Glory Days

Born in the USA / Bruce Springsteen

I pause first over the bridge, the strip malls look sad. Mostly empty now and the Grants, then K-mart is now a large grocery store. It seems wrong. But not was wrong as the plaza across the way, where Monkey Wards sat next to the DMV: twice the cost and frustrations for anyone with a vehicle. Now the lot is deserted. I pull into the parking lot, noticing the weeds growing up around the skeleton of what used to be the first fast food in town.

The Quarterback Club. Horrible burgers, one of the originators of minced onions in ketchup on mystery meat, but the roof had a giant football protruding out the top. The frame was still there at least. I couldn’t careless about football, but I loved that building.

“You’re such a pig.” I snapped at Joe, who just bounded up to the table to announce he’s going hunting for “land whales.” The derogatory phrase used for any girl in town that weighed over 100 lbs.

“You are an asshole.” Bob agreed sitting across from me, but he laughed. I gave him a scowl too, but it was short lived as he gave me the cherry from the top of his sundae. “You’re gonna scoff it down anyway.” He teased with a lopsided grin.
Why didn’t I date him? Bob. He was a nice guy. I look to my right and see him teaching me how to drive a stick in that very parking lot at midnight. Randy, the boyfriend, is sleeping in the back seat despite the perpetual stalling. Randy, the idiot, who four spaces to my left handed a knife to a stranger who arrived, drunk, pissed and ranting he wanted to kill someone one….

“What the hell were you thinking?” Bob asked later, knife retrieved and stranger sent on his way.

“Well, he asked for one.”
I groan and across the lot I see Bob and I accepting the ride in the Deloran that showed up one summer night. Had he wanted to go, or had he gone because I wanted to go?

The sound of the phone invaded my dreams, and though it’s 11:00 am, I was sound asleep.

“Ahhuh?”

“Get here. Now. It’s an emergency.” I registered Cynd’s voice, my manager at the Quickie Mart, though it was panicked like I’d never heard before. She was a year older than I, and had about as much enthusiasm for her job as I.

I glanced at the clock. We’d left each other at last call the night before at 2 or so. She opened at 5, too late for the store to finally be hit.

“What’s up?” I was up and tossing on clothes, retrieved from the floor.

“Get here, NOW…. It’s Bob. He’s … asking for you.”

“What?”

“Get here. Fast.” It was an order. It was panic. It was the last she said before she hung up.

Ten minutes later I enter the store, thankfully it was empty. Cyn was behind the counter, looking more upset than I had ever seen her in the six months we’d been working together and the four years I had at least seen her in high school.

“I’m here. What…”

She interrupted me with a yank that brought me around the counter to our little office/bathroom. “It’s Bob. He’s in the store room. He came in and asked for you. And then burst into tears…” The words poured out of her in a frantic whisper.

“What? Me?” I was wondering if I was still dreaming.

“Yes. He asked for you. He said he had to talk to you. It’s bad. I asked him what happened, and he said he’d gotten into a fight with his dad. And he hit him. I mean, Bob hit is dad, not the other way. He’s never hit him before. He’s upset. You have to do something. He’s crying in the store room.” Another frantic rush of whisper, now followed by a healthy shove in that general direction.

What the… what was I supposed to do? Bob? Bob was a rock. Bob was a football player, if he gave someone a shove, they knew it. He was asking for me? Me? Why me. Why not his girlfriend? And what did one say in this situation. I had no experience in this. I glanced back to Cyn. At least she had brothers, wasn’t she better prepared for this. I didn’t even have a pet.

I walked into the storeroom, and this bear of a guy hugged me and sobbed.