The Drought

by Patricia Fulton

  Frantically he looked around for an escape route. His eyes lit on the dumbwaiter. It was broken but it was still a way out of the room. The smell of singed hair grew stronger. He touched his hair certain it must be smoking. Burn to death or fall thirty feet? He opened the door and looked down. The slightest current of air was coming through the shaft. He imagined Beth sitting in the butler’s pantry with the outer door cracked open. He whispered, “I’m sorry Beth.” Praying she wouldn’t be there when he came crashing to the bottom.

  As he climbed into the opening he thought about Luke Casteel climbing into the drainage pipe. I’m Sorry Luke. I wish you had stood up to me, told me to go to hell—maybe we’d all be hanging out down at Flatrock bridge right now. He pushed his scarred back gingerly against one panel and his feet against the other. Had it been the beginning of the summer when Barry was the strongest of his friends and the fastest he probably could have shimmied down the chute. His legs were weak from attrition, his body was exhausted from the long ordeal of fighting Griffin and his hands and feet were sweaty from the heat in the enclosed tunnel.

  Three feet into the climb, he slipped.

  Oddly, he didn’t panic. For the first time in his life he felt a sense of peace. Aside from the time he spent with Jar at his trailer, he hadn’t had much of a life at all. The image of Beth waiting at the bottom stopped him. He owed her more than this. Pushing out with both hands and feet he tried to get friction on the panels. At one point he started to slow, only to fall again. With arms and legs that felt as loose as Jell-O, he pushed out one last time and closed his eyes. He felt himself begin to slow right before he slammed into the bottom of the shaft.

  *

  A loud crash made Beth jump. Her finger tightened on the trigger of the shotgun and it went off with a deafening blast. She had the weird sense she’d drifted off, maybe not to sleep but into an exhausted fugue—she’d felt Jared, felt his fear. Her eyes scanned the room trying to identify the sound that had startled her. She saw smoke tendrils drifting beneath the door, heard timbers popping—the house was coming down. They were out of time. She looked at the door that led outside. She couldn’t leave Barry, not after everything they’d been through. Tears burned her eyes. She thought, Damn it Barry you should have been back by now.

  The smoke thickened. Coughing she swiped brusquely at her eyes and opened the door a crack. Sand skittered across her bare feet, and bit into her flesh. Griffin could be out there waiting for this moment, waiting to pick her off as she fled the burning house. She stepped forward until she felt a bed of sand beneath her toes and then she stuck her head outside the door. The sky was still a hazy gold but the gusting wind had stopped. She wondered if she would hear the gunshot—know the bullet was coming for her making its way effortlessly through the sand that had stopped an entire town its tracks.

  A sound stopped her. She heard a low moan. Turning back into the smoke filled room she called out, “Barry?” She heard the moan again. It was coming from the wall. Scrambling onto the table she pulled the door to the dumbwaiter open. A limp arm fell out.

  Barry’s crumbled body was lying at the bottom of the shaft, in a jumble of splintered wood. The roof of the dumb-waiter had collapsed under the impact of his body. She reached in and pulled his body out of the shaft. Bracing herself to take his weight she slid down and dragged his body onto the table. From there she lowered him to the floor and dragged him through the door and away from the burning house.

  The acrid air made it difficult to breathe. A safe distance from the house she collapsed in the sand next to Barry. There were no gunshots, no sign of Griffin at all—that threat was gone. She knew they needed to find shelter but her strength was spent. She pulled Barry’s prone body close to hers and shielded his face from the blowing sand. She buried her own face against his hair and closed her eyes.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  They traveled East

  The state brought in snowplows and bulldozers to re-open I-10. Unlike snow, the sand was impossible to pack along the shoulder making it necessary to haul truckloads away from the interstate. Griffin drove along I-10 in the wake of a dump truck carrying four tons of sand. By the time he passed Kerrville the Aston Martin was covered with a thick coat of dust.

  The sleek machine, usually an eye catcher, followed I-10 out of Texas and into Louisiana without drawing a single appreciative honk or stare. Griffin pulled into a rest area just before Gonzales, unaware twelve hours earlier his quarry had hitched a ride from the exact location.

  In the bathroom he got his first look at his damaged face. The blast of the shotgun had burned away most of his hair. His right ear dangled by a thin strip of skin. The shell had ploughed a trough across his cheek, severing nerves along the way before exiting between his upper lip and nose causing the right side of his face to hang down in a permanent grimace. Golden sand caked the wounds, staunched the flow of blood and offered the finishing touch to the nightmarish image in the mirror.

  A truck driver stepped through the door and approached the urinals. He gave the normal no eye contact nod. He was unzipping when he caught sight of the man’s face out of the corner of his eye. His balls shriveled up. He wished he’d just headed for the stalls. Trying his damnedest to coax his reluctant equipment to function he arched his back and thought about running water.

  Nothing.

  He snuck a quick peek.

  The man in the mirror lifted a large machete toward his damaged face.

  He touched the blade to a dangling piece of skin.

  An ear fell onto the tiled floor.

  The truck driver stepped back, mumbled, “Fuck this,” tucked his useless penis into his jeans and fled the bathroom. He was miles down the road before he realized he still had to take a piss. Later, while standing in a phone booth, plugging endless quarters into the phone, he told his girlfriend about the freak and how he was certain he’d been in the presence of pure evil.

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Reserve, Louisiana

  The two young travelers were weary, dirty, out of food, water and money. More than once a sheriff’s car came trolling down along River Road. They got the sense someone was looking for them and figured, rightly, the old man had called them in as a couple of runaways. Every time they heard a car, they ducked behind bushes or dove into the dried out reeds along the bank. They lost time. Darkness fell on another day. Neither one voiced the obvious concerns: where would they sleep, when would they eat, and how the hell were they going to get back home when this journey was over?

  They were holding hands, bordering on mental and physical collapse when they approached a massive metal bridge. Shrouded in the night mist, it appeared before them like an illusion, as if rising from the very depths of the Mississippi.

  The sight of it made Jar’s tongue feel thick in his mouth, and for a minute he forgot how to swallow and felt like he might suffocate on his own fear. It was the bridge he’d seen when he held the Govi. Suzy unaware of his fear stepped onto the bridge and tugged him forward. The illusion was real. The metal was solid, the passageway secure.

  When they reached the highest point Jar leaned against the rail and stared out over the river. Refinery’s lined the banks. By day they were a tangle of ugly steel that scarred the land, by night a lighted escort for the dark, flowing water.

  The air was heavy, humid. He took a deep breath, and a last glance at the soft golden lights reflected in a ghostly display on the rippling current. He turned.

  A man stood near the railing.

  An apparition, perhaps, but even in the dark shadows he recognized Jean-Claude.

  Addressing the dark figure, he said, “I was wondering when you’d show up.” Dread, intermingled with relief weighted his words. Crazy hope rushed through him. Maybe this was it. He’d delivered him to his destination, now he was just coming out to dust himself off, tip his hat in thanks and go on his way.

  Jean-Claude smiled. His lips stretched across his dark face, yellow teeth gleamed. A smile so big,
it became a silent laugh. The suppressed hilarity resurfaced. He was ready to gloat, ready to share the private joke.

  Jar spat. “Out with it.”

  The man leaned over the rail, looked down at the flowing water as if contemplating his words. “Lil mon, send her away.”

  Jar glanced over at Suzy. It looked like she was watching the water. She was bent over at the waist, arms folded against the rail, chin resting on her forearms. Her eyes, however, were closed. She had fallen asleep while standing.

  “She already dead.”

  Jar glanced nervously at Suzy. He said, “No. She’s just sleeping.”

  Jean-Claude flashed a big smile. “Mon, she let death in, the moment she opened the door,” he jabbed the boy in the chest, “to you.” He let the words sink in.

  Jar shook his head in denial. “No. I don’t believe you.”

  “Tell her, go home.”

  “No.”

  “Okay,” He shook a condescending finger at the boy. “I warn you.” The dark figure walked along the bridge, his hand trailing along the rail. He merged with the shadows and disappeared.

  Jar stood for a moment doubting his own sanity. Eyes weighted with fatigue he scanned the murky gloom searching for the figure, so real, yet so elusive.

  Nothing.

  He tapped Suzy, startling her from her sleep. Her exhausted eyes mirrored his own. Neither one of them would make it much further without sleep and food. They linked arms, tottering along the bridge like Dorothy and the scarecrow following the yellow brick road toward a false promise and a wizard who could not deliver.

  Jean-Claude’s warning was not an idle threat. Nor did he leave it out there dangling in the future, an unknown peril to be feared. It waited for them as they made the descent, the worn rubber soles of their shoes slipping against the smooth metal of the bridge. At first it looked like a trick of the light, a deception played by tired eyes.

  It started with a subtle motion and looked like a slow motion projection of an ink spill in reverse. One small droplet and then another eased into a larger mass—the shadows were coming together, thickening.

  Suzy spoke first. “Ja—Jar, the sh—shadows are mo—moving.”

  The verbal acknowledgement gave the phenomenon credence. Subtlety gone, the shadows grew bold, the movements more rapid.

  Knowing it was Jean-Claude playing games he gripped her shoulders and pushed her forward. “Ignore it. Keep walking.”

  As the shadows scurried together in front of her feet, a small piece of her mind closed down. It was the smallest snick, like a light being shut off in another room. Junction was a million miles away and the girl she used to be gone forever. Dazed, she looked at Jar and tried to grasp the significance of her feelings. She saw his lips moving, but couldn’t hear the words. She felt like she was watching him from a great distance.

  It reminded her of when she, Luke and Jar used to sneak up onto the hill behind the drive-in theater in Junction and watch the R rated movies. They couldn’t hear a thing so they made up their own dialogue as they watched. Sometimes Barry would show up and as much as she disliked him, his dialogue would ultimately be the one that had them all crying and holding their sides against their laughter. She laughed out loud at the memory. She saw Jar flinch in response. She didn’t blame him, that laugh didn’t belong here. Shaking her head to clear the memory she turned without a word and started walking back up the bridge.

  In the moment of silence that followed, he could feel the reverberations of her feet as she climbed higher onto the bridge. He remained frozen in place for the length of a heartbeat. The expression on her face burned into his memory. He had seen it once before on Barry’s face the day he had lost his dad’s ball. He looked down and watched the oily shadows continue their shape shifting. They seemed oblivious to him. As he watched he saw the random movement was not random at all. The shadows were coming together in a path, following Suzy’s retreat.

  In horror he followed the pulsing black trail, increasing his speed as he went, attempting to get ahead of the mass. He couldn’t see Suzy, she’d crested the rise in the bridge and had started down the other side. He yelled, “Run Suzy! Run!” He thought, whatever you do don’t let them touch you.

  A scream pierced the night and he knew his warning had come too late. He scrambled up the grated metal bridge, his eyes searching the darkness. He saw her then, perched on the rail, her arms wrapped tight around a metal support beam. Inky shadows crept over the metal girders, and over her red Keds.

  *

  Suzy watched the roiling mass of darkness creep past her shins, past her knees and up her thighs. She wanted to believe they were just shadows, a figment of her imagination that couldn’t harm her but she could feel them, thousands and thousands of particles knitting together into a single living organism. A single word reverberated through her, moving like a vibration through a tuning fork, jump, jump, jump—she shook her head and tightened her grip on the metal beam. It wasn’t her word, or her thought.

  The face of a man swam in the darkness. She could see him trying to take shape, she could see something half-formed rising up from the pool of shadows. Five tendrils traced a path across her thigh, they looked like wispy fingers brushing beneath her jean shorts. Teeth chattering in fear she loosened one hand from the beam and brushed away the dark probing fingers gliding along her inner thigh. They swirled away like a phantom fog.

  She let out a shuddering breath. “You’re not real. You can’t hurt me.” Her arm wrapped back around the metal beam and she pressed her forehead against the pitted surface, repeating the words. “You’re not real. You can’t hurt me. You’re not real. You can’t hurt me.”

  The emerging figure collapsed back into the pool of shadows. The mass imploded, folding in on itself. It boiled like a bubbling cauldron and exploded outward in a two-pronged phallus. One prong thrust upward in a single violent motion.

  Suzy’s mouth fell open. Her arms fell away from the beam.

  Impaled by the pulsing black mass she stood suspended, her toes barely brushing the rail of the bridge. She understood now what it would have felt like if her mother’s boyfriend had gotten to her in San Antonio. She would have felt stuffed full like she was suffocating from the inside out.

  The black mass couldn’t be a part of her and keep itself hidden—it hungered, its entire existence depended on its ability to feed. Twisting inside the roiling darkness she saw the image of a man carrying a dirty knapsack. An odd bulge pushed against the thin canvas of the bag and a dark stain spread slowly across its surface. She could feel his arousal his childlike glee. He wanted her to know what was inside the bag. He untied the strings. A part of her had already identified the odd lump pressing against the dirty sack. She tried to look away but couldn’t. The strings came open and the contents came into view.

  The face had a purplish, grey cast but it didn’t matter—she’d had years to memorize the shape of his nose, the angle of his jaw bone and the lines of his face. She looked out toward the bridge wanting to warn him, tell him it was a trap but the second she opened her mouth the second prong of the black mass shifted upward. It entered her mouth, slid past her tongue and moved deep into her throat. This time she really was suffocating. She felt her toes slip off the railing, felt her stomach drop, she was falling.

  *

  In the seconds before Suzy’s toes slipped off the bridge, Jar saw clearly what had a hold of her. Jean-Claude stood next to the rail, his arms stretched beyond anything humanly possible. One hand impaled Suzy between the legs and held her up like a flimsy puppet. Her eyes found him and for a second it looked like she might shout a warning to him but before she uttered a word, Jean-Claude’s free hand arced up and slid inside her mouth. As jovial as ever, he turned and winked at Jar.

  In the next moment, three things happened simultaneously. Suzy’s toes slipped off the railing, Jar sprinted forward, and lights from an approaching pickup truck lit up the entire scene. In his desperate attempt to reach Suzy, Jar didn’
t notice the lights coming toward him. He reached the rail, hung over the edge and screamed, “No Suzy!” Oh God, no!”

  The truck coming toward him fishtailed. The tires slipped on the metal bridge and the car came around sliding sideways. Jean-Claude vanished like an apparition. Jar didn’t notice him disappear, or hear the driver door of the pickup truck open and close. He didn’t take his eyes off the black water below. He yelled again, “Suzy!” and moved along the rail searching for any sign of activity in the water. Nothing stirred below.

  Numbness crept through his exhausted body, his legs gave out and he sagged against the rail. Footsteps approached from behind, firm hands gripped his shoulders and turned him around. From far away, as if the words were being spoken through a mouth full of cotton or lips pressed against cellophane he heard a voice ask, “What’s your name?”

  Jar blinked and stared at the man in dumb silence.

  The man gave him a shake and asked the question again.

  This time Jar responded. “I never like to lose, but I’m proud to have played in this ballgame.” And that was it, the game was lost. Suzy was gone and the game was lost.

  Jar collapsed on the bridge.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Reserve, Louisiana

  It would have been better if the black water of the Mississippi had claimed her. There were things worse than death along the river. The current grabbed the body and tugged at the long hair. Dark water entered through the nose and filled her mouth but the drowning was incidental; the impact had broken her neck. The body floated just below the surface, bumped against debris, shifted. It wouldn’t stay buoyant for long. Red, scuffed shoes weighted the legs, made them heavy. They dipped down, caught and dragged a branch. The body slowed. Water swirled around the girl caught on the drift wood—it tugged, cajoled pulled relentlessly. The branch caught against the shoals, slid and gave way. It, along with the girl, floated on a current destined for the sea.