Sherwood Nation: a novel

by Benjamin Parzybok

  Christopher put his hands on the mayor’s head and took full breaths, and they stayed frozen like that for a long while. A whole new fear had oozed into Christopher, a breath-stealing fear, a dread he’d never experienced.

  They thanked Nevel and Cora and rode slowly in the dark, wary of what they might find lurking there. Crime in the city was several times the rate of crime in Sherwood, according to the news, and that was the statistic for reported crimes. Who knew what transpired in silence.

  Trash littered the streets. Renee knew it was a matter of perception, but the dust in the air felt more intense in the city, a presence you breathed in and out. She stopped to tie a bandana around her face, to hide themselves and filter out the dust.

  “We’re out of water,” Bea said. “We should have taken what they offered.”

  “Zach will have some.”

  “If he’s there.”

  “He’ll be there.”

  “If he let’s us in.”

  “He’ll let us in.”

  A block behind them a car’s headlights bore down on them, the glow diffused by the dust. They raced around a corner, rode up a driveway and hid behind a garage. They heard the car accelerate and turn, saw the strobe of the car’s searchlight bounce up and down between houses.

  “It’s a cop,” Bea said.

  “Is there a curfew?”

  “I don’t know. If they spot us, we have to run.”

  It was quiet behind the garage and felt safer than being on the road. She wished she could lie down there and sleep off the night.

  “Come on,” Bea said.

  A few blocks later they rode headlong into a mass of people, their bodies lit in the moonlight, grappling and fighting. There were fifteen or twenty or thirty—in the dark it was hard to tell—brawling in the middle of an intersection. They were serious, intent on settling some score, the only noise grunts of pain and the brute sounds of violence.

  Bea and Renee were riding too fast and became aware of them too late. In the moment Renee was upon them, adrenalin took over and she found a hole between the grappling bodies and sailed through. Bea followed and was knocked off her bike. She toppled over someone and fell heavily to the ground. A man lunged at her, landing on top, and a second later there was a gunshot and Bea rose up and her attacker didn’t. A circle quickly widened around her and someone yelled “No guns, we said no guns!” Bea turned toward the voice and shot again and in the moonlight Renee thought she saw another figure fall.

  “Bea!” Renee screamed.

  Bea turned in a circle and the figures scattered outward, some running, yelling threats over their shoulders, stumbling into the dark. Renee watched Bea stumble and she heard the stony thud of rocks and realized that they were stoning her from the safety of the dark.

  “Bea, come!” Renee yelled.

  One of the men on the ground was screaming. Bea stumbled again, and felt around for her bike. Renee dropped hers and ran the quarter block back and grabbed Bea’s bike from her. A stone the size of a fist hit Renee’s shoulder and she called out and pushed Bea in front and ran with her bike.

  They ran half a block and mounted their bikes.

  “I’m sorry,” Bea said, and Renee watched her sway. She was aware of the crowd coming from behind, of the man still screaming in the intersection, bleeding from some hole. Bea fell forward, jerking her bike with her, and clattered to the ground.

  Renee dismounted and pulled at her, but she was unconscious. She searched her body and found Bea’s gun in a duct-tape harness under her arm. She couldn’t tell if she saw shapes advancing in the dark or not. She kicked Bea in the back, furious now. “Bea, come on!”

  A moment later Renee felt an iron grip on her leg. “Renee?”

  “Get up right now,” Renee whispered. A stone hit Renee in the chest and she put her elbows up around her face. “Get on your fucking bike.”

  She clutched the handle of the gun to her handlebars, mounted her bike and looked back to see Bea followed.

  They rode fast for a dozen blocks. Behind them they could see a car had arrived at the fight scene. Renee pulled over and handed the gun back to Bea. “Fucking crazy bitch,” Renee said and then gripped her in a tight hug.

  “He was on me,” Bea said, and then bowed her head. “I was scared.”

  Renee could see a dark stain of blood on Bea’s forehead where a rock had struck.

  “You shot two.”

  “I know,” Bea said.

  “Why? Goddamnit, Bea!”

  Bea didn’t answer. They studied the glow of light behind them and then rode on.

  The plan was to grab Zach and bring him back the same night, but by the time they arrived it was near dawn. They were exhausted and thirsty, Bea was bleeding, and Renee had two big welts that made it painful to ride.

  They stood in the door’s alcove outside of Zach’s building and took turns knocking while the other watched the street. After a while they heard shouting from inside and it was clearly not Zach’ voice.

  “Get your gun,” Renee said. She put her ear to the door and listened. Someone on the inside was yelling, “Knock! Knock! Knock!” back at them.

  “What the fuck?” Renee said.

  “Should I shoot the lock out?”

  The knock knock knocks had taken on the tune of jingle bells. They stood in the door well, the street spookily quiet behind them, and listened.

  “Do you think he’s—he’s lost it?” Bea said.

  After a moment Renee said, “I doubt it.”

  “Maybe we should go.”

  “No way—we have to be inside before it’s light.”

  Renee looked up the street, hoping no one else heard the hoarse singing coming from inside. There were a few two- and three-story buildings around the intersection and up the block, and then it went back to typical residential.

  The knock-knock singer went fully hoarse, the voice dissipating into wheezy radio static, and then disappeared altogether. Renee steeled herself and pounded on the door.

  There was a loud crash behind them and Bea swung her gun around wildly. On the sidewalk they could dimly see a broken flower pot, a skeletal stem rising from the shapeless mound of dirt in the wreckage.

  “From above,” Renee said.

  Bea leaned out of the doorway and pointed her gun up. “We’ll shoot, asshole!”

  “Shhh,” Renee said, “for fuck sake. Don’t do any more shooting. If he’s not here we leave.”

  “Unless he’s tied up in there.”

  “Bea?” came Zach’s voice from above. “Is that you?”

  “Yeah! Zach, damn it—let us in.”

  “Who’s us?”

  “Me and—Renee is with me.”

  “I see.” After a moment he said, “I’ll be right there.”

  The door opened and from behind Zach they heard someone say, “They’re here-er!”

  “Who in the fuck is that,” Bea said and pointed her pistol around Zach and into the house.

  “That’s—” Zach waved his arm at Bea’s gun. “He’s my patient. Why are you here? Put away your gun, Bea.”

  “Not until I see him.”

  “You’re not coming inside with a gun out.”

  “Put it away, Bea,” Renee said.

  Bea emitted a defeated growl and holstered it and then pushed past, leaving Renee and Zach standing in the doorway.

  “We’ve had a hell of a night,” she said.

  “Oh? What’s going on? Don’t you have a country to run?”

  “Can I come inside? Can I—” She gestured toward him. She spontaneously leaned in and gripped him in a hug, clutching him tighter than she meant to, tightening her grip on him when she felt the familiar feel of his back. The smell of his neck. The hug returned wa
s light and impatient, and so she let him go.

  “Come in,” he said flatly. “I have to check if Bea has my patient in a half nelson.”

  “She’s good that way.”

  “Matter of opinion.”

  Zach lit a candle and cared for Bea’s head. After, he poured them a little water, and a dim light filtered in from dawn. They told him about their ride and Sherwood and Jamal’s disappearance and asked if he’d come back.

  “I’m not here because I don’t believe in Sherwood,” he said.

  “Oh,” Bea said. “Time for me to leave.” She downed the rest of her water and stood uncomfortably. “Zach—can I—we didn’t sleep—”

  “—Of course, Bea. Why don’t you take my room.”

  Bea caught Renee giving her a quick head shake no and Bea said she’d be fine with the couch. She turned and gave them a back-handed wave and edged her way around the sleeping patient and was gone.

  After a while Zach said, “I wasn’t sure I’d ever see you again. Borders are tightening and the city is getting rougher. At water distribution, people talk about how to sneak across, but they say it’s hard. One man got beat senseless trying.”

  “Probably the city,” Renee said, “afraid of losing important people. My people aren’t authorized to use force at the border.”

  “I don’t know . . .” Zach said. He ran his finger around the rim of his water glass. “I’m thinking about opening my own clinic here, seeing what I can do. I don’t know. I’ve been restless without—either of my jobs. You ever hear of seeding rain clouds?”

  “You haven’t changed one iota. Let’s go talk in your bed.” Renee put her hands over his and smiled up at him and knew it was the cheesiest of smiles but she couldn’t help it. He could rattle on unceasingly. She felt incredibly happy to see him, more so than she’d expected. But she was aware of the division of personalities within her: Maid Marian had a country to run and an agenda. Renee wanted to take Zach upstairs. And in this, Maid Marian’s and Renee’s desires were not mutually exclusive.

  A shaft of sunlight like a golden rod traced out an area of floor in Zach’s room and she could see that there were many projects at work here. On top of his dresser there was a baby food jar of clear red liquid, and when the light hit it, it glowed bright. She tapped the jar and raised her eyebrows. He started to explain but stopped when she began taking her clothes off.

  He was wearing green-plaid pajama bottoms and looked down at them as if to take them off, but did not. She could see that he was not ready to do this.

  “It’s OK, weirdo,” she said, “you can keep them on.” She pulled him into bed and wrapped around him. She pressed her lips against his neck and after a while said, “So here’s the deal. I’m sort of like two people.”

  “I guess.”

  “This one would really like to be with you. I’m not sure the other one can.”

  “How do I work out which one I’m with?”

  “I don’t know,” Renee said.

  With her toes she grabbed the cuffs of Zach’s pajama pants and pulled, lowering them a few inches.

  “Will you come back with us?”

  “I have a patient here.”

  She lowered the pants another notch. “Maybe we could take him with us.”

  “He has a leg wound.”

  “Are you talking sexy to me?”

  ”He’s from Oklahoma, his great grandparents lived through the dust bowl. Static electricity was so intense that nobody shook hands or touched. It could knock you flat.”

  “You are talking sexy.”

  Early the next morning Martin donned Celestina’s dead husband’s clothes. They were tight on him and fashioned after a different era but a suit and hat and a rolling suitcase allowed a sort of disguise. He set off into the streets to find water carriers to rob. He felt driven to provide, by some deeply buried instinct to protect those in your tribe.

  It was odd, he thought, watching a woman sleeping like that. Unsure where her unconscious meandered, toward death or away, while you stood next to her bed. Her lack of participation in the relationship so far had allowed him a level of intimacy that would not have been possible otherwise. He had touched her skin and studied her face. And he enjoyed caring for her with Celestina too. She could be his daughter, if he’d had one, and Celestina his mother, and the trio of generations he found comforting. His eye-hole ached severely, and he jammed the palm of his hand hard over his patch. He hadn’t figured any of it out yet.

  He found a couple of water carriers to follow. Each served a side of the street, and they fell into a synchronous pattern now, meeting at the cart for water, and then knocking at houses on opposite sides, occasionally taking the time to jot down a note at their front doors. They were quick, fleet of foot, and he was a middle-aged, one-eyed hobbling bull in an overly tight suit from the 1950s, the pant legs of which exposed his ankles.

  When they were both at houses, he barreled forward to their cart, grabbed two unit gallons, struggled with the suitcase, got the bottles in and hobbled on.

  “Hey, man.” A water carrier had his hand on his shoulder. “Come on, now. Wait your turn. Where do you live?”

  Martin turned and mimed remorse and the boy smiled.

  “You don’t want to be caught doing that. Give ’em back now.”

  Martin saw the other carrier approaching now too. Martin leaned down to open the suitcase and then rose hard with his fist, catching the pup in the throat. The water carrier fell and writhed on the ground, making choking sounds while the other erupted in a heap of cussing.

  “You tell her the cyclops is here. The cyclops is hunting her,” Martin growled. “That he’s back from the grave she dug for him. You got that? You tell her that.”

  Martin turned and walked away. He counted his steps. At one hundred he turned to look back. He was not being followed. All for two fucking gallons of water, he thought.

  Back home he rifled around in the old woman’s garage until he found some sturdy twine. Cyclops. That had come out of him by surprise, issued from some Greek myth. He touched his eye patch to make sure it was in place, a habit he’d picked up. Inside, he set the newly won gallons on the dresser in the Ranger’s room like a trophy. Celestina hovered in the doorway, watching him.

  “Hello?” the woman said. Her voice was weak.

  “You’re awake.” He smiled at her.

  “Where am I?”

  “I found you on the street last night with your head open.”

  “Oh,” she said meekly. “Is this a clinic?”

  Martin took the twine and cut off four long lengths. “In a manner of speaking,” he said. He took two of the lengths, positioned himself at the end of the bed and proceeded to tie her ankles to the bed posts.

  “No,” she said with alarm. She looked at Celestina in panic. “Please, god, no.” She tried to struggle weakly but he was fast and no stranger to rope.

  “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of you, Ranger.” He patted her legs after he’d finished.

  Celestina had her hand on his arm.

  “No te preocupas, Celestina. It’s temporary, for a little protection, so this one doesn’t go getting us in trouble.”

  He tied her wrists as she fought him. When he was finished, the Ranger turned her head toward the wall and wept.

  “Está OK?” he asked Celestina and she nodded. “Vamos a cuidar. Somos medicos! Agua.” He pointed. “Mas agua por mi doctor.” He patted her on the shoulder. “Doctor Celestina!” They were in this together. He cursed himself for not relieving the carriers of some food rations too. He would do that tomorrow. He had to make a plan.

  He sat down on the side of the bed and dug his fingernails into his leg. The fuck was wrong with him. Revenge was not meted out by an oaf with a baseball bat in a street, two gallons a
t a pop. None of this was fucking planned, he thought. This Ranger was not a substitute for the other. He resolved to get together with a pencil and paper as soon as possible. He was bigger, smarter and luckier than the average bear. It had taken him this far, which, in the end, was pretty much nowhere.

  “Your Maid Marian did this to me.” He pointed to his eye patch.

  The woman studied him sullenly.

  “Listen, hey, I’m not going to hurt you. We saved you, right? But look—she sent her fuckwads for me.” He lifted his eyepatch and showed her, and when she recoiled, he wished he hadn’t. It made him feel sorry for himself all over again. “They shot me in the face and tried to bury me. I was still alive! But I got away!” he said. He put his hands up in the air. “Ta-da!”

  “What did you do?” the Ranger said.

  “Nothing. She didn’t like my business. I’m just saying, she’s no saint. She’s going to bleed your little country dry. Evil queen bee. What’s your name?”

  “Rachel.”

  He patted her leg again. Maybe she’d come in handy somehow.