California(35)

“I need to be told that to my face.”

“I know,” he said. And then, after a moment: “Remember when we would go walking in your parents’ neighborhood?”

Frida nodded. Cal knew she’d been ruminating on their courtship, on their young love. Either he could read her mind, or she was hopelessly predictable. Or both.

“Of course I remember,” she said. They would go there to walk, because their own neighborhood was unsafe and ugly.

“I miss that,” he said.

Frida nodded. They had only just moved into their apartment, and she’d missed her parents’ house, her parents. It was her first time away from them, as pathetic as that was. It had been Cal who initially suggested they head there for a stroll. They’d ride their bikes over so as not to waste gas and walk along the old familiar streets. “It’ll make you feel better,” Cal had told her, as if he didn’t mind how dramatic she was being; they lived only twenty minutes away from the neighborhood she’d grown up in, and she was acting like they’d moved to the moon.

“Hard to believe those walks happened,” Frida said to Cal now. “And here we are.”

“It doesn’t seem all that different.”

Frida didn’t answer because this was the root of the problem. Cal didn’t feel any different—about her, about life—as he had all those years ago. For him, L.A. was the same as here. He’d been away from home since he was eighteen, and so everything was foreign, everything took some getting used to. She understood. Almost.

Frida was about to say good night, even though she was far from tired, when she felt Cal move closer to her.

They kissed, and he pushed himself against her, undoing the button of her jeans. She could feel by how desperately his tongue sought her own that he was afraid. Not of the night nor of the wildlife that probably surrounded them, eyes glowing yellow in the darkness beyond. It was tomorrow that frightened him. If these strange people welcomed them into their world, their lives would change. Again. Cal was trying to hold on to something. He was trying to hold on to her.

*



The next day was unseasonably warm. Frida could tell it would be hot before the sun had finished rising, and so she hadn’t used any of their drinking water to wash up, even though her crotch smelled like manure. How sexy. She would be prudent with their drinking water, she told herself, she would squelch her vanity and her squeamishness. They would need water for the final leg of their trek, when they were tired and their mouths were sticky-dry, and Frida would be prepared. She could have bathed in a nearby stream if they weren’t so eager to get going. Cal said there’d be more streams and bathing sources along the way, they were in a floodplain, after all, but she knew neither of them would want to stop.

Five hours into the trek, the dense forest cloaked the sounds of trickling water. The path was difficult and uneven, but Cal kept telling her they would keep east, no matter what. Hopefully they wouldn’t have to cross any dangerous rivers, though here it was dank and still, and Frida wanted badly to dip her toes and dunk her head in water cold enough to turn her numb.

Finally, the woods gave way to a large field, carpeted with goldenrod and aglow with sunlight. Frida grinned. What a relief to be out of the forest! She could actually breathe.

“At last,” she said, but Cal was quiet.

“What is it?” she asked, and he pointed into the distance.

She followed the line of his finger.

She’d been so enamored with the change in the landscape that she hadn’t noticed the medium-sized school bus parked at the other end of the field, its yellow face yellower than the goldenrod.

“Look at that,” Cal said, a smile breaking across his face.

Yellow. That unmistakable color. You’d think a world that was running out of oil, a land extinct of mountain lions and swordfish, would have also depleted resources of yellow dye. But no.

As Cal and Frida got closer, they saw that this bus wasn’t like the abandoned bathtub—aside from a cracked taillight, it was in good condition, and it must have been used as a vehicle, as a transporter of people, not too long ago. It bore a fine layer of dirt and grit, and there was no license plate or any other identifying information on it. On the back were printed the familiar instructions: STOP WHEN RED LIGHTS FLASH.

“Whose is this?” Frida asked.

“I wish I knew,” Cal said.

She wanted to get inside it, but the accordion door was locked, and Cal didn’t want to break in. “We don’t want to give anyone a reason to hurt us,” he said.

It was a good point. Besides, when Cal had given her a boost to peer into its windows, she saw that there was nothing inside: just rows of green-vinyl seats, waiting to be useful.

“It’s really getting warm now,” Cal said. He put a hand to the bus’s side and removed it quickly. “We’d better keep moving.”



By the time they saw the first Spike, rising sharp beyond the meadow they were crossing, Frida’s shirt was heavy with sweat, and there wasn’t much water in either canteen. They needed to save whatever little was left, Cal said, in case they were turned away.

From afar, the Spike was less ominous than Frida had imagined. At this distance, its surface glistened smooth in the sun, inoffensive as a sculpture in front of a bank. She had assumed, when she saw the first one, that she might feel an abrupt shock at its presence. She had pictured herself gasping or perhaps holding a hand over her eyes, her mouth falling open. But there it was, its existence undeniable, and it was immediately old news. She had longed to feel something stronger.