by Bryn Roar
Rusty frowned doubtfully.
Tubby said something else but Rusty couldn’t hear it. He bent closer until his ear was next to Ralph’s mouth. “Thanks for staying with me, Gnat. You’re my hero.”
Rusty shrugged bashfully. For the first time in his life he’d allowed himself to be brave. In the face of all his fears, Rusty Huggins had finally weathered his storm. He’d had no idea it would be so easy! Feel so intoxicating. All these years he’d assumed that courage was a tangible thing. Something certain people had been born with; like Bud and his dad, while others, like himself, had been cursed craven cowards from birth. Nothing more than a genetic characteristic, really. Like hair, eyes, and skin. He’d never considered the idea that courage was nothing more than a choice. The decision to do the brave thing, no matter the consequences. No matter the fear. Courage, as he’d always assumed, wasn’t the absence of fear. Courage was merely a choice in the face of fear, a decision, by God, to face the fear! Rusty had another thought on top of that. Does this mean that Bud Brown gets scared, too? Well, fuck a damn yellow duck! Who’d a thunkit? Big Bad Bud scared…
They watched the shadows lengthen above them; listening for suspicious sounds, but after the initial disturbance the woods above were oddly still; the crickets and cicadas mute. Not a good sign, they both knew.
Rusty pointed out the wishing star, far above the boughs of the overhead pines. Evening’s creeping blanket was upon them. Neither boy saw the other lift up their heart’s desires to the silent star above, their lips moving soundless and urgent. Rusty was about to tell Tubby that they would have to spend the night, when something blocked the remaining light from up above. “Shit on a stick,” Tubby said, looking past Rusty’s head.
Rusty knew it had to be bad; Tubby was not the profane sort. He looked up and saw two red eyes staring back at him. A shitty stick, indeed. The Rabid shouldn’t have been able to see them, covered as they were in the sinkhole’s shadows, but see them it did. The face itself was lost in evening’s early gloom, whimpering at the sight of so much fresh blood. So nearby, yet so inaccessible.
Other Rabids quickly joined the first. First one, and then another. They circled the sinkhole; the way wolves will circle their prey, looking for an opening. The drop was too far, though, even for their manic kind.
“What’re we gonna do?” Tubby wondered aloud. No sense in whispering now.
Rusty breached his daddy’s Remington and checked the loads again. He had fired this same weapon many times, out on the Betty Anne, and was fairly proficient with it.
He was tempted to take the easy shot and blow apart any of the jack-o-lantern skulls peering down at them, but after some consideration, he realized that wasn’t a good idea. No telling where all that bloody shit might end up. Probably right back in our damn faces! No, he would just have to play it cool for now. Save his ammo in case…
Well…just in case.
“You think they’ll come down after us?” Tubby asked him. Saying what was on Rusty’s mind.
Rusty looked down at him. In the failing light, he could barely see his friend’s face. Good thing. He didn’t want Tubby to see how scared he was.
“No,” he lied, feeling ashamed. Truth was, he thought it was only a matter of time before the Rabids grew bold enough to do just that very thing.
“I hope they’re too brain damaged to figure out how to get down here,” Tubby whispered.
Rusty sat down beside him; his legs crossed together, his shotgun held at the ready. He tried thinking of something to take their minds off their considerable worries. “Opie…you mind if I ask you something personal? I mean, real personal?”
Tubby tore his gaze from the red eyes circling above them. He shifted his leg by accident, and it felt like somebody just stabbed him in his shin with a steak knife.
“OWWWWWWWWW!!!”
One of the Rabids hooted like a hyena.
“Shut the fuck up! You corn holing bitch!” Tubby raged in return.
Surprisingly enough, the Rabid did just that, ceased its hooting. Its red eyes blinked back at them stupidly.
Rusty applauded. “My man! You go boy! Tell those nasty motherfuckers how it is! You hear that, you butt-licking bastards? My man here called you a corn-holing beeyaatch! Why don’t you monkeys take turns fucking each other, and just leave us the hell alone!”
“Stop it, Rusty!” Tubby said, laughing so hard now he was crying. “Don’t make me laugh, man! It hurts!”
“Sorry, Opie. But tell the truth and shame the devil—don’t it feel good to laugh at those assholes? To not be frightened every time we see those red eyes staring back at us? Man, I hate being scared of someone who’s too fucking dumb to wipe his own ass!”
Tubby smiled in the dark. He was still afraid, though. Very afraid, as the movie went. “So what’s the personal question, Gnat?
Rusty looked away from the red eyes. It was almost dark now and the damn things looked too much like monster fireflies, flitting here and there in the evening air. He didn’t want to liken such an abomination of science to one of God’s more whimsical creations. He coughed in his fist and sniffed. “Remember when we were in Bidwell’s office, getting examined by that toothy doofus?”
“How can I forget.”
“Well, what I wanted to ask…”
“Spit it out. You wondering how I got to be so fat?”
Rusty frowned. “Howzat?”
“I saw the look on your face that day, Gnat. One of disgust.” It surprised Tubby that he wasn’t ashamed to admit it. After all that he’d been through in the past 48 hours, his obesity seemed an irrelevant thing at worst.
Rusty giggled. “Shiiitt, man! You thought I was checking out your flabby gut and titties?”
“Well, what then?” Tubby said. He wondered if he was unaware of some other physical deficiency in his body.
“Ahh, forget it,” Rusty said, too embarrassed to pursue it any further.
“Oh, no! You can’t leave it at that! You owe me.”
“Owe you?”
“Damn straight, my brother!”
“Shhh, Opie! You want those goons to think you’re ringing the dinner bell? Besides, you talk street like Elmer Fudd. It don’t sound natural coming out your mouth.”
“Sorry, Tupac. But you do owe me. I broke your fall! Bet it was like landing on a giant marshmallow.”
“Man, I bet you hold that weak-assed shit over my head for the rest of our lives.”
“Broken leg ought to be worth something. Now give. What’s the personal question?”
“Okay, okay, but the whole thing’s been blown out of proportion now. I was just wondering, man, were you always so…Big...down there?”
“Junk food, extra helpings, and no self-control. Doi! I thought you said this wasn’t about my weight?”
Rusty rolled his eyes. He knew where Tubby was coming from, though. Tubby assumed people only saw him for his obesity, while Rusty felt sure that those same assholes only saw him for how runty he was. “It’s not your gut I’m rapping about, dummy. It’s your…”
He smirked and pointed at Tubby’s crotch.
“Huh? I don’t get what you’re—”
“Damn, boy! When did you hit puberty?” Rusty asked him, trying another tact.
“When I was twelve. I remember asking my daddy what was with all the body hair I was sprouting. Compared to the other boys my age I looked like a dang Wookie! Dad told me not to sweat it—that I’d just hit puberty early.”
Twelve-years-old, Rusty thought disgustedly. Ain’t that a bitch! “Did your, um, Thing start to get bigger once you began puberty?”
“Huh? My thing? Ohhh! You mean my Petey!”
Rusty rolled his eyes again. “Jesus, Opie. Yeah, your Petey. Or was your Kielbasa always that big?”
Tubby tried seeing through the dark, to see if Rusty might be pulling his unbroken extremity. Could they really be having this discussion, while twenty feet above their heads Rabids circled them like wolves? “Big? I wasn’
t aware my penis qualified as being Big.”
Rusty shuffled his feet in the dirt. “Well, it is. If you looked around the locker room…. Say, dude, haven’t you ever been curious to see how you compare to other guys?”
“No,” Tubby replied without guile. “Look, all I want out of gym class is to get through it unscathed. I accomplish that most of the time by keeping my head down and my eyes glued to the floor. Besides, I can barely see my Petey for the roll of blubber covering it.” He cocked his head and looked at Rusty. “Gee whiz, Gnat, you’re saying it’s bigger than most?”
“Shiiitt! Bigger than any kid I’ve ever seen! And a helluva lot bigger than my little wang doodle.”
Tubby felt oddly proud. “I’m not sure why it matters, but I guess it got bigger after I hit puberty.”
“I only ask because I haven’t gotten there yet.”
“Puberty? Really? How old are you?”
“Same as you, Op. Seventeen years old.”
“Huh! Well, you’re not missing all that much. Armpit hair, weird body odors, acne, and an obsession with sex. My Petey gets hard at the drop of a hat. I guess some fellows just go through it later in life. Right, Rust?”
“That’s what the fucking books say.”
“Yeah? What’s Bud say about it?”
“I haven’t told Bud; just you and Big Red.”
“Josie? You talked to a Girl about this?”
“Josie and I talk about everything, Opie.”
Tubby was silent, wondering if Josie had told Rusty about him masturbating in her bathroom. No, he decided. Josie had promised him that would always be their secret, and he believed her. Well, I’m flattered you—”
Excitement from above put an end to their surreal conversation. Tubby and Rusty stared up at the twinkling stars. The red eyes were gone now. They could hear the Rabids up there, though, moving something about in the brush. To Rusty it sounded as if they were dragging…
“Shit, Tubby. I think they’ve figured it out.”
The splintered end of a tree inched into view, just over the lip of the sinkhole. They could hear the Rabids grunt as they maneuvered it over the pit.
Tubby could pick out some words here and there between the infected humans. Mostly it sounded like gibberish. Didn’t matter what he thought—it was plain the Rabids understood one another just fine. “How many rounds you got left?” he asked Rusty.
“Enough to take care of those three jokers, and two more besides. Long as I make each shell count. But if we attract any more of those things…”
Rusty didn’t need to spell it out. Tubby knew what was at stake. “Save the last two.”
“Right,” Rusty said. It looked as if he would soon be joining his mother and father. The thought brought neither comfort nor fear. Just a queasy rush of adrenalin.
“It’s my fault,” Tubby said. He watched the trunk inch over the side of the hole. Dirt rained down upon them.
“What’re you talking about, Opie?”
“It’s the blood. They smell the blood from my leg.”
Rusty pulled back the firing pins on the shotgun. The satisfying clicks sent a surge of courage through his veins. Yep. It ain’t nuttin’ but a choice. “Way I see it, Ralph, that’s as much my fault as it is yours. Seeing as how it was me who broke your leg in the first place.”
Tubby laughed. Content in the company of his friend. The pain stealing whatever fear he might’ve felt in its stead. “Man, I bet you hold that weak ass shit over my head for the rest our lives.”
Rusty didn’t answer; he was fresh out of clever repartee. As gravity took over, the end of the slender pine began to slide down into the sinkhole. He leaned the 12 gauge on the dirt wall and got his hands under Tubby’s swampy armpits, all the while watching the slow descent of the tree coming towards them.
The pine began to pick up speed as more branches broke off against the side of the hole. Rusty was able to determine the jagged end of the trunk’s nearest point of impact: Right where Tubby’s belly is!
With all his strength, Rusty pulled his friend out of the way, ignoring the tortured screams. He threw himself over Tubby’s writhing body, the branches whipping him with the force of a pool cue in a bar room brawl. He shut his eyes tightly, for fear of the slapping boughs blinding him. Something heavy and sharp cracked him on the side, slicing through his army coat and T-shirt underneath. He felt the salty sting and warm dampness of blood flowing freely from the wound on his back.
The echo left behind by the falling tree filled the sinkhole and reverberated around them for what seemed like an eternity. Then silence…
It didn’t last long. Hearing something scramble down the trunk of the tree, Rusty pried opened his eyes. Pieces of bark, twigs, and pine needles fell on his back and head. Death was fast on the heels of this piney snowfall.
He looked into Tubby’s blank eyes. His friend had fallen unconscious again. Maybe that was for the best. At least for Ralphie. Besides, Tubby’s consciousness would hardly make Rusty’s dying any easier. The truth was revealed, as it is to all of us in the end. No matter how many people are with you when you pass on, holding your hand, kissing your brow, everyone must die alone…
*******
Finding Josie’s trail blaze wasn’t so easy in the lengthening shadows. Despite the remaining daylight left, Bud and Josie soon had to break out their flashlights. They shined them on the passing pines, searching desperately for Josie’s lost markers. As they hurried along, Bud slashed his own arrows, waist-high on the trees, so as not to confuse them with Joe’s eye-level blazes.
“Does any of this look familiar to you, Red?”
Josie shook her head. “We need to get further away from the Oyster Trail. I think I went past that heavy stand of bamboo over there.”
They traveled that way until the sun fell below the broken treetops, Josie crying softly beside Bud. The sound brought a bitter lump to his throat. There’s nothing more heartbreaking than unselfish tears. And that’s what Josie was shedding. She was weeping for their friends, lost out there in the forest of the night.
Bud brought his Mickey Mouse watch up to his face. The last birthday present his mother had ever given him. “It’s after six, Red. We better get back to the Bunker.”
“Just a few more minutes, Bud! They’re somewhere nearby! I can feel it!”
“I know you want to find them. So do I. But we can’t help them by getting ourselves killed. Believe me, they’re better off tucked away in that deep sinkhole you were telling me about. We’re the ones in danger,” he said, pointing up at the night sky for emphasis. “Running around out here in the damn dark like this. It’s crazy!”
Josie knew he was right. She’d seen what a little shade could do for these monsters. How it emboldened them. With the sun going down, she and Bud were in terrible danger. Still, she couldn’t abandon her friends to the night’s not so tender mercies.
“Bud, please. Just a little longer. Please!”
Bud took her face in his hands, forcing her to look into his eyes, to calm down. “They’re not gonna be alone much longer if we keep up this racket. For all we know, those things might be watching us right now. Hoping we’ll lead them to our friends.” He released her face and the two of them looked around the now pitch black forest.
And yet despite the silent and dark woods all about them, the mute crickets, Bud didn’t feel as if they were under surveillance. If there were any Rabids about, they weren’t aware of Bud and Josie just yet.
