LOST HIGHWAY

by Zac Funstein

  FB searched for any signs of NB who was nowhere in sight so it was assumed the one sought had somehow beaten him there-had already gone inside. This might not necessarily be so, but it was a reasonable assumption to draw on what they were given. This had the buzz of somewhere that seemed to ‘attract’ that precise same incident that had happened earlier. The parking lot had been picked because of its blandness maybe somewhere with more razzmatazz should have been chosen.

  Some liked the showbiz aspect they didn’t want anything that was remotely incognito. Traffic hissed past on both adjacent freeways oblivious to the dynamic enacted. F watched them go past momentarily just enjoying the sensation of being a passive observer.

  There was nothing that was going to pass that would have any significance to their miserable-lives. If disturbed they would not thank you for adding to their already growing burden. The fences, barriers, speed bumps empty watchmen's huts the trappings of wealth, the buffers of the avarice-personified that never made it here as anticipated by the city fathers were slowly being eroded by decay. This might have been once a dez-rez for planners but that had now passed. Coming here was avoided unless absolutely necessary.

  On one side was the was the huge block of the Toys-R-Us on the other was the DIY store that seemed to be put up from a kit. Those that lived here said it seemed to go up over night-was feted for a while, but now was falling slowly into decay. It seemed a little like Kinloch Castle (at least on the outside), where Felicien had stayed recently- not in the castle itself -(which was once run as a hotel by the National Trust for Scotland) but in a less salubrious part of the building - the old bunkhouse at the rear. Felicien pulled an e-cigarette from his pocket (since his major surgery resulting from this habit the real kind would be nothing less than fatal) then lowered the car-window as if for the e-smoke to go out. Then the one waiting glanced at his watch and flipped it out the window as if disgusted with chronology in general, rolled the window up then got out of the car.

  Basically, they sold everything, ranging from sporting goods to clothes to household items, all at discount prices. You would not find anything more reasonable anywhere else in town that was a guarantee. Those that ventured here however must accept the risk of entering a potentially hostile neighbourhood.

  In the middle of the lot was the pavement going on seemingly interminably. It seemed to go on in a concrete weave mixing to a blur with the horizon.

  A little while after the appointment time decided, Noémi Bourque’s ancient Renault Safrane pulled up. The start had not been auspicious the Renault hadn’t started for one. ‘Great just what I need’ had been muttered under her breath. When opened up the Safrane’s dusty oil-coated innards of metal-blocks, rings plus hoses brought home the sharp fact what was known about engines wasn’t very much.

  They had hardly spoken a word since Kauã Barbosa Cavalcanti had picked her up on a backstreet in Stamford. It would be so easy to just pull the gun out, point it then pull the trigger. Pull the trigger on your camera that is before beginning to record, you always get a few seconds of what they call ‘pre-roll’ or ‘post-roll’.

  Sure, it would mess his car up, gunk splattered everywhere but all his problems would be solved at a stroke. The disheveled figure of a tall, skinny, person, came hurrying up to meet him.

  Noémi seemed to Felicien Bonvoeur preoccupied somehow. Felicien suppressed a fervent desire to be critical of Bourque’s tardiness when everything was so top priority. Bonvoeur admired her passion, courage, it took devotion for a woman to refuse to reproduce to put her career first, but still, despite his ambition Felicien couldn’t imagine life without his son Pierre.

  To Noémi it was strange being near this building that was her zone of employment so many life-cycles ago. It was believed this was all past now it returned to torment her. Then Eve Strehlow picked up her daughter, returned to the table sobbed uncontrollably, looking at the debris of what had promised to be a beautiful evening, now defiled by Tayla Savery's hideous intervention.

  There was a rumour that this was the site where Sinku Juci the daughter of a wealthy industrialist, had asked Samantha Bright to take her newly-born child as her own before poisoning herself,Sinku predicted in her diary that haunting the speakeasy until her boyfriend,Koby Nguyen returned to her was a distinct option.

  “I find you a little distracted Felicien?”

  “I believe that you might have noticed something of this nature it is true. I am dealing with some stress, sometimes I just get spaced out. I am sorry if it is affecting you Noémi-I will try not to let it come between us. I am trying really hard to manage the tension- I believe I am doing okay. You've been a little preoccupied since you got that call too.”

  “That is not why you have brought us here Felicien.”

  Her expression was hardened devoid of emotion: beauty graced Noémi’s features, but had hardened with what life had dealt her. Most of which was ‘his’ fault.

  Noémi wasn’t sure if this was an instance of disarming naivety or arrogant hubris. If this was a life-affirming, emotionally liberating message, it would take courage plus conviction to be the messenger. The rule of the ‘unbounded person’ that assumes that the boundary between one person/others is not fixed, definite, but flexible/ negotiable must surely be applicable.

  “The Santa Anita debacle-of course how stupid of us.”

  The long slow-moving stretch-limousine cruised the parking lot of the nearby apartment complex. Smaller cars moving around the lot seemed to scatter as in deference.

  The Santa Anita Racetrack busses labeled ‘Special’ arriving one after another, then a welter of people in its wake. The mix of secrecy, scientific ethics plus national security was macabre, yet disturbing.

  “I don’t quite..”

  “Sulphur traces found on Mrs Sharon Oswalt from Wharton County, the largest known deposit, opened by the Texas Gulf Sulphur Company had to be matched to those on her husband Dorian who had made the flight to Santa Anita.”

  “That is very astute of you Felicien-without boasting I do know more than most it is true but how is this applicable?”

  “We found a minute sample of denim jeans which we believe contains a trace of the abundant, multivalent non-metal sulphur.”

  “That’s not unnatural-its usually used as an additional dye to complement the one included-one that is sulphur based invariably gives greater depth.”

  “Is it within your unique capabilities to find what kind this is?” asked the one lacking this unique educational need-a curious contraction had passed over the man's features, but so swiftly that it might have been a slight twitch.

  It was an unusually appropriate request. Remarkably, Noémi had been reading the last pages of Christophe Barjavel’s memoir when Felicien’s phone call had come, after his depression had lifted-Christophe was beyond its debilitation, Barjavel’s realized that the depression began long ago, when, at puberty his mother was lost. Christophe knew more about the element sulphur than anyone alive on the planet. Sadly on top of the physical debilitation brought on by his illness/advancing age, the elderly Barjavel must contend with senility-related failings that dramatically affected his day-to-day life-making it difficult or impossible to care for himself on a regular basis. There was a real danger that without those like Bourque everything acquired would be put into retrograde status.

  “I will do my upmost I believe I owe you a favour.”

  It was not anticipated that a speedy reply would come-sulphuric matters are not the top usually of anyones agenda- but it did the very next afternoon. The doctor had been researching what was called ‘nocturnal pressing spirit attacks’,or what scientific literature called ‘supine-paralysis’-which increasingly took up more of her energy-like a huge drain which fortunately-at least for them-had sulphur mooted as a cure. Bourque’s had all the superstitions of a nervous, sickly Creole; certain nocturnal sounds, certain phases of the moon were to her unfailing presages of specific events, of impending misfortune. It seemed to suggest t
he melancholy- a language full of the unique which her talent alone could understand/ translate according to her great skill in the element with the symbol S.

  “Noémi how very kind of you to reply so swiftly what is your verdict?”

  “An interesting case if ever I saw one-I come across this quite often as you might know but I must admit I was stymied. Do you want the good answer or the ‘really good’ answer Felicien?”

  The chaos was immediately replaced by a stillness, a hollow echo, an emptiness that hung in the air.

  “I’ll plump for the really good one.”

  “This is not your average sulphur-as they go.”

  “Average-non comprende.”

  “There’s the good stuff then the rest of it. Someone has spent some not inconsiderable effort-finding the best so that the effect on Mr/Mrs. Averages pair of jeans is overall rather than blotchy.”

  “I detect there is someone who is able to give the extra push to be really sure to what you are claiming.”

  “I know S (the element was constantly referred to by the chemical-symbol) reasonably well but yes there is someone knows it better than anyone else since his very career depends upon getting its qualities well discernable.”

  The film- set of a pop- video seemed an unusual setting to meet Burkett Lachance but that was where it had been decided was perfect for both their timetables to converge. It was sure that anything to do with sulphur (the rock that burns - hence its Old English name ‘brimstone’, meaning burning stone) would not bode well but things went surprisingly smoothly.

  The traditional sulphur miners of East Java burdened with the scorching of their labour - poisoned breathing criss-crossed with burns/striations might seem an unusual setting to recreate but the political group ‘Revolution Machine Gun’ wanted to bring this little known oppressed minority to everyones attention. The director Salvador R. Bagwell from Lewisville, TX last movie wasn’t much, but it had a slightly novel theme with some amusing things to look at in it. There seemed to be a buzz re Bagwell. This was a more serious piece Its promulgation would brings up another whole set of negative, alarming issues concerning the safety of people in their employment.

  Bonvoeur was expecting actresses dressed as nuns to be bussed in, purely so they could faint amusingly, or cover the gaze of small children who definitely shouldn't have been there, but the set was surprisingly like a volcano at least if you put together what was going to end up on the screen. In reality all that was there was a huge blank screen.

  The reality upon which this was based was unusual-large collectives-almost like the terrible chain gangs of America’s brutal prison system working in the core of Ijen volcano in East Java, Indonesia had to be recreated.

  The empty ritual of collecting crystalline lumps of sulphur that solidify beside its acidic crater once processed, the sulphur used to make matches/ fertiliser- vulcanize rubber in factories at home/abroad was what Burkett had been brought in to give a touch of authenticity too.

  Some believed the previous choice which involved following a man driving down a highway, meeting people in small town-diy stores would have been better.

  Burkett was a small man dressed in a cheap jumpsuit, not exactly the proper attire for a vid, but since his appearance was short-lived as well as being in the distance this was deemed unimportant. Distinguished from his stern predecessors Iosef/ Ursy by being known as the ‘genial czar’ his response was measured concerned:

  “Forgive my uncomfortableness-but being amongst all these camera is like being in a Chilean jail again-when I had my every move recorded- I felt powerless to stop the intimidation.”

  “You were locked up as a political prisoner Lachance.”

  “A master of understatement but where was I- the Schreiber incident yeh-I know it, who doesn’t it's been everywhere on the TV in the papers-if anyone reads them anymore that is-or believes what they claim.It seems to grip everyone at the moment. You were fortunate we had a new toy to fool around with!”

  “Out with the old in with the new!”

  “There are normal methods: gaseous diffusion/ gas centrifuge but what we have now gives us a much better picture than before. I was a little suspicious at first I must admit-the usual inherent conservatism!”

  “I’m sure you were more liberal than realised Burkett!”

  “Speaking as an editor of many years standing of ‘Sulphur Times’, I have long ceased to be amazed at the number of young-scientists who start out their articles with that opening sentence sometimes slightly ‘amusingly’ amended from ‘Nearest Thing to a Hell’ clearly believing they are being frightfully original.”

  “A bible of sorts by the sounds of it-imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.”

  “Yes but seeing it repeatedly-it gets a bit much. American author Booker T Washington referred to what was at the time the world's main source of this distinctive mineral. Washington, a former slave, was moved by the plight of the young children forced to work shifts underground on the slopes of Mount Etna, carrying heavy loads in unbearable temperatures. Element S of the periodic table has a cultural association with Satan/underworld as you probably know. I must be able to repeat verbatim Washington’s work inside out by now-I’ve seen it so often. ”

  Warming to this theme Felicien said:

  “My old neighbour who owned a garage told us that before Kevlar or polyurethane was known the original Mr. Goodyear, found that adding our friend to latex created a much durable material, which was used to produce the first tyres/ inner tubes. The process was dubbed ‘vulcanisation’ after Vulcan, the Roman god of volcanoes-indeed is still used to make rubber today.”

  Sensing that they were digressing somewhat an attempt was made to bring matters around to what was important.

  “What does the remnants tell you?”

  “Whoever made the torn jeans that were found on the remote site were into expensive clothing-no way is this your average bargain jeans from Walmart-this is top of the range.”

  “Interesting-what makes you say that?”

  A John Lewis carrier nearby is searched which contains (next to Cosmopolitan, Elle, Marie Claire plus other vacuous glossy rubbish) a folded jacket with wide lapels plus some fabric squares very neatly glued onto some cardboard. This is given for Felicien’s going over general approval.

  “My other passion in life is fabric, and l have been quite fortunate to have turned my passion into a very satisfying hobby. The standard when the superior dye is made with the good sulphur is very impressive I believe you’ll agree less blotching-less striations.”

  “There does seem to be a more even appearance that is true. This begs the question which denim companies use this.”

  “Anything upper end of the market-unfortunately I can’t be more specific. This is natural rather than created that much is sure.”

  “I don’t understand Lachance. We reserve our energies for people whom we readily comprehend -meaning those like you get missed out-let us correct this.”

  “Pre the French Revolution fumes from burning this were used as fumigants, medicinal mixtures were used as balms-all from natural sources until comparatively recently when Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier persuaded everyone this was an element not a compound. Seams have until recently been the basis for commercial production in the United States, Russia, Turkmenistan, plus (to a lesser extent) Ukraine. Currently, commercial production is narrowed to one source the Osiek mine in Poland. Even this of little commercial importance, most are no longer worked apart from specialist markets such as this. Booker T wrote ‘I am not prepared just now to say to what extent I believe in a physical Hades in the next world, but a sulphur mine in Sicily is about the nearest thing that I expect to see in this life’.”

  “How is most made nowadays then?”

  “Today’s production is as a side product of other industrial processes such as oil refining; but this is not what we have here of that I am certain-this hewn from the ground or a blocked.”

  Guerin Gagné
’s parents, an oil refinery foreman, a teacher, raised him plus his brother Archaimba in East Providence, Rhode Island; in his early stories graduating from high school, they'd both gone to work for one of the new oil refineries, quickly marrying then starting families of their own. His grandfather had been in the unique trade of moving domestic-residences-not as in real-estate-but off whatever the foundations were with a system of ‘jacks’ -of his creation similar to that which might be found in an emergency kit of the boot of a SUV albeit on a larger scale.The large poles were originally aluminium but when this was found to snap-this was changed to steel with titanium additive. Dolly-wheels would then be maneuvered under the residential-project then moved by a reconditioned tractor-engine. Sheds, cottages sometimes ever aircraft hangers could be shifted by this technique.

  It had been Guerin who'd chosen to break the cycle—to further his education, first at a community college then university. Finding the oil refinery where Guerin was situated wasn’t easy but then it appeared-a gleaming structure in the distance.

  Bonvoeur detected a similarity with Cape Canaveral-the Launch Director with its great structure

  poised on its launch pad, waiting to carry its cargo beyond the grasp of earths gravitational pull.

  From atop the Shuttles huge External Tank a pure vapor of gaseous oxygen is vented periodically to relieve pressure in the gleaming metal. It was this that most bore a resemblance with the refinery.

  Without being uncharitable Guerin’s balding gleam seemed veritably polished which only seemed to be accentuated somehow by a certain gaunt hollowness to the man as if the survivor of some terrible illness.

  An apology came for the poisonous glance shot but it had been believed that Felicien was from the local press who had been cultivating juicy lies about supposed pollution. Once it was realised that this wasn’t who they were the mood lightened visibly.

  “There are those who suffer from what I call the ‘Nice Guy Syndrome’, but I am not such-especially when it comes to propagating untruths about the refinery. It treats readers like automatons, insults them, denigrates the whole point of delivering news in the first instance.”