Route 12

by Marietta Miles

  Now sitting down at his teak desk, a generous gift from a grateful parishioner, Pastor Friend wondered to himself if all women were made of nothing but blood and sin.

  SHEPPARD

  VERNON STOPS OFF at Duck’s Bar, a dark, soulless, musty drinking hole one mile outside of Goshen. The owners keep it simple with bourbon, whiskey, and beer. There’s a jukebox in the corner with Jim Reeves and Marty Robbins crooning from the speaker. He runs up a tab he will never have to pay. Another benefit to friendship with Pastor Daniel.

  His courteous demeanor dropped, thanks to several bourbons, he bounces down the main street of town, his ass soar from the bumps. As he is about to pass the turn for Half Town he remembers he needs to stop by Sherry’s house.

  “Stupid girl,” he growls to no one. Her mother was stupid too. He wouldn’t have done so much to help if her father had not been from Goshen and a well-considered church member.

  His headlights break across the girl’s small, neat house. A black shadow standing in front of the living room window drops below a gathering of boxwoods. Slamming on his brakes, his car skids across the sand and dirt. He falls out of the car, not bothering to close the door. He stumbles near the steps.

  “Who’s there?” He slurs his words. “Who the hell is out here?”

  “It’s me.” A shaky thin voice rolls from the bush. “It’s just me, sir.”

  “Marcus?”

  The shadow stands and steps from behind the bush.

  “Marcus Diggs?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Why are you creeping around out here?”

  “I just came to see Sherry.” Marcus maneuvers out of the sticks, looking at the ground, hands fiddling nervously in front of him. “My mother told me to come and check on her. You know, cause she’s alone and all.”

  “If your momma told you to come then why are you sneaking? Like you’re up to something.”

  The young man exhales in exasperation and pushes his hands deep into the pockets of his worn out jeans. He watches the dirt under Mr. Sheppard’s feet.

  “Really, I’ve been friends with Sherry for a while now, sir. I was just coming to check on her. We haven’t spoken in some time.”

  “Friends?” Mr. Sheppard asks.

  Marcus is quiet for a long moment. He looks up and stares at a point far behind Mr. Sheppard. “Yes, sir. Friends.” He nods and looks nervously into the old man’s bloodshot eyes. “Do you know where she’s gone?”

  The liquor is messing with Vernon Sheppard, slipping in his veins, swimming through his mind. He feels dizzy and loose. His head spins and the knot in his gut pushes up his throat. A light turns on, an idea that makes him sick, makes him crazy. “Goddamn you! You!” He tries to grab the young man’s collar.

  “Sir?” Marcus slips away, just out of the old man’s grasp, dumbfounded.

  Without another word, Sheppard jerks away, jumps into his car and speeds home, taking down a mailbox or two on the way.

  SHERRY

  THE NURSES HAVE her undress, hurriedly take her clothes out to the laundry bin in the hallway. They tell her to lie down on the squeaky bed against the wall. While she situates herself on the thin mattress, a sharp-faced nurse slips close to the bed, quickly at her side, holds Sherry’s leg down and sticks her with a long, dripping needle.

  “What?” She rubs her leg and moves to scoot off the cot. The nurse forcefully presses down on Sherry’s belly with one hand and with the other, pushes two gloved fingers inside of her. Wheezing, Sherry barely stops herself from kicking the woman in the face.

  “She’s not open,” Nurse Jennifer announces to the room. The staff begins buzzing like a hive, rushing to shave her, purge her insides. They pull and tug on her like cats at a kill.

  “Grab her legs.” The doctor strides into the room. He is stout and sweaty.

  “Now, you better be still,” someone tells her. While the women hold her legs he takes a long knitting needle, or so it seems, and slides it inside her, breaking her water. Soon she is wet and sticky. Her room is alive with dead-faced strangers, walking in and out. No one is speaking to her. They strap her legs into a set of cold stirrups and secure her arms to the bed frame.

  “I don’t understand,” Sherry says. A powerful wave of pain gathers and rolls through her. She wants it out. He wants out.

  The old man sits on a squeaky metal stool between her legs, breathing through his mouth. Staring out the window, thinking his own thoughts, he examines her. Her hips lurch off the table. The nurse with the tight ponytail pushes her back down.

  “Hush. You’re fine,” the ugly mouth hisses.

  “Alrighty.” The doctor stares at the floor, maneuvering his fingers. He stands and yells out to the room, “We’ll make her ready. Let’s get this going.” His stale breath flows over her.

  “What? What?” Sherry panics and again tries to push herself up to sitting. Only her head and shoulders move. “No. Not yet. It can’t be time.”

  “Hush. This is best.”

  “I don’t know what to do,” Sherry moans.

  “Girls. Let’s hustle this along. I have to get going.” He pushes off with his feet, sending the stool rolling across the floor, and grabs a strap light. “Everybody ready?”

  “Nearly.” A short nurse from the back of the room hurries beside the bed, trying to place a white mask over Sherry’s face. “Sit back.” The nurse holds her still and pushes the mask down, covering Sherry’s mouth and nose. She tries to stay awake but the darkness is a crushing wave pushing down on her. Manually, they pull the boy from her body, using scalpels and forceps, tearing her up and down.

  ***

  Cut by pain, her skin slick with sweat, she wakes up for just a moment. The room is murky and blurry. The tall nurse, with her tight, angry hairdo, holds Sherry’s baby, pats him roughly on the back. There’s a tiny whimper, breathy and soft. Her heart beats faster. Her chest aches. The nurse turns and leaves just as her baby cries out for comfort. The room sinks over top of her, black and sleepy.

  ***

  “Where is he?” She wakes again. “Where’s my boy?”

  The women in the room pay her no mind.

  Everything below her waist is aching and throbbing. If she grits her teeth maybe she can ignore the burning. Maybe she won’t feel like tearing off her own skin. Her arms are no longer strapped down and her legs no longer in the stirrups but still she moves as if she is swimming in mud.

  Grinding her jaw together, she hangs her legs off the bed, the tear between her legs on fire. The anesthesia pushes her down and just as she stands, her shaky legs give out. She coughs and splits open the stitches tight in her skin. Wailing, trying to lean on the windowsill, she falls forward against the sill, one hand breaking through the glass. The nurses finally turn to face her.

  PASTOR FRIEND

  PASTOR FRIEND HEARS the screams and the shattering glass. He runs down the hall and across the foyer to the labor room. Standing unsteady, staring into the room, he sees all her pain and all her blood.

  “Where is he?” Sherry turns to him, her face in a stretched grimace and the splatters of red bright against her gray cheek.

  “Get out,” he barks at the women huddled in the corner. “Close the door.”

  “Come here and calm down, girl.” Alone with her, he holds out a hand and rounds the bed gently. Comforting. “God worked his will. Your son is gone.”

  “But, he’s fine. I saw him. I heard him.” Staring at him, her hands and arms open wide, wondering, begging. “I’m ready. I know I am.”

  “The Lord’s must always come first.” Pastor Friend puts his arm around her just as she begins to slip to the floor. His arms squeeze her a bit too hard. He smiles a wicked smile and eases himself down alongside her. Weak and tired, she weaves, dizzy, and finally rests her cheek on his chest, her breath shallow. She used up the last of her strength.

  “God’s will. God’s judgment. How else could this turn out?” His voice is thin as wet parchment. I am God’s answer and I
’ll clean this world of you. Pulling the narrow leather arm strap off the bed, he leans her forward and wraps it around her throat twice, pulling hard and tight. Sherry only cries.

  “After all, it’s really best this way. For a girl like you,” Friend whispers in her ear, his lips brushing against her soft skin. His foot pushes off the bed frame, angling for strength. Sherry is wheezing instead of breathing and one hand tries to push him away.

  His ears are ringing. Panting, his scar blazing, he jerks until the strap breaks, and her life is fully gone.

  Thirty minutes pass, and he lets the women back in to clean up and handle the mess and dirty things. When he exits and the door to the labor room closes behind him, whispers and gasps from the nervous nurses erupt only to die down a moment later. Daniel Friend walks to his office, pushing the hair from his forehead.

  “Pastor?” Carrie calls out from her desk and then runs to his door, her tight skirt forcing her to take tiny strides. “Vernon Sheppard is on the line.”

  “Not now, Carrie.” He sounds tired. Angry.

  “He says it’s an emergency.” The secretary frowns at him. “He sounds just terrible.”

  Pastor Friend sighs, skulks to his desk, and picks up the phone.

  NAOMI

  NAOMI HUSTLES ONTO the crosstown bus, a faded white giant, heading toward the east side of Goshen. It’s roomier out this way, newer houses and more land. In town, where Naomi lives, it feels hotter and tighter, busier, everyone on top of each other, in each others’ business.

  The bus chimes. She and the little boy, still tucked in her big, crocheted bag, ease off the bus. She thinks his quiet nature is heartbreaking, the opposite of what children should be, or at least how she believes children should be.

  Naomi looks inside her bag. His nose is running again. She reaches in with a wadded up piece of toilet paper and wipes his face. Big brown eyes stare back at her, confused but not afraid.

  At last she’s off the bus, stretching her back after the long ride, taking in the pleasant scenery. In the distance she sees the tall spire of First Baptist Church. She turns just a hair and spies a small shoe repair shop. There’s a basket in the window, full of used children’s shoes, on sale. For a moment, just a breath, she is torn. Disappointed, she heads toward First Baptist. She has to get somebody just right for this little boy. Someone working in the house of the Lord will surely help her.

  The walk isn’t long but the extra weight of baby Oggie wears on Naomi. By the time they reach the long driveway, covered in shade trees, she’s thirsty and bedraggled.

  She’s quite the sight when she steps into the church office.

  “Is there something I can do for you?” The redheaded secretary turns toward Naomi and looks down her nose. Her bright red lips curl upward.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Naomi nods her head. “Do you have a place for babies?” Her baby, Oggie, stays in the bag, quiet as a mouse. She taps one heel nervously.

  “Excuse me?” The secretary’s mouth is open, eyes wide.

  “Babies,” Naomi says slowly.

  “I don’t know what you’re saying. Or asking. What?”

  “Sweet Jesus on the cross. Babies. Do you have a place for babies? You know, children who don’t have folks.”

  “Uh huh. You just hang on a minute, will you, dear?” The baffled woman scuttles down the hall. When she returns, with a big, serious nurse in tow, Oggie is in the middle of the floor, sitting in the crocheted bag, wide eyes tearing up in a silent, bewildered cry. His hands cover his wet mouth and he squeezes his eyes shut.

  “Lord. Didya ever?” The secretary hustles over to the boy. Even as she’s picking him up, he turns his head away.

  ***

  In the evening shade, along the crackly gravel driveway, Naomi hangs her head while she walks. Imagine. Surely, she could take care of a little boy. She cares for her cats and the squirrels, her azaleas, too. She keeps the newspapers, scarves, and shoes, and the cans in the kitchen in order. Religiously she organizes her basket full of forgotten things. She keeps things safe. She keeps things tidy.

  Babies aren’t things.

  “Maybe I’m not so bad,” she thinks. “But I don’t think I’m all that good, either.” She cracks her knuckles on her legs and crosses her arms over her chest. She has slowed her walk to a stroll.

  Put him right back in my bag. That’s what I’ll do. Take him home. Put him on a shelf. Nothing will ever happen to him. The words don’t sound right, even to her. She picks up her pace, as if she’s trying to get away from something. Her arms are pumping and her mind is racing.

  PASTOR FRIEND

  “WHAT THE HELL do you mean, Vernon? What’s wrong with that baby?” Pastor Friend grits his teeth and growls from the side of his mouth. “You sure?” The phone drops from his hand and he slams his hand on the blotter. Already gone. The child is already gone, safe in the arms of Mrs. Duke and safe next to her tall, protective husband. They’re on their way home with their new baby, a gift from the church.

  The pastor tears through the corridor, slipping on the shiny floors and sliding into the main office. He pays the women no mind. He sees nothing around him. Jennifer and Carrie are standing and chattering over Oggie when he enters.

  “He’s cute. Just need to clean him up a bit.” Carrie bounces the tired boy on her hip. “I’ll tell you Jennifer, she was the strangest woman I have ever laid eyes on.”

  “Just left him?”

  “Yup,” she answers. “Well, bless her heart. I guess.” She shrugs.

  Pastor Friend runs past them, out the front door of the church, down the steps.

  “What on earth?” Jennifer shakes her head.

  “Pastor?” they call out together. He doesn’t hear them and runs all the faster.

  “Lord. You’d think the world was on fire.”

  He jumps into his white Cadillac sedan, newly washed and waxed by one of the elder boys, jamming the keys into the ignition, flooding the engine and, at last, hauling it to life. Thrusting into reverse, he rockets out of his parking space. Shooting forward he fires pebbles in every direction.

  NAOMI

  NAOMI HEARS HIS gunning engine and the rain of gravel from his tires. She’s on the wide road several feet ahead. Lurching around her, Pastor Friend takes the turn too fast and too wide, never straightening. She watches him slide across the rocks for several feet, slip, and plunge over the edge of a muddy ravine. The car lands in a deep ditch covered with mangrove limbs and thick with bog. The driver’s side is nearly submerged.

  Inside, Friend’s arms and chest are pinned to the back of his seat by the impact of the car hitting a sunken, knobby trunk. One shoulder, his neck, and his head all remain above the stinking, black water.

  She slips and trips in the mud as she rushes across the small dirt crossover, crawling around to his open window. “Oh God, mister. You look bad.”

  “Gotta get… God damn baby!” He gurgles, trying to raise his face from the rising water.

  “What did you say?” She watches his eyelids flutter and close. She smacks the back of his head, as a mother would a child. “I don’t think so. With that dirty mouth.”

  He makes a bubbling noise in his throat. Naomi feels the fire again and sees the world in red. She rumbles deep inside her throat, squeezes his nose closed, hard, and bends his head forward with her other hand, forces his face into the water. Her hands shake with anger. His pitiful final breath only makes her angrier. Her hands hold him like this, until there is no doubt and his head floats. His last words, ugly and cutting, play like a record in her ears.

  Legs tight and muscles throbbing, she stands, hands on her hips. The Cadillac breaks an air bubble somewhere underneath and it sinks another foot.

  “I better go.” She blows a curl from in front of her eyes, wipes her hands on her dress, and turns in the direction of the bus stop. She shakes the rest of the mud and dirt off her clothes. Her arms feel heavy but strong. Walking tall, stretching, she is grateful for the light breeze. When she
hears the bus, the soft ding barely audible through the open back window, her pace picks up. She fishes her return bus ticket out of her pocket.

  Once she takes her seat, two rows behind the driver, she looks into the rearview mirror. Her hair is wind-blown and her cheeks are sunburned, full of color.

  The bus rolls to a halt at the stop just before Naomi’s. A young mother, fumbling with a skinny baby, stands and scuffles down the aisle. She’s carrying the infant on her shoulder and a rickety umbrella stroller over her forearm. The child’s head is lolling all about. Off the bus, the girl immediately lights up a long brown cigarette and attempts to lock the baby in. Stupid girl.

  Back in her neighborhood, she gazes around, dumbstruck. She has never returned home at this hour or from this direction and everything around her seems new and different. Stepping through the shady bypass between two tall walk-ups she sees her street open before her.

  There are flashing lights and white cars, just like the kind Sheriff Riddle had driven. The door to her apartment house is open and there are officers walking in and out. She sees past the short hedges and spies mother cat: sitting, watching, and waiting until the busy, serious strangers leave. There is Mr. Baldacci, sweaty and animated, standing in his drive, talking to a tall, handsome police officer.

  “And who is that?” The young officer points to her as she crosses the street.

  “Her?” Mr. Baldacci waves his hand as if shooing a fly. “That’s no one. That’s only Naomi.”

  About the Author

  Marietta Miles has published stories with Thrills, Kills and Chaos, Flash Fiction Offensive, Yellow Mama, and Revolt Daily. She has been included in anthologies available through Static Movement Publishing and Horrified Press. Please visit www.mariettamiles.blogspot.com or Facebook for more stories and further information. Born in Alabama, raised in Louisiana, she currently resides in Virginia with her husband and two children.