My nerves were tight. I carefully dialed the phone number given to me in Sigourney by the cute waitress.
Each tone felt like another few feet up the roller coaster; my stomach waiting to drop. It didn't go straight to voicemail this time but I knew it'd be only time before she'd return my call. I sat down to write but I could barely think of anything to put to words. The line of the word processor blinking at me.
The phone rang. It was her. She had a slight lisp but the voice sounded very sweet to me; a little shy. I didn't know what to say. I never really did. She was surprised that I actually called. Why wouldn't I? She was really cute. She told me that I was the cutest guy out of our group.
I began to tell her a few quips about my life. Jumping from whatever I could think of that was the most important to keep the conversation going. She mumbled to herself a lot on her side, when I asked about it, she laughed and said she was doing laundry and making her bed as we talked. She didn't really tell me that much about herself except some details about her family and living situation.
There were long periods of silence that were filled with barking dogs, children, and some yelling. She said that it was her roommate and her child. The dogs were theirs.
There were some loud whispers, another long pause, and she finally asked: ''Do you wanna go with us to go see the Christmas lights in Ottumwa?''. I looked at the blank page on my computer, it would be blank for a while, and said ''Yea''.
The wait was excruciating. I felt excited to see this attractive woman but I also felt the slow, long, dread of the conversation that'd probably occur after it was all said and done. I couldn't put hope in this working out but when she told me about her life. I wanted to see if I could be a part of her life somehow. If I could be there for her to rely on. That's all I would have wanted.
I sat in the same exact spot for almost the whole entire time that I waited; an hour and a half. I couldn't remember the last time I was this nervous.
She called me when she was ten minutes away, she was freaking out about the traffic: ''I almost died three different times. This is the reason why I could never live in the city''. Cedar Rapids is as much as a ''city'' as McDonalds is an actual resturant. I couldn't help but laugh. She pulled up in the driveway, in a beat up van, and I got in.
She seemed nervous, still worried about the traffic, she pulled out a cigarette and smiled before taking a long drag. She was definitely the pretty waitress from Sigourney. I tried to reassure her about the traffic but she emphasized that she doesn't do this for just anyone. It hit me there that she was really into me.
We drove across the highway, an old woman drifted a few inches into our lane before remembering that she'd better operate her motorized vehicle rather than screw around on her phone; ''This is why I hate big cities!'' she said. I laughed. She was a genuine country girl.
The drive was long, I grasped for conversation, but she was very quiet. I talked to beat the awkward silence and the crappy country music quietly humming on the radio. Her friend, and fellow waiter and roommate, called her just before we left Cedar Rapids. They were both laughing. She, on speaker phone, was talking about an ''interrogation'' that would occur once we arrived..and some shepards pie.
The sun had begun to set about half way on the trip back, she lived in What Cheer but worked in Sigourney, so the ride was going to be a trek.
Once the sky had turned completely black, we were in the far reaches of the country. I pointed out into the beautiful, yet haunting, canvas around the solitary country highway saying: ''So the city scares you but this doesn't?''.
She laughed and said ''No''. I told her that this is cannibal country. You get hacked to death and they don't find you for a few decades. If you get injured, the nearest cop and/or ambulance is forty minutes away. She said that she didn't think of that before.
It felt too weird to be back in the town of What Cheer. What was I doing here again? I didn't think I'd be seeing that stretch of abandoned buildings again. It almost felt ominous.
We went up the hill behind the park I had been walking around with St Nick the day before. It all looked that much more strange in the dark.
The van creaked and slammed down a narrow gravel road until we got to her house. The backyard had been ripped up by the tires of the two parked cars; her minivan and her roommates Jeep. I could see into the two back sliding glass doors that the light was on. People were walking around.
Walking down the small hill to the house, by an old shed with two tvs out on the lawn, and a makeshift fire pit right by the back door.
We walked in and I was standing in a small, hot kitchen. The waitress who had given me her (Kristen) number was at the oven putting slices of cheese over a pan of potatoes. Two dogs, a german shepherd and pitbull pup, came running at me. They licked at me and sat at my feet. The woman (Sara) laughed and said that they had never done that before.
An excited man came out of a room, shook my hands, and wanted to know if I wanted to see his ten gauge shotgun. I laughed and nodded my head. He came down quick with the black shotgun, cocked it with one hand, and started describing it to me.
The man, Thaddeus, spoke quickly, with short laughs and always with a grin. Sara looked tired, she was busy with the shepards pie, but started ''interrogating'' me without flinching. I laughed but I respected her demeanor.
Answering her questions quickly, she seemed satisfied. Thaddeus would cut in after every few sentences about his progress fixing up the house. He pointed out this and that, how he got that deal, and what needed to be done. It was interesting. ''Finish one thing and have a thousand others, right?'' I said while slowly nodding.
Sara would curse out Thaddeus and try to regain the conversation. Kristen sat on the hardwood floor and grinned up at me: ''I told you that they'd do this''. I didn't mind.
Sara started telling me about her life, being born in Ireland, how she got to Iowa and how she got to What Cheer. It was a harsh story. She was a very blunt woman but It was easy to see why when she described what she had been through, what she had seen, what her own family had put her through. She would echo a lot of my own experiences with my family.
She told me that her grandmother had a bar in What Cheer, right by the auto store, she spent a lot of time there because her home life was difficult. It had been closed for about fifteen years but Sara said that, every now and then, she still had dreams about the bar.
She had been in the area for most of her life, she desperately wanted to go back to Ireland, and raise her five year old child there or anywhere that wasn't What Cheer or Iowa for that matter.
She was just making it there with her son, Thaddeus, and Kristen. They were all that she had except a few from her own family that she still talked to.
Kristen and Thaddeus would quip in between Sara's stories with random comments which would go until Sara would get annoyed and say ''I love you but I wanna drown you in the bathtub''.
They were their own small family.
Sara took out the sheppards pie and handed out everyone a dish while she was finishing her story. I was transfixed by the details, I would look at Kristen, and smile at her to remind her that I didn't forget her; she had been through her own tragedies and relationships with foolish men.
Sara was known for her cooking, and by the time I had got it down; we were getting ready to leave for Ottumwa.
As we all got into the Jeep, I was amazed that these strangers took me in with hospitality and indifference. We started on the long drive to Ottumwa.
Thaddeus drove fast down tight country roads and I was freezing in the back with Kristen and Sara's child.
I kept inching closer to Kristen for warmth. She took out a cigarette and opened the window closest to me, her arm resting on my legs to control the window, I'd look at her and smile. She, as many other times that night, shook her head and said ''What?''. It had been a very long time since I had been able to look at a woman's face in admiration and feel the same look back into my own eyes.
Thaddeus had installed some speakers in the jeep and Sara would use them to blast early 2000s rap while singing along to them. It seemed oddly familiar so I felt comfortable. He talked about many things at a rapid pace but I tried following as best as I could. It was getting cold from the lack of A/C and the open windows for cigarettes.
It seemed like a very long time before we got into Ottumwa. We drove outside of town, going down the highway, until we saw the park lit with Christmas lights. It was getting harder to see out the window as it was fogging up.
Thaddeus swerved a bit but we found our way in the park. Kristen got excited, it was cute to see the big smile on her face, and pressed her face against the glass to see the lights. Ahead of us, was an SUV filled with high schoolers who drove very slow. They'd stick their heads out to sing Christmas carols to no one in particular. I stuck my own head out to cheer them on.
''I can build my own lights for you, babe'' said Thaddeus as we passed through a tunnel of stringed lights. ''Just need a generator and some lights. I can build anything for you, right babe?''. Sara and Thaddeus would kiss and Sara would say ''I love you but you're annoying''. He'd just grin at her and scratch her back.
Thaddeus remembered Sara wanted to get some bones for the dogs at Wal-Mart and it was everything you'd expect at a Wal-Mart in Ottumwa; Good ol boys, grandmas with packs of Busch Lattes, and sad women.
We passed the woman's clothing section when we passed some slippers, Kristen spotted some owl slippers, and said ''I LOVE anything with owls on them''; a shine was in her eyes as she went on about them. They all were laughing, Kristen would be looking back at me as I looked at her, and Thaddeus would pick up everything that had the color pink on it.
Everyone in the store, except this small family, looked miserable. Old men rolled their eyes, people carted big screen TVs around, and hoochie little girls ran around giggling.
As we walked in between the aisles, the women started walking faster ahead of us as they kept looking back and whispering. ''Are they always like this?'' I asked Thaddeus. ''Usually'' he responded. He asked what I thought of Kristen. He told me that she had a lot of guys screw her over. That she just needed a good man in her life. I didn't know how to respond. It was such a long answer. I knew I couldn't be with her but I knew I had to tell her that. I just hadn't done it yet. I responded dumbly: ''she's cool''.
It always seemed that Thaddeus and Sara knew someone wherever they went. Thaddeus' brothers worked at Wal-Mart and Sara knew the manager of the McDonalds that we went to afterwards.
The place was disgusting. The bathroom was something out of a stereotypical complaint against public bathrooms; the putrid smells, stains of bodily fluids, and the floor was sticky. The floor of the place itself was covered in french fries and spilled pop; Sara's sandwich had a hair in it and a homeless guy slept in the back.
''You have no sense of humor, Chris'' said Kristen as I shot a straw wrapper at her head. ''Your salty, get it?'' said Thaddeus as he threw french fries at Kristen.
On the way back to What Cheer, I was so cold that I would get closer and closer to her, she'd look at me and I'd look back at her. I saw something in her eyes that I haven't seen in a long time. She really did look at me, smile, and I knew she wanted me. I couldn't stop looking. I felt at home when I looked into her eyes but I still knew I couldn't be with her.
We got back and we were all sitting in the kitchen, Kristen went into her room as Sara and Thaddeus talked to me. ''I don't want her driving back this late'' said Sara.
I knew then that I was going to spend the night and I knew the only place I had to sleep was in Kristen's bed. My mind went blank. Kristen came out in an owl onesie. The thing even had wings. I laughed but noticed that I was getting really tired. It all hit me at once. I was exhausted.
I was really nervous but I said that I was going to bed. I went into her room, the walls were half painted purple while the rest was blue, her bed was a mattress on the floor with some cozy blankets. I sat down on it, it felt real squishy and soft, I laid down.
She came in and I asked her what side of the bed she wanted. She wanted the closest to the wall so I stayed in place as she turned off the light. She laid down, gave me some blankets, and she turned to look at me. I couldn't handle it anymore. I had to tell her. So I did.
I carefully explained my reasons. She didn't say a word; just looked up at the ceiling. I asked her if she had anything to say. She didn't. She turned and went to sleep.
I felt like a moron. I really pissed her off and I couldn't blame her. When she'd wake up tomorrow, absolutely everything would change, she wouldn't look at me the same and I'd probably never see her again. I sat there; depressed.
The heat began to kick on and it quickly got very warm. It gave me a headache and I couldn't think at all. I kept turning to look at her while she slept. She softly snored.
She looked like she was at peace. She had her hands intertwined together at the waist. It made her even more beautiful and made me feel even worse; not for my reasons but that this wasn't going to work. I just wanted to hold the woman and make her know that I wanted her but I couldn't.
It wouldn't work out. I felt empty, drained, and I still couldn't sleep.
I sat there for hours, It was so hot that I took off my shirt and socks, and waited for her to just get up and beat the crap out of me. I felt like if I would have slept, I would have woken up with that shotgun in my face. So I just sat there, occasionally looking over to admire her before I would never see her again.
That morning, when the sun was finally up, Kristen got out of bed and got dressed in the bathroom. Sara came in and gave me some biscuits from the local gas station. Kristen came back in and was fixing her hair. She'd look at me when she caught me looking at her; now looking annoyed. I wanted to die.
Before leaving to go to work, Sara asked her: ''So what should we do with him?''. Kristen shrugged and left. Sara looked at me and said: ''Well I can at least show you around town for your book''.
''I've lived around What Cheer for much of my life'' said Sara as she drove around in the Jeep with Thaddeus in the passenger and her child in the back.
She pointed out that the buildings downtown were always there and always changing.
One, a hotel. Another, was a movie theater, diner, and now abandoned. ''I don't know why they just won't knock down this s****. They call it historically important but they've let it go to s****. It's all black mold and you can't even breathe''. The rubble from a building that was knocked down earlier this year still laid by the other abandoned buildings.
''This place used to be bangin', we had the telephone company, movie theater, and slowly the town just began to die''. She told me about how most of the residents were either junkies or stuck up; pedos or close to dying.
We drove a little outside of town, she wanted to show me what was left of what made What Cheer; the coal mining plant. Little if anything is left of it now.
A large lake is where the main building sat. At some point, there was an accident and the place had to be evacuated. The place must have been damaged beyond repair and they all lost their jobs.
They hauled off all the bricks, concrete, and whatever made up the place except for a huge crane that nobody could get to. It was apparently still visible in the middle of the lake. I wasn't too curious to see how sturdy the ice was.
After the plant closed, everything started going to crap. The buildings and the people had deteriorated to what it is now; a meth haven. It was a really depressing story.
Right by the site of the plant was a graveyard, Sara pointed out the grave of a man who was murdered by another who wanted his girlfriend. Shot him in front of her, in the neck, and somehow; it seemed oddly fitting.
We drove around the rest of the town, the local school had been closed for at least two decades, and someone raised white deer in their yard. The buildings were all the same; shackled out or abandoned.
The only decent looking house was a yellow victorian style, two story, that stuck out. Sara told me she had long wanted to get that place but never really could.
The only real local place to be was the only gas station in town. The place was always busy.
The clerk always looked bored. Everyone around there looked bored. A homeless, santa like, man sat outside texting random women who wanted money (he didn't have) from him while smoking cigarettes.
This whole place reeked of silence, sadness, and death.
We got back and I waited for Kristen to get off work. I talked with Sara and Thaddeus showed me more of the house. He eagerly showed me what needed to be done around the house. I started to feel this deep sorrow in my heart.
I knew that I wouldn't see these people again. They were just making it together and they had each other. I sat in the kitchen for hours, just looking out the back window, trying to take in the scenery. I didn't want to forget anything.
Some good ol boys and their father drove 4 wheelers around the whole town. You could hear their engines in the distance.
In the nearby yard was a crack house with no electricity. Thaddeus told me that people fill it sometimes at night and someone from the house tried fighting him.
In front of me, and behind the house, was the remains of a house that had burned down three weeks ago. Thaddeus had been using the remaining brick to make a makeshift driveway.
The sky was a light grey. The streets were quiet except the roar of the four wheeler engines. You could see most of downtown from the hill that the house was on.
I knew it was time to go when I saw Kristen's van pull in. I was outside with Thaddeus and she walked in the house without saying much. I walked in. She was getting dressed for a Christmas party she was going to after dropping me off.
I looked at Sara and Thaddeus. I thanked them for everything, wished that Sara could get back to Ireland, and looked at Kristen as she finished. She came out in leggings and a grey shirt. She looked great; beautiful even.
I walked out of the house and waved goodbye. Their dogs sat at the window wagging away; Thaddieus and Sara went back to living, and I never saw any of them again.
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