Less Than Nothing (16 page)

I laugh. “It’s really not that interesting.”

“Where were you born?”

I sigh. She’s relentless, so I might as well get this over with. “Clear Lake, California. Land of nothing ever happens.”

She nods. “Been through it a few times. Good breakfast places. Hell of a road getting in and out, though.”

“Yeah, it’s a complete map stain. If you’ve been there, you know there’s not a lot to tell.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I’ve found that every town has its high points and its secrets, no matter where you go, if you know how to pay attention and keep an open mind.”

I tell her about growing up, and gloss over my dad disappearing without a trace when I was ten. Unfortunately, Helen’s radar’s finely tuned, and she doesn’t let me off easy.

“What? He just up and left, and you never heard from him since?” she says skeptically.

“Nope. But I’m over it. He couldn’t take my mom anymore. If I could have disappeared, I would have too.”

She frowns. “Sometimes adults suck.”

“No kidding.”

That kills the conversation faster than a fart. I watch the landscape go by, the mountains gorgeous, the sky such a vivid cobalt blue that it seems unreal. Eventually Helen tries again.

“Tell me about this talent contest.”

“I don’t know much more about it than what I read on the Internet. It’s the first year, it’s a new concept, and first prize is a recording contract and half a million bucks.”

“That’s a lot of guitar strings.”

“I’ll say.”

“When are the tryouts?”

“Next Monday. We already registered online.”

“There must be thousands of people that want a shot at that.”

I nod. “There are. They already had auditions on the West Coast and in Texas and Chicago. This is the last stop, and then there are six weeks of weekly shows. The last week’s the finals. Derek calls it the death match.”

“How do they judge it?”

“Typical format. Three celebrity judges on the first three elimination rounds. Then it’s a combination of them and the phone-in audience.”

“How many acts make it into the contest?”

“I think they cap it at fifty – ten per city. This show’s supposed to be different than the other ones, because it’s a super short season and it’s only singers. The judging’s supposed to be really stringent. That’s the whole hook.
America’s Top Talent
. Not America’s most clueless hams, which is what a lot of the other shows seem like.”

“That’s exciting. Crossing the country to chase your dream. I wish I was young again.” Helen clears her throat and tilts her head at the sleeper cab. “What about him?”

“Derek? He’s from Seattle.”

“Right. But how about the two of you?” She hesitates. “How old are you, Sage?”

I’m embarrassed, but I don’t know exactly why. “Old enough.”

“Come on. Give.”

“Seventeen. My birthday’s New Year’s Day.”

“Wow. At least that’s not hard to remember.”

“Yeah, I overheard my dad say it was the last New Year’s my mom was ever sober.” I have no idea why I’m confiding in a complete stranger. Maybe because it’s easier to tell someone you know you’ll never see again your dark secrets when you can’t keep them inside anymore. You can’t tell your friends, or you’ll always wonder whether they’re thinking about them when they look at you. Or if they’ll use them against you.

Helen frowns slightly. “I’m sorry to hear that, Sage. Life can be too much for some people, and they take what they think’s going to be the easy way out.”

“Tell me about it. I’ve seen it all living on the street.”

Helen’s voice drops to a confidential level. “I have a brother. He’s homeless now. I haven’t heard from him for over a year. Don’t know if he’s even still alive. I saw it building for years, but he always seemed to have it under control…until one day I guess he didn’t.” She sighs. “But back to my question. What’s the deal with you and Derek?”

I twist around to make sure he’s still asleep. His chest is rising and falling steadily. He’s out. Still, I lower my voice. “There’s no deal. We’re just working together.”

“He’s…on the street, too?”

I nod. “Yeah. But he copes with it a lot better than I do.” I hesitate. “Then again, he’s older, and he’s got a lot more practice.”

“Listen, don’t take this the wrong way. I know I’m nosy. But when I saw you two together, and the way you look at him…are you sure there’s nothing more than singing going on?”

When I answer, my voice is glum. “Positive.”

Helen stays silent for a solid minute, which is a record since I met her. She turns to me and fixes me with a penetrating stare.

“Is that how you want it?”

What do I say now? How do I answer that? Do I tell her that I didn’t want anything to do with him when I met him a whole week ago, and now I’m having naked showering dreams? Or that there’s nothing I want more at the moment than to feel his lips on mine, but he runs hot and cold, and sends out enough confusing signals to jam my head up for a lifetime?

I almost do, but then at the last second I deflect. “We’ve only been together for a little while. If something winds up happening, it’ll happen. I’m not going to try to force it.”

Helen appraises me, clearly unconvinced. “That’s a very mature answer. I don’t know at seventeen if I’d have been able to say the same thing. Even now it would probably be as phony as a three-dollar bill.”

I’m starting to get uncomfortable with the discussion, which she must sense. But she gives it one more try. “Maybe he’s not sure what you want, Sage. Sometimes women confuse the hell out of men.”

Touché.
I’m
not even sure what I want.

Helen continues. “When I was younger, I did the same kind of thing with the men in my life. I’d wait for one to make a move so I could be the one to react rather than risk being hurt – that way I could avoid being completely honest with myself until that exact moment, and then if I blew him off, it wasn’t me being rejected, it was him. It’s a head game. All about power.” She swallows hard, and her voice is so soft it’s almost drowned out by the engine noise. “But sometimes to get what you want, you have to risk it all. Just like you’re doing now. Nothing comes easy, and if you want to be safe your entire life, you can miss out on the things that make it worth living.”

I don’t say anything. It’s obvious by her tone that she’s thinking about her past, where maybe there was a Derek that got away. The thought makes me unaccountably sad, and I don’t mind when she turns on the radio, even if it’s Willie Nelson, who I can’t stand.

Every mile is leading me closer to the biggest risk I’ve ever taken, but it doesn’t feel that way at all. For me, the really high stakes are in the back of the truck cab, asleep. I listen to Willie croon about love gone wrong and the end of innocence, and it strikes me that I never bothered to listen to his lyrics before, because right now, he could be singing to an audience of one. I choke down the lump that’s rising in my throat and close my eyes, willing the tears away.

If it’s meant to be with Derek and me, it’ll happen. I have to believe that, because the alternative feels like my heart’s being ripped out of my chest. It doesn’t seem possible that he’s had this powerful an effect in only a week, but there’s no denying the sensations that are overloading me. I silently pray that Helen will just leave it alone, or I’ll be bawling all the way to St. Louis.

The cities we’ve passed through were just dots on a map when we started the trip, but as we arrive at the truck stop on the edge of St. Louis, there’s a blanket of lights spread out before me, stretching as far as I can see.

Derek stirred awake as it was getting dark, and after a quick pit stop and a fast dinner, we serenaded Helen for a few hours, Derek on guitar, me with my harmonica. We quit a half hour ago, but not before it was obvious she was impressed, which gave me a swell of pride. I want Helen to see I’m not some clueless kid running off on a lark, and she looks convinced as she pulls into a stall next to a hundred other big rigs.

Helen turns to me and shuts off the engine.

“This is where I’m putting up for the night. It was a real pleasure meeting both of you, and I hope you win the contest. God knows you can both sing like nobody’s business.”

Derek hands me our bags and guitars and hops out of the cab, stretching his legs, arms extended overhead. I don’t see how Helen does it – sitting for twelve hours, day after day. She mentioned at one point that she clocked over three hundred twenty-five days behind the wheel last year, and this year would beat it.

She climbs down and rounds the front of the truck, and we say our good-byes. She gave me her cell number somewhere around the middle of Kansas, and reminds me for the fourth time: “If you get into a real jam and need a ride, call. I know truckers all over the country.” Helen hugs me for a long moment and, just before she lets go, murmurs in my ear, “Don’t be like me, honey. Go out and grab what you want and never let go. You don’t want to spend your life looking in the rearview mirror wondering about what could have been.”

Derek gets a hug too, and then we’re walking into the restaurant while Helen locks herself into her rig for another night on the road. Compared to Bull’s, her cab’s a five-star hotel with room service, but that’s not saying much.

It’s my turn to be tired, but I pull out a sheaf of papers I printed out at the Internet café in San Francisco and study the map. Derek opts for a cup of coffee and a cinnamon roll while I order an orange juice and eye the network of roads stretching east.

Our drinks come in a blink, and I’m trying to read the city names on the crappy printout when I pause. I look across the table at Derek, who’s attacking the pastry like it stole his wallet.

“Where did you say your idol lived?”

He looks at me quizzically. “My idol?”

“You know. The King.”

“Oh, Elvis. Graceland. It’s famous.”

“Right. In Tennessee.”

“Yup.”

He doesn’t get it. I wouldn’t if I didn’t have the map in front of me. I wait for him to guess why I’m suddenly perky, but he’s returned to his systematic demolition of the roll. I lean forward and waggle my eyebrows.

“We’re only a couple of hundred miles from Memphis.”

I wait for the news to sink in. He pauses with a chunk of cinnamon roll speared on his fork. “That can’t be right. It’s in the South. We’re in the middle of the country.”

I nod. “Correct on both counts. But St. Louis is only two hundred, maybe two-fifty, tops, from Memphis. From Graceland.”

He pops the bite into his mouth and chews thoughtfully. “What are you thinking?”

“We allowed eight days to get to New York. Tomorrow’s day three, and we’re more than halfway to the East Coast. If we don’t take forever there, we can probably afford a little detour to Memphis. It’s really not that far. Four hours. Maybe less.” I pause. “I just thought it might be nice, seeing as you’ve got Elvis inked on your arm for the rest of your life.”

His face breaks into the trademark Derek smile, and I feel almost as happy as I am exhausted. The two sensations are battling for supremacy, and after putting up a good fight, happy bows out and tired takes over. As he takes another sip of coffee, I drain my OJ and close my eyes for a second.

“We should find someplace you can crash for a while, Sage. Nobody’s going to pick up hitchhikers in the middle of the night. At least nobody we’d want to ride with.”

I nod. It sounds like a splendid idea right now. “You need to sleep, too.”

“I got enough in the truck. You can rest till dawn, and then we can trade off. I’ve already proven I can sleep through anything.”

We pay the bill and go back into the warm night. The air smells like diesel exhaust, wet hay, and water from the nearby Mississippi River. Derek leads me to a small utility building, retrieves his sleeping bag from his rucksack, and lays it on the grass. “Here you go. It’ll be just like old times in the park.”

I offer him an appreciative smile and set my backpack and Yam down. “Seriously? You’re just going to sit there and watch me sleep?”

His half smirk plays at the edge of his mouth. “You’d do the same for me. And I’ll be keeping an eye out, not staring at you.” His tone says ‘get over yourself, already,’ and my urge to try to kiss him good night evaporates. I’m not at my most sociable when I’m running on empty, so instead of a lip-lock I shift my backpack under my head, pull my black knit cap over my eyes, and close them. The muted roar of long-range trucks moving down the freeway hums me a lullaby, the stars a roof over my head.

“Sage, you dead?” Derek’s voice wakes me, and I lick my lips, push the cap up, and open my eyes. The truck stop’s on the southern outskirts of St. Louis, and I watch horsetails of neon pink and amber glow in the eastern sky as the sun rises over the muddy river. I sit up and look at Derek, still half asleep.

“Don’t get your hopes up,” I say. My voice sounds hoarse.

“You want to go use the bathroom before I do? Figure a couple of hours of sleep and I should be good, but all that coffee…”

I yawn and feel my cheek and then shake my head disgustedly. “Tell me I don’t have backpack lines all over my face.”