My Only Friend La Croix - Chapter 4

My boss caught me lurking over by the coffee machine after he arrived near 11AM. He walked over to the fridge and put in a small foil-wrapped cake pan, then he came over and started to pour his own Nespresso.

“Check this out,” he said to me. He walked back over to the fridge and lifted the foil on the pan, tilting it for me to see. “Banana bread.”

“Nice, did you make it?” I asked.

“No, my girlfriend did. My girlfriend is incredible.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. Like, once you try this banana bread, you’ll understand. And get this—she’s a director at Google. Plus, she’s super hot.”

“Sounds like a catch,” I said.

“O-oh yeah. Can’t believe it. So hot.”

I excused myself and went back to my desk, confused by the experience I just had. As long as he considered himself lucky, I figured it was a win, except for the fact that I had to sit there and nod politely as he told me about his super-hot girlfriend. Who am I to get in the way of love?

I fiddled with the code until it made sense as the day turned to evening. I hauled my bike downstairs and zipped up my rain jacket. It was cold and the sun had already gone down. I traced my daily route and couldn’t help but tear up from the cold air. I almost always involuntarily cried on my bike. I loved riding my bike except during the rain which seemed to be most days in my first winter in San Francisco.

I made it home and lugged my bike upstairs, leaving it at my entryway. I ran inside and kicked off my soaking Vans and stripped off my rain jacket and my wet pants. I swapped the gear in my bag, removing my laptop for my yellow climbing shoes and chalk bucket. I put on joggers and a tank top and put wet feet in wet shoes, squelching.

I carried my bike back downstairs. I threw my right leg over the side of my bike and rode between the naked cherry trees on Dorland and coasted down away from Sanchez on the decline most of the way to Harrison before Potrero Hill. I prepared mentally for the fixed-gear leg up the high hill, pumping my quads and calves onto the slim pedals of my single-speed northbound hill on 17^th Street.

Beads of fine mist squirmed their way into my eyes despite my squinting through the sparse rain. My Vans were even more damp and my nose was running from the chill against my face as I coasted, giving myself a breather before the next hill up Mississippi. I slammed that hill and was through the tough parts of the ride, legs burning but relaxed.

I fiddled with my bike lock as I parked outside of Dogpatch Boulders. The expansive gym always reminded me of a dance club, especially on Wednesdays, due to the inordinate mass of post-work 6PM athletes combined with the curated selection of electronic and pop music. I found a cubby for my backpack, kicking off my street shoes. I unloaded my damp chalk bag and La Sportivas into one hand and took off toward the corner of the gym to find a spot on the wall in which I wouldn’t have to elbow other boulderers for a route.

I saw Dirk as he held a lime La Croix, standing completely soaked in his white shirt. It had “Guess” written over it in red to make diagonal stripes and it looked like Dirk had just been in the pool. I knew that he had just finished an intense bout of Stairmaster and he was smiling in conversation with a girl over by the benches. I walked over and gave him a fist bump and made quick eye contact with La Croix.

“Oh hey, Kevin!” he said to me. “Have you met Julie?”

“Hey. I’m not sure—nice to meet you,” I said to her as we shook hands.

“Nice to meet you! How do you know Dirk?” she asked.

I had met Dirk at Mission Cliffs, I told her. Dirk knew everyone and he was a connecting presence within the gym—it seemed like everyone knew Dirk. He always gave off positive, social energy and it was clear that he took his fitness and climbing seriously. I remember thinking that Dirk was around my age when I met him, later to discover that he’s nearly ten years older than I am. I admired his healthy lifestyle.

“Kevin is like, a crusher,” he said to Julie, breaking eye contact with the both of us, looking at the ground.

“Hey, you are too,” I laughed.

“Yeah but you climb like V10,” he said.

“I’ve been climbing for a while.”

“How long have you been climbing?” Julie asked.

“About seven years,” I said.

“I wish I had been climbing that long,” Dirk said. “It’s way too hard to keep up here. Some of these guys climb, you know, everything in the gym.”

“I know what you mean—I see those competition kids absolutely crushing everything, and it makes me wish that I had started younger, but that’s life, you know?” I said.

I watched Julie warm up as I stretched. She would pivot from side to side as she kept her arms straight, reaching for the next plastic hold with poise. She pointed her calves to gain more distance into the next handhold and made quick, precise movements up the wall. She tapped the top and dropped down a few holds, then fell and rolled on the pad. We all exchanged fist bumps.

“So how do you know both know each other?” I asked Julie.

“We met at Mission Cliffs,” she said.

“Ah, right—that’s seemingly how everyone knows Dirk.”

“Yeah. I didn’t realize he worked at Apple when I first met him either,” said Julie.

“Oh yeah? Are you also at Apple?”

“Yep.”

“How do you like it?”

“It’s good. I mean, it’s definitely a job, right?” she said.

“Sure,” I said.

My image of San Francisco was shifting the longer that I lived there. I had arrived with an admiration of those who had the caliber to get into these big tech firms right out of college, although I found myself living in greater ambiguity by the moment. On one hand, I intuited that most of the connections I was making was with those who were the top of their class, and on the other I found them to be solidly normal, average people. I had become disillusioned to the idea that these companies and employees were deserving of the pedestal upon which I had once placed them; being a guy who sort of traipsed into tech, and having gone to a state school, I had thought that San Francisco was the pinnacle of the tech scene, but was that laurel worth anything to me? I vacillated between considering everyone in San Francisco far more normal than I had once thought and that everyone in this city was too busy and successful for their own good, instilled with fucked priorities, crushed under the weight of their own expectant potential, formed into misshapen diamonds under pressure unnatural for a human.

The busyness of the place crept into my skull, and I felt behind. How was it that I barely had time to get all of my necessary adult tasks done, plus tacking on time for hobbies and relaxation? Was this a bad set of choices and planning on my end, or did I have an over-inflated, internalized pull to flashy productivity? I thought about my boss—how he was too busy for his own good, working till 9PM every night, traveling to South Africa for a wedding or Peru for a retreat, but he seemed happy. My gut said that something was off. I felt that these people around me liked to commoditize their experiences as a badge meant for display around them. The accolades build, but does the life become greater?

I thought about my here and now; a conversation about skill level and wishing to have started earlier, combined with my desire to stretch and take the time to warm up. There was no rush and I meant to kept my mind aware of that. Memories of cracking into a tangerine La Croix in my old apartment, preparing to cook fresh ingredients that I had chosen by hand while leisurely pushing a shopping cart filled my head. Those ingredients were not delivered to me by a man beckoned by an app, wrapped in plastic, thrown without care into the backseat of a Camry as one of countless deliveries for the evening. My quads and hamstrings were still tight and sore from the bike ride and I appreciated the luxury to make my own way to the gym in contrast with hopping in an Uber. It might not have been the highest optimization of my time to bike to the gym, but it felt deliberate.

I lugged my bike back up the stairs to Casa Sanchez, ready to collapse for the night. I kicked off my soaking vans and stripped off my puffy jacket and hung it up to dry, then I threw my bike onto the hooks in the ceiling. I gave it a quick wipe so that it wouldn’t drip all over my bookshelf and stripped off my shirt and ran to the fridge. I cracked a coconut La Croix and stripped off my shorts and turned on the shower and the low light in my small bathroom. I stepped in and threw the curtain closed. Thus as always began the “lost hours,” I started to wash my hair and closed my eyes. I put conditioner in and I became absorbed in the feeling of having water run over my head. My vision played no part in my consciousness, then out of nowhere, I was done with my little ritual and had left those lost hours. I didn’t know what I was doing or what I had been thinking but it was time to wash my body. My Only Friend La Croix waited for me on the edge of the bathtub.

I realized how thirsty I was, so I turned around and let the water from the shower head fall into my mouth. I opened my eyes with my head back. I credited La Croix for breaking me from my trance, finishing my shower and toweling off. It was a rainy evening and I was now warm, so any ambitions to leave my apartment had vanished—in fact, I had no ambitions to do anything. I felt antsy in the house. I wanted to go play pool or go out and get a drink and write. The idea of being around strangers while I journaled and sipped an old fashioned felt nice. I put on shorts and did some swinging on my doorframe, stretching my tense muscles after a long evening of climbing. My Only Friend La Croix waited for me still on the edge of the bathtub, glistening with shower drops on his smooth skin. He was only one third full. I chugged him and swapped him for another, fresher La Croix, turning from the fridge to look at my easel.

Who am I kidding? I thought. It was a Wednesday night and I knew I’d be staying in. I floated with La Croix over to my easel. My palette was clean and my knives were lined up nicely on the side of the table. I held the Humboldt #14 in my right hand and hovered over the palette. My hand drew nearer to the glass and toward the glob of Hansa Yellow, the tip of the knife about to break its beautiful surface tension. I stared at the dome of pigment and oil, neck craned low, and I retracted a touch. I set down the knife and I stretched all ten fingers in front of me, rotating and clawing my hands to the side, inspecting for lost oil. I flipped them and checked the back—nothing to see.

My head rose and I straightened my back, twisted my left ankle over my right knee, and bent my torso, pulling into a hip and oblique stretch. I glanced at the bookshelf under my bicycle. I tried to spot where I put My Only Friend La Croix. As I continued the arc of my vision, his presence became obvious to me, and he was exactly where I left him, surely two-thirds full of his false flavor. Waiting for my return.

With a hand on the back of my high stool, I touched my feet down lightly and coasted over to My Only Friend La Croix. I checked my hands again on the way over. I grasped the can and turned to look at what I had done. Not much progress yet, but there will be. I took a sip and sat over by the kitchen under my satin pothos and thought about the Hansa Yellow I planned on adding, smooth layer on smooth layer against the gritty canvas.

I sipped My Only Friend La Croix and tilted him face-front, admiring his cursive much like how I had been viewing my hands: analytical, knowing, attentive. My fleshy, thick-fingered, apeish hands—not particularly suited for delicate work, swollen from heavy use of my tendons while climbing. My Only Friend La Croix snapped me back into focus away from my own hands and beckoned me to look at his soft pink undercoat, accents of green to make waves under his letters. I admired his glistening, aesthetic skin. His shimmer was not so brilliant as to distract me from my true focus. Again, I picked up the knife.