Toll Road: A Short Story of Murka

by Christopher Keelty

Lord’s name in vain.

  “Save your blasphemous appeals.” The Catholic’s voice was a belching growl.

  He raised his lance. Bayle gripped the revolver. Wait for the charge, Bayle thought. Wait ‘til the lance is at your neck. Plug him between the eyes.

  The Catholic spurred his horse. Bright light spilled over him. A peal of powdered fire and he fell in a spray of red. Bayle shielded his eyes.

  “Hold careful now,” said a voice, “or die where you stand.”

  “As you wish,” Bayle said. Kish was shaking. “Only we’d appreciate it if we could see, Patriot.”

  “Reckon you would,” came the voice. “Don’t mean shit to me.”

  The woods were quiet, save for idling engines. The battle was over. Soon there would be more knights, more guns pointed at Bayle. Better to end this fast, he thought.

  “Who are ye,” asked the knight. “Ain’t Catholics, sure.”

  “We’re travelers,” said Bayle. “Heading for Philadelphia. Mean no harm.”

  The knight stepped into the light. Bayle saw the pattern of red and white stripes on his leather spaulders. The bandanna on his head was blue with white stars, like Danny’s had been. His face was weathered and wrinkled. A thick cigar drooled smoke from one side of his clenched mouth.

  “No harm except to steal that quad, reckon. Two swaggers, eh? What faction?”

  Bayle clenched his jaw. He thought about Danny.

  “Boheme, sir,” said Kish. “Mean no harm.” He showed the guitar on his back, then turned away as if the man might steal it.

  “Boheme. Sure,” said the knight. “You, maybe.”

  “You.” He pointed at Bayle. “No way you’re Boheme. What faction?”

  Bayle’s breath caught. His palms were cold with sweat. He remembered his promise. No lying, no hiding. He tried to think of Danny.

  “Pink,” he said.

  Kish gasped. The knight only grinned.

  “Shoulda figured,” he sneered, “couple of faggots eyeing a dead man’s hog. Headin for Philadelphia, sure. They love faggots in Philadelphia.”

  Bayle gritted his teeth. His legs itched to run.

  “Mean no harm,” he said. “Just trying to get to Philadelphia. Just need one bike.”

  “Ain’t in Philadelphia yet, and I ain’t no Quaker.” The knight trained his gun on Bayle. “Off the bike. Now.”

  “Sir, I’m Boheme, not Pink Sister,” Kish said. “I just--“

  “Shut up.”

  “What happened to all men created equal?” Bayle said. The knight’s head snapped up as if he’d been shot.

  “Step down, boy. Don’t start.”

  “We hold these truths to be self evident.” Bayle fixed the knight with a stare. “All men are created equal. They are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

  “I didn’t hear buttfucking in there--“

  “Patriot, I’ve issued a challenge. Do you decline?”

  “This is bullshit. You think you can quote the fucking Declaration of--“

  “Do you decline, Patriot?”

  The knight’s brow furrowed.

  “Let us go,” Bayle said. “Would you deny us life, liberty, or happiness? Freedom of expression? With what justification? Your own hatred?.”

  The knight sneered.

  “During times of war, hatred becomes quite respectable. That’s Thurman.”

  “There’s more to that quote,” said Bayle. “That hatred must masquerade as patriotism. Samuel Johnson called patriotism the last refuge of the scoundrel. Bertrand Russell said patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.”

  “Trivial?” said the knight. “You choose your heathen ways over the will of God. Live so that your country shall be proud of you. That’s Lincoln.”

  “Jefferson said he never considered a difference of opinion as cause for withdrawing from a friend.”

  “You aren’t my friend, faggot.”

  “I’ll do better. I ask you to help us with a common goal. We’re going to Philadelphia, to help protect that great city. We’re patriots, like you. Hang together, or we surely hang apart. Do I need to attribute that?”

  “Franklin.” The knight bowed his head and touched his right hand to his heart. “Fine. Take the quad. Straight to Philadelphia. If we find you sidetracked, you’ll be executed for treason.”

  Bayle bowed and touched his heart. He felt sick.

  “Kish, come on.”

  Kish didn’t move.

  “Kish, now!”

  The boy approached, but stopped before climbing on behind Bayle.

  “I don’t--“

  “Kish, last chance!”

  Kish glanced back at the knight, and then grasped Bayle’s hips. Bayle revved the engine and headed up the hill, away from the battle. He put some distance behind them and stopped in a clearing.

  “What was that?”

  “I won the challenge,” Bayle said.

  “What the hell is a challenge?”

  “Debate,” said Bayle. “History. Philosophy. Rhetoric. Don’t you know anything about the Coming Dawn?”

  “Oh say can you see,” Kish sang. “How do you?”

  “Used to be one,” said Bayle. “Long time ago.”

  “Until you got caught pink, you mean.”

  “You coming with me? Get off here, they’ll kill you.”

  “Why did you leave Pittsburgh? Why?”

  “That’s none of yours,” Bayle said. “Burning gas, Kish. Gotta find smooth road. You coming?”

  Kish’s arms drew a little tighter around Bayle. “Don’t get any ideas.”

  They went south, following crumpled streets through ruined neighborhoods, the shells of ghost buildings all around. A light snow started to fall, flakes drifting lazily in the headlight beam.

  This was dangerous territory. Ghost houses were hiding places. Neighborhoods had schools and police stations, grocery stores. Gas, food, and guns. Bayle kept one eye always on the roadside, watching for movement.

  “Here,” said Kish. “Turn here.”

  They pitched down an access road, gaining speed. To the right were train tracks and the river.

  “We take this south to the expressway,” said Kish. “I’m sure of it.”

  The road dipped into a valley, steep hills on either side. A bad place. They passed a warehouse surrounded by dead construction machines, a faded US Steel logo on the black corrugated wall. Firelight flickered behind the broken windows. Dozens of motorcycles were lined up outside. Bayle pressed the accelerator to the floor.

  Around a block of falling row homes, the road opened into the remains of a small city. Buildings of brick and stone, filthy and empty, loomed above the collapsed corpses of their fallen brethren. They were the first city buildings Bayle had seen since he left Pittsburgh.

  A bronze plaque on one read, “Conshohocken Borough Hall. Incorporated 1852.” Someone had scrawled the letters ‘U-N-T’ in bright red spray paint, rendering the city Cuntshohocken. To the right, a bridge spanned the river, half-buried beneath a toppled silver office building.

  Bayle stopped the ATV halfway across the bridge.

  “We’ll camp here.”

  “Here?” Kish said. “We’re out in the open!”

  “Good visibility. Only two angles of approach. Someone comes, we go the other way. Problem?”

  “Won’t a campfire attract attention?”

  “No fire until daylight. Still a couple hours we can sleep.”

  It was bitter cold on the bridge. The night wind sped down the river like a motorcycle along three lanes of blacktop. In a satchel on the ATV they found a sleeping bag and a wool blanket, a cast iron frying pan, and a few thick rashers of bacon in wax paper.

  They put the bacon away, slavering like dogs, and bedded down with the cycle between them and the wind. They wrappe
d themselves as best they could, Bayle in the blanket and Kish cuddling his guitar in the sleeping bag. Bayle heard the staccato chatter of Kish’s teeth. He drew closer to share warmth, but Kish pulled away.

  “Danny was his name,” Bayle said. “My husband.”

  Kish didn’t move. His voice was monotone.

  “You don’t wear a ring.”

  “Sold it.” Bayle’s heart hurt. “Didn’t want to. It was cold in the mountains. Needed food and a place to sleep.”

  “Where is he? Still in Pittsburgh?”

  Bayle didn’t answer. The words were there, but he could not say them. He thought of late nights, the thump of music, the taste of beer. He remembered Danny’s body, lean and peppered with sparse hair, the smell of sheets and the feel of naked flesh against his.

  “Dead.” He choked on the word. “We were Dawn, both of us. Our CO found out. Kept it secret a long time, but secrets get out.”

  “What did they do?”

  “Split us up. Interrogated us. I lied. He didn’t.”

  Bayle stared at the crooked shapes of buildings. In the shadows he saw things that weren’t there. The cuffs around Danny’s ankles and wrists. The chains. The snarl of the engines.

  “Is that why you left?”

  They just left his body on the freeway. It was up to Bayle to collect the pieces. He swore then he would never be ashamed again, never lie. Never hide. No matter what.

  “Didn’t want to stay.”

  “So, what? To Philadelphia? For the Quakers?”

  It was what Danny wanted. Where he talked about moving, living openly. Where Bayle put off moving because he was too comfortable. Someday, he said, but someday never came. Bayle lay a hand on the knapsack in his lap. Tattered bits of trash tumbled down the bridge, through cascades of dry leaves.

  “Just somewhere else.”

  “There were some Pink Sisters in Manhattan,” said Kish. “A lot, actually.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. But they were real bad types, you know? Not married, not like you. They kidnapped boys for sex slaves and burned down churches. Stuff like that.”

  “You knew them?”

  “No, not me.”

  “Figured.”

  Kish pulled up the sleeping bag to hide his face, leaving only his mouth and the guitar’s silver tuning keys exposed. He shuddered against the ATV.

  “It’ll be warmer if we stay close,” said Bayle.

  “Yeah,” said Kish.

  “Now you know I’m married,” said Bayle.

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  He backed up against Bayle’s side. Bayle wrapped his arm around Kish’s shoulder and rested it on his chest. Kish did not protest. After a few minutes his head dropped to Bayle’s shoulder.

  “Do you remember much about the way it was? Before?”

  “A little,” said Bayle. “How old are you, Kish?”

  “I don’t know,” said Kish. “Could you really just buy gas?”

  Bayle pointed up the road.

  “We passed a station. Prices on the sign.”

  Kish lifted his head. His breathing was steady and he had stopped shivering. His hands were loose around the neck of the guitar.

  “I wish we could have a fire,” he said.

  The sky parted just for a moment, revealing stars like diamond dust on black velvet. As fast as they appeared they were gone, the clouds closing like stage curtains.

  “What do you figure’s out there?” Kish asked. “Think there are better worlds?”

  “Figure the Universe is pretty much like this. Cold and lonely, everyone just looking for their own.”

  “God,” said Kish. “I hope not.”

  In the morning they broke firewood from the dead trees along the sidewalk. The bacon sizzled and spat in a pool of drippings, and Kish plucked a quiet song as they waited. Bayle kept an eye on the street, fearful the smell might attract attention. There didn’t seem to be any tribes denning, but empty cities sometimes attracted worse. Crazies, or freaks.

  They gobbled down the bacon before it was finished, fat shining on their lips, and drank icy water from Bayle’s canteen. At first light Bayle had noticed the off-kilter sign at the far end of the bridge. A ramp to the expressway. They could take local roads, Kish said, but they wound through hilly forest. Risky.

  Bayle kicked at the fire, scattering embers about the concrete, and then climbed aboard the ATV. As Kish settled in, Bayle felt behind him.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Kish.

  “No gun,” said Bayle. “You take it?”

  Kish shook his head, held out his palms. Bayle knew the boy had no interest in the weapon. He dismounted and searched around the camp.

  “Did you drop it last night, maybe?”

  “Had it when we went to sleep,” Bayle said. He kicked at the fire, checked in the satchel and beneath the ATV. The gun was gone. Had someone taken it while they slept? Couldn’t be. No one would take the gun and leave them with the food, blankets, and a working vehicle. Bayle huffed. They had to move on.

  Kish rode behind, arms around Bayle’s waist. The gas gauge showed a quarter tank. Bayle doubted it would take them all the way, but there was no point looking for gas. In Dawn territory the stations would all be dry.

  They followed the expressway past towns drained of color, burned frames of buildings peppered with streaks of soot. The sky was pale white, and the wind streaked their faces with tears and trails of snot. Kish clung tight, his face pressed to Bayle’s back, and despite himself Bayle took some pleasure in the feeling. They watched for signs of the Dawn, listened for the growl of loud pipes, but the morning was still and silent. Only the wind made any movement.

  The ATV died with a mile yet to go, and they left it on the highway. Bayle was on edge. The expressway was walled on both sides, forming a canyon. If the Dawn came upon them, there would be no escape. A little further and the wall to the left was replaced by the river. On its surface gray ice had frozen, cracked, and refrozen. Scoured by the wind it made jagged mountain peaks that crawled toward the sea. To the right was a rise of earth and dead forest. If they were attacked, Bayle thought, he would try the river. Better to risk freezing to death than be taken alive by the Coming Dawn.

  Half a mile from their destination, the expressway and the river passed under a high rail bridge. Beneath the bridge lay the crumpled shape of a fallen traveler. They approached cautiously, knowing that highwaymen sometimes played possum to set traps, but the man did not move. The wind ruffled his frayed brown clothes. A crow landed on the pavement and cocked its head examining the cadaver. It hopped onto the face, ducking in a hammer-stroke and tearing away a scarlet strip of meat. Kish pulled back in disgust, but Bayle pushed him on.

  The crow took wing as they got close, carrying its prize. Bayle didn’t look at the dead man. He was afraid of the memory the sight would evoke. When they were just past the dead man, Bayle heard a cough. He turned and saw the gun.

  Kish gave a little scream.

  The man stooped and wavered. His hands shook, gray and gaunt. His face, wrinkled and rough with stubble, was smeared with dry brown blood. A single stripe of bright red dropped from his empty right eye socket, which was tattered and black.

  He stole the gun, Bayle thought, and left them alive. He lay still while a crow took his eye, so he could ambush them. The man was a crazy.

  “Mister, we got no food nor gas,” Bayle said.

  “I’m not interested in food or gas. Been watching you loverboys. Been waiting.”

  He sputtered and spat a black-brown glob onto the asphalt.

  “The boy,” he said. “Give him here.”

  Kish whimpered and backed away like a frightened cur. Bayle knew what was coming. Even the crazies knew what was to be done with a Pink Sister.

  “Boy’s not mine to give,” said Bayle.

  The man squinted. Bayle watched the gun. Would it even fire?

>   “You ain’t pink?” the man asked. He looked back and forth, his remaining eye searching. Bayle looked at Kish. No lies, he thought. No hiding.

  “I am,” he said. “Boy’s not.”

  A crooked grin wrinkled the man’s face.

  “You then,” he said. “Here.” He pointed the gun at Bayle’s right eye.

  Bayle hesitated. The man grimaced, revealing yellow teeth. “Here!”

  How long since the gun was oiled? How old were the bullets? Bayle looked down that barrel and he remembered Danny. If this was the toll, then Bayle would pay it.

  “Turn.”

  The man frisked him, searching his pockets and his waistband. Kish was still, hugging the guitar, his knuckles white as he squeezed its neck. The man grabbed the knapsack. When Bayle resisted, the man clubbed him on the head. Bayle saw only white, but he heard the man dump the knapsack, heard the plastic tube hit the pavement.

  When his vision came back it was there at his feet, the gray ashes obscured by the yellow and black tennis company logo and the silver duct tape. Breath caught in Bayle’s throat.

  The man gave the makeshift urn a glance, grunted, and tossed the knapsack away. Kish was staring at the tube, a look of realization on his face. He looked to Bayle.

  “You move along,” the man told Kish. “Nothing that way but Quackers, anyhow. Go on!”

  Kish’s wide eyes were glued to Bayle. The man barked like a mad dog and lunged toward Kish. The boy jumped with a scream, turning away to shield the guitar. He glanced back at Bayle, as if offering an apology, and ran away down the road.

  Bayle was expressionless, his jaw set. He was waiting for a chance at the gun. If that chance never came--

  Rough hands tugged his drawers, and Bayle felt the bitter air on his behind. The sound of a zip, and the thing was there, prodding.

  “Don’t got much spit,” the man said. He gave a dry laugh. “Better get ready.”

  There was a searing stab as he forced himself inside. Bayle grimaced, leaned forward. The man grabbed his hips and pulled, and there was the gun cold and hard against Bayle’s hipbone. Bayle did not hesitate. He grabbed the gun in both hands and twisted his whole body. The man bellowed. Bayle felt him withdraw as they fell to the pavement, kicking and clawing, grappling for the gun.

  Bayle was on his side. He held tight, keeping the gun aimed away. The man tugged, stood, kicked Bayle in the ribs. A boot came between his legs and smashed his balls. Bayle nearly vomited, but kept his grip. The man leaned down and sunk yellow teeth into the meat of Bayle’s thumb. Bayle cried out and kicked at his legs. He tried to find his feet, but the man dropped a boot onto the small of his back.

  Calloused palms rasped Bayle’s skin as they grappled. He was twisting, pulling, trying to turn the gun on Bayle. As the barrel came around, Bayle squirmed to avoid it. He tugged with all the strength he could summon, but the crazy would not relent. He lifted Bayle by the gun off of the ground, drew back a leg, and drove the toe of his boot into Bayle’s stomach. Bayle sprawled, and his fingers slipped from the steel. He curled into a fetal position, hands reflexively covering his face. The shot cracked the air.

  Except it wasn’t a gunshot. The sound was musical somehow. Harmonious. Lowering his hands, Bayle found Kish over him, holding the broken neck of his guitar. The shattered wooden body hung from tangled strings. The crazy was on his back, prick pointing straight at the sky. The gun was on the ground.

  The man moaned and reached a filthy hand to wipe his bloody face. Bayle stood and did up his drawers.

  “I