All the Lasting Things Read Free Page A

still rang in his ears, would, as curtain time came and went, want him, need him. They would hate him, all their worst suspicions of him confirmed, but a second before that they’d choke on their own superiority and simply wish he were there.
    He dropped his helmet and continued on his way.
    A road well-tended by the state parks commission snaked for more than a mile down a gently sloping wooded incline. It descended a hill of significant historical note, a trail of blue-and-white signs, ubiquitous in these parts, explaining the role it played, in 1777, in General Burgoyne’s surrender. Or something. Quicker, though, a path cut through the trees, a straight shot along the ridge of a craggy ravine, across an old, moss-covered bridge, to the entrance of the park, where a rotating cast of rangers, either committedly mute or annoyingly chipper, sat in a booth handing out maps and parking stubs, making change. And, in the one named Seth’s case, selling the surplus from his personal stash of pot, mushrooms, and pain medication.
    Over the course of his many pilgrimages, Benji had come to see Seth as the fallen powerhouse of his high school swim team. Seth had had the trophies, the top place on the record boards, the requisite hot swimmer girlfriend and college scholarship, then in about the time it took to tear a rotator cuff, he traded it all, everything he loved in life, for a stiff-brimmed olive-green campaign hat and a drug problem. Good-bye, girlfriend. Good-bye, scholarship. Hello, OxyContin. Ultimately, though, Seth’s biography mattered less than the fact that he was an appreciative Prodigy fan and, unlike most drug dealers in Benji’s experience, willing to extend credit.
    Shagged with a shifting carpet of pine needles, the path gave under Benji’s feet, and the grade proved steeper than he remembered. Because his time onstage was so brief, the boards he traversed so straight and level, he’d failed to realize the very real difficulties in walking in a metal suit. The more he tried to hurry, the more he moved like he had Parkinson’s. He took small, stuttering steps, sliding and clattering between the trees, ricocheting like a silver pinball, before a sunny ray of the obvious cut through the afternoon’s whiskey haze: why not take the armor off? He began with the gauntlets. One by one, with little grace and a violent twisting motion that would have given onlookers the impression that he meant to use his armpit to rip off his own hand, he shed his metal mittens.
    The rest of the suit proved less cooperative. Benji moved with care, knowing he’d be unable to get up, pathetic as an overturned turtle, if he happened to fall. He really did need a dresser, needed Jerry, to unbuckle the fine leather straps that held in place the leg things and the arm things and the shiny, tiered skirt that covered his crotch. The rain gutter–shaped pieces fastened to his forearms relented after ample struggle, but the buckles of the skirt waged a war on his recently trimmed fingernails, and without removing the skirt, he couldn’t get the bend he needed to undo the greave or the cuisse or the little round saucers that covered his knees.
    Freed in the end from only a few less cumbersome pieces, Benji left the molted armor on the ground, continuing on through a stand of tall, thin trees that opened, high above, into umbrellas of sparse pine boughs. As he approached the dark bridge, he nearly fell, his feet sliding slapstick style through the dirt and rot of the forest floor. In the light of day, the bridge, built just wide enough for a ranger’s jeep, looked barely capable of supporting a ranger. It was a miracle it hadn’t fallen into the ravine years ago.
    His efforts to stay upright had him panting, and a trickle of sweat, fed by the efficient furnace of the cuirass, rolled maddeningly down his unscratchable back. He took a cautious step, ears trained for the first sigh of splitting planks, but heard nothing. No wind. No traffic