Urban outfit
Hollis the Mountain Man visits the city
by Sally Cragin
Illustration by Lennie Peterson
Hollis the Mountain Man is enjoying his new job driving for
Tried-'N`-Tru Chips. Every Tuesday and Friday afternoon, he loads up the truck
and delivers cartons of Regla, Vinega-Dubl-Salt, and Bahbeque all over Tritown.
He likes sitting high up in the driver's seat and even makes his deliveries
with a modicum of courtesy. The manager of Tried-'N`-Tru finds Hollis more
reliable than Whitey Leblanc (now drying out in a halfway house near Tritown),
as he takes great care not to jostle the chips.
Hollis realizes that he likes being out and about, and his long-standing
distaste for the more urbanized parts of Tritown gives way to a grudging
tolerance. Thus acclimated, he is less than hostile when Delia Ellis Bell the
Partial Yankee (there was a questionable great-great-grandmother) proposes a
trip to Boston.
"There's no good presents for Mother's Day here," she explains. "I want to go
to Newbury Street and see if I can't get my mum something snazzy."
Hollis disagrees. "You could go to the Ant Barn and see what they have," he
suggests. (The "Ant Barn" is actually the "Antique Barn," but crucial letters
fell off long ago.)
"Oh gahd," she sighs. "There's no shortage of antiques, clutter, bric or brac
at my mother's house. C'mon -- you've been doing all this driving -- we can
take the Winkster. Let's head into town and see what we find."
Hollis's last trip to the metropolis occurred longer ago than he can
remember. An exhibit about hydrology at the Science Museum lured him east, and
he remembers fascinating layer-cake models of glacial strata. He also recalls
traffic, expensive parking, and no street signs. But there is nothing wrong
with trying something new before deciding he hates it.
When he arrives at Delia's, she looks rueful. The Winkster needs a new
alternator. Reluctantly, he agrees to drive his truck. The ride into the city
is mostly uneventful, though he gets nervous when the highway opens up into
four lanes. "Jeez-um," he swears, following the badly marked route to Storrow
Drive. "I haven't seen so many bad drivers since graduation night."
But Delia is excited. She wears a new pair of white painter's pants and has
blow-dried her hair into a modest pouffe. Hollis wears a worn pair of khaki
pants, his workboots unlaced, and a checkered feedstore cap. Delia was going to
sing the theme to Green Acres when she first saw him that morning, but
bit her tongue. He agreed to drive, after all.
Hollis turns off Storrow and makes his way cautiously through Back Bay. There
is no time to admire the closely packed brick buildings before they park. After
a few close calls ("Resident parking only" and a space too small for the
truck), they find a parking garage. Hollis almost backs up when he sees the
prices. "I could eat lunch and dinner on that," he squawks.
But Delia remonstrates: "Look, how often do we come into the city? Just chalk
it up to pavement tax."
Once they are out and walking, Hollis starts to calm down. But he needs
coffee. "Look," he says, "Dunkin' Donuts! I need a cuppa joe."
But Delia shakes her head. "You come all this way for franchise coffee? Let's
try something different."
Hollis rolls his eyes, and Delia, discreetly consulting her map, leads him to
Newbury Street. "Look!" she says. "Javarium -- let's go there!"
They descend into a narrow brick-walled enclosure pulsating with weird music
that sounds like the Tried-'N`-Tru potato-chip machines. "Hmmm," says Delia,
gazing up at the menu. "Lots of different coffees. Expressino,
moccacaffeinated, cappulatte, with `flavor shots.' That sounds cute."
The line is long and moves slowly. Then Hollis notices, with a moment's
horror, a washer through the clerk's eyebrow. No, he thinks, looking more
closely: a fishing hook. He nudges Delia. "Kid got into a casting accident."
Delia glances at the clerk. "No," she whispers. "That's intentional.
Haven't you heard of that piercing thing teenagers do if their parents don't
pay enough attention? Jeez, aren't you glad we're not 17?"
Hollis refrains from saying that even if he were 17, he still wouldn't look
like he wished he landed that smallmouth bass.
When it is their turn to order, Delia has a lot of questions, which the clerk
is happy to answer -- part of his job training includes heavy memorization of
these crazy brews, but nobody in Boston ever wanted anything exotic. "So,"
Delia concludes. "You'd recommend a mocha java double latte with a shot of
almond? Sounds good to me," she says happily. "Hollis, whaddya want?"
Hollis comes out of his reverie. He is trying not to stare at two girls with
purple hair, and instead his eyes alight on photographs showing an
autopsy-in-progress taped to the bare brick walls. "Appetizing," Hollis thinks.
"Hollis!" Delia barks. "You gonna order?"
"Sure," he replies grandly. "Whatever she's having." Who says he can't be
adventurous?
"Six dollars," says the clerk, putting cups on the counter. Hollis is shocked.
At Happy's Coffee and Quick-Stop (30 kinds of doughnuts, 20 kinds of lottery
tickets, one kind of coffee) the joe is 60 cents. "Pavement tax," he sighs,
turning over some bills.
Delia claims an empty table, but as she does, one of the purple-hair girls
approachs Hollis.
"Are you the drummer for Monopuff?" she giggles.
"Mondo-what?" he asks.
"Oh, c'mon, Lolly," says her friend. "We gotta go feed the meter!" She takes
her by the arm, but as they leave, Hollis hears: "I swear he's in Monopuff,
Stacey, hey, you're hurting my arm!"
Hollis joins Delia at the table, and gingerly raises his cup to his lips. "How
is it?" she asks, having missed the fracas.
"Okay," he says. "But for three bucks, you kinda expect something special."
Delia sighs. You can take the boy out of Tritown . . .
They finish and go to explore the street. Windows are filled with things you
never see in Tritown: wind-up toys, uncomfortable-looking underwear, used CDs,
and Japanese food.
"Bait," Hollis mutters. "Crazy city folk."
Delia tsk-tsks, and they cross the street where Hollis is entranced by a
window showing raincoats and boots: "Ruff Terrain."
Delia motions that she'll be next door at the boutique with colored soap and
dried flowers in the window.
Hollis enters and sees a row of parkas. A few other customers might pass for
Tritownies -- baggy pants and hats with earflaps -- but their boots are
suspiciously new and shiny. His old gunga boots are duct taped and Shoe-Goo'd
to within a quarter-inch of their lasts. But he needs a new parka.
A dark green model with extra-large patch pockets catches his eye. He shrugs it
off the hanger -- it is as light as a cobweb. A voice tells him, "That's all
poly-carbon, extra- lite, Silkalon." Hollis wheels around and stares at a
rake-thin saleswoman wearing gold hoop earrings.
"Well, not all the city youth get into casting accidents," he thinks but
just says, "Uh-huh."
"It's insulated to 40 below zero and can withstand a wind chill factor of 200,"
she continues. "You'd be toasty in that at the top of Mt. Washington."
"If ya didn't blow off," Hollis retorts, trying on the parka. It crackles
quietly.
"They've been flying out of the store," she says.
"Pretty nice," he says grudgingly, but then notices other people in the store
giving him curious looks. He turns around -- did he have a leaf in his hair?
That always happens at Myrt's, when you're sitting at the bar. Someone would
ask if you'd been doing yard work. But, no leaf. Hollis lifts a sleeve to
inspect the price tag, a folded parchment sheet. He squints twice -- no, those
are two zeros. And here he thought he had a bargain. "Four hundred
bucks?" he asks, his voice rising.
"That's reasonable for this grade of parka," the saleswoman says soothingly.
"It'll keep you warm on the next Monopuff tour."
Hollis starts getting the creeps. He wriggles out of the jacket and hands it
to the saleswoman. "Gotta feed the meter," he mutters, backing out of the
store.
He nearly bumps into Delia emerging from "Sudsy Tubs Ltd." She carries a pink
shopping bag tied with a silver ribbon.
They walk back to the truck. "Find anything good?" Delia asks, noting her
friend's empty hands.
"Just a lot of thin people hoping for a brush with fame," he replies. "Quite a
change from Tritown, that's for sure."
Sally Cragin teaches Creative Writing at Fitchburg Art Museum.