Rhiannon

Nights in the city of Flagstaff are always coated in a purple hue with little white lights. Rhiannon walks out of her boyfriend's RV with a cigarette in hand. She scuffs out her cigarette and walks to her father's old mustang.

The faded, red mustang sat parked by the faded white RV. The trunk made a soft whining sound as Rhiannon opened the back to grab a siphon and an empty canister for gasoline. She opened up the gas tank on the RV. The single pair of curtains flutter in the wind in the bedroom window where her boyfriend slept. Rhiannon puts the siphon in the opening to the gas tank and starts to remove the gasoline. It takes a good hour for the RV to be completely emptied. She walks over to the car and fills her gas tank with the siphoned gasoline. Rhiannon places the emptied canister in the backseat on the floor. She opens up the driver’s side and sits in the cracked and leaky leather seats. The soft whimper of the stuffing made a small cry of pain. Rhiannon inserts the keys into the ignition and then turns the car over two times before she drives onto Route 66.

Rhiannon always had an urge to leave. As she fiddled with the radio in the old mustang, she worked her right hand to the glove compartment and took out a pack of cigarettes. She inserted the lighter to make it bright orange. Rhiannon dipped her lips onto the first cigarette facing towards her and placed the lighter on its tip. The bright orange hue began to burn at the paper, turning it white and ashen. Rhiannon puffed at the cigarette and placed her right hand onto the steering wheel. She looks down at the glove compartment that contained her boyfriend’s sunglasses and other mementos before she punched it closed and stared into the dark road.

Nighttime driving was pleasant driving for Rhiannon. When she hitched a ride at night, she could fall asleep to the sound of the wind blowing by and the engine purring like a large cat. She could find solace in her long drive to Santa Monica. Rhiannon looked onto the yellow sunrise crawling over the large brown buttes. She takes another puff of her cigarette and sits back in her seat ever so slightly.

Rhiannon never liked to stay put, she always had to leave or find a place to be. She was never one to finish anything, not even a trip to Maine along the Appalachian Trail back in Virginia. Rhiannon planned out the one time she would hike the trail and head up to Maine. She always wanted to see the lighthouses and feel the cold on her skin. Maine seemed like a great place to start something new in her life. But by the time she landed in the city of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, her plan fell apart. Anything Rhiannon planned always fell apart. Her plan to go to college failed her plan to have a relationship with a guy failed, and her plan to hike the trail was another failure on that long list of incompletes.

Rhiannon finished her cigarette and flicked the bud out of the car. She reached for another cigarette and another light. She puffed and drove watching the mile signs race pass her. Their green and white shimmering paint reminded her of the hitches she took to come back home to Roanoke, Virginia. There was nothing there in Roanoke that would make Rhiannon stay. Her father was a coal miner for years. He was never home most of the time and when he was home, he would be asleep and up at four the next day. They never talked and they never had dinner together. It was on those rare occasions when her father would have a day off that they would have a nice meal. He would have her go to the store and buy a honey roasted ham and some green peas. "Grab a bottle of whiskey while you're at it," her father said trying to finish his sentence before he coughed and hacked like a dying animal.

Rhiannon took another puff of her cigarette and fiddled with the radio station. She turned the knob left and right until she found a comfortable station that played some decent music. Rhiannon’s father eventually developed black lung following his years of working down in the coal mines. Her father would have good days too where he could breathe in a small clump of air and bad days where he could barely breathe at all. Her father's latest checkup at the doctors was the announcement of his stage four lung cancer. He was forced to retire from the mining business and wear an oxygen tank to help with his breathing. Rhiannon couldn't cope with the need of helping her father and staying in Roanoke, so she grabbed her father's old mustang and drove up to Chicago, Illinois. She didn't leave him a letter about where or what she was doing. She picked up her life and left.

Rhiannon flicked her cigarette out of the car and onto the road and opened up the glove compartment. Rhiannon fished for a bottle of whiskey and took a small gulp. She placed it gently onto the passenger seat and looked back onto the road. The sun had fully risen by the time she reached the middle of her drive onto Route 66. Rhiannon never really had a mother or anyone else to help her in life. If she had two parents she probably wouldn't feel the need to leave. Her mother left her alone with her father when Rhiannon was five. Her father was in the coal mines one day when he came back to find Rhiannon alone and watching television. Her mother packed her suitcase and drove off with the station wagon to another place.

Rhiannon sipped from the whiskey bottle and placed it by her side. She never met her grandparents or stayed with them when she was younger. Rhiannon always thought she didn’t have any family besides her dad. There used to be an old photograph of a man and woman on a mantelpiece. The woman was smiling next to the man in a short dress with her hair glued to her face. The man wore a suit and tie, his hat was at an angle. Her father told her that was his mother’s wedding picture. Her grandparents married before the beginning of the Great Depression, so her father would tell her. She never really asked anything about her grandparents after the day her father told her about the picture.

Rhiannon was removed from her thoughts when the mustang sputtered and cranked its way to empty. "Fuck," she said. Rhiannon turned off to the nearest gas station as it slowly sputtered its way next to a gas stand. She reached for the money in her bra and flipped through the dollar bills before she got out of the car. A young man strolled over to her car and started to unscrew the cap on the gas tank.

"What you want?" he said.

"Here's sixty dollars for a full tank," she said, "Filler her up."

"Fine," he said.

The young boy began to pump her car with gas. Rhiannon moved into the old convenience store. She stared at the young boy, not minding her dirty look. Rhiannon heard a faint whistle from the back of the store by a man who walked out of the only bathroom. He was carrying a newspaper with a picture of a politician on the front page. Rhiannon walked a little further into the store and heard the bell ding from behind her as she made her way towards the snack section.

The man behind the counter eyed her suspiciously as she walked down the liquor aisle and looked at the small bottles of whiskey and vodka. Rhiannon thought of stealing the bottles by smuggling them out the door and drive off in her car. She could easily drink it all in the back of the store. Eventually, she placed the bottle of vodka back on its self and she went to the candy aisle. The bright wrappers were the only things that looked happy in this dismal store. She picked up the nearest bright green bag of candy and waltzed towards the snack aisle.

The man continued to read his paper when she looked at the pink cotton candy balls and boxes of monochrome cakes. Then she noticed a bag of fried corn nuts and grabbed it from its hanger, almost ripping the bag open and spilling its fried yellow contents all over the linoleum floor. Rhiannon pulled the bag of corn nuts closer to her face and felt a tinge of pain. When she drove on Route 66, she stopped in the towns along the way. But Rhiannon never really stayed in the town, never really stayed for a longer period of time because she would feel the urge to pick up and leave like a small dog was biting at her heels.

Rhiannon checked to see if she had enough money for her items and stuffed it back down her bra. She was always strapped for cash. Rhiannon had to sell some of her items in the local pawn shops in the towns along the highway. Rhiannon would meet guys in bars, head to their place for the night, and wake up in their trailers, motel rooms, or RV parks the next morning. She would steal their money from their wallet and grab an item that was lying around the room and didn't care if it belonged to her or her sleeping partner. She'd hop into her car and drive off to the next town and repeat the pattern. Rhiannon headed to the counter with her hands full of candy, cakes, and corn nuts and placed them gently on the counter.

Rhiannon remembered talking to one man in Missouri. She stopped at a biker bar after obtaining enough money for two cocktails and a tank of gasoline at the nearest gas station when he sat on the barstool next to her for a glass of scotch. The man wore a leather biker jacket and smelled strongly of cigars with a hint of strawberry body spray from the stripper joint across the street. His pants smelt of a fresh blowjob with a small purple shade of lipstick around his pants zipper.

"What's your name, kid?" he asked.

"Rhiannon," she said.

"Rhiannon, what?"

"Just Rhiannon."

Rhiannon drank a small sip of whiskey and then looked down into the ice. She finished the whiskey in the last gulp and grabbed the attention of the bartender to place an order or a White Russian. The bartender nodded in her direction and went to grab a glass for her White Russian.

"Where are you heading to?" he asked, trying to continue the conversation.

"California," she said. "Wanna see the coast."

The bartender came back with a glass of White Russian. She sipped a small portion of her drink before the man continued with his line of questioning. Rhiannon grabbed a cigarette and puffed a breath of smoke. Rhiannon and the biker talked a little more, sharing where they've been, where they are want to go, and what they want to do. Rhiannon opened up a little more to the biker and talked about her family and her life. She told him of the time she wanted to travel all the way to Maine and start something there but headed back home after traveling to Harrisburg.

"Why did you go back?" he asked.

"I couldn't go through with it," she said, "I felt like there was something tugging at me." 

Rhiannon watched the man rung up her items on the counter; he flipped through the small sheet near the register to input the numbers. Rhiannon felt the dollar bills in her bra and thought about why she never finished things she set out to do. Rhiannon went to college after high school, dropped out when she was twenty-two. She picked up small jobs that didn’t pay well, but gave her enough cash help her stay afloat.

Rhiannon was twenty-eight when he got fired from her last job. Her father was diagnosed with cancer when she just turned thirty-two. She was now thirty-three and all she could seem to do was keep on moving. Her father complained that she was just like her mother. Her mother, the very woman who left Rhiannon with a single slice of peanut butter sandwich, and no goodbye or mention of where she was going, her mother who picked up her life and left her there to die in Roanoke.

"Thirty dollars," the cashier said.

She looked back at the counter and the extended hand. His fingers were starting to wrinkle and his hairline was receding too quickly to do any justice. Rhiannon placed the forty dollars in her palm and then headed out the store. She hopped into the car and turned over the engine twice. Rhiannon turned back onto the road and headed towards California's state border.

She took a small sip of water and lit another cigarette and scratched at the dream watcher tattoo on her right shoulder. Rhiannon remembered the time she celebrated her birthday in Texas. She just turned 33 and she was liquored up with enough shots of tequila that she started to kiss and make out with one of the men sitting next to her in the bar. They decided to go to the nearest tattoo parlor to pick out her first tattoo together. She picked the dream catcher with the single feather at the end. It was simple in detail. Rhiannon wanted something simple to remind her of one successful moment. She wanted the tattoo to be a reminder of being able to complete one small task before she completed her big journey to California. After that, Rhiannon could stay there for a while or head back home to Virginia. Rhiannon was never one for plans.

She heard her car sputter and pop again, the gas tank read it was half full and she still had more miles to go. She was well into the last hour before she reached the city's entrails. Rhiannon saw the light indicate that her radiator was overheating. She pulled the car over to the side of the road and popped open the engine hood. Rhiannon grabbed her bottle of water and stood in front of the radiator. It coughed and gagged like her father would each time he sat in front of the television. The radiator was hot enough that it would leave an imprint on her hand. Rhiannon waited for a while to let the radiator cool before she added some water to the overheated engine.

The desert was hot and the air was sticky with humidity. The wind has died down. A small patch of clouds started to form into a giant gray mass in the sky that would drop its load of rain over the barren desert. The sun began to set on old Route 66. Its purple and pink sky turned the landscape a yellow color. The cactus turned black and the flowers were bright neon orange. The dust began to kick and dance around her feet.

"California, baby," she said.

The sign for the California state border was one mile short of the distance between her and her car. The metallic gray paint was shimmering in the last leg of sunlight. The half-circle of orange was dipping faster down the leg of the butte. Rhiannon went to the radiator and touched the cap with her palm. It was lukewarm to the touch of her hand and she dumped the bottle of water into the radiator tank before she screwed the cap back on before she closed the hood. She headed back into the car and turned the engine over again before she headed back on the road and headed towards the city limits.

Night has transcended into the city of Santa Monica as Rhiannon reached the first block off the interstate. The gas tank was near empty when she reached the first intersection. The car sputtered and began to slow down by the time she ended up near a shopping plaza. The gas meter dipped lower and lower. She pulled up in front of a shopping plaza and hopped out of the car. She made it to Santa Monica. Rhiannon patted the car and grabbed everything from the trunk. She took out her suitcase and backpack. She grabbed a shopping bag filled with clothes, her toothbrush, toothpaste, and a single bar of soap. She grabbed the items from the glove compartment and stuffed them into the shopping bag. She placed her cigarettes in her bra and headed towards the end of the street.

Santa Monica was a blur of lights and flashy signs at night. The people were pouring out from restaurants and boutiques. California was its own country. Rhiannon looked at all the shops and restaurants that lined the street. Menus sat on the street corner. The range of prices was in the double digits. Rhiannon could never afford to eat at a place like this. A walking white figure on a crossing sign glanced out of her vision. She headed towards the other side of the street and kept passing menus and shopping sales. The city felt vibrant and colorful like the neon signs plastered in windows along the street.

Rhiannon stopped two blocks from the main road that divided her and the beach. She saw the dark waters lift up white skirts as it crashed onto the shoreline. She stared at the bright orange lights that acted as guides towards the breathtaking view of the ocean. She smelled the salt in the air.

As Rhiannon walked in the crosswalk she avoided a driver who almost hit her but struck her shopping bag and drove off with the plastic attached to the hood ornament. Rhiannon watched as her belongings were strewn across the street, her toothbrush and toothpaste flew into the sewer, her sunglasses were crunched by the tires, and her clothes were flown onto other cars. She watched the colors fall from the sky and land like birds. Rhiannon just laughed and stood there in the middle of the crosswalk. The cars started to honk at her to move because the light turned green. She walked on to the beach with suitcase and backpack without a care in the world. Rhiannon felt at home in this new place. She belonged in this city with its crazy people and she loved it.

By the time she reached the beach, the areas became surrounded by darkness. The white skirts of the ocean water began to turn gray. She was tired and had no money for food, the last of her snacks she would save for breakfast in the morning. She had a small amount of change to call home and enough items to help her sleep on a park bench. The nearest phone booth was by the Segway rentals. She headed to the booth and plopped fifty cents into the slot. She dialed the long-distance area code for her house phone and heard the machine ring. Rhiannon gripped the phone tightly, waiting to her father’s voice. The line picked up and a woman spoke at the other end.

"Hello, who is this?" the woman said.

"Is my dad there?" she asked.

"Who is this? I want to know who is calling my house," the woman said.

Rhiannon hung up the phone, that woman's voice was not her mother's. Her father was still in the hospital to the depth of her knowledge. It would have been possible that her father passed away when she was somewhere near the Santa Monica limits. Rhiannon didn't have a phone with her, nor did she have any address that someone could reach her. She started to cry in the phone booth when she found out that her father was no longer living in the house. Rhiannon left the booth and made her way to the ocean.

The nearest park bench was cold enough for her that she could set up her small spot for the night. Rhiannon curled up underneath her blanket and placed her head on the suitcase. She looked out at the ocean before she felt her eyes get heavy. The sun started to rise and watched the water shimmer with light before she fell asleep as the golden sun appeared over the beach.