A Set Of Wheels

by Robert Thurston

  Yep. We own the land and you’re a trespasser. Legally.

  Somebody sold you a rest stop?

  Yep.

  They throw in the Brooklyn Bridge?

  Terry laughs without really laughing.

  Good one, cowboy. Nope, it’s ours. This is the legal property of Wheelers for the Lord. We own a lot of the stops ’round here, not to mention some ranches, a few towns, our own railroad line, and a fast-food franchise chain we call Spokes.

  I don’t get it, Link says. How can you own a rest stop?

  Easy. You freewheelin’ dudes who run the roads may not realize but our federal gummint—gov-er-ment, always screw up that word—anyway, our government is practically bankrupt. As well it should be, with its godless ways and its refusal to recognize and support the spiritual needs of the people. They’re sellin’ federal and state lands just like they did back in homestead days. A bit more expensive than those days, but a bargain anyway if you buy in quantity and hire good lawyers. Wheelers got the money, we buy up what we can. After we’ve all talked for a while, I’d like to invite you guys to our main settlement hereabouts—just a mile or two down the road there. Beautiful place where our people can—

  Sorry, we’re not headed that way, Link says.

  That’s what you think, friend.

  Without a noticeable sign from Terry, the ring of pretty people finishes closing rank in front of us, goes shoulder to shoulder. From out behind parked cars, more pretty people in stiff jeans and checker shirts emerge. They are all smiling. They all have bright teeth. For one of its brief moments, the sun comes out from behind the clouds and my eyes ache from the rays their teeth give off.

  You guys are rough around the edges, Terry says, just the sort we favor as recruits.

  I look over my shoulder. Some Wheelers have appeared from nowhere and casually surround the Mustang. I look back at Terry and her group. Their smiles are so appealing, their eyes so affectionate, that I am confused for a moment and don’t know which one to ask to the prom. I feel dizzy.

  Look, Link says, you want a fight you got one, but I don’t get this at all.

  We don’t fight, Terry says and all her beautiful companions nod. Recruiters don’t fight, we don’t have to. We have some fighters over at the settlement, try them, but you want to throw a few blows here, we’ll get out of your way. So—throw your few punches at the air, get the demons out, then we’ll get down to business about Wheelers for the Lord. Go ahead.

  C’mon, Lee, Link says. Let’s get the hell away from this place.

  What about Victor?

  As if in answer to my question, there’s a scream from inside the restaurant.

  That’s Victor, I say.

  Let him catch up, Link says.

  But Link, we can’t—

  We have to, get moving!

  We walk, almost casually, back to the car. Sure enough, the Wheelers there make way for us, with smiles paralyzed in place. They remain smiling as We climb into the car. Victor comes running out of the restaurant, looking panicked.

  Give me the keys, Lee, Link whispers as Victor rushes toward us.

  You had the keys, I say.

  Shit, Link says and begins hitting the steering wheel with the flat of his left hand.

  What’s the matter, Link?

  I think I left the keys in the ignition. Shit. I don’t do that. Shit.

  The keys are gone from the ignition. Victor reaches the car and begins pounding on the window on my side, screaming for me to open the door. A Wheeler leaning on our hood sends a bright grin through the bug-spattered windshield, and holds up a clean well-manicured little finger, from which dangles, on a shining brand new chain, our keys.

  — 2 —

  I am still disoriented by the Wheeler settlement, having never before seen a complex which integrates the best features of a utopian colony and a concentration camp. The place is more than Terry’s mile or two down the road. Seems as if we pass into another country. Maybe that’s because of all the checkpoints along the way, checkpoints staffed by more wide-smiling great-looking kids in checker shirts and jeans. They always step politely into the road waving clipboards at us to slow us down. Once our drivers are recognized and they make a friendly inspection of the unsavory trio squeezed into the Mustang’s uncomfortable back seat, we’re waved farther down the unusually smooth road, to the next checkpoint. Occasionally we pass other checker-shirted blue-jeaned young people working on the road, making the surface as smooth and well-scrubbed as your average Wheeler.

  Our pair of Wheeler drivers keep up a run of incessantly cheerful chatter. It starts to rain. The Mustang’s windshield wipers perform with their usual reluctance. Checkpointers and road workers wear grey raincoats with hoods. Victor hums to himself, using the wipers’ off-the-beat phrasings as rhythm. Link curses nonstop. I feel caught in the middle of either an avant-garde symphony or a behavioral modification test.

  We start down a long hill. The rain has subtly changed to mist. Everything seems eerie, as if we’re being driven into the middle of a horror movie where we’re merely going to be some vampire’s conventional victims, the dodos he gets before the hero and heroine finally show up. We pass a bent sign that instructs us to watch out for falling rocks. Next few minutes I keep a lookout. No rocks fall. Disappointing. Once Link shouts at the cheerfully chattering drivers to shut up or he’ll use their faces to line latrines. They laugh politely and keep right on chattering.

  We reach the crest of a high rise and suddenly the Wheeler settlement is on view. A large meadowful of mobile homes, all shiny and gathered together in bunches. Well, not bunches exactly. It’s all quite organized. Eight or ten of the mobile homes are arranged in a circle around a sort of mall which clearly is a meticulously planned setting of many-colored benches and vivid flower displays. The effect is both awesome and festive. Circular roads surround each grouping of mobile homes. Other, smaller and straighter roads link the larger roads to each other. It’s a minute before I get the image. The homes are spokes around a central decorated hub with a rim of roadway around them. Spokes, hub, rim. Wheels for the Wheelers. This is a deliberate arrangement and there are many of these simulated wheels spread across the expansive meadow. I ask one of our drivers if this is the main Wheeler camp. He chuckles proudly and says no, this is only a district headquarters. It is only one of the many Wheeler communities. Some of the others are larger and have responsibility for wider geographical areas.

  Wheeler communities are growing by leaps and bounds, he says enthusiastically. It’s fantastic, isn’t it?

  It’s stupid, Link says.

  It’s shit, Victor says.

  It’s, well, okay, I say.

  * * * * *

  A tall full-figured brunette named Lena delivers our indoctrination lecture. Although taller and bigger-boned, she still reminds me a lot of Terry. Her smile as she tells us we’ll like it here seems electronically controlled, set alight by a whole board of microchips. She has a habit of raising her arms and her voice simultaneously, giving her speech the feel of a pep talk or football rally. Considering her size, raising her arms within the narrow confines of the inside of a mobile home is an almost choreographic accomplishment.

  As she speaks I try to escape the sexy gaze of her luminous dark brown eyes by concentrating on the coffee table in front of the couch where Link, Victor, and I sprawl in various stages of ill-postured hostility. The coffee table is like a miniature plastic veldt, with tiny transparent statues of various animals arranged upon its glossy surface. I pick up a plastic antelope and study it. It is finely detailed, with many realistic lines and bumps on its head and body. I'm sure it’d be sold in a better store than your local five and dime. For a while Lena fiddles absentmindedly with a jaguar miniature while she talks. She strokes its body with her long thin fingers. In the course of her talk she mentions that the Wheelers manufacture these tiny animals down in Taos and then sell them in specialty shops all over the country.

  Whatever else, you must b
elieve in God, she says.

  Not giving God much thought these days, I say.

  Didja ever?

  I shrug.

  I understand, she says, life’s hassle enough when you got to get out on the streets or the road and grab what you can.

  You been reading my mail.

  She laughs, a shade too loudly.

  Wheelers know the malaises, she says, that guys like you face. The rootlessness of your lives, purposelessness of your existence. Wheelers aren’t ivory tower gospel preachers with out-of-date teachings, and we aren’t mindwashed cult members either. Wheelers become Wheelers by choice. Eventually, at any rate. We’ve traveled the roads, hung out in the cities, shoveled shit in the country. We have no formal set of ideas, just the need to bring God to everyone. We just care about people, simple?

  Sounds quite open, I say.

  It is, she says.

  No restrictions, I say.

  Lena has expected the comment.

  Course there’re restrictions, pal. Nothing’s worth anything you don’t give up something, that’s one of our mottoes,

  What do you give up?

  We give up unnecessary diversions. Drugs, liquor, sex.

  Sex?

  Yes. I suppose that upsets you, pal.

  Well, it does sort of reduce my interest. I was just beginning to take a shine to you, Lena.

  She glares at me for that. She’s mad. I feel a surge of energy, cheered by her anger.

  Don’t even make a joke about it, pal, she says.

  She continues with her lecture. It’s obviously prepared stuff. At times she reminds me of every preacher I’ve ever known. What am I saying, known? The only preachers I ever seen are on independent TV stations. Well, she does remind me of them at least.

  She says the Wheelers offer everything anyone could ever want—food, clothing, shelter. Even luxuries.

  We have our own cable TV system, stations from all over brought in by a vast array of our own microwave antennas. Most movies and TV programs ever made in the world are available on our library of videocassettes. We even got a porno channel.

  But you don’t allow sex, I say.

  That’s right.

  What’s the good of a porno channel?

  Don’t know, pal, I never watch it. Forget porno, we got to talk about God.

  Does He have a show on the porno channel?

  She looks like she wants to hit me. Link is amused, he keeps nudging me. But I’m not really baiting Lena, I am genuinely confused.

  All we ask, Lena says, is that you believe in God—in your own way, in whatever system, in whatever bizarre set of practices. Whatever God you want. The God of the Christians or the Hebrews. The God of the Mohammedans, or Allah, or whatever those guys call him. Even some god from ancient Greece or Rome. We have one group that specializes in Jupiter and Hera.

  That’s really mixing it up, Link says.

  What? she says.

  One Roman, one Greek, he says.

  If you say so, pal.

  She takes a deep breath.

  Look, she says, apparently getting down to basics. We don’t give a fuck what God you believe in.

  I blink a lot. Is this a new approach, speaking to the potential convert in his own language? I am shocked.

  We just want you to take God to your heart, she goes on. Actually, we aren’t so much for God as we are against godlessness. It’s godlessness that’s pressed us toward sin, decadence, the sheer confusion of life today. Godlessness has taken the vitality out of humans. That’s what godlessness is, in a way, lack of vitality. God equals vitality, you see? So all we ask of you guys is that you believe in God, simple?

  Why don’t you just start up a string of health clubs? I say and Link starts laughing uproariously.

  All right, idiots, Lena says. Clowns. Forget that shit. Look, we’re gonna keep trying till you capitulate. The wheels are always turning here. Nobody gets out of a Wheeler camp without God to let you through the checkpoint. You’ll all come around. Everybody does.

  You’re gonna keep us here till we believe, I say.

  Right. You don’t have to believe right off. Just live with us, let us convince you.

  Let me ask you one thing.

  Shoot.

  What if I said I believe in God even if deep down I don’t?

  She laughs.

  You’re working your way toward the advanced courses, pal. That question doesn’t usually come up right off like that. Okay. You say whatever you want. We don’t worry about what goes on inside your head. But, see, it ain’t as easy as you think. I look at it this way. You’re no longer saying you don’t believe, see, and that’s better than damning God with your disbelief. At least the words are there, see? You say you believe in God even if you don’t. You make a public declaration. You become another convert whether you mean it or not. You’re listed on God’s traffic log as a believer and whatever you really believe, you’ve helped anyway. The larger our numbers are, the more new people we can convert. So, even with your lie, you’ve helped us anyway. So, see, it doesn’t matter what you think, long as you say it.

  Okay, so I’ll say it.

  Uneasily, Link moves his body away from mine.

  Okay, so we’ll give you the fast shuffle in courses and you’ll have your assignment in a week.

  Assignment?

  Yes, you have to act on your belief.

  I thought you said we could go.

  True, but first you got to do something for the Wheelers.

  You’ve abducted us. This is a shanghai!

  That’s right, pal. We don’t mince words.

  Oh, shit.

  Well, you guys think about it. We don’t push. We like having you around. Enjoy yourself.

  She starts toward the door.

  Wait! I call after her. What kind of assignments?

  Oh, we have lots of work. In the fields, taking care of the settlements, soul-recruiting at rest stops, computer programming. All kinds of work. Something right up your guys’ alley might be our train gang.

  What? We get to rail-split for the Lord?

  It’s not that kind of train gang at all. You’d be surprised. Later.

  We stew in silence for a while after she leaves us. Link mutters, this is worse than Anton and his homilies, we should’ve stayed at the Ramada. Victor says it doesn’t sound so bad. Link says, what’s good about it?

  Looks like a nice shuck. I might like to take them for all I can get. At least a few good meals and some duds.

  That tears it, Link says. That’s just like you. Selling your soul for some new clothes.

  It’s only practical. You could use a new shirt yourself, Link. That one smells like last year’s garbage.

  Victor squirms out of Link’s reach, although Link doesn’t even make a grab for him. I play with the toy animals. There’s a particularly fierce-looking transparent gorilla. Resembles Link a bit. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to flack for God. I don’t want new duds. But one trap’s as good as another and I say:

  I’m going along with them. I’ll say it.

  Say it now, Link says. Say it to me.

  I believe in God, I say. He’s wonderful. He leadeth my soul and all that crap. I’ll put on a prom suit with a clerical collar and, whatever their rules, make a play for Lena. Or that lady back at the rest stop, Terry. Now there’s a goal worth—

  You’re out of your mind.

  All we got to do is say it.

  I can’t.

  Why not?

  You heard her. It’s not just saying it. If you say it, they use it. If you say it, they use you. What do you think your assignment’s going to be, handing out pamphlets at a rest stop, short-order cooking at their fast-food outlet? I don’t want to be used. I don’t want to say it. I been more than forty years putting up with shit, I don’t want any for supper just now.

  We go on arguing for a long time. Link is stubborn. Victor looks on blankly. He’s already phrasing his testimony, more than likely. I don’
t want to say I believe unless Link says he believes.

  I don’t want to leave him here. I would be uncomfortable abandoning him after all this time. I tell him that.

  Buddies, huh? he says. Male-bonding. Shit. Go, Lee, take the low road, don’t even think of me.

  I am about to list all my arguments for going along with the Wheelers, when I’m interrupted by a gentle voice from the doorway. Someone’s come in and we didn’t even hear him.

  Lena tells me, he says, that you guys might need some help in coming to a decision. I thought I’d see what I could do.

  I recognize the voice before I look. Even under the thick scraggly beard I’d’ve known that face.

  It’s Chuck.

  He’s here.

  He’s a Wheeler.

  Shit.

  Chuck is wearing a white and brown checker shirt, with a suede vest over it. He has spangles all along the pocket linings of his jeans. He’s wearing brown high-heeled western boots with spangles in the shape of wheels on the side.

  Hi, Link, he says, long time no see.

  I realize suddenly that Link is staring at him with as much startled recognition as I am. Link knows Chuck!

  I recognize you, too, Chuck says to me. Can’t say as I recall the name or the circumstances.

  I give him the name, but not the circumstances.

  But we’ve never met, he says to Victor.

  I like your duds, Victor says.

  You’re close enough to my size, Chuck says. Skinnier, but big enough. I’ll have them cleaned and altered and sent over to you in the morning.

  Victor’s mouth drops open. For a moment I’m afraid his new set of teeth are going to drop out. Then he breaks into a compelling smile. If Victor had any doubts about converting before, he’s a Wheeler now.

  So am I, I realize.

  — 3 —

  I believe in God! I shout and the assembled Wheelers cheer.

  Victor smiles smugly at me as I step down from the platform. He yelled his declaration even louder than I and obviously feels superior about it. He is wearing the outfit Chuck gave him. It suits him.

  Lena, presiding over the ceremony, asks Link to come forward. He looks away from her steady austere gaze. He moves his left foot spastically but can’t seem to take a step. There is a strong aura of tension developing around him. All the Wheelers who’ve dealt with him know there’s a chance Link won’t perform the ritual testimony at all, since he has never quite committed to it, not in any of the classes or work periods. He sat through the classes with the rest of us, but in a relative stupor. Although he passed all the written tests, he refused to participate in discussions or exercises. Chuck came to his quarters nightly and talked to him quietly.