How It All Goes Down
Part 3: Transit
Lev
- Lev is on the road, not with Kerouac, but with a 15-year-old named Cyrus Finch, CyFi for short.
- CyFi is "umber" (3.21.9), which is what black people are now called. White folks are "sienna" (3.21.9). We guess that makes sunburned white people burnt sienna.
- They met at a mall, where CyFi was disgusted by Lev's dumpster diving. He showed Lev how to get people to just give them food.
- CyFi "ain't no runaway," he's "a run-to" (3.21.10), but he won't tell Lev where they're going.
- That's fine for Lev. He just wants to go somewhere, anywhere. Now they're following railroad tracks and eating road kill…err, "track-kill" (3.21.65) that they pass along the way.
- When they reach Indiana, CyFi starts talking differently, and he reveals that they're going to Joplin, Missouri.
- They stop at a shop in Indiana, and Lev notices CyFi shoplifting.
- Then Cy runs, and Lev has to chase him.
- He finds him, and realizes that Cy's pockets are full of shoplifted goods, which doesn't seem like the honorable CyFi at all.
- Cy confesses that part of his brain is from an Unwind—an Unwind from Joplin, Missouri, to be exact—and that personality sometimes takes over. It's what leads him on this quest.
- He makes Lev take away all the stolen goods, so Lev does…but he keeps a diamond bracelet just in case.