Free The Railroad by Neil Douglas Newton

status?”
    “I guess not. I don't know what to say. I hope...I'd like to think that someday I will get over this and come back. And I hope that if you need me, you'll call me.”
    “And what will you do for me if you can't do anything for yourself?”
    “I don't want to have an argument.”
    “Neither do I. Barbara has called me and explained the situation. At least I could get some information from her since I can't from you.”
    “Dennis! I only want to-”
    “Whatever it is you want to do, you're not accomplishing anything by calling me like this. I'd say something rude but I don't want to leave that as the last thing we say to each other. So good luck. That's all I have to say.”
    I waited a few seconds, trying to come up with something meaningful to say. Dennis must have realized that I would fail at that because he hung up the phone after a few seconds.
    *
    “So where are you going?” Barbara asked me on the phone.
    “The weekend house.”
    “You can live there?”
    “People live their whole lives in houses like that.”
    “I guess.”
    My weekend house was something we’d argued about since the beginning of our relationship. It was a typical get-away place; something I’d bought cheap. It was an ugly house full of some older generation’s ugly paneling and bad decorating. It had only cost me a hundred thousand and I’d bought it because it abutted on a cul-de-sac right next to an abandoned kiddie park, or what was left of it; it was very private. She’d called it my one streak of rebellion.
    “What about the Co-op?”
    “I’ll sell it. I got an agent.”
    “Oh”. Her voice was subdued; this was real proof that I was leaving.
    “You can come up and visit me.”
    Her voice got hard. “What I said before still stands. Not until this bullshit is over.”
    “Barbara, I know you think you’re really perceptive, but my feelings aren’t bullshit.”
    “Good-bye, Mike. And fuck you.
    I paused for a second before it hit me. “You know, I just realized that I’m not responsible for you or how you feel. Or I don’t want to be. Interesting, isn’t it?”
    I heard a sob before she hung up.
     
    *
    How clean it felt to be packing a few things into my car. Imagine, from your own workaday perspective, what it would feel like to simply pick up and leave. Mid-December was cold but invigorating and I was leaving everything that had dragged me down. Nothing was set in stone; nothing was hanging over my head. It was just a big question mark and, amazingly, nothing else. How long had it been since it had been like that for me.
    I was heading away, and up to Bardstown, NY, only two hours and change from Chelsea. Before driving off, I stopped and ate at The City View Diner, a typically retro-chic phenomenon a few blocks from my co-op. I had my favorite breakfast: two eggs over medium with rye toast and home fries. The waitress smiled at me as she always did. What would she think if she knew I was leaving the belly of the beast?
    I paid my tab, all of six dollars, pretty standard for Manhattan. This might be your last time here , I reminded myself. Did the owner sense a difference as I paid my tab? In the car on the way out of Manhattan I saw the scenes that had made up most of my adult life. Finally I drove up the west side of Manhattan to I-95 and a few zigzags to the New York State Thru-way. I still tasted the eggs as I passed over the border into Westchester, out of New York City . Amazing , I told myself.

Chapter Four
     
    The first day in Bardstown began for me at about 1:00 P.M. I rose with a hangover that wasn’t much worse than those I’d had in Manhattan for the last few months. I had expected this great renewed sense of purpose, but it wasn’t there. I finally stumbled out of bed and consumed a can of chicken soup to quiet the churning in my stomach. After half an hour of staring out the window, I realized that my spiritual and intellectual ammunition was low and that I needed sustenance.
    I tried