When are you coming home?
“Steven?” she whimpered after an immense pause. “When are you coming home?
AURORA AUSTRALIS BY SAMUEL DAMON 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 100
Paper. Type type typing across it. Ice, pitted and crevassed, dangerous and thin. The sled’s runners smudge the white white white with typewriter-ribbon stain. I mush the dogs on, on to the pole, past Captain Scott and his lot looking like trout wrapped in paper to be thawed and fried. Still Amundsen made it. Aurora Australis. A revelation at the Tierra Del Fuego of consciousness. Paper. Ice. Los Angeles.
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I lived in LA for two years before I even thought of Steve Nixon. He was my roommate in college. At 18, when I knew him, his hairline receded like the tide before a tsunami. He screeched bad violin, speed read all the classics, and screwed the Mississippi Belle I loved and thought too chaste for sex.
Still somehow, I liked him but I hadn’t called him.
My subconscious accessed Steve Nixon’s mother’s name. Penelope.
“Directory assistance.”
“Penelope Nixon, Pasadena, please.”
“Have you consulted your telephone directory?”
“I’m as blind as Homer.”
“Uh-huh. Just a moment. Connecting.”
“No wait,” I said, but too late.
Penny Nixon answered on the first ring. “Hello.”
“Hello.”
“Steven, my God. I thought I’d never hear your voice again.”