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Antimony

James Bates

    My brother Larry had been thrown in jail for carrying a hunting knife in downtown Denver. It was late June of 1969 and the cops weren’t partial to long-haired guys like us wandering around the streets carrying an unconcealed weapon. What did we know? We’d been up in the foothills twenty miles to the west camping for a week and thought we’d come into town to see the sights. Bad move on our part.
    He was kept overnight, lent a guy twenty bucks he never saw again (neither the money nor the guy) and was hassled relentlessly by one of the guards, a fat redneck cop who kept telling him, ‘Wait’ll you get out, pretty boy. I’ve something big planned for you,’ while grabbing his crotch.
    Which never happened, but was enough for Larry to tell me the next morning that he’d had it with hitchhiking. I’d met him outside the jail and we’d walked a secluded park a half mile away. “Screw it, Quinn. You want to keep traveling around out west, go right ahead. Me, I’ve had it with being on the road. I’m going home.”
    I disregarded what he was saying and said, “I was thinking it’d be cool to head to Utah. I hear they’ve got a mind-blowing fireworks display out there. Some town called Antimony. It’d be far out.” I took a hit from the joint I’d just rolled and offered it to Larry. He declined. My older brother was definitely not in a good mood.
    “No way,” he said, shouldering his backpack. “You’re on your own. I’m outta here.”
    I couldn’t convince him otherwise, so we walked a couple of miles together through downtown to the interstate where we said goodbye and parted ways. He stood on one side of I-70 heading east to Minnesota and was picked up right away. I found out later it took him a week to get back to the duplex in Minneapolis we rented with two of our friends. I guess he wasn’t in the best of moods when he got there. Glad I wasn’t around to see it.
    Me, I was over on the other side of the interstate and headed west. After a couple of rides, and a lot time standing by the side of the road, I got into the mountains and spent the night curled up in my sleeping bag off to the side of the road east of Aspen near the little town of Basalt. The next morning, I was picked by a Vietnam Vet in an old Buick. He told me his name was Fred. He had a buzz cut, wore camouflage pants and an olive-green tee-shirt. He didn’t say much other than asking, “Going west?” when he pulled over. When I told him I was, he said, “Far out. I’m going to Grand Junction to check out a rodeo. Go ahead and get in.”
    So I did, and we drove over Independence Pass before dropping down to the plains and heading for the western part of the state. I had no real plans, just to see the fireworks which was really only an excuse to keep traveling. I’d graduated from high school a month earlier and had taken my pre-induction draft physical. Deep down I had the sneaking suspicion I might get picked in the upcoming lottery. Besides that, quite honestly, I just wanted to get away from Minnesota for a while.
    But I certainly wasn’t prepared for what happened in Grand Junction out near the western border of Colorado and Utah.
    It took us about ten hours to get to there. As we pulled off the interstate Fred turned to me, and asked, “Ever been to a rodeo?”
    “No,” I told him. “Never had the chance.”
    “Want to come with me? I’ll pay.”
    I thought about it for maybe ten seconds and almost said ‘yes.’ Then I noticed a young woman down the road a little way dressed in hippy garb. She seemed sort of free-spirited, not the kind of person I’d run into before too often in Minnesota. I started thinking that it’d be cool to get to know her. Maybe she’d be interested in hitch-hiking with me. Plus, there was still the fireworks in Antimony to get to.
    “Thanks, but I think I’ll pass,” I told him, getting out and shouldering my backpack.
    Fred noticed me looking down the road and nodded. “I understand,” he said, and gave me gave the peace sign. “Stay, cool, brother.”
    “Thanks. You, too,” I told him.
    I watched Fred drive off, then walked over to the young woman and put on a smile. “Hi,” I said, taking off my beat-up straw cowboy hat and wiping my brow. It was late afternoon and the sun was blazing in the west like a burning chunk of coal. It had to be at least one-hundred and ten degrees out. “How’s it going?”
    She turned and gave me a non-committal look. “Fine. Hot.”
    Her face was sunburned and acne scarred, and she had long golden blond hair, kind of dirty and stringy, that flapped in the wind. She wore a white peasant blouse and bell-bottom jeans with embroidery around the cuffs that were tattered from dragging on the ground. On her feet were low cut moccasins. She held her hair in place with a red bandana and carried a backpack kind of like mine. She also had the worst body-odor I’d ever smelled in my life.
    But there was something about her. It’s hard to explain, but I just kind of wanted to be with her. “How far are you going?” I asked, moving upwind.
    “Frisco,” she said.
    “Far out.”
    I put my cowboy hat back on and waited for her to say something else, but she didn’t, just stood there sizing me up as traffic zipped by going east and west, kicking up dust and blowing debris around. I kept my mouth shut. Larry and I had been on the road for nearly a month and by now I knew the drill. You didn’t invite yourself in to someone else’s hitch-hiking space. If somebody wanted you to join them, they’d ask. If they’d rather be left alone, well, you’d figure that out quick.
    I waited. And waited.
    A few minutes passed. I was just about to walk on down the road a half mile or so and start hitch-hiking on my own when she surprised me and said, “So, what’s your name?”
    “Quinn,” I said. “How about you?”
    “Starflower.”
    “Nice to meet you,” I said, putting on my best Midwestern manners.
    She made her decision. “Want to hitch together?”
    “Sure,” I said, moving a few steps closer so I stood next to her. Now that we were getting to know each other, her stink wasn’t so bad.
    Just then the wind blew back on me and I caught a whiff of myself. Geez. Not the best, either. My twenty-five days traveling without a shower had caught up with me. Embarrassed, I looked at Starflower. She grinned and pinched her nose. I laughed, and so did she. As the saying goes, ‘birds of a feather flock together.’ Right?
    “So, where you headed?” she asked, taking out a cigarette and lighting up a Kool. She offered me one.
    “Southern Utah. To Antimony,” I told her, shaking my head, no, to the cigarette. “I’m going to see the fireworks.”
    “Far out,” she said, taking a long drag and exhaling, making me wish for a joint. Too bad I’d smoked my stash all up in Denver. She shaded her eyes and looked east, smoking and watching the traffic.
    I watched, too, for a while, and then asked, “Want to come with?”
    “Where?”
    “To Antimony.”
    She shrugged her shoulders, her hair whipping past her face in the wind. “Sure. I guess. Why not?”
    Far out, indeed, I thought to myself.
    Here’s the thing about hitching in Colorado: it was against the law. If the cops wanted to, they could pick you up for hitch-hiking or loitering or anything else they felt like picking you up for. They’d bust you without batting an eye and toss you in jail without thinking twice. And the cops weren’t like the ones Larry and I ran into in Denver either. We’re talking the rural west out here, where the police had even less time for long-hairs than the city. I’d heard enough horror stories to let caution be my guiding light. I’d even smoked up the last of my weed in Denver before hitting the road so they wouldn’t find any on me if I was ever stopped and searched.
    With all of that in mind, what we did was this: nothing. That’s right. I’d met enough hitch-hikers that summer and we’d all agreed, it was best to do nothing. Just stand there on the side of the road and hope someone would eventually stop and offer a ride. It usually worked. That summer there were a lot of people traveling so rides were relatively easy to come by. At least that’s what I hoped for anyway as Starflower and I stood on the side of the road on the outskirts of Grand Junction watching the traffic speed by and the sun set.
    She told me she was from the east. “Yeah, I’m from New Jersey,” she said. “Newark. It’s pretty crowded out there. Lots of people.”
    “I’ll bet,” I said, just to say something.
    She told me she had two older sisters and two younger brothers. Her parents were divorced and she lived with her mom and rarely saw her father. “My mother’s remarried,” she said, her words carried away by the blow-back of a semi-truck that swung a little too close to us from my point of view. I took her hand and we moved a step back from the side of the highway. She held it a moment longer than she need to and squeezed it a little before letting go. It was nice.
    “My step-dad and I don’t get along,” she added, continuing her story. “He’s kind of a jerk.”
    My first thought was there was some kind of abuse going on. I’d read about that kind of thing. “I’m sorry,” I told her.
    She smiled and shrugged her shoulders. “That’s okay. Don’t worry about it. I’ll get by.” Then she took a deep breath of western Colorado air, that even with the exhaust fumes from the interstate, still smelled fresh and clean. “It’s good to be out here.”
    I agreed. I’d lived in Minneapolis, Minnesota, my entire life. I’d dreamed about getting away and seeing the mountains and now I was doing it. Larry and I had camped in the Rockies outside of Denver and now I was heading across the high plains with a girl about my age who no longer smelled bad but had the sweet scent of pachouli oil wafting about her. At least that’s what I told myself. And we were heading to southern Utah to a place called Antimony to see some fireworks. I was only eighteen. Life was good.
    But after standing along the interstate for about half an hour, talking and patiently waiting for a ride, a cop car cruised by. We watched as it went down the highway and then turned around and came back. All of a sudden life wasn’t so good anymore.
    “Hey there, you two,” a policeman said, through the rolled down window of his squad car as he drove up and pulled to a stop next to us. “Just stay right there. Don’t move.”
    I looked at Starflower and joked, “Where’s he think we’re going to go? Run away?” The land around us was a flat as a pancake. There was no place to hide even if we wanted to.
    She put a finger to her lips, “Shhh,” she said. The frown on her face told me she was taking the cop seriously. Suddenly, because she was worried, I was too.
    He got out of his car, all six feet, six inches of him. He unsnapped the strap on the holster for his gun as he sashayed toward us. “What do you think you’re doing?” he asked, adjusting his mirrored sunglasses. He stared at me for a few moments, then turned his head toward Starflower, giving her the once over. I saw on his badge his name was Henderson.
    I spoke up, “Nothing, officer. Just standing here.”
    He turned away from looking at Starflower’s chest, “Really? Just standing, huh?”
    I could sense his eyes boring into me through those mirrored shades and I looked back at him. “Yeah,” I said, shuffling my boots in the dirt, suddenly nervous. I could feel his hatred for me like a live wire. This was a guy who didn’t like anything different in his city, long-hairs especially, and I could tell he was serious about the law and keeping the peace.
    “Well, I think you’re both hitch-hiking.”
    “We aren’t,” I said. “We’re just standing here.”
    He stepped up and jabbed a finger into my chest so hard it hurt. I could smell his onion breath. “Don’t you talk back to me, you little creep,” he sneered, stepping so close I had to step back to keep him from walking on me.
    “Hey,” I said. “Watch it.” I glanced at Starflower. Her eyes were wide-open. In retrospect I’m glad she didn’t say anything. Who knows what Henderson would have done to her?
    “Hey, what? You freak,” he taunted, pushing me back another couple of steps. “What are you going to do about it, huh?”
    God, this was not going well. Who knows what would have happened if not for a call that came in on his radio? “Officer in need,” a dispatcher said. “Now.”
    Henderson took one last look at us and said, “Don’t move.” Then he went to his squad car, picked up his handset and talked into his radio for a minute.
    When he hung up, he came back to us. His demeanor had changed a little. He wasn’t so aggressive, but he still wanted us to know he was in charge. “Okay, you two. Let’s go.”
    “Where?” I asked.
    “The station,” he said. “Hurry. I’ve got another call. Something about a drunk at the rodeo.”
    My first thought was of Fred. I looked at Starflower. She seemed like she was doing okay. She put her hand on my arm and said, “Let’s go, Quinn. No hassles, okay?” Which made sense to me. Not that we had much of a choice.
    At the station, we were booked on loitering with intent to hitch-hike. We spent the night in jail and were released the next morning. No fine, no nothing. But I guess they wanted us out of town fast because when we were released, Henderson said, “I’m putting you two on a bus.” Then, he literally pushed us out door, “I don’t ever want to see your ugly faces around here again.”
    We didn’t want to see his either, but we kept our mouths shut. An hour later we were on a Greyhound bus heading west and saying good riddance to Grand Junction.
    An hour after that we were dropped off in the middle of nowhere on the Colorado-Utah border.
    Talk about desolate. I came from a land of green trees and sky-blue lakes. Pine forests and fields of fresh corn and soybeans were found throughout the state. Out here on the plains there was nothing but rolling hills the color of faded brown paint and the occasional jackrabbit. But it was pretty in its own way. For one thing, you could see forever to far distant horizons, which I enjoyed. Plus, the air was fresh and clean and had a sage scent to it. But I’ll tell you one thing; it was hot. Boy was it ever hot. Easily over one-hundred degrees, just like the day before.
    As we watched the bus drive off, I turned to Starflower. “We should try to find some shade.”
    She looked around and laughed. “Good luck with that.” There wasn’t a tree in sight.
    “Yeah, you’re right.” I took out my canteen and offered her some water which she drank thirstily.
    “Thanks.”
    I pointed down the road. “It looks like a gas station down there. Let’s walk over and see if we can find some place to sit out of the sun.”
    “Sounds good.”
    We walked along the highway, hitching as we went. It was legal in Utah, so that helped. What didn’t help was there wasn’t much traffic, only semi-trucks and the occasional pickup with a farmer or rancher in it. Sometimes they slowed down, mainly to look, I guess, and check us out. But they never stopped. By the time we got to the gas station we were pretty discouraged.
    I reached into my pocket. “I’ve got some money. Want a drink?”
    “Yeah. How about a coke?”
    “Coming up.”
    I went inside, paid for two cokes, and we sat on a bench outside the front door and drank them. It was a small, two pump station, and pretty quiet. But at least it there was some shade on the bench. “How was the guy inside?” Starflower asked, taking a long swallow.
    “Fine. Decent,” I said. “He didn’t give me a hard time.”
    “That’s good.”
    As we sat there on the bench it was weird, but we both felt it, a subtle shift in the vibe being in Utah. There were no hitch-hikers except us and a lot more pickup trucks. Lots more middle fingers being given to us, too, from passersby. It definitely wasn’t as fun as I thought it was going to be. Not like back in Colorado with Larry anyway. Back there at least a few people accepted us for what being a little different with our long hair. No here. Not by a long shot.
    We sat in the shade and sipped our cokes. When we heard a vehicle approaching, one of us would hurry out to the side of the highway, stick out a thumb and try to hitch a ride. We were having no success. After about an hour the owner of the station came out and gave us each another bottle of coke.
    “Thanks a lot,” we told him.
    “No problem. It’s on the house,” he said. “It’s pretty hot out here. Probably a hundred and ten.”
    It is,” I agreed. I wiped some sweat off my forehead. “Hope we get a ride soon.”
    “Yeah, good luck with that. Lots of people are scared of strangers in these parts,” he said, giving us the once over. “You might be here a while.”
    With that he went back inside.
    We spent the afternoon at the station, hitching for a ride and trying to ignore the heat, which was hard to do. But what we couldn’t ignore was what happened in the late afternoon when a pickup with three guys stopped for gas. They saw us sitting on the bench and things got ugly fast. I remember it to this day.
    “Well, what do we have here?” One of them asked, sauntering up to us. He was a tall, lean man in his thirties, dressed in cowboy boots, worn jeans and a faded snap button shirt. He had a sweat-stained cowboy hat on and was chewing tobacco. I saw the lump in his cheek. He shifted it and spit out a long, brown, stream of juice that landed on one of my boots.
    “Hey,” I said, standing up, “there’s no need for that.” It’s all I could come up with.
    “Hey, yourself,” he grinned, showing me his brown teeth. “And, yes, there is a need for that.” He punched me in the chest, and I fell back hard against wall.
    Starflower stood up and yelled, “Stop it. Cut that out.”
    He pushed her backwards and she tripped and fell to the ground. By then, two other guys had come up from behind to join their friend. They began taunting her. I glanced over my shoulder inside the station but the owner was nowhere to be seen. It looked like we were on our own.
    I turned to the guy giving me a hard time and said, “Cool it, buddy.”
    He laughed and punched me in the chest again. Harder than the first time. I slammed against the wall and fell to the ground. He moved fast and kicked me in the stomach, knocking the wind out of me. I almost threw up but didn’t. I rolled over and tried to get away from him, but he just came around in front of me and kicked me hard in the chest.
    I was worried about Starflower and got to my knees to try and help her. The two other guys had grabbed her and were pulling her toward the pickup. I tried to get up but the guy fighting with me pushed me down with his boot. “Don’t bother coming after us,” he said. Then he kicked me again three times, harder each time.
    I’ll never forget him laughing at me as he walked away while I was writhing in pain in the dust. I tried to get to my feet but was having trouble keeping my balance and only got as far as my knees. I’d never felt so worthless in my entire life.
    Who knows what would have happened if not at that moment, like a knight on a white steed riding in to save the day, Fred hadn’t shown up? Except instead of a white horse, he was driving his old Buick.
    He raced into the parking area and slammed on the breaks. The big car skidded to a stop and was enveloped in a cloud of dust. As it settled, he calmly got out and approached the three guys. I could see his eyes were focused, and he looked like a soldier heading into battle. There was no fear whatsoever on his face. When the guy who’d been beating me up approached him, Fred decked him with one blow to the jaw and that cowboy went down like a sack of wet manure.
    The two guys who had Starflower let go of her and attacked. Fred handled them easily, kicking one in the crotch and landing two swift jabs to the stomach of the other. It didn’t take but a moment for them to realize this buzz cut guy in an olive-green tee-shirt and camouflage pants meant business, and they were no match for him. They picked up their friend and dragged him to their pickup. It was then the owner ran out and made them pay for their gas. I guess he was in the station after all. Probably hiding. I didn’t blame him.
    Fred helped me to my feet. “Hey, there, buddy,” he said, dusting me off. “Looks like you’ve had a rough time of it.” He picked up my cowboy hat and gave it to me.
    “That’s putting it mildly,” I said, putting my hat on. Then I shook his hand. “Boy is it ever good to see you.”
    He grinned and pointed to the pickup truck speeding down the highway away from us, “Those guys were jerks. It felt good to teach them a lesson.”
    “Well, thanks again,” I said. Then I introduced him to Starflower.
    “Nice to meet you.” He grinned shyly and shook her hand.
    “Same here.” She smiled at him. “Thanks for helping us.”
    “My pleasure.”
    The two of them helped me to the bench and Fred went inside to get us some cokes and snacks. The owner gave them to us for free. He even came out and apologized for not helping. “Those guys are the Bertleson brothers,” he told us. “They basically run the county.” He shook his head, sadly, “They’re mean SOBs.”
    No argument with us on that note.
    The three of us sat on the bench resting and catching our breath. Fred told us the rodeo wasn’t all that great. “Lots of drunk cowboys,” he said, shaking his head. “Who needs it?”
    “Yeah, I hear you,” I said. I have to admit it was good to see him. He was a nice guy.
    “So, you still going to Antimony?” he asked.
    “Yeah. Me and Starflower.”
    He grinned, “Still planning on hitch-hiking?”
    “Yeah, we are,” I told him, not very enthusiastically. Then I had a thought. “Hey, do you want to come with us? See the fireworks? They’re supposed to be really cool.”
    Starflower put her hand on his arm, “Yeah, you should come with.”
    Fred grimaced. “Well, thanks. And I have to say that when I was your age I might have said yes. But...” he was quiet, looking off to the distant horizon, seeing god only knows what after being in Vietnam. He was probably only three or four years older than me, but a lifetime of experiences separated us. “I’ve seen enough of that kind of thing to last me forever,” he said. Then he looked at me. I don’t know when I’d ever seen a sadder face. He sighed, “Sorry, buddy, but I think I’ll pass.”
    “That’s okay,” I said. “I get it.” But I really didn’t, back then, and only kind of do now, so many years later. But I felt for him, and to this day I still do. “That’s understandable,” was all I could think of to say.
    He smiled and clapped his hands together as if to shake off the mood. “But I’ll tell you what,” he said, standing up and looking to the West. “How about if I take you there?”
    I looked at Starflower and she nodded her head. I grinned. “That’d be great.”
    “Okay,” he said. “Let’s go. What are we waiting for?”
    The three of us got in the Buick and took off down the road. We made it to Antimony just at sunset. We said goodbye to Fred and settled in to watch the fireworks. You know what? They were pretty good. Memorable, even. I only wish Fred could have been there with us to see them.

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