American Dead

by PW Cooper

  A car started, wheels grinding on gravel, headlights shining into the trailer windows as it turned away. She was gripped with a sudden terror. Oh God, they were leaving her...

  Then the door opened and she heard footfalls on the front step. She heard somebody come back inside. She shut her bedroom door and crept back under the covers, unnameable fear running like ice-water beneath her skin. She felt terribly cold all of a sudden. What was happening?

  Gena lay there and tried to sleep. Her mother was in the next room: either laughing or crying, Gena couldn't say which.

  * * *

  “How old are you anyway?” Carl asked. He was leaning against the shelving cart, watching her, as lazy as a predator that is sure of its next meal.

  “What?” Gena blinked.

  “I'm just curious. You seem kinda young is all.”

  She answered hesitantly, “I'm seventeen.”

  Carl whistled, looking her up and down. She shivered; almost able to feel his eyes peeling back her clothes, like clammy hands pressed against her skin.

  “Aren't you in High School, then?”

  “I skipped a grade.”

  “College?”

  “I don't know. I'm thinking about it.”

  “Well, don't rush into it. Look at me: my parents would have killed me if I hadn't gone to college. Never did me any good, but I went, got nothing out of it except a bunch of loans that I'll be paying off till I'm thirty.”

  Gena shrugged.

  “Besides!” Carl laughed, “you can always marry some rich guy. I know I would, if I looked like that.”

  Gena face twisted. She glanced self-consciously down at herself, then back up at the Assistant Librarian. She felt a surge of incredulous anger, but she didn't say anything, just slumped back against the edge of the check-out counter and glared.

  * * *

  Molly was kneeling at the edge of the ditch, her arms wrapped around her legs. There was a murky sludge pooled in the lowest point of the ditch where slimy black stones poked up like shipwrecks in the thick mud.

  Gena and Trevor stood in the road, in the spilled brightness of the headlights. The thin pool of blood grew out like oil welling up from the blacktop. Trevor's hands were thrust deep in his pockets, his gaze studiously avoided the mangled thing.

  Gena, however, could not look away. She stared. The crushed body lay broken and twitching in the middle of the road. There were clumps of blood-matted fur caught in the impacted front end of the car, where the bumper was twisted like a bloody nose between the glaring headlight-eyes. The animal's thin limbs spasming with increasingly infrequent kicks, its urgency waning with every motion. The pool of blood spread like a liquid halo, growing ever larger.

  Trevor scuffed his heels. He looked at Gena, biting at his lower lip. “What should we do”" he mumbled, “What are we going to do?”

  Gena looked out into the gathering darkness. There was nothing. No houses up against the gray-blue horizon, no power lines stringing their cobweb wires up in the air, no trees protruding full and shaggy from the earth. Nothing.

  When Gena failed to give him an answer, Trevor turned to Molly. “What are we supposed to do, Molly?” he asked.

  She just shook her head, rocking gently, her hair hanging down over her face. Her mouth started to move, working noiselessly for a moment before Gena heard anything, “... was when I was seven. We were coming back from walking Jane in the... you know... the park. We used to go there when we were kids. There was that marry-go-round thing that looked like some kinda beetle. You remember that, Gena? Anyway... we were coming back, walking across the parking lot and this big car, like a pickup truck or something. It was just backing up and Jane saw another dog or a squirrel or something and she went running towards it. And the pickup just backed right over her. I remember the driver was really angry at first, 'cause we were all shouting at him. Then he saw what happened and he looked really... I don't know. Like he was going to puke or something. He kept apologizing. Mom was crying, Dad just kept shaking his head like he couldn't believe it, like he didn't know what he was supposed to do. I wanted to kill the driver. Run him over, see how he liked it.” She stopped suddenly, turning and looking at Gena. Her eyes were dry and wider than usual. “Do you remember that dog? Calamity Jane. It's a stupid name, I know. They let me name her.”

  Then she turned away. She kicked the gravel along the roadside, sending it clattering across the pavement. “Fuck!” she swore, and kicked the road again, “Fuck, fuck, fuck!” She stood there, arms crossed, looking back out at nothing.

  Gena found that she couldn't remember Molly's dog at all, couldn't remember ever knowing a dog. The Riley's had never had any pets, for one reason or another.

  “Check the collar,” Trevor suggested, “maybe the owner's name is on it.”

  Gena nodded. She bent down over the dog. One sad brown eye rolled in the broken skull; it looked right at her. The mouth slipped open and the tongue slid out. The dog was smiling at her.

  It whimpered when she reached down under its neck. Her fingers shook, fearful adrenaline-fueled trembling. The dog's fur was warm and damp, sticky hot. There were two tags, a vaccination marker of some kind and a silver name-tag with the letters stamped onto it. Thin crimson liquid filled the indents: Toto. No place like home, there's no place like home. The phrase ran unbidden through her head. Judy Garland's plaintive voice and wide innocent eyes. Shiny red slippers clacking. What kind of person named their dog Toto?

  “It doesn't say,” she said. “No address or anything.”

  She stood up and looked down at the broken thing at her feet. Her hands were wet. The half-darkness of the late summer night turned the liquid on her palms to a black sheen.

  Trevor muttered, “We should, uh, we should put it out of its misery, I guess.”

  Molly was standing just outside the range of the car's lights. “What?”

  “It's... it's in a lot of p-pain.” Trevor's voice caught on the word.

  Gena looked at him, then back at the dog, then to Trevor again. She felt curiously calm. “How?” she asked.

  Trevor shrugged. Molly gagged, she crumpled back down on the side of the road. Gena looked down at her shoes. Her white sneakers were turning red. Ruby red.

  * * *

  “But when are you coming home?”

  “I don't know. Soon.” Her father's voice came weak through the telephone, frayed and electric.

  “When?” Gena's fingers were tight around the receiver. The cord was twisted about her arm.

  “I said I don't know. When your mom and I have a chance to work things out, I guess.”

  Gena wanted to scream. She bit down on her lip. “Where are you staying?”

  “Oh... I found a place.”

  “Where?”

  “It's, ah, it's a place, baby. Look, don't worry about me. I'm fine. How are you doing? How's school?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “How was your day at school, is what I mean. What do you think I mean?”

  “Dad... I don't have school. It's summer. And I graduated.”

  “Oh, shit. Yeah... Sorry. I'm just... I'm a little out of it, is all. Forget it.”

  “Okay.”

  Silence hummed on the line. Gena squeezed the cord between her fingers. It felt like he was worlds away, in another time. Gone.

  “I'll see you soon, okay sweetie?”

  Gena nodded. “Okay Dad. I love you.”

  For a moment, he said nothing. His voice was thick when he spoke again, like he'd just swallowed something sticky. “Love you too.” And then he hung up the phone.

  Gena sat there for what felt like a long time, winding the telephone cord between her fingers. She was still there when her mother came home from the garage. The two of them sat in the darkness, neither speaking, neither moving.

  * * *

  The three of them sat on the hill, staring out at the emptiness beneath.

  Gena wove her hands through the wild grass. The soft blades slid eas
ily through her fingers. She lay back; her hair spread beneath her. She stared up at the starry night. Thin white pinholes in the sky, like holes burning slowly into the inky curtain. It was one of those nights when the earth seemed very small and space so close. Her father used to take her to see the fireworks on the Forth of July. She'd loved nothing better than to lay back in the grass and watch the lights flare in the darkness, like stars exploding above. She could lay back and leave the ground. Her parents hadn't gone together to the fireworks for years now.

  She closed her hand on the black dirt, driving it deep under her fingernails.

  She thought she could feel the whole world turning beneath her. The sky revolved, her fingers closed on handfuls of grass and tore them from the earth. Life ended so easily. And the sky swallowed the world when you stared up into it. You just floated away.

  She turned her cheek against the soft spines of grass. Molly sat at her left, plucking the petals one by one from a wild flower.

  “What do you want to do now?” Gena asked.

  Molly threw the plucked dandelion out down the gently sloping hillside. “Nothing. I don't care. I just wanna be here a while.”

  Just over the hill was the rough patch of bare dirt where they'd buried the dog. Gena looked back up at the sky. It was a hot night. The warm air caught her, seemed to lift her effortlessly towards the stars.

  * * *

  “How was your day?” Her mother looked expectantly across the table, her hand poised over the open pizza box.

  Gena just shrugged.

  “Yeah? What did you do?”

  Gena shrugged again. She tore at the rubbery crust with her teeth. It stretched. This was the third night in a row that they'd eaten leftover pizza. Mom kept bringing it home. She'd never been much of a cook, Dad had always taken care of it. It had been five days since the fight, and she hadn't seen her father since, hadn't heard anything except what little he'd told her on the phone.

  Jessica put a slice laden with pale green peppers onto her paper plate, hissed and sucked her fingertips. “Have you thought anymore about college?”

  Gena scratched her nose. “Yeah. A little, I guess. I don't know...”

  Jessica looked at her again, her eyebrow twitching. “What about a job then? Full time somewhere. Or are you just planning on sitting around the house doing this,” she mimicked her daughter's shrug, “for the rest of your life?” She tried to smile.

  Gena blew an angry puff of air out her nose. “Cut it out.”

  Jessica laughed harshly. “Cut it out? Cut what out?”

  “Just leave me alone, Mom! Jesus!” Gena shoved back her chair and rose, tossing down the remainder of her pizza on the flimsy plate.

  Her mother's eyes flared. “Goddamn it, Gena! You're worse than your father!”

  “Well, then maybe you should throw me out too!” Gena's voice trembled with anger. At that moment, she hated nothing like she hated her mother. Her whole body was quivering inside. Her hands tightened into fists.

  Jessica pushed her hands through her short hair. “That's not what happened, sweetie. It's... more complicated.”

  Gena scoffed. “Right. I'm sure it is.”

  “Look, your dad and I-”

  “Stop calling him 'my dad' will you! He has a name doesn't he? You're still married, aren't you?”

  Jessica pursed her lips. “We're just... taking some time off, alright? Frankly, Gena, I'd appreciate it if I could get a little more support right now. It's not like this is any easier on me-”

  “Yeah. I'm sure you're really broken up about it.” Gena felt her mouth twist. She knew she should just shut up, but it was as though a faucet has been turned on inside of her; she couldn't stop the words gushing out, no matter how loudly the voice in her head kept screaming for her to stop. “Maybe if you weren't so goddamn controlling-”

  “Be quiet, Gena! You don't know what you're talking about!” Jessica's face tightened, hurt or anger drawing her eyebrows tight together.

  “You hate us both, don't you? You wish I'd never been born, don't you?”

  “Don't say that, Gena, you know it isn't true.” Jessica seemed to sink a little in her chair, and Gena felt that stinging excitement, the simultaneous satisfaction and shame. She knew then that this was her last chance. She could still turn back, or she could drive the knife in up to the hilt. She knew which she should choose, but it was too late now to stop herself. The words needed to come out, like bile rising in her throat the moment before vomiting, she knew that something foul was coming up and could not be stopped.

  “Anyway, what do you care?” she snarled, “You've never cared about either of us. You only care about yourself! That's why he's gone, you drove him away!”

  Jessica flinched, a sharp intake of breath. She looked away from Gena, lifting a hand to her face and wiping her cheek. She sniffed softly, pathetically, and Gena knew that her mother was trying not to cry. Gena blinked, shocked into silence. She'd never seen her mother cry before.

  She wanted to go to her, crawl into Jessica's arms and beg for forgiveness. She wished she could take it all back. It was out now, though, couldn't be reclaimed. She left the room without another word, almost turning back at the doorway, almost looking back, almost saying something more.

  * * *

  Gena stood on the street corner underneath the twisted oak tree and watched an old man stagger blindly into the silvery rain.

  She looked up, blinking against the raindrops. The green leaves were black in the darkness, whirling in the turbulent wind. The long limbs lashed violently, like the tree had woken up and was shaking out its arms in a desperate effort to stay dry.

  Gena was soaked through, hair plastered down and shoes squelching. Her coat was more-or-less waterproof, but the rain had gotten in under the collar and at the cuffs and soaked into her shirt. She stood there, shivering, just outside the pale radius of the street lamp.

  “Come on, Mom,” she pleaded to the night. It had all been arranged, Jessica would pick her up as soon as the library closed. But they'd closed ten minutes ago, and she was still waiting. Gena wondered if her Mother was still angry with her. She wouldn't take it out on her like this, would she? Gena was sure that she wouldn't. So what had happened?

  The sparse traffic hissed over the rain-slick roads, one vehicle after the other, none stopping.

  She was about to start walking home to the trailer park when a car slowed and pulled up to the curb. She didn't recognize the vehicle; it was a dark red station-wagon with the first signs of rust corroding the edges. The wipers flicked swiftly back and forth, sweeping the windshield with a clacking sound.

  The driver turned on the lights inside. It was Carl. He rolled down his window and leaned out into the rain. “What the hell are you doing out here?”

  “I'm just waiting.” Her teeth chattered uncontrollably when she spoke.

  Carl laughed. “Jesus. Come on, get in, I'll give you a ride home.”

  She hesitated, then shook her head. “No, that's okay. She'll be here.”

  “Yeah?” He made a show of looking up and down the street. “You sure about that?”

  Gena nodded.

  He rolled his eyes. “Come on, she'll figure it out. You have a cell phone with you?”

  She shook her head.

  “Huh, I left mine at home. Look, it's not a problem or anything. I can take you anywhere you want, just get in.” He leaned out towards her, and the light from inside his car fell on his face in such a way that his eye sockets filled with shadow; his features turned vaguely skeletal.

  “Uh...” Gena's fingers twisted together. It was something she did when she was nervous. She'd only noticed it recently, and was trying to keep from doing it. She stuffed her hands into her pockets. “I'd better not. Thanks, though.”

  Carl leaned back into his car, laughing incredulously. “You're really going to just stand out here in this? Jesus! You'll look like a drowned rat.”

  “I told her I'd be here.”

  “
Look, how about this: I'll park here for a few minutes, and you can wait in the car, okay? I'd feel really guilty if I just left you standing out here in the rain. Come on, get in.”

  “I guess...” she stepped towards the car. “Just to wait?”

  He nodded, rolling his eyes with exasperation, “Yeah yeah, just to wait. Come on already!”

  Gena bit back a curse. The tree was proving to be quite ineffective as an umbrella. On the other hand, though, there was something about Carl which made her nervous. Something about the way he looked at her.

  She went quickly out into the road, trying not to let her feel splash in the puddles, and she got into his car.

  Carl rolled the window back up. He turned, and he smiled at her. There was no sound but the airy murmur of the heater. He drummed his fingers on the wheel, beating out the rhythm to a song in his head.

  “So,” he said, his voice artificially level, “who was supposed to pick you up anyway?”

  “My Mom.” She twisted her hair in her fingers, wringing out thin rivulets of water that ran down her wrists.

  He laughed, “Ha!” He leaned close to her, as though sharing a confidential morsel of information, “My mom was absolutely incapable of being on time for anything. It was unbelievable! My dad used to say that she'd probably be late for her own funeral.” An ingratiating grin split his face.

  Gena just nodded, and focused intently on the window. Carl went back to tapping on the wheel.

  “So, how are you liking it here, anyway? On the job, I mean. You seemed like you were getting the hang of everything.”

  “It's alright.”

  “Hey,” he reached over and touched her leg. Two fingers brushing across her thigh along the seem of her jeans. “It'll be better once you got the hang of it.” He rested her hand on her knee, fingers spread. “It's just like anything else: the longer you do it, the better you get at it.” He smiled again.

  She stared at his hand. She wanted to hit it, or bite it. Don't touch me, she wanted to say, but she only nodded. She did nothing. There were crumpled receipts on the floor and candy bar wrappers in the back seat, all sorts of rumpled scraps of paper, crinkled magazines, a half-full bag of corn chips rolled tight.

  Someone walked past on the sidewalk. She couldn't see the person's face, only the darkness beneath their heavy black raincoat and hood. He – she thought that the shape under the coat was man – held a slick purple umbrella with a curved rubber handle.