333 Miles

333 Miles

  Thirty Years. Halfway to Nowhere. All the Way to Vegas.

  Craig Birk

  333 Mile Publishing

  San Francisco, CA

  Copyright 2010 by 333 Mile Publishing

  All Rights Reserved

  Published by 333 Mile Publishing, San Francisco, California

  This book is fiction. Not all information should be considered accurate. Creative liberties have been taken with data, names, places and information.

  Author's note: All characters depicted in this work of fiction are 18 years of age or older.

  All characters and events are purely fictional. Any resemblance to actual people or events is coincidental and accidental. All celebrity references are fictional and unendorsed.

  LCCN: 2010922166

  ISBN: 978-0-615-32307-7

  Cover Art by: Jessica Whiteside

  www.jessicawhiteside.com

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you to my parents for providing the love, support, and environment to create a life full of opportunity.

  Thank you to my gorgeous wife for helping me to slowly see the real meaning of beauty.

  Thank you to my friends for all the good times. We have been blessed.

  Thank you to the three guys who employed me for a long time. I grew up there in many ways, and it was a lot of fun.

  Chapter One

  Another Friday

  Friday, October 13th, 2006 - 1:22 p.m.

  “Turn around bitch I got a use for you

  Besides, you ain’t got nothin’ better to do…

  And I’m bored”

  – It’s So Easy, Guns N’ Roses

  On a wooden park bench, commanding a panoramic view spanning the blue vastness of the Pacific Ocean and the shoreline up to Torrey Pines, stood a healthy four-year-old seagull. The gull had no name. He did have a long, solid, yellow beak with a curved orange stripe toward the end. Despite his general vigor, like many of his fellow Americans, the seagull was visibly overweight.

  The gull slowly stretched his neck toward the sky, then shook his head profusely and opened his yellow beak widely four times in rapid succession, but no noise was emitted. He was not enjoying the ocean view. Instead, he was intently focused on a nearby Mexican-American family sitting atop a large diagonally patterned red and yellow blanket. The family, consisting of a mother, a father, a nine-year-old boy and a five-year-old girl, had just finished a hearty lunch of burgers and fries. The parents, both of whom were significantly more overweight than the seagull, had already consumed the entirety of their food. The small girl, however, had apparently lost interest in the second half of her bag of fries. Herein lay the seagull’s primary object of desire.

  The bird relied on human interaction for much of his food and had developed very useful stereotypes. Most importantly, the younger, smaller humans were much more likely to mount an attack. But these advances were nearly always harmless and could be ignored or easily evaded. Signs of a physical assault by the larger ones, while rare, should be taken very seriously. He also developed a knack for knowing which humans would stay in one place for a long time and which would change locations more frequently, thereby providing greater access to unattended food. As the gull expected, within minutes, this family had shifted several feet away from the blanket and began kicking a ball back and forth to one another. Lighter-skinned humans usually chose to entertain themselves by passing objects about using their arms, while the darker ones preferred to use their legs. Because of this, the lighter ones tended to be more accurate and dangerous when they threw rocks at the bird, a most annoying and seemingly pointless activity, but an unfortunately common one. All female humans, although they engaged in the throwing of rocks just as often as the males, were essentially harmless. The much darker people, who were quite rare at Ellen Browning Scripps Park in La Jolla, did not usually partake in the passing of objects games and tended to represent a low threat level.

  Unlike humans, seagulls do not waste the obvious opportunities life presents. The seagull first used his legs to jump of the bench, and then flapped his wings in three short bursts, achieving an altitude of five feet. From there, he descended quickly, covering the remaining fifteen feet to the red and yellow target in just a few seconds. The gull landed immediately next to the half-eaten bag of fries, grabbed it with his healthy beak and flew back to his bench, careful to ensure the bag remained upright so none of the fries were spilled.

  Just beyond the park, below a small cliff, light waves peacefully blanketed a rocky beach, infusing a soundtrack only the ocean is capable of. The air in the park was warm and sweet, with just enough humidity to create a soft, pleasant sense of tangibility. A faint smell of cut grass joined forces amicably with the aroma of seawater. In the middle of a brilliant blue sky, whose shade grew slightly lighter further out toward the horizon, the sun was well positioned to overlook every detail. A few miles up the coast, two medium-sized, puffy white clouds imperceptibly made their way inland. The sense of peace was palpable. It was a very average San Diego afternoon.

  Regardless, the seagull did not have the luxury of enjoying a leisurely meal, and he gulped down the remaining fries vengefully. Once finished, undisturbed by humans or other birds, he allowed himself a moment to relax. He again stretched his neck towards the sky, and then settled into a resting position to survey the scene. Thirty seconds later, content with all aspects of life, the seagull again jumped off the bench and took flight. His path led him over the ocean and he looked downwards as he passed over the small cliffs which divided the park and the sea. He lifted his head back up and continued flapping his wings to gain altitude for the next thirty seconds, continuously venturing farther from shore. Once satisfied with his height, the bird banked sharply to the right and began a swooping turn back toward land. At an altitude of forty-five feet, he crossed back over the northeast end of the park and seconds later passed over the Grande Colonial hotel. With no particular destination in mind, the seagull veered to the right again, now peering down at a newly opened restaurant on the site of the old La Jolla Hard Rock Cafe. While doing so, he noticed a slightly uncomfortable feeling in his stomach that was no doubt caused by the greasy fries.

  The seagull veered left in a southern direction over Girard Avenue and then made a right over Pearl Street. With minimal effort but significant relief, he paused between flapping his wings and ejected a large quantity of excrement. Like a fighter plane on a bombing run, the gull banked hard back to the right immediately after releasing his payload and headed back to the park to look for more food.

  The poop began its descent toward land at a sixty-five degree angle relative to the earth but quickly flattened into a straight downward trajectory. Twenty feet from impact, the poop broke into two pieces, with the smaller piece drifting slightly to the left in the breeze.

  At 1:28:13 p.m., Alex Reine was purposefully walking down La Jolla Boulevard. Despite being the fourth most profitable “Financial Advisor” at Pantheon Capital’s San Diego branch at only thirty years of age, Alex still did not have a parking spot in the company garage. Parking spots were the final remaining benefit awarded on the basis of seniority rather than profitability. Thus, Alex had to leave the building and walk four blocks to a paid parking lot if he needed something out of his car, usually change to buy Diet Coke from the vending machine. While annoyed about the $180 a month the spot cost him, he liked having an excuse to get outside and take a short walk a few times a day.

  Alex wore a grey Joseph Abboud suit with barely noticeable thin blue lines forming a wide checker pattern. It perfectly matched the brown Fratelli Rossetti shoes he bought in Milan last summer, which were currently his favorite pair even though he usually preferred black shoes. Tucked in the back of his violet Thomas Pink tie wa
s an Apple iPod nano. When Alex first saw that they made a tie designed to hold an iPod, he exclaimed to the girl he was with at the time that it was “gay” and wondered, “What are things coming to?” Since then, however, he had come around on the idea and he now owned three ties with the multi-functional design.

  It’s So Easy, by Guns N’ Roses played on the earbuds connected to the iPod at a volume loud enough to enjoy but low enough not to block Alex totally from the outside environment. Observing the world from behind a pair of vintage Wayfarer sunglasses, he quietly sang along:

  “It’s so easy, easy

  When everybody’s tryin to

  Please me baby

  Yeah, it’s so easy, easy,

  When everybody’s tryin to please me

  So eaaaasy . . .

  But nothing seems to please me”

  A minute later, just as It’s So Easy transitioned into Nightrain, Alex arrived at the corner of La Jolla Boulevard and Pearl. On the northeast corner lay the one true fast food chain restaurant in downtown La Jolla – Jack in the Box. He paused for a second on the sidewalk, running his hands through his short, slightly wavy, dark-blondish hair which he once proclaimed to be “like Mark McGrath’s.” He received so much ridicule for this comment that he never mentioned it again, even though he continued to believe it was a valid comparison.

  Alex put a lot of effort into maintaining his looks and was fully aware of the many benefits they afforded him. This was equally true with girls, clients and co-workers. Alex stood barely over six feet tall. However, due to a magnetic personality, frequent use of an engaging fake laugh/smile, and an ability to fully integrate his hands and body into his speech, most people remembered him as taller. Alex was equally as comfortable lunching at the yacht club with retired multi-millionaires as he was playing one-dollar liars dice in a dive bar with the surfer crowd in Pacific Beach. People usually liked Alex largely because he liked himself.

  He worked out at least five times a week and was careful what he ate. These efforts, while successful overall, were forced to compete with a robust alcohol intake and frequent Jack in the Box visits. Alex considered if he could justify one now. He remembered he had a salad for dinner the night before and completed a three-mile run before work.

  As he deliberated, a small piece of bird poo landed harmlessly in the bushes next to him. Two tenths of a second later, a larger piece landed directly on the left Fratelli Rossetti, covering the brown leather with white and yellowish goo.

  Some cultures consider it a good omen to be hit by bird shit, but Alex was unaware of this and would not have agreed in any case. He generally considered himself to be a lucky person and was vexed at his misfortune. “Cock Goblin!” he pronounced loud enough to hear himself over the iPod. Anger overcame surprise and misfortune, but by the time Alex located his assailant, the seagull had began an aggressive descent to the right and was already far out of range of any potential revenge.

  The sequence of events left Alex little choice but to enter the Jack in the Box in order to clean his shoe. It would be silly not to enjoy lunch there as well. He reached under his tie with the intention of stopping the iPod, but changed his mind at the last moment and instead turned up the volume and fast forwarded in order to listen to the first thirty seconds of My Michelle.

  The interior of the Jack in the Box was nearly perfectly square-shaped. The registers were thirty-five feet from the front entrance. Just about everything in the restaurant was red, white, black or yellow. Alex noticed the same was true of In-n-Out, McDonalds (only with more yellow of course), Carl’s Jr. (again with more yellow) and Burger King. He wondered if there was something about this color scheme that encouraged burger eating. At one of the half-booth/half-tables on his right, a twenty-three-year-old, slightly overweight, blonde girl was struggling to get her two kids to consume their food items without wiping the condiments all over their Old Navy clothes. There were no other occupied tables, which was strange because it was still within the range of normal lunch hours.

  When Alex emerged from the bathroom minutes later, his shoes looking almost newly polished, two registers were open. An obese lady (crazy, gigantic fat actually), wearing some kind of huge denim skirt with a black shirt, and who may have been about thirty-five years of age, was ordering at the one on the right.

  The left register was empty. From the opposite side of the restaurant, a fortyish man with some type of muscular disability, wearing acid-washed jeans and a classic wife-beater shirt, was lurching heavily toward it. The man was about fifteen to twenty feet away from the available register and was making steady progress despite his handicap. Alex broke into a medium-speed trot and successfully overtook him, gaining the front spot and feeling somewhat relieved he would not have to wait for anyone else to order before him. He was completely oblivious to the fat lady observing him with a disgusted look on her face, her stringy brown bangs held out of her face with one of her pudgy hands.

  The cashier working Alex’s register was a short Mexican male in his late twenties. His name was Jose, according to the red and white name tag attached to his uniform. Though the Jack in the Box employee English as a Second Language program, Jose had become a fluent English speaker over the past two years. In another six months, he would be promoted to shift manager and make more money per month than he ever imagined when he lived just over the border in Tecate, Mexico. So much money, in fact, that it would exceed what Alex earned in a typical day.

  At restaurants, Alex always made an effort to be courteous and to make eye contact with the servers. This practice was the result of a date he had when he was twenty-six in which the girl told him that one of her primary ways to judge a guy was to see how he treated the help. “Because that is probably how he is going to treat me in five years,” she explained cheerfully between bites of a papaya salad.

  The comment stuck with Alex, but he did not afford the same respect to fast food cashiers. “Two-tacos-and-a-sourdough-Jack-with-no-mayo-and-a-medium-Diet-Coke please,” Alex requested in rapid speech, all while leaning back and staring at the black menu with little white letters and numbers and pictures of various meal combinations above the cashier’s head. The words ran together, taking only two seconds to come out of his mouth.

  Nine highly satisfying minutes later, Alex sucked down the last sip of the Diet Coke and re-read for the fourteenth time the paper insert inside the red tray his food was served on. He was by now vaguely aware of its message: it seemed Jack (a tall guy wearing a suit who possessed an abnormally big, round, white head) felt there was a valid comparison between the restaurant’s new sandwiches and those served in the cafes in Saint-Tropez. Alex made a weak mental note that he should try to see Saint-Tropez before he turned thirty-five and would be too old to really enjoy it. Realizing that one probably needs a yacht to do that particular trip properly, he cursed himself lightly for not making more money. Then he made a mental note to try and make more money. This thought led to the realization that he should probably go back to work.

  “Donkey Punch,” he thought to himself.

  After checking his Tag Heuer watch (he had one with a blue face like the one in the Tiger Woods ad, though he really only wanted one after he saw Maria Sharapova promote the women’s version) he sat back in his red plastic chair and exhaled deeply. He subconsciously Al Bundied his right hand halfway into his pants, the lower part of his palm resting on his stomach outside of his Armani dress shirt. He scanned the interior of the Jack in the Box and focused in on the fat lady from the register. She was struggling to scoop out the last of the fries from her jumbo-sized container because her hand did not fit cleanly inside of it. He noticed with some revulsion that it appeared she had already eaten one Jumbo Jack and still had a Sourdough Jack waiting on deck. All of this was being washed down with a large vanilla shake.

  Alex simultaneously grimaced and said quietly aloud to himself, “Gross.” He sat up and exited the restaurant. Energized by the meal and invigorated by the sunshine, Alex
found himself in a very good mood, feeling pleased with himself and his life and no longer bothered by the unfortunate seagull incident. He checked the Tag Heuer again, which now showed that it was 1:40 p.m. Most of the more successful brokers took Friday afternoons off to play golf or drink beers. Alex usually worked diligently until at least five o’clock, finding that this was a good time to get ahead on things without being bothered much. Today, however, he distinctly did not feel like being back in the office.

  He retrieved his Motorola Razr cell phone out of his pants pocket, hit the contacts button and scrolled down to “Deez Nutz,” which was sandwiched between “Danielle” and “Dianna.” Danielle he had gone out with three times, fucked once, and then took on an ill-fated trip to Rosarito where they both got food poisoning from the taco shop outside of the hotel and took turns using the bathroom for the next twenty-four hours. They did not go out together again. He had no idea who Dianna was. “Deez Nutz” was really Mike Bochner, Alex’s best friend from college. Alex pressed the green Send button.