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Allen doesn’t enjoy silence. He’s a product of overstimulation, raised on movie montages and dopamine hits, addicted to the high of imagined freedom. Silence implies absence, and it burns itself into his insecurities.
There is a futile nature in it all; he rolls his rock up the hill and keeps the cogs going, yearning to recreate what he imagines is liberation from the bars of mundanity. Except, he’d hoped it to be some Sisyphean endeavour and not akin to a classroom hamster running on its wheel of life and death, destined to die by the Summer. Deep down, Allen knows he is the latter.
His hands are on the wheel, and he doesn’t know where he’s going, literally.
The night has settled into a low hum of mechanical whirring of automobiles and tyres hissing on wet asphalt. There is no destination, just driving away from a feeling he can’t name. He steers wherever his heart might pull him, trying to mimic the recklessness of youth. He pretends to be a child again, sneaking out, fooling his consciousness that he is still full of life and he never lost it in the first place. It works momentarily, and he chases the high. Like he isn’t an adult who’s lost himself in a world of squares. Stubborn in his belief that he’s destined for something better.
Allen sees an old roller skating rink ahead, a relic from the eighties, neon sign flickering and struggling to uphold its fluorescence. It’s an offer to renew an old flame, This is the part of his movie where something interesting finally happens, Allen thinks.
He’d pull over into the car park, the rink quiet except for the company of mysterious strangers, there for the same reasons he is. The staff member is falling asleep after spraying the hundredth pair of rental skates with freshener, sitting atop the scent of decay. He’d meet someone just as equally strange as him, and something cool and impulsive is exchanged, two ships in the night. Then he’d leave, knowing his presence is temporary, but stubborn in the memories of these strangers. Anything that would shift his world a little.
He drives right past.
He continues to drive, he’s a coward. Because what if none of that happens, what if it’s lonely and empty? Allen can see it, walking in, the employee doesn’t see him, so he’s awkwardly waiting there, tapping his fingers along the desk. He doesn’t even know how to skate that well, so he’d probably just end up rolling uncomfortably. But it won’t even be charming in the way a first date is charmingly clumsy, just sad. Orbiting the polished hardwood floors, going nowhere.
The occasional car passes by as a streak of light before fading, forgotten. Then the silence returns, resting in the dark corners of his car as his hands tighten on the steering wheel, fingers tapping with regret. He should’ve pulled inwards, even if he doesn’t find anyone meaningful, it’s still an experience he can pass down generations as a boastful exploit of his youthful days.
Allen is a grown man, shackled by no one but the forces of his mind. By the time he arms himself with the courage to explore the unknown, it’s already too late, he can’t U-turn here. He could’ve climbed out of the cycle tonight. Disappointment seeps, but before it can catch up to him, he’s turned on the radio, persistently postponing its arrival.
The radio pours out old jazz. Allen tries to hum to it but fails to match the rhythm, the ever-changing improvised rhythm. At some point, it loops again into a catchy chorus, again, he can’t catch it. He feels like he’s running in circles, chasing a meaningless fishing line. This is what life is meant to be about: living recklessly and in the moment, never caught in the past. Jazz is for artists with deep, complicated souls who speak in the language of anything but words because it could never measure its entire complexity. All hundreds of thousands of words and none of them palatable to the artists who crave what can’t be spoken. Allen turns off the radio just as the scat starts, alone in the silence again.
Allen reminds himself that this is all for enjoyment, to ensure he’s never in one spot too long. If he keeps running, the fatigue won’t settle. If he continuously revolves himself in the wonders of life, he’ll never have to witness its unsightly views. He takes the next exit, the freeway begins to feel monotonous after the same mist-heavy trees. It’s strange, he tries to drive spontaneously, blindly picking routes. But every time he encounters a crossroad, he instinctively turns towards the direction of home. He doesn’t even realise it before he’s already turning.
The window is still cracked, the jazz is gone, and silence sits shotgun beside him. It’s all the same, same steering wheel, same freeway, same fog. Allen’s still driving, running from the gnaw of longing and regret, of everything silence dares to echo. But he notices it, names it. And in that moment, it feels less like a threat and more like a companion. It doesn’t go away, he allows it to sit there for a moment.
Maybe not every missed exit is a mistake. Maybe it’s just another loop on the record, still music, even if it skips. And the silence is the opening introduction to a new song.