of course not."

"Well then, I'm confused. Obviously I need another drink, and yes, if I may, I'd like to call Brigit, because yes, I do love her, and you're absolutely right, Deb -- I'd feel better if I told her that."

Deb was glaring at him, not quite angry, but not real happy, either.

Sam walked to her and leaned over, kissed her on the forehead, then Deb stood up and kissed him hard on the mouth. Then they hugged.

"You know what, Deb? I hate to say this, but I love the hell out of you. And I think John was an idiot to let you get away in Berlin."

She broke down at that, she was crying hard and he held on to her, held on and whispered in her ear.

She nodded her head, hugged him harder, then she looked up and kissed him again, for a long time, too, and by that point I was getting very, very confused.

"You better show me how to use that telephone in there, darlin'," he said, "'cause I'm right clueless."

She came back a few minutes later and topped off my port, but she looked unusually happy. 

"The girls are still studying?" I asked, now even more confused.

"Yup. Both have exams on Friday, too."

"Well then, I'm the father figure in this little family you've got all planned out, is that about right? So, what does that make you?"

"Glue, John. I'm the glue that's going to hold this mess together."

"Glue? That sounds sexy."

"Isn't there anything else on your mind other that sex?"

"Rarely."

"You know, I know you're trying to be funny..."

"No, I'm not, not really."

She laughed. "How long has it been?"

"Munich?"

"You must be about to explode."

"I passed that point two weeks ago. So, what about the trip. You ready for it?"

"I think so. Better clothes this time. A real riding suit, skid pads, boots."

"What about camping gear?"

"Yup, got it, but I need bigger cases, some tie down points, too, but I guess we can do that in Athens. Does Sam have a good route?"

"I think so. We'll have to go through Iran, though. Might be a problem getting visas. We'll try in Istanbul; if that falls through then we have to head north, through Georgia and Turkmenistan, all those former Soviet satellites."

"Slower that way," she said.

"More dangerous, too," Sam said, coming back out. "Brigit sends her love, John."

"And the question is," Deb added, "did you?"

"I did, Deb, and I told her about John and Rhea. She's jealous."

"I'm getting worried about you," I said. "Two days, and you haven't been laid. How long can you go?"

"I don't know. Uncharted waters, Amigo. Not sure I want to find out, though."

"You ain't married yet, Sam," Deb said. "And you won't find any hookers in this town."

"I'm not planning on finding out," he said with a laugh. "What about you, Deb? Wanna get laid?"

She raised an eyebrow at that. "My, my. This is getting interesting."

"Hopelessly so," Sam rejoined. "I'm actually getting concerned. Afraid, even. Two more days and the record's broken."

"London's just an hour away," I said. "Probably one or two hookers there."

"I will if you will, John."

"I guess that answers that question. Maybe that's why they say 'Speak now or forever hold your piece.'" Of course I said that while grabbing mine.

Deb shook her head. "Man, I'm sure glad I don't have a penis."

"Me too," Sam and I said, in unison.

+++++

"I'm not sure what the etiquette is here," I said as I looked at Rhea. She was spread out on her bed, naked as the day she came into this world. "Do I just dive in, or is there some special kind of way to do this?"

"I'm not going to break, John, and I doubt you'll hurt the baby. You're big, fella, but not that big."

"Wow, you really know how to stroke a guy's ego."

"You look like you could use a stroke, but you know, it looks like you haven't had anything to eat in a while."

"A long time, as a matter of fact. Too long."

"Must've been -- hard -- for you," she said, taking the matter in hand.

"You're looking kinda hungry yourself, Kiddo."

"You got no idea, John."

When our late night snack was over, we talked for a while about school, and about the baby. She wanted to have the baby in the UK, she said, saying she loved England now. Thought she might want to stay after school, after all the training. Then she wanted to talk about me, about us.

"Do you really want to fly?" she wanted to know.

"It's what I do, Babe. I'm not ready to retire."

"How many more years?"

"Three, maybe five years."

"Jesus. I can't be apart from you that long. What'll we do?"

"Probably play it by ear for now. Worst thing happens is I commute from here, do something like two weeks on, two weeks off. But I'm not going to put us in the position of not seeing each other for months at a time."

"What about the trip? Is that still on?"

I looked away, because that would take me away for months, three at least. "Yes, it's still a go. And Deb still wants to go, for some of it, at least."

She nodded her head, her lip trembling. "I understand."

"I think you and Lucy will be inseparable by the time we get back."

"We already are, John. It's kind of strange, but we really hit it off."

I could only imagine. Deb again. Building her family. Always in control. "I'm looking forward to getting to know her."

"This has got to be so hard for you."

"How so? I mean, what makes you say that?"

"Alone for so many years, then...this. Surrounded by women, and every one making demands on you -- one way or another."

"When it rains, it pours, I guess. But..."

"Don't give up on me, John. On us..." and now she was crying.

I held her close, nothing else I could do, really. Words were inadequate to the moment, and the only thing left to do was to hold her 'til the moment passed. Actions speak louder than words, right?

+++++

We left Heathrow early in the morning on the 9th, and were in Athens getting the bikes out of storage by mid-afternoon, then to a BMW dealer after we topped off the batteries. Sam had a long list of work he wanted performed on each bike: beyond regular maintenance we were adding skid plates under the oil sump, beefier crash guards front and rear, cages over all the lights to keep stones out, even bigger cases and with more tie-down points. The mechanic at the dealer advised adding welded racks to carry at least five gallons of extra fuel, and offered to make a special rack to put Sam's new GPS on the handlebars, and promised everything would be ready in three days. We agreed and left for the hotel.

Sam disappeared before we left, however, leaving Deb and I to wonder what kind of woman he'd go for this time, but we rode back to our hotel in silence, sorry he'd fallen off the wagon so soon. We went out to dinner just as he pulled up in a taxi, and as he piled out I saw Brigit climbing out after him and I broke out laughing. 

I ran up and gave her a huge hug -- and a high five for good measure; she laid a kiss on me that made my balls quiver -- and I had to stand back and admire her frank sexuality once again after that. Introductions were made, Deb was elated, Sam too, as no doubt he'd spend the next two days in bed getting caught up. He wasn't hungry, he said, and hoped we'd have a nice dinner, then the two of them were off -- not to be seen for weeks, we assumed.

Athens is outrageous at night, usually cool with her breezes off the sea. The Acropolis and Parthenon, both dramatically lighted, dominate the city, and our hotel -- the old Grande Bretagne -- was situated to take advantage of the view; even so, Deb and I chose to walk around the city for a while, and of course she provided a running commentary of everything we saw, then she stopped.

"It's your turn to tell me something about Athens. I'm tired of hearing my own voice drone on all the time!"

"Well, runway three three right at the airport, Ellinikon, is probably the worst in Europe," I began, and when her eyes didn't glaze over too badly I continued. "The TDZ, uh, the touch down zone, slopes downhill so when the mains hit you're going downhill, but almost immediately the runway slopes up -- so if you let the nose down prematurely you'll rip out the nose gear. It's not so bad with conventional swept wings, but with the 727s supercritical sections..."

"John?"

"Yes, Deb."

"You can stop now, John."

"Yes, Deb."

"How 'bout some coffee or something?"

"Yes, Deb."

"That's impressive John. Do you something about anything that doesn't have to do with flying?"

"Sex. I know a little about that."

"Uh-huh. Well, sorry I asked."

"You betcha."

"So, how was Rhea?"

"How...what do you mean?"

"About you flying?"

"Worried we won't get to see each other enough."

"I guess my little plan backfired."

"Oh?"

"Yes, well, if I got Rhea to Cambridge you'd follow her there. I'd get to keep you in my life, and Lucy's."

"Life's too full of random events, Deb. You can't control everything."

"Especially where men are concerned."

"I wouldn't say that. Two months ago I was scared. A month ago I was terrified -- that I was going to die. And it could have gone either way, Deb. This time it went my way --"

"Our way, John."

"Okay, our way, but it could have gone the other. I could be in chemo right now, tied down with a colostomy bag, or maybe just waiting to die. No one had the slightest control over the outcome. It was all just chance. You could hit a rock in the road next week, or take a corner and meet a truck coming head-on in your lane. You can minimize bad outcomes with training, but a lot of it boils down to random chance, random outcomes. You can't predict everything."




In Places on the Run Ch. 05



"I know. But with Lucy and now with Rhea, why not do everything you can to maximize good outcomes?"

"There's no reason why you, or we, shouldn't do that. That's just being prudent."

"John? Do you think we could make love again? Someday?"

I stopped and looked at her, expecting her to tell me she was just joking, but when I saw the look in her eyes I knew she was as serious as a heart attack.

"Deb? Why are you asking me this now?"

"Because I love you."

"Uh-huh. Now tell me the real reason."

"Not yet. I'm not ready. Besides, it's not really that important."

"So, you want to have sex with..."

"Nope. We had sex once before. I want to make love. With you. Just once."

"I can't imagine doing that to Rhea, I really..."

"I've already asked her about it."

"Excuse me? You what...?"

"I asked. I explained my reasons, and I asked."

"But you won't tell me those reasons?"

"That's right."

"You know what, Deb? The longer I'm around you the crazier the world gets."

She laughed, and hell, I did too. "The world used to make sense to me too, John, then I found you for the second time in my life. Now the only thing that makes any sense at all to me is you. I didn't ask for this. I didn't ask to have my world turned on it's ear, but like you said there's no way to control these things. There's no way I can control what I feel when I see you. There's no way I can control what I want to do with you, except I want to build something together. With you. Rhea is a part of that, Sam is too, by the way, but Lucy is the center of my universe. And Lucy isn't just mine, John. She's ours. We made her."

"I know." I looked at her again, just as she took my hand.

"No questions, John. But when the time comes, don't run away from me again, okay?"

I'd never seen her so serious, so on edge. I didn't fully understand where she was going with this, or what she was hiding from me, but I could tell something was wrong. Seriously wrong. I took her hand and brought it to my mouth and kissed it, then I nodded understanding.

"Now, would you buy me a coffee?!" she said, feigning exasperation. 

"Sure," I said, "but if you expect a tip tonight you better keep up with the tour."

+++++

We were in front of Vagianelis S.A., the BMW dealer closest to the port of Pireas, early on our self-appointed day, and all three bikes were ready to go -- washed, polished and looking like race horses prancing in the starting gate. We had already piled mountains of gear out of the back of a van we'd hired, now the stuff was all over the display area in front of the dealership, and techs from the service department stood around and shook their heads as we began to load mountains of stuff into our GSs. We were dressed in shorts and t-shirts too, as it was brutally hot outside, and soon our racing steeds looked like pack-mules surrounded by geeks, as I'm sure we looked like idiots -- idiots completely unaware of our bikes' load limits. An while later, when they were fully loaded, we stood back and looked at our bikes, then even we shook our heads and wondered just how the hell we'd maneuver these beasts over rock-strewn, unpaved roads.

And we were in Pireas for a reason. This ancient port, home to the Athenian fleet when Themistocles sailed out to take Xerxes at Salamis, was the terminus for the Izmir ferry. We had to be there early to get our bikes into a special boarding area, and we were responsible for getting them lashed down once aboard. This is no mean feat, mind you, as the Mediterranean is one of the roughest seas there is, but Sam had ratcheting nylon-canvas straps for the job -- and we had them loaded and down tight with plenty of time to spare.

The ferry trip was scheduled to take 18 hours, but everyone warned us the trip could easily last more than twenty. Depending on the weather conditions, a lot more. We found our tiny staterooms then went up to a promenade to watch as the ship left dock, then we went to the odious dining room for lunch. As we cleared the breakwater the ship was hit broadside by wind and a hideous swell, and just moments later our world was wallowing and bucking like a bronco.

"We better check the bikes!" Sam moaned, for now, instead of enjoying the open road we were getting seasick. A few minutes later we joined a few hundred people heaving over the rails, then went down and tended to the bikes. We added lashing to the front tires, hoping to keep them from sliding around as much as they apparently already had, then we retreated to our bunks, tossing down seasick tabs like they were candy.

Sam was in especially dire straits, I guess you could say, because he'd dropped Brigit off at the train station. She was going to Istanbul for their grand farewell, because after we left that city we had no set plans, no real itinerary, indeed, no firm idea which route we'd take. Everything was hanging on what we learned at the Iranian Embassy in Istanbul, because if they denied entry we were going to have to go north through Russia around the Caspian Sea, and that might add weeks to the trip. As much as we disliked the idea of heading to Iran, there roads were considered good and we could completely eliminate Afghanistan from our route. Something called the Taliban, too.

We were up on deck later that afternoon, standing in a full gale and watching the ship's bow plunge into thirty foot waves, the deck rolling through an arc of maybe 10 degrees port through 10 degrees starboard, and Sam wasn't feeling very good about life just then. Or motorcycles.

"I wonder if they have enough lifeboats," he quipped as a huge wave slammed into the bow, sending shards of water high over the ship.

"We better check the bikes again," Deb said, and off we went, down to the auto deck again. Cars seemed alive down there, jumping up and down on their suspensions, but the bikes were fine and we went back up to the dining room. The empty dining room. One waiter stood looking out a broad window, holding onto a rail as the ship rolled again. He was looking down, down into the sea, and ten seconds later he was looking at the sky. The visuals were too much for Sam; he went sprinting for the deck and I saw him flashing hash over the rail again.

"This isn't good," Deb said as she watched him heave. "He keeps that up and he'll need an IV."

I looked up at the bridge; the captain seemed unconcerned, like all this was normal, so I didn't think much more about it. "They had lemon-orzo soup at lunch. Bet he could hold that down."

She laughed. "No, he won't." She took him back to our room and then went to her's, and a minute later she came back, pulled down his pants and swabbed his hip, then jabbed him in the ass with a shot of something. "You'll sleep now, Sam. We'll come get you in the morning."

"Right," he groaned, then his eyes rolled up and he fell down on his pillow.

"Eight hours, minimum," Deb said as she walked back to her room. "Come with me." 

"I hope this is over soon."

"Doesn't matter. We'll get to port and get the bikes and head out. He'll be hungry."

"You won't be?"

"I plan on eating tonight," she said, shutting the door behind us.

I sat in one of the chairs, looked at her, hoped sex wasn't on her mind just then. "He's got syphilis," she said. "Probably asymptomatic until yesterday. My guess is someone transmitted it to him within the past two weeks. Would that be Brigit?"

"Jesus. How could you...?"

"Oh, please, John. Really?"

"Well, Brigit's the only girl he's been with, that I know of, anyway."

"Okay. Well, here's the deal. I can go in and shoot him up and he'll never know a thing. And he'll never know Brigit gave it to him. I'll have to get to her before he does once we get to Istanbul, and we'll have to keep them from screwing for the time they're together there..."

"Right. Like that's going to happen."

"Tell me about her, John."

Oh crap, I thought. The cat'll be out of the bag now.

"Are we like in confidential mode here, Deb?"

"Whenever medicine's involved, you bet your ass."

I nodded. "Well, first things first. We have to tell him, but I don't think it's going to be a big surprise."

"Indeed."

"She's been making porn, an escort, and doing a live sex act at a club in Hollywood."

Her eyes went round hearing this, then she shook her head. "Syphilis could be the least of his worries. Shit. I thought he was smart, not self destructive."

"Like what? Aids, some other STD?"

"Who knows? And I wonder if she knows?"

"You could ask?"

"I'm not his doc, John. I really have limited room to maneuver here, believe it or not."

"So, how do you get around that? Ask him to be your physician?"

She shook her head, shrugged her shoulders. "Maybe. First thing we need to do is get blood work. On both of them. In another month he's going to be too sick to get out of bed. If I don't intervene. Soon. Once I give the meds, an accurate diagnosis could be screwed up, too."

"We could do it in Izmir. It's a big city."

"I guess. Then what about Brigit?"

"I go to the hotel. I talk to her. And I do it before Sam gets there."

"What? Fly up there?"

"Yup, then come back for the ride up. And you keep Sam in bed for a few days. In Izmir."

She nodded. "That'd work. He'll be okay in the morning, but he's going to start feeling like he's got the flu soon, after that he'll start feeling progressively worse."

"If untreated, that'd be the end of the trip?"

"Absolutely."

"How long will this set us back, time-wise?"

"Oh, not long, assuming it's nothing worse. A few days, less than a week, anyway."

"Anything you can give him right now?"

She grinned. "Already have, John."

"You want to try dinner?"

"Yeah. I'm hungry, believe it or not."

"I can't."

"John? Tell me...is it good having a doc along, or not?"

"Nobody likes a smart-ass, Professor Green."

+++++

Once we cleared the main headland as we approached Izmir the seas grew calm. A few more minutes and it was hot and stuffy below, and not much better on deck, and the three of watched the docking before heading down to the auto deck. Sam and I got the bikes untied, but I could tell he felt like hell. He was sweating too, something he never did.

"You look like crap," I said, then I felt his forehead. "You have a fever, too, Ace. Maybe time to visit with the doc?"

"Yeah, I think you're right."

"Let's get the bikes to a hotel, then I'll go up and get Brigit, bring her down here."

"That'd be great, John. Man, I really feel like shit."

It was off-season and all the hotels had rooms, so I asked at the Tourist Office and found one that had secure parking and was close to the main hospital. Map in hand, we rode off the ship and found the place, got two rooms and unpacked, then we grabbed a taxi and got Sam into the hands of a local internist. That done, I was off to Istanbul.

I found the hotel in Istanbul Sam had booked for us late that afternoon, and I got his room number and went up, knocked on the door.

"Who is it?" I heard Brigit say hurriedly.

"John."

"Oh shit!"

"Brigit, open up, we need to talk."

The door opened and of course there was another guy under the covers.

"Get some clothes on and meet me in the lobby." I was too pissed for words, but I guess some people always revert to type. I called Deb's room, she was just getting in, and I told her what I had learned -- so far. She asked me to call back when I was through.

Brigit came to the lobby and sat down, looking defiant, almost petulant -- just like a teenager, I thought -- and I found I just wanted to get away from her as quickly as possible.

"Uh, look, Sam's got the clap. Bad case. Probably picked it up a couple of weeks ago, so I assume it's you."

She nodded. "I guess you're going to tell him about this?" she asked, pointing upstairs.

"Can you think of a good reason why I shouldn't?"

"Because I love him," she said, starting to cry. "And I don't want to lose him."

"Strange way of showing your love, Brigit. But that's just me. Maybe he won't care."

The tears turned off, like shutting off a tap. "So, you're going to?"

I didn't say a word.

"Is he sick?"

"Yup," I said as I nodded my head.

She had her purse with her, and she opened it up, took out a keyring and struggled with a key, then handed it to me. The she handed me a bunch of his credit cards.

"This is it, I think."

"Do you have enough to get home on?"

She nodded her head, a tear falling, this one genuine, I thought.

"Do you want to fly down with me tonight, tell him, or shall I?"

"No, I think you should. You found me out, I guess. You make my goodbyes, John."

"Why don't you hang around the room for a while. I think he'll want to talk to you before you leave."

She nodded, stood up and walked off to the elevators.

"I will be dipped in shit," was about all I could say. I went back to the house phone and called Deb again. "Okay, what's the news?"

"Syphilis and gonorrhea, nothing on the AIDs panel. IV antibiotics tonight, probably leave the hospital day after tomorrow. What's up with the girl."

"She's leaving. Gave me his house key and credit cards. I asked her to wait until Sam calls."

"She's a sweetie, huh."

"Well, she's cute, I'll say that for her. She can turn the tears on and off at will, too."

"Sounds like a psychopath. Sam never had a chance."

"It's going to be hard to convince him of that."

"No, it won't be. My guess is he's expected nothing less, but he'll blame himself anyway. Self-destructive impulse, remember?" 

"Maybe. I'm headed to the airport now. See you in a couple." 

I guess I was insecure enough to call Rhea back in Cambridge. She was working on a physic's problem. Celestial mechanics. Probably not something that would make her horny, she said, and I just had to smile.

+++++

Sam took it about like I expected...he flubbered around for a minute then got angry. Real angry. She'd kept at least of his three credit cards, too, so he called and canceled the numbers, got new ones reissued, to be overnighted here, then called Tom, his neighbor in LA. Change the house keys, make sure she didn't show up, that kind of thing. By the time he was done he felt small and alone, said it was time to get castrated or some such bullshit. 

"You're lucky, Sam," Deb said. "Could have been worse. Much worse."

"I know. AIDs, all that shit."

"You should have Tom go by the house, make sure it hasn't been cleaned out, that the DBS is still in the garage," I said, feeling paranoid after seeing Brigit. He made the call, now we waited. 

"How's the food here," Deb asked, now a little worried too.

"Same company that provides food to the hospital does to the local prison, too. Nurse told me. Said if I wanted to get better, I'd better not to eat the chow here."

"Wow, nice," she said. "You hungry yet?"

"Nope. Might be next year sometime, maybe by July. How're the bikes?"

"Secure. Deb and I unloaded them. Everything's in the room."

"Shit."

"We'll get it down after a few more tries. Lots of stuff to sort through."

The phone rang; it was Tom. The house was fine, the car was there, and he'd talked to the gendarmes -- they were going to swing by and check on the house a couple of times a day. 

"Thanks, Amigo. Yeah, still planning on getting back late December. No, we're in Izmir. Oh? Really? We'll check it out. Thanks again, Tom. Later."

"Was that...?"

"Yeah, nice having a movie star for a neighbor. The cops'll do anything he asks. House ought to be fine. Oh, he says there's a place on the waterfront, d-e-n-i-z I think it's spelled. He said it's got good grub, real good fish." 

"I saw it," I said, "this morning on the way to the hotel. Looks okay, from the outside, anyway..."

"Y'all go check it out. I'm going to crash for a while."

He looked despondent. More sad then sad, and I asked him if we could bring him some real food.

"Nah, y'all have fun. I'll be okay..."

We took a taxi to the restaurant, a glass and steel place with seafood all over the menu; we sat and talked about Sam all night. He seemed, to Deb anyway, something like paradigm, representative of a type of decline she said was reshaping the world. Our generation, she said, had inherited a world order after the second world war, and then run it into the ground. Sam was a hedonist with no sense of responsibility, no morals, and who'd played a brutal sport then gone into an enterprise that produced vapid entertainment with hardly any lasting social value.

"He thinks with his balls," she said. "That seems to be the way of the world now, too."

"Oh, he's not that bad."

"Bad? There's no bad in his world, John. There's just now, he simply lives in the moment. I want this girl. Let's fuck it, then let's move on to the next girl. There are no consequences in his world, John, there's just the moment. I'd say it's all about instant gratification, but I don't think it even goes that deep. Maybe he really is that simple, or maybe he's all about the conquest. Dominating, with no thought of the consequences. You know, you burn someone's house down, then you move on. You don't stop to consider that the people who lived in the house are now living on the street, maybe they're hungry now, too. One thing's certain, though. Those people will hate you after that. Forever. Those are the consequences I'm talking about, John. The day after. That's what Sam runs from."

"You're describing a psychopath, Deb. That's not Sam. Never has been."

"Uh-huh. Did you watch his reaction today, John? When you told him about Brigit? Was he concerned about her? Hell, were..."

"Was I? No, not really. When I was with her I saw, well, as a psychopath, she didn't care about Sam, and I saw her as someone to be avoided."

"Ever stop to wonder how many men like Sam she's run into in her life? How many men fucked her and tossed her aside, just like yesterday's garbage? How many men burned down her house, John? Is she a psychopath, or is she just burning from the inside out, burning with hate. Maybe she just wants to hurt men before they can hurt her?"

"Isn't that called a lesbian?"

Deb's eyes narrowed, took a hard cast. "Don't be a child. There are so many girl's like Brigit, John, and they aren't lesbians. They like men, or want to like men, anyway, then something happens, one final straw, and they just give up. It's not worth the grief anymore." She looked away, looked back in time.

To Berlin, I thought.

"Tell me about your husband."

"No. I'm not going there, John. Sorry."

"You know, it almost sounded like you were talking about yourself there."

She shook her head, looked at the table.

"So, who do you hate?"

She looked at me, bit her lip, shook her head. "Don't make me say it, John."

"Me?"

She was crying, her lip trembled.

"I guess you have every reason to hate me, Deb."

"Don't..." But she stopped, then slowly shook her head. "I don't hate you, you goddamned fool. I love you so much it hurts, and it's hurt like this for twenty years. I fell in love with you that night. I wanted to hold on to you, keep you from leaving that morning. After I found out I was pregnant I thought about contacting you, letting you know, but I wasn't going to trap you that way. I was stupid, sure, I was careless, but then I let you walk out of my life. Stupid? Yeah. But you know the really stupid thing, John? I wanted Lucy because I wanted a part of you with me. Can't you see that? Haven't I made that clear?"

It was my turn to cry, but now patrons in the restaurant were beginning to stare.

"I wish you had."

"What?" she replied. "Had, what?"

"You know, when I was walking with Luce, I told her I almost felt cheated out of the best years of my life. All those birthdays. The Christmas mornings. Watching her grow up. But the funny thing? I didn't know I wanted those things until they were, I don't know, almost gone? Like it's too late for Luce and you and me to have all those things..."




In Places on the Run Ch. 05



"But you have Rhea, don't you John?"

"Is that why you want her there, with you and Luce?"

"I think so. You'll have your chance at birthdays and Christmases, and Lucy will get to re-experience fragments of something she missed through Rhea's child."

"So, you really want Rhea to stay there? With you and Luce?"

"And you too, John. It'll all be meaningless without you there."

"I wish you'd called me somehow, Deb."

"I know. I do too. Part of the price we'll have to pay, I guess."

"You know, maybe it'll work out. For Lucy. For all of us."

"Oh, you'll be off in the wild blue yonder again, John. Doing what you do best."

"It's what I am, Deb."

"Well, believe it or not, you're a father, John. And you're about to be a father again. You're about to be a husband, too."

I sat back, tried to catch my breath. 

"So, in this great American drama you've built up in your mind -- you know, the one where our generation gave up on our responsibilities to the future -- what role did I play?"

"You? You played the nice guy, John, the boy next door all the nice girls wanted to fall in love with. The boy who didn't know how to love, the boy who wanted to be loved, needed to be loved, but who always saw the next adventure and took off running. That was your part to play, John. Like most of the men there..."

"And what was yours?"

"Me? Oh, hell, I'm an Englander, remember? We didn't play that game."

"Bullshit. You invented it."

She laughed. "Don't try to be the sophisticate, John. It doesn't suit you."

"Oh, okay, so everyone's got a role to play in your little drama, is that about it?"

"It wasn't my drama, John. It was yours, Americas. To a degree it still is, but the world's changing now. Not much room left for little boys after all. The world needs grown-ups now, the world is desperately seeking men with vision and all we're getting from America is little boys who like to play with guns, who like to run off and play 'Cowboys and Indians.'"

"I don't get you. First you say you..."

"It's not important, John. You asked, remember?"

"I did."

"You like music?" she asked.

"Yes, of course I do."

"Of course you do? Music defined your generation, shaped your expectations, was the soundtrack you played as you ran and ran. Who was your favorite group?"

"I dunno. Zeppelin, I guess."

"Let me guess. Stairway to..."

"Nope. Kashmir."

"Ah. Yes, that one certainly fed our Romantic Impulse, didn't it? To travel, to experience everything, to expand the mind?"

"You say those things as if they're evil."

"Not in and of themselves, they're not. But when a generation used them as a pretext, as a justification, to drift off into a drug induced haze of narcissism? To run away from their responsibilities as parents. Example: How the hell are kids supposed to stay away from drugs when their parents are stoned all the time?"

"You're making some rash generalizations, you know?"

"Of course I am, but that doesn't mean there isn't a kernel of truth in them."

"Maybe."

"What get's me about your country is this religious thing going on. It's like all these people who fell into drugs, those that wanted to get out of the cycle of dependence, they all turned to religion. They're getting high on religion now, and don't even realize they've substituted one addiction for another!"

"What's all this bullshit got to do with me?"

She sat back, looked exasperated. "Nothing John. It's got nothing to do with you, with anything at all. You want some dessert? Some ice cream, perhaps?"

"You can be a condescending prick sometimes, you know?"

"A prick? John, I'd feel ever so much better if you called me a bitch. Prick sounds so, well, so inappropriate."

"And 'bitch' does?"

"M-m-m, yes."

"So, what was your favorite group?"

She gave me that exasperated stare again, then she smiled. "The Dream Academy."

"I don't remember that one."

"Oh sure you do. 'Life In a Northern Town'? Remember that one?"

"Oh yeah. So, is that your favorite song?"

"No, not really. 'In Places on the Run,' that one always got to me."

"I don't recall that one."

"M-m-m, yes, I doubt it made the top forty over there."

+++++

We three stood in front of the hotel, hoses in hand, washing the dust and salt from our bikes. When they were dry, we started reloading them. We, the three of us, had gone through all our bags and culled what we could, and when we reloaded the bikes the loads were somewhat reduced. With everything cinched down, we restarted them, let them stand at idle and warm up for a bit, and we took that time to go over each other's riding gear -- zip jackets to pants, make sure boots were tucked in, helmet visors clean -- all the usual pre-ride stuff. We'd have to ride along the bay-front through heavy traffic, so we'd planned to leave early -- but not early enough, we saw. Traffic at 0630 was heavy as hell, rushing along at insane speeds, no one signaling before changing lanes.

"Maybe we should have breakfast," I said. "Maybe it'll thin out some after rush hour."

"It's Saturday, John."

"Shit."

"Well," Deb said, "let's get to it."

We motored down to the edge of the roadway and waited for an opening, then cut in when a hundred meter gap appeared. About halfway around the bay we got on the D565 and exited for Istanbul, and a few minutes later we were clear of traffic, clear of the town and in open country. The road reminded me a lot of the Southern California roads I was used to: rolling hills, curvy roads, lots of traffic, gas stations aplenty. Well, this is nice, I thought. We've Americanized the whole world! Los Angeles, here we come!

We stopped for a late breakfast in Manisa and planned to make Bursa by early-afternoon, Istanbul by evening, and so far the riding was easy, the bikes purring like kittens. When we passed cars, or when they passed us, people inside stared at our bikes, at us, I guess, like we were aliens. Which I guess we were. Still, this was not like Croatia, or Greece. We were -- different.

We made Bursa much earlier than expected, so decided to push on to Istanbul, and there we rediscovered what real traffic was like. I'd hand-printed directions through town to our hotel, the same hotel Brigit had been staying at, and while the directions were in the top of my tank bag and so just visible, looking down and away from all the traffic was dangerous. I slowed down and pulled over, and we took out maps, started to figure a way through this mess.

And just then a motorcycle cop pulled up behind us, on the side of the road.

"Oh, swell," I said.

The cop started rattling away in Turkish and I just shrugged, Sam chuckled, Deb of course rolled her eyes.

"You are English?" the cop asked.

"American," I said. "She's English," I added, pointing at Deb, "but it's not her fault. Really."

"Ah, yes. You are lost? Where are you try to find?"

I held up the map, and the address of the hotel, the Hyatt on Taskisla, by the university.

"Okay, I go slow. You follow me."

I turned to Sam and grinned. "A police escort, no less. Well, let's do it!"

The cop led us through a twisting maze of highways then over the Bosphorus Bridge into the city, and a few minutes later we were at the hotel -- and the cop stopped with us. He wanted to talk, it turned out, but we needed to get our bikes unpacked and secured, so I asked him to come by later and have dinner with us. Surprisingly, he agreed, and said he'd be back at eight, and could he bring some friends?

"Sure. The more the merrier!" And actually, he laughed. Always a good sign. "We'll meet you in the lobby," I said, pointing. He waved and roared off into traffic, and I turned to Deb. "Well hell, that was unexpected!"

"Fun too! It was like he parted the Red Sea for us...everyone got out of our way!"

"Where's Sam?"

"I think he went in to get the rooms."

He was walking down the steps a few minutes later; he looked depressed.

"She's still here," he said.

"What? Brigit?"

"Oh, no," Deb said, frowning.

"Well, you can bunk with me," I said, groaning at the thought of her still here, just waiting for a fight.

"Follow me. There's a garage around the corner, and I have the pass card."

A while later we had the stuff we needed off the bikes and Sam had decided to take his stuff to his room, to her room.

"Sam," Deb said before he got out of earshot, "no sex until I've talked to her. Okay?"

He nodded. "No sex. Don't worry."

Deb looked at me, I looked at her. We both shook our heads, tried to prepare for the worst.

"That motor-jock will be here in an hour," I said. "Let's shower and get ready. It'll probably just be the two of us."

She nodded. "Right," then she disappeared into her room.

I called Rhea first, got her up to speed, asked how Luce was. They were in the kitchen as it turned out, cooking dinner, so I got to talk to her too. It hit me then, how good it was to hear their voices. We talked for a few minutes then I rang off, jumped in the shower. A few minutes before eight I called Sam.

"You coming?"

"Where?"

"We're meeting that motor-jock in the lobby, in a few minutes."

"I'm still in my riding clothes."

"Doesn't matter. I'm heading down. Join us if you feel like it."

"On my way," he said. "See you at the elevator."

Deb was there already and we rode down together. "I talked to the girls," I said.

"I know. Lucy was so excited she was finally home when you called."

"So, Dad? How's it feel?" Sam asked, just a little trace of sarcasm in his voice. Deb blinked her eyes rapidly, and I was beginning to understand this was a warning sign.

"Real good, Sam. Really very good."

He looked ahead, nodded his head. "Well, fatherhood suits you..." he began, but the elevator door opened and we were greeted by a half dozen motor-jocks, four still in uniform.

"So," Deb began, speaking in halting Turkish, "where would you like to go for dinner"

The cop who'd helped earlier laughed. "You want breakfast, now?"

Deb laughed, threw her instant phrase book in the nearest rubbish bin: "Okay, I give up! Dinner! Where's a good place for dinner!?"

"We have a place in mind. Come, we have automobiles! Oh, my name is Orhan. And this is Ahmet, and Nazim, and Ahmet and Zulfu and, at his insistence, Erik Estrada!"

Deb seemed confused as she introduced Sam and myself, then we explained Jon and Ponch, CHIPs from the old TV show about California motor-jocks and everyone laughed again.

"Sam writes movies," I said, "and used to play football for the Los Angeles Rams."

The cops stared at Sam like he was some sort of minor god, then Orhan asked what I did. Feeling they'd passed over Deb, I started there. "Deb is a physician and a professor, at Cambridge, in England. I'm a pilot. I worked for TWA until a few months ago, now I work for a company that makes rockets."

More silence as he translated, then Orhan motioned us to go outside. There were three squad cars out front, and as we got in I had visions of Turkish prisons dancing in my mind, but ten minutes later we pulled into a parking lot between a BMW motorcycle dealer and a crowded restaurant, and we followed our hosts into the restaurant and...it appeared their wives were already there, and many others, too.

I had no idea what was ordered, but it was delicious -- and endless! Lots of yogurt, lamb too, but vegetables featured in every dish. We drank tea, strong with cinnamon and cardamom, and began to listen. All the officers were motorcyclists, professionally and when off-duty, and it seemed they wanted to know everything about our trip. Where we'd been, and more importantly, where we were headed. They were serious, too; no idle chit-chat that night!

"We left Munich in July, and we are returning to Munich, hopefully in December, by way of India, China, and America."

Everyone in the restaurant -- waiters, patrons, cooks -- fell silent.

One of the cops started laughing, but he looked at Deb and stopped.

"You are not serious," Orhan said.

"No, we're crazy," Deb said, and everyone was laughing again, then we were answering questions, asking a few of our own, trying to eat when we could and before we knew it there were about twenty more people gathered 'round our table. We asked about getting visas for Iran and another Ahmet chimed in, said he worked in the some government ministry and that he could help, and he gave Sam his business card. Zulfu, a senior sergeant, said he'd tried to get into Afghanistan a year ago and the Taliban were a real problem, that we'd be better off avoiding that route.

"I agree," Sam said. "Our State Department firmly advised us not to go there. One diplomat said the most direct route would be through southern Iran and on into Pakistan. Avoid all the trouble in the north, but he said the area was still dangerous."

"There's trouble, alright," Orhan said. "When are you leaving?" 

"We're staying here for at least a week. Until we get the visa situation figured out."

Orhan looked at his watch, then I did too, and it was almost midnight.

"I will be at the hotel tomorrow again, at eight," he whispered in my ear. "We will have dinner at my house. Fewer people, better conversation. I would not impose but I must ask you a question then. This is alright with you?"

"Of course, Orhan. I'll look forward to it."

Sam of course had disappeared, but I saw him up at the counter paying the bill, then Orhan saw him and frowned. "We invited you," he said. "You are our guests."

"That's just Sam, Orhan. Please do not be offended."

He nodded, but he was hurt. "Okay."

The wives had been -- almost -- silent during the evening, and I assumed they must've felt out of place, yet two were talking non-stop with Deb now, and I was curious -- but decided to ask her about it later as we walked to the cars. Sam was in the other car and I hadn't had a chance to ask him about Brigit all evening; now I really needed to know what was going on with her. I really needed to know his state of mind, too.

Orhan and I shook hands when I got out, just as Sam's car pulled up. Deb waited while Sam said his goodbyes, then we went into the hotel to the bar, and as we took a seat Sam ordered Port then sat back and relaxed.

"So, about Brigit," Sam began, and I was all ears, Deb too, "I asked her to pack her bags and leave. She said she loved me, that she was sorry..."

"And that she'd never had it so good, and now she was going to have to go to work again..." I chimed in.

"John, shut the fuck up," Deb said, "and let him finish."

Sam looked distressed, I said I was sorry. "Anyway, I told her I wasn't about to sleep with her, then she cried. I got mad then, told her to leave, she said she would, but you know, I doubt she has. I guess I'll find out when we go back up."

"How do you feel about all this, Sam?" Deb asked.

"No couches, Deb, please. No Freud. I'm not sure I can handle that tonight."

"And I guess," I interjected, "you just answered that question. So. Let's move on. Orhan said he needed to talk to us tomorrow night. Dinner. His house."

"What the fuck? He said 'needs?'"

"Yeah, Sam, I don't get it either. As long as it's not illegal, we better hear him out."

"Well, the embassy is closed tomorrow," he said. "Deb, when will it be safe for me to get laid?"

"Assuming you use a condom, go knock yourself out."

"And without?"

Deb just shook her head. "Have you ever heard of antibiotic resistance, Sam?"

"Just kidding, dollface. I'm going up. If she's there, I'll be right back. If she's gone, I'm going to shower and change, then I'll be right back."

"So...?"

"I'll be right back. More or less."

"Right."

He disappeared and Deb looked after him as he left, then she looked at me.

"He's really just a giant penis, you know?" she said. "A penis in search of, what's that grand American word? Poon?"

"Ah. Well to be really accurate, that's 'poon-tang.' West African derivation, dahling, in case you must know, or you forgot."

"Shove it up your ass, Anders."

I broke out laughing. "Hey, I got to keep you honest somehow."

"You? Never."

"Uh-oh. Here he comes."

"She's up there. What should I do now?"

"Was she alone, or pole vaulting?"

"Goddamnit, Anders!"

"Sorry John. She's alone?"

"Yup."

"Be right back." I went over the concierge desk, asked when the next flight to America was.

"Five hours sir, at 0600. To JFK."

"Okay, I'll be right back."

"Okay, Sam," I said as I got back to the table. "There's a flight out at 0600. I say we go upstairs and pack her bags, then take her out to the airport and put her ass on the plane."

Deb looked at me, then at Sam, who was just looking at the floor and nodding his head. "Or, Sam, you could go up there and talk it out. See why she's staying, what she really wants from you?"

"She wants an engagement ring," he said.

"And what about you? What do you want?"

"I want none of this to have happened."

"Sam," I said, "come on! She's a confessed nymphomaniac, and you're going to leave her for three months? Really?"

He kept shaking his head. 

"Sam, do you love her?"

"I don't know anymore, Deb. I really don't. I'm too mad, and way too depressed."

"Sam? What's it to be?" she asked. "Talk it out or put her on the plane?"

He walked over to the concierge, talked for a moment, then left for the elevator again, but not before stopping at our table. "I'll see you two in the morning" he said, his voice now just a little too loud. "Don't stay up too late, John. You know how horny you get when there's a full moon out."

Deb craned her head, looked out the window. "Indeed," she said, ignoring the stares of everyone else in the bar.

+++++

I had five days of dirty clothes to wash and found a machine in the hotel basement, so set out to do that early the next morning, and after the wash was on I went up for breakfast. Of course Sam and Brigit were there, deep in animated discussion as I grabbed a plate at the buffet, so I walked to a different part of the restaurant and took a table by myself. I watched Deb come in, watched her sidelong glance as her infallibly accurate radar scanned Sam and Brigit, and then, as her eyes fell on mine. She smiled, took a few pieces of fruit from the buffet and then joined me.

"You're up early," she said. "Kill any small animals last night?"

"I'll never tell. I did find a washing machine, however."

"Ah, the crucial things. First things first. Talk to Sam yet?"

"Are you kidding? Cobra and mongoose right now. I ain't getting anywhere near that mess."

"Really? Well, here they come."

"Fuck."

"You're so articulate in the morning, John. Sometimes your brevity of speech leaves me breathless."

"Well, John, Deb? Why didn't you join us?"

"Indeed," Deb said. "Why not, indeed?"

"You looked involved," I said. "I thought I'd give you a little space."

"So, Brigit, how are you this morning?" She was, we could see, red-eyed but appeared quite happy, which I was beginning to understand meant absolutely nothing.

"Fine. I'm fine. I'd like to talk to you later, if that's alright?"

"Of course," Deb said. "Why not now, before the day gets going."

"Alright. Fine." Deb left with Brigit, leaving me with Sam.

"So, she didn't leave. How do we feel this morning?"

"I'm sending her back home, to Ireland. To stay with her parents a while. She's wanted to for a while, maybe she can get her feet back under her again, get settled in her skin, maybe stop hating herself in the process."

"Did you talk to her parents?"

"For a few hours, actually. If you could handle stuff here, I'd like to go back with her. See that things look safe for her."

"Safe for her?"

"Well, you see John, I discovered something last night, something personal, something private, something grand. Anyway, I'll be back on Tuesday. Anything you want from Ireland?"




In Places on the Run Ch. 05



"Just your happiness, Amigo."

"Yes, well, we'll have to see about that then, won't we?"

"You wrote that once, didn't you?"

"Maybe."

"Can I take you to the airport?"

"You damn well better."

"Is she happy, Sam?"

"You know, yes, I think she is. And I think if she is, I will be too. Anyway, she deserves the chance, John."

"So do you, Sam. Maybe we all do, at least once."

+++++

Orhan was in the lobby fifteen minutes early, but Deb and I were already down there, waiting.

"Where's Sam," he asked when he saw us.

"Ireland."

"Oh, well, no matter. Shall we go?"

His car was out front, a fairly new Toyota sedan of some sort, and his wife was in the front passenger seat, waiting. Deb and I took the rear, folding our legs in as best we could. We rode north along the Bosphorus for quite a while, then about a mile north of the bridge we turned inland, and after driving up a hill we were there.

Orhan's place was nice, small, but nice, and again the similarity to California struck me -- yet if anything his neighborhood was nicer than most in the LA area. We turned in his drive and got out of the car, and he took us straight away to his garage where, under a huge nylon parachute, sat a brand new Harley Davidson. Turquoise, with cream colored accents, the bike had more chrome then 20 BMWs and the man stood there looking at the bike like it was his baby.

Now I understood why we were here!

We went inside and the man's two daughters -- and apparently a grandmother-type -- were hard at work in the kitchen. The house smelled of tomatoes, cucumbers and lots of lemon juice, and lamb cooking over a wood fire on the grill out back. Again, the feeling of California hit me, only this was Turkey. Was it like this in more places than I'd considered possible before? Apparently so. Apparently these are the types of things you learn when not flying six miles overhead.

Two of the Ahmets arrived a little later, on their Harleys, of course, and dinner started as soon as we went out and admired all their freshly polished chrome.

"So, you are going to Iran?" one of the Ahmets said. "The northern route across Turkey?"

"Yes, we wanted to visit Sinope, then cross just south of Armenia."

Orhan cleared his throat. "It's very nice to look at, but very dangerous, this route."

"Oh?"

"A lot of drugs, opium, come this way. From Afghanistan. All the time. There are many smugglers. They are dangerous."

"Do you have any suggestions?"

"Well, it is best way. Shortest. If you get visa to Iran, that is. If so, uh, my question is, are to go with you. We have ask our captain after we meet you, he ask Minister, he say we must escort you, make sure no harm comes to tourism. Very important. Minister says they try to get many motorcycle tour company to here come, bring tour here, for many years. Very bad if you get harmed."

"I don't have a problem with that," Deb said. "In fact, we'd enjoy your company."

"Yes, Orhan, I think that would be very good, very fun. Will you ride your Hawgs?"

"Excuse me? Hogs?"

"Ah, your Harley Davidsons."

"Oh, no please, we ride our government Honda. To keep smugglers away, I think."

"I understand," Deb said. "But you seem nervous, Orhan. Why?"

"Well, Minister say we must make sure you are smugglers, uh, no, that you are not smugglers. I tell him I think this is not so, but he insists. He asks permission to search you machines, you luggage."

"That shouldn't be a problem," Deb said.

"Understandable," I said.

"You agree then?" Orhan said, his relief obvious. "This no problem?"

"Sure, no problem. How about after Sam returns from Ireland?"

"Okay. This is okay." The Ahmets nodded and seemed happy. "Why Sam did go to Ireland?" one of them asked.

"His girlfriend came to visit, and he is taking her home. To meet her parents."

"Oh? This is serious girlfriend?"

"I think so, yes."

"Yes, is good to be married, to have wife," one of the Ahmets said. "Very lonely with no wife. You say Sam write movies? Know which movies?"

I ran over the list of his most popular, a couple of Schwarzenegger flicks, several with Stallone -- and this was all they really wanted to hear. They were all smiles after that, and we were sure this minister of theirs would be impressed as hell, too. No doubt we'd have air cover all the way. I just wondered what Orhan would think when he found Sam's stash of condoms.

+++++

I called the foreign ministry Ahmet and asked him what difficulties he was aware of concerning Iranian visas, and his whole attitude was different. He was bending over backwards now, said he and a senior ministerial aide would go with us to the embassy, at my convenience. So, Orhan's minister had made phone calls. This was getting fun. I asked Ahmet to pick me up at 1300 hours on Wednesday, as if by some chance we got that far, I'd need Sam's passport and, I guessed, Sam. That left a whole lot of time free for Deb and I to go sightseeing, but when I called she was feeling a little off-kilter, said she needed some rest. 

"You need some company?" I asked.

"Sure. Whenever. Just drop by. Where are you off to?"

I was thinking about the bazaar, and I also wanted to drop in on an old friend, another ex-TWA jockey now flying air freight for FedEx who also happened to off tomorrow, but as it was the weekend I called Rhea.

Lucy was home, but Rhea was at the library, so I talked with her. One hour passed and still we talked. Another hour, then three had come and gone, and what you ask, did we talk about? Yes, flying. When, she wanted to know, could she start? I said I thought the coming summer would be perfect, that Arizona was hot then, but maybe she'd enjoy the change. What about Rhea's baby, she asked.

"That's going to be a hard one, Luce. I'm thinking I'll commute for a while, two on, two off. Except when the baby comes. I'll stay there for a while, a month or two at least, so she can keep up with classes when she's ready."

"She did really well on her exam last Friday. First in her class."

"In physics?"

"Yeah, Dad. She's really smart. I mean weird smart. Almost like Mom."

"I sure can pick 'em, eh?"

She laughed. "I'm not smart like either of them, though."

"Oh? How're your grades?"

"Oh, pretty good. Ask Mom."

"I asked you. I don't need to ask her. As long as we work together on a basis of trust, I'll never snoop around like that."

"Okay, Dad."

"You'll need good math and physics scores, though, if you really want to go forward with flying."

"I just want to do some with you. If I love it, I'll apply with BA, see how that goes."

"Understood. They're as good as we were, back in the 60s and 70s."

"You trained Air Force One pilots, didn't you?"

"Our academy did, not me personally."

"Did you ever teach flying?" 

"Yes, we have to as part of our own training. Almost all airline pilots do at one time or another, some longer than others, though. It's a good way to build hours."

"Lufthansa trains their pilots in Arizona. Did you know that?"

"Yup, Luce, their program is tops, too. Their heavy pilots are as good as they come."

It went on like this until, after a while, I could almost see where the conversation was going, where she was leading me, and where I might lead her to her own answers. She was becoming my daughter, slowly but surely, and when we were set to end the call it came out of the blue:

"I love you, Dad."

"I love you too, Luce."

After I hung up the phone I stared at it for a long time, then it hit me hard. I missed her. Bad. I missed Rhea. Real bad. And then, all of a sudden I missed Deb. I dialed her room.

"You still up?"

"Yes. What's up?"

"I'm coming over..."

And we talked, Deb and I, we talked for hours and about nothing other than Lucy. We talked about Christmases and birthdays, boyfriends and the classes she liked in school. We talked about the skinned knees, the barked shins every kid gets, then we talked about flying...

"Are you against her learning? Maybe wanting to make a career out of flying?"

"I wanted her to go to medical school, of course, but she's never once, and I mean never shown the slightest interest. She's taken classes to become a teacher, and in your terminology she studied, no, she majored in psychobiology. If she teaches, it'll be biology, and at what you'd call the high school level."

"And if she wants to fly?"

"I'm sure she'll be very good at it. The thing with Lucy is, well, if she's interested in the subject she excels. If not..."

"She a field dependent learner, you mean?"

"Not exactly. She has the intelligence to do well in any subject, and I mean any subject, when she's interested. If not, she just won't apply herself."

"I've known a few. Tough nut to crack."

"Or very easy. I assume you'd teach her?"

"The basics, maybe, but it's frowned on to teach relatives beyond that. It happens, but it's not optimal. Too much emotional baggage, it interferes with the learning process."

"You'd be happy if she flew?"

"I'd be happy if she was happy."

"You just might be a good dad, John."

"Doubtful, but thanks."

"Why do you say that?"

"After our little talk the other night. About narcissism, Sam and me."

"Sam's a narcissist, John, maybe a little bit of a psychopath, but I doubt it. Not after what I saw this morning. I think you two may finally be coming into your own. Maybe growing up, a little, anyway."

"Gee, thanks. I think."

"John, you didn't mention the one thing I'd hoped you'd remember."

"Oh?"

"I love you."

"You know, I started to love you in St James Cathedral, in..."

"Yes, I remember. I felt that too. I could see it in your eyes. I could hear it in your voice. Just like in Berlin. Oh, you were so tired that night. It was a miracle you could even perform."

"A miracle. Yes, I can see that now. Life is a miracle."

"Oh," she said, "I doubt that. Life is mundane, very ordinary. Love, on the other hand? That is the miracle, John. Of all the life in the universe, I wonder how many species can love. Like we do?"

"I hope there are some who love better than we do. Purity, I think I mean."

"Yes. And the intensity I see when you and Rhea are together. That is the real miracle."

"Did we have that, even for one night?"

"No, we never had the chance, until July anyway. By then it was too late."

"I can't tell you how much I enjoy being with you, Deb."

"That will have to be enough for you and I."

"I know, and it is. And Lucy. She'll always hold us together, that part of us."

"It's good you see that. Understand that now, anyway. What do think of Brigit?"

"I don't know. I saw something in her, back in LA. Now I don't."

"Maybe you don't know her well enough yet."

"True. But I could never trust her, and I don't know how Sam can."

"Perhaps because he -- loves her."

+++++

When we picked Sam up at the airport, we briefed him about Orhan's proposal, and the vehicle search he'd requested. 

"Yeah, I can see that," Sam said. "Wouldn't do them any good to protect us if we're smuggling shit. I take it you agreed?"

"Yup. And we have an appointment with some foreign ministry types tomorrow. They're going with us to the Iranian embassy."

"Well, we'll be flagged from then on, for good or ill. We'll probably be the first American's they've had there in a long time, too."

"You know, the old Silk Road used to head far to the north," Deb said, "and that went all the way to coastal China. We could take that, couldn't we?"

"Sure. But we'd never see India, or the Himalayas. And if we don't get moving soon, we could run into very cold weather in Russian. I mean snow. We could be trapped up north under those circumstances."

"So you're saying that heading into Iran would eliminate that chance?"

"Nothing's one hundred percent, Deb. There's snow in Iran, too. If we're not almost out of Iran by mid-November, I don't know. Tibet's cold too. If snow comes early, if the Nepal option sours, we'll need to get well east of Nepal before we head north. The Himalayas could easily snow over by late October."

"Maybe," Deb said, "we should store the bikes. Come back in the Spring."

"Nope. John will be working, and besides, he'll have someone new to think about by then. And I have plans of my own. We do it now, we start late this week -- or we head back to the UK."

"I didn't come this far to turn back," I said.

"And discretion is the better part of valor," Deb replied, adding, "as long as we're speaking in cliches."

"Well, I don't want to turn back," Sam said, "but we're not proceeding unless the people going are unanimous. Period. Not when our lives are on the line. Deb?"

"Oh, I'm just along for the ride. Count me in. Please."

"Not good enough, Deb. You think about it. If you want to go home, do so. If you're coming, it's with open eyes, because you really want to make the attempt. And you understand the risks."

"Sam, nobody here understands all the risks," she began. "There are too many variables. You talk about roads and weather, but have never mentioned things like smugglers and the Taliban, let alone kidnappers or things as random as floods." And syphilis, she didn't have to add.

"We've thought about 'em, Deb. We've read books and magazine articles, and understand this isn't a stroll through Hyde Park, okay?"

"Well, if you two idiots are going, so am I."

"Excuse me, Deb, but doesn't that kind of make you an idiot, too?"

"Shut up, John." I know Deb said that, but I think I heard Sam's voice in the mix too.

+++++

Orhan's search of the bikes was uneventful, the trip to the Iranian embassy was anticlimactic. We presented our Passports and our request and the clerk at the embassy stamped our documents without fanfare or rancor. That was it, we were now go for the southern route through Iran, and as we'd already secured visas for Pakistan and India in Athens, that was that. We asked Orhan and the group that was accompanying us to be ready to go on Friday morning, and for them to join us for dinner that night at the hotel. We made reservations, then went out for a swim, after we got back to the Hyatt.

"Are you sure you really want to do this," Deb asked me as we waded near the deep end. "I had the impression back in July you were doing this for Sam."

"That's not a bad reason, is it, Deb. He is my best friend."

"A friend wouldn't make someone do a trip like this unless both really wanted to make it, you know what I mean?"

"You know, we've talked about doing this since we were twenty. What makes you so sure I'm not right where I want to be, right this very minute."

She slipped under the water, and when she surfaced she slicked her hair back with pool water. She waded there as little trickles of water ran down her face, her bare shoulders mere inches out of the water, staring at me. She was treading water now, our feet dangled in the blue, and she told me to 'come here'. When I drew near her hand slipped inside my swim suit, she began massaging me, and when I was hard she straddled me and I slipped inside her. We kept afloat with our arms and she gently thrust into me; I steered us to a far corner of the pool then steadied us against the tile. She was grasping me, riding me gently, and a few minutes later we came together, very gently, then she was off me and swimming away.

I was too shocked to breathe, and Sam was looking at me like I was completely out of my mind which, at that point, I was. I watched Deb walk out of the pool and grab a towel, then as she walked inside. Sam swam over to me, treading water himself now.

"Did you just do what I think you did?"

"Hmm? What's that?"

"You son of a bitch. Why? Why did you do that? Now?"

"If I knew, Sam, I'd tell you."

"Fuck!" he said as he waded away.

+++++

I don't know how many people showed up for dinner that night. More then fifty, maybe a hundred. There were foreign ministry types, dozens of major league law enforcement officials, certainly not just a couple of motor-jocks, and even a few members of the press roamed the room. Someone in the government had coordinated the affair, and while we were 'the cause celeb' we were peripheral to the action. We were part of an orchestrated action designed to promote tourism, probably to bolster Turkey's reputation as the EU and NATO considered their role in the post-Soviet landscape of Asia. Or who knows, maybe it was just an excuse for a party.

Deb was acting as if nothing of consequence had happened in the pool. Sam was still fuming. I was half out of my mind, anxious and guilt-ridden, yet I remembered Deb's speech about this happening, about me not saying no, that we had Rhea's blessing. It was, she'd implied, a celebration of our past, not cause for indecision and guilt, and her behavior that evening certainly seemed to echo her words.

And I had to admit that, beyond the initial confusion of our coupling my feelings for her were the same. I neither loved her less nor more than before. I still felt more for Rhea than anyone else in my life, but if I was completely honest with myself I had to admit Lucy was much on my mind, and almost all the time now. And when I thought about Lucy I thought about Deb. Yes, I had to admit, I loved her too. Not as much as I loved Rhea now, but...

"How do you quantify love," I asked her at one point during that evening, and she turned and looked at me, studied me for a long time, then...

"You can't, John. Love has no degree. You feel love, real love for someone, or you don't. Anything else is a delusion, part of a warped social fabric borne of deceit, of perceived social necessities. Superficialities, I suppose, but that's not love."

"I love Rhea. And Lucy. Surely..."

"And do you love me, John?"

"Yes. Very much."

She turned, looked me in the eyes, smiled demurely. "Then accept the gift, John. That's what it is, you know? In the end, it's all that matters." And she walked away, into the crowd. 

Sam came up to me just then, still angry but still curious. "What was that about?" he asked.

"Do you love Brigit, Sam?"

He seemed taken aback, unsure of my question.

"Yes, I do, John. All I needed to do, to see, was her eyes. I can't imagine waking up in the morning and not seeing her there. That would be worse than death, John."

"I know."

"So, what about Deb? Are you going to dump Rhea..."

"God, no."

"Then what was that all about?"

"A few days ago she told me she wanted to once more. Not to come between Rhea and..."

"And you believed that?"

"Yes, I did...I do."

Then Orhan was there beside us, and he wanted to talk logistics, things like the range we could make between fuel stops, tire pressures, that kind of thing. He told us there would be six of them along for the ride, and we had no set time to make the crossing to Iran. He was looking forward to the trip, he said, and was glad he'd stopped to help us that day.

"I am too, Orhan. I've loved meeting your family, your friends. And all the hospitality you've shown us. I certainly have enjoyed our time here in Istanbul, too."

I saw a reporter, notepad in hand, writing down my every word.

"And I think I speak for all of us, motorcyclists everywhere, when I say how much we appreciate your efforts to help us with this part of our trip. It speaks well for your country..."

The reporter moved in close. "May I ask you some questions, Mister Anders?" she asked, and Sam slipped away into the crowd, groaning as he walked.

+++++

The bikes loaded, Orhan's team assembled, we left the Hyatt and wound our way to the highway, then crossed the Bosphorus again and made our way northeast on the D020 -- then the E80 -- bound for Sinope on the Black Sea. We were on the road early enough to tackle the 450 or so miles in one day if we had to, but Orhan suggested we get off the highway and work our way to the coast and take the slow road. 




In Places on the Run Ch. 05



"It might take two, maybe three days, but the road is without compare. Beautiful."

Sam nodded, Deb did too. "Why not?" she said. "What's the rush?" And so we did, and yes, so it was. Beautiful, I mean. Perhaps not as wild as Croatia's coast, not quite so medieval, but the series of two lane roads we took was without compare, in my mind anyway, as it wound between gorgeous seaside villages then through twisting arroyos where windblown sand threatened to devour the asphalt. Farmland, villages, huge estates, vineyards all in random succession, all with the Black Sea just to our left, cooling breezes nearly all the time, passing storms out over the water reaching in for us from time to time, and as we grew tired Sam decided to stop at a small seaside inn late in the afternoon.

Rustic? Perhaps, but the farther off the beaten path we ventured, the more relaxed our world became, the more relaxed civilization became. There was an elegance out here, a simplicity I'd never known existed. Our dinner was beyond perfect, candlelight more soothing than electric in ways so unexpected; fish soup, salads, lamb -- everything alive with lemon and cilantro and otherworldly scents bathing our evening, covering our evening in some kind of strange magic. Orhan and his crew weren't cops that night, they were medieval knights taking us on a journey, happy, laughing, and alive, part of the magic. When someone started playing a mandolin, one of the Ahmets asked Deb to dance, and I'd never seen her so happy, so in love with being alive. Sam sipped coffee, Turkish coffee, and I couldn't detect the slightest trace of his juvenile self on that tree covered patio -- no horniness, no obtuse longing for another woman to notch on his Winchester. He watched Deb and Ahmet, he watched an ancient dance unfold and I think even he began to fall in love with her, with life, and maybe it was for the first time in his life, for when I looked in his eyes he looked happy in a way I'd never seen before.

We woke late that next morning, and I felt as relaxed as the breeze washing ashore. Breakfast was another revelation, fresh simplicity itself, then we were on the road again, drifting along beside that carefree shore until we entered Akcakoca, then we rode along the breakwater, admiring the village and the tiny harbor at it's center. I felt I could have stopped there and planted my flag, called this place home, but onward we went, through even more idyllic villages and towns with names like Alapli and Eregli, each almost otherworldly in their foreign beauty. We stopped for the day in a small beachfront town, Memis, I think, was it's name, and there we found another hotel steeped in magic, and we found a restaurant on the water and had a dinner of fish and lamb under the stars, wild shadows cast by candles and torches. I didn't want this to end, and I could tell both Sam and Deb were caught up in the spell too.

Orhan and his crew didn't stay away from us, far from it. We listened to their stories about growing up in Turkey, about their family vacations to the area over the years, and about their hopes and dreams for the future. They lived right on the edge of the most volatile region on earth, Syria and the Levant, so they'd danced on that volcano all their lives, and I wondered what it might feel like to live in a city like San Diego if the Israeli-Palestinian conflict raged just across the border, in Tijuana. This was Orhan's reality, Turkish reality, and yet here they were, living in a country that was in most every way as advanced as California, and certainly more gorgeous. It wasn't a contradiction to them -- this was their day to day reality.

I had always envisioned Sinop, the home of Diogenes, a waypoint on Alexander's long march to India, as some windswept desert outpost, baked in fierce heat, bypassed by history and left to wither away until the end of time. No, not quite. Dry and windswept, perhaps. Isolated, yes, very. Alive with so many veins of history running through it's feathery streets, cliffs as seawalls, ancient homes built half in cave, half of stone by Hittite hands. We found another one of those inns that seemed to lie astride an invisible divide between the past and our present, and this place did indeed present an uneasy balance between the useable past and life in the twentieth century. 

The hotel was a monument to ancient engineering, the stone building set deep inside a natural stone cliff, the cove formed by the structure floated high above the sea -- yet remained seemingly a part of it -- the rear of the building a random arrangement of layers, each a patio, each borne of stone, each drifting aimlessly down, connecting the hotel to the sea. And there was neither television nor telephone in our rooms, though there was a phone in the lobby, and once in our rooms we unpacked, lost from the present, wandering through time, wondering where we might find ourselves in a day's time. In a week's. Even Orhan seemed lost here, adrift, untethered.

I loaded more Kodachrome in the F5 and grabbed a coat, for there was a late September chill in the air, and I left the hotel and stepped back into the past; Deb was there behind me, as she always was, but she was silent now, as lost as I, adrift over a sea of roofs, all red tile and ancient. 

The village was almost completely surrounded by the sea, a single grape dangling from the vine, and we walked harbor-side, down to sea, to the fishermen that lined the harbor wall, and we watched them offload their catch as restauranteurs and housewives cast bids for the days work, perhaps as had happened for millennia. The only item present that afternoon with any relevance to our time was my camera, perhaps my wristwatch. Without those to ground me to the present I felt as perhaps Diogenes might have felt, or Alexander -- or perhaps a peasant child -- when I looked out over that water. Were my thoughts the same, my hopes and dreams similar to other travelers on this road in centuries long past? I don't know why, but time seemed meaningless here by the water's edge, perhaps as meaningless as my musings -- or perhaps not.

"I wonder," I said aloud, "if a traveler standing here a thousand years ago would have felt, or even thought about his life much differently than I am right now?"

"Probably not, John. He was probably tired from traveling all day, maybe for weeks at a time. He was probably far from home, missed his family, so maybe he was tired and hungry. Like us."

"I don't know. There's something about this place, Deb. Timeless doesn't even begin to describe the feeling here."

"It's justified, John. There's history going back 700 years before Christ walked the earth, right here. The stones we're walking on, maybe even the streets we just walked down, were here before the Greeks began writing down the first histories."

"I'm glad you're here. With me."

She took my hand, looked at me. "I've had a strange feeling all day. I can't explain it, either."

"What is it?"

"I can't put my finger on it, John, but have you ever been outside when there was an eclipse? A solar eclipse? It might be noon outside, not a cloud in the sky, and suddenly everything falls into shadow. You look out on a world that moves from noon to evening and back to noon, and all over the course of a few minutes. John, I feel like we're moving into those shadows."

I felt her skin on mine. I felt her words graze my soul -- like a bullet. "Well, we're leaving our known universe, aren't we? Away from all our comfort zones and into a part of the earth that has existed, up to now, only in our imaginations. From known to unknown, light into dark. Maybe..."

"I know, and I hope you're right. I also want something to eat. I bet Sam does too."

"Well, we skipped lunch. My guess is everyone is starving. We'd better head back..."

And everyone was. Sam and Orhan were looking for us when we showed up, but after we made our excuses we set off looking for another perfect restaurant. We found what we hoped was 'it', an open air seafood shack with 'Christmas lights' strung up over their patio and a couple of old men playing little mandolin-like instruments. Drifting smoke, grilling fish, more salads, more perfection, and by the time we ordered dessert I was beginning to wonder why I thought LA was such a great place to live. 

Still, Deb's shadow hung over our table -- all through dinner, and I kept looking over my shoulder for Diogenes with his lantern, and I wondered what her truth was, and where we might run into it. Before I went to bed I called the girls from the lobby phone and talked with Rhea a long while; her studies were going well, she said, and she missed me. I told her about the past few days, my impressions of Sinop in particular, but I left out all mention of Deb's premonition.

She loved me, she said, and I loved her, I said -- more than once, and after I said goodnight I walked off into the shadow of the valley, not sure what tomorrow would bring.

+++++

We started early the next morning, eastbound for Trabzon, where we'd leave the Black Sea and turn south, away from Armenia and towards Lake Van, and beyond -- to Tehran. It took us two days, two long days of hot, dusty plains and winding mountain passes, most on very well maintained four lane highways, until we stopped near the border between Turkey and Iran, in the hamlet of Telceker. This was a night of goodbyes, of friendship celebrated and partings unwanted. I couldn't help but wonder what might have happened if I hadn't pulled over on the outskirts of Istanbul, if Orhan hadn't pulled over and offered to help us. How he'd recognized not only what we were, but what we represented, and how he'd put it all together. 

We mounted up early the next morning and rode the last seven miles to the border crossing together, and we stopped just shy of the border and said our final goodbyes, and though Orhan and the jocks rode with us right up the crossing, they u-turned and peeled off westbound.

That crossing was interesting, and on many levels. The Turk side was all glass and steel, modernity operating on multiple levels, very familiar in every respect. Beyond, in Iran, the architecture was ersatz-medieval. Turrets and minarets of plaster and stucco, huge billboard-sized portraits of clerics and the Ayatollah everywhere we looked, just like Brezhnev's had been around Moscow in the 80s. This overwhelming cult of personality seems to define dictatorships, at least everywhere I'd been, and as soon as we crossed the line I felt almost oppressed, hunted, almost spied upon. We presented our visas, along with a letter from the Turkish Foreign Minister introducing us, describing our ride, and hinting at the opportunities for tourism we represented to both their countries. Phone calls were made, our bikes were searched -- very thoroughly -- and when we left, almost two hours later, there was a black sedan on our tail. And my God, the traffic headed into Turkey! Huge semi-rigs were backed up at least two miles, waiting to make the crossing into Turkey, and we rode into Bazargan for fuel and food of some sort. Our tail followed us off the highway into the village, and when we pulled over to look at a map of the region, one of the men inside got out and walked up to us, asked if he could be of service.

He led us to a restaurant, owned by a cousin of his, I think, and we bought the men's breakfasts, then we followed them to a gas station and filled up our tanks, as well as our back-up fuel containers. Our aim for the day was Qazvin, almost 400 miles ahead, and so I told our new 'friends', then we were back on the highway -- our eyes on the posted speed limit and our speedometers. An hour later another sedan pulled in behind us and our first 'friends' disappeared; another hour passed and this second car pulled off -- and then we were on our own! We pulled into the next gas station we saw, found an open air pita shack just down the road and enjoyed the Persian equivalent of a Coca-Cola with our lamb and yogurt.

There's something about riding long distances on a bike I'd almost forgotten: it's the sense of personal isolation that permeates the adventure -- for hours on end. You have your thoughts to keep you company as you ride, and I've found I tend to drift between vigilance for road hazards and out and out daydreaming -- sex is good fodder, too. There is one constant, however: you -- are -- alone. Until gas stops become a necessity, or your stomach starts to growl, anyway. Where deserts run right up to mountains, as they did here, there's one more constant: wind. And if there's one thing more uncomfortable than anything else on a motorcycle, it's a fierce crosswind, especially on an overloaded bike carrying a top-heavy load.

You start to watch whatever vegetation there is all the time, because that way you can spot big gusts before they hit you, before they slam you around. Some gusts can pick you right up and spit you off the road, or into an opposing lane, and that's what we ran into that day. Winds almost 50 knots, right on our beams with some gusts much higher, and all we could do was slow down when they became overwhelming. 

We made Qazvin and found a hotel, and it was decent, not ostentatious but comfortable. We missed Orhan & Co when we slipped out for dinner, and we had to guess when we looked at the squiggles on the menu. 

"You are English," we heard a voice say, and Deb turned around.

"Yes, I am."

An old man walked over, looked at our motorcycle gear and asked where we were coming from. Deb recounted our ride from Munich to Athens, then the rest of our journey. 

He nodded his head. "I have been to Munich. And London. Can I help you with your meal?"

"Yes, please."

He made a few suggestions then ordered for us, and we asked him if he had time to sit with us. He sat for a few minutes before telling us he was a colonel in the Republican Guards. "This is a courageous ride," he said as we waited for our tea to come. "The weather should hold, unless you stay to the north. There is a cold front coming, maybe snow. I would recommend that you head south, to Zahedan, and at any event, avoid Tehran. I assume you will cross into Pakistan, not Afghanistan?"

"Yes, that's right," Deb said.

"Captain Anders," he said, "you are a pilot? For TWA?"

"Yes, that's right," I said, my blood chilling.

"Wonderful airline. Very nice, the time I flew."

I smiled. 

"We will be discrete," he said. "We must follow you. We do not want any controversy, but we ask that you do not, what is the word, hesitate, perhaps?"

"I understand," Deb said.

"Dr Green, before the meal comes, might I ask a favor?"

"Of course. How can I help you?"

"My granddaughter is ill. I wonder, could you examine her tonight?"

"Of course."

The old man's mood brightened immediately. "Really? I would appreciate that."

Our food came and he excused himself while we ate lamb kebabs and spinach, and when we finished he rejoined us, two more commando types by his side. 

"You have supplies on your motorcycle you need?" he asked Deb.

"Yes, that's so."

"You will ride with me, in the car. One of my men will ride the, uh, the motorcycle behind us. Captain Anders? You and this -- writer -- will remain here. We will return the doctor as soon as she has finished her examination."

"Of course," I said. "Could you suggest something sweet, perhaps something to drink?"

He turned to the kitchen, spat out a string of commands, then he asked Deb to come with him. When they were gone, at least when the colonel and his commandos were gone, I turned to Sam. "I can see your movies are held in high regard here," I chuckled.

Sam shrugged. "Iran, Utah, what's the difference? I was particularly thrilled when he called you Captain."

"I noticed."

"Yes. You turned the color of milk."

"Really?"

Some sort of rice pudding came, and coffee about as thick as molasses.

"How many days will it take us to get out of here?" I asked.

"Best guess? Two and a half, maybe three. But you know what, John. It ain't gonna get much better from here on out. We just have to trust that we won't run into too many homicidal maniacs. This guy's not a bad actor, and thank goodness Deb is here."

"Never thought I'd here you say that, Slick."

"Hey, when you're wrong, you're wrong. And you know, she handled those crosswinds better than you did. Just FYI, Ace."

"I was terrified more than once."

"Seventy knot winds will do that."

"You know, forty, sometimes forty five is the limit in a heavy. Seventy will knock an eighteen-wheeler on it's side." I took a deep breath, took a sip of the coffee. "Wow. Nice mud."

"Probably high octane caffeine. Go slow."

"Wonder if there are telephones here?"

"Telephones, yes. Connections to the UK? Doubtful from what I read."

Another deep breath, this one followed by a long sigh.

"She'll be okay, John. They won't hurt her. Not a doc. Not a woman."

"Oh ye of little faith, eh?"

"You really do love her, don't you?"

"It shows, huh?"

"Hell, I don't know how you couldn't. Not now, after what we've been through."

"It's not really an issue, Sam. She knows that. So does Rhea."

"And Lucy? You think that's what she wants?"

"Why shouldn't she?"

"Hell, are you kidding? Her mother AND her father, together at last? Every kids dream come true."

"I never thought of it that way."

"Maybe you're right. Maybe...well, hell, who knows how this is going to turn out."

"Thanks, Amigo. You've really cheered me up. How long have they been gone?"

"Only a half hour. My guess is we'll be here two or three hours. You know how doctors are."

It was almost four hours, as it turned out, and Deb was already at out hotel when the colonel showed up. He told us we were free to follow him back to the hotel, and after we parked and secured the bikes, Deb's too, we turned and waved at our very own republican guardsmen as they drove away into the night. Sam and I laughed, then knocked and went on into Deb's room.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Me? Of course."

"He was on the level? No torture, no truth serum? They didn't beat you up?"

She looked away for a moment, then came back to us. "His granddaughter is very ill. She won't get appropriate treatment here. Their tech just isn't up to the challenge."

"So?"

"So, we had a long talk about it. They're very proud, reluctant to ask for help, but he knows who we are, what we do. Everything. Very strange feeling, that, and Sam, you be a good boy. He hates you. Anyway, I asked if he could get her to London. He said he'd try. If he can, I can get her to the right doc. They may be able to help her."

"Fuck."

"Yeah. I don't think he'll bother us, though. And who knows? We may have a friend now."

"You okay? Really?"

"Yup, no problems. Showered and everything. Gonna hit the sack." 

Sam left, I sat on the edge of her bed. "I was concerned."

"Concerned?"

"Scared shitless. Worried about you. After two hours I was out of my mind."

She looked at me for a while, all scrunched up in her pajamas, but she didn't say a word.

"Anyway, we better get an early start," I said, getting up to leave.

"Sleep tight," she said, and as I shut the door she switched off the light.

+++++

The further we got from Turkey the flatter and more uninteresting the terrain became, yet our second day in Iran was marked by boredom and more intrigue. Hot and dry, the desert landscape was punctuated by sharp little pyramidal mountains, most, oddly enough, almost black, and while the highway was in very good repair we saw very little traffic. Bound for Yazd, the day was endless hours droning through a remarkably forgettable dessert nlandscape.

But that night we were rejoined by our colonel, who arrived at our hotel, unfortunately, in a helicopter. Deb didn't wait, didn't say a word, for apparently all had been arranged the night before. She had a small bag ready to go and walked out to the waiting Puma and hopped aboard, and she didn't even wave as the machine lifted and flew off towards Tehran.