The Speed Queen

by Stewart O'Nan

  She treats me nice, her and Mr. Jefferies. Over the years they’ve never left me, when everyone else did. Only my mom, really. Gainey’s still with me. So that’s three. If it weren’t for them, I don’t think I’d be okay now.

  So no, I don’t know what my IQ is. A hundred something, I guess. I’m not a moron, if that’s what you mean. I know what’s happening to me.

  When they electrocute you, they put this leather helmet on your head. On the top is this bronze knob. It connects to this copper screen inside with a sponge on it. That’s the top electrode. They shave your head so it sits right on your skin. The other one’s part of the chair; in most states, it’s attached to the left leg, sometimes your spine. It’s bronze too. They cut the back of your pant leg so it’s right against your calf. The straps on the back and the arms they make such a big deal of on TV don’t do anything except hold you down.

  It’s simple. The electricity needs to go from the electrode in the cap to the electrode in the ankle. You’re like the piece of wire in a light.

  The usual dose is 2000 volts. They do that twice, in some states four times. What’s supposed to happen is the current goes through you and stops your heart. What you do is go stiff. All your muscles tense up at once. It doesn’t always work like it’s supposed to. Back around the turn of the century, one guy went so stiff he ripped the legs off the chair and they had to hold his feet down with concrete blocks. The second jolt made him kick those over. They were going to try a third time, but he’d already died from third-degree burns.

  In Florida seven years ago they did this guy named Jesse Tafero; when they threw the switch, flames a foot high shot out of his head. Sparks were flying everywhere. The whole place was filled with smoke. When the guards unstrapped him, his skin fell off his bones like fried chicken. This other guy in Virginia, they got the voltage wrong on him, and the steam built up inside his head until his eyeballs popped and ran down his cheeks. The book I read had all these horror stories. If you made it the chair, you’d be able to use them.

  9

  I consider myself sane. So does the State of Oklahoma. It’s the only thing we agree on.

  There’s a joke in here, “I’m as sane as the next person.” Which over on the Row would be Darcy. She’s in for running over her stepdaughter with her car. She didn’t just run her over once; she got her caught between the bumper and the garage door and kept ramming her till the door broke. She lived a week. Darcy told me the whole story. Her boyfriend was sleeping with both of them and decided to go with the younger one. You might use that for Natalie and me, I don’t know.

  When I was first in, I might have been insane. Lamont was gone, Natalie was still in the hospital, and I was coming down after a month of just going. I couldn’t think of anything. I’d look at the bolt holding the flange of the bunk on the wall and it would be fascinating, but it didn’t mean anything. Nothing did. Everything was made of cardboard. The first time Mr. Jefferies came to see me I could see the wires in his head, the gears that made his mouth go. He wanted to steal my secret numbers so I put my hands over my eyes. I held my breath so I wouldn’t hear him. He talked like a recording on the phone; none of the words went together.

  “Well,” he said, “that’s all I’ve got,” and stood up to go.

  The guard started to take me away, but he was still looking at me.

  “I know what you are,” I said. “I saw you in the movie of angels. My dad is watching us on TV. He’ll get you.”

  A few years ago he played that tape for me. I recognized my voice but it wasn’t me. Not that that’s any excuse.

  People say it was all Lamont’s fault, that he was the crazy one and we just did what he told us. I don’t think that’s true. It’s easy to think that now. Like I said, it’s different when you’re there.

  When the detectives cleared out our apartment, I asked them to send me any pictures of Lamont they could find. There were a few envelopes from the Motophoto. I sat down on my bunk to look through them, and there we were sitting on the balcony at Mia Casa, kissing Gainey on each cheek. We were so young. There I was in my bikini, posing like a centerfold on the hood of the Roadrunner. There was even a bunch taken at a barbecue in the courtyard with Mrs. Wertz and all our neighbors. It looked like everyone was having a fine time. Even though I knew Natalie had to have taken some of them, Lamont looked happy with me, his arm over my shoulder, his cap pushed back. There was chicken and coleslaw and everyone had a can of beer, but I couldn’t remember when they were taken, what day, what the weather was like. The girl in the pictures was skinny, with long hair, and smiled all the time. It was like looking at a good friend, someone who meant a lot to you once but that you hadn’t seen in a long time.

  How do you tell if you’re insane? I still talk to myself. I remember things that never happened and forget ones that did. Some days I pretend I’m cruising Meridian with Lamont and Gainey in his car seat. This is before Natalie, before any of that. We slide into Coney Island and park under the awning and take turns feeding him fries. We both have the chili-cheese foot-long with double onions, and Lamont has to finish mine. Later we roll over to Arcadia Lake and watch the sun set over the water and then go home, and when I’m almost asleep, when I’m lying here with Janille there going through the newspaper, I feel him reach for me. Is that insane?

  10

  I dream every night. Normal dreams, I think. No more nightmares than anyone else. I don’t see the Closes or Victor Nunez or anyone else from the Mach 6 coming to get me, if that’s what you mean. I don’t see Lamont or the knives or the fire. I’m not afraid to sleep.

  I dream of driving across the desert with a cold grape soda. I dream of sleeping beside Gainey on top of the covers. I dream of being out of here.

  It’s funny how sometimes your dreams don’t change even when your life does. I still dream that the Conoco’s going to blow up. I’m working swing, waiting for Mister Fred Fred to relieve me, and this car wobbles in. It’s muddy like it just came from the bottom of a lake, and its wheels are falling off. It’s just like the beginning of The Stand—I’m sure that’s where I got it from. The guy behind the wheel is drunk or falling asleep or something, and the car just rolls into the pumps. One of the hoses splits open and the gas pours down on the roof. It’s a blue Malibu, the gas washes some of the mud off. In my booth I can see the muffler chugging out exhaust, and the gas streaking down the fender for it. There’s no way I can get out from behind the counter. The zodiac scroll dispenser is in the way, and the Slush Puppy machine, all the lighters and Chap Sticks and beef jerky; it’s like I’m buried. I look up on the monitor and the Malibu’s on fire. The guy’s forehead is on the wheel; the horn’s going nonstop. There’s a sticker by the pump controls that says In Case of Emergency, Follow Contingency Plan, but I can’t remember what the plan is.

  I never get to the end of the dream, to the explosions I know are coming. I started having the dream the week I started working there. It hasn’t stopped since. There really was a sticker that said that. It was a joke; the manager never told us what the plan was. It didn’t matter. Back then I was too drunk to be any help anyway. I would have stood there and burned.

  I dreamed about my dad for a long time after he died. Saturday mornings he’d bring me to the track and let me watch the stable-boys run their workouts. There was hardly anyone else there; you could sit wherever you wanted. In my dream, he was sitting high up in the grandstand and I was climbing the stairs. The stairs had numbers stenciled on them but they weren’t in any order. I kept climbing and climbing, and the sun was hot over the grandstand. He was still sitting there with his hat on, far across the rows. And then the PA would come on—not a voice, just this humming—and I knew I was going to fall against the concrete and I’d feel it against my skin forever.

  I still have this dream once in a while, but right after he died I had it every night. And others too. There was one where he was driving his Continental around and around the block, and another where he came home fro
m work and gave me all the change in his pockets. He used to do that in real life, but in the dream all the money was from another country; the coins were square and had holes in them and pictures of birds. Once we were talking, and my mom woke me up. I was mad at her all day.

  It wasn’t just dreams then. Sometimes I’d see him walking down the street. I’d think it was him from the hair, or his hat. Any short, fat man who walked by. It got so I couldn’t go to the mall. The gal who helped Natalie write her book made a big deal of this, like it proved I was crazy. Sister Perpetua said it’s absolutely normal, so whatever you want to do with it is fine. I loved my dad and I still miss him. He was a regular guy and doesn’t have anything to do with what happened.

  11

  I don’t have many fears for myself anymore. My biggest fear is that Gainey won’t know who his parents were. That’s one reason I’m making this tape. I don’t want him reading Natalie’s book and thinking it’s the truth.

  Honey, I love you and I’m always looking over you, and so’s your daddy. I know this won’t answer everything. We were young and mixed up. Don’t you be that way; you see what it leads to.

  That’s about it for fears. After a while you understand it’s a waste of time. There’s only so much you control.

  I used to be afraid of the weather. Out near Depew you could see it coming a hundred miles away. You were supposed to get hail right before a tornado. It would get dark and then you’d hear it dinging off the hood of our car. My mom loved it. “Look,” she said as it hopped in the grass. “How big around would you say those are?” She put a slicker on and a pot on her head and ran outside to put the car in the garage. On the way back she filled her apron, saving the bigger pieces for the freezer. Jody-Jo stayed under the dining-room table, resting his head on the carpet. I turned the TV on to see which counties were getting hit. The weathermen were on all the channels. Pea-sized, they said, marble-sized. Golf ball, baseball, softball. Outside it was like nighttime. My mom went out on the porch.

  “Come see the lightning,” she said.

  I’d only go to the door. Leaves flew in around my shins. The glider was going all by itself; the yard looked like it was covered with mothballs. I knew at work my dad would have to calm the horses down. I was afraid one would kick him in the head like they did in the movies. I was afraid he’d be trying to get home, driving with his windshield wipers on high. He’d have to lie in a ditch when the tornado came. His car could roll over on him, or the wind might pick him up, and then there were the wires still shooting sparks, the poles falling like trees.

  In the west, lightning branched down the sky.

  “Marjorie, look!” my mom said. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

  Of all the ways they kill people, the only one I’m afraid of is the firing squad. Here’s why. They’re made up of five people, usually guards. They stand behind this screen with a slit in it and you sit in a chair with a cloth target over your heart. If they like you, they don’t want to be the one to kill you. So what the state does is put a blank in one of the guns. Anyone who’s fired a rifle knows a blank doesn’t have a recoil like the real thing. It’s not like the electric chair, where there’s two switches and one’s a fake. The same thing goes for lethal injection; there are two buttons that press the plungers. With the firing squad, you know who’s doing it.

  What happens sometimes is everyone on the squad likes the person, and they all fire away from the heart. It’s happened a bunch of times in this country, and even more during war. Everyone hits you in the right side of the chest and you bleed to death while they’re reloading. So it’s better if they don’t like you. When they killed Gary Gilmore, the four shots overlapped at the heart of the target—like a four-leaf clover, the book said. I wouldn’t want Janille to have to make that choice.

  You asked me about dreams. There’s this great dream in Monty Python where this guy’s about to be shot. The firing squad’s locked and loaded on him, and all of a sudden he wakes up in this chaise lounge in his backyard. His mom’s there, and he says, “Oh, Mom, thank heavens, it was all a dream.” And his mom says, “No, dear, this is the dream,” and he wakes up in front of the firing squad again. That’s what it’s like sometimes, especially this last week. You expect Darcy to be there but there’s only Janille.

  The firing squad’s not very popular anymore. Only Utah and Idaho use it. It’s worse in foreign countries and during wars. They’ll shoot you anywhere.

  But what about you, what are you afraid of? No one reading your books after you’re dead, I bet. Hey, it’s okay, they’ll still watch your movies, and that’s what counts.

  12

  I don’t call myself born-again and I don’t go to any particular church. I’m a Christian because I believe in Jesus Christ. That’s it and that’s all. I don’t believe in figuring out all of the world’s problems. I don’t think I’m going to save anybody, even myself. There’s no guarantees of anything.

  When I became one is a tougher question. I began reading the Bible my second year here. Even before my trial I was getting letters from people who didn’t know me telling me that God had saved me for this. Some of them thought I was innocent and some of them said it didn’t matter. It was a kind of tribulation, they said. I would be a witness. I didn’t believe them at first because, honestly, some of them sounded crazy. A lot of them talked about the Last Times and the Rapture, things only crazy people would say. I didn’t write any of them back and after we lost they stopped writing, all but a few of them.

  One day a few months later Janille had a package for me. It had been opened and taped back up like they thought it was a bomb. It was from the Reverend Lynn Walker in Duncan. He’d sent letters before, saying I needed to remember the trials of Job. Now he’d sent me a new Bible, still in its shrink-wrap. He also sent a yellow highlighter with it. His note said I should mark the words that spoke to me, and that I might start with the Psalms. I wasn’t forgotten, Reverend Walker said. Every Sunday the congregation of the Duncan House of Prayer was remembering me.

  “Got any use for this?” I asked Janille, and stuck it through the bars.

  “I already got one,” she said, flipping the thin pages. She rubbed her thumb over the gold edges and the rough leather cover like a salesman and handed it back to me. “It’s a nice one though.”

  “Think the library would want it?”

  “I think they have enough of them.”

  “What am I supposed to do with it?” I asked.

  And I remember Janille backing away from the bars like it wasn’t her problem.

  Remember that, Janille—the day my Bible came?

  Janille’s been a friend. She switched shifts so she could be here tonight. We read a little earlier in Revelations, the seven angels. I haven’t told her yet but I want her to have my Bible. Sister Perpetua said that was kind of me, but it’s not. Janille knew what I needed then. In a way, she saved me.

  I didn’t start reading it right then. I put it away where I wouldn’t have to look at it. It wasn’t for another year that I dug it out again.

  It was June because the TV was all repeats and the floors had just started to sweat. The cement turned slick and you had to be careful if you were a pacer. Next door Darcy was listening to her boombox. I had my atlas out, and I was driving through Oak Creek Canyon on Alternate 89, curving along with the water, the red rocks piled high on both sides. Darcy turned her box off, then on again, then off. I rolled out of my bunk and went over to the corner where the bars meet the wall.

  “What’s up?” I said.

  “Your girlfriend Natalie’s gettin’ out.”

  “What?” I said, except I didn’t say, “What?” Back then I used a lot of unnecessary language. “How?” I said.

  “She’s done two of her six.”

  The numbers made sense but it was impossible, like a bill you’ve forgotten and can’t afford to pay.

  “When?” I said.

  “August first.”

  I thanked her and went b
ack to my bunk and wondered if I could have Natalie fixed. I couldn’t. I didn’t have any money, and everyone thought I was crazy. She’d be free and I’d be stuck here the rest of my life.

  A little after midnight, I opened the Reverend Lynn Walker’s Bible to Psalms and read:

  Happy is the man

  who does not take the wicked for his guide

  nor walk the road that sinners tread

  nor take his seat among the scornful;

  the law of the Lord is his delight,

  the law his meditation night and day.

  I uncapped the highlighter and colored the whole thing in.

  Sometimes in your books you make fun of religious people. You make them crazy or evil, like in “Children of the Corn” or Needful Things. I’d appreciate it if you didn’t this once. Just make me the way I am.

  13

  I was wondering if you’d do a 13. It’s like a yellow car’s supposed to be unlucky, like our Roadrunner. Lamont said you make your own luck. Maybe he was right.

  The worst thing about being executed is the waiting, knowing it’s going to happen. Five years ago, when they scheduled that Connie gal, Mr. Jefferies said it was just a matter of time for me.

  The last woman they did before that was back in the thirties, this woman who ran a tourist court with her husband out west on Route 66. This was in the Dust Bowl days, when families packed everything in the Model A and headed for California. What this woman and her husband did was let them park in a grove of pecans off behind their cabins. In the middle of the night the man and woman would cut their throats, steal their stake and sell the trucks to a man up in Wichita. They got caught when the man in Wichita stopped buying the trucks. The police found a whole barnful on their property. In the house there were fifty wedding rings on a keychain. They hanged the woman first. Her last words couldn’t be repeated.