Dallas Henry and the Gulch

A solitary old man tries to keep his gaze ahead, instead of firmly behind.

Photo by Clark Young on Unsplash

Grogginess made the words on the page blurry, nearly illegible. Dallas Henry had to read and reread the same sentences over and over again, comprehension eluding him every time.

But he was a morning person now.

Adjusting would take time.

Until recently, he was a wake up late and slow kind of person. Never by his own volition would he rise before the sun, let alone early enough to absorb a chapter of The Tilting Daisies, but he was trying. That day, he was even planning on adding to the list: jogging around the neighborhood, and picking up lunch from the grocery.

The night before, this schedule sounded simple, easy, but squinting at the worn pages of the boring book had him wondering what in the world he was thinking. He tossed it to the side before his first cup of coffee even began to cool. His excuse, of course, being that author E.J. Quibblethorn (an absurd name in its own right) was too dull a writer for his sharp and otherwise experienced mind to be able to enjoy.

As he pulled on his walking shoes and shorts, trying to move on to the next to-do, he wondered what Andy saw in the thing.

The book had come from his library, after all.

Dallas thought about what Andy might have said about Quibblethorn’t drivel as he settled into his walk (a jog, if anyone asked). He probably would have insisted that it was clever—“brilliant,” even, as he was keen to call most things that Dallas found tedious. It would have irritated him, whatever he said, but Dallas would have liked to hear it.

He smiled about the argument they might have had, something he could imagine in intricate detail, then frowned when he saw that he was being watched.

The peering neighbor’s mouth flicked into a smile.

They waved.

Dallas glared.

They were all acting this way, lately. Poking their heads around garage doors, trash cans, and car doors whenever they saw him coming. None of them were any good at masking their pity, as if he needed any of that, yet all of them went out of their way to offer their sympathy, as if he knew any of them that well at all.

A few blocks away from home, he gave up on the walk, too. Being made to feel like a fish in a bowl spoiled his appetite for exercise. And besides, the roads were in far too poor a condition. They were much too harsh on his legs and back. So Dr. Ambhers, he decided, must have been wrong about it doing him any good.

Having failed two out of his three daily tasks for yet another morning, Dallas put on another pot of coffee looking sullen. He resolved himself, as the steam rose from a fresh cup, to at least make breakfast: three eggs, two bacon, and a piece of toast.

He ate in silence, and, with Saturday’s paper firmly in hand, resorted back to old habits: scoffing at journalists instead of novelists, neighbors, or doctors.

Two hours later, however, a sound startled him out of a nap he hadn’t intended to take.

The paper was still in his lap. The half-eaten piece of toast was still on his plate. And, worst of all, the day was more than halfway gone.

But time was not about to win.

Forever Fresh—the soulless corporate grocery store they were marketing as anything but another corporate grocery store—was supposed to be his last stop. And it was going to stay that way, dammit.

Even if lunch was now dinner, he was going to go and get one thing right.

Even if it was the only thing he actually managed to do that day, he was going to get himself a disappointing corporate salad.

Dallas shuffled into the affronting luminescence of the place, eager to get it over with. The false cheer, and the plastic attempts at replicating the natural, made him turn up his nose, but he found their quote-unquote “fresh” salad bar at least somewhat serviceable. The condiments were always a bit soggy. The dressing was always a tad stale. The greens looked about as fresh as the cabbages wilting in his fridge from last week’s neglect. But Dr. Ambhers said he needed to eat more “leafy greens,” and what’s more “leafy” than a salad?

The place was repulsive, but it was Andy’s favorite place to shop.

“Isn’t it nice? And it’s just down the road!”

All of the attendants knew him by name, and he knew theirs.

“Lucia is having trouble with her boys.”

He spent a lot of time getting to know them, and they him.

“How are you? How’s your mom?”

That’s how he would have greeted Sara, the tiny blonde teller toward which Dallas carried his sad little salad. She was someone that Andy talked about a lot.

“How was her procedure? Did it go okay?”

But Dallas offered her nothing more than polite familiarity.

He just nodded, and she just smiled, taking his salad and five dollar bill.

Pretending to be in a hurry, they both let the silence linger.

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Dallas,” said Sara after a moment, looking uncomfortable, “but your total is eight eighty three.”

Dallas’s expression soured, but he said nothing.

“You’ve only given me a five.”

“Good grief,” he grumbled.

Muttering about the poor state of the store—and the world, by extension—he handed Sara another bill.

She took it without reaction, offering only a polite grin as she counted back his change.

She reminded him of Andy, too; he, too, couldn’t help but smile.

“You have the most kind eyes.”

He always had a way of saying what Dallas was too afraid to. Sara was probably the only person in the world who understood what they had gone through, and it shone in her eyes. In place of pity or masochistic curiosity, Sara offered him something much more than what he got from most other people: not just sympathy, but empathy, genuine and sincere.

Every time they interacted, Dallas went away wishing that he’d said more. How grateful he was, for her not treating him like everyone else. How much it meant to him that she’d visited them in the hospital. How sorry he was, more than anything, that she’d lost her mother like he’d lost Andy.

But instead, he just swallowed his words and took his change.

“Have a nice day,” said Sara softly as he turned.

But he was already out of earshot.

“It was good to see you,” she said to herself.

“I hope you’re doing alright.”

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