She was always remembering—just couldn’t seem to figure out how to fix that—how to stop. Every rumble of the tracks set her leg bouncing and the words on the page would fall to one side and she’d hear the crack and scream, and only closing her eyes would drive the little girl in the white dress back to somewhere else—somewhere underneath. She squinted hard at the page. The words crawled back and stood, front and center. There, she fixed it. In a few months she would be a proud graduate with a job in line where she would fix things. She dreamed of the money and the big house she’d buy that was nothing like the rundown sty that dirtied the white dress. Yes, she’d work the days away, fixing everything she could get her hands on, starting with bumpy rails and inconsistent trains. She’d design the greatest transport system man, woman, and little girl had every seen. The doors opened. Closed. She heard the squeak and drew up a new concept, a silent one. Two more stops of smooth tracks. No more rumblings to interrupt her future. She drank coffee in the city, and fixed everything before her: a wobbly table, a sad man’s frown, a messenger’s tire. Yet every bump in the road reminded her of things behind that she couldn’t.
He traveled alone: boarding pass in his pocket, best pair of shoes on his feet, and the watch she gave him hanging off balance on the wrong hand. The woman’s hands beside his were weathered and still. She wore bracelets of blue and purple and every color between along both wrists. She spoke in jokes, and smiled after every line, and he smiled when she did. He worried that he couldn’t truly laugh.
“Where you headed?” She asked.
He pointed to the intercom spewing static between syllables, “Straight through to New York City.”
“I know where we’re going,” she said, “where are you going?”
“A job interview,” he said, “Marketing.”
“Sounds nice, you’re gonna move all this way for a job?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“You sound convinced.”
She smiled, and he followed in suit.
He looked out the window. The West was a Sun dying in oranges. To the East was dark blue, a clear night.
“So what’s here?”
“Um, home.”
“Family?”
“Yeah.”
“Who is she?”
He smiled at the sunset.
“Hm.”
The engines roared to life. His watch grew taught as he gripped the hand rest and straightened his head. The old woman leaned forward with her head cocked to the left. She reminded him of some prying parrot that spoke too often.
“Scared of flying too?”
“I’m not.”
“Sure looks like it.”
The plane lurched forward. A flight attendant with a smile pinned to her cheeks leaned down in their aisle, “Ma’am, I’m going to need you to sit back in your seat for take off.”
“I’m fine, thank you.”
And with a wave of her hand, she sent the attendant scurrying away to scold two children’s parents on rows four and five ahead of them. The old woman leaned back over, “So is she coming? Does she even know you want her to?”
“She can’t just pick everything up and leave for me.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s crazy.”
“Ha.”
And for the first time the old woman didn’t smile. He looked over and found her eyes far off, somewhere out along the sunset, and he heard her bracelets jingle as her hands shook.
Eyes aimed, tongue feeling, thoughts only on the moment. Years packed into a month, but it’s only a moment. And, now again, his arm is up, my favorite part: gone. At least there’s a fire. At least there’s a blanket. Space, flying, cold water over my skin, then warm floor to dry on. Another fire, or is it the same? A bowl full to fill my belly. A plate’s scrap, I prefer. Moments repeated. We swim. I run. My muzzle is grey. Patient now, I know this game. Now he brings them to me. Lets me have the full plate. I dream of when I used to run, oh those moments. No need to stand, he drapes the blanket now, and I stay by the fire. It’s warm here, and I dream often. They’re dreams of stronger legs and clearer eyes and squirrels I used to catch. A moment I hear him, what’s wrong? And then he’s gone, and I’m young again. There are no fences here, and all the plates I could want, and I howl—oh, how I howl. But where is he?
The gray strands of his beard held leftover tobacco from his evenings on the terrace. All around his chair were empty bottles, and sawdust fallen from his boots. Every evening he sat to watch the horizon over the sea. He watched the whales breach and the ospreys hunt, and his eyes turned the color of the sea and he grew quiet as his beard grew long. In the mornings he fried his eggs with his bacon and drank black coffee with grounds strewn throughout, and he planned his day by the room and the lumber available. His saw, cutting, rang throughout the cathedral of carpentry above him. Great beams held off the rain as he measured and cut and drew, and measured again. The neighbors thought him mad, the townswomen were going so, and only the high belted mayor beat him on the dartboard in the tavern, though all present were sure the carpenter held back that night, or that he had had too many, though, the former was more the like. That’s what they called him: the carpenter. Though, if you were to ask him, he’d say he was a philosopher. And as he tore at the guts of his masterpiece—splintering gold—one could see the shine of the sea in his eyes and the sorrows of life in his heart. They buried him in the cliffs, his darts laid cross his chest, his hammer over his heart.