by J. Thorn
“Lake Erie is beautiful and it’s in your own backyard,” he remembered her saying, her Cleveland pride practically dripping from the words. “You don’t even have to leave Cuyahoga County.”
That was exactly Ravna’s point. They needed to leave the county and escape for a few days. Karen needed time away from her accounts and the pressure that came with being a creative entrepreneur in the twenty-first century, but that would not happen unless they put hundreds of miles between them and the daily grind. A darker thought crept into Ravna’s head, but he quickly dispelled it. He knew the trip would also help to heal his soul after everything that had happened over the past year.
“All set.”
Her sudden appearance startled Ravna. He looked up to see Karen now wearing a thin, transparent beach wrap settled around her hips. It swirled around her shapely legs, kissing her ankles. She wore his favorite sandals, the ones that looked like they could have been worn by the women of ancient Rome. Karen pulled a tight T-shirt over her bikini top, which struggled to cover the belly button piercing nestled within a flat midsection. She piled her dark hair on top of her head, with renegade curls spilling down her cheeks.
“Damn,” Ravna said.
“What?” she asked as if she couldn’t read his face.
“How did I end up snagging a young hottie like you?”
“Beats me,” she said, leaning forward to plant a slow kiss on his cheek. “Definitely ain’t because of your wallet.”
Ravna felt her breath on his face as she gave him a playful look on her way toward the door. Karen slung a bag over one shoulder and looked about the apartment one last time.
“Ready?” she asked.
Ravna nodded. He grabbed his bag, checked again for his phone, and snatched his keys from the kitchen counter. He ran a hand across his closely cropped hair before walking toward the door.
“Thinking of letting it grow out again,” he said, but Karen was already down the hall and out of earshot. Ravna made a mental note to run the idea by her on the long drive. He took one last look at the apartment and the view of Lake Erie before pulling the door shut.
***
He remembered the highways from childhood, but the rest stops and quirky, roadside restaurants had long since been razed and turned into bland, cookie-cutter, fast-food shacks serving the same tasteless sandwiches over miles and miles of blacktop. The aroma of grease fryers hovered over the highway, luring travelers to a quick and salty meal.
As they drove farther into the late afternoon, Karen’s phone made fewer and fewer chirps. Eventually, she placed it in a compartment on the dashboard, content to let it sit idly but within easy grasp.
“Kick us some tunes?” he asked as they rocketed down Interstate 81 toward Winchester, Virginia, on their way to Interstate 66.
“What are you in the mood to hear?” Karen asked as she plugged the audio cable into her phone.
Ravna regretted asking for music as soon as he realized it would be a reason for her to pick up the phone. “Something from my library. No offense or anything.”
“None taken,” Karen responded, unplugging the audio line from her phone and plugging it into his where it rested in the cradle hanging from the dashboard.
When Ravna heard the familiar clicking of shuffling albums within the app, he was pleased her attention was no longer on work.
“Metal?” she asked.
Ravna smiled. He would need a jolt of electric guitar as his back began to ache from hours behind the wheel. Karen let him have thirty or forty seconds of enjoyment before turning the volume down a bit.
“Spoke to my mom yesterday,” she said.
Ravna glanced into his rearview mirror and then at the dashboard in a ploy to ignore her comment. When it didn’t work, he felt obligated to reply. “Yeah?”
“She asked about us.”
“Karen, can we not talk about this now?”
“When can we talk about it, Ravna? How many times do we have to pretend that we’re not serious, that we’re simply having fun together? Maybe I want more than that.”
“You’re twenty-six,” he said. “How do you know what you want?” He regretted the question as soon as it came from his mouth. “Sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. What I meant is that there’s no hurry. Let’s let things naturally evolve.”
Karen winced. She looked out at the beige highway barrier before turning back to face him. “I guess we disagree on the nature of evolution.”
“Funny. Really funny.” Ravna’s gruff words failed to hide the smile underneath. “A family, a house. I don’t know if I’m—”
“I’m not asking you for all of that,” Karen interrupted. “I mean, I’m sure we’ll have that talk at some point, but not while I’m a naïve, gullible, twenty-six-year-old piece of ass.”
“Touché,” Ravna replied.
“I want more than whatever it is we’re calling this.”
Ravna nodded, his hands firmly at ten and two on the steering wheel. “And what are we calling this?” he asked.
“A mini-vacation at Virginia Beach,” she replied. Karen reached over the seatbelt and allowed her hand to slide down the inside of Ravna’s thigh. “It’s for lovers.”
“Works for me,” he said with a grin.
The green highway sign rushed to greet them, announcing a few more miles until Highway 340 in Front Royal, Virginia, would put them at the northern entrance of Skyline Drive. Ravna squinted, lowering his head below the rearview mirror to make sure he saw the number correctly.
“I’ve never been. Heard the scenery is incredible, especially deep into Virginia. It’ll add an hour or two to the drive. Only thirty-five miles per hour the whole way,” he said.
Karen nodded, pulling her hand back but brushing against the outside of Ravna’s jeans, just above his zipper.
“I guess if you’re not in a hurry to get there . . .” The words came out as a suggestive purr.
“Maybe we spend a night in the Blue Ridge Mountains,” Ravna replied.
“Go for it. Can’t say I’ll have a good reason to drive it anytime in the near future.”
Ravna let the black ribbon of Interstate 66 tease him to the east until the exit for the scenic bypass appeared. The early September sun radiated upon them while a tenacious, blue sky held the clouds captive, pushing them beyond the horizon. Ravna turned off the air conditioning inside the car and dropped the windows, pulling in all of the fall fragrances the Blue Ridge Mountains had to offer.
“Heard it can be slow going, especially if you get behind a semi.”
Karen shrugged, her eyes closed and face turned to capture the sun’s rays.
***
“What’s that light?”
Ravna looked down at the blinking red wrench on his dashboard. The majestic Appalachians wrapped around the looping roadway and had kept his attention outside the vehicle rather than inside. The hairpin turns and single-lane traffic made glancing at the speedometer unnecessary.
“Check engine,” Ravna replied. He felt a twinge of uncertainty until he gazed out of his window at the grandeur of it all. “We need to stop for gas soon anyways. I’ll have a look.”
Karen laughed. “Unless there’s a keyboard underneath that hood, I’m not sure what good ‘looking’ at it will do.”
“Funny. God, you’re so funny.” Ravna struggled to hide his amusement with sarcasm.
The sun slipped lower on the western horizon as the weathered peaks of the range turned to dark indigo. Eons of rain, wind, and erosion had robbed the Blue Ridge Mountains of the soaring peaks of younger mountain ranges. According to Native American folklore, the Blue Ridge Mountains hid ancient secrets beneath their blue haze. Streaks of orange sunlight burst through the turquoise sky, and the scent of sweet pine and hickory made a mockery of the paper trees Ravna had hanging from various places inside the car. Traffic thinned as headlights began to cut through the dusk. Ravna saw the rust-colored lights of a service station ignite in the distance, several hundred yar
ds off of Skyline Drive.
“Another mile or so. I think there’s a gas station up there,” he said.
Karen’s infatuation with the scenic highway had begun to wane. She no longer held her head out the window like an excited canine. Instead, she dove into a book of Sudoku and the remnants of an iced coffee from eighty miles ago. “Sure,” she replied, although she wasn’t really listening to him.
Ravna watched as the pickup truck he had followed for the better part of forty-five minutes turned right onto a gravel road, its red brake lights disappearing into the mountain. A glance in the mirror let him know that there were no cars coming up behind. Ravna turned the steering wheel gently to the right and allowed the car to coast up to a pump that appeared to have been around during the 1970s oil embargo. A bell rang twice as he put the car in park.
Karen yawned and tossed her book into the back seat. She tucked the pencil behind her ear and grabbed the latch. “Pee.”
Ravna nodded and unbuckled his seatbelt. Even though Skyline Drive was the most incredible highway he had ever driven, he had still spent hours buckled into a seat. He felt the unmistakable ache in his lower back and buttocks that came after hundreds of miles of driving.
“Fill ’er up? Check yer oil?”
The questions caught Ravna off guard. He could not remember the last time he had pulled into a gas station to be greeted by an attendant. Karen sauntered toward the side of the building, and Ravna suppressed a shot of lust as he turned to face the young man at his window.
“If you could, I’d appreciate that. My check-engine light came on a mile back or so and I don’t want the towing bill if I break down before we get back to the interstate.”
“No sir-ee. You don’t want that at all, sir,” replied the young man.
Ravna looked closely at the boy. He had a tattered, green ball cap on top of slicked-back hair. Grease covered a minor breakout of acne. A silver chain holding a crucifix lay upon his hairless chest. The boy smelled of brake dust and gasoline. Ravna squinted at the embroidered name tag on his mechanic’s shirt.
“No, guess I don’t, Jasper. I’m Ravna. Nice to meet you.”
Jasper thrust his hand through the window, fingernails loaded with dark lines of grime. “Nice to meet you, sir. That’s quite a name ya got there. Don’t have many of those below the Mason-Dixon.”
“I was about to say the same to you,” Ravna replied.
Jasper took a step back to allow him to open the door and exit the vehicle. “Travelin’ with your missus?”
Ravna smiled and nodded his head. “Guessing I should use the facilities too while we’re here.”
Jasper turned his head sideways. A smile crept upon his face, a white burst except where missing teeth created black holes. “Oh, you mean the john! I always fancy at those big Yankee words y’all bring down here with ya. Go ahead, Mr. Ravna. No need for a key. Our facilities are always available to payin’ customers.”
“Well, I appreciate your hospitality, Jasper. Seems like the reputation of southerners is still good.”
Jasper smiled. He turned to spit a wad of tobacco juice into the gravel next to the car’s front tire. He pulled a red handkerchief from his back pocket and made a twirling motion with his right index finger. “Pop the hood ’fore you go?” he asked.
Ravna reached inside the door and felt the latch click. The hood jumped up an inch. Jasper took a step backward and released it without taking his eyes off of Ravna.
“Much obliged.”
Ravna stepped back and glanced toward the side of the building. He knew he hadn’t been talking with Jasper for very long, but thought maybe Karen was spending a little extra time in the restroom, taking care of feminine needs that were beyond his understanding.
“Men’s room on the same side?” he asked.
Jasper shook his head. “Other.”
Ravna nodded and began walking toward the men’s room, but his eyes remained on the women’s room. He looked at the cramped shop attached to a single garage. One light hung over the cash register, swinging in the gentle, late-summer breeze. As he drew closer, he noticed a newspaper machine with a yellowing front page jammed in the window. The headline read something about a mining accident, and Ravna saw 1987 in the masthead.
“Seems like you need a new delivery of papers for your machine,” Ravna said over his shoulder to Jasper, whose top half appeared to be eaten by the car’s hood.
Jasper lifted his head and brushed his cap back with the sleeve on his left arm. “Ain’t got much use for written words ’round here. Most folks content to hear the Good Book on Sundays from the preacher man.”
Ravna stopped and shook his head. The pressure in his bladder trumped his intellectual curiosity as he moved toward the front corner of the building. “Let me know what you find under there. I don’t want to be driving these mountains at night with an engine light on.”
“No, sir. You sure don’t want to be stranded in these mountains.”
Ravna stopped and took a step back toward Jasper. The young man turned and leaned his rear on the car’s bumper, spitting and grinning while wiping grease from his crescent wrench.
“What’s that mean?”
“Don’t mean nuthin’ but what it means, sir. Folks say these old mountains ain’t too happy about being blown apart for the black rock beneath. Many spirits from yonder living in the ancient stone. Hell, some say they don’t even like having folks crossing ’em. Ain’t the way it’s supposed to be and all. At least that’s what some folks say.”
Ravna laughed. He felt the fatigue of the drive wearing his patience thin. “Let me know what you find, and please ask my lady to hang by the car. I’ll be back in a minute.”
“Sure thing, Mr. Ravna. Gaki will wait for ya.”
Ravna froze in mid-step. That name stole the breath from his chest. He took another step toward Jasper, now only a few feet away. “What did you say?”
“I said, ‘Sure thing, Mr. Ravna. I’ll have her wait for ya.’”
Ravna studied the look of confusion on Jasper’s face and decided his bladder could not wait. He waved an arm at the boy and trotted back to the side of the building. He grabbed the rusted handle to the door with “men” scrawled across the top with a permanent marker. Ravna stepped inside, hit the light switch, and began the desperate struggle to relieve himself as quickly as possible.
Back at the car, Jasper waited until the restroom door shut before turning back to face the engine. Another smile broke upon his face.
“Drew says hello, motherfucker.”
***
Ravna heard the unmistakable sound of a flushing toilet. He smiled, happy to know that Karen had not vanished into some backwoods portal from inside the filthy, gas-station bathroom. He heard a mild thump and surmised it was the spring on the ladies-room door pulling shut after she left. Ravna thought that the back walls of each bathroom probably butted up against each other, wrapping behind the office. The mental exercise on the structure’s architecture helped distract him from the exercise of going faster than he could.
Trying to ignore the stench of dried urine, he stood over the toilet, noticing a hole in the wall where a urinal had once stood. Ravna gazed at the hand-scrawled messages on the walls sitting amongst exaggerated sketches of boobs and a gigantic penis. He laughed at how all bathroom graffiti exposed the same juvenile material. It was always about farts, or shitting yourself, or blow jobs. His eyes grazed past several phone numbers promising a good time until they caught something different. Ravna bounced and zipped up his jeans. He flushed with his left hand while leaning over the toilet to take a better look at something scribbled below the paper-towel dispenser. At first, he thought it was nothing more than a stick figure performing a ridiculous sex act, but as he looked closer, Ravna felt his heart lurch inside his chest.
The gaping holes where eyes should have been appeared downtrodden and yet sad. The bald figure stood with its bulbous head atop a thin neck. The creature held its hands in front of its
mouth as if sickened by what might come in or out of it. Even though the drawing was done with a black marker, Ravna could tell the flesh lacked a vibrant tone. The creature’s muscles drooped, and its stomach was grotesque and distended, much like the horrible photos of starving Africans.
Ravna reached out and touched the wall. It felt cool and dead to the touch, much the way he thought the pitiful creature would feel if it were real. He blinked and then grabbed a paper towel from the dispenser. Ravna spread soap on it and ran the water. He tried scrubbing the drawing from the wall, but it did nothing but create running lines of dark ink that crawled toward the floor. He looked at himself in the mirror, and the fear behind his own eyes made him sway. Ravna reached out and placed both hands on the sink to keep from falling.
He knew the drawing could be only one thing.
***
“Can I help you, sir?”
Ravna looked at Jasper and then back to the place where his car had been. “Where’s my car, Jasper?”
“Sorry?”
“My car,” Ravna repeated. His eyes shot from the darkening highway, now cast like thin rust in the glow of the streetlamps surrounding the gas station. “Where is my car?”
“Ain’t seen a vehicle come through for the past hour or two. You’re the first hiker I seen in days.”
“Karen!” Ravna yelled her name and ran toward the opposite side of the restroom, where moments before he had heard the sound of the plumbing. “Karen!”
Ravna stopped in front of the door, where an out-of-order sign hung from a rusted nail that appeared to be twisted rather than hammered into the wood. The door stood open a crack, so Ravna pushed with his foot. His eyes scanned the dark room. His hand trembled, scouring the wall for the light switch. The fluorescent bulb flickered to life, revealing a cracked porcelain toilet. Bands of iron stained the sink while shards of mirror sat blocking the drain. Ravna mumbled to himself as he backed out of the women’s room. He ran back around the building where Jasper stood, leaning against the gas pump.
