Novel Treatments / Chapter 6--Way South (Analysis)

Chapter 6

Once I made the decision to just up and leave, the array and intensity of people’s responses was more extreme than I’d expected.  

Those who were career-minded, and who believed I should (and would) eventually get to such a point, considered my decision suicidal.

“What are you going to say when you return? If you return. And where exactly are you going again?”

Shelby was my cousin who’d gotten his MBA when most students are still navigating the college circuit of 101s. He’d grown up half his life in England and still affected an Oxford drawl. To me, his life appeared more ho-hum—he worked in an IT firm as well, somewhere near the top. He also believed in the seventy-hour workweek as a form of personal salvation.

“And where exactly did you say you were going again?” he asked as I sat in his small townhouse, nibbling at the edges of some chocolate chip cookies he’d baked.

“South. I just want to explore life, come back at my own pace.”

“I wouldn’t hire you, whenever it is you plan to return. You’re a pure liability. Who knows, when and where you’ll go running off again—north, south, east or west? “

Out of politeness, I spent a few more hours watching T.V. at Shelby’s home. Every few minutes he’d punctuate the hum of a broadcast with his thoughts on my imminent departure. “You’re going to ruin your life.” “You’re running away from something.” Or just as the villain was apprehended by the forensic psychologists, “What if you run out money in some shantytown in Costa Rica?”

Shelby’s response was rather subdued compared to my sister’s. I’d gone over to her house to pick up a backpack she’d used on her post-college Europe trip five years earlier. That she’d gotten me the job at Soft-tech, through a friend, unfortunately had slipped my mind as I entered her kitchen, or the shrine, as I liked to call it. In the shrine, a dust mite stood no chance, dirt was as scarce as rain in the Sahara and touching the countertop with grubby fingernails was treated like one of the seven deadly sins.

“Take off your shoes!”

I fiddled with the laces, sensing some sort of attack coming. Though I wouldn’t have minded availing myself of another half-eaten avocado, I sat quietly at her kitchen table, hoping for the best.

“You can have my backpack. In fact you don’t even have to give it back to me. I’m just trying to wonder what the hell it is you think you’re doing?”

I sat at her table not trying to touch the finely embroidered placemats, each with a giant duck quacking merrily at the center.  

“I just want to travel. I never got to go anywhere after college and I just…”

“So you’re going to quit in the end of Q4 when your team needs you. Ask yourself, does that make any sense?”

Sense of course was a highly relative term, although I knew it didn’t make any sense to point this out to my sister.

“I thought about it…”

“And?”

“Well, the time is right now.”

My sister looked down at her placemat, softly pleating the sides as though she were petting mama duck’s tiny brood, which had gone wandering off into the periphery. She looked up over her mallard ministrations. “Let’s just say I heard through the grapevine that they’re not too happy over at Soft-tech. So don’t even think about begging for a reference when you come back broke with dirt all over your face and holes in your shoes.”

“That’s not going to happen.” (I was referring to the shoes and dirt.) “I’m going on a rite of passage. Let’s just call it, finding myself.”

I seldom employed such hokey phrases but hoped I would appeal to my sister’s sensibility of self-help books and new-age jargon. She stopped moving her hands across the placemat, but again cast her eyes downwards.

“No, I’ll tell you what’ll happen. Mom and Dad will feel sorry for you. Let you stay at their home again and because you wasted all your money on some three-month vacation, they’re going to slip money in your pocket to help you along.”

I contorted my face in protest, ready to mention something about how she once when I was six-years-old, but she flashed a finger at me. “You call that finding yourself?!?”

I looked at a bunch of grapefruits and oranges that lay in a glass bowl at the center of the table. I wanted to hide in waiting and then, when she’d gone to sleep, smash them against the wall like Jackson Pollack gone fruity.

Instead the image of Bean flitted into the picture. He sat next to her, totally oblivious to her presence. They have the hottest girls down there. They’ll have champagne on ice down in Rio. We’re going to cause outrage.

“I don’t need the backpack.”

Not really listening to me she continued on, “Do you know what would happen to most people who just quit their job and…travel?”

I waited for her to dispense enlightenment.

“Well,” she continued, “they come back with no resources, they’re totally unemployable and… if they’re lucky, they don’t end up homeless.”

I was happy she said the last part; it sounded so irrational and over-the-top that I felt vindicated by what she’d said about mom and dad slipping Ben Franklins into my pockets. And really, would just leaving the country sabotage my future to the extent that I’d be holding out a plastic cup to strangers passing by?

I hadn’t noticed how while sitting there I’d pushed back against the chair. Now I could feel the arc of my spine relaxing.

“You’re right. I’ll just go for a few weeks.”

“You’ll still have to find a job when you get back.”

“But remember the stock options. I can travel on that money.”

She exhaled, pulled a Kleen-ex from a box in front of her and wiped her palms, as though they were covered in duck feces.

“Fine. You’re going to regret that. Selling your stocks. You could invest that money somewhere else in a couple of year’s time, but that’s fine.”

“Okay, then. I think I’ll just take the backpack and go now.”

“You’re not going to do it.”

“Do what? Leave the country?” I felt my spine arching back against her chair. “You sound like I’m planning to murder someone.”

“You never follow through on anything. You always make these big plans and…”

“but…”

“Look, just take the backpack and walk around in your room with it on, all those fantasies in your head about where you’re going. Where exactly are you going, anyway? Mexico?” She pronounced Mexico like it was a fatal disease.

“I’m going to Africa. To help orphans. I’m going to come back fulfilled and write a self-help book that you’ll probably read some day.”

“I can’t believe what an asshole you’re being. I lend you my backpack and you start going off on me.” Her eyes bulged out as though she were about to shoot laser beams from them. “You’re so ungrateful, Matt.”

“I’m going to Brazil.”

“I don’t care where you’re going.”

I knew it was time to make my exit, lest I took the placemat and ripped mama duck to fucking shreds. It usually happened that way, my trying to keep my cool, her digging into me until I found the closest object and usually hurled it or destroyed it. Then for the next two weeks, I’d have to apologize for what a bad-tempered person I was and how I didn’t deserve her constant largesse.

        “I’ll just go then.” I made to stand up.

        “Matt, take the backpack. Just don’t lose it. I hear people get robbed all the time in Brazil.” She paused. “I don’t even know why you want to go there. It’s dirty.”

        “I’ll be safe.”

        “Here, take the backpack.”

        All of a sudden she stood up, walked towards me and gave me a hug. “Be safe.”

I felt even more the ungrateful bastard, but feared whatever reprisal awaited me should I come back without the backpack. “Thanks.”

I swung the backpack over my shoulder, and without turning around, strode down her driveway. The sun was setting in front of me, but if I was literally walking off into the sunset, I felt my sister’s eyes burning through my back, and the cliché was stripped of its usually romantic associations. If anything, the sunset betokened something ominous—I hadn’t even bought my ticket to Houston yet, and the departure date was only three days away. Maybe my sister was right—I’d strap on her backpack, grab my Lonely Planet and walk about my room, stopping every few minutes to spin the globe that sat in the corner.

Amongst many of my friends, though, I was a sort of hero.

“You’ve finally done it,” “dude, I wish I could do what you’re doing,” “Yeah, you’re living the life,” and backslaps greeted me.

Salvador though didn’t seem too excited about my trip. I met him ten days after returning from New York. While I was there, he’d rolled his ankle during his soccer team’s final game. It was the same ankle he’d ended up twisting every year. He’d already had two pairs of crutches at home when he’d been discharged from the hospital Saturday. He’d also adapted to this recurrent injury by keeping a wheelchair at home.

At 6:00 P.M on a Thursday evening, three days before I was scheduled to meet Bean in Houston, I wheeled Salvador into the Martini Monkey, his leg elevated and in a cast, his crutches crossed over his lap.

The Martini Monkey was one of our favorite watering holes. We’d started going there about eight months ago, when we were both trying to come up with ways to inject some fun and randomness into our lives. It was Salvador’s idea; I thought hanging out at an airport bar would be a complete waste of an hour.

The first time there, we’d befriended a young couple sitting at the bar. Salvador and I concocted a story about how we were en route to Madagascar on a lemur expedition. When neither of the two knew what lemurs were, Salvador and I embellished further. No longer the curious squirrel-tailed simian, the lemur became a predating man-eater, with eight-inch talons and saber cat teeth. Hundreds of natives were being skewered every week and something had to be done. Our job was to trap the lemurs using special start of the art Teflon nets. The couple trotted off renewed, agog to tell their flight mates about the two lemur-hunters they’d met at the bar.

Over the next two hours, a whole slew of equally implausible stories poured from our lips, some to jeers others to wide-eyed, credulous gapes. We’d developed a patented purse technology that would shock anybody trying to steal a handbag. Now we were en route to Barcelona to deal with the dreaded purse-snatchers. On another occasion, we were on our way to Tibet for a silent month retreat. As soon as we left U.S. airspace—we’d tell our audience—we planned not to utter a single word. Midway through the conversation, Salvador would suddenly become silent and starting staring out in front of him. About a minute later, I would stop talking in mid-sentence and stare vaguely into space. Inevitably our dupes (either because their flight was leaving or because they were freaked out) would walk off, and Salvador and I would find some new prey, recycling our stories and embellishing anew when the moment called for it.

Over the last half year, we’d come to the Monkey every month or so, when we wanted to be blatant faced liars, imagining ourselves into lives far more exciting, or at least quirky, than the ones we were living. But this time was different—I was actually going somewhere. That my quest was not as sensational as hunting lemurs or electrocuting Barcelona purse-snatchers didn’t matter. I would be traveling through foreign lands, whereas Salvador would be working overtime, a bum leg and DUI bills weighing him down.

Clutching his green martini, Salvador leaned forward. “Man, you don’t even know this Bean guy. And from what it sounds like he’s a self-absorbed asshole.”

         “Yeah, but that’s part of the fun, I guess.”

“You’re traveling in Central America. Shit goes down there regularly. Fun? This guy sounds like the typical Manhattan cokehead, always making big plans. He was probably coked up the whole time you were with him.”

“He never mentioned anything about drugs. He drinks a lot. Maybe even more than us.”

“I can just see you guys wandering into some barrio in Panama City, drunk and looking to score some blow. Then when something goes down what’s going to happen?”

I felt like a lemur in a Teflon net. “Uhh…”

Salvador continued, “He’s going to run on you, while a bunch of thugs are pounding your American ass in with a pipe.”

Salvador was fond of employing colorful metaphors involving the anus.

“He did bail me out of trouble in New York. Jeez,” I countered. “You make it sound like I’d be safer in a Mexican cowboy bar.”

“Same shit, if you’re not careful.”

Salvador looked down, swilling his martini over the edge of his glass.
“Once you’re south of Mexico, it’s not about some machismo pride. That’s why you got knocked out, at that caballero bar. You were being a typical American asshole who thinks he can just start freaking some guy’s girlfriend and get away with it.”

“Yeah, I can see that.” I wanted to add that Salvador was just being a typical asshole.

“No, I don’t think you see it. In Costa Rica, in San Jose,” Salvador went on, “you don’t even need to be drunk. You could just be having a good time and some crack head cabron is going to come and put a pistol to your head, because he can.”

“So, what the hell are you saying? That no one should travel to these countries.”

“I’m just saying you’re out of your element.” Salvador smirked slightly. “How’s your Spanish, anyways?”

“It’s fine. Basic shit. I mean I can pick up a girl in Spanish and bed her.”

Salvador didn’t laugh. “You’re beginning to sound like this Bean guy. Look, both of you guys better remember to be cool to girls there. You screw the girls over, you deserve more than just a bump on your head.”

“Okay, I got it.”

“I’m just saying don’t piss anybody off.”

“Okay. I got it.”

Neither Salvador nor I said anything for a minute. Meanwhile, two college-aged girls had sidled up to the bar. They’d make perfect fodder for one of our Barcelona purse-snatcher routines. On the other hand, I could just tell them what I was doing with Bean—though there was a chance they would think I was lying. Salvador, however, didn’t even look up.  After a few minutes, he finally broke the silence.

        “Why Houston?”

        “It’s half-way between here and New York.”

        “And this Bean guy is definitely going to meet you there?”

        “Yeah, he’s even more gung-ho about the trip than I am,” I marveled, before pausing a few moments. “The thing is I haven’t even bought my ticket yet.”

        “To Houston?”

        “Yeah.”

Salvador looked up, grinning. “You’re supposed to be leaving in three days.”

        “Yep”

        “So go to expedia.com. Press Buy and there you go.”

        “Wait, just a second ago you were telling me not to go.”

        “Look, you sound like you really want to go on this Yankee Seducing crusade. I’m just warning you. Anyways, I don’t want to have to sit in this wheelchair the next couple of weeks listening to you go on about how you quit your job and are stuck in San Tana, but are planning on going somewhere soon. It’s always soon, right?”  

        “Fuck you. Why are you being such an asshole today.” As I said this, I felt like pushing Salvador’s wheelchair on the luggage carousel and watching him spin around.

“I speak my mind and now I’m the asshole.”

“Look, I’m driving you back home. I’ve had enough to drink.”

        Salvador angled his wheelchair away from the entrance. “No, I’m cool. I’m going to grab a few more drinks.”

        “I’m not going to leave you here. How the fuck are you going to get home?”

        “A taxi—it’s an airport after all.’

        I tried again. “You know, I’m probably not going to see you again, for a long time.”

        “I’m betting one week, Martini Monkey.” Salvador smirked, whether trying to mend the rift forming between us, or simply hastening our demise.

        “Dude, just get in the car, let’s go.”

        “One week, Matt, Martini Monkey.”

        I wanted to throw out a final fuck you, but I stood up and left Salvador to his wheelchair and half-finished martini.

The rest of the day, I tried unsuccessfully to shake the guilt that I’d just abandoned a temporarily crippled friend at an airport bar. The incident with my sister and the prospect of telling (or not telling) my parents didn’t help, and while driving aimlessly later that afternoon, I saw some bar named the Fifth Quarter, or the Lucky Seven, or some other number attached to a cheery noun, suggesting that those inside were drinking themselves to an early death, and I pulled over.

I got to within a few feet of the entrance and could hear AC/DC roaring from inside but thought better of throwing back a few drinks. For the next half an hour, I wandered about the abandoned-on-Sunday downtown of San Tana, finally ending up at a second-hand bookstore. Squashed into a handed-hand-me down chair, I skimmed through an account of an endurance driver who travels from the tip of Alaska to the tip of Argentina—about 9,000 miles—all in the span of one week. Though Bean and I planned to soak up the scenery a little more, the endurance driver’s route was similar to the one we’d come up with. As I placed the book on my lap, I began to think that Salvador was right, that we were way in over our heads, and would end up pissing somebody off whether we wanted to or not.

        But it wasn’t just corrupt police at border checkpoints, hardscrabble locals who would try to swindle you your last peso, or surly hombres at dive bars that made we want to limit any interaction with Central America to a dilapidated chair in a used bookstore. I’d read about something far worse—a seemingly random occurrence that could take anyone’s life, from the holiest of saints to the unholiest of sinners. Interdictions.  

        As soon as I got home, I sent a desperate Email to Bean hoping that the prospect of an interdiction would shake his resolve to travel overland through Central America.

        Man, just got finished reading a book about a guy who drives from Alaska to Argentina. (in 72 hours!) When he passes through Central America, he barely stops and still almost gets killed a couple of times. There is something called an “interdiction.” Rebels decide that on any given Sunday they will hijack a bus or a car or any land vehicle and kill those people inside! Are you sure you’re ready for this? Guatemala is pretty bad. We’d traced a route through to El Salvador, but they say that’s one of the worst places for these interdictions (actually Nicaragua is the worst.) I’m just saying we may want to rethink our strategy.

Lastly, I’ve been talking to people and they say there’s all sort of dangerous gang activity in the major areas. We don’t even want to consider Mexico City. If you take the wrong cab, you can get drugged, robbed and usually killed. According to the U.S. State Department Site this happens all the time. Maybe we can just party in Veracruz for New Year’s. Then we could just fly to Brazil.

Maybe, maybe, maybe. I didn’t know why all these possibilities  hadn’t deterred me before. Funnily, I’d convinced myself that all my life needed was a little adventure, but now with the prospect of thugs masquerading as cabdrivers, or rebels pouring down the hill to shoot up whatever vehicle I was in, my workweek grind seemed like a comforting thought.

I pressed send, hoping that Bean would reply agreeing that we’d probably end up getting mugged or beaten if we traveled through Central America. Only when I’d walked back up into my bedroom and saw my sister’s empty backpack on my bed, did I regret sending the Email.

Had I simply been making excuses for not buying my ticket to Houston? If I purchased the ticket, would I inadvertently continue combing travel literature and government websites for the worst-case scenarios?

I looked around the bedroom, where I’d lived since I’d decided to move back in with my parents to save money after college. The room was small and didn’t really serve as more than a place to sleep (it’s not a hotel where you can just come and go, my father’s strident voice made itself part of my stream consciousness), and thinking that I may not see it for a while made me sad. I wanted to crawl under the covers of my single-bed and wake up and go back to Soft-tech, let Spackmann rail against me each morning before farting in my cube, as he’d done on more than once occasion.

But that life, that wildly improbable life with Bean in Brazil, as Yankee Seducers, the Rio press chronicling our exploits, tugged at me. And for the first time, I really felt myself longing to go to Brazil, not just Anywhere, World. But first south, I thought, through Central America as originally planned. No more idle gazes over the horizon as I threw back another beer. No more aimless nights cruising passed the ill-lit strip malls of San Tana. I looked at the backpack and then at my globe, knowing that the symbols or travel could never translate into the real thing. I went downstairs and bought the ticket.  

A few minutes later I was I walked back down to the computer—a rite of passage, or a wrong passage? There was only way to know. I hunted the web for five minutes and found a flight for 220 dollars that landed on Christmas day at 5 in the afternoon. I clicked buy and sent the itinerary to Bean—As a triumphant P.S. to my alarmist Email of ten minutes earlier, I added that I’d bought a ticket to Houston and was landing at the airport at 5 P.M. on Christmas Day. A minute later I had an Email response from Bean.

I was getting worried. You weren’t sending me your Houston itinerary. Thought you’d bailed on me. But we’re on!!

Okay, here’s the deal. We’re doing a lot more than just pulling hot girls, though that’s the main point. We got to document life down there. I was just watching the news and they are rioting in the streets of Caracas, Venezuela. Awesome!! I’ve always wanted to see a riot. Central America will prepare us for that. If we get held at gunpoint we’ll just charm our way out of it.

You ready, Phillips. We’re going to make history!!

Charm ourselves out of gunpoint?!? All the doubt I had about this trip with Bean came surging back on the wave of adrenaline that had built up over the last 15 minutes. I imagined rebel gangs being totally unmoved by any of Bean’s theatrics and simply mowing him down in a barrage of gunfire. I also imagined myself standing idly by, uselessly baaing like a sheep.

With an impending sense of doom, I trudged back upstairs and started filling my sister’s backpack, as though I was packing for the afterlife. I was certain we’d have to run at some point, so I packed light adding only a few T-shirts, a pair of cargo pants, and some boxer shorts. A Spanish verb book entered the mix, as did a journal that I’d figured I could write in, if the travel muse so seized me.

Foraging about my room, I picked up a digital camera that I’d received a few months earlier on my birthday but had not used mainly because there was nothing I really cared to take a picture of in San Tana. I held the camera close to my face, looking at the blank, scratched screen. Before long, my mind started filling in the rest—Mexican pyramids (as I’d seen on television) in the background, Bean and I mugging goofily as feral monkeys jumped on our backs. The monkeys quickly morphed into those raven-haired beauties that I typically get a blink of when channeling surfing through Telemundo. The jungle became a nightclub. The nightclub became a legend. That legend became us. I tucked the camera into the cargo pants pocket and set the backpack down in the corner of the room. I didn’t pick it up until Christmas day.

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