The Puzzle of Erik

A crinkled granola bar wrapper fell behind him and he kept walking. His hiking boots worked hard on the pavement under his feet – he had been walking for seven hours that day. How much he had walked in total, he couldn’t say, but he wasn’t anywhere near the half of his travels. He had drunk the last of his water an hour ago and he regretted not buying more bottles when he had the chance. Still, he kept walking.

The cars passed him with increasing speed, or so he thought. He was certainly slowing down, but that was besides the point. The passing of each car reminded him of how far he’d made it and simultaneously made him picture the remaining route ahead. So, he kept walking.

He found a nice spot to sit and think. A spot to take off his boots and lick his wounds, so to speak. They weren’t quite broken in yet, the boots, so they rubbed, scraped against his ankle. He removed the old, dishevelled band-aids and observed the blister. He applied two new band-aids. He was near the town he was aiming for, and he would soon buy some more, as he was running quite low already. He hoped that his boots would mould to his ankle soon. He got up and kept walking.

In the parking lot of a gas station, he drank. Then, he drank again. He also applied new band-aids. Twenty minutes passed before he took his first step on the motel’s doorstep. He counted his cash, noticed he was running low already. He’ll have to visit an ATM, but how long until that well dries up? He opened the door to the main entrance, and the sound of a bell welcomed him. Suddenly, he was taking off his boots and lying down.

He knocked on the door of a modest house on an empty street. It had a nice white picket fence, flower beds by the big windows and an adorable swing on the porch. The doorknob turned with hesitation and the door opened an inch. Peering at Andrew from inside was a yellow lady. She had a light-yellow cardigan on top of a bright yellow blouse, and a skirt with little lemons on it. She seemed to have been crying give or take half an hour ago. “Can I help you?”

Sitting inside, with a cup of coffee in front of him on an antique table, he wrote her a question in his notebook. “How did you know Erik?”

“Oh, he and I were together through most of college and ten years after. I can’t believe he never talked about me.” She said this last part with strong dissatisfaction. “Well, yes, actually I can believe that. He was sweet some of the time, but otherwise he was… not quite mean. I really don’t know how to put it. I guess he was reserved, in a way. He left because he thought he was to be on his own. And he was on his own. For a few months, then he came back one day and knocked. He apologized and said all I wanted to hear.”

After writing “Did you get back together,” she laughed with a strange nostalgia.

“No, we didn’t. I told him to leave. He pleaded, he tried to stay but I told him,” she took a sip of her coffee. “I told him that if he didn’t figure out what he wanted, I didn’t want anything to do with him. So, he left. For a few months. Then, I heard knocking at the door – you know, when I opened the door to you, a few memories came flooding in. Anyway, I opened it and of course, it was him. He had grown a smallish beard, and he started wearing his glasses. ‘I’ve changed,’ he said. And I believed him. Of course I did, he was always so charming. After six months he told me that he made a mistake coming back. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Twice he’d made me feel so secure, only to take that all away. I was so angry, the angriest I’ve ever been, I think.” She took a long, pensive sip of her coffee. “I never thought of him again for four years. I would focus on other things. Meet with friends I hadn’t seen in a long time, read books I had been meaning to get to, tended to my flower beds. And one night, all it took was one dream to get me thinking about him. So, there I was, standing on his doorstep and knocking on his door.”

He wrote “Did you get back together?” There was a pause.

“No.” She got up. “More coffee, dear?”

With a new cup of coffee in front of him, he let her finish her story. “I never hated him for what happened between us. He had always had a place in my heart, no matter what stupid things he’d do. These past 10 years we had been seeing each other occasionally. We were always sweet with one another, always this kind of romance between us, but nothing ever came of it. Either way, I never saw another man nor Erik a woman. I guess you could label this a relationship, or whatever you want, but the truth is, you will never be able to describe what we had in a single word.”

A few days had passed since his conversation with the lovely lady, and he had a lot to think about. He was sitting, taking care of his blisters and watching the cars go by. He took the notebook out of his bag, along with a pen. He wrote about the man whose story was slowly being revealed to him. He wrote about how he was confused to have never heard any of this from Erik himself. He thought there were no secrets between them. He drew, meticulously, a hummingbird. Satisfied with his work, he kept walking.

He walked between acres and acres of pine trees, on a two-lane, semi-busy road. The cars passed, reminding him of his progress, and he listened to the birds sing a wonderful tune. This time, he had bought enough water to last him a couple of weeks, and he hadn’t drunk half of it yet. For that, he was proud.

He held an object in his hand. A flask with an engraved moose on its face. Sometimes, when he lost motivation, he would look at the item and remember why he was doing this. So, he would once again gain motivation. The cycle would continue for the rest of his walk.

The sky was grey and the day was grey and so was the gravel of this driveway. His boots had started to feel more comfortable, though his blisters still bothered him. Before continuing on the long, winding path to the seemingly aging house, he sat and reapplied his band-aids. He observed the landscape before him. There was a rusted chain-link fence. Behind it, grass, dead in odd splotches throughout the yard. The house itself was a rough sight to see. A decent number of shingles had fallen, the white paint of the siding was wearing off in various areas, and the deck was quite crooked. Behind the house, there were pines. They were very common in the area.

The crunch of his boots on small rocks had aggravated a big, loud dog. It was barking fiercely, barely being held back by a chain when the door swung open. Immediately, he saw the gun and put his hands up, not letting go of the flask. No words were spoken while he slowly took off his backpack and threw it to the side, a kind of insurance. The man holding him at gunpoint wore white sneakers, way past their prime, dark blue jeans which were too big, even with the size of him, and a jean jacket with the sleeves ripped off. The big guy tapped the dog’s head, calming it down. He carefully walked forward, towards the walker, and spun him around, keeping his pistol pointed to his chest, now his back. He patted him down and observed the flask in the young man’s hand. The armed man spun him again, so they could face each other. With a slight hesitance, he holstered the weapon. “Why doncha come in?”

The hiker walked in and was immediately overwhelmed by the sheer number of things in the house. Every surface: table, counter, or floor had boxes, magazines, or pages on it. It smelled like he hadn’t opened a window in a few years. Moving a pile of miscellaneous things from the couch to make room for his new friend, the gunslinger said, “I woulda cleaned if I thought I’d have company.” He probably wouldn’t have, but it was a nice thing to say. “That flask, uh… it yours?”

The walker handed it over and shook his head ‘no’. “My Lord, I haven’t seen this in… shit, a whole lotta years.” He turned it, examining every inch. “Say, boy, you look a little familiar. I dunno, maybe I’m getting old,” he said, chuckling. “I swear I’ve seen your face before.”

There was a page at the hiker’s feet. It was a blog, printed out. It talked about how the earth was flat, how birds aren’t real and how we’re controlled by aliens. All of this was connected.

Staring, narrow-eyed, at the hiker, the fat old man suddenly had a flash of recognition. “Jesus. You’re related to Erik, ain’t you?” He lowered his eyes to the flask now in his hands. “What, he sent you here to give me this?” He laughed. “Oh, the sonofabitch. Yeah, he’s a funny guy.”

On his notebook, ‘How did you know Erik?’

“The guy was crazy, you know? One night, he came into the bar already shitfaced. I was sitting there, minding my own business – the Canadians were playing and I had bet some money on ‘em, so of course I wasn’t having a great night. He sat next to me. Well, he tried at least. The guy missed the fuckin’ stool, fell flat on his ass.” He laughed loudly. “It cheered me up a bit; I’ll give him that. He got back up, stumbling. ‘I think I missed the… the uhhh’ ‘the seat,’ I said. He pointed at me. ‘That’s exactly what I meant, you smart man.’ Anyway, the guy finally made it on the seat and asked the bartender for a double whiskey. So, we sat. We drank and we watched the game, booed when they lost. He bought me a beer to reimburse me for the lost cash. We had a good time.” He toyed with the flask’s cap. “He made what would’ve been a miserable night into something of an alright one.”

He got up and disappeared into the kitchen. The cover of a magazine was stapled to the wall. “ARMAGEDDON IN 2023: HERE’S HOW YOU CAN PREPARE!!!” It was 2026.

From the kitchen, “he came a few more times. He was always drunk as a skunk. But we had a good time.” He came back holding a single beer for himself. “One night, we were laughing and talking, and he got up. ‘Gotta wee,’ he said. He didn’t come back. The morning after, I suddenly couldn’t find my flask,” he raised it up, as if I didn’t know which one he spoke of. “I never saw him again.”

Continuing his journey, he kept walking. He walked until he made peace with Erik stealing, something he never thought he’d be capable of. Or even with him being drunk as a skunk. In a way, he was happy to never have seen that side of him, but he also felt lied to. He always built Erik up in his head, making him the standard for any person he’d meet. Now, he wasn’t sure.

He stopped to sit. He didn’t feel the need to change the band-aids just yet, but he wanted to count the items that were given to him by Erik. There were still twelve. Twelve revelations of the lovely, charming Erik. Erik, the thief. Were all these things stolen?

He took his notebook and opened it to the drawing of the hummingbird. He stared at it for a long time and thought of him. He thought of the last evening they spent together.

He got up. He took the next object; he looked at it, observed it. He had a magnifying glass to deliver. He kept walking.

The hiker was sitting, comfortable, on a porch. Only he wasn’t a hiker just yet. He was just a guy. Before being replaced by hiking boots, he liked to wear canvas sneakers. He had light jeans and a dark green hoodie. It was a chilly summer evening, but it was nonetheless absolutely gorgeous outside. The few clouds in the sky were turning pink with orange highlights and the birds were flying only for the fun of it. There was a slightly cool breeze, but either way the guy enjoyed hoodie weather.

Next to him was Erik. He had on a quarter-zip sweater and nice, brown pants. On his feet were slip-on sandals. They looked comfortable. With an unwavering calmness, he worked on a crossword, sometimes pausing to ponder the leaves on the trees and how the wind danced upon them.

It was quiet; they didn’t utter a sound. Yet it meant so much to both of them.

The hum of a plane in the sky made both of them look up. The guy smiled, hoping to travel one day. He wanted to go everywhere. Just like his uncle had done.

The plane passed, and they were back to their birds and leaves and trees. Erik looked up from his crossword to the buzz of a bird overhead. “Look, a hummingbird.” He sighed. So did the guy. “Your father used to say they were good luck.” He resumed his puzzle. “Would you get me a drink, dear boy?”

The dear boy got up, obedient, and went inside to fetch him a drink. While he was mixing the gin and tonic, he looked at the smart picture frame. Erik in front of the Eiffel Tower. Erik in a rowboat in the canals of Venice. Erik, sitting on a plane, with goggles and a parachute attached to his back, ready for action. He finished mixing the gin and headed back outside.

Handing over the drink, Erik thanked his nephew. The nephew sat down, and the perfect silence resumed once again.

Written by Louis Caissie