The Prologue

Mid morning, hands gripping the worn leather wheel of a 2004 Honda Civic. Writers are always so specific about cars. Are we trying to show off a good memory? Are we quirky? Maybe we’re savoring the one detail we can actually be sure of.

Mid morning, hands gripping the worn leather wheel of some car. Eyes locked on stubby tan ferns that gave a half-assed effort of making the land look somewhat aesthetic in the winter. It wasn’t snowing that day, and piles of blackened slush lined edges of the asphalt.

If I breathed out hard enough, I could see my breath just enough to know the heat still wasn’t working, and this place was still f*cking cold. And, as I drove that 10 miles through sleeping farmland, I didn’t see the jagged blue, white-speckled peaks in front of me. The mountains might as well have been excessively large ferns. To me, it was an overused backdrop.

With each frigid breath, I stirred with dissatisfaction. If I could just get out of my hometown, I thought, my story would begin.

A prairie dog darted out from the roadside ditch. I swerved right, just slightly. Not enough to startle it, not even enough to disturb the anxious pitter-patter as my fingers drummed on the wheel.

I got the email two nights later. In a few months, I would be headed in the other direction, for real. That’s the thing about being stuck in the prologue… you don’t realize it ever ended until you look back and decide to finally write the thing... much, much later.