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The desert is vast. If he tries to comprehend all of it, his brain starts to break.
So Jimmy focuses on the details. The little picture, as opposed to the big picture. You’re alive, Mike said earlier. Focus on that. But that’s far too big a concept. It’s all about the minutiae.
Like the bullet hole in the upholstery of the Esteem; it felt sharp and crusty when he touched it earlier. The folds of Mike’s drab shirt. The shredded cottonball patterns of the clouds — he doesn’t know what any of them are called. (Cumulonimbus is the only cloud name he can come up with at the moment.)
When he glances down, he takes note of the pattern of bloodstains on his own salmon-colored dress shirt. It’s kinda cool. Like a Jackson Pollock painting. If he copied it and sent it off to MoMA, they’d have no reason not to accept it as a work of abstract expressionistic brilliance. Or at least that’s his opinion.
These thoughts are getting too big. No museums. Just red rusty stains that are rapidly fading to brown. Little specks scattered around big bold patches. He thinks about that for a while as he puts one foot in front of the other.
Mike has stopped, seemingly for the night, which strikes Jimmy as dumb because it’s not night yet. But Mike assures him he has his sound, logical, reasonable, boring Mike reasons for stopping. And now Jimmy’s standing at the top of a rock formation with no cell signal and utter nothingness around him.
It would be easy to let the nothingness overwhelm him. To think about the fact that barely any animals live out here. The fact that certainly no people live here, not even the people most adapted to this environment. That humans are not welcome here, and the very earth seems to be unceremoniously inviting them to die.
The fact that Kim is probably just now, at this moment, realizing that it’s getting late and he should be home and thinking that he fucked up just like she knew he would…
No. The Jackson Pollack pattern. Focus on that.
There’s a stripe down the middle of the stain. Must have been creased right down that line, so the blood didn’t get on it.
The little picture, not the big.
He hasn’t slept much, but technically he does “wake up.” And the morning light invites more thoughts that he’s not ready for. Big thoughts, big as the sky.
So he slaps his attention on his T-shirt turban. No, it’s not technically a turban, is it? What’s the word for it?
He took it off last night fairly intact, since he didn’t want to have to figure out how to wrap it again. Looking at it now, he realizes that the back-of-the-neck label is positioned right in the middle of his forehead. He takes a moment to read the washing instructions.
Machine wash warm. Only non-chlorine. Bleach when necessary. Tumble dry medium. Cool iron if necessary.
Then he reads it again in Spanish. After half a day in the desert, it’s scintillating reading material.
He decides he likes the label right there in the front. It’s a fashion statement. He positions the turban (it’s not a turban) on his head carefully, noting every speck of dust in his hair and the tender spot where the side of his cranium spent the most time resting against a rock while he dozed.
Still sitting on a rock, he reaches up to see if he can feel the texture of the words on the label. He can’t at first, but after a few long seconds he fancies he can feel some slight differences in texture when he grazes it with his fingernail.
“What are you doing?”
Mike is almost ready to go, of course.
“Nothing,” Jimmy says, standing up. “Any chance you wanna switch up the gear this morning? Take a turn with the cash?”
“Nope. You’ve got what you’ve got.” Mike heads over to inspect something on the ground and starts fiddling with his water bottle. Jimmy strolls a few paces away and prepares to relieve himself.
“Hey. I wouldn’t waste that,” Mike says.
Mike explaining to him that he might have to drink his own piss is way more than he wants to think about. So after they get underway again, Jimmy is back to pondering the turban, and the way it hangs off the back of his head. He’d like to think it makes him look heroic. If Peter O’Toole could pull it off, then why can’t he?
“Hey, Mike,” he calls ahead of him.
“Hm.”
“You ever see Lawrence of Arabia?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s that, uh, thing Peter O’Toole wears on his head? What’s it called? I know it’s not a turban.”
“I don’t know and I’m not about to use brain cells trying to figure it out.”
“But if it’s not a turban, then…”
Jimmy lets his voice trail off. Mike hasn’t been inclined toward conversation this entire time; no reason to think he’ll start now. It’s pretty damn annoying. It would be much easier to keep the big thoughts at bay if he could just converse with someone. He sighs, trudges along, and thinks about his headdress.
If he just reaches back far enough in his brain, he’ll remember the word. It feels monumentally important to figure out what his headdress is called.
An hour later, it comes to him. He doesn’t know where he read the word or why it appears at this precise moment, but it does.
Keffiyeh. That’s what he’s wearing in the movie. It’s called a keffiyeh.
But now that he’s got the word in his head, his mental image of T.E. Lawrence gets clearer and it doesn’t seem quite right for the thing he’s got on his head. So he spends another hour trying to come up with a new word for it. But he comes up empty. Keffiyeh it is, then.
And with that matter concluded, the desert looks vast again.
Twenty minutes after their water break, Jimmy has exhausted his self-congratulations at his new idea of dragging the money bags behind him. It really is a good idea. If he can only get back to civilization, he’ll be full of good ideas. Great ideas. He can accomplish so much. He can make Kim proud…
A lurching sensation throughout his gut nearly makes him double over, and he latches onto the first thing he sees: a bottle full of urine, bouncing against his hip as he walks.
He looks down at the cap. It’s a good cap. Good water bottle. He catches a glimpse of the Davis & Main logo. It’s red. Erin Brill’s clipped voice comes back to him: And we’re not talking about a number one…
He almost chuckles to himself. Of all the shenanigans he pulled at Davis & Main, not flushing the toilet after number two still amuses him the most. Probably because it disgusted Erin so much. She would probably be thrilled to see him in this state. Well, he’d rather be in this state than wherever Erin is right now, sticking her nose up people’s butts to get ahead.
The existence of the pee bottle grossed him out at first, but he’s come to terms with it. He won’t drink from it, of course, but he’s okay with it being there. It’s emblematic of the lengths he’ll go to to get ahead. That’s what this whole trip is, really. He’s just doing what he needs to do.
What I need to do…
What I actually need to do is…
Fuck. There’s a big, big thought that he’s staving off, and he cannot let it take shape.
Back to the piss. He wonders what makes it yellow. Bacteria? He feels like he learned that in school, or was supposed to. Or maybe teachers don’t talk about pee in school. Especially not the nuns.
He listens to the sloshing sound and how it creates a sort of musicality in conjunction with his shuffling footsteps. He starts to hum a tune along to it, but his throat is dry, so he sings the song in his head.
Six million nine hundred ninety nine thousand nine hundred ninety eight dollars of cash in the bags
Six million nine hundred ninety nine thousand nine hundred ninety eight dollars of cash
Take one out
Pass it for clout
Six million nine hundred ninety nine thousand nine hundred ninety seven dollars of cash in the bags
He comes up with a new rhyme every time. The words don’t fit neatly with the rhythm, but he tweaks them until they do. It keeps him going, and keeps out most of the intrusive thoughts, until Mike inexplicably stops and turns around. Mike never stops. So what the hell…?
“You gonna get that?”
A hundred dollar bill is fluttering on a twig a few yards back. His stomach drops and flips around. Now this is something to focus on.
Jimmy has taken turns fixating on everything at this point: every item of clothing, every detail of the bags, the multitude of desert flora around him. There’s nothing left now to grasp onto except the pain.
The sharpest pain is the one in his foot, of course, where the cactus nabbed him. It stings with every step. It’s an accusatory pain, one that speaks directly to him.
The pain. Zero in on it. The particular character of the wound, the way the ache shoots all the way up his body and seems to land at the lefthand corner of his mouth, making it twitch periodically. He hates it and it’s great. It distracts him for a while, wondering if it’s infected, wondering if his foot will have to be amputated. Mike has assured him he’s fine in exactly those words and no more. You’re fine. But the pain says otherwise.
The pain says a lot of things.
“You forgot about her,” it purrs.
But I didn’t…
Mike obviously thinks he did. His “I know why I’m out here” speech worked, Jimmy supposes, but in retrospect it was kind of holier-than-thou. “I have people waiting for me.” He said it like he was talking to a toddler who doesn’t have a full appreciation of human relationships. Who takes them for granted. Well, screw you, Mike. Jimmy is fully aware of how lucky he is. He didn’t need to be reminded about Kim. He thinks about her all the time, cares for her almost exclusively. The truth is…
There’s a gaping hole at the end of that sentence.
The truth is…
He tries to grab onto something, some new detail in his surroundings, some tiny thought that can save him from the truth. But there’s nothing left, and he tumbles into the hole.
God, she didn’t want me to do this, she told me so in just those words… What the hell is wrong with me…? I don’t deserve her, I don’t…
He rips himself away from the thoughts.
THE FOOT PAIN! Don’t think about anything else! No, no, not the foot pain, that doesn’t work; there’s a twinge in his lower back that doesn’t blab about any of this shit. So he concentrates on that and how much it sucks. And for good measure, he makes up another song, this time about his backache.
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts so bad
It’s such a rascal, imp, and cad
It hurts, it hurts, it hurts so good
Just like a money bag injury should…
It’s really more of a chant than a song. Ahead of him, Mike grunts upon hearing the umpteenth iteration of the verse. Well, it’s not gonna win him a Grammy, but it gets him through.
Jimmy sips the newly acquired water from his bottle. He didn’t appreciate just how foul the piss tasted until he washed it away. He wonders if he left particles of urine in the cistern water. He must have. Whatever, they’ll get diluted. And what’s more, no one will ever know.
Mike told him to take it easy on the water, but he’s not bothering. Mike says a lot of things.
They must be close to civilization now. But as they walk away from the cistern, he doesn’t feel any closer to salvation.
Mike. Damn him. He’s all high and mighty, with his time machine shit. He’d right all his wrongs and check on his people, like a perfect little angel. Well, Mike doesn’t realize how altruistic Jimmy could be with his trillions of dollars. Mike doesn’t think big enough.
Or maybe, Jimmy, you really are the piece of shit he clearly thinks you are.
After all, Jimmy did just suggest absconding with the money and abandoning his entire life. Including her.
With the water has come a certain amount of clarity. He knows why he almost gave up and left himself for dead. It’s the same reason he floated the idea of running away.
I do not deserve her.
And she’d be better off without me.
If he stays with her, who’s to say that next time she won’t be the one in mortal peril? Mike has reminded him oh-so-plainly that his family is not involved in his shit. But Kim’s too smart not to be involved. She can’t play dumb, can’t live on the periphery of his life. So now she’s involved, and it’ll get her killed if he’s not careful.
I got up off the dirt because I’m selfish. Because Mike made me think of her. Of how I need her. And she’s like a goddamn magnet that I can’t resist, even if I know I’ll destroy her.
Well, no more. He vows right then and there that as soon as he gets ahold of her, he’s going to do the right thing. The noble thing. The noble thing isn’t dying in the desert or running off with $3.5 million, either way leaving her to wonder forever if he’s a martyr or a shitbag. The noble thing is to tell her the truth. That he needs to break up with her for her own good. Cruel to be kind, like that brat Hamlet.
He takes another gulp of water and tries to think about it exclusively, but the little things are gone. Only the big, scary thoughts remain.
This whole thing was easier when he thought he was going to die.
The phone is ringing. Not his phone, her phone. Funny how they make cell phones sound like old-timey phones, at least when you’re the one calling and it rings in your ear like it always used to in the olden days.
He counts the rings. He latches onto each one, making it stretch into eternity, because these will be the last moments he has with her.
He’s going to tell her, see, that he can’t be with her. That he’s bad for her, that she should stay far away from him.
One. Two. Three. Four.
“Jimmy?”
The sound of her voice is like a choir of fucking angels.
“Yeah… it’s me. I’m okay.”
He hears her sobbing. All other objectives fall away, making room for a new one: make Kim happy.
“Where are you?” she asks.
“It’s hard to explain… I’m coming home. Today.” That will make her happy. That will make her tears stop.
“You’re really okay?”
Everything is okay, he’s forgiven.
“Yes,” he says. He steels himself.
Desert revelations are, by definition, mirages. They don’t represent reality. He can safely ignore whatever he was thinking before this conversation began, because this is reality.
“I’m coming back to you,” he says, with newfound conviction. “I swear.”
He has to come back to her. He doesn’t know who he’d be without her.
And he can keep her safe, can spare her the particulars of this adventure. Just one final lie, to save her from the danger.
Kim clears her throat on the other end of the line, and he can picture her: sitting up, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye, getting down to business. “Will you need anything when you get home? Any food? Electrolytes?”
“I don’t think so. I’m gonna pick up some stuff soon.”
“Okay. Do you know… how long you might be?”
He can hear the excitement in her voice, even though she’s trying to contain it. He can’t help smiling. “Not exactly. But not too long. And no,” he says, before she can ask, “You don’t need to pick me up anywhere. I’ll get myself home.”
“Okay. I’ll be… um… I’ll just be here. At home.”
“Okay, Kim.” He smiles again and lets it shine through his voice. “Bye. Kim.” He can never say her name enough.
“Bye, Jimmy.”
I’m coming back to you, he hears over and over in his head. He’s coming back to her.
That didn’t take much, says Mike’s acrid voice in his head. I thought you were breaking up with her.
No. It didn’t take much. But Mike doesn’t understand: it’s Kim.
That’s only the Mike in his head, anyway. The real Mike doesn’t know anything about his silent struggles. The real Mike probably thinks he’s purely a cad, incapable of love. He could never understand what it’s like to hear the voice of the only person in the world who thinks you’re worth a damn.
Who knows? Maybe all the Lalo shit will be over after this. Maybe he has nothing to worry about.
Really? It’s not over, you imbecile. And WHEN it comes back, you’ll have no fucking excuse for keeping her in your life.
That’s not even Mike’s voice. It’s his own.
Time to stamp it down.
He grimaces and focuses on the fly buzzing around his face. It’s kinda cute. The buzzing gives him an idea for a new song.
Back to the little picture. Not the big.