No. 11 to Los Angeles

I hung out in the Mission during the day, at night frequented a dive bar full of travellers. The dive bar was really just a big, echoing room with peeling-paint walls. You had to buy the booze at the liquor store and bring it in the side entrance. The backpack brigade was out in force and if I heard one more asshole tell me about giving up his job back in London for a life on the open road (itinerary organized by STA, comprehensive insurance plan) I was going to fucking kill them all. Then this guy wandered into the dive bar and stood uncertainly in the doorway. He was wearing a suit and looked lost. I waved him over and gave him a beer. Turned out the dude was from Melbourne Australia, met a chick from New York a couple weeks back, decided to come over and visit her and take in some sights along the way. He said he had no clothes with him, no luggage, just the suit. He was gonna buy some shit in San Fran. He called this New York chick his girlfriend. I wondered if she sensed stalker like I did, but he seemed nice enough.

The hall was dark. The air was chilly and our breath made mists when we spoke. Everyone sucked on cigarettes urgently. Drum'n Bass made us all feel old, sitting their remembering the comedowns of times past, but no one made a move to change the music. It sounded frantic and scrabbling in that place, like the thin voices of the people I spoke to, insisting they were having fun, probably regretting that resignation letter to work. It was tiring. San Francisco was OK, but it was just tiring. I missed Montana. I missed it bad.

I had to catch the train to Los Angeles early. I woke up in the hostel, wandered down to the dive bar and watched two pale and sweating guys still high from the night before fall over. They asked me for a cigarette. I told them to fuck off. I wanted to sit on that damn train, not talk to anyone for nine hours, stare out the window and soak up the sea as we trailed after the coastline all the way down California. But of course when I got on the train it didn't work out like that.

I slept for a while, and woke up to find some kid staring at me. He was sixteen or so, spotty and dopey looking, reddish brown hair and some punk rock t-shirt.

"Can I sit here?" he asked. I looked around. The carriage was empty.

"No." I replied, and closed my eyes again. A minute later he asked:

"Why?"

"Because I'm sleeping and I wanted to stretch out. Why do you wanna sit here?"

His mouth hung open then, and he plunked down onto the seat.

"I'm in a punk rock band.... We play in Portland.... I live in LA."

He spoke like this. Weird staccato sentences, ellipses hanging in the air, filled with a nervous panting as he rocked back and forth frenetically. I wondered if he'd left his Adderall with mommy or something, because he sure as hell needed it. He leaned in close then and the monologue began, and I swear I was fucking speechless. For the first time in my life I had nothing to say. This weird little kid with the spots and the crazy stare drove that smart ass tongue of mine right down my throat. There was nothing to do but move, so I made some excuse, grabbed my shit and changed carriages.

An hour later I looked up from a book and the kid was back, panting and gasping nervously as he struggled over words.

"Hi. So you're, like.... sitting.... here.....Can I just say....your eyes are amazing... are you like twenny one..."

The monologue resumed. Five minutes in a large black lady strode up and tapped him on the shoulder - one of the conductors.

"Stop molesting this girl." she said firmly. The kid stuttered.

"I'm not molesting her! Am I molesting you?"

"Yeah."

There was silence as he took this in.

"Oh. So I should go?" he bleated plaintively.

"Son, leave this lady alone and move on."

The kid moved on and the conductor moved her shit opposite me.

"Apparently he was acting real weird after you left," she said. "Kept kicking chairs and cussing real loud, and several passengers complained about him and said he was wandering around asking after you. I'm gonna sit here and make sure he don't come back."

She plopped down firmly and sure enough the kid kept coming back, kept being driven away by her big brown eyes narrowed to slits, those arms crossed firmly over her ample bosom. We talked some when crazy wasn't around. She showed me pictures of her grandkids, let me say hi to the youngest on the phone. He was five months.

We got to LA and it felt weird. It felt kind of right. You ever have that feeling? You didn't even know something was wrong until it was right, and that was Los Angeles. The crazy kid hovered around me as I waited outside Union Station clutching bags, and then his mom drove up and he left, and my ride came along, and we went to his place in Silverlake, cracked open a few beers. I needed a cigarette to go with the beer and I didn't have any so I walked out onto the balcony in the yard at the back. There were three people hanging out and laughing, and they looked up and smiled when I came over, invited me in, gave me a drink and some cigarettes and we talked shit. I fell in love with them right there and then. They felt right too, and when I had the meetings the next day with the film people my agent hooked me up with, it all felt so damn right. I have a friend, Jonny, who kept telling me this trip would change everything. Everything's changed and everything's changing, and when I hung out the next night with a bunch of smiling, warm, funny, talented people who totally adopted me, I felt a little bit like I'd come home.

Now today - today - I just feel fucking hungover.