Complex City

by G H Edwards

  Claire had hoped that the drive would be a nice time to talk, and she could cuddle with her husband as he sped down the road. She had been very wrong. The noise of the old truck’s engine and the sound of the tires hitting the cracks made conversation nearly impossible. Claire found that she had to yell to Michael even though she was pressed against him. When they hit the first big buckle in the road, she let out a high-pitched squeak as the truck lifted up. She felt her stomach float like it did on a ride at the amusement park. Michael groaned and nearly crumbled with the impact of the truck touching down. The steering wheel violently jerked as his thin arms tried to control the landing. After he had recovered, he slowed the truck down considerably.

  Claire looked at her husband as she drove; he must have been behind the wheel for an hour and a half, but he looked like he had been driving for days. He was hunched over the wheel and was squinting to see the road ahead of him. Claire instantly thought of an old bus driver she knew when she was in school. He was named Gus, and he was very old and very friendly. Every kid who got on the bus always gave Gus a chipper greeting. One day he had died at the wheel while waiting for passengers to load up at a scheduled stop. Claire was on the bus and was one of the many passengers who looked around in confusion when the bus didn’t move forward after everyone had sat down.

  Suddenly she became very worried about her dying husband. It seemed like every bump and every turn was draining the life out of him. It was as if the city was his life support system, and the farther they drove away, the worse he became. She wondered if this was a terrible idea. Maybe Michael would have been okay if we’d just stayed at home, she thought. What if he can’t make it? The horrible thought crawled up and refused to leave her mind no matter how hard she tried to push it back. She couldn’t even begin to imagine Michael actually dying, let alone dying in the middle of nowhere with no one to help. She refused to even entertain the thought of losing him, let alone what she would do if he died on the road. No, she decided it wasn’t worth worrying about because he would be fine, as long as he could rest on the trip. She knew she needed to drive but was very intimidated; in fact, she kicked herself for not learning to drive when they were preparing for the trip. It had been less than two hours into the journey, and she already realized she hadn’t prepared as much as she should have. She thought about how she could tell Michael they needed to rest and she was going to drive.

  She leaned over to Michael’s ear and yelled, “So how do you drive this thing?”

  “You just use the wheel to steer and the pedals to stop and go,” Michael said as loud as he could, which sounded more like a cough.

  “Sounds pretty easy. Can I try?” Claire said, trying to sound confident, but in reality she was terrified.

  “Um, are you sure? It’s not easy to drive on these roads,” Michael said while he stared unblinkingly at the road.

  “I’ve always wanted to try. Just for a little bit,” Claire lied nervously.

  “Okay,” Michael said as he slowed the truck to a shuddering stop. He wasn’t worried about pulling over because he hadn’t seen another car since they had left the city. Claire pulled the handle, and the door opened with a loud groan. She walked quickly to the driver’s side and opened the door. She looked in and saw Michael was still sitting in the driver seat with his hands on the wheel.

  “I’ll be fine. Trust me,” she said.

  “I do trust you,” Michael said in a whisper, “but I can’t let you sit here.”

  “What? Why not? How do you expect me to drive?”

  “Do we have any towels or newspapers?” Michael said, clearly embarrassed.

  Claire did an excellent job of pretending that Michael urinating in his pants wasn’t a big deal. She had said things about how the bumps made her want to go also, and it was okay because they had changes of clothes. She had worried before about Michael’s quickly failing health, but now she was certain that he was in real danger. She knew she had to learn how to drive this old truck quickly. After she had cleaned him up and helped him to the passenger side, she slid into the driver seat, which was now covered in newspaper. Michael gave her a quick mumbling rundown regarding what the pedals did and how to drive. Soon she had shifted Ol’ Blue into drive and was beginning to drive forward. Despite her husband’s dire condition and the fact that they were in a completely foreign land, she was thrilled and wired as she began to speed up and steer to miss the bumps. She looked down and saw she was going twenty miles an hour; at this milestone, she glanced over to Michael and saw he was slumped over at an awkward angle. Terrified at his condition, she hit the brakes with all her strength. The tires locked up and skidded, and Claire’s head jerked forward, making her hit her teeth on the steering wheel. Michael slammed forward against the dashboard and fell onto the floorboard.

  “What the hell was that?” Michael said in a groan that sounded confused.

  Claire put her hands to her mouth and found a small amount of blood on her fingers. She looked at Michael, who looked like a toy doll stuffed into a small drawer.

  “I’m sorry… There was an…animal in the road, and I didn’t want to kill it,” she lied.

  She reached down and gently pulled Michael out of the tight spot and helped him back to his seat. When she looked up, she realized they were coasting uncontrolled through the grass on the side of the road. Without thinking, she slammed on the brakes, causing Michael to slide forward and hit the dash again.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, I thought we were… Oh, never mind. I’ve got it now.” After shifting the truck into park, she leaned over and once again helped Michael get back to his seat. Soon she was ready to go again and swore to him that she wouldn’t do anything stupid like that again. After a few minutes, she was cruising down the bumpy road at thirty-five miles and hour and was feeling much better. Michael had fallen asleep again. Claire found it very hard to watch the road for large holes and slow down quickly enough to go over them gently. She could now see why Michael had been so tired. Through trial and error, she discovered that if she kept the truck over forty-five miles an hour she could nearly glide over the large potholes and gently swerve around the large buckles.

  After some time, she was able to break her hypnotic trance on the road and look around at where she was driving. There were no lights in sight; she had never seen such darkness in all her life. Like everyone she knew, she was born and raised in the city. She hadn’t ever felt the need to leave her city because everything she needed was an easy bus ride away. Every member of her immediate family was nearby, and so were her in-laws. She was happy and free in her world.

  She felt as though this was a dream and she was cruising at forty-five miles an hour through it. The stars filled the dark sky like Claire had never imagined, and she had trouble keeping her eyes down as she drove. She looked off to the sides of the road, but all she could see was just a few feet of grass before the darkness swallowed it up. She began to wonder what was out there. Were there people? On the outskirts of town, there were farms that supplied most of the food; she wondered if she was driving through one of those. Her question was soon answered when the sky began to lighten. She saw that just outside the range of her headlights was open country with far-stretching fields of wild grass. She had never seen such openness in all her life. The land was coming to life, and she was finally able to stretch her neck and enjoy the views around her. To her right, she saw that the two-lane road they’d been driving on was actually a four-lane interstate with a grass median. The extra lanes gave her some comfort and allowed her to occasionally switch to a smoother lane. She discovered they were cruising past open fields and lakes and over broken bridges. Her fear of driving over bridges was softened when she found that most of the time they’d already traveled over the bridges before she’d even noticed them. To her right she occasionally saw flashes of blue water like a flickering dream world.

  Claire rolled down her window and felt surprisingly at peace for the first time in a long time. She felt the wind, which
seemed to blow away all the turmoil in her life. She felt like she could breathe more easily than she had ever breathed in her life. She had seen the sun rise many times over the Gulf but never over open land like this, and it inspired her to keep going. She smiled when she saw Michael sleeping soundly next to her, curled up in a ball like a child. The sight of buildings just ahead of them soon interrupted her peace. Was this a city? She knew there were no cities between Houston and Miami—had she made it there already? There were two small buildings, one on each side of the road. As she approached, she saw there were holes in the walls, and it appeared that one of the buildings was missing the entire back half. She glanced at Michael again and debated with herself whether she should make sure he was okay and show him the buildings. She slowed to a near stop in front of the buildings and saw signs advertising cigarettes and soda. To her relief she didn’t see evidence of a person anywhere nearby. She knew they were getting low on gas, so she decided she would stop here, have a look at the buildings, and fill up the truck.

  Claire gently stopped the truck and turned off the engine. Ol’ Blue coughed and sputtered as it finally shut down. Silence filled the cab. She had forgotten how loud everything was until the noise was gone. Michael groaned and rolled onto his back. Claire rolled down to the floorboard and stroked Michael’s hair. She was worried when his skin felt cold. He gave her a weak smile and tried to sit up but couldn’t.

  “Hey, baby. How are you feeling?” Claire asked.

  “I’m okay.” She could tell he was lying. “How are you?”

  “I’m fine. We need to put some gas in. I’ll do that. You stay here.”

  “No, I can help,” Michael said, trying to pull himself up.

  “Baby, it’s okay. I got it. I’ll be right back.”

  Claire opened the door, which made a loud cranking noise. She felt very exposed being out of the truck in this foreign environment. Cautiously she stepped out, gun in hand, looking in all directions for any movement. It was pure absolute silence outside, which startled Claire. This was the first time in her life that she had heard such quiet. All those years, there had always been a bus driving by or a neighbor talking or an air conditioner blowing, but in the middle of nowhere there was nothing but loud silence. She heard herself breathing, which felt strange. She had a desire to make some kind of noise, so she slightly dragged her feet as she walked to the nearest small building. She peeked through the space where the glass windows should have been and saw shelves with a few items on them. Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust, and spider webs crisscrossed every corner. She realized no one had been here in decades, and she had no desire to break that streak. She walked around the building but saw nothing of interest.

  Claire went back to the truck and checked on Michael, who was asleep again. At the back of the truck she untied and dragged one of the large gas cans. It was hot in the sun, and she started to sweat. She had practiced filling up the truck while they were in Houston, but this time she felt weaker and the can felt much heavier. She thought back to when she learned how to fill up the gas tank and realized someone always had helped her lift the large can. She could sense that the men hated to watch her struggle with the weight, but she now understood that their kindness might have actually hurt her. By the time she had lowered the tailgate and lugged the can to the rear of the bed, she knew there was no way she could lift it by herself let alone pour the gas into the small hole. After some thought, Claire decided she’d have to use something smaller to get the gas from the can to the tank. She looked around and found the only useable item was an empty grapefruit juice bottle. She figured she’d pour some gas from the large container into the bottle then fill the truck using that. Although she knew it would take a long time, she felt it was her only option. After putting the gun down, she opened the large gas can she had dragged out and saw that it was completely full. With the lid off, she balanced the small bottle on the bed of the truck as she tilted the large heavy can forward. The gas gushed out with so much force that it knocked the bottle to the ground and spilled all over the bed.

  Cussing, Claire began again and found she was able to balance the large gas can with one hand and hold the small bottle in the other. With a few spills and a little overflow, she filled the bottle. As she carried it to the truck’s tank, she grabbed the rusty funnel they had packed, inserted it into Ol’ Blue’s tank, and poured the fuel. The sun was bright and beating down on her as she repeated the process. After her twelfth time filling the bottle and draining it into the tank, she decided she needed a better way. She walked to the cab and found a few grapefruit juice bottles that were still full. She put them on the ground next to the truck and retrieved the small pocketknife they had brought. She felt bad about pouring out perfectly good juice, but she didn’t have much of a choice. She spent the next few minutes cutting the bottoms of the bottles and jamming them all together to make a long tube. With the end of her self-made fuel tube in the funnel, she was able to pour the fuel from the large can through her concoction and into the tank. She smiled at her ingenuity. When the truck’s tank was finally full, she was soaked in spilled fuel and sweat. Hiding herself behind the truck, she removed her shorts and top and rinsed herself off using some of the water they had brought. After putting on fresh clothes, she secured all her supplies and was eager to get the truck moving. She missed the speed.

  As the buildings disappeared in the rearview mirror, she saw that the two abandoned buildings were simply the first in a whole small town of lost buildings. It looked like a bomb had hit the city. Entire roofs were caved in; most of the glass was broken; and there were even a few old cars parked haphazardly throughout the main street. She drove past them, slowing to inspect every inch. Just as fast as the small city appeared, it was gone and they were back on open road.

  Claire was curious what town they had just driven through so she consulted the only map she had. It was an old and faded tri-fold paper map Matt had bought at a black market store years before. She traced her finger along the thin line she thought was the road she was driving on. To make it easier to read, she had unfolded the map and laid it on Michael as he slept next to her. The thin paper covered him like a blanket. Darting her eyes from the road and the map and back again, she was able to find what she believed was her location and saw to her dismay that they had only traveled a few inches. She glanced again at her only other navigation tool, a ball compass that stood on the dashboard in front of her. The pointer was between “N” and “E,” which was what she had wanted, but she felt that they weren’t making fast enough progress. It also didn’t help that often she saw that her compass pointed more “N” than she would like so she’d stop and find old signs that sometimes told her where she was. Often these signs had fallen years before so she’d have to park the truck and trek through overgrown grass to uncover them.

  Claire had sped back up and was enjoying the speed as the sun lit up the countryside. She passed more and more abandoned cities. Some were quite large and had bridges that were mostly collapsed. Often in the cities, Claire found her road blocked or too destroyed to get past, so she’d have to backtrack to find different routes. Once, on a seemingly endless wide right curve, she had to come to a quick stop because the entire area was flooded over from a nearby swamp. She had driven through dozens of large puddles so far, but this was closer to a lake. Cyprus trees were growing directly in front of her where the road should have been. She sat up tall in her seat to see if she could make out where the road went on, but the water was opaque. A thin waving line passed a few feet in front of her, creating tiny ripples in its wake. A shiver ran up her spine when she realized it was a snake. Surveying the area, she saw that the far lane of the other side of the pair of highways was slightly exposed. This seemed to be the only clear path, so she steered the truck into the median to cross over. What she didn’t realize was that the grass, while it looked solid, was only slightly less flooded than the roads.

  As Claire felt the front end of Ol’ Blue
sink, she panicked and mashed the gas pedal. The engine roared to life as the truck launched into the muddy divide of the grass. She spun the steering wheel to the right as the truck slid through the mud, but it wouldn’t turn. She felt the back end of the truck slide to the side, and the vehicle slowed to a crawl. Over the roar of the engine, she heard large splatters of mud hit the bed of the truck. She kept her foot on the pedal as the truck slowly crept forward, just shy of the dry concrete on the other side. She held her breath, willing the truck to continue. Slowly, inch by inch, the truck emerged from the mud. When the rear tires finally touched solid ground, the truck lurched forward. She turned the truck in time to prevent it from running off the other side of the road. She felt untouchable as she navigated around most of the water and over the gravel shoulder till she had cleared the lake that used to be the road.

  CHAPTER 13

  Back in Houston, while Michael and Uncle Matt were fixing the truck, they had discussed some situations the couple might run into on the trip. Matt gave them advice on avoiding road hazards, how to read the map, and much more. He knew there would be bad roads and maybe bridges out, but he thought they should be able to get around all that except for one. He was adamant that if one particular bridge was out, there was no way they could make it, and instantly Claire knew it when she saw it.

  Long before their trip, the Mississippi River was an important trade route that connected Houston to the rest of the cities. However, when most of the cities stopped working together, the river was viewed as a symbol of the filth and greed of the other cities. In the textbooks Claire had read in school, she learned the Mississippi River used to be as clear as the waters of the Gulf, but when Mega City Chicago started dumping all its waste into it, it took on a thick, wretched look. The photos in the book, which showed the brown water pouring into the clear warm waters of the Gulf—their Gulf—infuriated Claire and her classmates.