“It's raining like dogs and cats in San Antonio,” the human being sitting in the booth behind Diane in McDonald's said. Diane could not tell from the sound of the human being's voice if the human being was male or female. She didn't care. She could discern that the human being was talking on a cell phone. Before making the call the human being had grunted and burped a few times and cackled at something the human being found hilarious. Diane was sitting in a booth doing various things on the internet on her boyfriend's laptop. She only came to McDonald's for the free wifi. She was not a customer. Since moving in with her boyfriend the first week of February Diane had been trying to lose weight. “If you ever get fat I'll dump you so fast your head will spin,” her boyfriend said once. He went on to clarify that Diane was not fat but she could stand to lose twenty to thirty pounds. She had a beer belly. It wasn't sexy.
Diane looked out the window. Drops of rain wiggled down the glass and lightning added its dazzle to the drab sky. She looked at the San Antonio skyline and realized she had first visited that very McDonald's when she was fifteen years old and touring San Antonio with her acting troupe, The Esteem Machine. She remembered seeing The Tower of The Americas from the window as she sat with her fellow thespians and dipped French fries in barbecue sauce, too shy to speak. Diane had only had small parts in comedic skits. She never got a part in any of the dramatic skits. She envied her older friends who acted in the suicide skit. They were able to cry on cue. Diane cried often in her bedroom when she was a teenager but she was too stilted and self-conscious to get into the role of someone who had just committed suicide and was screaming at the survivors for missing all the signs. The Esteem Machine performed comedic and dramatic skits about suicide, sex, birth control, rape and abortion in various churches and schools all over Texas. Being a member of The Esteem Machine did not make Diane feel better about herself. She was skinny and awkward and had a crush on Ringo Starr. Now Diane was overweight and misanthropic and she was in love with her boyfriend, Luke Acosta.
It had last rained in San Antonio two days ago. Saturday. The plan had been to take a bus to the Alamo Dome and enjoy the Fiesta carnival for a few hours...ride a couple of rides, throw darts at balloons, eat cotton candy and corn dogs. When Diane and Luke boarded the 100 Primo bus the sky was blue. There were a few clouds but they didn't look ominous. Diane sat beside Luke on the bus thinking, “I'm not talking enough. I'm too sober. He likes me better when I'm crazy and raucous. I need to get fascinating pretty fucking fast. I'm losing him.” Their first night together in Luke's trailer they sat across from each other in the booth in his kitchen drinking Coronas. “We'll stay together until we start to bore each other,” Luke said with an amiable grin. “Fucking aye,” Diane said. But even as Diane said those words she was thinking, “This man will never bore me. Fuck me. I'm smitten.”
There was an old couple sitting in front of Diane and Luke on the bus. Diane looked at them and offered up a silent prayer to no particular god. “Please let that be us. Please let this man be the one to bury me.” Diane didn't want to be buried. She had told Luke more than a few times that when she died she wanted him to scatter her ashes into the Pacific Ocean. Diane and Luke had only been together for a couple of months but Diane had lived with three different men before Luke and been in love countless times since the age of five. She knew that Luke was the last man she would kiss, fuck, fear, adore. “What if I die first?” Luke asked Diane. “You are not allowed to die first, motherfucker. Don't even think about it,” Diane said. Then there was that movie Luke told Diane about. Johnny Depp played a barber who used and abused some woman then passed her around. Soon she was old and used up and ended up as a bag lady. Diane feared ending up as a bag lady. She often felt like a bag lady in training. When she was a girl she could not understand why Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton killed themselves. Now she was forty and suicide made perfect sense. Luke sensed that so whenever Diane said she wanted to keep a gun in the trailer for all the nights she spent alone while he worked in Carrizo Springs Luke said, “No. No gun. Call 911 if you get scared.” Luke had never heard of Hunter S. Thompson until Diane told Luke about him so he would not get it if she told him, “Calling 911 ain't the Gonzo way, darlin'.”
Luke was wearing the new shirt Diane picked out for him in Wal-Mart. Diane wanted to rip the buttons off the shirt and devour Luke. She told him she was a tiger. He laughed and told her she was a wolf. The night they met in the bar on Broadway they went to Luke's room at the Hilton on the Riverwalk after hours of drinking and flirting and making out. As soon as they entered the room Diane ripped the buttons from Luke's shirt and bit his neck. He fucked her so hard and for so long that night that in the morning Diane noticed blood on the sheet. There wasn't a lot of blood, not enough to cause alarm. There were bruises on Diane's breasts. There would be more bruises. “You like marking me, you beast,” Diane said. Luke reminded Diane often that they were not teenagers but he enjoyed giving her bruises and hickeys. Diane was reminded of the soda shop scene in “Grease” when Rizzo complained about the hickey on her neck. Diane wasn't sure how she felt about the bruises and hickeys. She liked to tell herself that she was loved by a passionate, possessive man and leave it at that. But then there were Luke's hands on her throat. He had put his hands on her throat three different times in bed. He teased her that he wanted to kill her. The strangest thing of all was that Diane trusted Luke more than she had ever trusted any other man. Luke would never really harm her. They were two animals in love, making love the way Diane liked it...dirty and primal. Yes, Diane was a tiger and Luke was a panther. They lived in a tiny bubble in a steamy jungle that was fat and radiant with song.
The bus drove deeper into San Antonio's colorful downtown. El Mercado was even more vibrant and colorful during Fiesta. Diane and Luke looked out the windows at the throngs of people in Fiesta hats, walking and dancing and drinking beer and margaritas and sitting in lawn chairs waiting for the Fiesta Flambeau parade to commence. “This bus is crawling at a snail's pace,” Luke said. “Let's get out and walk,” Diane suggested. “No, the Alamo Dome is way the fuck down the road.” A couple of blocks later Luke changed his mind. They got off the bus and joined the throng on the streets. Luke pointed out the county jail to Diane. Diane wondered if Luke had ever spent time there. She didn't ask. He might be going to jail for six months or longer next month. When Luke told Diane that he might be going to jail she asked if he had gone to jail before and he said, “I don't want to talk about it.” Diane had visited her favorite uncle in various state and federal prisons when she was a little girl and had almost gone to prison herself when she was 23 for writing hot checks in four different states. Luke told Diane he would understand if she dumped him if he had to go to jail. Diane had visions of visiting Luke in jail, sending him letters and books and poems and stories. “You're the only man I want, goddamn it. What the hell does jail have to do with anything?” Diane asked. Luke knew Diane was a romantic. He had read her novel and poems and stories. But he didn't get it. He had no idea how crazy in love Diane was with him. He did not know the distance she was willing to run for him. It was a starry spacious distance littered with dinosaur bones and rusted automobiles from a brighter era. Diane wanted to ride the Ferris wheel with Luke at least a hundred times before she died. She wanted to watch him throw darts at plump pastel balloons. She wanted to pick out at least one huge tacky prize. She wanted to feed him tufts of cotton candy, lick mustard from his mouth. And Diane didn't even like mustard.
There was a festival in front of an old cathedral. Loud live music, families, food, beer. Luke bought a beer. Diane didn't want one. They watched the beginning of the parade then decided to head to the Alamo Dome. Then there was a bar called Drink. Luke wanted to go inside and drink a couple of beers and shots of Jose Cuervo. Diane was not interested in drinking. Her mind was on the Ferris wheel. But she sat at the bar with Luke, watched him flirt with the barmaid. He was a flirt. She knew and accepted this. If he wasn't a flirt they wouldn't have ever met. She had walked into the bar on Broadway the night before Christmas Eve in a short red sequin dress she bought at Goodwill in Albuquerque when she was married to her second husband. She was wearing mismatched socks and too much makeup. She slid into a booth and ordered a bacon cheeseburger and beer. Luke walked up to her and asked her if she wanted to join him and his sons. His sons were shooting pool. Diane assumed Luke felt sorry for her because she was alone. She was too surprised to turn him down and she liked the way he looked so she joined him in his booth behind the pool table. He was a congenial gentleman at first but it didn't take him long to show his true panther self. Diane's tiger liked Luke's panther so she stayed and let him raise her dress to inspect her thighs, let him grab her ass and her left tit, let him kiss her like he was starving for her. She was starving for him, too.
In Drink Diane drank half a Corona. Luke drank two Coronas and two shots of Jose Cuervo. Diane wanted to kiss Luke, bite his neck, rip his shirt off and dig her nails into his back, remind him how it was the night they met. She was too sober to take it to that level and her mind was on the Ferris wheel. They walked toward the Alamo Dome, saw The Tower of The Americas. “Take a picture,” Luke said. Diane took a picture with Luke's digital camera. The picture came out blurry but the lights were beautiful. “I think this carnival is a myth. I don't think it exists,” Diane said. Then she saw the lights of the carnival. The Ferris wheel was waiting for them like The Emerald City. If they could just make it to the Ferris wheel all of their wishes would be granted. Diane only had one wish, really. She wanted to be with Luke until the day she died. Anything else would be gravy.
“This is my city, baby. I know these streets,” Luke told Diane as she followed him across the highway. Yes, San Antonio was Luke's city. Luke was born in San Antonio, grew up in San Antonio, fell in love in San Antonio, got married in San Antonio, bought a house and raised a family in San Antonio, attended two different universities in San Antonio, worked various jobs in San Antonio, partied in San Antonio. Diane was only a tourist. Diane did not have a city. She was born in a small town in Wise County, spent her childhood in various small Texas towns, attended three different high schools then graduated from a tiny Christian school in Fredericksburg, attended college in San Marcos and Kerrville, got married on Mount Bonnell in Austin, moved to Albuquerque with her first husband and moved back to Texas with her second husband. Diane had many San Antonio memories. Visiting the Alamo with her choir group from the First Baptist in Monahans, visiting the Alamo, zoo, Riverwalk and The Tower of The Americas on a family vacation, touring San Antonio with The Esteem Machine, spending a month on the psych ward of a private hospital when she was seventeen and being put on Prozac, Christmas shopping with her mom and sister, dancing topless at The Wild Zebra and All-Stars, renting a bedroom from a hairdresser in Alamo Heights, working as a teaching assistant at a Christian preschool and getting fired after a couple of months, going to Sea World with a boyfriend, going to Fiesta Texas with another boyfriend, shooting pool with another boyfriend, meeting Luke in the bar on Broadway, fucking Luke in his room at the Hilton, drinking with Luke on the Riverwalk on Christmas Eve, shopping with Luke on the Riverwalk on Christmas Eve, singing karaoke with Luke, fucking Luke, kissing Luke, loving Luke, making Luke her home. But San Antonio was not Diane's city. She remained a gringa tourist with a toddler's grasp of the Spanish language and a fascination with Dia de Los Muertos. She had a Dia de Los Muertos skull tattoo on her upper right arm but she got it in Albuquerque. “I'm really Latina. I only look like a gringa,” Diane told Luke the first hour of their acquaintance. Luke might have laughed. Diane couldn't recall. The truth was, Diane was a genetic and spiritual mutt. She was Cherokee. She was Irish. She was Scottish. She was Swiss. She was French. She was brought up Baptist but had practiced Wicca by herself for years. She liked candles and incantations. She had a whimsical pantheon of gods. Pablo Neruda. Federico Garcia Lorca. Henry Miller. Ernest Hemingway. Lewis Carroll. Jim Morrison. John Lennon. Kurt Cobain. The Mexican flag was Diane's favorite but the only flag she flew was the freak flag. She had been living in exile all her life.
As Luke and Diane neared the carnival the skies opened with a whooshing howl and the rains came down, not like dogs and cats but like sharks and dolphins. Suddenly Luke and Diane were swimming in an idiot sea with hundreds of other idiots. “They're going to close the carnival down because of electrocution,” Diane said. “We don't know that for sure,” Luke said. The tequila made him optimistic. They stood under an overpass with other wet optimists. “This is my home,” Luke told Diane. He was taunting her, mocking her, daring her. “This is my home, too,” Diane said. “This is MY home,” Luke said. “Su casa es mi casa,” Diane said but she wasn't sure she believed it. She wanted to believe it. Whithersoever thou goest I go, too, cleaving unto your flesh until I turn to a pillar of salt or a welcome mat or a Jewish candle. Diane thought those words but did not speak them. She wanted to cling to Luke and make the unspoken words true but Luke was dripping wet, too, and had no idea what would happen next, where they would land. There were bars and taxis and buses. There was dry land. There was warmth. But Luke and Diane were dripping wet in San Antonio, Texas and the carnival was closed and the streets were flooded and magical mermaids were only a rumor.
Then Diane was following Luke down the highway, her shoes filled with rainwater. She wanted to hail a taxi. Luke wanted to wade back to Drink. He was smiling and proclaiming and Diane was silent, her mouth a straight line. They reached the sidewalk. A couple of women walked by. Luke made a wolfish sound of appreciation, turned around and checked out their asses. Then Diane knew she was alone. It was confirmed. She was alone in the universe and the gods did not care. She was rained on spit on shit on pissed on. The gods were finger fucking each other in the sky while Appalachian music played.
“Fuck you. I'm going to stick my thumb out now. I've got a key. I'll go to your place and pack my things in two hours or less and be on my way,” Diane said.
“What are you talking about? What's wrong?” Luke asked.
“Don't insult my intelligence. Don't act like you don't know why I'm pissed.”
“You're crazy. I have no idea what you're talking about.”
“That's so disrespectful. My god. If you want to fuck other women then be proactive about it. Get their phone numbers. Chase them down. Don't let them get away.”
“I want to fuck you. You're the love of my life.”
“I don't think so.”
“Why are you acting like this?”
“Why are you playing dumb?”
Then they were in Drink again. Diane was surprised the bouncer let them enter the bar. They looked like drowned rats. All the other people in the bar were dry, young, hip, gorgeous. Luke had to go to the bathroom. Diane didn't.
“Will you be here when I get back?” Luke asked.
“I can't make any promises,” Diane said.
Diane stood near the bar dripping water, feeling like a canker sore, a cockroach, a poodle turd. She watched Luke try to high five a voluptuous Latina. The Latina recoiled, eyed Luke with obvious disgust. Diane shook her head. She glanced at the various televisions, all of them showing a basketball game that Diane had no interest in. People were drinking and flirting, so smug and well-adjusted, so certain of their places in the fucking world. Diane stood damp and defeated, every inch the trampled bag lady willing death to bang down her door. Her soaked jeans were falling down. Diane did not feel victorious about her weight loss. Skinny, voluptuous, fat...what the fuck did it matter? She would continue to love men who didn't love her back. She would continue to trudge the sidewalks of the world behind men who noticed other women's breasts and asses. La la fucking whee. Life the parade. Life the festival. Life the fucking carnival.
On the bus ride back to their part of town Diane looked at a young drunk couple, so giddy and glad to be alive. The girl was a cute blonde in a silly hat. She wore a tight pink tank top over a purple lacy bra. The guy looked less than brilliant with his wide-set eyes, small nose and aw gee shucks expression. He glanced at Diane a couple of times, glanced at the wet black bra strap that was slipping down Diane's left shoulder. Diane wondered why he couldn't be satisfied with his cute blonde girlfriend and her purple lacy bra. Maybe he was glancing at Diane because she was wet and mysterious. His girlfriend was a dry known quantity, a familiar feel. They had probably fucked each other at least a dozen different ways at least a hundred different times.
“It's basic biology, baby,” Diane said to Luke with a tired smirk.
“What are you talking about now?” Luke asked.
“Animals. The rain. Noah's fucking ark. Aren't you glad we aren't both zebras?”
“I'm glad I'm a goat and you're a kangaroo.”
“Likewise, mi amor.”
Diane let Luke hold her hand. She was looking forward to shedding her clothes and standing beneath a hot stream of water. Anything beyond that would be gravy.