45 minutes

I shaved my head. Nothing unusual there. Well, other than the fact I’d never done such a thing before. But it had to be done. The balding Prince Valiant look just isn’t sexy. No chance of it. Even when Brad Pitt or some other caricature of a Hollywood heartthrob has it. Just ask Luke Perry. Well, he doesn’t have it, but have you seen the photos of the guy at some autograph session? It’s horrible.

However, pretty quickly I had a revelation. Nothing that will cure AIDS or get a man on Mars before I die, but it was pretty cool to have. And it made me realize that sometimes you really do have to do something different if you want to understand something else.

I put my baseball cap on. It seemed to fit differently.

I pulled it up a little. Like some of the silly looking fools do. And it stayed up. For the first time in my life, a baseball hat stayed pointing up on my head. Funny. All these years I’d wondered how rednecks and chew-spitting dunces kept their hats up like that. It always slumped down when I put mine up like that. Not that I ever wanted to do something like this, except in a jovial way.

The secret is the hair. A close up hairdo gives your head Velcro. Who woulda thunk it?

Ha. Score one for trying different things.

***

My car pushed its way through traffic. It’s four cylinders pushed to the limit. Almost whining in how much they had to work to keep up. But I needed to get there first. She’d be waiting for me. But only for another 45 minutes. And I’m 48 miles away.

This isn’t what I thought would happen when I first met her. I figured we would get married the old fashioned way. In a church. Families and friends all around. A stupid bachelor party. A lame attempt to get me to grab a redhead stripper’s ass. And then a honeymoon.

Instead, we dated for a pretty long while. We had a lot of fun. We also had a lot of shit. Mostly caused by our pasts. And our inabilities to deal with it. Such a shame really. I think it may have worked, had we met at a different time. A different place. But, that’s silly to think about. Why? Because that doesn’t happen. Except in a Twilight Zone episode. Or a Family Guy one. Science fiction for sure.

But right now, she needs me. We haven’t seen each other in a while. Longer than I’d like, and longer than she’d like. She called one day last week. I don’t remember which day, I was drunk. I’m always drunk it seems. Someone was after her she said. Did something to her cat. I wondered if it was true. It had to be. We didn’t lie to each other. Anymore.

Her blonde hair used to drive me insane. It was blonde like my hair was when I was 6 years old. Bleach blonde. Except it was real still for her. My hair had turned greasy blonde a long, long time ago. If I got a lot of sun, it almost turned blonde again. At least when I had hair.

Now, I’m thinking about her hair. About the time I cleaned out my old car, and some of her hair was still there. Years after we’d decided it was better to not see each other anymore. Well, one of us decided that. The other? Well, the other died a little bit more that day.

That hair made me stare. It was sitting in the back seat of the car.

That car is long gone. Just like every trace of her. Except for a few things. Books. Photos. That kind of artifact.

But for now, I have to keep my mind focused. I nearly wrecked two miles back. And I wasn’t thinking then. Now I’m thinking. Need to stop.

I turn up the radio a little louder. It’s Stiff Little Fingers’ “Alternative Ulster.” That’ll do.

38 minutes to go. 33 miles.

I come up on two cars. Playing that awesome game that so many in this fucking state seem to want to play -- I’ll stay in this lane, you stay in that one. And we’ll go the same speed.

My car edges close to the brown Chevy Blazer in the left lane. This guy is a hunter. I can tell because he’s wearing an orange hat. The woman in the car on the right is about 65 years old. Grey-haired and balding. Not the best combo for sure. But she is driving a silver Jaguar. It can go faster than 53 miles per hour in a 55. I look behind me. Two cars are creeping up. I have to make a decision. I chose left. The blazer guy.

I flash my lights. The international sign for get out of my fucking way. He looks in his rearview. Then he taps his brakes.

“Fucker,” is all I can think. By now, the two cars have caught up. They are in the right lane.

I see a gap as the Jag has pulled ever so ahead of the Blazer. I gun it. All four cylinders put their gerbils to work. I get in the gap. She slows. But not before I swerve over in front of the blazer.

I floor it.

32 miles. 32 minutes. Damn. Falling behind again.

My mind wanders for a second. Her voice pops into my head. That southern drawl, just like Judy Davis from “Barton Fink” or Jane Alexander from “Brubaker”. No wonder I love those movies. The dames in them sounded so much like her.

Back in the road. Back on the road. Going 87 mph. The 35 mph zone is coming up.

27 miles. 30 minutes.