Posted On January 27, 2015 By In Miscellaneous, Ramblings

Born on the 5th of July: Part 24

 
 

Record 24: Death Valley, Saturday, July 5th, 2014. Day.

John Shane sits in a cowboy-cool diner in Death Valley. The sun hangs low in the sky. He knows this, because he can see the sky outside the window. The window has smudges on it. And like a rush, he remembers: this is a dream. This never happened. Nothing is real, except smudged windows and cowboy diners.

“Why am I here?” John thought, in his head, where thoughts

the coffee shop, the wooden booths and sawdust floor. Slow spinning ceiling fans sprinkling dust. A fat couple, a cowboy and cowgirl, at a table adjacent discussing Obama’s Effect on Economic Stagnation and Duck Dynasty. They chortle and guzzle coffee. Chortle and guzzle.

Coffee.

Chortle and guzzle.

John thinks, “They don’t even wear boots. ” But then he remembers that he doesn’t, either. He wipes sweat from his brow (furrowed, like brows are) and removes the Stetson from his head melon, unveiling rows of grease-ball-sweaty hair, pulled back into

Chortle and guzzle.

Woman in front of John. Sitting. Her legs are crossed and eclipsed in denim. Red bangs on (her melon head), tickling curled eyelashes. Her face is unsullied by makeup. Words are said and John wishes he had a holster for a gun he doesn’t have. He smiles at the woman. She comes from

“Why am I here?” John’s words to the woman.
“You don’t remember?”
“I enjoy your denim clothes…?”
“You’re too…”

On the table that separates them, woman is sliding John a

Chortle and guzzle.

“Is this a key?” John.

Obama.

“For our room.”

Ducks. Dynasties.

“Our room?”

Chortle and guzzle.

The woman’s teeth (yellowed) when she smiles, but John is interested in the company of women who love, and in the outside heat she tugs him through gravel and past cars (parked)

The room. Humidity. Packed inside. Sweat pours onto an arid mattress. The horizontal push and pull of humans with no clothes on. Groans and grunts. “Oohs” and “Mmhmms”. Wet skin and dough lips and rapid-fire dream-thoughts melting like warm play-doh into worlds of still oceans and sea breezes.

Moments go _________________. Statements and declarations die on tired tongues, jumbled and colliding. Tornados of lost vowels. Woman and John. Laying. Happy-sad with no more

Chortle and guzzle.

“But how?” John’s head melon, back in action mode.
“Do you hear, something?” Woman buttons denim.
“Outside. Don’t you?”

her head out the room’s window. Looking and scanning for

“I don’t see. Not anyone.”

Chortle and guzzle.

“But I hear.”
“Oh wait hey there are some people there.”
“Why?”

Woman laughs and shouts.

“Hey! Will you fat people stop making noise?” Woman yells.

Obama. Duck Dynasty.

“Hey!”

Without mumbles or exasperations, they’re gone. John lies on the arid mattress and counts out money paper into the woman’s hand. Folded and into a denim pocket

“There was a…” Woman.
“Holiday. Yes, there was. Yesterday.”
“Fireworks.”
“Yeah.”

John remembers barbecue fire and stale beer. Chewing hot dogs in Wrangler jeans, the skies overhead streaking light, colored and sharp and snapping past dead stars. He remem

“Can you close the window?” John speaks. “It’s smudged.”

John registers a disconcerted reaction. The window is closed. Lips are kissed. The woman seals the door with a gentle click, and John sighs putting on his (cowboy) hat.

still naked, a handful of wet toilet paper is pressed against the window. Buffed and scrubbed. John squints through glass. The sun sets behind a mountain, and John tips his

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Will is the Co-Founder and CEO of Taken Films. He holds an MFA in Film Production from USC's School of Cinematic Arts. He wrote a book that you haven't read. It's called 'My Blood Feet.'