#Wattys2015 The Ghost of James Fitzpatrick

Chapter 5

James

Just as my Christened name was James Ryan Fitzpatrick, and people called me Jimmy, or Fitz, the Bridge too had its 'Christened' name, 'The Hernando De Soto Bridge'. It was named after the  first European to lay eyes on the Mississippi River. No one around here referred to The Bridge by its Christened name. To us, it was simply, The Bridge.

Anyone who grew up around her would know this of The Bridge. It was four lanes across, and 95 feet wide. It was built in 1948, and depending upon the time of year, and the river's water levels, there was generally about 100 feet of clearance between the water and The Bridge. It was the guardian of our town.

The Bridge was the way out of Arden. It carried you right up to St. Louis, and over to Chicago. It took you up north to the University, the Metro Station, the airport, or the bus station.

It was a portal in the truest sense of the word. The way out to everything unfamiliar, and dangerous, and adventurous, and different, and new, and wrong, but The Bridge would always stand guard for us, like the taxi driver with the running meter. The Bridge would wait patiently for us to explore, and then bring us back home again to our beds in Arden.

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Below The Bridge, barge traffic came and went like semis on the interstate. Sometimes the freighters came all the way from China, but there are also local fishermen down there just looking for a catfish dinner. In the summer, there were kids on the other side of the sand bars next to the shore, swimming and running around between the trees. Sometimes I was there with them, jumping from the top of the abandoned riverboat, 'The Dixie Belle', knifing our bodies into the green waters below, to feel the darker, colder currents further down beneath our toes. From The Bridge, you could be part of it all, you could see it all.

There's a spot on The Bridge where we pulled our bikes off under the main tower and climbed out onto the railing, which was actually more like a concrete wall. It was wide, maybe five feet across, and I swear to God, my mom would have kill me herself if she knew I sat there, but lots of us did, or I should sat lots of boys did. I know they had been doing it for years; my dad used to hang out there with his friends, smoking cigarettes and telling dirty jokes. The Bridge felt alive to us. It was our 600,000 ton buddy, with bones of steel and concrete for blood.

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Yesterday, I sat atop its concrete wall after practice with a couple of friends, and dangled my my feet over onto the street side. I felt the warmth of a day's worth of sun from the concrete on the back of my thighs.

I saw a few of my teammates pull up on their bikes. I was always happy to see them. A day without their bullshit banter was like a day without sunshine.

"Yo, J.J." I heard my friend Travis yelling out to guys who just pulled up.

"What's up dipshit?" said J.J. He liked to call everyone dipshit. "What're you pansies up to?"

"Robbie," I heard Travis yell loudly as Robbie's bike came to a screeching halt. He had an unlit cigarette hanging from his mouth.

"What's up J.J., Trav, Fitz!" Robbie said while he shook my hand. Robbie lit his cigarette and jumped up onto the ledge next to me.

"Why do you wanna smoke those fuckin' things, man?" asked J.J. "They'll keep you short, you dipshit dwarf."

Robbie pulled up the collar of his letter  jacket.