by Terry Bisson
It was the tire-marked claw. I should have cut it off and tossed it away. I shouldn’t ever have turned my back on it. It had me by the boot and was starting that slow sideways cut even while it pulled, and I knew I was in trouble. He still had six legs, each as big as a fencepost, and he was taking me home with him.
I reached for, but missed, the tire rack. I reached for, but missed, the hatchet. I reached for the big, soft rear trailer tire, even though there’s no place to grab it—then I saw two shots crack the lobster’s shell. You don’t hear shots in a near vacuum. I looked back and saw the kid ducking under the truck from the other side, shooting. Even with the big gloves on he hit it twice more, but you can shoot those things all day long. They’re like snapping turtles. I pointed at the Boy Scout hatchet, waving my arms, but the kid was falling. I hadn’t left any breath spray for him. He was sealed in his suit and turning blue. But just as he fell he pushed the hatchet close enough for me to reach it.
Thank God for the Boy Scouts. I chopped my foot free, and wearing the claw like a clamp on my leg, dragged the kid under the truck, up the ladder and into the cab. Even inside in the air, he could barely breathe. The fall had knocked his mask loose, and his tongue and throat had swelled up from decompression. Luckily they make a spray for that, too, and I had some in my first-aid kit under the seat. I’ve had it used on me and it’s bad. It puckers you up like eating a green persimmon but it works. It’s called GAZP.
I pried the claw off my boot and stuck it up under the seat. When I was sure the kid was breathing, I went back out and got the 9 mm where he had dropped it. The lobster was gone and the claws I had cut off were gone, too, so the whole thing was a waste. I wasn’t surprised. They say he eats them.
“Well, kid,” I said when we were in gear again. “You saved old CD’s butt back there.”
“Weren’t nothing. You get the claws?”
“Just the one he had me with. It’s under the seat. That’s that smell.” Landlobsters smell like piss on coals until they’re decompressed, and then it’s gone.
The claw wasn’t worth anything because it was tire-marked, but I didn’t mention that.
All that talking wore me out, and the kid too, I guess. I looked over and saw he was asleep. I was in high third. On either side of the highway, nothing but miles and miles of stone. It’s amazing to me that so many people could live for so long in those little mountains and leave so little sign. Twenty miles farther and the road got steeper, going down. I had to gear down to low fifth. I popped in Hank Senior and the kid whimpered a little from a dream. At that minute I might have been driving past his great-grandaddy’s grave. I could tell from the way he talked it was up here somewhere—somewhere between eastern Kentucky and western North Carolina, northern Virginia, and east Alabama. Somewhere in those endless, wrinkled little hills that got unwrinkled and raised up, and rolled their children out into the world, rubbing their eyes and wondering when they get to go home.
Maybe someday. I read in Popular Science that Flat Mountain is sinking again, at about a foot and a half a year. At that rate it’ll only be one hundred thousand years.
From the edge of the western slope you see a snow-white roof of clouds, but from the eastern slope you see what looks like the edge of a giant blue-green ball. You first see it just as the switchbacks start, at about ninety thousand, when there is just enough air to leave a little vapor trail back over the road. Far ahead the sky is not black anymore but dark blue. Then you see it’s really the sea. And not just a few miles of it: You are looking halfway to Bermuda from eighteen miles high. From here you can see that the water and the air are two versions of the same stuff.
The roads down the eastern slope are better, probably because the highways were newer, mostly four lanes. The switchbacks are long—forty, fifty miles a swoop. Morgantown, Hendersonville, Bat Cave, just names given to turns anymore, since the towns are long since gone. At Bat Cave (no bats, no cave) the kid woke up, and this time he didn’t try not to look impressed. We were far enough east and far enough down Flat Mountain to see the Atlantic coast all the way from Morehead City to Savannah. The Carolina Desert is the color of October woods, red and orange and yellow and brown. It’s a fast trip down, with no cogway needed. Here on the eastern slope, the yoyos are muscle trucks, and the robot train roundabout is set in a cold, dry cloudless perch called Shelby, which looks down fifty miles onto Charlotte. There’s a good diner there but I just rolled on past and hit the hard switchbacks below 21,500 with my KJ barking like a hundred-dollar hound.
It gets dark early in Charlotte, but it felt good to be down in the air. I unsealed the locks and let the dry night wind run through the cab. There used to be magnolia trees in Charlotte but that was before the Uplift. Now they were just street names, like the towns on Flat Mountain. We found Magnolia on my map, but first I took the kid and bought him supper.
The reason I bought his supper was, I kept remembering the Mexican who bought my meals all the way across Missouri and Oklahoma when I was just a kid. He said he used to hitch, and he even tried to give me a five when he dropped me off, but I shook my head and wouldn’t take it. The thing is, when he looked under his car seat later on, his pearl-handled revolver was gone. I sold it in Fort Worth for twenty dollars. I have always felt ashamed of that ever since.
The kid had two black eyes from the decompression but his throat was better, good enough for him to eat. He didn’t complain when I paid for his supper. Then I stopped at High Top Meat. I told the kid to wait in the truck. The night broker shook his head when I unwrapped the claw and he saw the tire marks. “Too bad, CD,” he said. “I can’t buy road kill unless it don’t look like road kill.”
“How about for dog food?” I said, and he gave me a five.
The kid looked nervous and asked how I’d done, and I lied. “Good,” I said. I gave him a twenty and told him it was half the money. He folded it and put it in his watch pocket with the ten.
Magnolia was one of those dirt streets with no sidewalks and little modular houses, all alike. Any one of them could have been his grandma’s house, or any one not. “Don’t turn in, I’ll get out here,” he said at the end of the street, gathering up his stuff in a hurry.
“Vaya con Dios,” I said.
“What’s that mean?”
“Means good luck finding your pa.” I never did find mine.
I slept eleven hours while my rig was serviced and loaded. I was halfway up Flat Mountain the next day before it occurred to me to look in the glove compartment for my 9 mm. Of course it was gone. I popped in Crystal Gayle and had to laugh.
Press Ann
WELCOME TO CASH-IN-A-FLASH
1324 LOCATIONS
TO SERVE YOU CITYWIDE
PLEASE INSERT YOUR CASH-IN-A-FLASH CARD
THANK YOU
NOW ENTER YOUR CASH-IN-A-FLASH NUMBER
THANK YOU
PLEASE SELECT DESIRED SERVICE—
DEPOSIT
WITHDRAWAL
BALANCE
WEATHER
“Weather?”
“What’s the problem, Em?”
“Since when do these things give the weather?”
“Maybe it’s some new thing. Just get the cash, it’s 6:22 and we’re going to be late.”
WITHDRAWAL
THANK YOU
WITHDRAWAL FROM—
SAVINGS
CHECKING
CREDIT LINE
OTHER
CHECKING
THANK YOU
PLEASE ENTER DESIRED AMOUNT—
$20
$60
$100
$200
$60
$60 FOR A MOVIE?
“Bruce, come over here and look at this.”
“Emily, it’s 6:26. The movie starts at 6:41.”
“How does the cash machine know we’re going to the movie?”
“What are you talking about? Are you mad because you have to get the money, Em? Can I help it if a machine ate my card?
”
“Never mind. I’ll try it again.”
$60
$60 FOR A MOVIE?
“It just did it again.”
“Did what?”
“Bruce, come over here and look at this.”
“Sixty dollars for a movie?”
“I’m getting money for dinner, too. It is my birthday after all, even if I have to plan the entire party. Not to mention get the money to pay for it.”
“I can’t believe this. You’re mad at me because a machine ate my card.”
“Forget it. The point is, how does the cash machine know we’re going to a movie?”
“Emily, It’s 6:29. Just press Enter and let’s go.”
“Okay, okay.”
WHO IS THE GUY WITH THE WATCH?
BOYFRIEND
HUSBAND
RELATIVE
OTHER
“Bruce!”
“Emily, it’s 6:30. Just get the money and let’s go.”
“Now it’s asking me about you.”
“6:31!”
“Okay!”
OTHER
“Look, pal, there’s a problem with this machine. There’s another cash machine right down the street if you’re in such a goddamn hurry.”
“Bruce! Why be rude?”
“Forget it, he’s gone.”
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, EMILY
WOULD YOU LIKE—
DEPOSIT
WITHDRAWAL
BALANCE
WEATHER
“How does it know it’s my birthday?”
“Jesus, Em, it’s probably coded in your card or something. It is now 6:34 and in exactly seven minutes . . . What the hell is this? Weather?”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“You’re not going to press it!”
“Why not?”
WEATHER
THANK YOU
SELECT DESIRED CONDITIONS—
COOL AND CLOUDY
FAIR AND MILD
LIGHT SNOW
LIGHT RAIN
“Em, will you quit playing around!”
LIGHT RAIN
“Rain? On your birthday?”
“Just a light rain. I just want to see if it works. We’re going to the movie anyway.”
“Not if we don’t get out of here.”
PERFECT MOVIE WEATHER
WOULD YOU LIKE—
DEPOSIT
WITHDRAWAL
BALANCE
POPCORN
“Em, this machine is seriously fucked up.”
“I know. I wonder if you get butter.”
“It’s 6:36. Just press Withdrawal and let’s get the hell out of here. We have five minutes until the movie starts.”
WITHDRAWAL
THANK YOU
WITHDRAWAL FROM—
SAVINGS
CHECKING
CREDIT LINE
OTHER
“Excuse me. Are you two going to see Gilded Palace of Sin?”
“Shit. Look who’s back.”
“I was just at the theater and the newspaper had the times listed wrong. According to the box office, the movie starts at 6:45. So you have nine minutes.”
“I thought you were at the other machine.”
“There’s a line and I didn’t want to stand outside in the rain.”
“Rain? Bruce, look!”
“It’s just a light rain. But I’m wearing my good suit.”
OTHER
“Emily, it’s 6:37 and you’re pressing Other?”
“Don’t you want to see what else this machine can do?”
“No!”
THANK YOU
CHOOSE OTHER ACCOUNT—
ANDREW
ANN
BRUCE
“Who the hell are Andrew and Ann? And how the hell did my name get in there?”
“You told me the machine ate your card.”
“That was . . . another machine.”
“Excuse me. Ann is my fiancée. Well, was. Sort of. I thought.”
“Are you butting in again?”
“Wait! You must be . . .”
“Andrew. Andrew P. Claiborne III. You must be Emily. And he must be . . .”
“He’s Bruce. Don’t mind him if he’s a little uncouth.”
“Uncouth!”
BRUCE
“Hey, that’s my account, Emily. You don’t have any right to press Bruce!”
“Why not? You say you wanted to pay for dinner and the movie, but the machine ate your card. So let’s go for it.”
GO FOR IT, EMILY
PLEASE ENTER DESIRED AMOUNT—
$20
$60
$100
$200
$60
SORRY. INSUFFICIENT FUNDS.
WANT TO TRY FOR $20?
$20
SORRY. INSUFFICIENT FUNDS.
WOULD YOU LIKE A BALANCE CHECK?
“No!”
YES
BRUCE’S BALANCE: $11.78
SURPRISED?
“Surprised? I’m furious! Some birthday celebration! You didn’t even have enough to pay for a movie, much less dinner! And you lied!”
“Excuse me, it’s your birthday? It’s my birthday too!”
“You stay out of this, Andrew, or whatever the fuck your name is.”
“Don’t be vulgar, Bruce. He has an absolutely perfect right to wish me a happy birthday.”
“He’s not wishing you a happy birthday, he’s butting into my life.”
“Allow me to wish you a very happy birthday, Emily.”
“And to you, Andrew, the very same.”
“Plus he’s an asshole!”
NO NAME CALLING PLEASE
WOULD YOU LIKE ANOTHER BALANCE CHECK?
BRUCE
EMILY
ANDREW
ANN
“I still don’t understand who Ann is.”
“My girlfriend. Sort of. She was supposed to meet me at the movie but she stood me up for the last time.”
“How terrible! On your birthday! Andrew, I know exactly how you feel.”
“As a matter of fact, you’re both a couple of assholes!”
NO NAME CALLING PLEASE
EMILY AND ANDREW,
PLEASE ALLOW ME TO TREAT YOU
TO A BIRTHDAY DINNER AND A FILM
“A hundred dollars!”
“It says it’s treating us. Take it, Emily.”
“You take it, Andrew; I think the man should handle the money. And you can call me Em.”
“I can’t fucking believe this!”
“We’d better hurry. Excuse me, Bruce, old pal, do you have the time?”
“It’s 6:42. Asshole.”
“If we run we can catch the 6:45. Then, how about Sneeky Pete’s?”
“I love Tex-Mex!”
PLEASE REMOVE YOUR CARD
DON’T FORGET TO TRY
THE BLACKENED FAJITAS
“You’re all three assholes! I can’t fucking believe this. She left with him!”
WELCOME TO CASH-IN-A-FLASH
1324 LOCATIONS
TO SERVE YOU CITYWIDE
PLEASE DON’T KICK THE MACHINE
“Go to Hell!”
PLEASE INSERT YOUR CASH-IN-A-FLASH CARD
“Fuck you.”
GO AHEAD, BRUCE
WHAT HAVE YOU GOT TO LOSE?
THANK YOU
IT WASN’T ‘EATEN’ AFTER ALL, WAS IT?
“You know it wasn’t. Asshole.”
NO NAME CALLING PLEASE
WOULD YOU LIKE—
SYMPATHY
REVENGE
WEATHER
ANN
“Excuse me.”
“Jesus, lady, quit banging on the door. I know it’s raining. Tough shit. I’m not going to let you in. This is a cash machine, not a homeless shelter. You’re supposed to have a card or something. What?”
“I said, shut up and press Ann.”
The Coon Suit
I’M NOT MUCH OF A HUNTER and I don’t care for dogs. I was driving out Taylorsville Road in Oldham County one Sunday, when I saw this bunch of pickups down in a hollow by a pond. My own old yellow and white ’77 Ford half-ton was bought from a coon hunter, and it could have been the truck as much as me that slowed down to take a look. Men were standing around the pickups, most of which had dog boxes in the beds. I saw a Xeroxed sign stapled to a telephone pole, and realized I had been seeing the same sign for a couple of miles along the road.