A Short Story
Something different today
“I saw your brother yesterday.”
“The one who died?”
We stood outside the last gas station for ninety miles. Our breath hung in the air like notes on a clef. The stone face of the mountain behind us dripped ice.
“Yeah,” he said, shoving reddened hands into his pockets. “Yeah.”
I looked down. Gravel stuck to my boots. He saw Ben. Where? How? I dug my nails into my fists when I realized I was trembling.
“Where?”
“Down in the valley. In that parking lot that stays lit all night, even when the power goes out.” He smiled. “He was smoking a cigarette like always,” his two missing teeth in his bottom jaw made his smile crooked. “You know how he was. Like that dead Russian king.”
It was true. My older brother was a spitting image of Tsar Nicholas II. No one knew how since none of us had a lick of Russian at all. Just Scots-Irish all the way down. Ben looked so much like the last Russian emperor my grandma printed out a bunch of photos at the local library and hung them up by her fireplace, after he died. We didn’t tell her about the needle in his arm, and how when the cops removed it they got blood all over themselves.
“Yeah?” I kicked the gravel at my feet.
“Mmhmm.” He said, leaning back on his heels, looking up at the mountain. The bottle in its black bag tipped back. “Hey remember when those girls used to chase him? Ask for his picture? Saying tsarskoe, tsarskoe, ah what was it?” He clenched his jaw, remembering.
“Yeah I remember,” I answered, “they were Ukrainian or Bulgarian or something.”
“Something like that,” he agreed. I could sort of smell him from where I stood, that smoky dirty old whiskey scent.
“Well I’ll be seeing you,” I made my way towards the glass door with its three brass bells dangling from a red and green rope. Allen, drunk by 10 AM, waved his free hand in a goodbye.
“Oh you know what?”
“What’s that?” I turned.
“He told me to tell you something.” Allen staggered up to me slowly and put his hand on my shoulder. It was heavy.
“He told me, to tell you,” his eyes stared into mine, glassy, blue, like blurry uncut sapphires, “to stop chasing it. You won’t catch it.”
“Is - is that right?” I could barely believe what I was hearing.
“Mmhmm. That’s what he said. Not sure what he meant,” Allen’s breath was hot, suffocating, I groped for the cool door handle, “but you better leave whatever it is alone.” He released me and I felt like I could breathe again. Allen looked at me long and hard, almost clearly. “He went too far you know. And you better not go the same way,”
“I won’t. That’s, that stuff isn’t for me,” my voice shook. I gripped the $20 in my pocket.
“Mmhmm.” Allen unscrewed the cap on his bottle with one hand. “Well keep it that way. I’ll be seeing you.”
I watched him disappear through the morning fog. Somewhere his truck started and roared off. I was breathing fast. I turned back towards the door. It was locked. I peered into the gas station. It was empty. Everything inside, from the shelves to the register, was covered by a thick layer of dust.
