I hit the road again the next morning, chasing the coastline as it owed me money. This time, the sky was a scandalous shade of blue—like it was trying to seduce satellites. I stopped trying to make sense of it; skies like that aren’t for understanding, they’re for surrender.
Birds tracked me from old telephone pole to telephone pole, switching positions like they were running surveillance. The kind of feathered agents who don’t fill out paperwork because they already know how the story ends.
Somewhere past a cluster of eucalyptus trees, my phone buzzed. A message from my secret lover:
You’re headed for trouble. Don’t even think of going to D.C. They’re testing things again.
No signature. No context. Just the kind of warning you only take seriously after it’s too late.
A GAS STATION PROPHET
I stopped for gas in a town with one pump, no price signs, and a clerk who looked like he moonlighted as a conspiracy theorist for hire. He watched me with the intensity of a man who sleeps in a tinfoil hat by choice.
“You driving east?” he asked.
“I’m driving away,” I said, which wasn’t an answer but felt close enough.
He leaned in, lowering his voice like the seagulls were listening.
“Word is, the White House has its lights on at 3 a.m. every night this week.”
“And?” I asked.
“And the birds fly in circles over it. Perfect circles. They’re not supposed to do that.”
I nodded as if this were normal gas-pump chit-chat.
He continued:
“Really suspicious time to start that kind of activity. Election season, vaccines being rolled out again, people calling everything 'routine.' Nothing’s ever routine at that hour.”
I didn’t know whether he was unhinged or enlightened, which is usually the sweet spot in American conversation.
THE ROAD TO SOME SECRET I NEVER ASKED FOR
By the time I crossed the state line, the sky had turned a more decisive blue—righteous, almost patriotic. The kind of blue you could imagine squinting down over the Mall, trying to read classified paperwork from orbit.
My secret lover called.
“You heard the rumors, didn’t you?” he said.
“About the White House lights or the avian surveillance program?” I asked.
He exhaled.
“You joke too much to survive what’s coming.”
I told him I’d meet him in Baltimore. He told me Baltimore didn’t exist in the way it used to.
THE LIBRARY OF SUSPICIOUS INTENTIONS
Somewhere along the interstate I passed a billboard:
ELECTION AHEAD. ARE YOU THINKING FOR YOURSELF?
Which sounded less like democratic encouragement and more like a threat from a sentient voting machine.
I pulled into a roadside library—because yes, those exist, if you’re delirious enough or dehydrated enough.
Inside, an elderly librarian was feeding breadcrumbs to a pigeon perched on the reference desk. They both stared at me with synchronized disapproval.
“You’re looking for answers,” she said, not asking but diagnosing.
“I’m looking for coffee,” I corrected.
“No you’re not,” she said. “You’re looking for the pattern.”
“What pattern?”
She slid me a pamphlet with no title, just a blurry photo of the sky and an embossed seal that could’ve been presidential or could’ve been clip art.
Beneath it, in tiny letters:
The truth migrates.
Then the pigeon nodded, which I’m still confident I hallucinated.
WHAT THE SKY KNOWS
I ended the day on a hill overlooking whatever city I’d arrived at—everything blending into one long ribbon of neon, exhaust, and questionable life choices.
Election chatter on the radio.
Rumors about experimental vaccine trials in congressional hallways.
Birds mapping perfect spirals above government buildings.
My secret lover leaving me voicemails that sounded like poetry written under duress.
The sky above it all turning darker, deeper, wiser.
Blue with intent.
Like it knew something the rest of us were still pretending wasn’t happening.