Fiction Fragment: Marblehead

  

I rode my bike past the outskirts of Marblehead.

I don’t know what time it was when I left the house. Don’t think I grabbed my phone. Can’t remember if I locked the door. All I know is that after she told me, my stomach dropped, my throat felt tight, and a buzzing started in my head that was somehow inaudible yet deafening, threatening to rip my skull in half if I didn’t get out and get some air. So I did.

I started the ride with speed but without direction. My destination was simply: away. How far could I make it before I needed to turn back? Before my body gave out? 

I rode my bike past the outskirts of Marblehead.

Past a harried mother loading a minivan while balancing a screaming toddler on her hip in a grocery store parking lot. Next to runners huffing along the Charles River with sweaty brows and ruddy cheeks. I dodged tourists and high-strung co-eds in Harvard Square. I passed from the parts of Boston where streets are paved with cobblestone and old money to the industrial waste-inspired stretch of Beacham Street and neighborhoods that campaign promises of revitalization forgot.

I rode my bike past the outskirts of Marblehead.

Took the Community Trail through Lynn to be surrounded by trees and try to feel lost. To try to forget where I was. What had happened. What she said. 

I rode my bike past the outskirts of Marblehead.

From the congestion and confusion of the city to classic New England postcard charm- old colonials in varying shades of L.L. Bean-friendly pastels, windows accentuated with dark shutters. Quaint little shops with useless and overpriced inventory. A tasteful smattering of American flags, not precisely the same as those found in the Deep South, but not entirely different.

I rode my bike past the outskirts of Marblehead.

I rode past the cove to the ocean, where fatigue set in, and the edges of my vision blurred and faltered so that just as the world opened, my ability to see it closed, which was fine because I didn’t want to see the world around me. I needed the world to disappear, to fade away. This is why I left. If I could ride far enough and pedal fast enough- I could escape.

I rode my bike past the outskirts of Marblehead.

But when I pulled myself to a stop, my breath ragged and hollow in my chest, joints rubber and limbs heavy, I heard a chirp. I looked down and saw the incoming call on my watch.

I rode my bike past the outskirts of Marblehead, but no matter how far I traveled, I was still tethered here. 

And he was gone.

Photo by Tiffany Nutt on Unsplash