Part 1 of 5
It was raining when she arrived in San Jose, saving her the trouble of crying herself. She carried everything with her, the least of which was the small rollerboard with her clothes. It was always her habit to hit the head immediately after getting off the plane. She looked in the mirror, but didn’t bother powdering her nose or touching up lipstick as she used to. There was no point. She hadn’t worn lipstick in almost seven months, anyway. She took a deep breath and headed out into the reception area, her eyes scanning for a face she knew would not be there. But she looked for ghosts in this place rife with them, her searching eyes feeling the heat of the tears forming behind them.
She walked down steps she’d never walked down before, for they didn’t go to the parking garage, didn’t lead to a red truck to which he opened the door, kissed her, and handed her seatbelt so she didn’t have to fish for it before he shut the door and walked around to his side.
Out the door, on the shuttle bus to the rental cars. She loaded her bags into the rental in the rain, the sky just spitting for the moment, arraying her maps and directions upon the seat next to her, searching for KFOG on the radio and catching the tail end of 10 @ 10, taking another deep breath as she turned the key and drove out of an airport she’d always been chauffeured away from.
It wasn’t until she realized she was coming up on the exit to his place that her calm began to crack. She had debated stopping by his place, by his shop, on the way through, but decided she’d said those goodbyes, such as she was able, the last trip and doing so again would be disturbing graves better left in détente, if not peace. But the highway took her right past his shop anyway, and she could see the cedar shake roof and the sign as she craned her neck. And then the tears came hard, the sobs shaking her as she drove to a soundtrack of Dylan’s latest, wiping away the tears so that she could see. It was raining outside and inside the car.
She cried all the way through the Silicon Valley, for memories and lost futures and fond, comfortable habits stolen by death, for being alone in a place she wasn’t supposed to be alone.
The rainy day and the winding roads demanded the attention and energy her tears required, and they dried up as the road meandered between heavy fog and deluge as she climbed the Santa Cruz mountains, the trees heavy with moss and rain and history. She followed a Toyota Tacoma with a lumber rack until the turn-off to Big Basin. A sign. She parked next to another, sans lumber rack, when she arrived at the park headquarters. Another sign.
She had arrived. Three months later than everyone else, but there nonetheless.