Running Red

by Jack Bates

  I guess she thought I could take care of myself.

  I can’t blame her. Charlotte is her world. She had to think of her daughter first, didn’t she? Isn’t that what a responsible parent would do?

  A large billboard at the foot of the exit ramp to my destination greets me. Kawkawlin: Home of the Velodrome. On it is an image of a steeply banked, oval track. Three figures race against one another on bicycles. One wears red, one wears white, one wears blue. Each figure flashes pearly white smiles. A happy, smiling crowd cheers from the stands. The infield is filled with coaches and a smiling blonde girl waving a checkered flag. In the corner of the sign are five interlocked circles. Kawkawlin is an official training ground for the U.S. Olympic team.

  Yuki and I hike up the exit ramp. It occurs to me that when I rode in cars, I never paid attention to the gentle rise of the road. I’m pretty certain the ascent was to slow cars down as they left the open freeway. Likewise, the return ramp sloped down for the opposite effect. On legs supporting a hiking pack, it is a bit of a struggle. I would have cut through the triangle of field between the service station and the road, but a rusty barbed wire fence prohibits the shortcut from happening.

  At the top of the ramp, there’s a green sign. Downtown Kawkawlin is three miles to the east. Larkin is 16 miles to the west. There isn’t much option for me. If we went to Larkin, we’d pass houses, maybe a gas station halfway there. I need to be smart and just do what I call a walk-through: Go into the nearest store, grab, and go.

  A single convenience plaza stands on the south side of Wilder Road. The Get Gas sign is rendered in letters leaning to the right to give the impression doing your business as quickly as possible. “Get your gas and go!” it says.

  There is no glass in the door and I know this probably means it has been picked over. I’ve learned a lot about surviving since I left the city a year and a month ago. One thing I know for certain is to never pass up a store. Even if the food is all gone there is bound to be something I can use, like matches, lighters, charcoal fluid, or duct tape.

  I undo the snap of the black leather sheath hanging on my belt to make sure the knife I carry will be accessible should I need it.

  Yuki and I go down the hill. The rusted fence ends where the convenience plaza lot begins. We touch the far edge of the cracked asphalt of the Get Gas service center, where I stop to remove the hiker’s pack from my back. I kneel down and Yuki trots up to me.

  “Yuki. Check.” I point at the store.

  Yuki turns her eyes to the store. She looks back at me.

  I point a second time at the store. “Yuki. Check,” I say. This time the dog trots up to the door. She stops, sniffs the air inside. Her tail is full mast, rigid, and jabbing at the sky: she is exhibiting caution. Yuki takes a hesitant step inside the door, sniffs again, and then disappears all the way inside the shop. A second later she gives off a single bark. It is her way of telling me “all clear.”

  I loop the strap of the backpack over one shoulder and hurry across the lot. I don’t like being out in the open any longer than necessary. Whoever broke the glass out of the door didn’t bother to unlock it. I twist the dead bolt and pull on the metal handle.

  Yuki is busy eating something she’s found on a lower shelf. I don’t bother to look, although from the crunching, the food is dry.

  I go first to the coolers, which are now nothing more than glass door cupboards. The beer and wine compartments are all empty. I am not surprised. The same can be said for the pop coolers. What I find in the slanted shelves are plastic jugs and bottles of white and chocolate milk. I pass on those.

  The next door’s glass has been busted. Bricks of cheese are sprinkled with safety glass. I brush away some of the chips. Mold. I want nothing to do with anything like that. There are metal racks coated in white rubber where once upon a time sandwiches grew. Little plastic signs indicate ham and cheese, Italian sub, roast beef. These packaged meals have long since been plucked off the wire shelves.

  I am just about to surrender when I see several stacks of unpacked boxes in the back. There is a storeroom behind the shelves where the employee used to stock the racks and shelves and sleeves. I go around to the alcove of bathrooms. There’s a large metal door that says, “Employees Only.” I pull on the handle and the door swings open. I am about to step inside when Yuki growls. I hesitate.

  “Yuki. Check,” I say. Yuki leans inside and sniffs. She looks back at the glassless front door and then looks at me. “She wants to leave,” I think, but I can’t. I need what’s inside those boxes.

  “All right, girl, we’ll leave. But first I need to look inside those boxes, okay?”

  Yuki whines. She looks at the front door. When she looks back at me, her eyebrows rise and fall. I reach down and pet her, reassure it will be okay. I hold the door open and she goes into the back room. I let the door swing closed behind me. There is no worry about getting locked in. Most of these doors have a safety on them to prevent any accidents. Besides, if it was necessary, I could get out through one of the glass doors.

  There is a horrible smell inside the stockroom. It was once a walk-in cooler, now it’s a sweat box. There are eggs, milk, and other perishables. At one time the stench would have been a lot worse, but now the room just has the smell of garbage.

  The boxes that have caught my eye say “Sports Drink” on the side. It’s not any of the name brands. The owner of the service station probably got a deal on some knock-offs. Doesn’t really matter. I need to keep up my hydration levels. If I could, I’d take all seven crates with me, but I know that is impossible.

  The label on the bottle says “Electric Berry.” It’s neither electrifying nor berry flavored. It’s warm, flat, stale, and I think I should have maybe shaken it first. I pour the rest of that bottle into a white, plastic bucket for Yuki. It’s probably not the greatest thing for her, but she needs to hydrate as well. Yuki sniffs what I pour and then looks out front from behind the glass door. A dog knows when it wants to eat or drink, I remind myself. If she wants it, she will drink it.

  I shake a new bottle of Electric Berry. This new one tastes a little better, but I’m sure it would be more electric if it were chilled to the proper temperature. It’s why all of those big, orange containers on the sidelines of football games were filled with ice. No one would drink this crap warm unless they had to. I had to.

  Midway through a swallow I realize Yuki is hunching down. She’s baring her fangs again. I set the bottle down on the flap of the top box and crouch down behind the wall of boxes. I pull the backpack next to me and call softly for Yuki. I hear her whimper. I know she’s trying to protect me, but if someone or something comes in and sees a dog inside the cooler, he, she, or it may come around like I did to investigate.

  “Yuki,” I say. My voice is a little louder. She stops her whimpering. She trots around behind the box. Because I’m at her level, she licks my face. “Stop that,” I say. She continues to lick me. It’s the salt from the drink, I think. Now she’s interested in what’s in the bucket. Thankfully I’ve placed it behind the rows of cardboard boxes.

  “Hey Lucy, I’m home,” someone says out front. His Hispanic accent sounds forced. Someone laughs; maybe it’s the guy who spoke. Yuki looks up from the bucket. I put my hand over her muzzle.

  “Dude. What are you talking about?” a new voice says.

  “It’s what Ricky always says to Lucy on the show.”

  “What show?”

  “The Lucy Show.”

  “What are you talking about?” I hear one of the far cooler doors open and close.

  “The Lucy Show,” the first speaker says. “There’s a bunch of discs back in the house.”

  “That’s what you’ve been doing?” Another door opens and closes.

  “Yeah. Cage has one of those battery operated DVD players.” He stops his story too abruptly. “What?”

  I can tell from the way the blabbermouth speaks something has changed between the two out front. There is no way of
knowing what the predicament is until I hear the blabbermouth speak again.

  “What bottle?” he says.

  “Shut up, you idiot,” the second speaker says. He says it in a whisper full of frustration.

  What I hear next sends my stomach down to my toes. It is the racking of a gun. Probably a shotgun with a slug now in its chamber. A slingshot and a knife aren’t going to be of any value against a pump-action shotgun.

  I look Yuki in the eyes and put a finger to my lips. It’s a futile gesture. After all this time I think she understands me, but truth be told, she’s just a dog. Anything she does is just a trick I’ve taught her. My fear is she’ll trot out from behind the boxes and the mighty hunter out front will fire his round into her.

  To my surprise, Yuki flattens down on the floor, her nose between her front paws. Her eyes stay on me, and I think I see concern in the way her eyebrows dance. Now I’m the one being silly, thinking I understand the subtle nuances of a dog’s dancing eyebrows.

  The cooler door behind me opens. “Come out, come out, whoever you are,” the first speaker says. He laughs. It is a high pitch giggle. “Friggin runner. Blast those boxes.”

  “Dude, it’s not a runner,” the second speaker says.

  “How do you know?”

  “Because a runner doesn’t need to drink.”

  “How do you know, Professor Know It All? Plants need water to grow, right?”

  I’m betting their frustration with one another will buy me just enough time to get the jump on them. If I don’t do something, they will storm the stockroom and I’ll be found. I fit the wrist rocket on my arm. I don’t want to kill either of them, but I need to send a message.

  I fish a metal pellet out of my pocket and place it in the cradle. Instead of aiming at the gunman, I shatter the glass of a cooler door two down from where they stand.

  “What the—” one of them says.

  “I’m coming out,” I yell.

  “Throw out your gun,” the second speaker says.

  “I don’t have a gun,” I say.

  “Bullshit,” the first guy says.

  “Did you hear one?” I ask.

  “Maybe you got a silencer,” the first one says again.

  “Dude, shut up,” the second guy says.

  “Your friend is pretty dumb,” I say. I put a second pellet in the leather cradle.

  “Hey, don’t call me dumb,” the first guy says.

  “Silencers are a Hollywood myth,” I say.

  “She’s got a gun, Aubrey.”

  “Dude, shut up.”

  “Why don’t you just blow her away?” the dude asks. He clearly doesn’t trust me.

  “Back off,” his accomplice says.

  “Or what? You’ll shoot me?”

  “No one has to shoot anyone,” I say. I’m standing up, the rubber tubing stretched taught. My right hand grips the handle of the wrist rocket. My right arm is a lethal weapon. All it needs is for my left hand to release the leather cradle.

  The one with the gun, Aubrey, stares back at me. He’s wearing camouflage pants, an olive green tank top. He has dark, wavy hair and crystal blue eyes. This boy is farm bred, sinewy from daily labor. His chest pulls the tank top tight and his arms are sculpted. It has been so long since I’ve seen a boy my age, I feel my cheeks warm.

  His partner on the raid—Dude, as Aubrey keeps calling him—wears pants that are either long shorts or short pants. If they weren’t so baggy, I’d think they were capris. A wide-brimmed sports cap is cocked sideways at the two o’clock position on his head. He holds the door open. Aubrey leans in and looks at me down the barrel of an over-and-under shotgun. He’s killed before, I think. He might do so again.

  “Man, why don’t you waste her?” Dude asks. “Man, she don’t even have a gun, just a little old pea-shooter.”

  I speak evenly. “One day you’ll run out of bullets, but I’ll always have stones.”

  “Just frickin’ waste her, Aubrey,” the dude pleads.

  I see Aubrey’s cool, blue eyes shift ever so slightly at the dude. When his blue eyes swing back to me, I’m smiling. “Before you do, at least let me peg him once with my shot,” I say.

  Aubrey laughs. He lowers the gun. I lower the slingshot.

  “This ain’t cool,” the dude says. “Denny’s going to be pissed.”

  “Who’s Denny?” I ask.

  “Guy back at the house,” Aubrey says. “Come on out from back there. We’ll take you to him.”

  Normally I would reject the invitation. There’s something inviting in Aubrey’s eyes. I find myself suddenly starved for human companionship.

  “Let me get my backpack. I’ll meet you guys out front. You have a car?”

  The dude scoffs at me. “As if,” he says.

  “All right. Let me load up on some of this sports drink.”

  “I’ll grab a case for the house,” the dude says.

  “I got it,” I say. “Go on out front.”

  The dude eyes me. “I think she’s hiding something.” Aubrey looks away from the dude to me.

  “This time he’s right. I was in the middle of taking a piss when you two showed up. I’ve got the bucket right here.” I slide the bucket I used to give Yuki some of the sport’s drink out past the boxes with my foot. “You want to come smell it?”

  “No, we’re good,” Aubrey says. He nods his head at the front door. The dude, reluctant to trust me and for good reason, goes out. Aubrey closes the cooler door and follows. I immediately drop down to the floor. Yuki has been extremely patient with me. I take her head in my hands and lift her eyes to mine.

  “Yuki. Stay.” I look at her. “Yuki. Stay. I’ll come back for you. You have food and drink here. Yuki. Stay.”

  She whimpers. I ruffle the top of her head. “Yuki. Stay.” It hurts a little to say it. There is no way to convey to the dog that my biggest fear is that this Denny back at the house will want to cook her and eat her. Meat is scarce.

  I put on my backpack, grab a box of the sports drink, and prop open the door of the stocking room. I stack two crates and leave my companion of the last thirteen months. I know if I say come she won’t hesitate to join me, but I can’t. I don’t plan on staying with Aubrey or the dude or Denny at the house any longer than I have to. I might get there and turn right around and come back.

  But I have to go. Someday the rash and the runners will be gone and the world will slowly return to order. When it does, we’ll all have to fit in again. Maybe that time is coming sooner than expected. I have no idea of how wrong I am.

  Three

  We hike another mile along Wilder Road. There are wide-open fields on either side of us that, a year ago, were filled with beets or corn or soybeans. Now they are overgrown with wheatgrass. The wild weed gives the landscape a pale yellow glow. Out in the field to our right is a large, olive green truck. Camouflage designs have been painted on its body. Military, I think. There are tandem wheels on it. Serial numbers are painted on the hood. A torn, dark green canvas is draped over a frame on the back of the bed. It looks very much like one of the military transports I saw rumbling through the city.

  We eventually go north on Euclid Avenue. During the walk I learn the “dude” has a name: It’s Matt. He prefers Dude. Matt, who seems to be obsessed with how well I fit into my jeans, pulls a wagon behind him. It’s a rusty Radio Flyer with wooden fence-like pieces fitted into brackets along the inner sides. The crates of sports drink fit snuggly on their ends in the wagon. Apparently Denny hates to have scouts come back without any booty.

  We pass a brown sign that says Velodrome 1. To change the subject from Matt’s hormonal driven, spontaneous rap about my ass, I ask if either of them have ever been to the Velodrome. Neither says anything at first. I catch the look Matt gives Aubrey. Matt smiles and laughs at some private joke.

  “Oh, you’ll see it soon enough,” Matt says. He stops the wagon to open a carton of the cigarettes he took from the convenience store.

  “You better not d
o that,” Aubrey says.

  “No one’s gonna know,” Matt says. He burns the end of a cigarette with a disposable lighter. The inhale calms him. He holds up the carton. “It’s how we found it. We took it from her.” Matt smiles around the cigarette and flips it up between his lips. He lifts the handle of the wagon and walks north on Euclid.

  “I don’t smoke,” I say, and then think, “Anymore.”

  Aubrey touches my elbow. It’s electric, and not in a hurtful way. It sparks something inside me I didn’t realize I missed until I feel it. I stop walking. I don’t realize it at first, but I am stroking my skin where he touched me. I rub my hands together like I’m wiping them clean.

  “Come on,” Aubrey says.

  “What did he mean ‘I’ll see it soon enough?’” I ask.

  Aubrey studies me. His blue eyes are magnetic. There’s something in them that he’s keeping from me. He cradles the shotgun in one arm and puts a hand on my arm. For a second I think he’s surprised at the muscle I flex under his touch. I don’t mean to, it is completely involuntary. It’s just been so long since I felt someone do that I react defensively. Aubrey’s hand drops.

  “We should keep up with him,” Aubrey says.

  “Who is he? He your brother or someone?”

  “That dude?” Aubrey shakes his head. “Nope. Just some guy who’s living with the rest of us at the house.”

  “Whose house is it?”

  Aubrey swings his hand out, indicating the houses on the outskirts of town. “Whose houses are any of these? When the trucks came in and hauled everyone to the Safety Zone, people just left these behind. I think some tried to take extra food with them. We’ve found a lot of bags and suitcases packed with canned goods and bottled water. But I guess they were either too heavy or the evacuators said they had to leave them.”