“Challenger.”
“Man, these cars rock.”
Mary Jane turned around and smiled at Rachel.
“Going on a plane sweetheart?” she said, buckling up her seatbelt.
Rachel nodded, then looked away shyly. “Yeah.”
“How exciting,” Mary Jane said. When she turned back to the front, Cody saw her glance nervously at the black sky.
“Alright,” he said. “Let’s go.”
Cody drove the Challenger back onto the highway. He barely bothered to check for oncoming traffic anymore because the roads were so quiet and empty. Maybe that would change as they got closer to the city.
An uncomfortable silence lingered. It felt weird having somebody else in the car and Cody didn’t like it. But the risk of another encounter with the Black Widow was greatly reduced in company. And with no cup of coffee likely to appear in the near future it would help him stay alert too.
Fortunately the silence didn’t last long.
“Say you look familiar,” Mary Jane said. She was looking at Cody, her eyes gleaming like he was something sweet and sugary sitting on a supermarket shelf. It was a little unnerving but it was a look that Cody had encountered many times during his film career from giddy fans.
Cody shook his head. “Don’t know about that,” he said. Ever since moving to Texas a decade ago, he’d heard those four words all lined up in that exact same order, more than anything else.
Say you look familiar.
“What did you say your surname was?” Mary Jane asked.
“I didn’t,” Cody said.
But Mary Jane didn’t seem like the type of woman to take a hint. Her eyes were bulging with curiosity.
“I do know you though,” she said. “I’m sure of it.”
“Maybe I’ve just got one of those faces,” Cody said. “I probably look like someone you knew once.”
Silence followed but he could hear Mary Jane’s brain at work. She was sizing him up from the passenger seat. It was something he’d gotten used to a long time ago – strangers gawking at him. At first, back in the 1980s, it had been glorious but as things had gotten worse in his private life, those starstruck eyes had been replaced by looks of pity and the occasional look of disgust. Nowadays he was happy with being Mr. Invisible.
“You’re famous,” Mary Jane asked. “Am I right?”
“He used to be,” Rachel said.
Cody threw Rachel a dirty look from the front.
“Thanks a lot,” he said.
Rachel screwed up her face. “What? What did I say?”
He sighed and turned back to the road. “Never mind.”
Mary Jane watched this exchange between father and daughter from the passenger seat. Slowly, her eyes lit up and with a deep sigh, she fell back into her seat.
“I know who you are,” she said. “Holy sh…sugar!”
Cody looked at her. “Congratulations.”
“Who do you think he is?” Rachel said. She was laughing now. If nothing else, at least all this was entertaining her.
Mary Jane glanced over her shoulder. Rachel, putting shyness to the side, leaned closer to her.
“I think,” Mary Jane whispered to Rachel, “that your daddy is the blond kid from The Forever Boys,” she said. “The stutter kid. Which means that your daddy is Cody MacLeod. Am I right?”
Rachel’s giggling was all the answer Mary Jane needed.
“I love that movie,” Mary Jane said, turning back to Cody. She smiled, showing off her dazzling white teeth. “Always has me in tears at the end. Good Lord, you and that other kid nailed it man. What’s his name? Eddie Faldo, yeah. We all watch that movie in my house. Even my kids love it. You know how it comes on TV all the time during the holidays? Well if The Forever Boys is on TV, no matter what else is going on in the Labelle house, we’ll drop everything and watch it. It’s that damn good. Wow – I can’t believe the stutter kid just picked me up on the side of the road.”
Cody was only half-listening. As Mary Jane talked, he was staring at the raging red sky over San Antonio. He was still wrestling with the possibility that he’d made a mistake in accepting Nick’s offer. It wasn’t too late to turn around and start driving north. What chance did they have up there in a plane?
“You don’t like talking about the past,” Mary Jane said. “Do you?”
Cody gave her a lukewarm smile. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “Where am I taking you Mary Jane?”
“Stone Oak,” she said, pointing a finger at the windshield. “You know it?”
“Sort of.”
Cody wouldn’t have picked Mary Jane as the Stone Oak type. Not in a hundred years. All those big houses, picturesque views of downtown San Antonio, swimming pools and country clubs – it sure as hell wasn’t cheap to live down in that neck of the woods. He’d envisioned Mary Jane as being more of a trailer park type. Or maybe somewhere with a little wooden shack in the backwoods with the confederate flag poking out the top.
He scolded himself for being an asshole.
“That’s where you live?” Cody said. As hard as he tried, he couldn’t keep the surprise out of his voice.
“That’s where my brother lives,” she said. Her voice was harder this time around. Colder. Cody wondered if she’d taken offence. “We’ve been staying with him since all this started.”
Cody nodded. That made sense. A lot of families had been sticking close together since the Black Storm.
“You ain’t that far from the airport,” he said. “If Stone Oak is still standing then maybe the airport is too, right?”
“Sure. I guess.”
Cody looked in the rearview mirror. “You okay kid?”
“Uh-huh,” Rachel said.
Mary Jane pointed towards the dark road.
“Listen Cody,” she said. “You’d better come off the highway before we get to Stone Oak. I ain’t seen it for myself but I heard the 281 is a little wild on the outskirts of the city. That’s me putting it mildly. There’s a lot of human traffic moving this way and that means carjacking, robberies...”
She looked at Rachel briefly, turned back and lowered her voice. “And a whole lot worse,” she said.
Cody had heard the same rumors. “Yeah.”
“Stick to the suburbs as far as you can going south,” she said. “That’s the best plan. Might take you a little longer but it’ll get you there alive. Get off at Bulverde, travel down the back roads – down Bulverde Road, keeping south till we get to Stone Oak. After you drop me off there, take the 1604 back onto the 281. You’ll pass the worst of it. After that, you put the foot down mister and don’t slow down or stop for anyone until you reach the airport, you hear me?”
“Yeah I got it,” Cody said. “I don’t really want to come off the highway though.”
Mary Jane nodded.
“I get it,” she said. “But there’s a lot of distressed city folks spilling out of San Antonio. Some good people for sure, most of them just trying to get away. But there’s some bad ones too. You know, the type of people who see opportunity in disaster. Some of them will be coming north. You’re driving straight into the eye of the storm Cody. You gotta take care of yourself – you got a little lady here to protect.”
As Mary Jane was talking, Cody saw the exit sign for Bulverde at the side of the road.
“Yeah,” she said, pointing at the sign. “That’s the one. We’re going to jump off here and I’ll give you directions that’ll take us straight to Stone Oak. After that, you’re almost home.”
Cody didn’t want to come off the highway. But he didn’t want to run into a gang of violent opportunists spilling out of the city either. They’d be all over the Dodge in seconds. All over Rachel. Mary Jane was right. The quiet roads were his best chance of finding smooth passage to the city. He saw the sense in it but he still didn’t like it.
“Alright,” he said. “But before we turn off I’m going to pull over so I can take a leak. Might as well get it over with.”
&nb
sp; “Sure thing,” Mary Jane said. “I might even go myself.”
“Rachel,” Cody said, glancing over his shoulder. Rachel was sitting upright with Bootsy at her side. “We’re going to take a little detour in a minute. Narrow roads, less people. I don’t really want to stop once we get on them. You need to go?”
“Okay,” she said.
“Good girl.”
Cody pulled the Dodge into the side of the highway, a little short of the ramp that led down to Bulverde. He got out the car and Mary Jane and Rachel did likewise.
“Is there a ladies room?” Mary Jane said, her lips curving into a half-smile.
“Over there,” Cody said, pointing to the stretch of central reservation at the back of the car. “Little boy’s room is up here at the front.”
“Sure thing. Let’s go Rachel.”
Cody walked in the other direction, unzipped his pants and peed. Further down, Mary Jane and Rachel were huddled somewhere out of sight.
He stared into the distance.
To the south, orange fire-clouds and black smoke plumes spewed out of the city. It was neverending. There was however, at least from afar, a strange serenity to be found in that moment. While he was by himself, Cody felt like he was the last human being in the world.
“Say what you will,” he said, shaking out the last drops. “But if that’s the end of the world, it’s kind of beautiful.”
6
Cody was the first one back in the car. While he waited for Rachel and Mary Jane to finish up, he turned on the radio.
Static. Of course.
He persevered and turned the dial back and forth. After about ten seconds of electronic hissing and spitting, he found something. A brief spurt of electric guitar, a stabbing rhythm, and a familiar Irish bluesy voice sang out to him. Cody knew the song. It was ‘Moonchild’ by Rory Gallagher. The first time he’d heard that song was ten years ago when he and a pregnant Kate had undertaken the long drive from California to Texas to start their new life away from Tinseltown. They’d insisted on driving to Spring Branch because somehow it would feel more real than hopping on a plane and just landing in Texas a few hours later. They wanted to feel the wheels turning underneath them. They wanted to look over their shoulders and watch as Los Angeles faded into the background.
The music didn’t last long. The static returned and the memories slipped away inside the white noise.
About a minute later, the front door opened and Mary Jane squeezed back into the passenger side. Rachel climbed into the back seat.
“Oh man,” Mary Jane said. “I needed that.”
“All aboard?” Cody said.
Rachel picked up Bootsy and put the scruffy-looking bear back on her lap.
“Yeah,” she said.
Cody looked at her and shook his head.
“You haven’t given that bear a single glance since you were five years old,” he said. “Now you’re best pals again?”
Rachel’s eyes scowled at him.
“We all need our vices Cody,” Mary Jane said, tossing a wink in Rachel’s direction. “Lord knows when my cigarettes run out there’s going to be hell to pay. My poor Harry and the kids. This Black Storm ain’t gonna look much worse than a stiff breeze compared to what I’m going to put them through when the tobacco dries up.”
She made a mock angry face at Rachel.
Rachel laughed.
Cody saw the way they were looking at each other. It wasn’t a bear that Rachel needed – it was a mom. He’d tried his best to be both a father and mother to her over the years but there were some things a young girl needed that only a woman could provide.
With a sigh, Cody turned the dial on the two watt Music Master radio. He was chasing after that lost piece of music. He wanted the others to hear it too. He wanted them to know that were still people out there putting music on the radio and that it was something to be hopeful about. At the very least, let them hear it again. When was the next time they’d be able to listen to music?
But he couldn’t find it.
Cody was about to give up fidgeting with the radio when he caught onto a woman’s voice amidst the static.
Anybody out there getting this? I’m in Arkansas and things are real bad here, especially with planes going missing or falling out the sky. Seems to be happening all the time nowadays. I heard this morning that another flight has been reported missing out of Little Rock. It’s the third one this week, another small private passenger aircraft and that makes it the ninth this month that has seemingly vanished into thin air. That’s not counting all the planes that have crashed into buildings, highways and into the Arkansas River.
All commercial passenger flights have been suspended, we know that much. Still, private jets and light aircraft are venturing up into the sky at great risk not only to themselves but also to those on the ground. Yeah I get why they’re doing it. I know a lot of people are stranded far from home. It must be horrible to be so far from your loved ones. Especially with all this going on. These latest incidents aren’t expected to stop people from trying to make private arrangements with local pilots to get home but my advice to you all is to stay on the ground. Look at what’s happening for Christ’s sake. You think it’s bad on the ground? Trust me, it ain’t much better up there. The Black Storm will spit you out of the sky. The Black Widow will show up in the cockpit, whisper into the pilot’s ear and then…
Cody turned the radio off. He was about ready to take a hammer to that damn thing.
The silence that followed was excruciating.
Cody?” Mary Jane said, after about a minute. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing? That ain’t the first time I’ve heard about that kind of thing – planes crashing into buildings, roads and whatever. Up in the sky – that sounds like a bad place to be if the pilot gets a dose of the Black Fever.”
“We’re not going on a Lego plane,” Cody said. He kept his eyes on the road but could feel her looking at him. “There’s a fully-fuelled Boeing 737 waiting for us at the airport. It ain’t exactly a ten-seater job.”
Mary Jane lowered her voice.
“Used to be the big planes that went down first,” she said. “Before they grounded them.”
Cody hoped Rachel wasn’t listening in. He had a feeling she was.
“Nick’s taking seven or eight pilots with him,” he said. Damn it, he didn’t want to talk about this right now. “Anything weird goes down, it’s covered.”
“Yeah maybe so,” Mary Jane said. “But where exactly are you going to go? You got fuel, you got pilots – you got a destination?”
Cody looked through the windshield and pointed to a break in between the dark sky. A speck of white-golden light shone back at them, piercing through the black sky like a laser cutting through metal.
“Up there,” Cody said. “Somewhere…”
“Over the rainbow?” Mary Jane said. “That’s nice but...”
“Have you looked at San Antonio lately?” Cody asked. “You really want to hang around and be a part of that?”
“No I don’t,” Mary Jane said. “But where are you going to go where it ain’t the same thing happening?”
Cody bit his lip. “Nick’s a great pilot – he’ll find a way.”
Mary Jane sighed. “I’m all for hanging onto hope,” she said. “And I don’t mean to bring you down. But honestly, it sounds a bit like out of the frying pan and into the fire to me.”
Cody put his foot down as they approached the ramp to Bulverde.
“You know I saw her tonight,” Mary Jane said. “I saw the Black Widow. On the road, not long before you guys showed up. Jesus, I thought my time was up. I thought she was bringing me some of that Black Fever. Thought I was going to end up stepping out in front of the next car that came speeding along the highway at a hundred miles per hour. She wasn’t far away, about fifteen or twenty meters. Those eyes man, or whatever you call them – they were looking right at me. Through me – like she was drilling down into my soul.”
She smiled but her eyes were fearful at the recollection.
“Tell me something Cody.”
“What?”
“You think all this is real?” she said. “You think the Black Storm is real? Or do you think we’ve all gone crazy? What is it they said? That some military-constructed virus has gone airborne and we’re all having the same mass hallucination. What’s going on?”
“Don’t know,” Cody said. “I’ve stopped trying to make sense of it.”
He drove the Dodge towards the ramp and down into Bulverde. Cody knew little about the area he was going through. He knew that Bulverde was a tiny city with a population of less than five thousand and that it was located on the outskirts of San Antonio. He wondered if they’d see any people once they got into the suburbs to drop Mary Jane off. What he’d give to see something humdrum and ordinary right now. Kids playing in a park, people jogging on the sidewalk – boring suburban activities like that. Where was everyone? Were they all hiding indoors, listening to the radio and waiting for the all clear? Or were they dead already?
Off the highway, the roads were darker and quieter.
“Stay on this track for a little bit,” Mary Jane said. Her voice sounded louder in the stillness of the back roads. “There’s a right turn coming up that’ll take us onto Bulverde Road,” she said. “After that we’re on our way down to Stone Oak. It’s easy when you know how.”
“Alright,” Cody said. “Just tell me when.”
“This one here,” Mary Jane said, pointing straight ahead. Cody could barely see the turn until he’d almost driven past it.
“Bulverde Road,” Mary Jane said. “Right there.”
“I see it now.”
Cody turned the steering wheel to the right. He felt uneasy as the car drove onto the narrow and claustrophobic Bulverde Road. Only the Dodge’s headlights prevented a total blackout from swallowing them up. Large trees stood on both sides of the road, swaying menacingly in the wind.
“Wow,” Cody said. “It’s creepy down here. Right?”
Mary Jane didn’t answer. She was a dark, faceless shape, sitting like a statue and staring out at the road. He looked over at her. Conversation wasn’t exactly Cody’s thing, but it would at least take the edge off things.
Mega Post-Apocalyptic Double Bill Page 49
