Almost there.
The flights, airports, crowds, lines, queues, the self-centered pockets of humanity—all of it had become commonplace. It was all ridiculous jewelry, track suits, and selfie sticks. It took effort not to scowl.
But this was different. This was Dallas, USA. Home. For better or worse.
I stared at my phone, trying to maintain connection, doing my best to stay present at the airport bar. I’d been awake for 28 hours. Everything was a wild and brilliant array of lights… colors…
One more flight.
I’d left my entire world in the arms of a dispassionate caretaker. I had offered up to God the only thing I had that was worth a damn—the only thing I had worth living for. And I had said: “I’ll do whatever it takes.”
This was a journey of transformation. I’d gone back to the well. Hard travel, cheap hotel rooms, hostels, and the faces of people I will never see again. All to boil out the cancer in my soul. Everything that I was had been left as a smudge on the counter, slowly dripping down onto the floor beneath…
I was back in the same terminal, the same bar, the same seat that I had been in years before. Then I’d been headed to Tulum, the barest sense tickling my brain that there was something other to life than the soul-shattering betrayal I had just witnessed… I took a sip from my beer and watched the flight to Portland take off. It was a surreal juxtaposition of time and fate.
One more flight. I couldn’t count how many I had been on that year. I downed the beer and ordered another. It was a half-thrown prayer. A desperate Hail Mary toward the end zone.
Keep it together.
Almost there.
***
He whined and shook, darting back and forth between my legs. They’d had someone bring him to me. It was just a random gas station, a poorly lit cluster of buildings somewhere north of San Diego. Words came from my mouth — incoherent babbling. He jumped up and licked my eyeball. I didn’t care.
The couple was nice enough. They eyed me warily. I couldn’t blame them. I’d threatened to burn down the entire town. All I could hear was a high-pitched ringing that blared between the sides of my head. Rambo stared up at me, transfixed, his tail whapping the side of the rental car.
Fuck ‘em.
The man pulled out a bag of dog food and plopped it into the trunk of the rental car. He smiled and winked. Then he brought a familiar-looking bag and set it inside as well.
“Yeah, this little guy had a ton of donations. A bunch of people cared about him…”
I looked in the bag. They were all my things. Rambo’s things. Puzzles. Toys. Toothbrushes. Medications. Everything that I had collected over the years, crammed into an old green duffle, the same one I had taken with me to Tulum…
I let it all go. Tears had begun to openly stream down my face, which made them uncomfortable. As they rolled away, I sat down on the oil-slick pavement, spread my legs and arms wide, and reached for him. With a lunge, he barreled into my chest, bowled me over, and began licking my face again.
After all of it — countless miles, flights, tuk tuks, dirt roads, temples, and asanas — it was said and done. And the only thing that ended up mattering was a ball of fur, four paws, and a bag of dog food.
Eventually I got up and let him in the car. I don’t know how long I drove. The moon was still high over the desert when I pulled into the rest stop. Before the engine was off, Rambo was crawling into my lap, the same way he had when we first escaped Asheville. He was too heavy now, too big. His circling crushed my nuts, expelling air in a loud whoosh. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be. I’d made it.
I was back.
