The Fantasy Years

WHOOSHT! DENNIS WISHED HE COULD fix the blond lady’s flat again. When he thought of her, he could only remember the blueness of her eyes. Her unpainted, youthful lips. How her breasts heaved—well, maybe they didn’t heave. He just liked the sensation of the word in relation to the memory of her. Whoever she was. Dennis relived the episode in his mind, but with alternate endings. What was it about being there that made such a difference? A lady needed help and Dennis got to give it. His mind wondered. He saw her giving him her business card. Dennis didn’t have a business card. He saw her saying she owed him and she would cook him a nice meal sometime. He’d show up dressed in his best shirt and newest jeans. He’d bring flowers because he was taught that you were always supposed to bring something to someone’s house if they invited you over. Upon seeing the flowers, she would thank him profusely and say how pretty they were. This way, he wouldn’t have to make a fool of himself saying he liked her. She would understand. “Well, come in” she would say. “Please come in.”

She’d be dressed just as she was when he encountered her on the road. A pretty blouse and white skirt—like she was on her way to work. Except she would be wearing an apron over it.

“Oh, I’ll have to get a vase for these. You really didn’t have to. After all, it was so nice what you did. And here you come, being so kind, bringing flowers.” Dennis would shush her and say it was nothing.

But it would be something. She would know what it meant too.

They would sit at the kitchen table, just she and him. She wouldn’t be married but she would live in a house alone. She would ask about his work. About his views. About him. He would ask about her job. About her life. Eventually, the conversation would turn to one’s values. To what was important to them. He’d apologize for his old-fashionedness but she’d say “No need to apologize. I wish there were more men in the world with your manners.”

Time would get away from them. The sun would set and night would rise around them, dark and magical.

“I guess I should think about going now,” he’d say. He’d only say it because it was expected of him to say it.

“You don’t have to rush,” she’d say.

Then Dennis would make his move. After an evening of the most restrained courting, he’d say, “Blonde lady whose tire I changed, if it isn’t too much trouble and if you’d find it agreeable, can I suggest that we meet again?” He’d couch his question in this polite, fancy language. That was part of the ritual, too.

“Yes!” she’d say, her voice swelling with emotion. Quivering. But she knew the conventions too so she held herself in, “I’d be delighted to, sir.”

“So would I, ma’am,” he’d say, his breath growing thin with the excitement.

They’d go to her door. “Well…” she’d say.

“Well.” Her blue eyes almost frantic with the emotion she held in. And then…And then…And then Dennis remembered it wasn’t real. And that he was alone. And that now that he thought of it, he had to go to the bathroom.

Brandon and Carolyn, the chick from Math: It’s Spirit and Use, could still hear Fekkus, Shane’s friends’ metal band, thrashing on the stage. It was Saturday night in Dallas; Brandon and Carolyn sat in Brandon’s car parked behind The Rock Pile, the local metal club. The charging, thumping chords wormed their way through the club’s cinderblock walls, out into the air, and through the windshield of Brandon’s 87 Cutlass.

But Brandon wasn’t thinking about music.

Minutes earlier, inside, he asked her how she liked the show. She nodded, saying it was great. But she was probably just being polite. Just being cool because she was a cool girl. Cool enough that he didn’t want to waste his date with her jamming out to music. Brandon could do that anytime. Instead, Brandon led her out of the club, parading her in front of Shane, Rocky and all his friends.

Then they got in his car as if about to go somewhere. But he stopped.

“Where to?” he asked.
“I dunno,” she said.
“Wanna just hang out for a second?”
“Sure.”
They talked awkwardly about math class, about her plans to be a medical technician.
“Why a medical technician?”
“I dunno. I think I could do it. And I want to help people.”
“That’s cool.”
“Yeah. What about you? What are you going to college for?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you plan to do?”
“I don’t know.”

There was a pause after Brandon’s ‘I don’t know.’ He and Carolyn kind of reached up for each other. Brandon wasn’t sure where to put his hands: her shoulders? Her ribs? Carolyn’s clammy hands fluttered over his face. Then they were kissing. Then they were doing nothing but kissing. Fekkus launched into another song, its chords thudding through the club’s walls.

Brandon and Carolyn heard only their own breathing, their own heartbeat, their own music silent and sure between them.

Dennis wished Meg, the waitress at the Country Kitchen, had a flat tire. Or better yet, an ignition problem. Something that required him to give her a ride home. Not to invite himself in to her house. Oh, no. Just to have the time to talk to her. To show her he wasn’t just another fat guy wolfing down eggs, bacon, and biscuits every morning. And for him to learn that Meg wasn’t just another waitress at the Country Kitchen.

Meg was young. Her smile lit up brightly. She dyed her hair a lot of different colors—black, red, auburn, ginger. He noticed every time. And he told her every time that the shade looked good.

But Meg’s Nissan ran just fine. So from how Dennis saw it, he never had the chance to make a move. Never had a reason to get beyond the Hi, how are you? Did you change your hair? stage of friendship.

On the car radios, around the country, the anger sounded and it resounded with the people.
“Conservatives view the world rationally,” said a voice. “They understand virtue.”
“And liberals react emotionally. They understand feelings.”
“Conservatives know enlightened self-interest improves the world.”
“Liberals cling to the faded ideas of the 1960s.”
“While conservatives believe in timeless ideals. And they believe in making them happen today.” And the voices on the radio said liberals had done enough damage. They had wreaked enough havoc. Enough was enough, the voices on the radio cried. Enough was enough, the listeners nodded in wrathful agreement.

“AS YOU KNOW, Four Seasons Customer Service isn’t just about magazine subscriptions,” Shannon said concluding the quarterly floor-wide meeting. “It’s about developing a relationship with the customer. A rapport.” Jenny sat in the third row, giving Shannon, the assistant general manager, her best with-the-program attention. Jenny made a point of arriving early to get a seat toward the front. She actually liked these meetings: they always ended in such an inspirational way.

“We at Four Season’s are in the business of all kinds of phone-based customer services and customer support. And we’ve got contracts coming up that require us to educate the consumer. That means, when you get a caller asking for customer service, it’s not just a matter of adjusting their subscription and hurrying them along. It’s a matter of developing a rapport, a relationship with them. And more often than not we’ll be called on to educate the customer about the changes with whatever client we’re representing.”

Jenny nodded, looking around at her co-workers. Educate, yes.
“I can’t impress this enough on you. You’re no longer expected to just note changes on customers’ accounts. You’ll have to be able to explain to the customer how things work with whatever product you’re providing services for, whether it’s a phone company or a vacuum cleaner. But I’m sure you’ll do a great job. Why? Why?” Shannon asked, setting her intense, wide blue eyes on Cynthia, Jenny’s co-worker sitting three seats to Jenny’s right.

“Because Four Season’s means world class customer service?”
Shannon laughed. “You sound so unsure.” Laughter ruffled throughout the room. “Yes, Cynthia because Four Season’s and you, Cynthia, have a reputation for world class customer service. So I want you, and everyone here, to bear that in mind as you go back to work.”

It just felt good to Jenny. Then Chris, one of the floor managers, began clapping, and everyone in the room applauded in a burst of good feeling. Jenny checked her watch as she and the others in the faux-wood-paneled room bolted up from their seats, heading back to their cubes.

Jenny sat down in her cube, turned on her computer, took a sip of her coffee, took a deep breath. She put the headset on. She took another deep breath. She really couldn’t get enough deep breaths before the onslaught. When the call-processing program was up, she held her finger over the button on the phone and, pushing it, heard the bing! of the soft ring tone which signaled the new incoming call. The first call of the day.

The voice was gravely and intimate. Breathy and angry. Like Rick coming home after having his work cut short by a contractor.
“How long,” the voice began, “does it take you people to finally answer the fucking phone?”

In July of 1993 Vince Foster’s death was news to Mike. It was news to Dennis. It was news to a taxi dispatcher named Cletus in a stuffy office in Louisville. The news of the death of Vince Foster, who was a Clinton aid, seemed mysterious. And it was news to a guy in Houston named Charlie. Before even saying hello to his coworkers in the Titan Property and Casualty branch insurance office one Monday morning, Charlie quipped.

“Oh, here we go! Here we go!”
“What?” his co-worker asked.
“Did you hear about Vincent Foster? Clinton’s deputy counsel. He killed himself. Did you hear?”
“Yeah,” his co-worker said, his voice swelling with satisfaction.
“This is where it all begins to unravel. The whole Clinton lie. You mark my words. No one in that position just kills themselves. No one takes their life without a reason. No one so close to the president just does that. There’s always a reason.”
“There’s a reason.”
“Of course there’s always a reason!”
“How can there not be?”
“And then there’s the cover-up. This is just the beginning. You mark my words.”
“But what do you think they’re covering up?” his co-worker asked.
“That’s what we’re going to find out.”

Whoosht! Dennis drove the same back way he took from the Country Kitchen to the office every morning. As he drove down the residential road, he was just entering the straightaway. The one lined with wide lawns and flimsy plastic mail boxes, where he usually picked up speed. But instead he slowed down for what he saw: a car, a Mazda, parked by the side of the road with a flat tire. He slowed down to see a lone woman, looking out over the horizon. She was tall. Her blond hair was pulled back into a neat pony tail. She waved once at Dennis who nearly locked up his brakes coming to a halt. He put his car into reverse, turned down Rush on the radio and lowered his window.

“You gotta flat, ma’am?” he asked.
“I’m afraid I do.” The woman’s mouth was a little too large for her oval face, Dennis thought. But she was a woman. She needed his help.
Buzzing with purpose, Dennis pulled up past her on the roadside, opened his trunk and got to work.

“If you’re so good at math, what are you doing here?” the girl with the dyed black hair asked Brandon.
“Well, let’s just say I was good at math. I wasn’t good at attending class.”

Brandon had made it back to community college. Finally. Amid the endless nights of beer and bongs and Black Sabbath, the forces of order had aligned themselves enough in his life so that he could afford the tuition and register for community college at the same time.

Brandon found himself in the sober, smoke free-light of a remedial math class. He had always overlooked this kind of clarity in life.
“I’m the opposite,” The girl laughed. “I showed up every day and did all my work. I just wasn’t any good.”

She wore gothy make-up to hide her wholesome looks, Brandon thought while he and she talked about math class, then high school, then where they lived. They found a lot to talk about. The conversation carried on and on in many different directions, and whatever topic they arrived at, there seemed always to be more to talk about again. Brandon thought he saw the guy behind her roll his eyes as she and Brandon talked. He didn’t care.
Her name was Carolyn. She was 23.

“You know when I was a trucker I didn’t have to answer to anyone,” Mike said, then sneezed.

He brought the car to a halt at a stop light.

“You had to answer to me,” Kath said.
“I just wish I could have a job where I didn’t have to answer to anyone.”
“Like what?” Kath asked. “Everyone has to answer to someone.”
“Do you have to say it that way, Kath? Do you have to say it that way?”
“What?”
“‘Everyone has to answer to someone.’ No one wants to hear that.”
“Okay,” Kath spoke flatly, deadpanning the words. “You don’t have to answer to anyone, Mike.”
“I’m not saying I don’t want to answer to anyone. I had to report to people when I was trucker. But in between…”
“That’s what you liked, Mike. You got to do whatever you wanted in between.”

Mike scanned the strip mall looking for the Applebee’s. It was around here somewhere. “What I liked,” Mike declared. “was driving across Kansas riding side by side with another trucker taking turns pulling ahead of each other. I’d lead, then they’d lead. I liked that.

“And I liked pulling up in the middle of the night at a truck stop at two a.m. outside Flagstaff and walking inside and seeing a table of buddies,” Mike said with a certain fondness smoothing the edginess out of his hoarse voice. “And we laughed when we saw each other and I sat down and they made room for me at the booth. That’s what I liked.”

“Everyone wants a job where you can sit around with your friends.”

Mike threaded his car down the access road, making a series of deft lane changes until he was in the far right lane, ready to turn off.

“And what else I liked? No tourists on the road. Not at that hour. Just a few stragglers. A couple highway patrolmen, maybe. And then us, the truckers. And it was like we owned the place.”
Mike checked Kath’s face, which showed the same kind of skepticism she showed when he talked about his ideas for the future. But Mike didn’t care. He went on: “And it was like we owned the place. You see, a lot of the country, most of the country really, looks like this. Same Applebee’s. Same Safeway’s. Same parking lots. But when you get out on the road and you see the land, and you see how it changes, and us truckers were the ones who… The only ones. It was like we owned the place. Like I owned everything I could see. Like I had some part of it. That’s what I liked.”

Mike parked the car, and got out. The Little Rock highway skyline uncoiled for far, far in both directions.

“Instead of now. Now I feel like another employee working at another job like the rest of these guys here,” Mike said, nodding as they opened the second door to enter the Applebee’s and the high school aged hostess, decked out in ill-fitting polyester approached them to ask, “Two for smoking or non?”