Tourist

I never planned to be in California. I knew nothing about San Diego. I had to look at a ship’s chart even to see that it was in California at all, to see that it was between Los Angeles and the Mexican border. I was told that it had a great zoo. I had already been told that I wasn’t old enough to drink, so I went to the zoo. It was a great zoo, with lots of the big impressive animals, and apparently the best collection of gorillas in the world of zoos. That was what the zoo looked like: a collection. The only difference between that and a butterfly collection was that the animals were still wriggling.

I felt like I understood. My trip, my great journey, Jakes the Adventurer—what had happened? I was supposed to be a great free spirit. Travelling the world at an age when most kids aren’t allowed to travel alone to the next city. What happened: I fell in love and was banished from the life of the girl I loved. Then I was banished from her country. Then I found a way to get over it, in the heat of the kitchen, and was thrown out of that too. And ticking away during all of this, I was even banished from control of my own tongue, with Balarubu policing every thought and every word I spoke or declined to speak. I had been freer while I had been in after-school detention for exercising my mouth. I was eight thousand miles from home and bound hand and foot.

My travelling had by my measure been a failure. However much I had seen of South America, it had got me in my present situation. My head felt numb. I needed a fresh start. I didn’t know how to get one. I wandered aimlessly through the hot, rich and glossy streets of San Diego. I stopped for a quick bean burrito and won ugly stares when I spat it out. The flatbread had all the taste and texture of a damp flannel. I stumbled, half awake into a large square with the most enormous fountain shooting straight up in the air. There was absolutely not a whisper of wind, which allowed the fountain to go so high. There was an anemometer measuring the wind-speed so that the fountain never went so high that the spray went outside the fountain’s perimeter. In this deathly hot stillness, the water rose straight and true before collapsing back in upon itself. I walked directly to the edge of the fountain, dropped my bag at the edge and walked straight in. A cop at the other side saw me and yelled across.

‘Hey kid, get outta the fountain.’

I ignored him. I laid down in the fountain and turned myself over and over, then stood and walked right up to the jet. I tried to push my hand into the rising spume but it was far too powerful.

‘Ya dumb kid, get outta there!’

The cop was walking round towards my bag. I walked back in the same direction. We reached my bag at the same time. As I stepped over the stone ledge, I saw an enormous pool begin to form around my feet, so I lifted my back onto the ledge.

‘The hell…’

I shook myself vigorously, arms flying, head shaking, making a crazy

‘Brrrrrr’ sound.

The cop stepped back. Though a little of the water had already dotted his uniform, he was finding it harder to be angry and was smiling a little.

‘Samatter, kid, there a full moon tonight?’

I raised my head back and let loose a wolf howl.

‘Yaaaaaaoooooooo. Maybe. Cool in there, officer, you want to give it a try.’

‘Maybe I do, but I’m kind of at work. You English?’

I had asked for my ticket to the zoo in English, and my time with Lucia had been in a kind of mixed Spanglish, but it amazed me to realise that this was the first entirely English conversation that I had had in almost two months.

‘Yeah. London, England.’

‘You got nice colour for a lunatic.’

‘Thanks. I’ve been in South America. Just sailed in from Chile.’

‘There’s cruise ships to Chile?’

‘A container ship. I was working in the galley.’

‘That’s the kitchen, right. For someone who looks twelve, like a twelve year old drowning mongrel, you been busy. Wait till I tell my wife about the crazy, wet English lunatic chef. So long kid. Take some clothes off and dry out before you catch something.’

I gave him a thumbs up sign and a big grin. I liked my new job description. It didn’t maybe sound so nicknamable, Micky ‘the crazy, wet English lunatic chef’ Jakes, but it would do. For now it was a good fit.

Trailing my puddle from the fountain, I made my way to the beach. It was pretty quiet, I guessed that was because of the temperature. For California, it was pretty cool. For me, just back from the edges of Antarctica, still dragging my fishy parka around, it was glorious. Stripping to my boxers, I laid out my dripping clothes on the sand and went in for a swim. People stared as if I would have to be mad to swim in these temperatures. The sea felt like a warm bath. In no time my clothes were dry, I was clean and fresh, my blues were washed away and I was ready to make like a tourist.

I checked into a cheap motel. This was off the backpackers trail, but just in case, I picked a place without any kind of ‘alternative’ look to it. Thus was just a plain old cheap motel. I ate plain food at family restaurants. I tried another couple of Tex Mex places, but none yet that was an improvement on the first spat out burrito. I guessed if I wanted Mexican, I’d have to head for the right part of town. And while I was busy playing tourist, I wasn’t ready for that. I was still getting used to chatting in English and I was enjoying myself.

I would rise early, bacon and eggs at the diner, get down to the beach with a cheap paperback or a Marvel comic. The Hulk and the Fantastic Four were just what I needed. This was time to turn off my brain and get away from South America and everything that happened there. Balarubu was still humming away there, keeping her mean and beady eye on everything I said. I would have to guess that she was watching what I got up to as well, so she could check I told it straight, but maybe she just knew. And maybe, I thought, maybe I was right that very first night and Balarubu is just some dozy Andean folk myth, and the flying Toyota was no more than a co-incidence. And the buzz in my head. The one that saved me when I was thinking about Balarubu. That was a coincidence too maybe? No worry. Coincidence enough for me. I was, reluctantly or not, on Balarubu’s team now. Mentally, I made the lip-zipping mime and winked at her.

San Diego was an easy place to tell the truth. The only times I spoke, it was to order food, or to make small talk. And the small talk I was making came in the smallest size on the shelf.

‘You’re not cold here, with just those swimming shorts?’

‘Hot for me.’

‘You’re English?’

And then one of those conversations.

In some combination certain information had to come out. It would almost always include:

‘London.’

‘Not really—There’s a lot of places where people just live and work and not very many of them are near Buckingham Palace.’

‘Yes once. She was opening a school, I was on the top deck of a bus going past and I saw her through the window.’

‘Yes we still have them.’

‘Yes red. And you can still get on and off at the back on some of them.’

‘No David Beckham doesn’t play in London, but yes I’ve seen him.’

‘No not clubbing, I’m sixteen. I saw him playing against West Ham.’

‘It’s a football team.’

‘OK, soccer.’

‘Not many famous people but sure, now and then. I saw Jude Law once, and Catherine Zeta Jones.’

‘Yes very nice. And a beautiful smile.’

There was more like this, but they were the staples. I didn’t want to talk about love and fear. Uncertainty and the future. There was enough of that trying to stir up anxiety in my head and all the beach, comics and small talk to tamp it down.

The beach, though it was quiet, did have its share of California’s beautiful people. But youth is more important than anything also here, maybe second to money then, so being young, skinny and brown, even without a gym polished body I was wiry and strong enough after living on the road for these months, so I blended in just fine, especially now I wasn’t dragging my bag and fishy parka around. I was just laying around and flirting, and not aiming for anything more ambitious than that. What’s even better is that I was succeeding. That was one of the lessons I learnt. My original trip was really ambitious, setting its goals way high, and I fell flat on my face, with events queuing up to deliver slaps and sucker punches. But my new ambition, to lie on the beach, eat and read comics, that was nice and low, low as a lazy guy lying on his back. And I was hitting my targets every day. Maybe I should write a business book. ‘Succeed Every Time: Aim Low.’

It was so easy, the time flew. I called home regularly, a few seconds a time, just letting the folks know I was OK. There wasn’t much to say, and now everything was going steady, I didn’t feel the urge. I knew this couldn’t go on forever, and soon enough, after almost four weeks, I knew it couldn’t go on at all. The beach had cooled down and the money had run down. I had enough to go up to Los Angeles, get another cheap motel, confirm my flight, and maybe do some LA stuff, like Disneyland. San Diego was fun, in a numbskull kind of way, but it was time to go. As I checked out of the motel after my last long day on the beach and walked to the edge of town where I could hitch a ride to LA, I have to admit I felt a small lump in my throat. I was on the way to LA. It wasn’t a long ride, and I was going there mainly to catch a flight. Home. That was a scary thought. People I’d really have to talk to. Honestly.

A pick-up pulled up pretty quickly. With me and my history of pick-ups I almost didn’t get in, but it was a ride and the sun was getting close to the horizon; less than an hour away, so I wanted to get on the way. I threw my bag in the back and came toward the door. The passenger jerked a thumb at the back.

‘LA?’ I asked.

He nodded so I jumped in the back. I dozed off pretty quickly, and when I woke I was as stiff and uncomfortable as you’d expect to be if you’d slept in the back of a pick-up. I knew I’d slept deeply. We must have stopped because I couldn’t feel the truck moving. I drummed my fingers and felt dirt and sand. I was on the floor. It must have been a while because it was pitch dark. The sky was crowded with stars. I would have expected the Pacific Coast Highway to be busier and brighter. This was as quiet as the grave, and darker.

Me and my mouth. I was blinded by two rows of lights, bright lights, shining straight at me. Squinting tight, I could just tell that they were the lights fastened across the front and across the roof of the pick-up. You should always trust your gut, and I hadn’t. The engine fired up and revved high. It launched. I could hear dirt spitting out the back from the spinning wheels as the pick-up shot towards me.

‘Why?’ I yelled into the sky.’ I did what you wanted.’

I leapt to the side and the pick-up skidded trying to turn in a hurry. I thought they were playing with me, that they didn’t actually plan to kill me, but I also suspected games like this, with toys like two-ton pick-ups, could go wrong in a hurry, and I was front of the queue to get hurt when it did.

‘Why?’ I screamed into the empty sky.

‘Cos we’re having fun, boy,’ the passenger shouted back at me. This time as he drove at me, he wiggled and wobbled the steering to make it harder—in his mind—for me to know which way to jump. But by now, as he careened about the emptiness, I’d had a look around and I could see it wasn’t as empty as it looked. As he speeded , I dove one way and he, as I expected, spun the other and clipped the side of a big old cactus. Sure it was an endangered species so I felt bad for a moment. But it was a tough old thing and it squashed up the corner of the pick-up, smashing a couple of the lights. I heard cursing from the open windows of the pick-up and off it went.

‘Seeya, stupid,’ they yelled in chorus as they accelerated away.

I looked back up to the sky and shrugged.

‘Thanks.’

Maybe she’d stepped in for me, with one of her notorious truck-tricks. Or maybe I’d just been quick off the mark. Still, knowing her short temper, best to thank her just in case.

It took me a few minutes to adjust after staring into their lights, but eventually, by starlight and by memory of when the area was lit, I managed a faint picture. The picture had no bag in it, or a fishy parka, and the temperature was falling. I couldn’t lie down to sleep and wait for light: who knew what kind of rats and creepy crawlies there were out here. I patted my pockets. My wallet wasn’t there. And if my bag wasn’t either, then I had the money in my pocket, certainly under five dollars in small notes and change. I also had no more clothes, no more money, no mobile phone, no LA-London ticket and no passport. I could get another passport, but I didn’t have a ticket number and I didn’t expect I would be able to replace the ticket. I wasn’t about t call Ava and ask for another.

This holiday was going like clockwork. Maybe, I thought, when I got back home, I should forget school and go be a travel agent.

I looked in the direction the pick-up had gone, and set off after it. I hoped they had a clue. Their lights were long gone, and I couldn’t see the lights of any other vehicles in any direction, but I had to do something, in some direction.

I figured I’d walked maybe three or four miles when the ground started to rise. I scrambled up and after only ten yards or so, I found I was at the top of an embankment. At the other side was a decent sized road. I hadn’t been quite so far in the middle of nowhere, but in the dark, the embankment completely hid the road—which was probably the whole idea. I had no idea where I was. But that didn’t matter so much because I had no idea where I was going. Could you get passports in LA? I couldn’t see it that you’d have to go to Washington DC, who knew? Thinking like a kid, I suspected mum would know, and I wished she was here, or even better that I was there. Another unfulfilled wish. I remembered: Balarubu is a vengeful god of truth, not a fairy godmother.

I leant against the embankment, waiting until I could see the oncoming vehicles before I tried to catch a ride. Eventually I caught a Winnebago.

‘Where you headed, kid?’

‘Same place as you.’

‘Nogales? That’s some coincidence. How’d you know we was headed Nogales anyways?’

I didn’t. But you are, eh?’

‘Sure. Hop in. You headed Nogales, Mexico, or Nogales this side, Arizona?’

‘I guessed, if I was headed anywhere, Mexico would be a cheaper place to last out while I waited for anew passport, subsisting on wired money from my parents: what better preparation for a return home with my tail between my legs and an everlasting litany of ‘told you so’s about the wisdom of travelling so young.

But then I couldn’t even get into Mexico without a passport I remembered.

‘Nogales your side.’

‘Hey then. Arizona here we come. Now you look like you’ve had a tough day there. Go up the back there, and stretch out on the sofa, catch some winks, y’hear.’

This was the most extraordinarily happy and hospitable family, but as soon as we reached Nogales, I had to say goodbye. The last time I followed the hospitality train from car to home was when I got involved with Ava. I had to get out and stand up for myself. This wasn’t going to be easy. I checked a map in the back of the Winnebago and found that Nogales—the Arizona version—was slap on the Mexican border, at the bottom of Arizona, in the middle of a mountainous desert; the Sonora. Great. My experience with mountains and deserts was really something to be envied.

I slammed the Winnebago door closed. It was only then that the Happy couple noticed that I didn’t have a bag.

‘You didn’t leave your bag on the Winne, there?’

‘No.’ I lifted my arms to show my white T, my ratty blue jeans and my trainers.

‘What you see is what you get.’

‘You’re sure travelling light.’

I nodded. There wasn’t anywhere to go with this. ‘Thanks for the ride and good luck with the rest of the journey.’

‘Thanks kid. Y’ain’t been listening good—we live here, but thanks all the same.’

The Winnebago clunked into gear and slid away from the curb with all the pep and energy of Free Willy drifting from the poolside.

I looked around. It was a pretty funky place. Not a tourist place, though I guessed they would get the odd tourist. Certainly not a place where I’d get a new UK passport, but I guessed I could sort that out when I made it back to LA. So long as I hit the phone and informed them that the old one was stolen. I was hoping mum could do that from home, along maybe with trying to chase down a replacement air ticket. Instead, Nogales looked like a place where people lived and worked and died, and tried to have some fun in the spaces in between. A home kind of place. There were cheap places to eat; apart from the odd burger joint, these were mainly Mexican. There were motels and cheap hotels, discount tire shops, oil change and service shops, and a High Street and a few streets off, and a small mall on the edge of town with the usual range of stuff for sale. It didn’t have any of those weird tourist shops where you can smell them before you get there, like they already fell victim to The Attack of the Killer Pot-Pourri. I discovered all this wandering around the town for an hour. I washed up in the toilets in the mall, and then, when I’d run up another sweat, in the toilets of a little Mexican café, where I had the first half decent burrito. I don’t think they were familiar with people eating or spending as little as I had, especially tourists, which is inevitably how they nailed me when they heard my non-Arizonan Spanish.

‘A small bean burrito and a glass of water, please.’

‘We don’t do small, just regular.’

‘Regular then.’

‘You want the water still or sparkling?’

‘Tap.’

‘We don’t sell tap water.’ The man behind the counter told me. He wasn’t being difficult. Just telling me.

‘That was what I was hoping. Just a plain old free glass of water. I Know you’re here to make money. I’m just trying not to spend much. I’ve been mugged.’

That got his pity flowing.

‘You have? Bad luck. You want hot sauce on the burrito?’

‘Not a whole lot. If it costs, none at all.’

He cracked half a smile at this.

‘Chile comes with the deal, kid. That’s a dollar forty nine. Bar service so we’ll skip the tip. Come back when you have money, OK?’

I thanked him and took the burrito. The beans were hot and spicy and the bread was less like a hand flannel. A little like one, mind, but at least not one that had been left damp over the radiator and begun to mould. This one was fresh and fluffy out of the drier. I wolfed it like I hadn’t eaten for over a day—for good reason. This no money thing could get pretty tired pretty fast. I had a problem of getting the things I needed in a row. I needed money, and the fastest route was to call mum. That was also the way to a lovely

‘You are right and I am wrong, you are clever and I am stupid, you know more than I do, my problems are all my doing and I am contrite and pitiful’ conversation, where I could be condescended to as only someone who got his condescension in first can be. Then I could get a hotel, and then I’d have a base to get on and decide how to get a passport. When I had money and could stay where I wanted within reason, no-one asked me a single question about my ability to pay. Now I didn’t have a bean—well actually since my bean burrito and a couple of cokes during the day I had a little under three dollars—I couldn’t get near a bed. It was the lack of a bag that did it. Hotel receptionists of all levels are taught to spot that kind of thing. So when they asked if I had the money to pay for my room, what did I tell them? Naturally I told them that I had no money, but that I hoped to have some very soon.

‘Not good enough,’ was the gist of the replies at the three places I tried, though one of them gave a more robust suggestion, complete with gestures and face pulling. And in English. The other two replied more politely, in Spanish, but with the same effect on my need for a bed.

I carried on walking the streets, slowly now. No point walking fast when you’re headed nowhere, without a deadline to get there. I stopped to clench my fists and breath deeply. Fine. That didn’t help. But when I breathed again, I picked up a tang, a spicy smell with more subtlety than most of the cantinas I’d been eating in. I looked around for the source of the smell and located it straight across the street. I laughed out loud. For the second time in a day, I didn’t know if I needed to thank Balarubu. I had done nothing special. No more than she asked, just made sure that whenever I spoke, whatever I said, was the truth. I had the impression she was a pretty passive God, just letting things roll along, until she needed to step in to punish a liar. But maybe not. Could be she had a kind side too. Maybe she was running a bonus scheme and looking out for the poor saps in her care and helping them out of the odd tight spot so long as they kept their noses clean and did her will. It wouldn’t be too tough a job. With most of her followers, as far as I knew, living up there in the hills, all knowing each other’s business, there would be precious little need or scope for lies. So keeping an eye on me and a few scattered others would probably be a novel diversion. Still, this time I had to admit she had come up trumps.

I stared, still laughing, at the deep golds and reds of the restaurant sign.

Painted Wind.