You Are Here

You are here.

But you don’t want to be here. 

Your mind is elsewhere.

The future, the hopes, the fantasies couple with dread that you are here and you don’t want to be here. You want to be in the distant time where your brain guarantees that it will be better. You are here but you can be there. It’s an obsession and you feel like you’ll never get there. You stop, drown in your sorrows and feel no sense of purpose. You push away your reality searching and seeking anything. You are here and everything you want is elsewhere. You got here by giving up everything, making the necessary sacrifices until you were left dry and thirsting for anything to give you a sense of bliss.

She shut the tablet and grabbed her duffel bag, several smaller bags and her pillow. You are here, she thought to herself. Hoping she had everything she needed, she walked out the door.

~

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The radio rattled on as the pickup meandered down a dusty highway. She kept throwing sideways glances at him; he caught her from the corner of his eye. She smacked the button on the dashboard silencing the loud commercial.

“Let’s play a game,” she said clutching the notebook she’d been scribbling in.

“Okay,” he said. “What game?”

She tells him once on a road trip to a rodeo in South Dakota—or was it North Dakota?—her friend played a game where every time they passed a specific sign, they had to compliment each other. On this route, there were signs every few miles advertising an attraction.

“Since there aren’t really signs like that,” she said looking around the barren, unmarked landscape. “we’ll just take turns saying nice things.”

He smiled shaking his head ever so slightly. She wrote at the top of a page in her notebook, “10 Things I Like About You.” Turning a page, she wrote, “10 Things You Like About Me.” She put the date in the top right corner like the scrupulous writer she was. She looked up at him.

“You first,” he said.

“I thought of the game.”

Pause.

“I like your laugh,” she said. It was something she knew he was self-conscious of. He used to be embarrassed when she made him laugh; he’d cover it up and never let a full hearty laugh out.

“I like your smile,” he said. She tried not to smile.
Each bump and jostle of the road drown in the background and the places they cruised by might as well not have existed.

“I like your butt in those jeans,” she said.

“Hmm,” he murmured. “I like the way you accept me the way I am.”

The landscape started to change. There were more hills and trees. The grass held shades of autumn.

“How much longer?” she asked.

“Oh, not too long.”

“Okay, let’s do things we hate about each other.”

Again, she titled two different pages.

“I hate how you won’t listen to my music,” he said.

“I try!” she retorted.

“You’re getting better,” he acknowledged.

She looks out the window. A large property with a beautiful home, a barn and lots of pasture. They make eye contact, the knowing look that says someday.

“It’s only ‘cause,” she says returning to the conversation, “My brother used to listen to that kind of music and he would get so angry and frustrated. I just associate it with that.”

He nodded.

“Your turn.”

Without hesitation, she said, “I hate your driving.”

“I hate your side seat driving,” he responded.

She wrote “side seat” in quotations refraining from saying she hates that he said it that way.

They pull up to a house with a car port. Leaves from a tall expansive tree crunch beneath our feet.

“This is my future daughter-in-law,” her future father-in-law said wrapping an arm around her.

“Hi,” she says to the first of many people she’ll meet for the first time.

~

A long-distance relationship is like balancing two lives in two different places.

Places.

In "Harry Potter," Hermione could be in two places at once. Sometimes I want to be in two places. Sometimes I really am. I am in Nebraska going to school. Sometimes I want to be home in Colorado and sometimes I want to be in Oklahoma with my cat and fiancé. Sometimes I’m talking to my fiancé so much when we aren’t in the same geographical location that I feel although I am physically in Hastings, I am mentally somewhere else. It’s like leading two different lives, which is silly because I hardly handle the life I was given.

Home. It’s one of my favorite places. The first place I left; the first place I returned. The scenery was something I took for granted. I didn’t know anything but the mountains, vast forests, blue skies. It took leaving for me to appreciate what I woke up to each day. 

She looked up from her tablet, her hands poised above the keyboard. She leaned back in the chair with a sigh. Her coffee was cold; her brain running on fumes.

~

“We’re praying,” someone said.

Everyone stood in a large circle. She grabbed his hand and he grabbed his grandpa’s next to him. His grandpa saw her and quickly switched spots with him.

“I want to hold a pretty girl’s hand,” he said in a raspy voice. She smiled and obliged. They bowed their heads as the prayer began.

Just like that there was movement to the kitchen, a pot luck style of filling your flimsy paper plate with as much as you can.

After eating they went back outside. The sun was shining and it was warm out. He stood by her as she sat on the tailgate of her pickup. They had a cooler of beer. The contents of it they had to drink inconspicuously.

“We’re starting games! Get in here,” a woman said peeking out the door.

“Noooo,” she groaned. She meant to keep that internal, but her dread pushed outward. “Do I have to? Can we just hide?”

He only nodded in sly confirmation. He poured a beer and they walked towards the park. The family gathering was taking place at a church so there was plenty of room to spread out. It was only a matter of minutes before his mother called out to them, commanding them inside. Everyone was on teams. The noise ricocheted off the walls, bouncing off her ears and making her head pound with it.

“You can take my place,” a brother’s wife said. “Or you can hold the baby.”

“I’ll hold the baby,” she said. The baby was reaching for her watch as it caught the light. As soon as he was in her arms, he nuzzled his head against her neck and dozed off. She tried hiding but the mother found her and insisted it was her turn to play; she needed to feed the baby. Her stomach dropped when she saw plates of whip cream on the tables.

“Come on!” everyone seemed to yell.

Hesitantly, she stood next to him.

“You can’t use your hands. There’s a letter on each plate. You have to find all five to spell a word,” a voice said.

She pulled her hair back eyeing the plate. Then stuck her face in it. But she could not find a letter. The rest of the team had already found theirs. She stopped, looked around, and paused before continuing. Another team already won. Her future mother-in-law patted her on the back.

“You’re a trooper,” she said.

~

“Now what are we doing?” she asked for what felt like the hundredth time.

“Going to Papa and Nana’s,” he said. “My dad’s parents.”

“How long of a drive?”

“Two hours.”

She plugged her phone in and played the end of the podcast they hadn’t finished earlier. She was fidgeting and after stopping at Starbucks, the caffeine only made it worse.

“Let’s ask each other questions,” she said. The highway was extremely dark now.

“What kind of questions?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I saw some good ones on Facebook.”

The screen lit up her face as she scrolled.

“Okay,” she said. “It says, ‘Without prompting, ask your significant other these questions and write exactly what they say.’ Okay. What’s my favorite food?”

He thought about it for a while. “I’m not sure actually. Steak?”

“I’m not sure either. . . depends on my mood. Yours is definitely steak,” she said. “What makes you proud of me?”

“Your writing. You write so well, and you’re just so smart.”

He turned the cruise off as his brother slowed down in front of him.

“I wish he would just pick a speed,” he muttered. “What are you proud of me for?”

She glanced at him. “How adaptable you are, especially at your job. They can throw anything at you and you can handle it.”

“Mmpf,” he grunted.

They grew tired although it was only eight o’ clock. He followed the pickup in front of them onto the exit ramp. But his brother continued back on the highway.

“What is he doing?” he said aloud as he turned right.

“Is this the right way?”

“Yes,” he said. A little later he said, “I guess it’s just a little longer.”

He turned off on a side road and drove into some trees. He pulled into a grassy area by some campers and parked. An older gentleman walked towards them with a flashlight. He went to hug him but when his grandpa saw her, he pushed him aside.

“I’d rather hug this pretty little thing,” he said. “How are ya?”

“Good,” she smiled.

They followed him toward the house. There was a garage full of junk. A fridge stood open; it’s doors filled with non-perishable items.

The home was warm, filled with family and shelves of knickknacks, a large kitchen, cook books filling the cupboards. A crock pot of white chili. The men say in the living room. A father and a son reminiscing of old hunting stories.

~

The morning was brisk. Frost covered the grass and a light fog floated around the trees. It was completely silent. Inside the house cinnamon rolls were baking in the oven, coffee brewing in the pot. Everyone was slowly waking up, even the kids.

“I’m going to Atwoods today to get some bullets,” he was telling his father.

“Yeah, I’ll go with,” his father had said.

They went, the two of them, a brother, father, and grandpa to town. Grandpa drove with sharp turns, unexpected braking and random swerving. Expecting it to be busy on this Black Friday, they were pleasantly surprised. The spent almost an hour perusing the sales at the country store. Camouflage, camping gear, home decorations, clothing.

“If we stand here long enough, I’m going to buy a pair of boots,” the brother said to her.

“I know right. Fifty bucks off?” she said.

Eventually all of them found their way to the front, and they made their way back to the house. Someone else drove on the way back, sparing all of the necks whip lash.

At the house, the rest of the family started showing up. More introductions for her.

“This is my betrothed,” he said.

“Hi,” she said shaking their hands.

“I didn’t know you were engaged,” one woman said.

“It’s still early,” she said. “We’ll talk after Thanksgiving.”

The woman laughed. “I think you’ve found your match,” she said smiling up at him.

I wasn’t joking, she thought to herself.

They stood in another circle of prayer.

“Does anyone want to say grace?” Nana asked.

“My dad does,” a boy chimed in.

Everyone laughed and his father stared down his boy from the other side of the circle. She stood in his arms as the prayer ended and everyone ushered into the kitchen. This was her place.

You are here.