Two Trains Running

Then the singing starts for real. Old broadwater ballads such as “Barbara Allen” delivered by a friend of Lee’s whose sweet tenor exhibits signs of academic training. A rider in a bush hat and desert camo hauls out a guitar. In a brief conversation earlier that day, he made violently homophobic comments; but now, with no appreciable acknowledgment of irony, he proceeds to deliver a thoroughly professional rendition of “City of New Orleans,” concluding with the reverential statement, “That song was written by Mister Steven Goodman.” More train songs follow. The mystical union of the rails is dissolving into a hootenanny. I sense that once all the railroad songs have been exhausted, a few verses of “Where Have All the Flowers Gone” would not be deemed inappropriate.

Adman drops into a chair close by, and says something about “the bluehairs in their RVs,” contrasting these conservative seniors and their feeble journeyings with “the wisdom in the eyes of old hobos.” His delivery grows increasingly rhapsodic, peaking as he describes how, during one series of rides, his cassette recorder broke and he was forced to scavenge for batteries. “I hooked it up with batteries from a dumpster, and I’m listening to opera.” His voice full of wonderment, as if recounting not long after the event, how the young Arthur Pendragon pulled Excalibur from its imprisoning stone. He’s probably as blitzed as I am, but even knowing this, it’s hard to bear. The whole scene has become an enormous sugar rush, and I have to get away. I like these people. No matter how dippy this part of their fantasy, the rest of it’s way cooler than most. I move out into the darkness, where other refugees from the fire are drinking cups of beer and looking off into the blue shadows of the desert.

Tonight I’m drinking more heavily, sitting on a grassy embankment next to a Portland strip mall with half a dozen crusty punks. They’re happy to drink up my money, but only one wants to talk. Her name, she tells me, is Jailbait. She could pass for thirteen, says she’s seventeen—if you split the difference, you’d probably be right. Dirty blond hair hangs into her eyes, accentuating her waifish quality. Clean her up, dress her in something besides baggy jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, she’d be breaking ninth grade hearts. A crop of inflamed blemishes straggles across her forehead, so distinct against the pale skin, it makes me think I could connect the dots and come up with a clown’s face or a crude map of Rhode Island; and maybe it’s only a combination of the malt liquor and the reflection of the neon sign on the roof behind us, but her teeth look kind of green.

Jailbait’s been living in a squat with her friends for six weeks, but now it’s getting cold, they’re thinking about LA or maybe San Diego. She tells me she comes from LA, but I hear the great Midwest in her speech. I ask why she left home, and she looks off into the sky, where stars are sailing clear of a patchy mist, and says without inflection, “It was just fucked up.” She’s been riding for a year, she says, and she’s never had any trouble with the FTRA.

“They yell sex stuff at us sometimes, y’know. But that’s about it.” She rubs at a freshly inked homemade tat that spreads from the soft area between thumb and forefinger to cover the back of her left hand. I can’t make out what it’s supposed to be—a blurred network of blue-black lines—but I’m fairly certain the tiny scabs at the center are tracks.

“We don’t hang out with them much,” she goes on. “Some of them are cool, I guess. There’s one I met last summer played the harmonica. He was nice. But most of ’em, they’re these old fucked-up guys, y’know.”

“They never got aggressive with you?”

“Carter got chased by them once.” She glances up at her friends, who’re sitting above us on the slope, and addresses a sullen, muscular kid with the basic Road Warrior look: stubbly scalp, heavy designwork on his neck and arms, and enough cheap facial jewelry to set off an airport detector. “Wasn’t those guys chased you back in Pasco FTRA?”

Carter shrugs, takes a hit off his forty.

“He stole some of their shit,” Jailbait says. “But they couldn’t catch him.”

“I didn’t steal nothin’,” says Carter. “I was just walkin’ past and this ol’ fuck started waving a knife.”

“If you didn’t steal nothin’, you were thinkin’ about it.” This from a chunky blond girl in a tight turtleneck and a stained black mini and torn stockings. Her make-up’s so thick, it reminds me of Kabuki.

“Fuck you!” says Carter.

The girl’s voice grows querulous. “You know you were! You said you were gonna see if they had any wine!”

Carter jumps to his feet and makes as if to backhand her. He goes off on her, shouting, his face contorted with anger, using the C word with frequency. He’s sick of her skanky hole, why doesn’t she just fucking die.