Flying Machines

Ray Tate sat forward in the easy chair and set the stove on maximum. It was 5 below outside and the wind was whistling in through the cracks in the walls. Skid passed him the bottle of Early Times. He wiped the bottleneck off with his dry hand and took a pull.

“You got a cold, Skid?” Ray wondered. Skid just nodded a couple of times, leaned forward and coughed into his palm several times in rapid succession. They were still celebrating the success of Ray’s barn sale the previous weekend. Ray was trying to get Skid to give him a ride to work at Jane Thom’s place.

Ray had been thinking. “You know what I think. I think that people could fly around in personal size flying craft, you know, like the size of a compact car. Then you wouldn’t need roads anymore. It would be a lot safer that way.”

Skid doubled over and coughed a few more times, his free hand raised like he was back in school asking to be called on, straightened up and gasped for breath. “So what, you think people wouldn’t still crash. Cars, or whatever you call them, would come from all directions. How’d you even know where they are?”

“I guess you’d have radar on a screen to tell you.”

“Well then it’s just like an airplane. You’d have to be a pilot. Half the people on the road are bad drivers, imagine what they’d be like flying. And what if people flew drunk, crashed into trees or wires.”

The trouble with Skid, Ray reflected, was that he had no imagination. He took another drink and passed the bottle back. “OK, so not everyone will fly them but some people will.” Ray wondered if he would be allowed, with a DWI on his record. “If this were 200 years ago and I told you about automobiles you’d have said the same thing – ‘there’s no way that people could drive around on roads.’”

Skid decided to ignore Ray rather than argue about something he didn’t care about. He could have stayed home with his wife and kid if he wanted to argue. Skid picked up Monday’s newspaper from the ground and pulled out the sports section. “I’ll be dipped in shit” Skid exclaimed, “Syracuse lost to Georgetown.”

Ray did a double take. “That was last weekend. Anyway, what’s so unusual about that.?”

“They were up by 18 at the half and playing at home.” Skid gave Ray a look. “Don’t you remember?”

Ray returned the look. “I was out here running the sale. Don’t you remember? You were supposed to be helping me. Anyway you can never tell when those two teams play.”

“Yeah but Georgetown isn’t as good anymore.”

“So, neither is Syracuse.”

“They made the final four in ’96.”

Ray reached, took the bottle back from Skid, took another pull and let it sit on his palate, thinking of what they might talk about instead of arguing about the quality of Syracuse basketball. The buzz from the barn sale had worn off. Ray’s mother had deposited nearly all the money in the bank. Ray had spent the rest. He was back to square zero, no license, no work except for what he was working on for Jane Thom, if he could get over there. His mother had taken his father up to the VA hospital in Utica for his therapy appointment, leaving him dependent on Skid for transportation.

“Why don’t we go in and watch some TV?” Skid asked.

No way Ray was going to let Skid in the house with his mother gone. Skid would raid the kitchen and be passed out drunk on the sofa by lunch time. Nothing on TV anyway.

“Why don’t you give me a lift to Jane Thom’s?”

“Told you, I’ve got to be in Bainbridge.”

“Fine, then go to Bainbridge.” Ray stood up, swiped the bottle of Early Times from the table, shut down the stove and stalked out the barn, his three dogs rousing themselves from their repose and following him. Ray could have gone down the driveway and stayed dry but he chose a shortcut through knee deep snow in the yard, snow falling in to his boots as he walked, unzipped jacket flopping in the breeze, open bottle in one hand. He jumped up on the porch, spilling some of the whiskey, and went in the back door, slamming it for emphasis. The dogs ran around to the steps and scurried up but they were too late. Ray wouldn’t have let them in anyway.

Ray went into the powder room to pee, heard the sound of Skid’s truck as it went down the driveway. He looked out the window, noticed Skid had left the barn door open. He zipped up and went to close the door. The snow had started up again. It was too cold to be doing any drywall. Anyway he couldn’t get there. Maybe they should have settled up with the phone company so he could call Jane and tell her.

He settled on a chair in the dining room and flicked the remote. The picture came on slowly, waffled between clear and snowy but the sound was pretty good. Some talk show. It didn’t matter. He didn’t pay attention. He sat looking out the picture window into the backyard. The bushes were completely covered with snow. His eye followed the whiteness uphill to the horizon a good 50 feet higher and a quarter mile away. The wind was blowing a cloud of snow, making it dance from left to right. He squinted his eyes so that he could see only white, imagined himself in a podlike vehicle, levitating a few feet off the ground, cruising over the hill and down into the next hollow. The people on the TV were talking about travel. That fit right in. They were better company than Skid.

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