Presented in its entirety.

THE ART OF BEING A 30 YEAR OLD PIZZA GIRL
by Elle Jae



Never underestimate the art behind the making of a pizza. It is an art. Think of all the people who depend upon a fresh, hot, cheesy pizza being delivered to their doors: the stoners, the bachelors, the bachelorettes, the single dads with the kids during the weekend, the frat boys, the chicks at their chick-flick parties, the people on their way home from work, the pizza-and-a-beer folk, etc. The pizza is a staple in the American food culture, and it is arguably its most delectable. Having a reputation for making "the best pizza in town" is a serious mantle to uphold. I, finally, at the age of 30, had become a part of an organization that could boast having the best pizza in town. And it was comprised of the most serious group of people I have ever been around.

My first day on the job started at five o'clock in the evening during a weekday. I had not given my first day much thought and I was definitely not nervous about what, putting sauce and cheese on some dough? For minimum wage? Yeah. This was going to be kid stuff, as this was also indicated by the average age of the employees of this store being a ripe old age of 18 (with my throwing the curve off, it was probably about 23).

The first night I was shown around the store by my friend, a very pretty and young girl I who knew from the community college, who was the assistant manager of this joint. She had offered to get me on the schedule quickly as I had not been interested in a long job-hunt. She showed me where the freezers and dry goods were; where to find the paper products such as napkins and TP. She guided me to the front of the store where the almighty register, or "till" as they referred to it, sat. One of my main functions as an over-21 full-fledged adult employee was to pour beer for patrons as the under-21 crowd (96% of the workers) could not legally do so. Strangely enough, the fact I had not died at 21 but actually lived to see 30 and could therefore pour the beer gave me at least one immediate value amongst my co-workers at the shop. Indeed, a reason to be proud it was. Quickly as the dinner crowd began to roll in, the cry of "I NEED SOMEONE TO POUR!" came shrill and clear from an adolescent girl's mouth to pierce my eardrums over and over again, and I actually began to suspect the real reason why I had been hired so quickly and enthusiastically. However, by a certain point in that first evening I was not confident that the patrons would want to see my image before them as I poured their beer, much less touch their glasses, as I must have seemed a pitiful wretch a few hours into my shift. I shall explain.

Thinking I would be allowed to touch the food on my first night was sheer folly. I apparently would not be graduating to that esteemed level for at least a few weeks. I wistfully stared at the "pizza line" where four or five of the most gorgeous, thin, and well-manicured teenaged girls took a wheel of dough and transformed it into a mouth-watering dinner for anywhere between one to four people. These girls were the pantsuited and pointy-toed corporate account executives of the future, here merely whetting their appetites for a long list of impressive employments. They would one day look back on this first job of theirs and say, "Wow. What a great first job. Oh yeah, and there was that 30-year-old lady there, too." If I may be allowed to foolishly interject myself into their future reverie.

But for now they "sauced" the pizzas, "cheesed" the pizzas, and topped the pizzas with traditional to straight-up bizzare, if not morally wrong, food items. I was jealous and awed. Why? Because after I was given the quick obligatory turn around the restaurant ("Here's the john. Don't hide in here or you'll get fired like the last girl named Elle Jae who worked here.") I was led directly to the station that could easily be dubbed "the punishment of the new": the dishwashing machine.

I, like most American-born children, had a natural aversion to washing dishes. That fact immediately became inconsequential. My manager/friend pulled a tray of dishes from the steaming cylindrical machine. "These are very hot," I naively stated, jerking my hand off a ceramic plate that was in the also steaming, freshly washed tray. My tone must implied that I thought the notion of actually touching, much less picking up, one of these scalding dishes was audacious.

My manager/friend, without skipping a beat, flatly replied, "You get used to it." At that very moment I knew my fate was sealed. This would be no light work for a light wage. This was my new reality.

The methodology of being a dishwasher is not complex. Believe it or not, within an hour and a half I discovered I had a sixth sense for knowing when the kitchen was about to run out of pizza trays and the dining room of silverware. A constant influx of elementary school, cafeteria-style and flesh-colored plates streamed into my sink. Needless to say they were all caked with cheese and sauce. The plates used by children were undoubtedly the ones with the most topping picked off and set aside on the plates. The sink filled up with rejected pizza crusts, olives, croutons from Caesar salads, straws, spaghetti noodles, and all other variations of pseudo American-Italian cuisine.

I began to fantasize that the food remainders themselves were plentiful enough to be recycled into another completely unique dish. I would call the new creation "Hobo Pizza," of which the toppings would be predetermined by the combination of whatever was leftover from the previous patrons. Hobo Pizza could be sold at a discount and would still garner a huge profit for the store. At the time, it seemed like brilliance. Mostly hobos would purchase this menu items for obvious reasons.

Being a woman who takes pride in my good, if not rigorous, grooming habits, I arrived at my new job that first evening with full makeup and hair curled and then put up in the mandatory ponytail. About the same time Hobo Pizza had made its introduction into my psyche, my mascara had migrated to the tops of my cheeks in symmetrical, if smudged, semi-circles not altogether dissimilar from what football players paint on their faces during a game. Having never been a dishwasher before (nor having any foreknowledge that this position would be my fate) I was completely unaware of this cosmetic abberation sliding down my face. Nor did I conceive of my hair melting into shapeless net of blonde mush over my forehead. This, coupled with being drenched to the knickers with what had been warm water and yet remaining somehow to still be covered with food particles, made me quite the vision.

Did anyone tell the new girl about her unsightly visage? Nay, not a single Samaritan suggested a quick trot to the restroom to straighten up, at least, the black tribal paint that had turned my face into a Rorschach test. (People were looking at me and saying "I see a butterfly!" and I had the gall to be flattered.)

Thus the horror that ensued during the completely incidental trip to the restroom that did happen as Nature called; how many beers had I poured in the face of viewing public? How much sympathy was secretly being wafted toward me in the form of polite smiles as I reached over the cash register to hand over pints of beer? Were my witty utterances that are trademark of my verbal transactions being greeted with strained receptions, the recipient's mind wondering how bad a turn in life this woman had to have made?

Yet I wiped the makeup out from under my eyes and decided that it was a good thing to have learned this particular lesson so quickly into my time at the shop. And, unlike Elle Jae the First (a real person who really got fired for hiding in the bathroom whilst on the clock), I whirled out of there and back into the kitchen to resume the task at hand, which was to scrape cheese off metal pizza pans with a metal scrubber.

This action invoked the sensation of chewing on tinfoil. After having repeated this action well into the third hour of my shift, it became clear that my true adversary in life was not, in fact, the struggles I had with philosophy and the existence of God, but mozzarella.

This all goes without saying that my manager/friend's prediction about getting used to the magma-hot plates was spot-on. Losing three quarters of sensation in the fingertips is conducive to a higher tolerance for pain. Thusly I was able to develop my rhythmic scraping, rinsing, stacking, loading, unloading, restacking of the magma-hot plates that they may cool off enough that others may transport them comfortably to their final stations to be used again, washed, rinsed, and repeated again. It was noticed that for a "girl" I was quite an accomplished dishwasher. Watch out, teen boys, I had arrived.

Having reconciled that "the punishment of the new" was a matter of fact, I actually began to rather enjoy my time at the sink. People came back to visit me as they chunked used dishware onto the pile, usually with an apology. "Well, they don't wash themselves," I chuckled. In fact, being stuck back there with so much steam had to be good for the pores. Unless, of course, tiny molecular-sized particles of grease were attached to the rising steam and covertly entering my pores, which would lead to sabotage. This concept was alarming, and in retrospect I think it had some legs. It would be okay, though, and one day I would be graduated to the pizza line itself. I would be like an artist, and the dough wheel would be my canvas.

One bright day the store's GM pulled me over to the long trough of cheese and other toppings and said, "We're putting you on the line tonight." A wave of glee flooded my senses; however, did I detect a twinge of disdain from the other pizza line girls? Was their sorority of Canadian bacon and black olives being infiltrated by a saucing virgin whose latex-gloved hand would have to be held as she was sure to forget to put cheese on first?

"But I haven't studied, I'm not ready," I protested to the GM, unsure that I was worthy.

"Here, it's easy," the GM replied.

Surely a pizza order came through a tiny printer, and he ripped off a piece of the paper ribbon and showed it to me. "See here. Twenty pepperoni. Two ounces of black olives. Ten Canadian bacon slices." As he spoke, he pointed to the ingredients. Was that it? Was that the magic? I had been washing dishes for two weeks to prep for THIS???

Right before I had a chance to be overwhelmed with chagrin, I remembered that first sauce had to be applied to the wheel of dough. I was assured that I would not be elevated to the post of Grand Doughmaster for at least six months. I was relieved, and the GM handed me a ladle. "This is a Spoodle," he said.

"Spoodle?"

"Yeah," he continued, "you know, half spoon, half ladle." He motioned for me to dump the contents of the Spoodle onto the dough. "Work in a circle from the inside out to the crust. Leave an inch all around."

Honestly, I was not a natural Spoodler at first. But I have overcome many obstacles in my life, and I wasn't going to blow two weeks of dish duty because of one little Spoodle. I worked the sauce in a clockwise motion. The GM eyed my technique. "Not too far out on the crust...it gives the illusion of having been burned. It makes the pizza unsightly." Granted, I was a little slow. I showed genuine concern for accuracy. The GM seemed to be pleased. "Now we cheese the pizza."

I loved the way the words "cheese" and "sauce," normally simple ole nouns, had been morphed into verbs. I cheese. You cheese. We cheese. I had cheesed the pizza. Cheesing the pizza occurs only after saucing the pizza. There was a solemn tone to my instruction as these verbs were spoken to me by a man whose life had been pizza for the last thirteen years. I dared not smirk. In fact, I played well into the gravitas.

"When you cheese the pizza, you must not pack the cheese into the dispenser. You must not overfill the measuring cup," he said, demonstrating the right way to fill a cup with shredded mozzarella. Then, with the grace of one who knows the intrinsic value of a well-made pie, he sprinkled the cheese across the sauce. Not a single shred of the white cheese fell idly. The rest of the topping process was child's play. The hard part was done. The part that required...skill.

Many of the faux pas I committed during my first night on the line mainly consisted of silly errors, like forgetting to cheese the pizza, or interpreting the term X GRN PEPR to be "nix the green peppers" instead of "extra green peppers." There would be the initial shout from the person holding court at the receiving end of the oven, "WE NEED A REMAKE!" at which point my heart would freeze in fear of the certain humiliation to occur. "What's the problem?" another would ask. "No cheese," the oven man would reply. Eyes would silently fall on me, and they chanted "new girl" in unison telepathically. I would show them all, one day soon, that I could make the most beautiful pizzas ever eaten at that store. My pizzas would be cheesy and delicious, to hell with the cheese packing rules - I would throw an extra dash of mozzarella on my pies just to know that somewhere someone would eat one of my creations and say, "Hell, this is the best pizza in town!"

It is fair to mention the nature of the management at that particular store in that they did well and I have no complaint against them. However, I had no idea that pizza making was such a serious business until I crossed paths with the ruthless pixie drill sergeant that I'll call Mandi, to protect the innocent (me).

Mandi had just turned 21 and was the kind of person who would either become a drug addict having fallen in with the wrong crowd or a general for the US military. If Mandi perceived that too many folks were milling around the kitchen she would spontaneously shout the command "WORK!" at such a pitch that no doubt some customers must have picked up a rag and started to wipe something down. This girl had an acute sense of authority and knew her position of shift manager entitled her to complete control over her minions. I once made the mistake of being new around her, and I was lost trying to find an immediate task to attack with urgency. She peered at me, pulling herself up to all five feet and two inches of her stature. "Elle Jae, you really need to find something to do."

I was dumbfounded. Where had this firecracker been when I had slaved over the boiling sink so willingly with virgin hands? Where had she been when I took hold of the Spoodle for the first time with so much hope and pride? Where had she been when I independently took it upon myself to fill the parmesan and napkin dispensers all on my own for the first time, or replenishing the ice machine? Actually, she had been in Mexico celebrating her 21st birthday. Stories of her legendary temper had circulated the store during her absence, creating her a mythology akin to the likes of Athena.

I begrudgingly jumped to find a table in need of bussing. Having been so blatantly accused of loafing in front of my new peers stung me. They had all quickly buried themselves in random acts of busywork. I had not been so fortunate as to instinctively know what needed to be done when, an ability that comes at all jobs with time. I could not let this injustice go without a rebuttal. I was going to state my case.

Cooly I approached Mandi, who had stationed herself at the oven. "You know," I began, catching her attention so that she turned around, "if you want me to do something, you have a better chance of having me do it if you just ask without the bad attitude."

As it must have been a prerequisite for management at this shop to possess nothing less than a very healthy sense of righteousness, Mandi, unmoved by my abruptness, replied, "I don't have a bad attitude." And that was all she offered me by way of an explanation.

For the record, I soon thereafter apologized to her and blamed myself for being too sensitive. Mandi won me over by admitting she had quite the aggressive tone, something she did not perceive as being a social asset. I too had been accused of the same in the past. On this point we reconciled.

I will always fear Mandi.

All of that happened before I had a chance to really chat with any of the young ladies who worked at the shop. I hadn't understood the complexity of the inner social workings within the store, the hierarchies, who were the footsoldiers, the newbies (like myself), AKA Not Yet Worth A Damn. Being of such an advanced age immediately put me on a list of suspicion. I was eyed warily by the 17 and 18 year old damsels and socially ignored completely by the males. When would be the appropriate time to strike out with my sparkling personality and therefore become integrated into this pizza-making family? How could I wriggle into their hearts and explain my situation? I was not merely a 30 year old part-time pizza maker, but rather a college student who needed cigarette, beer, and gas money! I was cool, for crying out loud.

Then again, swaddled in my boxy short-sleeved man's button-down shirt and black, double-lined Dickie's work pants, my 5'8". 175 pound fame did not look like a frame at all, but rather a large square structure that soon would be a parking garage. Although I am compelled to blame part of this on my substantial rack, that fact was inconsequential whilst sizing me up by the side of the nymphs whose uniforms were obviously not to code. My alter ego was socially masterful at school and at the bar, but while at work, even it lay on the floor of my room, crumpled next to my shredded, flared jeans. My mantle at the pizza joint was Boxy Older Lady Who Did Dishes. And Had No Control Over Her Mascara.

Anyway, the social strata of the shop could be summed up as such: 1) The really pretty girls, 2) The pretty girls who you can tell are kinda slutty, 3) The cute girls who are slutty, 4) The guys who are just happy to be working in close proximity to girls, 5) The General Manager, and 6) Me (BOLWHDDAHNCOHM). Naturally I gravitated to the future wayward youths, a couple of spacey young ladies who were obsessed with boys and looked to me for the horrible advice I was willing to dispense as long as they understood I was explaining the wrong way to handle things (the way I had indeed handled them). And yet I felt like some tomato-splattered sherpa. Of course, I knew that any pearl I had handed down to this younger generation would be immediately tossed asunder once an actual boy would be, er, um, at hand, in the presence of one of these said girls. I made peace with that and learned to be OK with just hearing the sordid details a day later.

The really pretty girls were perfectly indifferent WASPs, possibly imagining their future husbands and corporate takeovers while flipping dough balls into pizza wheels. They could not be stirred to grant any reaction to anything, looking like great willowy stoics who could only be prodded enough to recommend where to get the best blonde highlights in town. Even at their young ages I was highly emotional and unable to suppress anything that should have remained private only unto myself, and I was famous for making a spectacle of tears and angst down every avenue I traveled. It seemed to me that these pretties were content allowing their minds to remain blank slates, yet still maintain 4.0 GPAs. How could one seem to be so vapid, yet destined to never fail in life? They tossed dough as my humor sailed so far over their heads that nary a hair ruffled. Or perhaps, in their indifference, they willed it to sail right through their ears. This is why I found that the sluttier girls were far more fun.

This stoicism seemed to also apply to the boys. The Hitler Youth Brigade that manned the oven, the pantry, and many other stations was nothing like I'd ever seen outside of an Abercrombie&Fitch ad. Suddenly, one evening, I became slightly alarmed as I scanned the physical makeup of nearly every person working in the kitchen. At least 90 percent of the kids back there were tall and blonde, with light-colored eyes. Even I, as a bottle blonde, still managed to qualify. I felt a chill as the worker bees swarmed in a golden fury around dough, cheese, noodles and sandwiches, cleaning, slicing, ringing up orders, sweeping.

Should I have revolted, and told the world that the Nordic Pod People had come to make and deliver their pizzas, infiltrating their digestive systems with a supremacist standard of excellence, unbenownst to them?

As one might imagine, I had a chance to mill over this hypothesis thoroughly one night while at the dishwasher. This speculation was surely in vain, as there mustn't have been a covert reason for the selection of attractive blondes besides the obvious. Seriously, the store was about five tank tops away from being a Hooters.

I did my best to reciprocate the lack of attention I received from the boys, although once after I'd come to the shop in my civilian clothes to pick up my paycheck I noticed a distinct change in the manner of which the males treated me. After that, and the verification of my "okayness" by a few "in" people, I started to receive acknowledgments of "goodnight" to me by name and "How are you doing today?" which to this day I believe came from some of the most gentlemanly young boys I have ever met. Good for them.

Having been classed socially as Boxy Older Lady With A Weird Sense Of Humor But Is Still OK, I felt secure in my place at the store. I became well-adjusted to the toils of the pizza line and was able to both make small talk and cheese at the same time. Some nights were hectic, and sometimes I couldn't seem to to remember which order the tickets were coming in, causing a little snafu easily remedied by a more experienced member. I would schluff off my inability to remember the order with self-deprecating jokes about being old, which I knew was complete BS, but that explanation would be readily accepted as rational. I would slit my eyes at their lack of irony.

But on to another nightmare. Mandi, the graceful pitbull that she was, on her nights to manage, always stuck me on the phones/till/dishes position, which in real terms meant "You're going to be bussing tables and washing dishes tonight," considering at this point in my employment I still had not been trained to handle the phones or the register. The all-important phones would ring and I would stand idly by, helpless to even pick it up and say "hold, please."

(A quick aside to explain that being on "phones" was not a task as simple as picking up a receiver and addressing a customer. There was a whole computer system involved, and if one were actually manning the phones it was a very big responsibility to be able to do it effectively and systematically. Having an inexperienced or untrained person wasting his or her time bungling the phones could have meant a lot of lost revenue and customer dissatisfaction.)

I was very good at dishes and tables. I was quick for an old girl, a solid workhorse not quite ready to be made into glue. Whereas the youngsters resented having to clean up after the public and hated having their perfect coifs melted by endlessly rising steam, I had been whipped free of any lingering pride about my appearance at this job. I looked like a truck, and by God, I was gonna work like one. I could clear ten tables in the time it took two kids to clear five. Of course, I wasn't having all these side conversations about prom and I certainly wasn't getting paid more by the hour for my haste. However, a phenomenon did occur by way of money. Seeing that I was generally the only employee representative working in the dining area, to the public's viewing eye I was the only person there really busting my ass while all the young kids were in the back chatting. Thus, the sympathetic feelings directed at me, the hypothetical single mom working at a minimum-wage pizza joint with a bunch of lazy kids, began to work to my advantage. And advantage I did take. I started getting tips on the down-low put directly into my hands by customers who gave me explicit instructions to not put the money into the communal tip cup. "Thank you, guv'na," I would whisper feebly, tenderly caressing the folded bills, fantasizing about warm milk and formula for my non-existent babies. "You're welcome," the patron would reply, satisfied with her generosity. So, long story short, whereas most of my coworkers were walking out with four to six dollar tips, I was walking out with about 20. And I put it all in my gas tank or drank it. Hell, I was only a college student.

But that was not the worst nightmare.

Nightmares take many forms, from teeth falling out or rolling off one's pillow into a cavernous abyss. To me, a nightmare comes in the form of a 40-person party of preteen soccer players and their moms, all fresh from a game. They come via minivan of SUV, brandishing cutesy slogans professing soccer's superiority as a sport - and lifestyle - stuck on the rear hatchbacks and plates.

These people funneled in through our doors, bringing the stench of kid sweat in with them to our air-conditioned sanctuary. The mothers huddled with their select groups of progeny and asked their daughters and sons if they wanted spaghetti or fettucini. Because, for God's sake, they weren't at a pizza store or anything. Invariably there would be thirty-two orders for fettucini alfredo and eight salads with extra extra ranch and forty waters. That meant I would end up carrying out 32 scalding-hot, heavy ceramic plates with about 35 cents worth of pasta noodles in them. Water came gratis.

In the end, three hundred dollars worth of food took about a half hour to make, and an hour to clean up after they had left an hour later. The trail of destruction left behind was epic. The cost of the paper products used up like that must have negated some of the profit. Tinfoil torn and made into hats, napkins wadded on the floor, extra straws chewed and purposelessly strewn about, mountains of crumbs and table salt, water glasses three-fourths still full and therefore impossible to stack for convenient transport to the kitchen, and yet again, the heavy ceramic plates, this time crusted with uneaten alfredo noodles and hardened garlic bread; these were the remains of the soccer parties. And social graces were completely lost to them. The mothers were no better as they tried to orchestrate and therefore control yet another aspect of their beloved children's existence: the order in which their food was delivered to them from the kitchen.

I stood chagrined as one mother tried to tell me that her daughter was so hungry she had resorted to nibbling the croutons of her mother's salad and she needed her pasta now. The plates in my hands had to be going to her daughter.

"No ma'am, these plates are attached to this table marker with these other girls, not yours." I was unflappable.

The mother looked very disappointed. Her daughter, who was nowhere near the brink of starvation, stared up at me contemptuously. "If I put this food down with you then all of the orders will get confused," I explained. "There's seven of us in the kitchen and forty of you. We're doing the best we can...I'm sorry."

That seemed to placate the mother for the moment, or at least shame her into silence. Her daughter's food was a part of the next batch I had to deliver anyway, and the precious child would live to see another day. The girl ate, maybe, one third of it. And did they tip?

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

Since those first days I had eventually been trained to answer phones and use the register ("SOMEONE GO TO TILL!"), my two primary functions at the restaurant having completed the prerequisite "punishment of the new." I became the face at the counter, an adult with enough sense to be polite and maintain the patience of a saint. Of course, customers often have no sense at all, and I will always inwardly curse the bratty girlfriend who doesn't deem me worthy to be directly told her salad order, but instead filters the information through her boyfriend. And then there's the teenaged girls who would not make eye contact with me, but would tell me their order as if embarrassed to be seen speaking to such a lowly person. And there's the mulled-haired rednecks who really don't use English but spout "Pizza. Large. Meat." and then toss a twenty in my general direction.

I treated none of them differently, but instead remained friendly, polite, and a bit robotic. I knew my friendliness could be frustrating; my singsong cadence of "WE'LL have YOUR food RIGHT OUT FOR you," was repeated over and over again, unwavering and unchanged no matter who was on the other side of the counter. That was my passive-aggressive way of stating their lack of individuality in my own perception of them. They treated me like a robot and I was a robot...who didn't give a damn about them, but was programmed to act as if I did. Be in the service industry long enough and one will come to know this game. It is a pissing match between temporary master and temporary slave, and everyone, eventually, gets to play both sides.

I don't recall being so cynical before I started working with the public, years and years ago. Maybe I was and choose not to remember. I wish I could have held up a mirror in front of all the cash registers I've manned over the years and just let people see what they looked like when they failed to acknowledge the service provider's humanity. Apparently it is all too easy to perceive a clerk's inferiority. Customers can make a worker feel less than human. Sometimes it takes a lot of self control to not buy into that.

Yet the kids who worked at this particular store did not seem to notice when it happened to them. Then again, they did not respond with "yes sir/ma'am" when spoken to, or even say "yes" instead of "yeah" when asked a question. They were, for all of their good qualities, completely irreverent to their elders who had spoken queries with all courtesy. Having again been elevated to the level of Boxy Older Woman Who Probably Used To Be Hot, I felt confident enough to call a few of them out on this. They would shrug it off. Respect wasn't being offered to them on a regular enough basis for it to register when it was. Why bother with the disappointment?

Therefore, amongst the steam and the spoodling, the bussing and the spraying, the pouring, the phone answering, the till-ing, the occasional smoke break, the wiping, the sweeping, the refilling, the slicing, saucing, and cheesing, there was a whole microcosm in existence where real people were trying to find order in the mundane of a pizza shop. Of course, I am sure I have paid more attention to these details in the few hours it has taken to write these pages than all of the thoughts of prior employees combined (save for the GM, who rumor had it obsessed about the store even at his home). But doing something mundane and finding another deeper purpose to it is an art form, especially when the finished product, in this case a pizza, brings so much happiness to the recipient. And that's when it can make someone's day better. And that's why doing it right matters. And that's why these kids took it seriously. And that's why I did, too.

Order a pizza. Be nice when you do. We artists are sensitive folk.

I'm not good enough of a writer to ever be published, but I don't care.  I'm putting this story out there because I think it is interesting as hell...I've had a glass of wine and I don't recall which version of this I'm posting.  Either way, it still needs a ton of edits.  Turns out, writing short horror-ish stories is my favorite thing to write.  Love stories suck.

Enjoy.

For Mama

Vast and white like a space-age docking port on a newly discovered planet, the concrete beckoned all visitors in.  Cars and minivans were but tiny matchboxes rolling under four magnificent columns leading out to the brilliantly wired suspension bridge, vast and open over the water, limitless to the eye.

Under construction for five years, the Gittinghoupe project was now complete. This side of the new structure would now be connected to the city across the water. What an honor, to have been chosen for such a glorious proposal. The revenue alone coming from the new and bright city would be enough to boost the local economy for generations. What an honor.

Gittinghoupe. It was the city across the water, the city that taunted all with its crisp new apartments, condos and town homes for rent and purchase. The fliers littered the roads back over on this side of the bridge. Television ads looped endlessly. The white concrete road splayed open, the columns a god’s giant arms scooping up all his children. Elegant metal cords stitched the bridge into its solid frame and had the sensuality of a woman’s lace corset, truly a testimony to the power and poetry of engineering.

The ads and fliers told all to come to Gittinghoupe and begin living the best part of their lives.

One of these fliers lay on an long-worn and ringed coffee table, the flier itself ringed with red and brown, the colors of wine and coffee.  The wornwood table bore few signs of a previous life:  a thick spice-flavored candle, half melted down, wick an ashblack nub and dust-glazed in its entirety; a catalogue boasting trendy furniture from the Netherlands.  Most of the other items had been permanently removed.  The Gittinghoupe flier lay stiffly at the right end of the rectangular table, having been mindlessly used as a coaster now for at least two weeks.  The apartment that shrouded these few defiant possessions had not a breath of life within it; it was a block of concrete, a structure stricken dumb of any linear thought or purpose.  Its sole occupant stared blankly at the flier, the occupant standing by all means prepared to dash to work, yet the eyes remained tearglazed, the posture a stance defeated, the coffee thermos held aloft more so for the sheer appearance of  habit than by need for drink.

It was an empty home, a sentence without any punctuation. It was an earthworm cut in half, the side owning the head having long crawled away. If the occupant stared more carefully in the direction of the flier, she would notice a sock sticking out from under the couch, just the hint of a gold toe. This gold toe would send the occupant into an eruption of panic and she would surely come uncoiled.

Brynn. No “E.” No vowels.

The flier had remained throughout the crisis of his abandonment, a silent witness amidst the horror. Though ringed, it still retained enough gloss to captivate her gaze, if she was considering its content or not.

Sometimes she wondered if the mundanity was worse than the crisis. Arising from the coffin, ascending into the world of work.  The insipid distractions of her fellow employees.   Numbers, memos, emails.  Round-the-clock cycles of wasting away, wine, alarm.  And for what purpose?  Her best friend and mate was gone save an email or two wrapping up loose ends, his side of the earthworm having grown whole again and inching into pasture, as she just writhed and dried in the sunlight.

This day he had the nerve to send her an email about her half of a long-reneged gym contract. Three-hundred dollars would cover her end.

She did not reply but wrote a check and slipped it into an envelope. Jesus, she didn’t know his new address. Another dagger. Brynn would have to reply. “whats your address” - no question marks.  Hitting "send" seemed an abberation.  Life underwater.

XXXX Name of Road, Apt XXX

City, STATE XXXXX-XXXX

There was no reading or absorbing of a location. There was only skimming, the introduction and the handshake and the immediate forgetting of the stranger’s name. Why are some people so bad with names? Is it because they find the other person irrelevant?

 

Brynn saw a tall, beautiful and willowy lady pumping gas into her silver European sedan. How do some people get by in life without getting scuffed? Do they ever get hurt? Feel pain? Lose their dignity for even a moment?

Oh, how glorious it must be to not have to think.

But it didn’t become the burr under her agitated skin until she saw the same woman again at the grocery store. The heart-shaped face, the bowed lips. The slight up-turn of sandy blonde hair, lustrous, voluminous. Bejeweled ears, diamond cross lain squarely between tanned collarbones. Red nails, red pumps, pointed and full bosom. Three-carat diamond ring on left-hand ring finger. Bright eyes. Nary a tired ring of purple under either.

“Excuse me,” the woman said to Brynn. “Would you happen to know where the bakery is in this store?”

Brynn pointed without remark.

“Thank you.” The woman made a move as if she were about to roll off with her basket, but she hesitated.

“Forgive me for asking, but what is a young woman like you doing single? Why aren’t you married?”

Oh, how this pierced Brynn. The bottom dropped out, the sky came falling, the holy tablets broke in half.

Brynn sensed grit in her mouth and ground it between her teeth.  “That is none of your business.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” the woman sing-songed. “I’m just visiting here from Gittinghoupe and it seems to me so many of the young women in this town are single.”

Ashamed, Brynn left her basket of snack foods and stampeded to the wine aisle, picked up a liter of cab sav and a liter of merlot. Old habits die hard. His and hers. Fuck it, I’ll drink ‘em both.

Bad ideas die hard, too.

She’d drank through the first mellowing of the body, she’d drank through the initial buzz and swoon. She’d drank through the riotous indignation of her singledom. She’d drank through the first of the crying jags, she’d drank through the first round of spinning. At long last she’d drank herself into the bottom of the spiral, worn out and too tired to protest the present state of affairs. Worn out was not always bad. Brynn decided she should learn to embrace the sweet lull of exhaustion that perhaps may lead to the sanctuary of sleep.

The flier for Gittinghoupe lay motionless and ringed. Again, it was the object of Brynn’s silent gaze.

The white road, taunting. The columns, welcoming. The wired bridge looming heroically over the sapphiric blue waters. Glinting. Gleaming. Hinting of what was to come on the other side. New. White.

Affordable.

Hung over, Brynn made it to work the next morning in possession of a renewed feeling of intent and purpose. She got online and looked at what some of the apartments had to offer. Hell, it wouldn’t be that much longer of a commute to work, especially considering her quality of life might finally stagger uphill.

She stopped at a convenience store on her way home from work and while walking out to her car she saw a stand holding thin catalogs for the new homes in Gittinghoupe. Ah, something to peruse while getting drunk again tonight.

At her apartment she opened a small container of California rolls and untwisted the top to a bottle of cold sake. Brynn flipped on the tube, and serendipitously an ad for Gittinghope apartment, condos, and townhomes flickered on the screen. I get it, I have been thoroughly propagandized.

Situated, Brynn opened the catalogue. The first page featured the grand-showstopper homes. Five bedrooms, three full baths and one half-bath. Gleaming white kitchen countertops. Christ, was every day a blue sky in Gittinghoupe? Front-yard fountains, marble bathrooms. Columns lining the front of the houses. New roads, ink black and flawlessly lined. Brand new green sod, still so new as to give the illusion of patchwork.

Brynn flipped through three pages to get to the apartments. Living alone, she was not greedy for an excess of living space. Being able to breathe would be nice enough.

Ah, here’s one. One-bedroom apartment. Damn, look at this kitchen. Actually makes me want to cook. But that thought set in a pang. She had cooked.

Goddammit.

The one-bedroom apartments all boasted spectacular views over the water. The architects did not discriminate against those tenants who did not require much square footage; the smaller homes and apartments were crafted and situated with the same respect and care as were the grander designs. The apartments had balconies coming from the bedrooms and modest but stable decks coming from the living rooms. The windows were long and high which gave an air of true marina living. Nothing about the white-walled apartments seemed claustrophobic and most certainly were not boring or gray. The prices were hilarious – these rooms could have easily gone for twice as much.

Gittinghoupe. You’d better live up to your name.

 

At work she made the call.

“Thank you for calling Gittinghoupe Residences, this is Lydia speaking. How may I direct your call?”

Wow, a real person.

“Um, I’m interested in taking a tour of your properties.”

“That’s fantastic. Anything in particular?”

“Well, I have the catalogue, and I’ve been online, and I think I’m only going to need a one-bedroom apartment.”

“That’s fantastic. When can I make you an appointment?”

Ironically, Brynn hadn’t prepared for this part of the conversation.

“Really, I suppose any time after work – after four o’clock will do.”

“Great. Do you have time in your schedule today?”

Silence.

“Ma’am?” Lydia asked, hunting for a response.

“How about Saturday?”

“Saturdays are busy, but that will be fine anyway. How about nine in the morning, or is that too early?”

“No, no…I can make it there by nine.”

“Fantastic.” Fantastic, I get it. “May I have your name?”

Two more days until the tour. If Brynn decided she liked what she saw, she was going to sign a lease that day. Fuck this moping around anymore.

And then, of course, the instinctive and powerful mystic carnality of nature showed its shameless face of jealousy, in that one who was previously the proprietor of another was finally losing the power of the unspoken but strong soul-cord that ties lovers together even after they have gone into the ether from one another.

Brynn’s phone rang.

“I just wanted to see how you’re doing.”

“I’m getting by.”

With this silence on the other end, already. You called ME. At least give me the dignity of having something to say. I’m not carrying the weight of this conversation on my broken back.

“Is that all you have to say?”

What do you expect from me. I’m slain.

“I’m thinking about going to Gittinghoupe on Saturday to check out their apartments.”

You have no right to ask me anything about my life.

“Wow. Really?”

“Yeah. I can’t stand living here anymore.”

Because of YOU.

“I’m sorry.”

“That’s nice. So is this really why you’re calling me or do I owe you more money.”

“No, you don’t owe me anything.” He dares to sound jovial. “Do you want me to go with you on Saturday?”

And what, bring your smell to my new home, too? Saturate it with your footprints?

“Why would you ever want to go with me on Saturday?”

“I don’t know, maybe give you some advice or support.”

“Thank you, but I think I am big enough to do this alone.”

Another pause.

“Are you sure you really want to drive that far alone?”

Tommy, if I don’t, I may die.

“Yes, Tommy. I need to move. It’s too hard on me here.”

“Brynn, I want to see you.”

She sighed aloud, reflexively, and Tommy perceived her pain and frustration over the phone line.

“Do you know, do you have any idea, why I want to get away? Why are you doing this now? It’s been two months. Two months. I can barely function. I can’t believe I’m even talking to you right now. My heart is falling apart because you’ve called me and I can tell from the bottom of my soul it’s because you are just curious enough to feed your ego. If you have any reason to see me other than torturing me for your benefit then maybe, maybe I’ll consider it. But in the meantime just try to leave me alone, for chrissakes, please just leave me alone.”

She slapped her phone shut.

Then the asshole had the nerve to send her a text message.

With this, Brynn was flooded with the temptation to be hopeful, then immediately felt ashamed that she would allow herself to be strung along.

Nothing was going to stop her from going to tour the gleaming white apartments on the water and over the bridge in the beautiful, pristine city of Gittinghoupe.

I am just some pathetic, spineless schoolgirl.

How did he know I am thinking about leaving?

Brynn, oh how she languished.  She damned herself for even thinking about him and then felt ridiculous for the self-condemnation. He was her lover, her fiancée for five years. Five years. Five years of the same space, the same spit in the bathroom sink. That’s a lot of DNA getting traded for one of them to get cold feet. A lot of time to expect her to be more healed after only two months of being separated.

The idea of Gittinghoupe was the only thing propelling her feet forward. I must not have any desire to see Tommy tomorrow. I must not even give myself the option. It will only lead to more pain and separation when he does not say he loves me, when he does not want me back. I cannot get my hopes up for any reason. I will go to this new apartment and I will try to start again.

Her chest feeling sore with the exhaustion of too much stress, she cried herself to sleep Friday night, having three glasses of wine. In her mind as she closed her eyes she envisioned the glinting blue waters that would welcome her home as she crossed over the gleaming white bridge, away from the smothering gray walls that only existed to mock her.

Saturday morning.

Brynn awoke, for once, optimistic. Even the shower water seemed to encourage her. It was warm, the spray massaging her scalp. Her shampoo smelled like citrus. Her clothes, laid out neatly the night before, looked crisp and casual, with a hint of togetherness. Her hair cooperated with her and stayed out of her face.

I’ll be damned. I look human.

Packing a liter water bottle and the Gittinghoupe catalog, she slid into her modest sedan.

Her cell phone buzzed, signaling an incoming text message.

GOOD LUCK HOPE 2 HEAR FROM U SOON. TOMMY

As much as she hated to admit it, she was glad, and slightly relieved, to get this.

Okay, off to the races.

Saturday morning driving was always such a pleasant surprise to Brynn who was used to the droning, stop-and-go of rush hour traffic. She had allotted herself 45 minutes to get to her appointment at nine and still she was flying on the roads.

The sun was out, finally, and for once.

The traffic thinned out significantly as Brynn approached the threshold of the highway leading to the magnificent bridge of Gittinghoupe. About a quarter of a mile before reaching the entrance, all the other cars seemed to slip off down neighborhood roads or thoroughfares leading in different directions.

Frikkin’ odd. Where’d everybody go?

Nearing the entrance, the columns stood majestically and mystically and with an authority over everything in their realm. This choice of architecture was of course a bit strange, considering that 99 percent of highways aren’t announced with such pomp, but they did glow in the sunlight and offer a sense of security to anyone hesitant to start their lives over again by traveling down this new and intimidating thoroughfare.

Brynn looked around upon crossing the boundary onto the new highway and saw no other cars, at all. The welcoming arms of the giant beckoned her alone.

Here I go.

She hadn’t realized how tall the columns were until she was directly underneath them. Easily they could compete with a 40-story skyscraper. Why in the hell was this necessary? Ha, your tax dollars at work.

Not to mention the pavement of the highway itself. Vast and wide were the six lanes. Six lanes and no one on any of them.

Tell you what though, it’s so smooth the car seems to be driving itself.

She’d left the house with about half a tank of gasoline, which she figured would be plenty for the half-hour drive she estimated each way would be. Brynn flipped on the radio. A song she deemed half-respectable was on and she sang along.

Feeling slightly alive for once.

On either side of the highway was a gorgeous stretch of rolling land. Damn, I can’t believe there’s so much land out this way. Why haven’t I ever been out here before?

That first song ended, and then another came on. Brynn sang along to this song as well.

By the fourth song there was no sight of the bridge.

She looked in her rear-view mirror and did not see the gargantuan columns pointing to the sky.

By the sixth song, Brynn pulled over and looked at the catalog. On back cover of the booklet was a map to Gittinghoupe. It’s a straight shot. I’m just freaking out because I had too much coffee.

Brynn pulled back onto the highway. It had narrowed to a four-lane road at song number eight and lost some of its gleaming luster. The scenery faded from the greenscape it had been before and looked drier. Still no cars. Still no traffic.

Song eleven came on the radio and Brynn was no closer to water or a magnificent gleaming bridge than she was the man on the moon. Okay, this is bullshit. I must have missed a road.

I am such a dumbass.

I should have brought Tommy.

It must have been a simple mistake, she thought. Maybe she was so caught up in the glory of the initial columns she missed a special detour, or maybe even an exit. Maybe there were two highways, one going this way, and the other going that way. Although these thoughts seemed absurd to her, this must be the explanation.

I’ve done dumber things in the past.

Brynn resolved to turn around. She’d been driving for a half-hour. Picking up her cell phone, she called the office at Gittinghoupe. “All our operators are currently servicing other customers….we know your time is valuable, and we hope you will hold until one of our associates is available to help you.”

“Fuck.”

Losing hope, Brynn made a u-turn on the empty highway and headed back toward her town.

“This is such bullshit. I can’t even drive in a straight fucking line the right way.”

She’d stopped singing along to the songs on the radio. Her own voice sounded obnoxious to her, her chords flooded with stupidity. On top of that, she was plagued by the monotonous pang of hurt and anticipation brought on because Tommy was waiting to hear from her when she got back.

It wasn’t the missing traffic, it wasn’t the twelve or so songs on the radio that played until she’d decided she’d gone the wrong way, it wasn’t the fact her car was having exceptionally good gas mileage despite her unfortunate round-trip, it wasn’t that her heart was aloft with hope and then dashed with disappointment at her own perceived failure, it wasn’t any of these things, not the awkwardly huge columns that called her forth, not the missing body of water. None of these things gave Brynn such a great shock or pause as to deter her from attempting to better her depreciating life.

None of this had deterred her enough for her to truly stop hoping she might eventually succeed, until she passed over a rolling hill, having completed her u-turn, having headed back home, for the last four songs or so.

And the paved highway was black.

A two-lane black highway, framed by an arid landscape that Brynn had never seen. It certainly had not been there before.

Brynn hit the brakes.

And like an anvil, the same pain that hit her the night that Tommy told her he could not be her husband, the searing realization that all you thought was secure and right in the world was about to end and never had a place in the future –

The needle on her gas gauge remained fixed on the half-tank mark. This was after an hour of solid highway-speed driving.

Brynn knew. This was not just a wrong turn. She also knew how irrational this all was, and although she stopped just short of admitting it to herself, she knew.

As long as there’s gas in the car I’m going to keep driving.

Her car jumped over the change of the pavement as the road turned into a winding ribbon of tar and gravel. Her tires were loud going over their new terrain and her radio blared into static. No more songs for distractions.

In her rearview mirror there was none of the white, four lane highway to be seen. It was as if this black highway had always been what she’d traveled, roping along the landscape forever and ever, nary another car ever having followed it anywhere in time.

Nothing was changing.

Should she drive 40? 50? 60? 70 miles per hour?

There was simply nothing anywhere. The time on her cell phone said 10:30 a.m. She’d been in the car for two and a half hours.

She contemplated turning around again, but this was after she’d turned around yet again.

Nothing was changing.

She’d called Tommy. He hadn’t answered. She’d sent him a text message. He had not responded. She’d called Gittinghoupe again. She’d heard the same message. Her gas gauge remained unmoved.

Technically she was headed back toward Gittinghoupe. Another twenty minutes in this direction and then she’d call them again.

Her phone signaled she’d received a text message.

JUST GOT UR TEXT WHATS UP?

Brynn screeched to the side of the highway. On either side of her was desert. Sand kicked up where her tires halted, the smell of rubber wafting up through the cabin.

She tried to call him but again, an answering machine. “GODDAMMIT!”

Hands trembling, she fumbled with the tiny buttons on her phone.

AM LOST CANT FIND GH OR MAIN ROAD PLS HELP ME

Send.

Panicking, she took a pull off her water bottle. The water was warm and tasted sour.

Two minutes later another text buzzed on her phone.

I NEVR LUVD U

Clinching the phone, Brynn’s face wrenched up in a spasm of tortured disbelief; now totally abandoned, lost and unable to escape, there was no life-rope, no thread of hope dangling from on high to retrieve her.

She wailed and sweat on the side of the abandoned highway.

Ten minutes later her phone buzzed again. She hadn’t moved from her spot. She had just been staring at her odometer.

105,986

That was the mileage on her car. Had this number changed? Had it moved?

She flipped open her phone, dreading what the screen would have to say.

PLS TELL ME WHATS UP Y DONT U ANSWR

Thoroughly deranged, Brynn replied.

WAT THE FUK R U DOING 2 ME

She cranked her car and began to drive again.

As long as there’s gas in the car, I’m driving.

Technically still driving toward Gittinghoupe, the landscape remained the same for miles and miles. How she knew she’d travelled miles and miles she could only surmise by the amount of time elapsing according to her trusty cell phone. She hadn’t received another text message from Tommy, or what she assumed was Tommy, for another hour.

Her odometer remained at 105,986.

Her gas gauge also remained at a half-tank.

She’d turned her radio off the moment it received nothing but static.

The static came back on. Brynn jolted and slapped the radio knob over and over and over again, but the radio was not signaling that it was receiving any power from the battery.

Her phone buzzed with another long-awaited text message.

I NVER WANT 2 C U AGIN

“What? What? What is this? What’s happening? Why are you doing this to me?”

The static blared, and Brynn tossed her cell phone out of her driver’s side window.

As she did this, the odometer clicked over to 105,987.

The static silenced.

It was just Brynn and the road.

She was unnerved but had reached an uneasy peace with her situation. Anxiety battled with her stomach’s audacity to be hungry. Brynn dug around in her purse and found three loose mints and a lozenge, and lovingly put them one at a time in her mouth until each one was gone. She took another sip of her warm and stale water. The water tasted more rancid than before. Strange, it had come straight from her tap. But still this did not alarm or surprise her. It was just one more thing.

Continuing to drive, ironically, boredom set in as it does often during road trips. Ha, I’m on a road trip. A road trip with no end.

The Gittinghoupe booklet rustled on the passenger seat as the wind tunneled through the cabin of the car. Brynn took it and folded the covers together and read the page featuring the one-bedroom apartments.

Gittinghoupe, the dreamhomes you’ve always wanted. Come today and tour our beautiful selection of one-bedroom apartments. Gittinghoupe, where you can begin to live the life you’ve always wanted.

Brynn studied the page more closely. Her eyes honed in on the window in the photograph of the apartments taken from the outside. The window was on the third floor. A woman’s head and torso could be distinguished within the ambiguity of the photograph.

It was her, it was her.

Oh my God oh my God oh my God

And at this point, her head hit the steering wheel, she was out, lost to unconsciousness, and the beautiful blissful ignorance of sleep.

Upon awakening she realized she was parked at a very bad angle. The car was not quite in a ditch, but was precariously teetering over the edge of one, toying with the idea of sliding on into it. Naturally her first instinct was to leave the vehicle and try to regain some semblance of balance and place. However, not sure how this would upset what little stability the car had in this position, she stayed inside. Instead, she put the car in reverse and luckily was able to back out and return to the highway.

It was then she turned the car off and stepped out onto the pavement. Evening was falling and the desert sky was brimming with glorious twilight colors. Unfazed by the beauty presented to her, she was grateful that the temperature was falling. How far will it fall?

She remembered the booklet and her photo. Almost needless to say, the picture was not the same as it appeared to Brynn before. The woman in the window was now just a blurred and anonymous, unidentifiable figure of a woman. It could have been anyone, herself, her mother, the strange lady at the grocery store. Mother Teresa.

Frustrated and terrified, Brynn closed the booklet. The back cover read

WHY DON’T YOU KEEP DRIVING?

Brynn dropped the small catalog and took backward steps away from it. It flopped in the wind. Finally it blew away underneath the car and into the ditch.

Trembling her way into the car, she turned the ignition and fired up her headlights. She opened her bottle of water, but by now it smelled like rotten eggs and she emptied the contents onto the road.

The fluid sizzled on the pavement.

Knowing that one is going to die, and die alone, die without purpose, die without having first been redeemed, carves a person out hollow, negates their birth, negates their life, and erases what the person would craft into their legacy…It was not her death that frightened her, but the torture that appeared which would immediately precede it. The injustice that she would be a toy for some sadistic and cosmic power to finally destroy poked holes into her brain, and ate away at her resistance to death. As morning peeked over the edge of the horizon, driving down the road with no purpose, Brynn’s eyes were dried and seeing distortions in her path. The distortions, slight discolorations in the road and in the desert sand that surrounded her, became shifting shapes swirling like demonic dust devils, taunting her to drive off the road and join them.

As long as there’s gas in the car, I’m going to keep driving.

The dirt puppets swung along in an unholy dance, boneless, limbs hanging and flopping to their sides, faces sweeping in close to the windshield and smiling at Brynn with a loathing and menace that filleted the precious remainder of her electrified nerves. Cats and dogs, fluffy and healthy, would randomly run into her car’s path…she accelerated and ran over them, two and three at first, and then ten, twenty small animals ran suicidally into her path, and she rammed them, too, but when she gathered the nerve to look behind her all the thuds of flesh hitting metal was but another psy-ops maneuver conducted by whatever was in control of this deranged land…there were no bodies, no blood.

And the odometer rolled over to 105,988.

Parched, and despite herself, starving, Brynn continued to drive. A hailstorm manifested from a clear, white-hot sky, but she refused to pull over…when the storm cleared, a highway sign appeared hauntingly in the near distance, a blood-red sign, scripted with white lettering.

Brynn dreaded closing in on the visage that appeared before her, but any information was better than nothing.

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

“I DON’T KNOW!” Brynn screamed.

Passing the sign, another one appeared.

Closing in on the second sign, she saw that it said the same thing.

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

Another sign.

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

Again.

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

…

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

Brynn pushed the accelerator to the floor of the car. The signs became so close together that eventually it was impossible to read them. They all asked her the same thing.

The car was pushing 110 miles per hour, surely the fastest her old sedan could go. Why do I keep driving?

She cried and cried, her eyes stinging hot and hopeless, she was driving with her eyes nearly all the way closed, driving with the pedal to the metal. Her stomach was trying to eat itself, her chest wanted to implode from its own weight, and she was going to die alone in this horrible unknown dimension, unloved and undiscovered, a missing person to be cloned on discarded and forgotten fliers that would only momentarily litter kitchen counters until some lady of the house found it fit to discard them.

“I drive, I drive…” she bawled aloud, “I drive because I HATE YOU! I drive because I CAN’T STOP! I drive because if I stop driving then YOU ARE JUST GOING TO EAT ME ANYWAY, YOU’RE GOING TO KILL ME ANYWAY, AND AS LONG AS THERE’S GAS IN MY CAR SO HELP ME I’M GOING TO DRIVE UNTIL I’M DEAD! FUCK YOU, FUCK YOU! KILL ME, MOTHERFUCKERS! YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE TO COME AND GET ME FIRST!”

Car speeding at full throttle, as those final words passed from her lips, the orange needle on her gas gauge began to slowly but steadily descend to the “E” at the bottom of the dial. That was the final straw. They’re finally going to get me.

The numbers on the odometer span in nonsensical directions and out of control; they ceased to mark anything discernable as earthly mileage, and at one point Brynn saw that her car was registering in negative distances.

Almost out of gas, her car began to rumble and black smoke billowed from under the hood. Faces appeared from the smoke, mouths unnaturally wide and bearing fangs biting at her through the glass. Brynn choked and coughed, being forced to close her eyes…This is it. They’re going to get me.

The pollution clogged the car so that she could not breathe rhythmically and she braced herself for being eaten, an impact, a final act of death, pins, needles, knives…whatever was going to end her life. Past any point of nervousness, Brynn pined for relief in any form that could overtake her.

The engine broke; it would not run any more. The car slowed and stopped, black fumes pouring from its every orifice.

What was left of Brynn’s survival instinct nudged her to roll out of the car. Sputtering and crusted with soot and oil, she landed on the hard ground.

Something cool brushed past her face. It was air.

On the ground, Brynn rolled over onto her back and coughed up black phlegm. She leaned over onto her belly and spat it out.

Once the smoke was brushed away by the cool onslaught of wind that circled her and her vehicle, she looked up into the sky…it was blue, not the white-hot wasteland of the horizon that had loomed overhead for so long.

In the distance she perceived the visage of water…and a great, white, gleaming suspension bridge heralded by the sign “Gittinghoupe 3 Miles.”

Her mind rattled with the image of the bright red signs asking her why she continued to drive. Why she didn’t roll off the road, why she plowed through the cats and dogs, why she didn’t falter under the persecution of the fanged ghosts dancing along the side of the road, snapping at her.

The car was dead. Behind her, the road travelled appeared as bright white and wide as the magnificent columned entrance that first had beckoned her to come through it. Ahead, it stretched the same…of course, she would have to travel this last leg on foot if she decided to go in that direction.

Would she? Should she? Did Gittinghoupe deserve her after the hell it had put her through to get there?

Or was this all a part of the plan to see if she deserved to be there?

There is no way I’m going back.

In her mind, the signs:

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

I drive because I don’t want to go back.

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

I drive because I have hope.

WHY DO YOU KEEP DRIVING?

I drive because if there’s a way out, I’m going to find it. I am going to find a way out of this hell.

And Gittinghoupe gleamed past the bridge even as she walked across it, her mind and body ragged and torn…exhausted, starved, wild…

Walking into the threshold of the city of Gittinghoupe, her eyes black and red, her clothes ruined, she saw the first inhabitants of the city which had beheld so much promise. These people looked average and normal, save for the hallowed glow of their expressions as they observed her approach. Their eyes were the proprietors of the same scars, the same unbelievable nightmare from which she had just emerged.

As Brynn collapsed, she was swarmed and gathered by a flock of clean and peachy-skinned people, swaddling her in a blanket as someone ordered someone else to bring her water.

“WE HAVE A SURVIVOR!”

The crowd grew in size and roared with approval. Brynn was oblivious to this.

Her new apartment was exactly like the one in the booklet that she’d picked up at the convenience store and subsequently lost during her trial in the desert. She’d decorated it lovingly and the white walls allowed her to breathe and breathe deeply and freely.

There was no return to Tommy, no return to her dusty old history books, no return to the nights spent obliterated in the hopes of escaping the reality she had created around herself.

There was instead fresh air sweeping into her apartment from the nearby body of water, seagulls swooping and porpoises searching for fish. There were new friends and dinner parties, a new job where she was allowed to use her creative abilities.

There was even a prospect for new love. They had gone on a couple of dates, and the only thing they hadn’t discussed were the personal trials that brought them there.

Gittinghoupe brought Brynn all the things in life she knew she wanted and deserved.

But at night, even when she left her sliding glass doors cracked and she could hear the sounds of the marina and all its life, even when her belly was full and her wallet was full and her life was otherwise full, the horror of her arrival into town was always the last thing that filtered through her thoughts before she fell asleep.

There is always going to be a price.

But at least here, there’s hope.

That’s why I kept driving.

If Amyle had wanted to open the letter, she would have opened it.

 

She thought about rain and graves and the prospect of a lone black-red rose rising from a carpet of long-forgotten sod.

 

It would have been a good death; children hanging like eaves and a husband resting his weary head on a calloused hand.  No - he would have been a doctor.  No callouses on his hands.

 

Amyle thought about the taste of gravy made with grease, sopped up with a homemade biscuit.

 

Would someone eventually pick the rose?  Hang it upside down until its essence had dried?  Kept it as a scepter, or for adoration?

 

The letter loomed and swayed, crisp in its yellow paper, waiting for dust to envelop it.

 

The chair welcomed her.

 

A white sill framed the rain.  Trees dripped and sobbed.  A wet place this was.  Swampy looking houses absorbed the water and exhaled with mossy breaths. 

 

Brown puddles clasped welcoming hands to the heavy drops excorcised from the sky.  They presented their new arrivals with muddy crowns as each one plopped, plopped down.

 

Behind her she knew phantom children danced in the corner shadows of the room.  Some had his face, some had her hands.  

 

One she had to lull to sleep with phantasmic stories.  One would not tolerate the taste of her milk.

 

One would delight at the sight of a rubber ball bouncing.  Timothy.

 

A duck found a brown puddle.  The duck floated.

 

The white, peeling paint of the neighbor's front porch.  A swing.

 

A long branch deflecting drops.

 

Petals surviving, petals falling down.

 

All for beauty?   

A grey sky, sullen, yet illuminated by clouds backlit under the sun.

 

So much time to fix the ruin.

 

Every little drop of rain.

 

Washing everything away. 

I have been a bad customer.

Is it because I am just getting older?  More impatient?

Now, I know how to wait.  I can wait for a long time as long as I know my presence has been acknowledged.

Oooh!  I am sounding so ENTITLED.  I must be ACKNOWLEDGED. 

Well, I am spending my money.  On products I don't really need.  I am, after all, paying their salary.

Have you read anything else I've written?

Somewhat recently, I was waiting at a relatively busy counter, hoping to buy some product.  I don't remember what.  The saleswoman behind the counter was obviously busy, but as I recall, there were a few choice moments when she or one of her coworkers easily could have said "hello" to me.  None did.

I took this personally.  Was it the way I looked?  Was I not important? 

I was with my husband, and being ignored in front of him by people who at one time would have been my cohorts was very embarassing.  We took our business to a slower, albeit more expensive counter in the department.

Immediately I told our saleswoman that I had not been acknowledged at the other counter.  She was, of course, apologetic in the way folks who have to deal with the public are automatically trained to apologize.  I have done the same a million times.

I told her that I wasn't going to complain to upper management and that I was sure she and the people at the other counter were friends and that I had also sold makeup for years like they are now and before you knew it I was spewing off at the mouth sounding like some coked-out paranoid middle-aged woman who hadn't gotten her due and was pissed but also felt stupid for saying anything about it but I had to say something, ya know, because it was important even though I understood so can I have a mascara now, please?

My husband giggled, standing behind me.

Indeed, the woman at the second counter had said, she was friends with the workers at the busier counter.

I had become that person.  That customer. 

I avoided counter no. 1 there for a few months, out of shame and embarassment.  Since then, I have been back, made the same idle chit-chat with them, talked shop, showing off what I used to know about that life, identifying with them, telling them about this site, although they will never read it, never come here.

I don't know if I owe them an apology or not, but I know that since then I have been on much better behavior.

It's just not worth it to get pissed off at people who are selling retail.  It's just going to make you look stupid when you complain to a manager or another salesperson working the floor.  They're just going to say that you're crazy or busy or bitchy or spoiled or just don't get it.

And chances are, they're probably right.

So...it's safe to say it's been a few years since I worked behind a counter selling makeup.  To the point now that I actually feel trepidation walking through the cosmetics department of any store I'm in.

I feel I want to avoid the hopeful (yet malaised) looks from the salespeople...the same look that says both "I want your business" and "please keep walking by me so I can continue to do nothing."  I want to avoid the feigned excitement that I have come for their product.  I want to spare them the song and dance of how I am today, do I need any help, and can they show me this. 

I was that person...I had to force myself to stand up...I had to...talk to people.

Not too long ago I wanted to buy a cleanser for someone.  It was early on a Saturday and the mall had just opened.  The line from which I wanted to purchase was having its GWP.  The saleswoman, besmocked and chagrinned that we demanded service upon the opening bell of the day, heard my request.  I was actually there with my mother in law.  She was willing to buy this product for me, and when the saleswoman pronounced to us that the qualifying purchase for the gift was actually more than the cost of the cleanser we'd requested, I felt irritated.

This irritation came from the fact I had not inquired about the free gift with purchase and yet we were being, as it felt to me, slightly lectured about the fact we were not going to receive something for nothing.  Instinctually, I wanted to look at the salesperson with my eyes wide and rounded and say, "I know that."  Maybe I don't want your damned gift.  Maybe I have so much makeup and likewise accessories my closets are overflowing with worthless minis.  Maybe it is presumptuous that a salesperson would assume that we thought a GWP "valued at $50" would be ours for a miserly purchase of $17.50.  Maybe she thought she was cutting us off on the path of disappointment and anger when a GWP would not automatically become ours.

However, this is what is important to remember:  The woman behind the counter has been given proof positive that the public cannot be trusted to know - much less, understand - that a qualifying purchase of $25.00 is non-negotiable and that she cannot do anything about the fact your favorite powder or astringent doesn't make the cut.  You might have gotten swaddled up in your finest, packed your credit card and the empty bottle of your Moisture-Ridden Carbide Complex SPF 555 to make sure you come home with the right product but if it doesn't cost $32.50 you'd better be prepared to load up on next month's supply as well if you want those free little ceramides. 

And the woman behind the counter has been hit with "What?  It doesn't?  But I buy here all the time!" so many times that she is doing everything in her power to soften the blow before the customer tries to swing. She doesn't want you to be angry at her.  Hell no.  She wants the commission from your sale, duh.  Pissing you off is not going to improve her paycheck.  This is what gift is all about, at least to the lowly salesgirl.  Making that extra 2% from every sale.  And you get to walk away with an extra squirt of vaseline or a dash of powdered pigment.  Everybody wins.

Although our friendly saleswoman on the day of this particular episode did end up looking at us in amazement when I announced I didn't need anything in the gift and the cleanser was all we'd come for (another form of customer snobbery I should address here), the woman did seem a little put out that her items per transaction (IPT) was already going to be registering down for the day (ideally three items are sold per customer).  But I couldn't help that.  The cleanser was all we'd needed.  And the salesperson didn't seem prepared to hit us with the hard sell.  She didn't argue with us to look at the new products for gift.  She didn't try to link to the core three products.  She didn't ask us what products in her line we were already using.  She didn't compliment us on our own makeup or jewelry.  She didn't ask us what shopping we had planned for the day.

Nope.  She rang up the cleanser and watched us walk out of the store into the mall.  So she must have not wanted us to have the free gift that badly.

Or maybe it was just me?

I want to introduce you all to a friend of mine, Lulu. We've all had a friend like her.

Lulu's pretty normal, she likes to read and chill, you know, regular stuff.
But sometimes she loses control...she never knows the appropriate boundary when she's had too much.

She really is her own worst enemy.

Lulu's tragedies always ended up posted on MySpace...poor thing...

If you're wondering where Lulu is now, let's just say she's gotten herself into a little bit of trouble:

Maybe there will be more soon. I haven't heard from her in a while. Take care, Lulu.

This could be dangerous.

 
And for those who are twitter-rific (WTF???): MakeupGrlMemoir