Fragment: Drive

         "People tend to follow their eyes," he said and his eyes are closing. But the words stick, for whatever reason, and I can still imagine them in my head: Tall, hefty people scuffle back and forth, eyes on the ground or dead-set ahead of them- like beetles wearing blinders- and that's what I see.
         The grass was dry, yellow and dead. It rustled in the breeze, snapped and cracked underfoot. So autumn had ended and winter had ended and spring was ending. Summer was upon us all, hot and heady and oppressive with its heat- but to see the fields of wild flowers flanking the sides of the highway made it all worth it. I hadn't seen them since I was young, and only twice then. It was something I didn't share, not anytime with anyone on the long car ride home- because the flowers were yellow, a sea of bright yellow among grass of dead, dry yellow-gray. I would just watch from the window as they blurred past and into memory, then watch the highway rush out, under the tires, past the tires, racing telephone poles across the cracked land until it kissed the horizon and I found myself squinting into the sun.