Georgetown, 2010
Dwayne managed to get himself up off the floor of the RV and stagger over to the mattress, where he sat. He felt a trickle of blood along the side of his nose and waited for it to reach his mouth and when it did, the taste was not unexpected. He spat the blood into a coffee cup and recalled the last time he was assaulted, about a month ago down in Georgetown, behind a wholesale furniture warehouse. Blood tasted no better when one was sober.
The Georgetown fight ended with Dwayne lying face down, unconscious, in a pile a broken concrete. He doesn’t remember the ambulance ride to Harborview or the blue clad intern stitching up the deep gash above his left eye. He does, however, recall the court ordered stint in detox and if this latest cut required stitches, he would sew them himself rather than face another week without a drink. He pressed a t-shirt against his forehead as he rummaged through a cardboard box for a bottle of water so he could clean the wound.
He had been finding decent spots off Leary Way lately, and seemed content to stick around Ballard for a while until the police or unforseen circumstances forced him to relocate. This latest attack might very well qualify as one of those circumstances, but it was too soon to come to any decisions. First he had to get the blood to stop gushing.
The Georgetown incident was preceded in recent months by similar scuffles in Des Moines, Seatac, South Park and one particularly memorable skirmish along the shores of the Duwamish River near the First Avenue South Bridge. Dwayne’s penchant for making enemies while inebriated had put him on a free wheeling RV tour of the greater Puget Sound area, beginning in Tacoma and traversing north one stop at a time--here for a day, there for a week--until ultimately, he would cross the border and become Canada’s problem.
Dwayne’s troubles began in earnest about a year ago, when he inherited the RV and a little cash from his grandfather, who had died of a heart attack driving the vehicle through a snow storm in the Colorado Rockies. Grandpa Ellis, a decorated World War II veteran who, upon retiring from the military, divorced his fourth wife and spent the remaining years of his life criss-crossing the United States in his "Big Baby," routinely lectured to anyone who would listen that some vehicles were simply made to be owned and operated by men. “The Recreational Vehicle is a man’s domain, his fortress” he declared. “Men can handle these big rigs. Women can’t. That’s just the way it is.” His will stipulated that his oldest male descendent inherit the RV, presumably to insure that no woman would ever try to operate his beloved gas guzzler, or worse, sell it.
But selling the RV was exactly what Dwayne set out to do once the title was handed to him.
At the time of Grandpa Ellis’ death, Dwayne was piecing together a meager existence in Hamilton, Montana, stocking shelves part-time at Wal-Mart and Costco. He had gotten his drinking more or less under control and was considering enlisting in the army when his friend, Dean, an unemployed mechanic, suggested he drive the RV down to Los Angeles and sell it to some illegal Mexican families who, he convinced Dwayne, would pay good money for the rig--“Way over Blue Book value,” he said--allowing him to finally get the sports car he’d always dreamed of owning. Dean would accompany him, acting as mechanic, consultant and drinking buddy. This idea sounded good to Dwayne. If all else failed, his boss at Wal-Mart, Frank, assured him that he could find a job stocking shelves somewhere in Southern California.
When the pair reached Las Vegas, however, their plans went awry. Dean, the unemployed mechanic who had dropped out of high school and lived in his brother-in-law’s garage, who had never crossed the Montana state line in his life, was smitten by the glitz and glamour of Sin City. “I feel it in my bones,” he told Dwayne. “This is where I’m meant to be!” But, unfortunately, Dean's optimistic premonition was swiftly quelled. The city swallowed him up in no time. Luckless at the tables and slots, he gambled away all of what little money he had and much of the cash that Dwayne loaned him. One night, in the RV park on the outskirts of the city where the pair were staying, he got Dwayne drunk on Jack Daniels, knocked him out by smashing a bottle to his head, and stole most all of Dwayne’s inherited cash. The next morning, Dwayne awoke with a massive hangover and the first of what would be a series of head wounds that would require medical attention but rarely receive it. Dean was never seen or heard from again.
After a few days of nursing his injury and drinking the hours away at the RV park, watching the happy vacationers come and go, Dwayne reassessed his situation--his life, really-- and decided not to sell the RV. Maybe his Grandpa was right, after all. Maybe this vehicle was truly intended to be his domain, his fortress. Maybe losing his money and his friend Dean and the allure of Las Vegas was the best thing that could have happened to him.
Dwayne walked over to a small, family-owned casino and sat down to enjoy his first meal in days. He lingered over several cups of coffee, watched the news on CNN, and flirted with the waitress. It felt good to be among people again.
Afterwards, he bought a case of whiskey at a liquor store and then secured it in the back of the RV. Finally, sitting on his mattress in the cool shade of his fortress, sipping a whiskey, he studied a crude map of Nevada printed on the coffee-stained placemat he had pocketed at breakfast.
It was high noon and the blistering, blinding white heat of the sun immobilized this normally bustling city in the desert. The sidewalks were empty, the roads eerily quiet. Dwayne saw this as a sign, an opportunity. He finished his whiskey then got behind the wheel of his domain for the first time in a week, turned the key and revved the engine. From the RV park he turned right, not south onto Interstate 15 and Los Angeles, but toward the US 95 exit, north to Sparks, Nevada, where his destiny waited.
He maneuvered his rig onto the highway with renewed purpose and clarity. A genuine sense of calm enveloped his whole self--perhaps for the first time since he was a boy, before the drink took over, when the days were good and life was full of possibilities.
Like his friend Dean had felt it--that certainty--in his bones in Las Vegas, so now, on the road to Sparks or beyond, did Dwayne.
Ballard Industrial Area, 2010
