8

In the morning when I woke, I had a voicemail from Megan. I rubbed my eyes and studied the phone. Message received at 5:57 a.m. local time, 7:57 eastern. I scarcely remembered her being awake before nine.

I walked to the back porch with a cup of coffee and sat down. Then I played the message.

“Julian,” she started. Already there was something wrong with her voice. Something scratchy or distant or off, but then that was to be expected.

“It’s Megan.”

The composure was there. She kept it together well, her top lip holding strong and communicating poise. I heard it waver just once, briefly, in those opening lines, and that was only because I knew her well. Had I been a casual acquaintance, I would have been fooled into believing her guise of detached tranquility. But we were past that. We shared a bed for seven years.

“I’m just returning your call. I’ve been busy.”

It was rehearsed, but I couldn’t blame her for that, either.

“Call me when you get a chance, if you still want to talk.”

She said nothing about the large sum of money I’d transferred into her account, nor was she obligated to.

“I wanted to tell you I saw Brent last night.”

What.

“I figured you should know.”

What.

“That’s all. Talk to you soon.”

What.

My hand shook. I listened to the message one more time to make sure I had heard right. When she said his name, the pretense fell off her voice, and she spoke clearly. And when I heard it, my feelings of sympathy dissolved immediately. Sympathy was out of the question now, which should have made me happy.

“I wanted to tell you I saw Brent last night.”

I replayed it in my head, and heard again the way she spoke it. The waver gone instantly, replaced with genuine confidence. Satisfaction? Comfort, in the pain she knew it would cause me? Perhaps. Not that it mattered.

Brent. That fucking clown.

It shouldn’t have killed me the way it did. I waived my right to heartache when I put that car in drive. And I should’ve known. If I’d been looking long term, and doing any prognostication, I should’ve known there was a chance that would be the first place she’d go. It made sense. The dots connected. But still. But still.

I hiked again that day, this time through the meadow of Chautauqua at the foot of the Flatirons. My lungs burned again and I turned back after an hour. The beauty was overwhelming, though I didn’t allow myself to enjoy it. In the afternoon I walked to Boulder Creek and sat down. I found a grassy spot, just above the water’s edge, and watched the creek move. Summer was well underway, but still the water was high and fast, the masses of snowpack in the mountains slowly melting and trickling down the canyons, steadily gaining power until it became a force like this one. Upstream some college students swam in the creek, staying close to the side and laughing. At one point a young couple floated by, quickly, on black inner tubes. They smiled at me.

By 3 p.m. I was drinking. Still at my perch above the creek with a bottle of Seagram’s whiskey at my side. The water moved and I took a swig from the bottle. Throughout my life, when I looked at a river like this one, I trusted the water would always move. I had never given it much thought, never asked where the water came from, or why it moved. Just blind faith, that as a river flowed today it would also flow tomorrow, and the day after that. Sometimes the water would rise or fall, perhaps even freeze, but it would be there, always, because it always had been there before. I hadn’t once pondered where the water ended up. We see the stretch of river in front of us, and trust that we always will.

Sitting there with the bottle, I realized I had been naïve. Assuming the river would flow forever was an exercise in entitlement. This creek could dry up. Any creek could dry up, anytime the natural world saw fit. The supply of water could be cut off, and the creek would dry up, and all that would be left is a dry sandy bed. Or maybe that bed would close up, the land on either side would join together, and there would be no evidence of the creek ever existing. Or maybe it never did exist at all. Maybe I’d come to find I’d imagined it, or thought I saw something I didn’t. Maybe.

I watched that creek until the sun set. Hours later, in the dark of the Boulder night, I finished the whiskey and walked home.

9

A week passed and I drank too much. I walked Pearl Street and drove the hills, drunk at night and hung over in the mornings. Anthony and Julia noticed a change. In the evenings, when the sun dipped behind the mountains, I would duck into a bar and sit alone. Sometimes I watched the other patrons, young and vibrant and laughing, and sometimes I watched my drink.

One evening I found myself at a bar far south of Pearl, cloaked neatly in the embankment of the highway. It was an inconspicuous joint. I stopped there after wandering farther than usual, determined to get away from the main drag and explore a quieter area. After walking a few miles, I needed a beer.

Inside was dimly lit with low ceilings. The décor was an interior designer’s nightmare, various unconnected pieces scattered over the walls in a seemingly random fashion. Wagon wheels, old signs, pictures of people who were dead now. You could crawl through it for a lifetime and not see everything. The place smelled of stale beer, cheap beer, but the feel was homey. I did not feel out of place walking into that bar alone, like I did at so many others.

“What can I get you, bud?” the bartender asked, and I told him. He wore a green t-shirt adorned with the bar’s logo.

It was a Tuesday, and the establishment was quiet. Small groups talked over pitchers at scattered tables, but the bar area was nearly deserted.

“You from Boulder?” he asked, sliding a beer to me.

“No,” I said and took a sip. It was light and flat. “Most recently, New York.”

“Right on,” he said. “Vacation?”

“Not really. I just moved out here actually.”

“Sweet,” he said with enthusiasm. “I think that calls for a shot. I’m Kyle.” He was young, with long blonde hair parted in the center.

“Julian,” I said, and shook his hand. He poured a syrupy liquid into two shot glasses, and we drank.

“How you finding our town?” he asked.

I shrugged. “It’s nice. Beautiful. Not sure how long I’ll be sticking around. Kind of came out here on a whim.”

He nodded.

“Didn’t really think it through. Kind of impulsive. Stupid, really.”

“What made you come out?” He was pouring a vodka/soda.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Early mid-life crisis or something.”

He laughed. “That’s funny. Early mid-life. I figured you couldn’t be that old.”

I nodded and took a drink.

I sat at that bar for a long time, long after Kyle had moved on and was conversing with other patrons. I stared at the bar, stared at my drink, stared at the liquor bottles hastily arranged against the wall. Occasionally I glanced at the TV, displaying the late innings of some baseball game. I thought about the brewery from last week, and more than once considered going back there. I could walk; finish my drink and pay my tab, point myself in the general direction, then ramble along until I reached the front door. I could get a cab and be there in a few minutes. And when I arrived, I’d enter and order another beer, and maybe she would be there again, and maybe she would turn to me and tell me she could get me whatever I wanted again. Maybe she would be there, and maybe she would look at me the same way she looked at me then. Maybe. But probably not. Probably, she was back in the mountains, wherever that was. Probably they all were.