Empty Mile

by Matthew Stokoe

“Not outside Oakridge, ever? Looking for properties to market?”

  “Why would I?”

  “I was out at a place called Empty Mile. The woman who lives there said that when my father came out to try and get her to put it on the market he had someone with him.”

  Gareth frowned and shook his head, then suddenly his face brightened. “Oh yeah! I know what you’re talking about. My Jeep broke down coming back from Burton. Ray was passing and gave me a ride, but first he had to go someplace for business. Empty Mile. But I wasn’t working with him, dude.”

  “Did he have a particular interest in that land?”

  “I don’t know. The woman didn’t want to sell, I remember that.”

  “I mean the land below her house.”

  “I don’t think so, it’s just a patch of land.”

  “Did you know he ended up buying it? For himself.”

  “Yeah, I heard something about that.”

  “The woman said you were interested in a journal she had.”

  “Oh yeah, that. It was really interesting. We both spent, like, an hour reading it. Do you think you’ll sell the land, after Ray’s will and everything gets sorted?”

  “I could sell it now if I wanted, he put it in my name before he disappeared.”

  “Really? How come?”

  “Some tax dodge.”

  “Interesting… You know, me and Dad have been thinking about getting a piece of land, something for the future. Maybe we could work something out.”

  “You want to buy Empty Mile?”

  “If you’re selling, why not? I’ve seen it, it’s just the kind of thing we’d be interested in.”

  “I thought you guys were broke.”

  “We are, but I could still raise the money on the equity we have in this place.”

  “I’m not planning to sell.”

  He looked disappointed. “Okay, promise me one thing. If you change your mind, give me first crack at it, okay? I’ll pay market value, I’m not asking for a discount or anything.”

  After we’d had another beer, Gareth walked me out to my truck. As I got into it I remembered something. “What were the holes for?”

  “What holes?”

  “The ones you drilled with my father at Empty Mile.”

  “Fence posts.”

  “Really?”

  “That’s what Ray said.”

  “But they’re too deep. And they’re right in the middle of the trees.”

  “Dude, I was just labor. Your father wanted a hand, he said they were for fence posts. Who gives a fuck? Remember what I said about selling.”

  He turned and walked back into the bungalow. I drove to Empty Mile and picked Stan up and we headed to the warehouse for our appointment with what we hoped would be a new customer for Plantasaurus.

  There was a high-sided rental van parked at the junction of the garden center driveway and the Oakridge Loop. Its engine wasn’t running and I got the feeling that it had been there for a while. There was someone in the cab but the light was such that I couldn’t make out more than a dim shape behind the wheel.

  Stan and I passed it and went on up the driveway. We opened the warehouse and, as we had a little time before our prospective customer was due, Stan turned on the hose and started watering. We’d received our first shipment from the Sacramento wholesaler ten days before and it felt good to stand there and look at the plants, at the different greens of their leaves, shining under the spray of water, knowing that this miniature forest of trees and potted shrubs was ours, that we were in business and this was our stock.

  When the watering was done we took several sample displays outside and placed them along the front of the warehouse. As we finished positioning the last of them a champagne Mercedes SUV pulled in from the road, crunched up the drive, and parked in front of us. Three well-dressed women got out, one of them was the customer we’d been waiting for-the owner of an expensive clothing boutique in Old Town. Her name was Cloris and she wanted plants for both her store and her house on the Slopes. The women gathered in front of the displays.

  We all said hello and Cloris introduced her friends as fellow Slopes-dwellers who’d come along because they were interested in displays for their homes. Stan managed to shoot me a quick look without anyone seeing and I knew if he’d been able to get away with it he’d have made the sound of a cash register. I left it to him to explain about the various types of plants we used and the other options that were available if they didn’t like what they saw today. The women nodded and made approving noises.

  While Stan was speaking I heard an engine start a little way off and half a minute later the van that had been parked at the side of the road raced noisily up the drive and slid to a stop behind the Mercedes. The women turned in surprise. Stan stopped his spiel and looked uncertainly at me.

  Jeremy Tripp climbed out of the van and walked calmly around to the double doors at the rear of the vehicle. He paused there and nodded to the women.

  Stan lifted his hand timidly. “Hello, Mr. Tripp.”

  Tripp ignored him and addressed the women. “You might want to look at this before you waste your money.”

  He opened the back of the van and began hauling out the planters we had installed in his house. He handled them with quick angry movements and let them fall heavily on the ground. When he was done he put his foot against one of the tub planters and tipped it over. The Yucca it contained broke rottenly, its trunk opening to show a center of soggy pulp. Its leaves, too, had shriveled from their usual tough greenness and were now empty skin, wet and darkly discolored. The other plants were the same, all blasted and dark and dead.

  “Great service, guys.”

  The women made small, anxious comments to each other as they tried to figure out what was going on. Stan stammered that something must have gone wrong, that the plants must have caught a disease, that we would replace them immediately…

  Tripp snorted in disgust and climbed back into his van. Before he closed the door he paused and took a long look around the garden center land.

  “You know, this site would be perfect for a small hotel. Say about thirty rooms. You ever thought of that?”

  He made a tight U-turn and drove leisurely down to the road and away. Stan dropped to his knees and started inspecting the plants, pulling their limp carcasses from the soil and holding them up to the light. The women looked briefly at each other then got into their Mercedes. Cloris thanked us then quickly made her own U-turn and drove away before I could say anything.

  “They’re not going to be customers, are they, Johnny?”

  “Somehow, I don’t think so.”

  “This is bad. They might tell someone else.”

  “What do you think happened?”

  Stan shook his head. “I don’t know. It’s too quick to be a disease. The only thing it looks like is too much insect spray.” I prodded a couple of the plants with the toe of my shoe but it was pointless, I didn’t know anything about the things plants died of. Some of the planters had fallen onto their sides and I bent down to right them, pushing the spilled soil back into them with the flat of my hand. As I did so I smelled something-an ammoniac, chemical tang. I lifted a handful of soil to my nose, then held it out for Stan to sniff.

  “Smells like bleach, Johnny.”

  “Yeah.”

  I dug a sample from another of the planters. Same thing. The plants had been fed bleach.

  Stan frowned. “Why would he kill his own plants?”

  “Maybe someone spilled something when they were cleaning.”

  “Rosie’s his cleaner. She’d never do anything like that, she’s careful.”

  Stan was right of course. No one had accidentally done anything to these plants.

  At the kitchen table that evening Stan seemed drained and serious. He ate quietly without any of his usual wise-cracking or horsing around. The matchbox in which he kept his moths lay next to his plate and occasionally he pushed it open and looked for a few moments at the in
sects inside. When he had finished eating he drank a glass of milk.

  “Johnny, do you think Plantasaurus is going to work out?”

  “Other than today I think it’s looking pretty good, don’t you?”

  “It’s important now, Johnny. Really important.” He was silent for a moment, then he added, “Because of Rosie. I’ve got to make sure she doesn’t stop liking me.”

  Later, when he was in bed and I was saying goodnight to him, he reached across to the nightstand for his matchbox. He was wearing his pajamas but he had his Captain America mask on. He pushed the box open slightly and breathed deeply from the opening and then said seriously, “When things get hard you need more power. If you don’t have enough everything starts to go wrong, like today. Maybe you should get a costume. You can have Superman if you want.”

  “I’m not wearing a costume, Stan.”

  “But we’ll get more power.”

  “Listen to me, dude, this power thing is getting a bit tired.”

  “That’s because you don’t believe in anything. You’re so upset all the time about things that have already happened you don’t think there’s anything good left in the world.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “The world’s a good place, Johnny, it is. Only sometimes you have to get extra power to help it along.”

  I could see the subject was important to him so I didn’t push things any further. “Okay, but you’ll have to do it for both of us, ’cause I still ain’t wearing no costume.”

  He smiled softly. “Okay, Johnny.”

  After I left Stan I called Marla to see if she wanted to come over and spend the night, but it was late by then and she told me she couldn’t face the drive.

  “I wouldn’t be much company anyway, Johnny. I feel like a pig.”

  “You’re not a pig.”

  “I’m disgusting.”

  “Don’t talk like that. You’re a good person.”

  On the other end of the line Marla’s laughter sounded lost and a long way off. “Really?”

  I thought about telling her of Gareth’s promise not to pimp her anymore but the way she sounded right then I didn’t think it would have much of an impact. Instead, I made a date to go to her place for lunch the next day. Then I told her I loved her and hung up.

  CHAPTER 17

  The next day was Saturday. I took Stan out to Empty Mile so he could spend it with Rosie, then I headed to the Channon.

  Marla’s road was quiet, as usual. I had the windows down and in the shade of the trees the air was cool. Ordinarily it would have been a pleasant scene, but it was marred for me that morning by the sight of a red Jaguar parked on the shoulder of the road opposite her driveway. Its top was down and as I turned into Marla’s place, Jeremy Tripp waved at me from the driver’s seat and smiled like we were old friends.

  Marla opened her door as soon as I knocked and jerked me inside. “Did you see him?”

  “Yeah, what’s that about?”

  “What’s he doing?”

  “Looks like he’s watching the house.”

  “He’s been there for half an hour.”

  We went through to the kitchen at the back of the house.

  “Why would he come here?”

  “I don’t think it’s too hard to guess, Johnny. He must have gotten my address from Gareth.”

  Marla looked pale and frightened and the skin under her eyes was dark. I put my hands on her shoulders.

  “I don’t think Gareth has anything to do with this.”

  “Don’t be stupid.”

  “No, I mean it. I went to see him yesterday, about this pimping bullshit. He told me he was going to leave you alone, now that he knows we’re together. He even apologized.”

  “Doesn’t sound like Gareth.”

  “I think he meant it. You’re in the book, Tripp could have gotten your last name when he spoke to Gareth and found out where you live himself.”

  “So, what, he thinks now he can come around and fuck me whenever he wants? Jesus Christ!”

  We made coffee and stood around expecting Tripp to knock on the door at any moment. As Marla raised her cup I noticed a long thin burn on the inside of her forearm.

  “What happened?”

  She shrugged and didn’t say anything. I took hold of her arm and looked more closely at the burn. The blister was about four inches long and the skin that bordered it was singed a pale brown and looked dry and dead.

  “What the fuck happened?”

  She pulled her arm away. “I told you last night, I’m a pig. And people who act like pigs should be punished.”

  “You did that to yourself? Christ! How?”

  “I heated up a knife on the stove.”

  “Marla, this is terrible.”

  “No, it’s not. It’s exactly right.”

  I was about to say more, but the bubble of toxic emotion that had formed around us was punctured then by a loud knocking on the front door. Marla looked stricken and groaned.

  “I can’t do it again. I can’t…” She trudged along the hall to the front of the house and tiredly pulled the door open.

  On the porch, Jeremy Tripp stood beside a smaller man who wore a smooth dark suit and held a large manila envelope. Beyond them, in the driveway, a new-looking silver sedan sat under a pattern of leaf shadow. Jeremy Tripp lit his face up with a high-voltage expression.

  “Time to fuck off and find somewhere else to live.”

  The man with Jeremy Tripp cleared his throat. He reached into his jacket pocket and held out a business card. “Gerald Turnbull. I act as Mr. Tripp’s lawyer in this matter.”

  Marla frowned. “What matter?”

  “Slight change of landlord,” Jeremy Tripp hissed.

  The lawyer cleared his throat again. He opened the envelope he was carrying and drew out several pieces of paper which had been stapled together. He held the papers out to us and turned the sheets one by one so that we could see their contents. They looked like they formed some sort of contract.

  Marla shrugged. “So?”

  “So, today Mr. Tripp closed the sale of this property.”

  “What?”

  “He owns this house now. Your previous landlord, Mr. Constantian, sold it to him.”

  “Bullshit.” Marla snatched the papers from him and looked through them closely. A few moments later her arm dropped and the lawyer took his papers back. “He never said anything to me about selling.”

  “The sale was conducted somewhat more rapidly than usual.”

  Jeremy Tripp turned the palms of both hands up and grinned. “One of the happy consequences of having a lot of money.”

  “You are fucking kidding. You’re my landlord?”

  “Not for long.”

  The lawyer reached into his envelope again and took out another sheet of typewritten paper. “You rent this house on a month-by-month basis. You don’t have a lease. Mr. Tripp would like you to quit the property as soon as possible, and in any case not later than six weeks.”

  He held out the sheet. Marla took it and looked at it so blankly the lawyer frowned.

  “That means six weeks from today. Do you understand?”

  Marla shook her head. “This is my house. I’ve lived here ten years.” She turned to Jeremy Tripp. “Why are you doing this? You don’t need this place. I can’t leave here.”

  “Oh, I think you can probably do anything you put your mind to.” He looked up at the sky and the trees around him and took a deep breath. “What a day.”

  He turned and walked down the porch steps. At the bottom he looked back at me.

  “You know what? If you and your dumb-ass brother had a bit of competition you might raise your game. Might be good for you. What do you think?”

  Then he turned and headed back along the drive and out to the road. The lawyer checked inside his envelope to see if he’d missed anything then nodded goodbye and went down and got into the silver sedan. Marla slammed the front door so hard the glass rattled.


  We lay on her bed and I held her as the light outside the windows softened into late afternoon. I knew what this eviction meant to her. She had no family of her own, no hometown to go back to for Christmases and birthdays, no childhood repository of happy memories. This house had become all of these things for her and losing it would rob her of the largest piece of the life she had managed to create for herself.

  She threw her head back and sighed. “I thought I’d end up buying this house. It’s the one thing, the one thing I’ve managed to hang on to.”

  “You don’t know this Tripp guy outside of the other night, right?”

  “I never saw him before in my life.”

  “Then this is getting weird.”

  I told Marla about his visit to the warehouse, how he’d poisoned the plants and driven our customers away. “He was obviously trying to hurt our business. Now, for some reason, he wants to hurt you too. I don’t understand what’s going on.”

  “Maybe it’s a man thing, like he has to destroy the whore he slept with.”

  “But buying a house to do it?”

  “Yeah, I’d have to be a monumentally bad lay.” Marla tried to smile at her own joke but just ended up looking sadder.

  I stayed at her place as long as I could before I had to pick up Stan. When I left I asked her to come with me but by then she was so thoroughly depressed she’d curled into a ball on the bed and wouldn’t move.

  In the pickup, on the way back from Rosie’s house, Stan had a smirk on his face and kept giving me sideways looks.

  “Okay. What is it?”

  He turned toward me and smiled painfully. “I did it.”

  “Did what?”

  “With Rosie. We had sex.”

  I’d known it would happen at some point, but now that it had I didn’t really know how to react.

  “Wow… That’s pretty big.”

  Stan must have mistaken my hesitancy for disapproval because he spoke quickly. “It’s all right, she can’t have babies.”

  “I know. Her grandmother told me. It’s okay, dude. I don’t think it’s wrong or anything, I’m just, you know, taking it in.”

  “It was my first time.”

  “I figured. How do you feel about it?”

  “I feel good. I mean, gosh, Johnny, it makes your head spin round. It’s good to be that close to someone.”