It's been a long time.

When I was eighteen and just out of high school, my girlfriend and I spent a lot of time driving the back roads of Tennessee in the middle of the night, looking for places dark and secluded where we could do things that would make her mother blush. Times were different back then, and the air was so clear that the stars could still guide you home. The girl moved on like girls do after a while, but I still spent time on those roads. I've seen things while driving out there, things that are sometimes difficult to explain. I swear I've seen a pack of wild panthers, and I swear that I've seen ghosts walk the roads in the middle of the night.

But that was nothing like the time I found God in a bar.

It was in the early evening on a Wednesday, not much later than 7 o'clock, and I was very drunk. There were three of us there, me and Brad and Lee, coworkers at the factory and the sort of friends you can only be with the guys you work with. We didn't know each others birthdays, or each others favorite color, or our lives before the job or anything like that. We didn't know a lot about anything, I don't think, but we thought we knew more than we did, if you catch my drift.

The bar was dim, as most small-town bars are, and what little lighting there was dimmed and flickered every few minutes. A stuffed crow perched above the bar, just beneath the ceiling. We had been there since at least 3:30, killing our paychecks one cheap beer at a time.

After a while, Lee walked away. He was taking a piss, or hitting on the bartender, or having a cigarette. I didn't know, and it doesn't matter. He was gone for a minute, and that's when the old drunk took his seat next to me.

He leaned over to me, the smell of cheap vodka wafting through the air.

"Don't you worry about them. They're losers."

I looked up and he was staring at me. A half drunk smile broke out on his face.

"You think so?" I smiled.

"I know it." A pause. "People never look up anymore. Did you know that? That's where it all went bad. Back in the early days, a man could look up and see the stars. A man could lose himself looking up into the sky like that. Today all there is is this concrete fucking jungle. You see it here. You see it in Russia. You see it in the back roads of Tennessee."

And that's where he stopped, and my heart skipped a beat.

"Time was," he continued, "You might see a pack of wild panthers walking through a field at night. You might see ghosts traveling down the road. Not no more. Now there's just neon signs and golden arches and gas stations, and there's no room for me no more."

I just stared.

"You know where I went wrong?" He didn't wait for an answer. "My first week on the job. The seventh day. So here I am, working six days straight. I decide to take a break. I'm a great fucking manager, you know that? I'm taking a break, so I'll let everyone else take one too. I'm real generous like that. So I say to everyone, look, you can have the seventh day off too. We can even do stuff together. All of us. Company wide, you know?

"So it all works out for a while. Everyone's happy, everyone loves that day off. But I didn't think of something. After a while, people start to realize, like, hey, who needs to hang out with the big guy? These people got families of their own now, and they don't need me anymore. There's a whole lot of shopping and football and all that shit, so slowly they forget about me, and that's it.

"So you know what I do? I hire this new guy. Bring him into the management circle, you know? Fresh blood. He's like a son to me. So he talks me up to everyone, and all of a sudden, I'm back in everyone's good graces." He stopped. Took a long swig from his mug.

"He's dead now."

I looked at that man for a long time before I asked him.

"Who are you?"

He laughed, and he winked. "You know who I am. I'm the big guy. I was there when you were born, and I'll be there when you're dead. I may be a drunk, and I may be washed up, but they always come back to me. There are always people out there who still look at the sky and wonder who's out there, and I'm always home, and I'm always listening."

"What's it like? Where you're from, I mean." I should've asked more questions. I realized how incredibly close the air felt, how still and slow and immensely powerful against my skin.

He thought about that for a minute. "It's a lot like here," he said, "but the air is clearer. You can still find your way home by the light of the stars." He finished his drink. "I told you before. Those guys you're with are idiots. You're better than them, kid." He clinked his glass against mine, pushed his stool back, and left.

"Well, that was weird. Why'd you even talk to him?" It was Brad. I'd forgotten about him. My head was spinning.

"Did you feel that?" I asked him, my voice shaking.

"Feel what?"

"That guy. That was God."

"You're drunk, man," he laughed, "That was just an old drunk idiot."

"Seriously, man. Didn't you feel anything?"

He stopped. Checked his watch."Maybe something. But hey, it's late. Let's get out of here. We got work and stuff tomorrow."

So that was it. We paid our tab, and walked out. Lee showed back up at some point. He had managed to snag a close parking spot, so he made it to his car first. We waved, clapped each other on the back, and off he went. He shouldn't have been driving. His car weaved between lanes as he drove off.

"Did you believe him?" I finally asked.

"Who, Lee? Yea, I think he was ok to drive. Maybe. I don't know."

"Not Lee. The man in the bar."

"No, I didn't believe that shit. Crazy old drunk."

"You were there. You felt it. You told me you did." I said, and that's when his face changed.

"I didn't feel anything. He was just an old man."

"Look up."

"Fuck you, man."

"Seriously, Brad. Look up. What do you see?"

He did. "I don't see shit, man. I see buildings and airplanes and streetlights. That's it."

He made it to his car all right, assured me he was fine to drive, and left too.

And there I was, walking alone in the middle of the night, and it seemed like forever until I found my car. And I don't know what I was thinking, but I kept walking, and I kept walking, away from the city, and away from the factory. I looked up to the sky, hoping to find the old man's path. Hoping to find the way to the places where you might see a pack of wild panthers in a field, to the places where you might find a ghost traveling down the road, and to the places where the air is so clear you can follow the light of the stars back home.