When Christian, the chiseled-jawed, soot-covered, mirrored-sunglass-wearing smokejumper punched open the swinging doors of the Triple Y Saloon, I had no idea it would soon be over between me and my boyfriend, Ewan, that it would be just a matter of hours before I'd find myself not only single, but homeless, all my belongings tossed out the side of the slow-moving Volkswagen van in which Ewan and I had lived happily for months like fleece-covered gypsies.
Initially, Ewan had to convince me that Dawson City, Yukon, was a good idea after our not-so-lucrative stint driving cabs in Whistler. But I loved Dawson instantly, loved its weird, lonely people, loved the dusty streets, and its garishly painted Victorian homes with the two-by-fours supporting the outside walls. They reminded me of old ladies wearing too much makeup. But as embarassing as it is to admit, the only thing I loved more than the twenty-four hours of summer daylight was the math of it all. In Dawson it was about nineteen men to every woman, a ratio that had a complicated effect on my moral makeup.
If before I was the recipient of the casual male gaze, in Dawson I was a frickin' neon supermodel, a horrible gift to hand to a funny, plain girl with an epic inferiority complex
promotion
fuelled by years of boys picking my blond willowy friends over me. It was like I had been handed special powers, albeit temporary, geographically specific powers, but ones I'd utterly exhaust nonetheless. Men (always men) would come into town after weeks in the wilderness finding gold, paving roads, or fighting fires, to do what frontier men always did: sleep, bathe, gamble and fuck. They'd shave off bills from the fat ball of cash and shove them down my costumed bosom. I had regulars who'd slap my ass, whistle at me, and stare at my tits so often that I began to forget it was very wrong for men to treat women like that. While the attention, however sexist, was intoxicating, I never thought I'd act on my flirtations until Christian. But when I watched him clean his soot-encrusted fingernail with a fork, he instantly turned everything I once loved about Ewan into a set of twee tics.
"Hey, beautiful. Listen. We're going to the Midnight Sun later," Christian said, throwing money on the table. "You be there."
"Okay," I said.
It — I — was that easy.
"Let's fuck in the shower," he yelled over the Aerosmith.
After my shift, I said goodbye to Ewan, who was opening the bar, and a friend and I headed to the Sun to penetrate the tough outer corona of women surrounding the smokejumpers' tables. We felt like sperm wiggling towards the egg. After many drinks and heavy glances my superpowers seemed to be in full force, with the added effect of wiping out all memory of the boyfriend with whom I lived in a van that was our home.
I don't remember how I found myself out back smushed against the Dumpster with Christian's hands up the front of my T-shirt, but I know how I ended up back at his hotel room above the Triple Y Saloon. Christian said, "Let's go back to my hotel room above the Triple Y Saloon," to which I replied, "Okay."
