I left Three Forks on June 27th, tempted by signs for Big Sky an hour south. It made sense and checked all the right narrative boxes. 

• Location of the craziest show on the “Nowhere is Everywhere” tour.
• Spot where Dad and Paul wrote “Lazy Susan”. 
• Where Dad and I spent three hours in an arcade emptying a skill crane machine. 

My eyes felt like beach sand. The car engine chugged in the parking lot, sounding just as tired as me. The ten-hour route from Three Forks to Seattle disappeared. I replaced it with an hour from Three Forks to Big Sky, hit Go, and said, “What else do I have to do?” 

            I dialed Mom and drove. 

            “Hello? Hello? Fender? What’re you calling for?” 

            “Hey, Ma. How are you? What do you mean what am I calling for? I’m calling to say hello and see how you’re doing.”

            “You never call. Or want to see how I’m doing. Where are you? Are you driving? It’s not safe to drive and talk.”

            “It’s a speakerphone, Ma. It runs through the car speakers. Hands free and very safe. Where are you? It sounds busy.”

            “Bill and I are out to brunch. What’s that, honey? Okay, okay. Yes, I will. Bill says hello… Fender says hello, Bill. Of course, he does. Why wouldn’t he? Anyway, what’s up?”

            “Nothing. Well, not nothing. I’m on that road trip I told you about, Dad’s scavenger hunt. I’m on my way to Big Sky. I thought of that time Dad and I won all the stuffed animals and I brought you that monkey to add to your collection. It made me laugh. Hadn’t thought about it in years. Thought you’d want to hear.”

            “What’s that, Bill? Sorry, honey, Bill’s talking and there’s some issue with his Bloody Mary. What monkey?” 

            “It’s nothing. It’s harder doing this than I thought. I know you and Dad don’t talk, but I know you’d understand if you were here. Lots of memories.”

            “And not all of them good. Excuse me, sir, there’s something… off with this Bloody Mary. I don’t know. Maybe the chicken tender was bad. Or the vodka. Can vodka go bad?”

            “Are you asking me? It’s vodka.”

            “No, I’m asking the waiter. Fender, I swear, either I’m getting old, or young kids are incompetent. Did I tell you Bill and I are heading to Hawaii in January? It’s on your birthday, but I figured you’d be okay because birthdays once you hit forty are just whatever. I’ll make sure to call, although I don’t know what time zone it’s in, and you’ll be–wait, where are you living now?”

            “Atlanta, Ma. Still Atlanta.”

            “That’s right! I knew that. I need to visit you. We can come down. Bill has family in Buckhead. Make it a whole ordeal.”

            “It’s okay. No rush. Just wanted to say hello. I’ve had a lot of thoughts the last week and I don’t know, I wanted you to know.”

            “Thank you, sir. That looks much better. How does it taste, Hun?”

            “I miss Dad. Wish he was here.”

            “Excellent! Thank you so much for doing that. What’s that?”

            “Are you asking me?”

            “Oh, no, thank you, mine is perfect. I didn’t think I’d like it with pulp, but I love it. And the cava? Splendid. Thank you. What’s that?”

            “I’m gonna let you go, Ma. Enjoy your brunch.”

            “Sorry, Fender! We don’t get out often so when we do I get so overwhelmed. Thank you for the call. Bill says hello! Bye now.”

            My eyes weren’t so dry for the three minutes of silence I endured before I cranked the radio. 

            Music: “Radio Ga Ga” by Queen, at a level that pierced my ears, followed by “Automatic” by the Pointer Sisters at slightly less volume, “Safety Dance”, and then assorted road trip music until Big Sky Ski Resort neared. 

            A week prior, I anticipated memories at random moments. No one told me they’d suffocate me. I opened the windows and sunroof as I slowed to turn at the sign marked FAIRGROUNDS, 1 MILE. I lapped at the fresh air like a thirsty hound dog. I’d begun to sweat, which made me panic, which made me sweat more. The air cooled me. I gagged from breathing too fast and choking on my own spit. 

            Good one.

            “Sometimes I wonder about myself.”

            You’re good. No different than the next person going through life.

            I parked next to the other two vehicles in the lot and roamed the grounds. The Big Sky Fairgrounds reminded me of every fairground in America. Gravel lots to the front and left side, with signs pointing to the back for RV and trailer parking. The occasional strip of grass, overgrown but ready to colorize the scene come fair time in August. Ticket booths that only just started accepting plastic last year, if at all. Cement sidewalks curving around empty plots waiting for carnival rides. Shuttered wooden vendor stands like clenched jaws. In the back, past where I would’ve put the Tilt-a-Whirl and the Zipper, and next to where they definitely put the giant slide with wavy ridges you rode down on a burlap sack, laughing at the unexpected speed and scratchiness of the burlap, were the livestock barns. Cages and pens for chickens and cows and llamas and goats. Name your slice of meat and they can grow it and show it. 

            Big Sky’s entertainment arena was set to the right of the livestock barns. The back of the stands served as a sound buffer to whatever noise was playing that night: demolition derby, rodeo, Spin Cycle show that went off the rails. 

            The chain link fence entrance hung open despite the closed sign. Dry dirt scuffed under my shoes. The sun floated like Cherry Cola over the arena. Mounds had been built up for the monster trucks. Echoes of car crunches haunted the stands. A row of tall pines backdropped an empty stage beyond the arena. 

            “Hey, dude, sorry, fair’s closed.” 

            A man in jeans and boots and shirt saying “Glory Days” worked on a broken bench seat in the stands. He wore a red ball cap and damn it if I didn’t think my mind was messing with me again. Was this Bruce Springsteen reincarnated working as a handyman? 

            “Excuse me?”

            “Fair’s not until August. The festival goes July 14th to 16th. I’m making sure no one gets a splinter in their ass, or worse. And you’re about to not be here.” 

            The sun reflected off the windows of the announcer’s booth. I shaded my eyes with my palm. “Any chance you’ve heard of Spin Cycle?”

            I saw the joke coming before his mouth opened. The eye glint of bad sarcasm.

            “Can’t say I need it for my work clothes. Maybe for my daughter’s confirmation. You think?”

            He was maybe twenty-five, with dark hair sticking out of his red hat. What age did confirmation happen? Seven? Ten? I pictured the teenager version of this man raising a baby. Where did he work? The fairgrounds weren’t open year-round. Were there factories? Did he do construction? Build fireplaces? Work at Walmart? Was the mom around? What were the odds this was Paradise by the Dashboard Light? Or did he fall in love with his high school sweetheart, knock her up, and live happily ever after? 

            “Dude, you can’t be here. Boss will fire my ass if I’m letting gangly dudes with black eyes roam the grounds.”

            “Yeah, sorry. Don’t suppose you’ll let me check out the stage? My Dad used to play there. Old punk band. You know the deal. Memories.”

            The amphitheater was empty. In my mind, the stands were packed like M&Ms into a glass jar. Guess how many were in there and win a prize! Funk Police had just finished their set. Two fights had broken out already, one in front of the stage, and one backstage, between Dad and Paul. I couldn’t see the stage floor from that distance, but I remembered the blood dripping from Dad’s nose and lips as he took the stage to dangerous applause. 

            I remembered Larry’s words later, “Some nights are more wicked than others.” 

            “Not my memories. Time to go, old man. Thanks for stopping by the Big Sky Fairgrounds!”

            An image of me running around the grounds with a corn dog held high like a sparkler hit on my jaunt back. And of Paul, red-eyed with his hand wrapped in ice, before he got into his rental car. “You’re the best and worst thing that’s ever happened to me, Brett. To most people. Even yourself. See you in Seattle.” 

            I drove the five miles to the resort with the wind singing back-up. 

            The resort was ready for the 4th of July. Red, white, and blue were everywhere. Wrapped around street poles. Flown from condo balconies. In the flower beds dotting what felt like a campus more than a resort. On a wooden tower that advertised summer ski lift rides to the mountain summit. The buildings all took on the same charred bronze of the welcome tower. 

            I parked in a lot a quarter mile from the Big Sky Resort Town Center, according to the signs and the man sitting behind the wheel of a large white bus labeled “Big Sky Tours”. 

            “Everywhere’s a quarter mile. Nice day to get your steps in. Don’t forget your hat and sunscreen.”

            He spoke with an Italian accent, thick enough that I wanted to ask him if he was on break from bus tours in Europe. A woman with white hair under a blue bonnet knocked on the bus door and asked him if he’d found a lost wallet. 

            I took a bottle of water from my car and walked through the resort.

            I’d always thought ski resorts, no matter the season, felt a bit Disney. The sensation was aided by when I’d visited them, which was only one, Big Sky, as a short and impressionable child. As a taller adult with opinions on the world, the resort still possessing a sense of magic astounded me. 

            It was the fancified version of the fairgrounds. Shops and water fountains and restaurants with and without rooftops. The ski slopes ran in open-patched angles up the mountain, green and tree-lined and enjoying vacation. Sections of mountain closer to the resort had been turned into a switch-backed BMX bike course. Men and women and boys and girls wore body armor like Spartan warriors. Their hair was soaked. They carried white helmets under their elbows with intimidating, casual ease.

            The resort was busy. The term “milling about” suited the majority of the visitors, including me, as I made my way to the Big Sky Arcade, formally called Marty’s Playland. It was bigger than before, and changed into part arcade, part restaurant. The entire right side upon entering used to have a bank of pinball machines. Star Wars. Dukes of Hazzard. Terminator. It was now a bank of soda machines. Booths with automatic payment machines took up where the Skee-Ball machines once offered their addictive coin slots. 

A golf simulator beckoned, not for me to show off my terrible skills, but because the skill crane machine once sat there in the back corner of the arcade, hidden behind a popcorn machine. The morning before the show Dad and I discovered the broken latch on the coin slot. The latch that opened to the inner workings of the machine, including a switch that when flicked triggered the same response as a token falling through the slot: one play. Only, we weren’t using tokens, we were using our fingers, taking turns flicking it fifty at a time before closing the slot door and going to town on the skill crane. 

            Patrons would wait in line but soon realize our commitment to cleaning the machine out, amazed at our persistence more than our skill. With the day starting off so dangerous, it’s no wonder the show ended up wicked that night. 

            Dad had me ask the arcade staff for sacks to carry the stuffed animals. They couldn’t say no to a kid. They didn’t, and we skipped out with smiles on our faces like cantaloupe slices. 

            I breathed popcorn butter and went outside. 

            Birds flew into the high branches of a tree outside an REI. I sat on the wooden bench in front of the tree. The other two spots were taken by the woman with white hair and blue bonnet and a man in a tan fisherman’s hat. The chin cord draped down his chest like a necklace. She gestured with open arms to him. The woman could have been his twin sister or wife.

Laramie wasn’t there. Neither was the too cute woman. James was, but I was pissed at him. Careful to not be the guy talking to someone who wasn’t there, I said in my head, “Did you know, they did a study once to figure out why couples end up looking alike.”

 The too cute woman responded. “Who is they?”

            “They. Researchers. People like you and me who are curious about long-time partners beginning to look like brother and sister.”

            I sipped from the bottle of water, letting the water coat my teeth and gums and mouth and throat. I smelled ice cream from the shop next to the REI. Birds sung a song of summer. Enclosed lifts rose into the sky over snow free rock formations. Tiny chairlifts rose even higher from the first summit to a second summit. The height made my stomach churn. Would the too cute woman hold my hand when I panicked halfway up the ride? I thought so. 

            “I didn’t know they did that, but I’m not surprised they did. The world’s full of interesting people doing interesting things. I reckon curiosity is at the crux of it all.”

            That she spoke like me wasn’t a coincidence. She was in my head, and not real, at least in this moment. Either that, or in this discussion, she and I had been together for long enough that our speech patterns had melded into one. 

            “Evidently their hypothesis was that partners spend so much time together eating the same food, doing the same stuff, living in the same space, finishing each other’s sentences enough, that they start essentially mimicking each other, even in appearance.”

            “Go figure. And the survey showed?”

            “That fifty-two percent of couples in the study had eighty-three percent or higher similar facial characteristics, according to their facial recognition system, which according to that system, meant ‘looking alike’.”

            I wanted the ice cream. From the sound of it, the birds did too. 

            “Forty-eight percent of couples get along just fine without morphing into identical twins over time?”

            “They didn’t get into behavior and compatibility as it related to positive relationships. Just facial features.” 

            “Hmm.”

            I was hosting a hypothetical internal conversation with a woman I’d met twice, and for a combined ten minutes. Still, I took the bait. “Why hmm?” 

            “I want to know more. Whenever you finally ask me out, let’s discuss further.” 

            “But I don’t know where you are.”

            “Yeah, you do.”

            The view at the second summit had to notch the magic up. I slapped my knees. It was impromptu and felt electric. “Would you go up there with me?” I asked, and the woman in the blue bonnet stopped gesturing. Her and her husband turned their heads in the same mechanical way as the birds above us. 

            “We’re at Big Sky,” she said. Her matter-of-fact tone reminded me of my Grandma Carradine. She’d died seven years before from repeated bouts with cancer. Her funeral was the last time I had a meaningful encounter with Dad. 

            The reverie popped. They wouldn’t know embarrassment from the heat wave in my flushed face. “Yes, we are. Would you ride the chair lift with me? I can’t visit without seeing the best views in town.” 

            They made an identical lip shrug and slowly stood. They were quite short, but it suited them. The man said, “If you can’t visit without seeing the best views, neither can we.” 

            I bought us ice cream cones while they purchased tickets to both summits. In the enclosed lift, she told me about her son’s second wedding in Jackson Hole, and they had a laugh at explaining that it wasn’t only his second wedding in Jackson Hole, but his second marriage, and that they – he and his new bride, a lovely woman who was way better than the first – chose Jackson as the location as a form of love exorcism. 

            The cones were devoured by the time we reached the first summit. 

            The woman in the blue bonnet was named Donna and the man in the fisherman’s hat was named Art. When she stopped speaking, he picked up where she left off, and vice versa. Their words had a lyricism I thought only existed in music. Lyricism and Love. Dad could use that as a song title. 

            When we exited the enclosed lift, my legs did an okay job of walking me to the smaller, open lift. When I sat on it, only a bar stood between me and sudden death. Suicide was the furthest thing from my mind. The ground disappeared under our dangling feet and a strong wind blew. There were only jagged boulders below to cushion the blow should we slip and plummet. Donna gently squeezed my twitching hand.  

            No words, only gestures. That was Donna. 

            As we approached the sheer mountain face, a wall of black that reflected my thudding soul, Art exclaimed, “Hold onto your britches!” 

            My free hand clenched the lift crossbar. I ate my throat. The wind gushed. And the ground and lift carousel appeared under foot. The surfer dudes working the lifts ran around casually getting folks on and off. My legs wobbled me off the lift, down a set of stairs, and across an open gravel space to one of several viewpoints. 

            “Worth it?” Donna asked. 

            The snow-covered Rockies loomed in the distance, but also not. We were in them. On them. Among them. The drop below gave me the heebie-jeebies, but I made myself look down into the rocks in the lush valley below, into the aqua waters of a mountain lake, to take in how far I’d come, and back to the mountains far away. Not too far, close enough to keep going. 

            Art began to sing. I thought it was my mind playing tricks again, but no. His voice started low and craggy, and smoothed as he found the words. 

Who knows what tomorrow brings

In a world few hearts survive

All I know is the way I feel

When it’s real, I keep it alive

The road is long

There are mountains in our way

But we climb a step every day

Love lift us up where we belong

Where the eagles cry

On a mountain high

Love lift us up where we belong

Far from the world below

Up where the clear winds blow

Donna smiled and held his hand as the two looked out over the mountain range.