The Swailing

Vegas: A Gamble

When I wake up the auto is no longer moving. I look around and find I am alone and disoriented, trying to remember what is going on and where I am.

Finn's car. Running away. The name of the place comes to me eventually: Vegas.

That's right. We're headed to Los Vegas. Las Vegas. Whatever.

I check my money to make sure I haven't been robbed and abandoned. But the lump of cash is still in my backpack pocket, and Finn left me in his car so he can't be far.

I feel for the lever that tilts the seat back up and look out the window. What I see makes my eyes hurt. Everything is shockingly colorful. Not just nature bright, like sunshine, or the ocean, or a field of green, but bright like a fluorescent rainbow. And glittery. Lit up like fireworks in the pre-dawn light. There are tall buildings and buildings shaped like ice cream cones and buildings shaped like ... are those breasts? They are! They even have skylight windows on the roofs that look like nipples!

Thousands of people stroll the sidewalks, even at this early morning hour. Women in tiny skirts and even tinier tops. Occasionally I see women with no tops at all. Men with brown, leathery skin, women with unusually large lips and matching unusually large boobs. Hair in shades so unnatural that they hurt my eyes.

I am still staring when the car door opens and Finn climbs back in. "Morning sunshine," he says lightly. "Need to use the facilities?"

I nod and open my door to get out, but just sit staring for a moment longer.

"I know. It's a lot to take in."

I laugh. "It's like another planet."

I get out of the car and Finn calls after me, "You might want to get something to eat, too."

I nod, only half paying attention.

In the midst of these cartoonish people, my organic cotton earth-toned clothes stand out like a sore thumb. My hair is its natural shade, my breasts are smallish and you can't see one bit of them. It is hard to believe that this place is only hours from where I live, and the people look like aliens.

I follow the sign that points to the restrooms, but when I open the door I am sure I must be in the wrong place. The floor is covered with soggy paper and the room smells strongly of urine. And maybe vomit. Two of the three toilets are clogged with more paper and who knows what and the seat of the third is spattered and wet looking, like someone missed the commode completely.

Determined not to touch anything, I pull down my pants and hover over the seat in the least offensive stall and relieve myself. I quickly realize that these toilets are different from the ones in Optima and you are supposed to use the tissue to wipe yourself and then flush it down the toilet. I am somewhat shocked by the wastefulness. Tissue down the toilet every single time someone goes to the bathroom. Unreal.

I flush the tiniest wad of paper I can get away with, feeling guilty the whole time. I wash my hands thoroughly and dry them on my pants.

Even though my appetite is almost completely erased by my bathroom experience, I force myself to browse the shelves of the small market inside the fuel station. I don't recognize one single food item. There are no fresh fruits, no vegetables. Everything is in brightly colored plastic wrappers. I pick up one package to see if there is any nutritional information on the back, but there is nothing but a cartoon bear saying "Mmmmm!!!".

In the cooler case I find some kind of sandwich that appears to be on whole grain bread, though I can't be sure – it's brownish, anyway. I grab one and a plastic bottle of water, since I refuse to fill up my empty reusable bottle from that filthy bathroom faucet. I pay the bored looking clerk with Optima money, hoping he gives me the correct change with the strange and colorful bills he pulls from an electronic drawer beneath the counter.