by Nathan Susnik
It was one of those old summers, where the heat and humidity sinks deeps into your bones and hides there, where you could stand in a freezer for an hour and not shiver — not once — where the sun didn’t set until eleven o’clock and the birds sang at four in the morning. We were freshmen at middle-of-nowhere-colleges, back to this middle-of-nowhere town for the summer. All our high school friends had stayed at their big city campuses over the summer or were caught in the web of this town, locals forever, too busy with jobs and families and friends that hadn’t left to meet up with college kids. We had nothing better to do than sit in the shade of the old willow in your backyard, drinking the local beer, talking about all the places that we would go, all the cities that we would conquer: New York, Tokyo, Beijing, Mumbai. We were too old for daydreaming, yet too young to let our dreams go. Never close in high school, we were brought together for the summer by necessity, our friendship like blackberries, growing like a weed. The fruit wild and tart and somehow perfect for the late summer.
You said that you had never been so close to anyone else. We knew one another’s deepest secrets, like how you used to have a crush on Heidi Bright, like how I still loved Saturday morning cartoons and Star Trek and Pokémon. I was the first one in this town that you came out to. You had never met an enigma quite like me, you said. “A boy who fit in so well without quite fitting in at at all.”
“Stand up,” It was August, and we were under that willow tree. “Stand up and close your eyes,” you said. I laughed. “Just try it.”
I stood up, stumbled a bit to the left, dizzy from the heat and the alcohol.
“Where have you always wanted to go?” you said. “We’ll both think it. Keep your eyes closed.”
“What?”
“Just do it.”
“L.A.,” I said. “I’ve always wanted to live there.”
“Keep your eyes closed and think of L.A.. On three, take a step.” When I stepped, the air turned cool, my sandal rung on hollow metal.
Under our feet was an old steamboat with blue decks, held to a dock by massive lines. You confused an old man fishing from the levee by calling:
“What city is this?”
“Dubuque,” he said. You shrugged at me.
“Well, at least it’s better than my house.”
There were hammocks stowed behind the bar on third deck. We strung them between poles and watched the Mississippi flow by. At 2:00 am, a towboat silently pushed barges down river. The spotlight shined from the tower, beam flitting back and forth over the black water, searching for other boats or debris.
“It looks like the eye of Sauron,” you said. I closed my eye, and we awoke under your willow.
When we tried for Rome, our shoes echoed on stone, and we heard chanting: “In nomine Patris et Filii, et Spiritus Sanсti…” When I asked a man where we were, he whispered:
“Basilica di San Nicola.”
“Rome!” I said. “It worked.” The man laughed and shook his head.
“This is Bari. You are a long way from Rome.”
We spent the day in the sun, wandering ancient alleys, watching old women poised on rickety stools crack eggs into heaps of flour. As they kneaded, they called to us:
“Fresh pasta! You can watch, but don’t steal! It is cheap enough to buy.”
I wanted to go to London, but we ended up on Needless Alley in Birmingham, stumbling into basement taverns and taprooms, laughing and drinking the best beer I’ve ever had.
Remember Paphos (not Athens) and the amphitheatre carved from limestone? In a booming voice, you recited the opening monologue to Oedipus Rex for all to hear. That day, we stood with the tombs of kings under our feet.
We explored the half-timber houses of Ciqikou Chongqing instead of downtown Shanghi, hung out in the fish markets of Catania under the shadow of a volcano instead of under the bridges of Venice. Every place beautiful for its imperfections, for defying exceptions that we never had. Sault Sainte Marie and Kotor and Ameland are still vivid in my mind; the places which we intended to go are long forgotten. We were never where we wanted to be and somehow always in the right place.
We grew apart after that summer’s end. We were too busy with school and friends and parties to call, to write. Our friendship ended like blackberries left unattended. Withering on the vine, it fell in autumn. Your parents said that you were coming home the next summer, but you never showed up.
I made it to L.A.. I got a job, got married, got divorced. I work in an office and sit in traffic jams on a 12-lane highway. I’ve taken trips to New York and London and Shanghai. They look just like the pictures; they feel like the books describe them. Beautiful and quirky, just as expected. But onlyas expected. No surprises. Every little bit of them has been explored, photographed, dissected.
I tried to track you down. Someone else answered your old phone number. You weren’t on Facebook or Instagram. Your parents sold your old house. The willow tree in your old backyard died in a drought a couple of years ago. The new owners burned it for firewood. There were still some pieces left; I took one with me.
Are you still out there, friend? Did you find what you were looking for? You were right about me. For all of my appearance, I’ve never really fit it. You know, fruit withers on the vine, but when it falls it leaves behind seeds. Sometimes, those seeds disappear, but sometimes they’re carried hundreds or thousands of miles by the birds and the wind and serendipity. They can survive for years, even decades, not dead just dormant. When times are right, they can germinate and sprout a whole new plant, one stronger than the last with deeper roots.
So here I stand, closing my eyes and thinking of a place (let’s say Berlin). I will count to three, take a step, and hope that we meet in Bochum.
© Copyright 2023 Nathan Susnik
About the Author
Nathan Susnik has been a pole vaulter, a steamboat deckhand, and a biology re-searcher. He is currently living with his family near Hanover, Germany. His fiction and poetry have been published by Strange Horizons, Escape Pod, Short Édition, and more. Follow him on Twitter at @NathanSusnik or visit his website: www.nathansusnik.wordpress.com