light the beam
i was just a 707 girl trying to make it in a 916 world.
jake steps outside his front door, snaps a picture, sends it to me in a text, nevermind that it’s 6am where i am. i open the message to a shot of a purple beam piercing the sky and one word, KANGZ. he lives in river park, but you can see the laser space cannon from most anywhere in the city — well, on nights when there’s a win, that is. the last time i saw him, i arrived in town on a capital corridor train. he picked me up at valley station and off we went, though the streets of midtown, down a literal memory lane. even though it was december, the memories smothered me like the city’s mid-july blanket of heat.
i was just a 707 girl trying to make it in a 916 world. i felt like an imposter at times, claiming a city where my previous frame of reference was the railroad museum, the delta king, the pony express, the eagle theater. but it didn’t take long before i made it my own, laying claim to the deftones and cake, to !!! and hella, to tera melos and an angle.
living on campus meant long days at capistrano hall, java city breaks, squirrels eating from my hands, being the punk rock kid invited to the greek parties. meant late-night study sessions at panera with all-you-can-drink coffee. meant late-morning post-debauchery brunch at crepeville, fox and goose, or anywhere the brew was strong and the food greasy.
and where is your girl tonight? i caught the bus downtown to spend my evening at the true love, to see jonah and kepi and kevin and allyson play. i’m drinking endless mochas, meeting boys off the internet. i’m there for patio hangs with the besties, splitting nachos, and board games for days.
there was that one summer when the black velvet boy got a paid gig as an elvis impersonator. we’d drive to cal expo, ride the giant wheel, walk the midway, turkey leg in hand, and watch him perform. laughing at the pyrotechnic show, i befriended the kids from christian brothers, the ones who all lived in pocket. we’d supply them with alcohol and i’d reminisce about how i was such a good kid when i was in high school: no sex, no drugs, no alcohol.
on his state fair off days, we’d crate-dig at dimple and watch late 90s action films while draped across the couches in his parents’ air conditioned living room. sometimes we ventured west on i-80 to party with the uc kids. there was always a show of some sort, at someone’s house or the coho, and the afterparty inevitably at sharps and flats. on those nights i adopted the persona of a smoker, drank too much, crashed in beds of boys i’d never sleep with. the next morning, we’d drive back, hungover and sleepy eyed, and when we only had 3,073 miles to go before we hit ocean city, maryland, we knew we were almost home.
other nights, we’d stick to the grid. shows at cap garage and the press club, lipstick at old i, dollar disco popups. we’d sneak alcohol into the townhouse and drink it on the stairs. 2am rolled around and we’d find ourselves stumbling to a friend’s for stir fry and sparks. or, somehow, we’d end up at the now-defunct lyons on 30th and j, where we went certainly not for the service and definitely because it was open 24 hours, a decision we’d always regret because del taco drive-thru was, in hindsight, the better choice, no question.
my time in the city of trees was waterslides at sunsplash, spontaneous road trips to south lake tahoe, to reno. it was ticket office hangs, state hornet hangs, union hangs. round table garlic parmesan twists with ranch, togo’s sandwich and soda, no line. it was walking the levee and philosophizing about life as an angsty 21-year-old, barbequing along the river, hanging out by the water and watching the ducks, the geese, at mckinley or southside park. it’s a place i love, but one i know i can never go back to.
some people called it a cow town, but it was so much more for me. it was the yolo causeway, the tower bridge, the guy west bridge. arco arena, pancake circus, downtown james brown. tule fog, scorching heat, and too many one-way streets. but one day i turned on one that led out of town, and i just never stopped.
Natalye Childress (she/her) is a Berlin-based editor, writer, translator, and sad punk. Her poetry has been nominated for Best of the Net and appears or is forthcoming in BRAWL, Querencia Press, Frozen Sea, DarkWinter Lit Mag, Silly Goose Press, wildness, and elsewhere. She has an MA in creative writing, and her first book, The Aftermath of Forever, was published by Microcosm Publishing.
