***

Before he went on to Sugar’s he took Maggie’s car by the factory, saw the white lights and smoke cut in and out of the night like they were signaling to something high above, and then drove by the track. He thought about stopping in the parking lot, grabbing a beer from the cooler in the trunk, but put the idea out. There was beer at Sugar’s, and he might need the other for later.

He drove ovals in the parking lot, mimicking the track, for nearly an hour.

She was there at the bar. Looking at him. He let her know he noticed, but he did not look back. He did not get up and go sit across from her and buy her another Manhattan with better than rail scotch. He did not leave, either.

On the jukebox she played “You’re Only Lonely”. Heels tripped her up as she strutted. She set two beers down on their table. She sat and thick fingers straightened the skirt across her thighs.

Raising an eyebrow at the beers, Poocher said, “You’re really going for it tonight.”

She chirped a laugh, high and long. “Well, one of those just might be for you.”

“What’s the occasion?” As he drank.

“Well…” Playfully, she clinked her beer to his and foam rose and fell over the neck of hers spilling down her hand like a postcard waterfall. “No.”

Poocher tossed her a napkin. Lips pursed, she took it and forced a smile.

“Occasion is, only one more day and you’re out on that track. I wanted to wish you a little bit of luck.”

A couple of hours later, Poocher pulled into the drive before the darkened house. He scoped the trunk for a beer. One left. If he went in, he may wake Maggie, the last thing he wanted to do. She deserved her rest. She didn’t need him darkening any doors. He wondered if the old woman was asleep, or if she slept anymore, her eyes open and starving and knowing in the night.

He dropped to his ass in the gravel, head against Maggie’s fender. Cracking the beer, Poocher looked out over the grass. He saw a kid playing there, an apparition like a grease stain smeared against the filmy night air. A boy. If there really had been a boy, his boy, there in the grass, Poocher wondered if the kid would love him when he was old enough to have a choice to.

He talked to the boy in the night until he fell asleep.

***

And he ran. Forgetting all about the old woman taking up space on his floor. Reminding everyone all the time. At least she wasn’t Dad. No, Dad he would have let die. Done what he could to help in fact. She was worse, he had decided long ago. Her tight-lipped silence. Funny how, Poocher had noticed, the more people see the less they do about it. She deserved to stay like that. Yeah, he forgot all about her. He lost everything except for his feet and the track and the beer. All that mattered.

When he finally stopped, he chugged down the last beer and let the satisfying, crisp finish leave his mouth. He returned to the world. The sun hovering close. Shrouding him.

The track was quiet. The world, empty.

Then, Courtney French. He stepped through the gate, carrying a duffel bag and a little cooler thing. He waved. He actually fucking waved.

“Howdy, Poocher,” Courtney French said.

“Mm,” Poocher said.

“Good work out there, man. You’re fast. And your time on those beers is crazy. That’s what’s tripping me up. It’s like I can’t open my throat up enough or something like that. Yeah, you’ve got some form with those beers.”

Poocher looked out at the street. Scoot was nowhere. Courtney French dropped to the steel bench and started putting on different shoes.

“This is just wild, dude. I always saw you around the bar, and after the station signed me up to run this thing for the show, see if I could go to the competition in the capital… I felt so weird doing it by myself.  I’m just really glad you signed up. I feel a lot less silly with somebody doing it with me… More fun too… Two guys… Messing around…”

The TV voice flickered and faded away as Poocher wondered if Courtney French had been waiting, hiding like a snake, timing his run. That gave him an idea.

“Gotta go,” Poocher said.

He sauntered toward the gate, then took a sudden, sharp left and sprinted violently toward the bleachers. He remembered a nice little spot between two of them where he’d watched Ashley Wheeless work out before tossing her discus senior year. Still there. Nearly impossible to see into with just enough space to peer out. His old hunting blind.

Courtney French finished tying, opened his little cooler and started stretching. Legs like a clove hitch. Arms like a bowline. One big tricky Boy Scout knot was Courtney French.

Poocher started his watch as the newsman took off running. One, two, three, four laps. Four beers from the cooler. He stopped the watch.

Soil opened up beneath him, spread wide, swallowed him. He tumbled down into a void, far from the beer and the old woman and Scoot and Maggie and the track until he disappeared into the absolute center of nothingness.

Eight minutes and forty-nine seconds.