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Long drives to see his mother for Christmas ⋯ father chain smoking Camels (unfiltered) with all the windows rolled up and the vents closed against the cold ⦾ I'd stare out the window at farm houses while my parents, up front, listened to a sequence of local AM stations ⦾ The radio crackled with static every forty-odd miles ⦾ You're a ghost in the machine he said to me once ⦾ And Yeah, he'd say, Hell is like this. White on black.

I saw those lines as a black-and-white movie running in reverse ⋯ the blur of trees and cows and houses like a fast-forwarded film ⦾ In the dark the dashboard lights became campfires in the distance ⦾ I'd stare at her back as she smoked Chesterfields through a slim ivory holder, the tip glowing like a hovering meteor

We'd pull into the driveway and sit for a moment before he turned off the engine, taking stock of the hedge, the house, the lawn ⦾ I'd stumble out stoned from a nicotine fog while mother applied lipstick and a smile ⦾ You're a mess, she'd say, adjusting her coat ⦾ You look like you slept in a sewer.

Grandmother would ask how I was doing in school, and I'd lie ⦾ She'd ask what I wanted to be when I grew up, and I'd lie ⦾ She'd tell me that it wasn't too late to be anything I wanted to be, and I'd lie ⦾ The trees outside were always bare, the sky was cloudy, it was always too cold ⦾ You will be known when your father's gone she once declared while reclining in an embroidered oriental robe

We'd stop for fries on the way home and I would watch mother pull out the lipstick and apply it again ⦾ I always wondered what she was trying to hide when I saw her do that ⦾ Some years later, I got my answer ⦾ Guess we all need something to hide behind