traffic

day that things will finally click. Flip on the news next. What else? Reports on the traffic. Bad as usual. Aggravated people battling to get to aggravating jobs. You were gone almost three years and nothing’s changed. In fact, that could be the same tape of a ‘98 traffic jam for all you know. Why not, save on helicopter fuel, film costs. Who would notice?

Alright, that thinking is getting you nowhere. Gotta stop that; not productive. Today’s important, that much you know. But what—

The ring of your phone interrupts that thought.

“Get a move-on, buddy. It’s almost nine,” the voice cheers into your ear. It’s Brett Reed, energy-filled as ever. He’s probably been up and in pinstripes for hours now.

“And what would I need to be moving on to?”

“Hey, I’m not your secretary. Whatever you do between nine and five.”

“What day is it, Brett?” You ask this a split second before realizing you shouldn’t. It’s the sort of question that doesn’t sound too promising to a man who lives by the second. But now it is out there, hanging in the air like a surprise hiccup in front of a highway patrolman.

“Don’t go depressive on me, buddy. It’s Thursday, the day all the hotties are fresh. Meet me at The Trader at eight. We’ll put your whole ancient mariner thing to good advantage, maybe even get you laid this time.”

“I don’t know if I can make it tonight, Brett,” you say, knowing full-well resistance is futile.

“Not acceptable. I just closed on a six-figure commission and, bro, we’re celebrating.”

“Brett, what exactly do you do again?” Even three years ago, when you power-lunched with Brett, you could never pin down precisely what he did. Something involving big companies and bigger buy and sell orders. But Brett’s relation to the whole thing remained as vague as the feeling with which you now wake every morning.

“I make money, bro, I make money.” The second money comes out long and sweet, as if Brett were describing a tall brunette he wants to conquer.

By ten, after forcing yourself to take a shower and shave, you’ve remembered what today is: lunch with the old boss. More importantly, and not coincidentally, today is the one-month anniversary of your return and your self-imposed deadline date for getting a job. You’ve really gotta get a day planner. But then, that would probably result in plans for each day, and that sounds daunting.

You fight traffic all the way to the offices of Voice, the magazine for which you spent four years selling ad space. Cars move past you only slightly more quickly than when you are lying flat on your back in your street-side bedroom.

After waiting ten minutes for Jonathan Pike to get off the phone, you rejoin the traffic battle back the way you came to The Bistro and make small talk while you wait for a table. Why didn’t you just meet at the restaurant in the first place?

Finally, you are seated. Jonathan checks his watch immediately. “Mind if we order right away? I have a one-thirty,” he says, apparently without remorse. This is not encouraging.

Things start happening fast now, even relatively speaking. Before the waiter brings what looks to be French onion soup and half of a club sandwich—Jonathan ordered you the number five since you didn’t have time to read the menu—Jonathan has told you that, yes, he knows why you asked him to lunch and, no, he’s sorry but there isn’t anything he can do.

“Things are really tight right now, chief. But you’ll be the first one I call when they turn around.” He turns to the waiter, who is just releasing his hand after setting down Jonathan’s plate. “I better take this to go.”

Three minutes later you are alone at the table, unless you count the face of Andrew Jackson staring up at you from the twenty dollar bill Jonathan left in his stead. Which you don’t.

The rest of the day is a slow-motion blur, a phenomenon you are just now getting used to. You wind up, as always, at the cliffs above the beach, watching the sunset. It is the only part of the day that seems to travel at your speed. Today’s curtain is slower—and therefore more soothing—than normal. A blanket of high clouds has provided a perfect canvas on which every hue of orange can be displayed. Others—in power suits and skirts—roll up, get out of their BMWs and Mercedes S-classes and stand for a moment to take it all in. But you out last them all. While they grab a sound bite of the magic and check it off their daily things-to-do-“for me”-list, then quickly move on, you stand and appreciate every ray and swirl, until the oranges have turned to purples, the purples to deep blues, the deep blues to black.

Why you showed up here at The Trader you are not fully sure. Possibly the effort of drinking with Brett is slightly less taxing than explaining why you didn’t the next day. Besides, sooner or later you’re going to have to get back in sync.

The Trader is new and, as such, very packed. That’s the one part of this town that has changed: the restaurants and bars. But then, this mutation fits in with the frenetic atmosphere; it seems natural. As natural as cattle grazing away one field and needing a new one from which to feed. Only these cattle devour and move on quickly and are very well-dressed and carry cell phones and feed on martinis and Sex on the Beaches. These pastoral thoughts canter through your mind as you stand just inside The Trader’s massive oak doors watching the well-heeled herd buzzing around this upscale wild west-themed venue. You are about to turn in retreat when Brett appears by your side, accompanied by two very attractive ladies who instantly dissolve any bovine images you were enjoying.

“Told you he was the real deal, ladies,” Brett says, handing you what must be a vodka and tonic. “Just look at that outfit.”

You take Brett’s cue yourself, realizing you’re not quite sure what you have on. Turns out you’ve decided on your salty deck shoes, faded blue jeans and a not-so-impressive-even-to-you beige wool sweater. You are trying to think of some witty excuse when Brett introduces Pauline and Amber. You get the impression that he is after Amber, but with Brett it is not always easy to tell. The official Reed motto has always been Leave your options open until the very last instant, “to the foot of the bed,” he likes to say. It is also distinctly possible that he is after both at once.

Brett has, against all odds, secured a cozy booth in the corner and you all move to it. Pauline and Amber slide in close on either side of you while Brett is off to get more drinks, the waitress not being fast enough for the Reed celebratory intoxication quest.

“So Brett tells us that you sailed around the world. Alone,” Amber says.

“That’s right,” you say.

“Wow! You gonna write a book? You could make a lot of money. Maybe get a movie deal.”

You tell her that your goal is to be the only man to sail around the world and not write a book about it.

She laughs but looks disturbed. She’s obviously picked up on the fact that you meant what you said, and that doesn’t fit any of her male paradigms.

Now Pauline speaks. “You must have seen so much beauty out there,” she says.

You are in awe of this sentence. It is the simplest and most pleasing you have heard since your return. What you like most about it is that for once it came before the inevitable questions about storms and pirates, or what you do for a living now—a question that is becoming increasingly sticky to answer.

“Yes,” you say, “beauty is everywhere out—“

Before you can continue Brett is back with a tray of fresh liquid soldiers.

“Has he gotten to the part where he fought off six pirates with Uzis yet?” Brett says, squeezing in next to Amber.

“That can’t be true,” Amber says, apparently excited at the mere possibility.

“Now could we lie in the face of your piercing beauty?” Brett says as he clinks Amber’s cocktail with his. “Tell them bro.”

“No, we couldn’t lie,” you say.

“So it’s true?” Amber says.

“No. The truth is I never saw a pirate or a big storm,” you say. Brett takes this even harder than Amber.

But Brett makes one of his famous saves, appeasing Amber with talk of his six-figure day. Amber has apparently decided to gamble on the money story and conveniently forget that it was Brett who only a moment ago tried to put across a whopper. This allows you to start a happy melt into the booth’s soft burgundy velvet, your complete withdrawal stopped short only by Pauline, who asks what place in the world you found most attractive.

This is another question you like, it powers up images of clear water, blue skies and warm trade winds. You do your best to convey these images and to your amazement time seems to act appropriately again. In fact, everything acts correctly and before long you are alone with Pauline on warm velvet, Brett and Amber finding life in the booth too sedentary and your talk too idyllic.

Later, back at your apartment Pauline is telling you that she did some traveling after college. “Like everyone, I backpacked through Europe,” she says. “It was great. I felt free and exciting. But at the same time the fact that all my friends, everyone I had ever heard of, really, were doing the same thing kind of tainted it. When I got back it didn’t feel very special. It wasn’t like sailing around the world.”

“It sounds exactly like sailing around the world,” you say. But you find it impossible to explain any further. To explain that no matter how far you go, or how long you take, that you always come back, and no matter how grand the memories are, they are still just memories. They don’t stand a chance against the full-court press of the present.

In the morning Pauline is still there. As she sleeps, you watch her slow breathing and her long charcoal-colored hair shimmer in the early morning sunlight. How long before this is just another beautiful memory you wonder.

When she wakes you kiss her and she smiles. It’s a radiant, shy smile that comes across as both familiar and fresh.

“Why did you come back?” she asks.

You could give her the obvious reasons of accomplishing your goal, needing the security of land again and, not least, running out of funds. But all those, while valid, seem false.

So you tell her the truth.

“I don’t really know,” you say.

There is a quiet moment. A truly quiet moment you realize after a few seconds, during which, for the first time since your return, the traffic was not audible.

Then Pauline asks another question.

“Why did you go away?” she says.

“I guess I didn’t like who I was,” you say, but that seems incomplete. “I wanted to change.”

“And did you?”

You think for a moment, listen for traffic.

“Yeah,” you say. “I think I did.” þ

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