Chapter 9
THERE WASN'T a single car on the two-lane highway until we were nearly to Carrborough Street, but near the point the sparse homesteads grew more dense and transitioned into regular houses, we saw a white Cadillac SUV on its side in the ditch on the right side of the road. Jennie was the first to spot it. She sucked in a breath and held her hand over her open mouth. The undercarriage was facing the road, facing us, and the two top tires were spinning slowly, as if the accident had just happened. There was nobody in sight, but I slowed anyway as we approached.
"Should we stop?" I asked. I brought the truck to a crawl. The Cadillac was directly beside us now. Exhaust rolled in ghostly plumes from the tailpipe. The engine was still running.
"No," said Rivet with finality.
"What if someone needs help?" Jennie argued. "They could be hurt. You know they can't call an ambulance."
"What if 'someone' turned freak-a-boo behind the wheel?" Rivet said. "We're leaving them. Go ahead, Ray."
"I don't see anybody..." I said. Fuck it. I dropped the brake pedal, then shifted into park and cranked up the parking brake below my door. "I'm gonna look. Real quick. You guys stay here."
"No, you're not," said Rivet. I gave him a sidelong glance, then opened the door and stepped out.
"Be careful, Ray," Jennie called. "Don't get close to it." I nodded. Rivet scooted sideways to the steering wheel. "You need to run, go to that side and I'll gun it." Jennie slid into the middle of the bench seat, leaving the passenger side open. I grabbed the axe from the bed of the truck and walked toward the Cadillac.
It had fallen at an angle to the road, putting the hatchback door at the rear closest to the asphalt. The driver's side door was pressed into the ground. The pavement ahead of the pickup was scuffed and streaked, so I figured the Cadillac must have come from town. Was it worse over there? More people than our little neighborhood, that was for sure. We should be heading the other direction, away from town, into the plains. Find a farmhouse somewhere far away from everyone else. Hole up. Wait it out. I shouldn't be here, shouldn't be out of the truck.
Beyond the wrecked Cadillac was a white, three-story bungalow. The Cadillac's grill had dug a wide, earthen trench through the edge of their scrubby front lawn. No sign of movement from the house, nor from the neighbors adjacent to either side. Where the hell was everybody? Not home? Scared to come out? Freak-a-boos already, trapped in their own homes?
Gripping the axe in both hands, muscles tensed, I stepped to the roof side of the toppled vehicle. I could hear the engine idling under the hood, but that, the prattle of the Ford behind me, and my heavy breathing were the only sounds. Every other noise seemed to have been whitewashed into oblivion. The Cadillac had a sunroof, but first I stooped to look through the rear window in the hatchback. Sunlight streamed through the passenger windows, now at the top of the vehicle, illuminating most of the interior. I didn't see anybody, didn't see any movement.
I moved along the side of the Cadillac to look through the sunroof. Beyond the glass, I could see the two front seats and the middle seat behind them as if from a top-down view. All were empty. I breathed out and loosened my white-knuckle grip on the axe. Blood flowed back into my fingers, into my limbs.
"Nothing here," I called, turning back to the truck. Jennie and Rivet were watching me through the window. I started toward them. "Let's go."
Jennie screamed, and my first thought was that something had gotten into the truck. She banged the window, pointed at me. Get in here. Help. I started to run just as something grabbed my ankle and pitched me foreward into the grass.
I shut my eyes reflexively as my face smashed the spindly grass, saving my eyeballs from the dry, needlelike blades, and then rolled onto my back and kicked out. My tennis shoe smacked a face. The grip on my ankle loosened. I scrabbled back, hands and feet. Axe? Shit, the axe. The man was on his belly, legs still out of sight behind the hood of the Cadillac. Crawling toward me. Teeth gnashing. A long red crack split his forehead, blood still wet, dripping. Over his eyes, blinding him.
He got his knees under him and lunged, hands out, chest sliding over crunching grass. His teeth nipped the end of my pinky and I jerked back. I heard wet phlegm rattling in his throat, saw bits of grass scabbed to the wet blood on his face. His feet kicked, sliding, gripping. He lunged forward again and I kicked straight forward, snapping his head back. I rolled away from the Cadillac and lurched to hands and knees. In another world, Jennie screamed. An engine roared. Tires squealed. Were they leaving me? Was Rivet leaving me? I couldn't look. The axe was in the dirt under the man. He ignored it and clawed at the SUV's roof, using it to pull himself up. He gained his feet, then dropped back to his knees and gripped his face tightly. An immense full of howl of pain and sorrow surged out between his fingers, rattling my bones.
Watching that moment of profound struggle, I felt a wave of pity wash over me. He was still fighting it. Whatever darkness was rising to claim him from within, he still had a sliver of sanity left. We could help him, I realized. Maybe I could hold him still long enough to get some pills down his throat. He wasn't gone yet.
The man crumpled lower, dug his elbows into his ribs and touched his forehead to the ground, fingers clawing over his eyes, now merely whimpering. Jesus, it was awful. Get the pills, Ray. You can save him.
An engine roared again, and the Ford soared over the ditch beside the road and struck the man. The truck crunched into the Cadillac and scraped along the roof, metal shrieking, leaving a thick red smear across the white SUV and a garden-hose splash of crimson all the way to the top of the roof.
It was over as abruptly as it started, but the sight of the blood carved a deep scar inside me. Maybe my empathy tied us together in some invisible way, me and that man. Twined a thread of our souls into a single strand. I wonder if, if our world hadn't gone to shit, someone would have found a way to measure empathy, quantify it, like electricity or radio waves.
All I know was that I felt a brief connection with that man, and then something snapped inside me when I saw his insides smear across that metal.
I rose to my feet, knees shaking. The truck had stalled in the middle of the lawn, just past the Cadillac. A rose had bloomed across its windshield. Rivet tumbled out of the driver's seat and ran toward me, followed by Jennie. I found it hard to focus on their voices.
"Ray, you alright?"
"Did he hurt you?"
"...tried to warn you."
"Got that sonofabitch!"
"You don't look so good."
"Stand up, man. There."
"Christ, you're bleeding."
I looked down, but didn't see any fresh blood, didn't feel any pain. Jennie was looking at my face, and I wiped the back of my hand across my forehead. It came away red. I stared. Jesus, it wasn't my blood. The man had gone off like a cherry bomb in a mud puddle. If I'd just moved sooner...
"You...son of a BITCH!" I rounded on Rivet and shoved him. He landed on his ass, shocked, goggles askew. I jumped on him.
"What the hell, Ray!" He tried to fight me off. My hands went around his neck.
"Why'd you kill him!" I roared.
"Ray!" I felt Jennie's hands on my shoulders. I shrugged them off.
"We could have saved him," I shouted. "He wasn't completely gone. We could have saved him. We could have saved him."
The words rolled out like a mantra, but each iteration found them streaming with less anger and more sadness. I collapsed to the ground beside Rivet, crying. "We could have saved him," I sobbed. So much fucking blood.
"You're welcome, asshole," Rivet stood and brushed himself off. "Last time I save your life." I watched through blurred halos of light as he stormed back to the truck. Jennie knelt beside me and put a soft hand on my shoulder.
"We could have saved him," I whispered to her. "Why didn't we even try?"
"We don't know that, Ray. What if we couldn't? He was trying to kill you, and Rivet did what he thought was best. He did it for you. No matter what you're think
ing right now, remember that: He did it for you."
This was all so fucked up. Was there a line with this shit? Some border where humanity ended and the cannibal psychosis began? Did any of it mean anything? It was all shades of gray, shades of brown, muddy watercolors, pigment mixing, blending, dreary and dark, as if the spirit of somber Joshuah Hill itself had possessed its citizens and spurred them to bloodshed.
Rivet swore loudly and Jennie and I both looked up at the truck. Rivet tramped around the the front and lifted the hood, tinkered with something out of sight, then flopped back into the driver's seat without shutting the door.
"Piece of shit won't crank," he called. He hopped back to the exposed engine, banged something, and tried again. "Nothing. Must have blown something. Dammit!" He was angry, and I had the idea that he was taking his anger at me out on the truck. I got up to help, already feeling foolish about my outburst.
"Leave it, Ray," he said. "It's shot."
"I'm sorry, Rivet," I ventured.
"Save it." He pulled my pack out of the truck and thrust it at my chest, then grabbed Jennie's. The cat poked its head out of the half-open zipper and mewed. Jennie trotted over and lifted it out before taking the bag from Rivet.
"Who's a brave kitty?" she cooed. The cat purred and nuzzled her neck. Why couldn't I be that calm?
Rivet came out of the cab with his overstuffed backpack and slung it on, then leaned in for the shovel. He jammed it into the dirt and retied his bandana, which had come loose in our struggle. Since I had the least to carry, I grabbed the duffel.
"Titan's hungry," Jennie announced. "Anybody up for a lunch break?"
Rivet let out a slow sigh of frustration, clearly eager to get into town. My own stomach felt empty. Lunch sounded good. "What do you say, Rivet? Quick lunch?"
Rivet steadfastly ignored me. He said, "I guess I could eat, Jennie." Whatever, I figured. Let him stew. He had a right to be mad at me.
Lunch agreed upon, we broke into the house right beside us and microwaved a pile of the Lean Cuisines, washed down with apple juice and milk from the refrigerator. The frozen dinners were already getting soggy in the duffel, so Rivet consented to trashing the rest of them. We replaced the space with a dozen cans of beef stew. Rivet made a quick search of the premises, but all he found was a bottle of outdated antibiotic ear drops. Some people just don't get sick, I guess.
"Find any cigarettes?" I asked, comfortably full from the meal and aching for a tobacco aperitif.
"Please tell Raymond I didn't find any cigarettes," Rivet said politely to Jennie. She rolled her eyes and said, "And here I thought I was your girlfriend. Do you guys think we should look through the rest of the houses around here? Could be some good stuff."
Rivet shook his head. "Waste of time. We hit that pharmacy, we can do anything. Houses we're just pissing. No, we can head back here for the night, but after we load up at Dinkins. One good thing: At least the power's holding up."
As he said the words, the overhead lights winked off, plummeting the kitchen into shadow. Without the unheard hum of the refrigerator, the silence quickly grew eerie.
"Just had to say it. No, Titan, that's my food. Here, over here. Here kitty."
"We can still come back," I said. "At least we know we can get in and there's nobody else in here. We can also leave most of the food and the cat. They'll probably slow us down."
Rivet nodded agreement before he remembered that he was mad at me. A short time later, we all shouldered our lightened packs and headed out on foot.