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Miss Seattle

Liam Spencer

    The letter came. A stained uniform surrounded him. Sweat held it clinging uncomfortably to the exhausted body. A lifeless face flushed. This was it.
    Lower Queen Anne was quieter than usual, despite it having been a relatively cloudless day. The summer was ramping up to be another long, hot one. Drought would be declared yet again. Four months straight of ninety plus and higher. Hot sunshine awaited.\pHe gently caressed his fingertips down the aged door. Built 1903. All the old world charms. One of the last times, for him. There was his apartment. Number 102. Never the home he had intentioned. It was the base, nonetheless. His escape.
    The apartment was odd, even for it’s day. The bedroom and bathroom, right off the entrance, were small. Too small. On the other end was a small kitchen and dining room. In the middle was a giant living room, long and odd. The place held memories over decades. 1903. All the state of the art trimmings, the finest, decorated the place.
    Hardwood floors echoed footsteps much like when he had lived with the Her. His now ex. Those echoes always bothered him, as they were so heavy. Now his were far heavier in his own place.
    His shoes offered no resistance as they came off. He let out a sigh as he looked around. Wow, what memories this place contained. Generations of people coming home after long, hard days to fill their glass with this or that, have some enjoyment before going back to the grind. He raised his cheap can of beer to them and to himself.
    This day was long in the making. Seattle didn’t want people like him anymore. She obviously didn’t like who she was, and decided to change her ways. Gone were the up and comers. The down trodden. Enough of those who seek to work to rebuild ruined lives. She had grown out of it. Now, it was security and money that mattered. It was time for the software bros to take her. They were cleaner, richer, and far more reliable than those who get dirty hands and bad backs.
    Gone would be the night clubs in Pioneer Square. Too noisy. Too much actual life. No more.
    The software bros needed quiet after eight PM. Seattle needed to tuck them into bed and read them a bed time story.
    Shh! Don’t dare tell of what used to happen in that neighborhood, as Seattle recalled all the big, bad wolves. Her face glowed one last time.
    The software bros needed tucking in. No big, bad wolves around. Silence. Lifelessness.
    Next was Cap Hill. Gay or not, the software bros were the queens and kings. All must shut down. No exceptions. None. Eight PM, sharp. Don’t you know that they have to work tomorrow?! Seattle nodded as she tucked them in too, singing a lullaby.
    “Go to sleep...”
    Her ex lovers wept and protested, and even begged. Please...please don’t do this! We had such great times! We can outlast anything! I love you! Please give me a chance...
    They met with silence and skyrocketing prices. It was Seattle’s way of dumping people. Instead of “Please, just go.” It was rent going from $1100/month to $2500/month, and all the cool, interesting places disappearing.
    Cookie cutter “micro beer bars” filled in, crammed with software bros. No diversity would be allowed. Ever. She had had enough.
    The beaten body tossed the letter on top of the usual clutter before taking the beer out of his backpack. A long sigh forced its way out before rain hit his eyes. Again. Seattle is dry. His eyes supplied the rain. Old times’ sake. He already knew.
    When a woman turns against you...
    He grabbed another cold beer. Crack. Chug, exhale. Repeat.
    “Fuck.”
    The beer went down fast and hard. The numb body grabbed another. $2500 a month. Seattle was good, but not that good. The bathtub filled as he sipped. Soreness melted slowly. It was almost orgasmic.
    He always cleaned up nice. There was his prized possession; his fedora. His one splurge, aside from women. His long coat. A shirt the Her had given him. He walked out the door.
    Saturday Night in lower Queen Anne. Loud. Frat bar down the street. Annoying assholes from rural college towns. Avoid.
    The west side of Queen Anne Avenue was not to his liking. East of it was better. His dying legs scurried him out of there. It wasn’t far. Soon he was there. He sighed, and slowed down, as he began taking it all in. Memories.
    The Space Needle showed brightly, deceptively. Seattle had turned her back long ago. It was memories, and nothing more. He defiantly forced his all but dead body along, needing to say goodbye, even as she wouldn’t dignify any of it.
    He paused part way up the small hill to look back, remembering all the times, good and not. An involuntary grin met his face. All the adventures, the festivals, the dancing, the loving, the hurtings. Yeah.
    Seattle pushed him on. “Come on now...I have many to say good bye to.”
    He arrived at Belltown. It was kind of dangerous. Back in the day, he was super cautious. He was a homeless guy then. Young, privileged drunks took pleasures in beating him. Now he was dressed well and was forty pounds bigger. A load. Experienced.
    The amateurs passed by without more than a glance that was met by a well-earned glare. The homeless and dealers passed by thinking NARC. Fuck them all. Memories need their time and place.
    There it was. The Nitelite. They had been good to him back then. On the streets, being seen as filth, being able to be served at a bar, any bar, was golden. It was your chance to be human.
    He was the best dressed they had seen in forever. He looked Mafia. His face meant business. The young bartender nodded to the nervous bouncer.
    “Can I help you?”
    “Yeah, can I have a Rainier, please?”
    “Sure.” She scurried, and cracked it open.
    “Ahh, thank you...” He drank mightily, sighing and looking around, suddenly grinning like an idiot.
    The mood eased as he kept grinning. The young bartender smilingly approached.
    “Another?”
    “Oh yes, thanks.”
    “So, what’s your story? You new here?”
    “New? No. I’m old. Leaving. This place meant so much to me back in the day. I was homeless then, and could come here for safety. Long stories. Now I’m leaving Seattle forever. I had to say goodbye.”
    An older woman abruptly bear hugged him from behind.
    “I remember you...” She sobbed. “I thought they killed you...you never came back!”
    Memory smacked him. Yeah. They. Them. They shot. They missed. Close range. No cops. Drugs. Mistaken identity. Chills ran through him.
    “It was the worst here. They beat you.”
    “And I beat them, so they squeezed triggers and ran. They missed. Thank God. They missed.”
    “His drinks are free.”
    His glow illuminated the dim bar. Roughed up men came and went, conversing to feel important in their lives. The few women set about to set themselves apart, destroying their dreams. Humanities flowed with the beers, as hopes drowned in sorrows. Seattle would not be deterred. She was better than this. She’d be rid of all of them soon.
    Glasses clanged as he recalled his days back in 2001, relating this and that. How much easier it was then, how much harder it is now. Everyone hurt. Everyone listened. Everyone drank.
    Those who thought they were somehow making it puffed out their chests. Others scurried away. Regardless, it was clear; Seattle was moving on. Enough.
    It’d be a much longer, harder road without her love.
    As per his old, not risking death, routine, he abruptly left well before one a.m. He stopped to look back at the place, as liveliness began peaking. His eyes filled. The Nitelite had been his first home. There was no hello. There could be no goodbye.
    He walked along Second Avenue at first. Dealers had wide eyes as he shoveled his way through. The very same that tried to hustle or intimidate him years ago now steered clear.
    Memories brought him off course. There were a chain of unique bars, famous, rowdy. All were scheduled for destruction. He stopped in front of one, and turned around. He was unsure. Might this have been the place that years ago the Her had met him on their second date...the night she came walking along, looking so troubled, only to toss her hair back and glow as she walked into his arms?
    He glanced into the place. He was right. “Their” booth was empty. He grinned.
    “You going in, or not? One of our last nights.”
    “Sure. One drink.”
    The place was sad but lively. Life it to the end. Good advice.
    He left five for tip. They’ll need it. Next door was an icon. An old school video game bar. It had been there forever. Tattooed women ran amuck as the men tried to look hard. It was loud and rusty, celebrating the last. As usual, the line for drinks was too long.
    His footsteps echoed through the noise. Cars raced. Homeless begged. Dealers pushed. He was unnoticed. So was Seattle, as she plotted the end of them all.
    Seattle Center glistened ahead. Deep breaths calmed his body.
    This was it.
    The women that called to him, loved him, at one time, were here. Here is indeed where the heart was. He paused to breathe deeply.
    The air was still. Silence and darknesses surrounded him as Seattle gently pushed him along. His eyes welled. Here. So much here. I might never make it back....she doesn’t want me anymore.
    The hill gently rose as his cigarette smoke spread across his last toughness, hiding his face. Here was there... Yeah. All those times. All those times.
    Seattle pushed him along, further and further, as he looked in awe. This was his home for so long. She sopped up his tears.
    “It’s over.”
    She continued to push him along until they reached the long, covered, well illuminated walkway, where he stopped them both dead in their tracks.
    “Not this, Seattle. This one is not about you. This is about the Her. THE Her. Samantha.”
    It had been their thing. The coverage had lights that made it look like an engagement ring commercial; as if they were going through life’s phases together. Nearly engaged twice, and in love, it was, at one time, so fitting, so magical.
    He walked through it alone for the first time. Probably for the last.
    “Sorry, Seattle. Unfinished business. I’m all yours now.”
    Seattle had simply left him, going off to a software bro.
    Silence was the only response.
    The convenience store was empty. An eighteen pack was rung up. The fridge was largely empty. It fit right in. Alone.
    The alarm hit. The head hurt. He was too old for this shit. Coffee was needed. It brewed.
    “Are you sure?”
    “Yes. Get out.”
    Work sucked, as always. Supes pushed hard and intimidated. Clueless. Those who can’t, manage. Twits. The long route showed absolutely no mercy. He pushed on, his ankle screaming at him. Things are what they are.
    Evening had him resting his bad left leg. It hurt. Eighty pounds running up sixty feet of stairs to deliver a sales flier. Times six hundred. Yeah.
    Nights had him packing, one hour at a time. People at the station didn’t know or care. It was all good to him. Sometimes it’s best to not be remembered.
    It came time. The old Honda CRV was mechanically checked out. 192k miles. Perfect. The U-Haul was loaded. He made his final leg. The first apartment. Places he worked. Where he and the ex wife lived....
    His grin glowed.
    He drove north, all the way to Edmonds, his body shaking. It was time to say goodbye to the HER. The HER of poetry fame. Without her. Without her knowing or caring, by now.
    His car parked nicely in the empty lot behind her store, like old times. The jazz station still played that song as he sat there smoking his cigarette, his door open. Like old times, when they had painted her store purple. He grinned while he got out and stood there.
    The “biker bar” she had feared was the same. Lame. His gin and tonic raised eyebrows. His smirk erased them as the place began filling.
    He walked to the front of her store. It looked amazing. It was nothing like the woman’s consignment place he had first laid eyes on so long ago. It was now beyond upscale. A real boutique. A prize. Diamond in the rough.
    “Hey Liam. What are you doing here?”
    “Hi Jess. I’m just doing a goodbye tour...Heading back east, to Chicago. Just saying goodbye to people and places. How are you?”
    Tanya stood nearby, looking hot as ever, especially for an older chick.
    “Does Samantha know you’re looking in her windows?!”
    Jess was always an asshole.
    “No. Is it a crime to widow shop?”
    “I’ll call the police...”
    “I’m not doing anything wrong.”
    Tanya pulled Jess away, taking his cell phone. They argued.
    “He’s just saying goodbye...”
    The beach was the same as always. What changed was her. She was gone. Tides brought memories. “It was here that we...” “It was there, right there...” That was then, long ago. He half expected the police to show up. Fuck them, he thought, and fuck Jess. Really? Have some decency. Really.
    There were the police, for real. A cop car blocked his Honda. Lights were flashing. His eyes went wide.
    “Officer, that’s my car. The Honda. What’s going on?”
    “You’re under arrest!”
    “What?!”
    Two officers drew firearms. Liam’s hand flew up.
    “I’m not armed! Please! Don’t shoot!”
    “OK.” One officer checked him. “Nothing.”
    The cuffs hurt. He sat helplessly in the backseat. The two cops gave him the eye. One move, and die. It was their biggest excitement in years. They actually “got someone.”
    A background check brought nothing, of course. A call to the business owner brought humiliation and confusion. Soon, a purple Saturn pulled through the mayhem. It was the Her. She heard bullshit, looked at him, and shook her head.
    “What did he do?!”
    “He was here. And...well... Did he have your permission?”
    “For what?”
    “To be here.”
    “Look, he didn’t do anything, right?”
    “But he might have...”
    He couldn’t help it. His mouth.
    “I was only saying goodbye to the places I knew and loved, before leaving Seattle forever. I did NOTHING wrong to anyone. I’m a federal employee, a mailman. That’s right, you guys roughed up a mailman. Congrats. I’m impressed. My wrists are killing me! At least loosen the cuffs.”
    Their eyes met. Fires and passions were in hers. Deadnesses were in his. Soon the police “escorted” him out of town. Out of luck. Such memories. He vowed to return, just for spite. Miss Seattle would grin. He would moon. Fuck Edmonds. One last, one...Please, Seattle, one last. Let’s laugh.
    “I’m so sorry...” the email started. His red face forced on. “I chose times I knew you wouldn’t be there, so as to not impact you. Just wanted to say goodbye to places that mattered....throughout the city I’ve loved. I meant nothing toward you. No harm, no foul, I hope.”
    There was no reply, as usual. The past is the past. She obviously wanted to forget he existed. To her, he no longer did. He wept as the reality set in. That was likely the very last time they’d ever see each other. That will be how they’ll remember... Oh fuck.
    He timed it right. The tides would be very low. The bus dropped him at the grocery store. He bought beer and munch, and walked down the trail, glowing the whole way. Carkeek held so many memories.
    Being a weekday, the beach was empty. He found a secluded place, set his old backpack down, and grabbed a beer. The water was cold. The morning sun began its’ oppression. Waves crashed around him as the waters slowly inched higher.
    He walked south to the next beach. Golden Gardens always had special meaning to him. It was a place he always went when massive life change was needed. Those changes always came in as irresistibly and forcefully as the tides.
    The cold wind took from the hot sun. Winds of change. Change was needed. It was coming. He was going.
    Queen Anne was as always. Busy and fairly crowded. It was his last day. He beamed. It was all a blur. He needed to somehow slow it down to make sense and memories of the swirling madnesses as he winded his ways through the streets.
    His old apartment. Wow, what times! Somehow jazz was playing from somewhere. It’s bittersweet spirit playing into the air, slowly fading like life itself. He found himself dancing to it all. How much it meant. The best times of his life were right there. He could almost see those times, feel them, swim in them. He laughed aloud, and was thankful no one was around to see his madness.
    The steep hill seemed to push him along cruelly. He stopped in the old convenience store to get a soda and a last visit. It had been too long. No one remembered him. He chugged the soda and left.
    His heart pounded as he neared the apartment he and Samantha had shared so long ago. Such times, great and not. He looked up at the place with an admiring smile. It was just as he remembered it. He slowed his walk, taking it all in. He’d have been happy to have lived there forever...if only...
    It hurt him to walk past it, leaving it behind. There was nothing else left to do, though. It wasn’t like he could be there again. Hell, Samantha probably didn’t even live there by then.
    “Hi Liam.”
    He knew that voice. It was Samantha. His heart raced.
    “Oh hi! How are you?”
    “I’m good. How are you?”
    “I’m well, I guess. Just making my tour.”
    “Oh yeah. Chicago? Wow. Most people want to move to Seattle from Chicago. The weather. You’re really leaving?”
    “I’m still on the fence.” He laughed.
    They glowed at each other. She was still so beautiful. He was still lucky to have had her in his life. It had been years since they had spoken. Memories’ flood returned. He had never seen anyone glow as she did in those moments, even as the conversation remained surface.
    “Well, I hope you have a good day.”
    “You too, Samantha. Let me guess, you’re off to chase sunshine?”
    She laughed.
    “You know, I’m heading that way, going home. Maybe we could walk together the few blocks. It’d be awkward to walk apart when we’re heading the same way, right?”
    “Sure. We could do that.”
    They began their last journey together, broad smiles and dull aches. Her voice was as heavenly as he remembered.
    “So, let me guess, you’re probably engaged and living happily, making some guy thrilled in life.”
    “Well, not exactly...” She beamed.
    “Samantha, how is that possible?”
    “What?”
    “No one snapped you up yet?”
    “Not really...”
    “Wow...you know I would have...”
    “You disappeared after we separated. There was still a chance....kind of..but you went away.”
    “I couldn’t...couldn’t stand the thought of you being with someone else...I just...”
    “Well I have been...”
    Her voice reflected distress.
    “I have too. All of them mistakes.” He laughed.
    Near the corner of Roy and Queen Anne Ave is a jazz club tucked away in a high end hotel that plays jazz on loud speakers for all to hear. “My Funny Valentine” was just coming on.
    “Samantha, please wait here for just one moment. I’ll be right back.”
    “Ummm...ok.”
    He rushed into the hotel. He knew them, as he had delivered their mail.
    “Frank, I need a favor. Please crank up the loudspeakers for like five minutes. Please, it’s important.”
    “Ok. Will do.”
    “Thanks.”
    The music was much louder as he rushed down the few steps, his arms outreached toward the Her.
    “May I have this dance? Old times’ sake...one last, for the ages...”
    “Sure.” Her clever grin revealing so much.
    There, surrounded by the hustling city, drawing impressed stares and smiles, they had their last dance, bringing one last precious memory to their story.
    She glowed brighter than ever as he spun her around like he used to back in the day. He had actually forgotten how amazing she truly was. She had forgotten his ways of surprise and romance.
    He timed it just right, taking her into his arms just as the song ended. He worried that he may have gone too far if he tried for a kiss. She solved that for him, pressing her lips against his.
    Cheers rose as the music volume lightened. Both their faces turned a little red. Someone actually threw some rice they had just bought from the nearby grocery story. Everyone laughed.
    “Umm...wow. That was unexpected! Only you...only you.”
    Her laughter showed so very much.
    “I can’t help it. You bring it out in me.”
    “Oh really?” she blushed.
    “Yes. Absolutely. I can’t help myself. What do you say we go for a drink somewhere? Old times’ sake?”
    “Well....”
    Her phone went off. A text. Her glow disappeared. Their love was forbidden. Complicated. Her smile dropped, as her eyes got cold. Compartmentalized.
    “No. Liam. I...I have to go. Really, thank you for the memory, though. That was fun! Only you...only you.”
    Part of her glow returned, along with a sly smile.
    Suddenly she wrapped her arms around him for one last embrace. Tears were shed as a love was being finally breathing its’ last. Murdered.
    As it ended, they looked deep into each other’s eyes, to their soul. This was how they would remember each other forever.
    She turned and walked off into the world as he watched, again. The third or fourth time. The one that got away, again and again.
    He stood there with his arm still open, and empty. The rest of the world didn’t matter. It was over.
    He stayed home on his last night as a Seattleite, as usual. He thought back of his first night in the city that now rejected him. That cheap motel room, cold pizza, and hookers knocking on the door every twenty minutes. He laughed as he wished to somehow do it all over again. What a ride it had been!
    The beers went down almost as fast as the tears as time flew more mercilessly than ever. It didn’t take long before his sleeping bag provided his only comfort. He was technically homeless again. He had lost both Seattle and Samantha forever.
    The cruelty of the alarm hit at nine AM. This was it. Coffee. Need coffee. More coffee. Soon it was eleven. It was moving day, so no need to sprint to go to work. He had days to spare. Nothing needed to be exact.
    Everything was wrapped up. Even his coffeemaker was now packed. His apartment was completely empty as he stood in the middle of it. It wasn’t his favorite place, and he hadn’t been its’ favorite tenant, but there had been a few good times.
    He locked the door one last time, and caressed his fingertips across the old fixtures on the outside of the door. One last, one last. He slid the key under the locked door, as directed by the landlord. He was homeless again, and about to be without his beloved Seattle.
    The U-Haul sat waiting, with his CRV towed behind it. The thing took up two or three parking spots, which probably upset local residents. He got in and turned the key. The truck sprung to life. These were the final moments of Seattle in his life. He’d never be back. It’s now or never.
    He turned the key off, got out, locked the door, and began walking. He wasn’t sure where he was going, but it probably didn’t matter. Now or never. Forever hold your peace. Is there any way? This is it. I mean, is this really happening?
    The Streamline is a fantastic dive bar in the neighborhood that he had been to here and there over the years. He was sort of known and sort of liked there. Jim was just getting some things done as he prepared to open.
    “Hey Liam! I thought you already left for Chicago. You still leaving?”
    “Probably, Jim. Everything is loaded and ready. Just having trouble actually doing it.”
    “Yeah? Maybe it’s wrong.”
    “Probably, but I can’t see what else to do, here. Seattle is just too...”
    “I hear you. I know.”
    “Hey Jim, can I ask a last favor?”
    “Sure. What you need?”
    “I’d like to have one last beer here, if it’s not too much trouble.”
    “Ok, I can do that. A proper send off. Come on in.”
    The barstool fit perfectly as a cold Rainier found its way in front of him. Jim scurried off to get ready for a new day of drunks.
    He sat there alone in the still closed bar, sipping a cheap beer in darkness, thinking back to the ride he had been on, while the sunlight burst through to bring another round of fakeries and pretentions, saying the right things at the right times, having the right experiences...living the right lives.
    His longing looks had only affected himself. Seattle was moving on. Somewhere out there was Samantha. She’d always be of fame to him. Their love would always burn brightly through the wind and rains and cloudy, dreary days, and would always bring him smiles.
    The last gulp of beer landed hard. It was time, but still he sat motionless. Is this really happening?
    The cell phone vibrated. A text. It was Samantha.
    “Is the offer to have a drink together still good?”
    “Absolutely!”
    Jim came back in to see a smiling, glowing face.
    “You ready to leave yet?”
    “No. Can I have another? I might just say the hell with it and stay. Damn the torpedoes.”
    Another can sat in front of him as he texted back and forth with Samantha, coordinating for that drink.
    Seattle smiled through her tears.

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