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Just up past the light

Nic Bernstein

It had been a long, hard drive. Thankfully, the worst was behind me. It was thirty-six hours since I left Oregon, and about twenty-five since the radio went belly-up. Wyoming hadn't been too bad, I was still feeling pretty chipper then. South Dakota, however, had been something else entirely.

The Badlands of South Dakota are aptly named, a forsaken stretch of nothing good at all. I suppose that if the radio hadn't packed it in and closed up shop, it may not have been so bad. As it was, though, driving through the Badlands without another soul in sight had been the closest I'd ever come to mental illness.

There is something about a place like that which can encourage even such die-hard enemies as your soul and mind to forget their differences and come to an amicable understanding. This had happened to me, and believe you me, once these two get on speaking terms, you're in trouble. They gang up on you, they really do, and there's absolutely nothing that you can do about it. Nothing helps, neither logic nor caprice, you're just left helpless as they tear into your (in my case abundant) stockpile of regrets and misdemeanors, gleefully parading even the most minor or forgotten indiscretion before you once again, razzing and tut-tutting all the while. It got so that I prayed for a major accident to appear on the horizon, something - anything, to stop this oppressive aloneness from pushing me over the edge.

It was in such torment, then, that I made my way to Pierre, and took a well deserved R&R at a small greasy spoon off the side of the highway. It was all that I could do just to squeak out my order to the waitress. Until I had a couple cups of coffee inside of me I was having a hard time adjusting to a reality which included voices outside of my own cranium. I sufficed by burying my thoughts in the local gossip pages.

Something which I have always liked about the smaller Midwestern newspapers is the abundance of insignificant news to be found. Granted that the wire services still provide them with the same national and international stories as are read in Washington and New York, but the focus is entirely different when it comes to the local pages. Gossip is always my favorite. In New York, the Times is not above stooping to tell you what Donald Trump or Henry Kissinger are up to, but to get the real dirt on Miss Grady's mysterious visitor, well give me the local Dispatch or Herald anytime. A few meaty stories about Mr. Jones' young daughter's affairs, or the ditch-riding escapades of the elder Smith sons, was just what I needed after my long trek through my own dirty laundry.

As I readjusted to the concept of there being other people in the world, I started to examine the small diner in which I sat. I quietly nibbled my grilled cheese and tomato sandwich as I observed the usual truckers and other travelers that surrounded me. As my gaze returned to the newspaper I heard someone coming to settle at the counter next to me. I looked over and saw an elderly man, carefully arranging his tattered flannel coat onto the chair beside me. When he caught my gaze he cleared his throat and introduced himself, "Pleasure to meet ya' sonny, the name's Flannery, Chap Flannery, mind if I sit here?" Not waiting for an answer he lowered himself, with great creaking and grunting, into the chair.

"No problem, old timer." I replied. "Help yourself to the coffee and paper, too, I've read most of it myself. Say do you know who this Jones gal is, sounds like quite a spitfire from what I've been reading. You from around here?" I was astonished at my own zealous rapport, the road must have extracted an even greater toll than I had thought.

He had already started to examine the local columns which I had read; like me, he went straight for the gossips. "Not from around here, no, not from these parts, if that's what you mean. That Jones girl's story though, reminds me of a gal I used to know..." These last words took with them a great feeling of suspense as they left his mouth. I sat forward on my chair a little, oddly ready to attack and devour the next, surely significant, utterances to come from the old man.

"Her name was Bess, little Bessie Williams. You might call her a spitfire, for sure you might, if that was your way, I mean. I used to spend some time with her, myself, in the days before the war that is. She was a wild one, that Bessie, always gettin' into some sort of no good or other. More often then not drawin' some good kids down with her. But there was no one else you'd rather take on a hayride, and that's a fact, that is. Haven't seen hide nor hair of her since the war, though. Funny you should mention it..."

His thoughts seemed to sort of trail off. I allowed what seemed like a respectful pause, and then, when he stooped to sip his coffee I pursued my questioning. "Which war was that then, the first or the second?" I asked.

"First, second, what difference does it make. It was the war where people died, it was the war that made widows out of teenagers and orphans out of children, it was the war that made rich and poor equal in the squalor it left behind, it was the war that made great men small and small men heroes, it was the war that clouded men's minds with the pride of the fight until they saw their own flesh and blood lying crumpled at their feet, it was the war that filled these men with a rage and fear that never dies. Not until they do, that is."

I was overwhelmed by his words, and the horror they placed into my own heart. What was more overwhelming to me, though, was the fact that his expression never changed throughout the entire speech. He had retained the same simple manner and honest look on his face. Before I had a chance to say anything, he started talking again.

"Now Bessie wasn't the kind of gal that you were lookin' to come back to, set up home in the city, or anything like that, mind you. No, but she was the kind of gal that you thought 'bout there in the trenches as you played another game of poker with that same pack of cards 'was missing the three o' clubs and Jack o' spades. It sure was a bitch getting a royal flush within' that deck, I can tell ya' so I can.

"She saw us off at the train station, that cold December morn we went to learn about glory and death. Not a one of us had seen death 'fore we got there, 'ceptin of course for the farm critters, or some hound get split open by a passing car. But standing there on that train car, waving to Bessie, each of us grinning away like we were some special kind of fool. Don't know why she didn't meet us again when we returned, those of us that did, I mean. I can only imagine that she really did love us all, and I mean all, and that she jes couldn't see no way around to loving just a few of us was left.

"Spitfire you say, sure, you could call her that. But she was a Spitfire with a bigger heart than any one man could ask the right to hold on to. I been searching for her for the last twenty years, funny you should get me talking bout her now, now that I'm getting so close. Say, stranger, I don't believe you even said your name yet."

I was a little startled by his abrupt conclusion to his story, and felt somewhat put upon even to remember my own name. I stuttered something out and quickly lunged for my coffee, hoping it would provide me a good excuse not to say any more until I had a moment to collect my thoughts.

"Last word I got was that she was living in Minnesota, a little town west of Albert Lea called Santa Claus, can ya believe that, Santa Claus, Minnesota." He let out a loud guffaw, the first real break in his demeanor so far, in a small way it warmed me to him again.

"How are you traveling, old man, I don't see any cars out there but mine." This was true, in the time we'd been talking the diner had pretty much cleared out, with the exception of a couple of truckers.

"Just about however I can." he replied, "Caught a freight train here from Cheyenne, then got a ride with a trucker from the elevator to this here diner. Nice fellow he was, but he was heading down to Saint Louis, couldn't help me out none past here."

"Tell you what Mr. Flannery," I said, " I'm heading east, got to make some meetings in Dubuque this weekend. Albert Lea is on my way, if you don't mind riding in a car without a working radio, that is."

"Who wants that noise anyhow." he said, "I'd be a might glad to take up your offer then, sonny. Let me just go an clean up a bit before we hit the road though, freight trains an trucks can be messy business, if you know what I mean."

I watched as he made his way back towards the men's room. I couldn't help but be struck by the distinguished way he carried himself. Sure, he wore tattered clothes, hopped freight trains and talked like a small town yokel, but he had in him a sense of truth and honesty that humbled me. I felt a compulsion to take advantage of the hours we would spend in the car together to try and gain as much as I could from his acquaintance. I felt that perhaps, if I could learn something from this old man, then maybe my next trip through the Badlands wouldn't be so fraught with trauma.

As he returned I paid up our bills, and made for the door, holding it open for Chap. He refused my gesture, insisting on holding the door for himself, as I went ahead toward the car. We settled into the ride after stopping first for some gas and an oil check. Once we were back onto the highway I started to tell him about myself. I told him silly stories from my childhood, loves lost and won in my younger days, my hopes and aspirations, fears and shames as I approach middle age. It was amazing how easy it was to talk to him, and how quickly the miles flew by us.

Before long we had left Souix Falls behind us and were closing in on Willmer. We had just taken a pit stop off of the I when I finally thought to ask him why he had been searching for someone for so many years. "A man don't ask why, a man jes do it." he said.

"I mean, " I said, "I understand from all you've said that this Bessie, she was some incredible sort of woman, but why have you been searching for twenty years. You've been back from the war for twice that long at least, and besides, in today's world it couldn't take twenty years to find someone."

"Well," he sighed, his voice dropping a bit, "you're right on that first count there. I been back awhile, alright, an I didn't start looking for her first thing back, neither. I lost a lot o' my friends in the war, an those I didn't lose came back as scared as I was. I guess I did what most of them did, find a good woman to look after me, get a job and try to settle down. As time went on though, I found I kept thinking on ol' Bessie, an the way she weren't at the station when we got back.

"Now don't get me wrong, I loved my wife, loved her every minute she was with me, but when she was taken up, an I was left alone again, well that's when I started looking for Bessie. It was hard, though, trying to find a trail that been cold for twenty years something. I went back to the ol' town, wheren we grew up. As I told ya', she had left 'fore we even got back from the fight, an no one could tell me where she'd gone. All anyone knew was that she had headed out o' town with a hat box and a big city newspaper, said she had to get-go, find herself a life outside of this little town where she knew every native son that gone and died in a war so far away.

"I started to go to every big town I could find nearby. I went as far as Topeka, some three hundred odd miles 'fore I found a trace o' her. I did this thing, see, I'd go to the libraries an look in the old papers. Spend weeks at a time, just looking through the ol papers looking for her name. In Topeka I found it, it was an article about one of them anti-war rallies were all the craze back then. There, sure enough was Bessie. The ol' gal was standing in a crowd of them hippies carrying a sign with one hand held high, like this."

He held his hand over his head, his fingers making a peace sign. I thought to my self that this sounded like a pretty enlightened lady. But then I suppose that seeing half the young men from your home town come back in boxes can do that to you.

Chap continued his story, "I thought to myself, That's it! I found her. I started trying to get in touch with other folks mentioned in the article. It was tough though, not many of them wanted to talk to a guy like me about them rallies. Guess they figured I was with the government, or some such thing. Finally, I found some nice folks that understood, I told them about the war, about Bessie and the train station. They told me she had left town many years ago, no forwarding address. The best information I could get was that she had headed west, to California. I guess she liked the way them hippie kids thought, or something like that. So west I went."

An uneasy dawn was starting to break on the horizon before us, as we followed the I east, past Mankato and Owatona. Chap carried on with his story. It had lapsed into a series of investigations, minor successes, further travels, and more investigations. It seemed that he was always at least three years behind her, as he often had to stop for as much as a year at a time to earn some money, or find a particularly cold trail.

His most recent tip came from the burbs outside of Berkeley. A landlady there had given him a forwarding address that was only a couple years old. I found myself as enamored of the chase as he was, it seemed so magical. I searched my own memories to see if I had one so rich and full of unfulfilled possibility that I would pack it all in and go hunting like this. Alas, I could not find a one.

And so it came that we arrived in Santa Claus, Minnesota. An unlikely name for a far to typical little town tucked into that part of the state where the incredible flatness of the great plains starts to rise and undulate towards the bluffs beside the Mississippi. It was almost noon, but the fog and drizzle made it nearly as dark as the night we had driven through. Even though we had gone the whole way without stopping to sleep, I felt rested by the old man's tales. For his part, Chap was bright and beaming.

We stopped at a gas station for a sandwich wrapped in cellophane and directions to the address Chap had been given. As we drove the last mile to the house, Chap seemed like a little kid. I could tell from looking at him that he had never felt this close to his quarry before. It made me a little giddy myself, just being a part of it. Finally, I eased the car to a stop in front of an old farmhouse. Chap got out of the car and then leaned in to say something.

"I'm in no hurry, old man." I interrupted, "I'm going to wait and make sure she's here before I leave. Now you get along, you're about forty years late for this date." I said, my voice almost cracking with the feeling of resolution, at long last.

He smiled, straightened up, and started up towards the house, brushing his gray hair back with a shaking hand as he went. Slowly he mounted the steps up to the porch, then paused in front of the door. He looked back toward the car, and then, deliberately and calmly, rang the doorbell.

A figure answered the door. I couldn't make out, through the haze and the screen door, whether it was a man or a woman. A conversation seemed to be taking place. After what seemed like a long time, but must have been mere minutes, he came back toward the car.

I tried to put on a happy face as he got back into the car, reminding myself that I was just a bystander in this whole thing. "Don't tell me, she moved again, didn't she?" I said, trying to sound cheery.

As I looked at Chap I could see that he was distressed. Little of that fine character which I has seen at the diner the night before was left in his face. For the first time since I met him, he looked old, I mean really old. "She's not there." was all he said.

"Did you get an address then? Is there still a trail to follow?" I asked, half wondering whether I could blow off my meetings long enough to finish the hunt with him. "Just drive down this road, here." he said, distant and tired.

I did as he said, easing the car back onto the little road and continuing the way we had been going. I drove for several minutes, neither of us saying a word. The road seemed to just stretch endlessly before us, splitting the fields of corn and soy like a crease in a well ironed sheet. Just as I was going to ask where we were going, Chap shifted in his seat and said, "Just up past the light, just up past the light."

I felt my heart sink as we crested the small rise and I saw the intersection. It was a small county trunk style crossing, with just a single flashing beacon to alert the drivers. And, just past the light, was our destination. I looked over at Chap, not even knowing what to say. What could I possibly say to a man twice my age, who had been searching twenty years for a woman he's loved for forty. What could I say that could match anything that he was feeling in his soul, deep in his soul. All I could do is slowly steer the car on to the driveway up to the cemetery gates.

Before I had even brought the car to a rest, Chap had the door open, and was on his way to the gate. I parked, and followed him. We walked together, silently, through the drizzle, searching for a tombstone that would bear her name. It was the first time in my life that I was in a cemetery by my own choice. I had come too far not to see it. When we finally found her grave Chap just stood and stared at it, I sat down on the fresh mud and wept.

How much time passed like that, I cannot say. Gradually I collected myself, got up, and unceremoniously wiped the mud off my slacks. Chap was still standing, no longer staring, but just standing with his eyes tightly closed. I could not tell if he cried or not, as the drizzle effectively hid any tell tale tears. I watched him awhile, and then, as it was starting to get dark, I approached him.

"Come on Chap, ol' boy." I said, "Let's go find a place to bed down for the night, figure out what to do next." As I reached out to place my hand on his arm, he brushed it away.

"I didn't search for this long just to leave when I had found what I looked for." he said, "I'm an old man, sonny, I've lived for one thing in my life. Here it is. You go on now, I thank you for your help."

I tried again to get him to come with me, but he was adamant, finally turning on me and shouting, "Can't you see you blasted fool! This is my life, this is all there is! I've seen all that I need to see in this world, I've seen the best and worst it has to offer. When I started this journey that cold morning at the train depot, I went into the bowels of hell and back again, I saw the worst things that man can see on this world, or beyond it. And this woman, this glorious woman here, she understood that. She understood the horror and pain, the pointlessness and waste of it all. And now, now that I've found her again, you want me to leave? Are you daffy, or what!? This is the end, don't you see? This is heaven. There is no further for me to go. Now leave me be. Don't you have a meeting in Iowa, or some such thing?"

He turned away from me with a hard shrug. I stood transfixed for a brief while, and then started back toward the car. As I drove the remaining way to Dubuque, I replayed the events of the day over and over in my mind. When I finally arrived I was exhausted. I checked into my hotel room, took a hot bath, and settled in to sleep. Just before I dozed off I reminded myself, better get a new radio tomorrow.