The Club

CHAPTER 23

"Do you smell that?" Graham asks as he sticks his face in the air through his open window and takes in a big whiff.

I take a deep breath of air. I'm not really sure what he's referring to. "What am I smelling?"

He grins and states, "The Pacific Northwest. Rain. Trees. Depression."

What? I'm not even sure where he's going with this one. So I ask, "Depression?"

I look around the area we're driving through. There's a coldness to the air like it just finished raining or it's about to. There's green as far as the eye can see and I'm not used to seeing so many trees. I must say I kind of like it though.

"For somewhere that's always so doom and gloom with clouds and rain, they would all have to be depressed."

I can't help but laugh at his assumption. Although I must say it does make sense. Washington is known for always being rainy and overcast. "You're hilarious."

"I try," he says with a wink.

I gaze around the small ship building town and I can't help but feel lost. When I set out on this journey to see all of these places I thought it would help give me some clarity on my situation. I could visit all of these locations and understand what they were going through. What frame of mind they may or may not have been but now. Standing here, I feel like this was a dumb idea and I'm just wasting time. "Why did we come here?"

His mouth drops open and he asks, "Is that a rhetorical question or do you want an answer?"

"I don't know." I shrug because it doesn't really matter either way. "Maybe a little bit of both?"

"You're searching for the key to your problem. At this point it could be a literal or figurative key. But staying in your apartment agonizing over whether or not you could find it wasn't getting you anywhere. That's where this trip comes in. You may not be any closer to finding the key but the question is, are you closer to finding yourself?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Nothing. Or maybe it's everything. Can you honestly tell me you were happy with your life before? You already told me you didn't want to become a pop star. That was the label's doing. So look me in the eyes right now and tell me."

"No, I wasn't. I hated everything about my life. The lack of privacy, the fake friends. I even hated the money. Do you know how many random distant relatives come out of the wood work when you're suddenly rich and famous? It's disgusting the greed people have when it comes to dollar signs. Yes, I could afford anything and everything I ever wanted but the cost isn't worth it."

I've heard that back in the booming days this used to be a ship building town. But now it seems business isn't booming so much and some of that gloom in the air hangs over the town. There's not a whole lot of activity going on as we drive straight through town. The impending rain hanging over us might play a small factor into that but either way it just seems strange. Graham pulls the car into the motel parking lot and I wait in the idling car as he runs in to get us a room.

As I look around the parking lot I'm not the least bit surprised to only see one other car in the parking lot. This doesn't exactly seem like a tourist hot spot even with its history. Sure they probably see people from time to time but it's probably not at all the way I would imagine it was shortly after his death.

After we checked into the room, I dragged Graham down the street. Now I'm standing here unable to form the words to describe what I'm feeling. It's so surreal that I'm standing in a place with so much meaning. Back in high school I dreamed about coming here thinking it would provide all of my answers. I'm not sure what made me think that but now that I'm here I'm not in any better of a place than I was before I got here.