by guest columnist L. J. Pickett (fiction)

Billy Strecker is dead.

A.J. Forest is asleep.

I am sad.

A.J. and I are sitting in my battered black Honda Accord in the heart of a cold November night. My car idles in a lonely corner of the empty racetrack parking lot. The only signs of life are the purr of the engine and exhaust clouds billowing from the tailpipe. I push a button on the armrest. My window gives a soft thump and slides halfway down. The smell of horses and broken dreams drift into the car.

Usually, Billy would be the captain of a caper like this, but he cashed his final ticket five days ago when his heart exploded as he walked up the front steps of his Brownstone apartment. He lingered for a day with tubes in his throat, but he never opened his eyes again.

At the hospital, a scruffy guy wearing a leather motorcycle jacket, maybe 40, knocked on the door and introduced himself as Randall, Billy’s cousin. Randall was the only person who visited, and he only stayed about 20 minutes, long enough to tell me the family was a shitshow and there were not many people to notify.

Billy’s ashes are in a box behind me on a muddy floor mat. Good old Billy always with his unlit cigars, oversized glasses, and endless enthusiasm. He made the decisions. He was the center of our little racetrack world. Billy recruited us to our careers as racetrack regulars. Billy made the plans and carried the conversation ball. What will happen to us now?

Strange thoughts pop into my mind on this gloomy night. Once, maybe 10 years ago, during a lull between races, Billy led a mindless conversation about movies, well, not so much a conversation but one of his monologues. At some point, Billy said, “Pick (my last name is Pickett), you remind me of Gene Hackman, the coach from Hoosiers.” I flipped Billy the bird, but I enjoyed the comparison. I never forgot it. I will never forget Billy.

I don’t want to be in charge, or have A.J. drunk, snoring in my passenger seat, or have my best friend in a small square box.

A soft snore startles me. I watch A.J. sleeping with his pudgy cheek smashed against the glass of the side window. The combination of tequila shots in Billy’s honor, the late hour, the sadness, and the quiet ride to the harness track contributed to A.J.’s slumber. I smile at A.J.’s outfit; black velour running suit, black ski cap, brown wing-tipped shoes.

I’m the youngest member of our unnamed trio. A 44-year-old insurance adjuster by day, now a nocturnal master criminal, A.J. dozes with his mouth open and his lips forming a small doughnut. With a chilling shudder, I realize that A.J. is now my last real racetrack pal and wonder if he will continue to come to the track without Billy.

I lean forward and squint through the smudged windshield. My mind drifts to the box with Billy’s ashes. Yesterday, when I picked up the box from the Bakker Brothers Funeral Home, I was surprised at the small size of the package, barely big enough to hold a dozen of Billy’s victory cigars.

When one of the Bakker Brothers extended the little box to me, mumbling something about, “Sorry for your loss,” I was surprised again. The little box was heavy as a brick. I gently shook the box above the blue plush carpet of the funeral home. It felt more like fine gravel than powder. A dull ache shot into my chest. I began to grasp that this was Billy, “Box-em” Billy Strecker, dead, in a little, heavy box.

I wheeled around and walked out the glass doors. I did not want whichever Bakker Brother was on duty to see me cry.

A.J. sleeps like a baby, temporarily free of sadness. I look at the green numbers on the dashboard clock: 3:12. I wonder when they start getting the horses ready for morning workouts. When does the sun come up? Is there time to complete my mission before racetrack personnel begin stirring? I watch the numbers click to 3:13. The luminous clock numbers glow harshly in the inky blackness.

Other lonely thoughts march through my mind: riding on a bus to Paris Island for boot camp, reading divorce papers from Kathy at the kitchen table of my barren apartment, sitting in a pew as the pastor gave a perfunctory eulogy for my mother, waiting for the doctor to re-enter his office last year with the biopsy that turned out “a little suspicious, but don’t worry about it, you might have another 45 years if you quit smoking.”

I slip a Marlboro between my lips. The flame of my lighter joins the glow of the clock numbers. I fish behind me with my right hand, grab the box, and set it on my thigh. I gently tap it and speak to the cardboard tomb in a whisper:

“Home stretch, pal.”

Hardly a week had passed in the last 20 years when Billy, A.J., and I did not make the drive to either The Big M or Freehold. We each chipped in a third, gambled as a team, and would make at least one ridiculously exotic wager weekly, a one-in-a-million shot like a Pick-5 with all long shots. After the Led Zeppelin song, we called our wild bet the Stairway to Heaven. We would fantasize about cashing a colossal ticket and playing high rollers for a week. We never hit a Stairway to Heaven play. No matter, we were horseplayers, and the big score was a shared dream.

We had time. Let the dream percolate. Someday, we would toss money like confetti. We would win and have the time of our lives. Three middle-aged railbirds joyously in the clubhouse for a heady week, making memories we would take to our graves.

We had time to buy another yearling. Our first two yearling projects didn’t work out too hot. The trotting filly did not even make the races, but we had fun being on the other side of the fence. We would give it another whirl.

Billy would not make more of these memories. He would not even have a grave. The best I could do now was to honor Billy’s request.

“A.J.,” My voice was loud in the quiet car.

“A.J.,” I repeated in an eerie, disembodied voice.

I leaned across the console and tapped his velour knee. A.J. made two rasping snorts, removed his black ski cap, and slid it between the cold glass and his cheek. He sighed and smiled. And fell back asleep.

Suddenly, shocking myself, I twisted and grabbed the box and cradled it carefully under my arm like a fullback running out the clock. I opened the door and stepped out into the cold blackness.

I should have called the track people, but I needed to do this alone for some reason. Maybe next week, I will call and ask the track to announce his name in the program or over the P.A. system. Billy would like that. Perhaps they would name a race in his honor, a low-level claimer, Billy’s favorite race.

My shoes crunched beneath quick steps as I marched across the gravel of the deserted parking lot. A few lonely light bulbs on the side of the concrete building are enough. I know the way.

The front door is open. I walked right into the cavernous racetrack and the familiar smell of horses and dirt. Dreams are in the stillness. I passed the empty betting windows, the silent snack bar, and the ocean of empty chairs. I glanced at Section “C,” where Billy, A.J., and I set up shop for over two decades. Despite the box under my arm, I climbed the wire fence quickly.

I hesitated at the fence’s top and jumped to the racing surface. I landed with a muffled thump, walked across the racetrack’s loose soil, and stopped near the finish line. Billy and I had watched thousands of beautiful horses thunder down this stretch. Walking on the alien surface tonight, I feel like I am walking on the moon.

An unexpected wave of fear washes over me. Disoriented from the strange time, territory, and errand, I fall to my knees as if in prayer. I set the box down in front of me.

My frantic fingers claw at the top of the cardboard box until a corner opens. I poke a finger into the open corner, and a final angry jerk rips the top of the box wide open. I grasp the sides of the box, extend my arms, rise to my feet on shaky legs, pivot a half circle, and spread the ashes with one swoosh. Flecks of gray powder settle on my jacket.

My voice is half scream, half sob. It splits the night.

“Climb that stairway, Billy.”