By John Christenson

Mighty glad to see you, friend. Sorry you lost your way. How do I know that? Because lost is the only kind of customer I get here at Reba’s anymore. If you want to know what obscurity tastes like, you’ve come to the right place. But I have to tell you, not that you asked, it wasn’t always like this. Time was when folks drove for miles on the Mother Road to dine on my legendary fried chicken and listen to Reba’s golden pipes every Saturday night. There were three Ford pickups and a Hudson coupe for every pothole you hit in the parking lot.

Oh, the taste? Reba’s coffee, always from the bottom of the pot, made sometime after the Dust Bowl but before the first nuclear test-ban treaty, back when Reba’s was the hottest nightclub west of Oklahoma City. When that sludge burns your throat and peels away your esophageal lining, you’ll understand how the sun, the rain, and the years have stripped the paint from Reba’s sign, still dangling by one hook. Sorry you had to duck under it to reach that splintered excuse for a door. The aftertaste you can’t get rid of is the dust on the dance floor that hasn’t seen a coat of wax in twenty-five years. I’d understand if you decided that even death might not taste as bitter as obscurity.

Now, I know what you’re going to ask. Same thing everyone who used to walk through that door asked: where’s Reba? Not dead, not demented, not even divorced. I should know since I’m her husband. We had many happy years, but when the interstate bypassed us and the crowds blew away like so many dried weeds, Reba tumbled down the road after them. I stayed because I’d somehow taken root in this hard caliche that can’t grow anything. Anything except obscurity, that is.

You want to hear what happened to her? That’s a story that needs telling, if for no other reason than to brush off the few crumbs of truth still clinging to it. I’ll pour you a drink. See if you can find a barstool that don’t wobble. No? Fine, we’ll park ourselves at a table, over by the dance floor.

Back in the ’30’s, almost half a century ago, we started the café with my stake from roughnecking in the Oklahoma oilfields. There was so much misery, sorrow and regret over vanished cropland, bank accounts, and dreams, you could take all the joy and happiness left on Route 66 and fit it inside these four walls with plenty of room to spare. But however bad times got, folks still hauled themselves here every Saturday night. I’d be in the back frying chicken while Reba belted out the old standards. Her voice and fiery red hair lit up the place, pushing back the darkness. Before long there was Texas swing dancing, beer swilling, and genuine laughter. That was her magic. Hard to imagine anyone thumbing her nose at the Depression and the Dust Bowl, but she managed.

After Reba took off into the sunset to go “toe-to-toe with obscurity” as she put it, time rolled by until the roadmap in my head leading from Reba’s to the wide world curled in on itself, going nowhere. Or ending up back here, the last stop on the way to nowhere. At first, that was fine with me. Route 66 changed people, made them abandon who they were like all those broke-down Model A trucks that used to litter the side of the road and turned them into something brand shiny new. Didn’t want any part of that.

Got a steady stream of postcards from Reba at first, about how she entertained the troops in some war or ’nother and finally had her own variety show, singing and dancing on the TV. Thought about getting a set so I could see what had become of her, but Reba’s was so dug in by then that even television signals got lost on their way here. The stream of cards turned into a trickle, with smudged postmarks so I couldn’t rightly tell where they were from. When a year went by without a card, I knew my last connection with Reba was gone. 

What’s that you say? The storm of all storms is coming? Yes sir, it is getting mighty dark. Let’s head outside and take a look. Mind the sign. You got to help me; I can’t hardly stand up in this wind. Have to say, that storm don’t look natural, coming from the east where storms never come from this time of year. Look at it, turning everything a burned-up orange like the light itself is dying. It’s coming at us like one of those Dust Bowl monsters that darkened the sky for days and erased the farmland. But I’m afraid this storm is made of equal parts old, brittle hopes and stillborn dreams. Is this the storm to end all storms? I think for me it is. It’s a storm of my own making, the one that’s been building ever since Reba kissed me goodbye for the last time.

Sorry, you were talking, and I wasn’t listening. You have to excuse me; my mind doesn’t travel in straight lines anymore. Thanks for the offer of a lift, but you go right ahead, friend. There’s nothing on the other side for me. My time for traveling any sort of road has come and gone, and all that’s left is the only kind of ending possible when you’ve sacrificed that deep, hard part of yourself for a life of obscurity. If you see her, tell Reba I bless her and hope she’s well, on whatever road she’s traveling now.  

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John Christenson lives in Boulder, Colorado with his wife who paints watercolors and a cat who is fond of penguins. He has been published in a variety of literary magazines and anthologies. A piece entitled “A Tree Grows in the Mancave” was nominated for the Pushcart Prize.