malaria medicine
The first thing is: a once-correct board displaying price of gas per gallon in white on red, with numbers that bend to fit. or did once. sideways now in the shallow end of the lake. stuck in 1997, at $2.14, unleaded.
i see this from the window of the train; the first odd thing.
across the aisle, a 2 or 3-month old has been screaming for over an hour. this is to my left. to my right, i think his name is michael. something i thought i saw written on a keychain. i said ‘hi’ when i sat down, i smiled, i tried to flash the card indicating my assigned seat, number 12, next to his number 13. tried to linger on the brass label above the seat. all so he’d realize that i wasn’t sitting there by choice. that i wouldn’t have crowded him if i didn’t have to. this was all 15 or more minutes before i noticed the matching double black wristbands with the embroidered swastikas, one red, one white, apparently so well-used that they are starting to shred. i can stare at them because michael is asleep against the window. past his frame in a black sweatshirt, inch-long splats of rain are on the window. it’s snowing sideways. we’re at the other end of the lake now, and this end of the lake has trees in it. and traffic cones. and a chipped lazy susan.
they said hallucinations might come. but i think this is real.
there are 5 men in dark green uniforms at the end of the aisle. their lips are moving & their arms are flailing and they come closer to each other and further from each other to the rhythm of a conversation i can’t hear at all. in gold lettering their chests say: u.s. border patrol. and they look like it. tall & white & green & straight teeth & i wonder how they know what they are looking for.
i look past swastikas as we pass 8 trailer homes lined up end to end & each once sinking in the middle, sunk so far down that i think you’d have to crawl to get from one side of the home to the other. a man comes out of one trailer and a woman comes out of another. they can’t be more than 4 feet tall, either of them. they have sunk down to fit their homes. a single tree is draped with blue insulation, like cotton candy on every branch. the snow bank in front is full of gravel and a hundred wet cigarette cartons.
2 blocks down, a vast parking lot. a handicap-parking-only sign is posted in every spot. in all 1,000 spots.
i feel my forehead. they said hallucinations or a a fever might come. but i don’t feel hot and i think this is real.
i get up and head to the end of the car that says ‘restrooms this end’. the door of the first one is stuck, i can’t open it. the next is locked. i walk to the next car. i open the restroom door. inside, the smell is a sour one i can’t identify. the lid of the toilet is down. i open it and the smell intensifies: the stainless steel bowl is filled to the top with red-soaked paper towels. the red is still bright. blood runs in a rivulet down the front of the bowl. i look down and quickly step back, clamping a hand over my mouth and reaching for the door. the door is stuck, i cant open it. the smell is overwhelming, i can’t open the door. the bowl is full of red. the floor is red. my shoe is red. i pump soap from the dispenser and cover my hands. i twist the taps, but no water comes out. i dont understand. i grab a towel and wipe the drying soap from my fingers. the floor is red, getting redder. i slam against the door with my shoulder and it gives and i fall out of the bathroom, out of the smell. a man is waiting to use the restroom and i dont tell him not to, i dont say anything.
i watch only out the window as i walk back to my seat. rusted cars and trucks from 1982 are parked at an intersection. they will never move again, in a traffic jam that has lasted already 25 years. and white stone tombstones, inscribed only with black paint (a 6 on one, a 19 on the other) next to the highway, watch, and wait.
i return to my seat. swastikas is still asleep. the infant is screaming. the border patrol is pacing. the snow has turned to rain and water is beginning to cover the train tracks. i root through my backpack until i hear something rattle when i touch it, and feel a cylinder of plastic, and i lift the bottle out of the bag. i punch my hand through the glass window next to swastika’s head and throw the bottle out. the hell with pills; malaria can’t be scarier than all this.