I didn’t fully comprehend why I lied to my best friend, but I knew it had something to do with someone not understanding an event he or she doesn’t normally see. Like trying to explain viewing a ghost or hearing voices—the only human you’d want to share this with is one who had seen and heard the same thing. Even I doubted my knowing, in the same way someone might disbelieve an after-death experience.

There were swaths of dark land within Rusty that only I have seen, and I can’t explain them to anyone who has viewed only the beautiful landscape. We all have a cavern and an abyss inside, I told myself.

“God, it’s so hot,” Sadie said into my headset. I agreed.

The Alabama summer sun wasn’t a kind friend; it was a clinging, damp, overly needy companion that followed me through the landscape. Heat shimmered through the pine trees, moving in waves off the pavement. My car pumped the air conditioner in vain. My hands slipped on the leather steering wheel as I turned off the exit onto College Street and into Auburn. We’d decided to stop and say hello to Lil on the way to Bayside.

“Sadie,” I said into my headpiece, “I’m going to hang up now in reverence as we pass the War Eagle Club.”

Her laughter was loud and full of memories. “Fine, I’ll follow you to Lil’s.”

I drove toward the low concrete building on the right, slowed, smiled, and honked, as did Sadie. The broken sign out front was exactly the same as it had been twenty-five years ago, announcing the band for the weekend. The side lot was composed of dirt and generations of college students’ spilled beers. I was sure alcohol was the glue preventing the parking lot from disintegrating. A short bus was parked in the lot; the words NO DUI/War Eagle Club Shuttle were painted on the side. They hadn’t had that bus twenty-five years ago.

I slammed on my brakes and made a quick right into the dirt. Sadie laid on her horn, barely missing my back bumper, and she then drove up to the Arby’s parking lot to make a crooked U-turn and return. I stood waiting for her, leaning against my car, the heat nestled in between my shoulder blades and pressing as a hand on top of my head.

Sadie jumped out of her car. “What are you doing?”

I nodded toward the building. “Let’s have a beer.”

“No way.”

“Come on, just one.”

She laughed. “That is exactly what you used to say to get me to come out with you when I’d have a test or project due. Just one, you’d say. It was never just one.”

“It will be this time.”