What You Need

What

You

Need

Taylor was in Portland.Taylor had taken a plane to Portland, because he had the airplane ticket to go there. He’d beengiven the ticket by that old lady who was positive he was her nephew. Taylor had decided thathe’d see Portland for a while, give the lovelorn widows and starstruck daughters and grieving businessmen of Dallas a break, get out of town for a while. So he’d gotten the old lady to givehim a ticket to Portland, her thinking that he was some nephew or other, and him thinkingnothing more complicated than

I guess it’ll be Portland.

He’d picked out Portland sort of on awhim, and wondered if maybe one of the Dallas women had mentioned it. Not that he paidmuch attention to them when they talked. But for some reason, when he’d been talking to theold lady at the home, and he’d mentioned that he had to be going, and she’d said “

You’re flying out already?”

Taylor had thought

Portland,

and had said “Yeah, you know what my schedule’slike.” Then he’d paused and said “It’s just tough, with the economy the way it is.” And beforelong, she’d offered to charge the tickets on her credit card. Why wouldn’t she do that for her nephew, she’d asked.Taylor had wondered where her nephew

really

was. Alive, or dead? Did he

sometimes

visit her and she’d just not seen him in a while? Or had he stopped, long ago, and she’d been pining awayfor him?And why her

nephew?

He’d occupied himself at the airport in Dallas with that thought.

Was she one of those old bags that never had kids and so had glommed onto her sister’s kid?

That was about the extent of the musing he’d done on the whole trip. He’d gotten to the Portlandairport, braced himself in the cold, wet Oregon air, and walked towards a rental car counter,waited in line scanning the people behind the counter. He’d waited, letting a family skip, untilhe could get the man behind the counter who looked a little down, who looked grim, who lookeda little lost. Taylor had stepped up to that man’s window, and waited. The man had looked up,initially not doing much of anything.“

Yes?

” he’d said.Taylor had waited a moment, smiling, and then the man had said “

You?

” Taylor had nodded,then, firmly and convincingly. The man had said “

I thought you weren’t going to be back for sixmore months.

”

Taylor had then assured the counter guy that he was back, that it was him, and before he knew it,he had a car, with the counter guy promising to take care of the paperwork and Taylor woulddrop his stuff off and they’d get together for dinner as soon as the guy was off work…… and Taylor had driven away, knowing he’d never see the guy again and wondering who he’d been for those few moments. He hadn’t congratulated himself. The first couple of times he’dgotten away with it, he’d thought

I’m really something.

But he knew, now, that it wasn’tanything he himself

did

. That’s just the way the world worked, the way his life was and itwasn’t worth mulling over for very long. Not anymore.He’d stopped thinking about it, in fact, as he’d pulled the car in to get some snacks at a GO-Drive convenience store. He’d been thinking about nothing more complicated than maybefinding a hotel, because he was too tired to be a dead husband or a dead son or a long-lostcollege buddy tonight, and thinking, too, that he shouldn’t have mixed two kinds of sodas intohis 144 ounce cup, and that had occupied his mind so much that he barely noticed George staringat him, and then when he

did

noticed that George was looking at him, even then he didn’t reallyregister it other than to think to himself

Hey, loser, go stare at someone else.

Then he’d gotten into the rental car and decided that

yes,

he

would

get a hotel room. The flighthadn’t been long, but there were two layovers; that old lady had him traveling

cheap

, and whilehe

shouldn’t

complain, he would.

She must not have been too crazy about her nephew

, Taylor thought to himself. He started up the car and began to back away from the parking lot. In hisrearview mirror, he saw the man he would come to know as George staring at him, again.“Geez, what’s your problem, buddy?” Taylor said to himself, window rolled up. He drove away, pulling out onto the road towards the city, and looking one more time in his rear view mirror.The man, the one he didn’t know was named George yet (but he would, soon) was still staringafter him. Taylor didn’t know the man and didn’t think further about him that day, other than toagain shake his head, mutter “

Buncha hicks around here,”

and drive off.Taylor’s peculiar talents didn’t include forecasting the future, which is too bad, really. If he

had

been gifted that way, too, he might have known that in a surprisingly short time, George would be holding an axe to Taylor’s neck and asking:

Did you cut off her head slow, or quick?

Taylor didn’t know he’d be hearing that soon – soon enough – and so he drove down theroad, away from the GO-Drive convenience store. The sky was cloudy, which matched perfectlywith what he’d always assumed about the Pacific Northwest (that it was gray and wet and dank and dark) but which also provided a good change from the wide-open, the scorched, the blue of the southwest where he’d been living, for the past 7 months, with Andrea. He tried to remember,as he drove, how he ever ended up in Dallas. Where had he lived before that? How had he met