Novel Segment (RUNNING SOLO II: THE JAMES WAGNER TRILOGY)

Chapter 13: Brothers

Photo by Hermes Rivera on Unsplash

*This is chapter 13 of a novel (called Running Solo) which is the second in a trilogy. The first novel is completed and ready to rock. This chapter is from Book II which is complete but needs revision still. This is what I’ll call ‘fictional memoir’ just like my Covid/NYC/East Harlem ‘novel.’ Book III has not been written yet. Enjoy!

RUNNING SOLO II:

THE JAMES WAGNER TRILOGY

Chapter 13 (2009)

Brothers

I woke that morning—early—with a feeling of dread. It was just after dawn. It was cold. I sat up. The first thing I became aware of was the sharp sunlight lancing down through the trees having risen just above the jagged mountains to the east. The next thing I became aware of was my hangover. I’d chugged nine beers, hard and fast. Jakob had only drunk three. He liked to drink with me but he wasn’t an alcoholic like I was.

               Jakob was still asleep, bundled down deep in his yellow mummy bag. We hadn’t used our tents. It’d drizzled at night; I felt the wetness on my blue sleeping bag. It was totally silent out. The rushing Kennebec River was lovely. I felt drawn to it like I’d been to Matilija Creek when my father took me backpacking up in the mountains of Ojai when I was a kid. I’d always loved nature, trails, mountains, creeks, rivers. My father, if nothing else, had taught me that.

               I got up and made instant coffee using my Jet Boil. I made oatmeal using two packets of maple-sugar. I chugged water from my purple Nalgene bottle. I was wrapped in my green REI jacket, warm. After eating, I made a second cup of coffee, snatched my black moleskin journal and walked down to the river. Sunlight knifed across the rippling surface. I felt warm sitting on a flat rock. I closed my eyes, breathed, took the sunshine in. I felt happy. I drank the coffee deeply.

The sunlight was now covering everything. I smelled the rich mucky moist earth by the river, and the stench of Douglas-fir. I opened my journal, saw my last entry from several days before, picked up my pen, and started writing. I recorded my experiences: The last day of New York City; the Greyhound bus to Portland; the decision to go to Quebec City; the ride with the two cute girls to 201; getting to The Forks a la the river-guide; the feeling of excitement; and sitting right then in the sunshine by the river.

               But why, I wondered, did I carry this sense of impending doom?

               A little before eight in the morning Jakob and I were already moving. He’d woken up around 6:45, had eaten and chugged water like me, while I’d kept feverishly writing. I enjoyed writing in my journal, marking down my experiences. I felt like an amateur sociologist. Like Kerouac or Steinbeck. One day, I told myself, I’d cobble together this material and write a book. It was important to write how I felt, what was happening, my fears and insecurities and joys, what it was like on the road.

               We’d decided to walk a while at first, instead of thumbing right away. Highway 201 had a wide, safe shoulder. Wilderness surrounded us on both sides, rising high above us, like green natural versions of buildings in Manhattan. It made me think of the redwoods on Highway 199 going from Grant’s Pass in Oregon to Crescent City, in northern California, where we hooked up to Highway 101, in the summer of 2006, me and Darren and Roger. And then…Arcata.

               I shoved that thought aside. Now was not the time.

               I walked behind Jakob. We didn’t talk. He wore beige long shorts which fell below his knee. A blank white T-shirt. Shades. A black baseball cap. I wore my usual: Tight torn blue-jeans, my REI boots. We made an odd pair.

               After maybe an hour we stopped and drank water and decided to thumb. The Canadian border was less than fifty miles north. I felt that grainy exuberance again. It was early in the day. My headache was slowly fading. What would Canada be like? Quebec City? I’d never been to Canada. I imagined pretty French-Canadian women, French being spoken everywhere, cheap hostels, camping, gorgeous nature, barren rural roads.

               Half an hour or so later we caught a ride with a man who was on his way to go fishing. Low-to-the-ground red truck, dirty. He was in his sixties and wore a wide-brimmed fishing hat. He didn’t say much. He drove us only for about fifteen minutes and dropped us off.

               We walked again. Cars rushed past us; they only came every five or ten minutes. The sun beat down mercilessly. It started to feel barren, more and more like we were in the middle of nowhere. That fear, that feeling of doom, again started to grow and expand, bit by bit, in my stomach. A knot of nerves was being tangled tightly.

               We caught a couple more very brief rides. I asked one man if he was going across the border. He said yes. I asked if we could cross with him and he said no because he worried about trouble with the border patrol. I felt an uneasy itch in my gut then. That, I thought, might be where the fear is stemming from. Maybe. I hadn’t truly given this much thought. The border. We both had passports. It shouldn’t be a problem. Right?

               Again we walked. The hours passed. We stopped a few times to rest, sit on our packs, drink water, chat, relax. It was so gorgeous out. We watched the cars rushing on 201. Often people gazed at us lazily as they passed. They didn’t seem concerned.

               After eating some dried apricots and chocolate bars we pulled from our packs, we kept moving. The sunlight started to slowly wane, moving more and more towards the west. I was shocked to discover, when I finally checked, that it was past three PM. We couldn’t be that much further away, I told myself.

               Jakob and I stopped again. We stuck our thumbs out. We’d been walking another hour. My legs were starting to feel rubbery. My feet were sore. I felt a blister developing on my right big-toe.

               While waiting, Jakob said, “What do you think?”

               “What do you mean?”

               Jakob looked at me. His pale blue eyes and blond hair. He’d removed his hat. There were beads of sweat on his brow. I remembered meeting him that first time in New York City, at the hostel, how I’d heard his voice first, that thick Austrian accent, some disembodied thing, and then had met him. We’d caught eyes and had held it. Then that bar in Greenwich Village. Drinking. Upstairs. Dancing. The girls. R.E.M. blasting from the DJ’s record, all of us dancing, full of life and zest and sweat. The time of our lives. Brothers.

               “Well,” he said, wiping his brow with the back of his hand. He stuffed his black baseball cap back on. “We’re moving really slowly. It’s after four in the afternoon. At this rate we’re going to have to camp for the night before we hit the border. I figured we’d be in Quebec City already.”

               I nodded. “Me, too. What do you suggest?”

               He thought for a moment. I could sense the cogs of his brain turning.

               “Let’s try to flag a car down. Ask them to drive us across. Offer them cash.”

               “How much cash?”

               He shrugged. “I dunno. Ten bucks? Fifteen?”

               “Ok,” I said. “Let’s try.”

               Fifteen minutes later a white Ford truck approached on 201. He was even moving a tad slowly. Perfect. We walked a few feet into the road, off the shoulder, and waved our arms. I was half-smiling. The man stared at us as if we were crazy. He slowed but didn’t stop. He shook his head.

               Five minutes after that we tried again. Basically the same thing happened.

               A little after that a brown Toyota Camry approached. We walked right into the middle of the road, waving our arms wildly. I felt a little nutty but we had to try.

               The car stopped. No one was behind him. Highway 201 was deserted. He rolled his window down. “Yeah?” the guy said, with a Canadian accent. “What’s wrong?”

               “We need a ride across the border,” I said. “We have cash.”

               He gaped at me and then at Jakob and said, “Sorry,” and hit the gas pedal, flying off. We watched him go.

               Finally, a clunky green Ford Explorer, the back door bashed in badly, pulled over on the shoulder. We’d begun walking once more. We were exhausted. Fun had sluggishly morphed into work. Serious, hard work. Again I wondered why we were doing this. I should be in California, getting laid.

               The driver was dark-haired and in his mid-twenties. He seemed strange but he was nice enough. His car reeked of cigarettes.

               “I can get ya close to the border. But I won’t take you across. You can get in a lot of trouble for that,” he said. He pushed in the cigarette coil, waited, pulled it out, and lit his Camel, hanging from his lips.

               “Think we can just walk across the border?” I asked, from the backseat.

               The guy shrugged. He rolled his window down a few inches and blew out. He caught my eyes in his rearview mirror. “Maybe. Be careful though. Canadian border patrol are a bunch of assholes. They’re mean.”

               That fear again. My anxiety was rising. I wondered if Jakob felt the same way or not. This was certainly an unusual situation: Walking across a country’s border.

               He dropped us off just past the town of Jackman, a mile from the border. We thanked him. He drove off.

               We walked. The road turned and curved. The wilderness no longer felt lovely and lush and inviting; it seemed to mock us, hate us, to want us to turn around and leave. I kept hoping to see the border, only so that we could get it over with. I’d become increasingly worried and afraid.

               At last, winding a final curve, I saw it. The border. A big, rectangular, dented green sign—bolts around the edges—said, “WELCOME TO CANADA.” Beneath this sign, in yellow, it said, “ALL VEHICLES MUST STOP AND REPORT.” To the right of the green sign it repeated the words but in French. Ditto the yellow sign beneath that one.

               There were lanes for cars. A white building. I saw a long fence, tall, with curled razor-wire above it, and an emblem with the words: “Canadian Customs and Border Protection.” Above that it said, “ENTRY TO CANADA” and below that there were turnstiles.

               Jakob and I stopped.

               “Well,” Jakob said. “What do you think?”

               “We have no other choice. Right?”

               “Turn around and walk back? Keep asking cars to take us across?”

               I shook my head. “No. Let’s just face this.”

               We remained silent for a minute. And then we started walking. I walked in first.

               As we approached the white building a border patrol officer walked out towards us. He must have seen us through the diamond-shaped window. No cars were around. His uniform was black. A gold patch on the shoulder of his uniform had a gold Canadian leaf and it said in a semi-circle around it, “Canadian Customs & Border Patrol.” Around his black leather duty belt were mace, handcuffs, a holstered gun. He was short and walked with a brusque stride. When he spoke it was gruff and with a Canadian accent.

               “Do you intend to enter Canada?” he said.

               “Yes,” I said. I felt my heavy pack on my shoulders, moist against my back. I glanced behind me. Jakob was walking up. We must have looked like crazy bums. Vagrants. Tramps. Drifters.

               “Do you have a car?” he said, seeming annoyed.

               Jakob came over and stood alongside me.

               “No,” I said. “We’re on foot.”

               “Americans?”

               “I am,” I said. I pointed at Jakob. “He’s from Austria.”

               The officer shielded his eyes from the glare of the sun. He stared at us eerily for what seemed like a long time. A twisted grin appeared on his face.

               “Come with me,” he said.  

               He led us into the small white building. Somehow I’d known, intrinsically, that this building was the white hot core of trouble. I’d been able to feel it from miles away. That was the fear I’d sensed.

               They told us to sit down on seats inside the building. We were in a small room, square-shaped, an office in the back, a counter facing us. The seats wrapped around the sharp square angles. We shuffled our packs off and sat down. I could smell the stink of our unwashed body odor and of our fetid packs. The smell of sweat and alcohol and the wilderness and the river, of camping outside.

               We sat there for a good twenty minutes before anything happened. Then a new man approached, from behind the counter. Same black uniform with the gold patch. The duty belt with gun, mace, handcuffs. He was taller than the other guy, brown hair buzzed short like a U.S. Marine. His eyes were slitted and dark. His hands wore clear latex gloves.

               He eyed us and, beckoning with his fingers, said, “Passports.”

               I didn’t like the way he seemed to address us like animals, like sub-humans. I’d always resisted authority. I felt the heat rising from my guts.