In my head it is and not in the real world. And it’s just a road that goes nowhere and it’s straight as a finger pointing and I’m standing looking along its length. I told someone ‘bout it once, someone at work. How it was there in my head when I was sleeping and sometimes there when I woke. The person I told made some remark about journeys and adventures waiting for to be begun and she sang that line ‘bout how ‘the road is long, with many a winding turn’, and I put her right on the road being straight as a arrow.
I started drawing pictures from memory, pictures of that road and the grass on both sides all tangled and dry and the colour of old rope. And the sky like an unholy bruise and me standing just looking. I’ve pinned those picture up on the wall of my room, till there’s no space more, and now I just lay them down on the floor or stick them with tape to the back of the door.
Maddy, and she’s my wife, she thinks I’m losing it. She says I’m like that guy in the film about space aliens coming down to talk with humans, and he sculpted a mountain out of mashed potato, and then out of dirt and all the dirt piled up in his front room. Maddy says as how I am obsessed the same and maybe I ought to see a doctor ‘bout it.
I say fuck her and I say as how she don’t know shit. Cos, see, I know what the road is and it’s fucking obvious. And Maddy, she oughta know, too.
We been going through a rough patch, me and Maddy, which I know all relationships do. Things has been a little tired between us and a little ordinary. And I remember a time before when Maddy said as how she wanted to know where we was going. I shrugged my shoulders and I said I didn’t know what she meant. And I said I loved her and as how that should be enough for now cos for me it was everything.
Maddy said she understood, which I don’t think she did. She said it was all good and she kissed my neck and put her hand down the front of my pants and I sucked in air and swore under my breath, and like that it was all good.
But then didn’t it all get fucked up? And she says I ain’t exactly no saint in what happened, and she turns it against me, like I was the one who sinned. The guy was nobody and that’s supposed to make it easier on me, and she says if I’d just paid her some attention, more than I had, and if I’d just done that then nothing would’ve happened between them, between this nobody guy and Maddy.
And she knew it was a mistake, soon as it was made, and she came right back and she only kept it from me to protect me from the hurt. But then I found out and it was only after we was married. And she says again how I have my part in what happened.
I got in my car and I just drove out of the city. I drove to nowhere that I knew and I came to this road. It’s not the road in my head exactly, but it’s a road all the same. And I don’t know where it goes. I parked the car and I got out and I just stood there till the night came down and I didn’t know what was what.
Now, there’s Maddy, and she’s my wife after all, and she’s saying as how I should see a doctor; and there’s the road that’s in my head and on a hundred scraps of paper; and there’s the memory of Maddy and a nobody guy touching her and Maddy letting him – and it’s so fucking obvious what the road is all ’bout. And me, well I’m just so chicken-liver shit-scared of that road, cos like I said to Maddy, I love her, and once that was enough and once it was everything, and I don’t know as how I can just walk away from that and I don;t know either how it is I can stay.
Patricia Ann McNair 
In my head it is and not in the real world. And it’s just a road that goes nowhere and it’s straight as a finger pointing and I’m standing looking along its length. I told someone ‘bout it once, someone at work. How it was there in my head when I was sleeping and sometimes there when I woke. The person I told made some remark about journeys and adventures waiting for to be begun and she sang that line ‘bout how ‘the road is long, with many a winding turn’, and I put her right on the road being straight as a arrow.
I started drawing pictures from memory, pictures of that road and the grass on both sides all tangled and dry and the colour of old rope. And the sky like an unholy bruise and me standing just looking. I’ve pinned those picture up on the wall of my room, till there’s no space more, and now I just lay them down on the floor or stick them with tape to the back of the door.
Maddy, and she’s my wife, she thinks I’m losing it. She says I’m like that guy in the film about space aliens coming down to talk with humans, and he sculpted a mountain out of mashed potato, and then out of dirt and all the dirt piled up in his front room. Maddy says as how I am obsessed the same and maybe I ought to see a doctor ‘bout it.
I say fuck her and I say as how she don’t know shit. Cos, see, I know what the road is and it’s fucking obvious. And Maddy, she oughta know, too.
We been going through a rough patch, me and Maddy, which I know all relationships do. Things has been a little tired between us and a little ordinary. And I remember a time before when Maddy said as how she wanted to know where we was going. I shrugged my shoulders and I said I didn’t know what she meant. And I said I loved her and as how that should be enough for now cos for me it was everything.
Maddy said she understood, which I don’t think she did. She said it was all good and she kissed my neck and put her hand down the front of my pants and I sucked in air and swore under my breath, and like that it was all good.
But then didn’t it all get fucked up? And she says I ain’t exactly no saint in what happened, and she turns it against me, like I was the one who sinned. The guy was nobody and that’s supposed to make it easier on me, and she says if I’d just paid her some attention, more than I had, and if I’d just done that then nothing would’ve happened between them, between this nobody guy and Maddy.
And she knew it was a mistake, soon as it was made, and she came right back and she only kept it from me to protect me from the hurt. But then I found out and it was only after we was married. And she says again how I have my part in what happened.
I got in my car and I just drove out of the city. I drove to nowhere that I knew and I came to this road. It’s not the road in my head exactly, but it’s a road all the same. And I don’t know where it goes. I parked the car and I got out and I just stood there till the night came down and I didn’t know what was what.
Now, there’s Maddy, and she’s my wife after all, and she’s saying as how I should see a doctor; and there’s the road that’s in my head and on a hundred scraps of paper; and there’s the memory of Maddy and a nobody guy touching her and Maddy letting him – and it’s so fucking obvious what the road is all ’bout. And me, well I’m just so chicken-liver shit-scared of that road, cos like I said to Maddy, I love her, and once that was enough and once it was everything, and I don’t know as how I can just walk away from that and I don;t know either how it is I can stay.