SmokeLong Quarterly

We are co-conspirators crouched together in an empty hotel parking lot when my dad teaches me how to start a fire. He cups his hand over mine, holding the magnifying glass above a pile of dry leaves. He shows me how to focus the light into a small dot, hot. We watch the leaf char, then ignite.

We have a tradition where he takes me to stay at Best Westerns, a different one every time. He gets a room with a single bed, “two beds are too expensive,” orders a pizza (half anchovies, half pepperoni) and a 7-Up for my stomachache. We sit on the edge of the bed, eating slices off paper plates, watching TV.

I watch Brian Boitano win the Olympics from a Best Western hotel room. I stand in the television’s glow, transfixed as Boitano soars around the rink, more bird than man, wearing a military themed unitard. Halfway through the routine he knows he’s nailing it, starts to smile. By the end he’s triumphant. The audience leap from their seats chanting U! S! A! U! S! A! U! S! A! Barefoot in my pajamas with a mouthful of pizza, I throw my fist into the air, U! S! A! U! S! A!  U! S! A!

At bedtime he rubs my private parts and his private parts at the same time.

One morning he gives me a swimming lesson in the pool.

He tells me to jump into the deep end, my instincts will kick in and I’ll swim. I jump in, my instincts don’t kick in, I sink through the soundless blue. As my toes graze the bottom of the pool my dad’s body splashes in like a cannonball, rescuing me. Over and over.

There’s only one other person at the pool, a woman beneath a big floppy sun hat. I can tell she hates my dad and pities me. She complains to the staff, “It’s impossible to read my book when this child is practically drowning every other minute.” We are asked to leave the pool, my dad says no, and we are forcibly removed from the hotel.

Another Best Western I find a cat outside our room. I hear meowing, open the door. It’s nighttime, storming. Under the streetlamp, raindrops race down like a thousand fugitive suns, a herd of shooting stars. She’s all black with a white patch between her eyes, curled up at the edge of a stair, trying to get shelter from the handrail above. Dripping wet, crazy eyes, screaming. I pick her up, bring her inside, but my dad says it’s against hotel rules. For once I argue with him, convince him to let her stay in our room, just for the night.

A Sunday morning, we’re leaving a Best Western. I’m sitting in the car while my dad returns the keys to the front desk. The leather seat burns and sticks to the backs of my legs. The sun coming through the windshield makes my eyes heavy and weak. I watch as my dad carries our duffels to the trunk. His undershirt (wife beater, I’ll later learn) is tucked into his jeans. I watch his muscles move under his skin. He’s high frequency, always teeming forward at the front of space and time, edging eruption. Everything he does, he does too hard. I know this better than anyone.

He opens the driver’s side door, swivels and lowers himself in. “Alright we’re ready to go.” He swings his arm toward my face, I flinch as he grabs my headrest, leverage to look out the back windshield. I watch his foot ease off the brake as we roll out of the spot, feeling bad for flinching. With the hand he uses to rub himself, he shifts. With the hand he uses to touch me, he steers. He’s the clutch. I’m the wheel.

“Hey there’s something I want to say to you.”

I look at my hands. They’re small and fat with chipped pink nail polish. I press my thumbs into each other.

“If I made you uncomfortable last night, I didn’t mean to. I was trying to help you fall asleep.” His tone is matter-of-fact, reassuring.

All these years, weekends, nights and Best Westerns, he’s never mentioned it, his scotch and pizza breath, the dingy curtains, the sounds sheets make. I didn’t know it was mentionable and now in the car I can’t find anything to say.

In his glove box is a booklet, Best Western promotional material. It lists every Best Western in the US. He’s bookmarked the Northern California section with a napkin from a fast-food restaurant, drawn a checkmark next to each one we’ve been to. He’s traced the checkmarks over and over again, rubbing abrasions into the pages, says our goal is to visit them all. There are over 100 Best Westerns in Northern California. It’ll take years.

“You were having a hard time falling asleep. Remember?”

I imagine myself as a pile of dry leaves beneath a magnifying glass. “Yeah,” I say, bursting into flames.