Joe backed away from the window. With a shaking hand, he locked himself inside the room and wedged a nearby chair beneath the knob, knowing there was nothing he could do to help the man.
He took a quick shower using a leftover bar of soap and crawled into bed, completely and utterly exhausted. His life in Hell Paso seemed like centuries ago. He wondered if he would ever visit it, if he would ever see his mother again. He didn’t want to be apart from her forever, but as long as she was with Terrance, he was determined to stay away. Now, in Slushland, it was all up to him: his career and living situation, every dime spent and penny earned, and every person he spoke to. Every bad and every good decision would be his.
Joe rubbed his face, unable to sleep despite his exhaustion, and lay listening to the riverboats tooting their horns and the gunshots ringing out round the streets. At one point the tarnished doorknob jiggled and shadows flickered beneath the door, but the sound of footsteps went on by down the hallway.
………
Zeb sat on the back balcony of his boathouse, with his feet propped up on the railing and a cigarette hanging between his lips. A fully loaded double-barreled shotgun was angled against the railing. He had his cellphone to his ear.
At the other end, a woman eventually answered his call.
‘This Amanda?’ Zeb asked. ‘Hey Amanda, I’m sorry about the hour, but can I speak with Phillip? Oh yeah? How drunk is he? Too drunk to have a conversation with? That should be fine then. Thank you, darling.’
Zeb took a drag of his cigarette while he waited for Amanda to give the phone to Phillip. His unfinished beer sat at his feet. He’d always preferred the buzz he got from smoking over drinking. Drinking made him sweat and his stomach clench up; smoking felt more relaxing and atmospheric.
‘Hey Phillip, you doing alright? Amanda said you were drinking. Well, pace yourself then, okay? You’re too important to go and croak on us. Hey, I’ve got some big news. I met someone today…No, not like that damn it—a boy…Will you shut up and listen for a second? He came for the job. He had a motorcycle that he’s been working on. Real solid…No, he’s got no experience with hovercars, but we can fix that. I’d bet on him being a quick study. I’m meeting with him tomorrow…That’s the thing, he’s not from Slushland…It doesn’t matter if he’s not bonded to it. He’ll see the importance either way.’
There was a long pause as Zeb listened to Phillip speak.
‘I think this kid might be on the level, Phillip. I’ll call you about it tomorrow after I meet with him. You’ll meet him eventually, don’t worry…About your daughter’s age.’ Zeb laughed. ‘It’s his dead father’s bike…Yeah, a veteran…All right, be safe.’
The line went dead and Zeb set the phone on the ground and slipped another cigarette from the pack.
He sighed and watched the river before him. He loved this city, every inch of it, and it killed him seeing it deteriorate bit by bit every year. He remembered so vividly the day the bridge collapsed with his brother on it. That had been the breaking point for the city, as well as for him. He’d never experienced so much grief. Afterwards, he shut down his shop for a week and stayed inside smoking cigarettes and drinking until his stomach felt like it would rupture. Zeb touched his face and found that his cheeks were wet. Stubbing the cigarette into the deck, he swung his feet off the railing. His foot knocked over the beer bottle; it went clattering to the edge of the balcony and toppled into the river. There was a time when he would have rushed to fish the bottle out. Now he just let it float away.
15
Joe hadn’t been able to sleep much with all the gunshots firing off randomly in the night. After each one he’d slunk out of bed to the window and watched the gritty, tar-colored street. The condos across from the motel looked abandoned, the doors torn from their hinges and the roof marred with holes. Some telephone wires had snapped and now hung against the poles, swaying in the wind like the tentacles of a sea anemone. Back home, after Terrance had moved in, Joe had had a difficult time sleeping through all the sex and the fights that occurred like clockwork. But after a month had passed, it was like his brain refused to register the noise. He hoped the same would happen in Slushland.
As the first light of morning crept through the cracks in the blinds, Joe sat on the edge of the bed taking the pistol apart and putting it back together again. The five bullets he had found in its chamber stood to attention, like miniature sentries, on the bedside table. He was on his tenth reassemble when he noticed sunlight lapping his toes.
He put the pistol back together one last time and tossed it onto the center of the bed. Then he got dressed and went down to the foyer where he helped himself to some free coffee set up on a table beside the front desk. It turned out to be stale and cold, but it would have to do.
The city still looked asleep at 7:30 a.m. A light fog had settled along the sidewalk, and there was no movement along the street or in the buildings. Joe walked to a nearby trashcan and picked out a discarded newspaper and skimmed it while he finished his coffee. On the front page was an article about two men from Virginia who had recently carried out a heist in the North. One of them had been caught before reaching the Wall; his partner had been lucky and made it back. The article didn’t go into detail about what had happened to the captured man.
Joe dropped the paper back into the trashcan, along with his coffee cup, and scanned the length of the street. Two bare and bloodied feet stuck out from the porch of a building. He made his way towards them, already knowing full well what he would find. The drunk from the night before lay slumped against the wall of an abandoned grocery store. He was stripped down to his soiled underwear, his chest and face covered in dried blood. His pale eyes stared straight ahead, as if they were watching something on the far sidewalk, and his fists were clenched by his sides. Joe hunkered down beside the man and, ignoring the hardened blood on his face, shut the dead man’s eyelids. What did they do to corpses in Slushland, he wondered. Were there graveyards or did they just dump them in some hole like he’d seen at Dick’s gas station?
He stood up and looked down at the man’s matted hair. If this was me, would anyone bother with a burial? He checked his watch, ten till eight, and left the man where he lay and hopped on his motorcycle.
He wanted to arrive early at the shop. That was something he’d learned from his father, some of the advice he’d given before heading off to war: Always show up early the first day on the job. On time isn’t good enough, son. Any joker can show up on time. He pulled into Zeb’s with four minutes to spare.
The lifeless canoe remained perfectly still in the glassy, wakeless water. All the lights were off, the shutters closed. Something was missing from the whole picture. Joe racked his brain, trying to figure out what it was. With a mixture of excitement and nervousness, he noticed that the NOW HIRING sign was gone. As he sat on his bike contemplating whether or not that was a good omen, the front door opened and Zeb, wearing the same clothes he’d had on the night before, walked outside smoking a cigarette.
‘Morning, Joe,’ he said, his back to him as he locked up the boat house. He pointed to the chain-link fence. ‘You can park her in there for now.’
Joe opened the gate and pushed the bike into the empty lot. Zeb locked the gate with a heavy padlock and tugged it to make sure it was secure. He grunted his approval and turned to Joe. ‘Couldn’t sleep, could you?’
‘I was up the better part of the night.’
‘I figured.’ Zeb ground his cigarette out with his heel. ‘I’ve never gotten used to the gunshots. Some people do, but not me. Every time a gun goes off at night, I wake up. There’s almost no point in even getting in bed.’ Zeb lit another cigarette without offering one. ‘I wanted you here early so I could show you around Slushland—really show you what this city is all about. I figure that’s only fair.’
They set off on foot, crossing the street and heading west towards the highway. The morning air felt sticky and Joe wished he’d left his jacket behind. He was used to t
he arid, dry atmosphere of Hell Paso. The air was thicker in Slushland, harder to breathe. Zeb walked a couple feet ahead, taking long, confident strides, like a king showing off his domain. ‘You got in pretty late last night, so I doubt you had a chance to see much of the city.’
I saw plenty, Joe thought.
Zeb continued: ‘If you had, then you mighta realized the truth and gone right back to Texas. This city is dying, if not already dead.’
They passed an abandoned kiosk filled with spoiled produce, rotten fish, and moldy loaves of bread. There were dozens of these kiosks along the sidewalk, each hinting at human life, but without people anywhere. Scattered rubble lay in piles beside the buildings; bricks, splintered beams, sheetrock, and shattered panes of glass were strewn all down the street. Along one of the telephone wires that hadn’t been severed, dozens of old shoes had been strung up like bunting.
‘Where is everyone?’ Joe asked.
‘That seems to be the question of the hour.’ Zeb kicked aside a blackened cabbage. ‘There’s no great divide in Slushland, Joe. I’d guess Slushland’s got the highest poverty rate in the south. Not that something like that can be proven—not anymore.’ Zeb pointed straight ahead. ‘Up here, there’s something I want you to see.’
They stopped at the entrance to an alleyway. At first, Joe thought he was merely looking at bags of trash and piles of old, filthy rags. Then someone moved and the true image pieced itself together the longer he looked. People were huddled together, crouched under layers of clothes that also doubled as pillows and mattresses. Some were lucky enough to have a real mattress, but it was shared by at least six bodies.
Joe looked at them for a couple minutes before asking, ‘Are these Guttermen?’
‘Slummers. This is the norm in Slushland. I’ve never seen a Gutterman. They might be a myth. I don’t care to know.’
From there, Zeb led Joe to a square surrounded on all sides by skyscrapers. Slummers slept on benches around a bronze monument completely covered in graffiti. It was obvious the square had once been a wonderful source of pride for the city. He imagined employees wearing black ties and jackets looking down on the square from their offices, surely thinking that the city would be eternal and the sun would always shine. Joe used to think the same thing about Hell Paso. It was home, a place that couldn’t be touched, that would stand until the end of time.
The statue was of seven young men wearing ancient football outfits: the hide helmets, high striped socks, and jerseys. One young man stood before the rest with a football tucked under his arm. His vandalized face, that had once exuded confidence, now stared down sadly at Joe and Zeb.
Zeb nodded towards the statue. ‘This epitomizes what’s become of Slushland. When we realized the war was inevitable the city hired a sculptor to build this. It was s’pposed to remind the city to stay strong, come what may. As you can see, it didn’t have the effect we were hoping for. The city decided on the statue’s name—Seven Saints Monument. We thought it was so powerful at the time. As long as this statue stood, our city would remain strong.’
Etched on the base in scratchy, bright lettering were the words ‘Seven Sacks of Shit’. Joe understood Zeb’s disappointment. He realized with some shame that he mustn’t have felt that strongly about Hell Paso or else he would have stayed.
‘I’ve lived here my whole life, Joe. I’d do anything for this city. But after a while, you gotta cut off the life support. It’s tiring, fighting a losing battle.’
Joe unzipped his jacket and tucked it beneath his arm, somewhat resembling the football player in front of them. It was difficult to comprehend that a city this big was full of so much poverty. Zeb had only showed him a couple blocks. What about the other side of the city? Didn’t people live in the skyscrapers?
‘Why are you telling me all this, Zeb? Are you trying to run me out of town?’
‘No, I don’t want to run you outta town, Joe,’ Zeb said, laughing a little. ‘But I’m not gonna keep you here under false pretenses. This city has a disease with no cure. I want you to be fully aware of what you’re committing to if you decide to work for me.’
‘Are you offering me the job?’ Part of Joe wished the answer would be a resounding No.
Zeb lit his last cigarette. ‘Yeah,’ he said with a lungful of smoke. ‘Unless you want to get the hell out of this city as soon as possible.’
Joe crossed his arms over his chest, his jacket intertwined. ‘I’ve got nowhere else to go.’
‘Hell Paso?’
Joe shook his head. ‘I couldn’t go back there even if I wanted.’
They left the square, heading back to the auto shop along the river sidewalk. The buildings on the other side of the river were covered in a fog that seemed unable to dissipate.
‘If this city’s so bad, how come you’ve stayed as long as you have?’ Joe asked.
‘Several reasons—the most important being that this is still my home, no matter how shitty it gets.’
Joe couldn’t deny that Slushland, even in its rundown, poverty-stricken state, still possessed an uncanny charm. It almost made him wish he’d seen the city in its heyday, back before the war had flipped everything on its head.
16
Phillip rode shotgun in the Jeep chugging up the mountainside in Dustmouth, the place some folk called Hell’s Mouth, and others—the hikers and backpackers—spoke of as the greatest challenge since Everest.
As the bending trees, shrouded in endless dust, zipped past the window, Phillip laid a hand on his leg, tracing the outline of his hipflask with his fingers. It had been two hours since his last drink and he was desperate for another gulp of whisky to warm his stomach, loosen up his bones. He knew he should have snuck a pull back at Jeff’s ranch house, but it was getting dark and Jeff kept urging him to hurry up. Even Jeffrey Graham, a native of Dustmouth, feared being trapped out on a bad night.
Phillip pushed thoughts of the flask out of his mind. ‘How far is it?’ he asked.
‘Right past that ridge,’ Jeff said, indicating with a finger.
They rolled over a fallen tree, bumping and swaying side to side, before finding solid ground again. The Jeep reached the ridge’s peak, then began the descent to a clearing surrounded on all sides by trees. Jeff drove through an opening that would have been impossible to find unless you knew the land by heart. He parked beneath a canopy of branches, which lessened the harrowing dust and wind. It was unremitting—enough to drive a man crazy. Wind and dust covered everything like buckshot; even the noise of it, the tiny beads scattering against a window, pushed Phillip to his limit, forcing him to appreciate the quiet of Midland.
‘See it?’ Jeff asked.
Phillip leaned forward until his face was right up to the window, his searching eyes greeted only by clouds of dust. He shook his head. ‘Not a thing.’
‘Good,’ Jeff said and grabbed two bandanas and two pairs of goggles out of the glove compartment. He handed a set to Phillip, who wrapped the bandana around his mouth and slid the goggles over his eyes.
Without warning, Jeff opened the driver side door. Dust and wind whipped into the Jeep. Phillip leapt out of the car and immediately wished he hadn’t. He couldn’t see Jeff or the hangar, and even though the Jeep was still an arm’s length away, it was beginning to disappear. A flashlight burst on. The grainy light flashed this way and that, beckoning Phillip, who followed it for close to two minutes until the light vanished and a door opened in front of him. Jeff grabbed him by the collar and tugged him through. Phillip stumbled forward as the door slammed behind him.
He stood coughing as he yanked the bandana to his neck and set the goggles up on his forehead. If he’d thought he needed a drink earlier, now he was practically dying for one. Dustmouth was more than he could stand, regardless of what Jeff had to show him.
‘You all right?’ Jeff asked, helping him to his feet.
‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ Phillip said, noticing Jeff eyeing the imprint of the hipflask in his jeans pocket. Phillip dusted h
imself off. ‘So this is the place you had in mind?’
‘This is it. Zeb’s deliverin’ materials tomorrow.’
Phillip walked around the dusty hangar, kicking aside ancient newspapers and empty bullet shells. It was circular, with one main entrance, the door they’d come through, and another large opening that looked like an oversized garage door. A propeller detached from a prop plane leaned against the far wall. ‘Did you hear he finally found a partner?’ Phillip asked.
‘He didn’t mention it.’
Phillip stopped at a bloodstained tube lying on the floor. He bent down to pick up the tube and stood with it clutched in both hands. ‘Are these the blueprints?’
‘Tesh delivered them this mornin’. Ben got very lucky up there.’
‘I heard about his partner. Offer my condolences next time you see him,’ said Phillip, popping the top off the tube and looking inside at the sheets of rolled up paper. As tempted as he was to take a look at them, he knew he wouldn’t be able to make head nor tail out of them. He’d need Zeb to translate.
Wind and dust beating against the hangar walls tore him from his reverie. He shoved the top back on the tube and propped it against the wall. ‘I don’t know how you do it, Jeff, living in a place like this.’
‘You get used to it.’
Dustmouth had started as a terraforming experiment, meant to create the perfect conditions for farming and thriving livestock. Experimentation had begun two years before the war, and the years before that had been taken up with creating the living conditions for the horses and cows, planting the corn and tobacco fields, and building the head of operations, which was now Jeff’s ranch house. Phillip didn’t know or understand all the specifics of the experiment, but he, along with the rest of the country, knew that something had gone very wrong. Within six months, the grass had turned poisonous and the drinking water so acidic that it melted the cows’ lips. Soon there were piles of reeking carcasses strewn over what used to be healthy, beautiful land. By tinkering with the weather system, all they had accomplished was to make it a violent, treacherous place, uninhabitable for humans and wildlife. Jeff was the only person Phillip knew of who still lived in Dustmouth.
Our Home is Nowhere (The Borrowed Land, Book 1) Page 8