Samantha was a thin, dark-haired woman of twenty-nine or thirty and dressed in baggy, cut-up jeans and adorned herself with heavy jewelry. Her ragged bangs lay just above her eyebrows like a dark feather. Those eyebrows came together like two lazy cliched caterpillars, and flicked and flickered at every slight thought that came across her mind.

When we first met in the downtown lights outside Salazar’s Jazz Club she looked younger than I expected, but it was just her delicate form. That was the only time I saw her wear a dress, a sequined curtain of some kind that draped like a mushroom cap or flourishing bell. She was graceful and excited.

“Have you heard of this place before?” I asked, knowing she had not but also knowing it was a good way to start the conversation.

She shook her head happily, full of energy and curious to see where the night was headed.

____________

“I don’t like surprises,” Samantha confided in me while on our way to a surprise I had prepared for her.

“Well I think you will like this,” I replied. “It’s not a big surprise.” She would like it, right? I hoped so. It was the only restaurant in the city that served a special kind of vegan burger. I’m not too sure what it was called but I wouldn’t mind choking one down for her. She had trouble finding good dinner and I wanted to show her this new restaurant Revival.

We were listening to New Nothing, her favorite band. It reminded me of a desert trance: unending rhythms and chants that stirred something ancient and deep and primitive inside. The older I get the more I learn to appreciate when art brings out those feelings; when I was younger I ignored them probably because I was afraid of them. It ties you to your ancestors, or if you wanted to really sever your relationship with your rural Midwestern heritage, ties you to the divine. Nobody back home thought in those terms.

Samantha did, I think. At least she acknowledged the music put her in another state of mind. She did not like drugs of any kind and I was on a new path of no drugs of any kind so I would have to settle for healthier ways of finding nirvana.

————

The rooftop of the Bronze Line featured a restaurant that must have once been a greenhouse. At least that’s what it felt like. Plants grew everywhere in the small space; philodendrons, ivy, and pothos hung from every open spot on the ceiling and drooped like thirsty tentacles grasping for water.

Samantha and I ordered avocado toast. We weren’t that hungry and we just wanted to see each other before I left for New York. I wouldn’t be gone for long, just a week visiting some friends. There’s something nice about seeing someone the night before you leave town. It confers a special status. The last night you’re here you choose to spend it with someone in particular.

We spent the rest of the evening beside the pool outside the Bronze Line, huddled together on a seat above the bluish-yellow waters. She was leaning comfortably into me, exchanging few words and just appreciating physical touch. Underneath her baggy clothes I felt her thin, bony body. For not the first time I wondered if she was a healthy woman.