Purple Twilight

By: Jeff Hardesty

“There’s just nothing of substance in the world these days Simon! Nothing at all to give two thoughts about!” Andrea spouted, taking a slug off of a fifth of Johnny Walker and lying the half-full bottle on the hotel nightstand.

Simon walked out of the bathroom shirtless, wiping a bit of vomit from his lower lip. He slid a Barclay cigarette from his pack beside the TV, lit the end of it and flopped himself onto the love seat by the open window. He coughed. “What is it exactly that you are looking for?”

Andrea was in her underwear and a spaghetti strap sleep-shirt, her hair in tangles, a cigarette resting between her skinny fingers. She fell onto her stomach, pouting. “Anything Simon! I am looking for absolutely anything that isn’t this worthless wasting away of our lives.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Simon said calmly taking a drag from his smoke.

“If you’re looking for a motivational speaker you’ve come to the wrong guy.”

“Oh!” she said playfully, bouncing off the bed and kissing Simon’s chapped lips.

“You’re worthless.” She gazed out the hotel window at the red rock illuminated in the purple moonlight. There was magic in Tempe on such desert evenings. “Let’s have a baby,” she said. “Let’s get married, buy a house and make lots and lots of babies. What’d you think?”

“I think we better keep practicing for awhile longer. And…” he began kissing her between words, “I think you are drunk. And I think you are a dreamer. And I think that you make me very happy. What more purpose do you want?”

Andrea glowed at his comments but her spirit was restless. Words were not enough. “I want it all!” she said, waltzing about the room. “I want to see the world and have adventures and have a nice house and kids and a picket fence and a meaningful job. I want my life to have purpose!”

“So…I’m chopped liver, basically.”

“Of course not!” Andrea said straddling his lap and kissing him multiple times with a mouth full of fire. “I want you too. Who do you think I would have my kids with? I couldn’t possibly go on all these adventures by myself. The world is scary, I would need you there to protect me.”

Simon laughed, nearly shooting amber ale from his nose. “Ah yes, I suppose I would be your knight in shining armor.” He took Andrea’s face in his hands, looking lovingly into her eyes. “You are wonderfully odd and perfectly beautiful but absolutely insane. How exactly would we afford to do any of this?”

“We could get jobs!” she said.

“We have jobs,” he replied, gently lifting her off of him so that he could retrieve another beer from the small refrigerator.

“I mean real jobs. We could go back to school and get real jobs with salaries and vacation time and insurance and then we could afford to do whatever we wanted. We could see the world and buy a house and have kids and it would be wonderful! Come on Simon, think about it.”

Simon’s face was losing its calm. The thought of sitting in a classroom listening to pretentious academic types tell him about the happenings of three thousand years ago was enough to envelope his entire person in total disgust.
“Mm Hm,” he said. “Well you get on that. I am a free man. There’s no way you’re getting me back into any goddamned university, no matter how wonderful you think it will be. I am finished with that life.”

Andrea’s face turned as red as her hair and she didn’t know whether to cry or yell. She did both. “Damn it Simon you’re so stubborn! What is this life going to get us? Getting drunk in random hotel rooms just to get away from living in our parent’s basements! Do you really want to work these shit restaurant and construction jobs for the rest of your life?”

Now it was Simon who starred out the window with a far away look in his eyes. Andrea said nothing.

“Do you see that rock out there Andrea?”

“What?” she asked, frustrated with this distraction. “Don’t change the subject. I want to talk about this.”

Simon ignored her. “That rock has been sitting there for a million years. It’s seen storms, and floods and droughts and battles. It’s probably seen native ceremonies and caravans of settlers and things that we have no idea ever even happened. And it’s never moved. Never done anything but be a rock.”

Andrea’s eyes drooped in a way that anyone’s eyes would when faced with the sad difference between nature and humanity. She stood and kissed her boyfriend on the cheek. They stood for a moment in silence with their arms wrapped about each other’s waists.

“You are so thoughtful,” she said, finally. “I love it.”

Simon looked embarrassed and bowed his head. He laid his beer on the dresser and pulled the girl’s lovely frame in close against his body. Her breasts pressed against his naked chest and they danced into the early hours of morning. When the music stopped Andrea lay naked with her head on Simon’s shoulder, their creamy flesh glowing orange in the early morning sunlight.

“Simon?” she said softly, “I still want to go back to school. For both of us.”

Simon kissed the top of her head and sighed. “Yeah,” he said, looking out the window. “I think that might be a good idea.”