CTAS 9: Schwinn Continental
Cycling Through a Storm
Previously, in Cycling Through a Storm One: Cycling Through a Storm Two: A House, a Boy, a Girl, a Car, a Dock, a Boat, a Hug Three: Starting Sequence Four: Yacht Race Five: Save the Hat! Six: Squid's Bar Seven: Sailors and Fishermen Eight: Maxhole
Staring at pouring coffee, Vic contemplated: Where did that come from? Likely the beans were sourced somewhere in Central America and then over-roasted for consistency to whatever specs some marketers said and packaged with shiny euphemisms to emotionally prepare people for happily consuming burnt beans. Typical ramblings of Vic’s morning mind before taking brain fog meds. Meds were not available, however, because Vic had not anticipated sleeping away from home. Well.
So, the hot, brewed coffee, post-bean-burning, came steaming and precious from the drip coffee maker after Vic rolled off the couch. Thank you, lovely Bev. And the coffee tasted just fine. And what a fun day was laid out before him, without meds! Vic made a mental note to leave an extra pill or two at Stewie and Bev’s place, but he knew he would not remember. “I should write that down.”
Vic’s phone was dead, though he did not recall powering it off. “May have been alcohol involved,” he mumbled, shrugging at Maxwell.
Maxwell stared at Vic from his station on the countertop.
Pressing the phone’s power button did nothing. Dead like the Monty Python parrot. Vic reached to plug it in again and discovered the problem. “Maxhole!”
Several inches of charging cable remained, savagely nipped, prematurely vasectomized.
“Mrow.” Max loped to the floor, slinked ‘round the corner to the basement stairwell.
“How do they keep him from just crapping on the dirt floor down there?” Vic muttered. He rummaged in the junk drawer for another cable.
Googling Sequoia Minnesota yielded listings for used Toyota SUVs and reviews for a coffee shop in a central Minnesota town. A Breaking News alert on Vic’s phone led him to the New York Times website. He dragged a kitchen chair near the countertop, kept the phone charging. After doing the Wordle puzzle, the NYT Wednesday crossword, and the Mini, he sipped cold coffee. While microwaving the coffee he poured a fresh cup from the drip maker’s hot carafe. Vic laughed at Vic. “Brain needs blood. Must exercise.”
Appraising Stewie’s blue Schwinn Continental, Vic grasped that Stewie’s inseam must be even shorter than previously imagined. The bike was ancient, and built to last forever, the way Stewie liked things. The saddle had to be raised. Vic returned to the kitchen, pulled a Sharpie from the beer stein. He made a mark on the steel seat post so he could put it back the way it was later and found a crescent wrench to raise it. He took the bike for a test spin on the driveway, then adjusted the handlebar, too.
Inside, Vic put on his sailing shoes, which were really barefoot running shoes. His bike cleats wouldn’t work on the Schwinn’s old-school pedals. Vic lifted Maxwell to give him an extra snuggle, then grabbed his backpack and his phone. On the way out he noticed that Max’s water dish was nearly empty.
“Mrow!”
“Just backwash, Dude! No bueno.”
Max rubbed around Vic’s legs while he rinsed and refilled the dish.
Vic’s helmet was likely still in Sequoia’s car, so he stopped first at E-Fred’s Cycle Emporium on the main drag in Hudson. He picked out a cheap helmet that fit well and really wasn’t any less comfortable than his own helmet, though it cost a quarter as much. His only misgiving was the color—the loudest fluorescent pink he’d ever encountered. “Real men can wear pink,” Erick the store owner said.
The day was sunny and the river beautiful. From the bike path on the I94 bridge over the St. Croix, Vic could see sailboats beyond the wide part of the river where the races happened. The boats were too far off for Vic to identify. They appeared to be cruising toward Hudson from somewhere down river—Bayport or Afton. Vic could see the dock at Lark and John’s house where Sequoia had dropped him off the day before.
The heavy Schwinn Continental was slower than Vic’s own bike or the super-light demo bike he needed to retrieve from Sequoia. And the Continental’s vintage pedals—the kind with just a steel spindle and frame with teeth perfect for scraping mud from boots—were making his feet sore through his thin-soled shoes. He continued over the bridge, down to the Minnesota side, then took the county road north. Vic was sure he would remember Dawson’s house when he saw it, though he wasn’t sure now what street it was on. It started with an O, he thought. He tried to just ride, trusting he would remember the way if he didn’t over-think it. That worked.
Vic was about to lean the Schwinn at the corner of the garage when he noticed the bike had a kickstand. “Haven’t used one of these since middle school.” He stood the bike on the driveway. He knocked at the front door. Silence. He knocked again. He rang the doorbell and heard the chimes inside. There wasn’t even a woof from Dawson’s service dog. Vic pulled a Post-It Note pad and a ballpoint from his backpack. The pink pad was warped and still damp from riding in the storm, but some of the middle sheets were dry enough.
Hi Dawson & Liz,
I left my bicycle
in Sequoia’s car
yesterday!
☹️
Will you call me, or
give my number to her?
Thank you!He added his cell phone number and signed his name, then stuck the note to the door at eye level. Unlike his helmet, the note was a mere pastel shade of pink. Still bright enough that they should notice it.
Riding toward the bike shop, Vic was constantly adjusting his feet. There was no comfortable way to push with soft-soled shoes on steel cage pedals. The terrain was hilly, so on the downhills he was able to lift his feet off the pedals and get some relief. But each time he had to climb, the pain grew more intense. Eventually he had no choice but to change shoes. He sat in a grassy spot just beyond the gravel shoulder, pulled his flimsy shoes off, and leaned back a moment, wiggled his toes wide to let them feel the sun and the air. Visible heat ripples should be rising from these feet, Vic thought. He took his riding shoes from the pack.
One of the lingering side effects from Vic’s chemotherapy was peripheral neuropathy. Three years before, his hands, feet, and legs were dull as clay. He could write as well with his left hand as his right, which is to say, with neither. Walking was a challenge because he could not feel his feet or the ground. After the chemotherapy was finished, his hands recovered gradually and then nearly completely because Vic trained himself to constantly massage them to maximize blood flow. That proved an effective restorative therapy for his hands, but he couldn’t do the same thing with his feet. With time and regular acupuncture treatments the dull clay feeling evolved into a constant pins-and-needles tingling from his feet to his thighs. Even bad feelings are better than none at all. Sometimes it seemed like a positive: For instance, his feet weren’t as sensitive to cold as before, so he could spend more time outdoors on frigid winter days without the annoyance of cold feet. But the fact that his feet remained as sensitive to mosquito bites as ever struck Vic as further proof that god was either dead or verily an asshole.
The bike cleats were sloppy on the Schwinn’s pedals. He pressed carefully, with deliberate strokes. No standing up or he’d slip off a pedal and crotch himself. He couldn’t help looking at every car that passed in either direction, as well as on every driveway and parking lot, hoping to spot Sequoia’s red Prius hatchback. He saw a few little cars that were about the right color, and he even coasted into a Walgreen’s lot to get a closer look at one, but it turned out to be a compact Ford.
One block short of the bike shop Vic had another flat tire. Of course he did. He laughed. There were exactly as many repair kits on Stewie’s Schwinn as water bottle cages. He sat down on the side of the road, this time in the shade of a boulevard tree on the relatively cool grass of someone’s front lawn, and he swapped shoes again. His bike cleats weren’t good for walking. Everybody knows flat tires happen in threes, so, counting the two yesterday during the storm, at least that’s done with for now, he thought.
He was within site of the shop’s back service entry when his phone buzzed. He fished it from his jersey pocket, saw the display: Psycle Snobs Cafe
“Hi Bob.”
“Hey Vic. You almost here?”
“I’m not on the schedule ‘til later, right?”
“Yeah, I was just hopin’. Rachel’s got an event scheduled tonight on her end, so she’s super busy. Any chance you can start early?”
“I guess.”
“Awesome. And maybe stay on later, if she needs extra help?
“I think so.”
“Great, see you soon.”
“Sure thing.”
The back door at Psycle Snobs Cafe was locked. Vic thumped the door with one fist. “Wanna get the door, Bob?”
“Real men can wear pink,” said Erick the bike store owner. Ha!
My feet hurt while reading this chapter!