by Clara Hume
I was twiddling with the radio on the way to the bike and sat down in the passenger seat.
"Can't sleep in that damn wagon," I said. "Hope you don't mind? I can take over the drive if you want."
"I might take you up on that offer later," he admitted.
I had grabbed a gun, which I think relieved him some.
"Guess if we come across any strangers in the road, we oughtta figure them to be dangerous," I said.
"Too right," he agreed.
"What do you make of it all? These outlaws?"
"These blokes are out for themselves. Half your luck if they leave you alone. "
"I oughtta mention to Leo tomorrow to get off the main road. Or maybe they're worse on the back roads," I said.
"I came up from Florida and saw enough on my way, but the main roads were worse," said Caine. "You had police trying to control everything and getting downright stampeded. Military types too. Then everyone got sick. Fran calls the new outlaws the Mad Max Drifters. I can't think of them as anything but that nowadays." He snickered.
I smiled too. Caine was an okay bloke, as he would say.
"Hey, whatcha got there?" he said, noticing some static coming from the radio.
"A hobby," I said. I began to search for audible stations. In Silver City sometimes late at night I could pull in a choppy voice of a woman who said she was from Chicago. She sounded East Indian, which is why I felt drawn to her. I hardly knew my roots. I had vague memories of a woman with brown skin and hazel eyes smiling at me, but Maggie had been the woman I called Mother. The soft radio voice from Chicago would say that the city was overcome with wild animals, wildflowers, and terrorists. She had escaped to a farmhouse in the suburbs to hide out and was looking for people out there. I'd tried to reach her, but never could. Perhaps my voice had skipped across currents to elsewhere in the world.
"Pretty cool. The others brought a radio too," Caine said, "But I don't think it works at all."
We drove on through the night, and occasionally I would fidget with the radio, trying to bring something in. The moon guided us, turned the night surreal. At times, we noticed dead bodies on the side of the road. We had been seeing them since the start of our trip, but just rode on by. There was nothing you could do but hold your nose and swat away the flies.
Most the time the bodies were so decomposed that you couldn't tell what was what. The flies would have moved on, and so had any scavengers. Nights were the worst, and you either had to sleep or be deep in conversation to ignore the bodies. But tonight the conversation was sparse, the smells dense, the night foreboding, as if the spirits had taken wing from roadside to moon and floated around us in mock appeal.
Caine and I tried to talk more. He asked me about Maisie, and I said I'd known her all my life.
I could tell he wanted to ask more, but figured maybe he thought it was best he wouldn't discuss the woman behind her back. Or something. That potential banter died, but it was okay. I wasn't keen on talking about Maisie either.
Our awkward conversation was saved by a sudden voice on the radio, which was distant and cutting in and out. The speaker was a man. Caine said, "Whoa," and I turned the volume up.
The man spoke with authority and said, "Ye who are out there in the night, alone, or with others, I want to warn you. Warn you about the coming storms, the thieves in the night, the marauders seeking to deceive and conquer you. It has begun, friends."
The man's voice was dramatic. He sounded old. Not in age but in time. His voice cut in and out, but we heard most of what he was saying.
"The fall is upon us, and the mountains will tumble when the Lord descends back into this earthly and temporary domain."
A stretch of ghostly static screeched into the airwaves, interrupting the man's words so that for several seconds he faded out. And then: "You have seen the dead and the diseased ruling over the dry Earth. This is the hell promised to us. This is God's sign to us. Repent now, all ye heathens, and lift your faces to the heavens."
"What the fuck?" asked Caine.
"As God's appointed and last-standing prophet, I tell you of our fall and our future restoration! Hand over your soul to Him now. Give your life to Him. It is the only way we will…"
The man's voice cut out. I desperately attempted to get him back but couldn't.
"Lots of crazies out there, yeah?" I said to Caine.
"The world has gone crazier than ever," he agreed.
Finally, I offered to take over driving, but before we switched Leo stopped the wagon and we stopped behind him. We sipped from a canteen and made small talk. We were weary, and it seemed that the night wanted us to sleep. The water was warm and unsavory but clean.
We wearily returned to our seats. Fran drove the wagon, and I drove the bike with Caine next to me, falling asleep in the sidecar. This seemed like the longest night of my life. I couldn't drive fast since I had to keep pace with the wagon. I occasionally felt the rifle to make sure it was within reach. I kept the lights off and stayed slightly behind the wagon. At times I mistook the blond flop of Fran's hair in the moonlight to be something else: a ghost, a light off in the distance, who knew what. My mind was playing tricks on me. I think Leo was trying hard not to doze next to her. She drove on, looking straight ahead, lost in thought.
The heat was incessant, even without the sun, and it was a dry, humorless intensity that baked my soul in its arms. I finally yielded to a stony resignation: I didn't have to be fully alert. I could drive along this road slowly for eternity. If I slept, the most that would happen was going off into the ditch, whereupon Caine might wake up and hit me on the arm.
But I did stay awake. And before I knew it, the long night behind us gained a rosy tint, and Fran glanced back and said, "We made it!"
I gave her a thumbs up and smiled. I could sense Caine waking up. But not for long. He dozed back off, mumbling something that I couldn't make out. In the blue twilight the desert loomed before us like an empty canvas, yet a promise seemed to be there, and even in the void there was a magnificence that had always shown its face. The miles of dusty dunes, the thespian sky of the morning, and the long fingers of shadow: they stretched before us endlessly.
During my adoration of the morning, I came across yet another pile of bodies. Three of them that I could see. All adults. Freshly dead, and with morning buzzards gathered at their feet for breakfast. I looked away and nearly choked at the ghastly odor steaming from their decay. I wasn't sure what would cause such death, unless diseases still spread throughout the land. Or maybe they had been murdered for the few goods they had?
Several moments after we had passed the latest funeral, Fran turned off on a side road near an old worn and weed-overgrown sign that read "Swansea." She kept going until she found a small grove of Palo Verde trees and then pulled the wagon underneath them.
Fran said there must be water nearby since these were blue Palo Verde trees that grew near washes. She seemed to ignore the bodies we'd just passed and insisted that we had to set up a sleeping camp for the day.
She was off, skipping to find water before Leo was fully awake, but he soon ran after her like a puppy dog. I thought their love was pretty fantastic, but groaned like an old man as I straightened myself up from the long drive overnight. Caine awoke and looked at me through squinted eyes, saying, "Mornin', mate."
I didn't know about anyone else, but I still had the odor of the three dead bodies back there; the smell stuck with me like a bad memory. I couldn't shake it. It was a reek I'd gotten used to on the ranch when coming across a dead coyote or other animal here and there, but with humans I couldn't just deal with it. Something or someone was out here killing people. Could be heat, a virus, or madmen.
The day was already shaping up to be sultry, and that stench arose around me as if it was teasing me. That's when I heard Fran cry out. Caine and I jolted toward to her direction, a little dip beyond the grove of trees she'd found. She was down there with Leo, kneeling over a rock. I ran down with my newly found m
ate and saw that Fran had found another human. Leo was trying to pull Fran away. At first I thought it was because the person was dead too, but came to find out that she was barely alive.
As we approached we could see quite clearly that this person was a young woman in much pain. She wore a cotton dress, which was horribly stained in dirt and sweat, its original color lost, and there was a formation of blood pooling down the lower part of her skirt. The woman's brown eyes knotted in pain, and she cried out to the winds.
My heart went out to the girl immediately, but she wasn't exactly alone. At the edge of the horizon we could see a strange site. Silhouettes of about a dozen animals roamed around us. As they came closer, we could hear their growls and snarls. Feral dogs, I thought.
"Shit," said Leo. "Looks like we got us some company."
The dogs were way too thin and, if they had ever lived as domesticated animals, their old ways had been shed. The rangy dogs approached us hesitantly, pacing about as they slowly neared us. We had no guns with us here; they were back in the wagon. Defenseless in the desert, I thought. I could hear the preacher's words from last night overcoming me. We were on the way to hell, is what he said. But this seems like hell, I thought. Hot, dangerous, death at every corner.
Fran said, "They've been stalking the girl, I bet. Look, they aren't sure about it now that all of us are here."
Leo told Fran and the strange girl to head back to the wagon and tell Jimmy or Daniel to come. But, as the girls attempted to retreat, the dogs ran right up to us and began barking wildly, trying to cut off the girl, surrounding her violently. Maybe it was her blood, I thought.
I don't remember thinking about what I was doing. I just did it. I ran into the gang of dogs, waving my arms wildly and yelling. I could see Fran had escaped successfully, and Caine and Leo joined in my attempt to scare off the dogs. However, I was the first to try to rescue the girl, and the dogs now concentrated on me. I could feel them jumping at me, tearing my pants and shirt sleeves. Leo and Caine were trying to scare the dogs off, but they weren't frightened. These free-roaming dogs were starving and aggressive.
Next thing I knew one of the dogs knocked me over. I lost my voice, having gone from instinctively protective to scared out of my wits. I could feel the dogs tearing at me, ripping my clothes. My head had hit the ground hard, and my left arm suddenly became numb. I could feel their teeth bearing into the flesh on my arm. Warm blood gushed out onto the dusty ground. Shots, then more yelling was heard. By the time I was rescued, I was in so much pain from my arm that I had blacked out in shock.
When I awoke, I rolled my eyes to the sky. Heat and merciless wind slapped my face. I was being carried back to the wagon. I could still smell death. It was all around the desert. I thought about the woman. I found out later that her name was Mei Sòng, according to a nearby purse with an ID card and an old handkerchief in it. The smell of decay and death would always remind me of meeting Mei—not as cool as the smell of bitter almonds, I thought.
Elena—Chapter 15
When they came back to our camp with Joe's arm dangling from his shoulder, and a strange woman to boot, everyone panicked. Joe had been attacked by feral dogs when the rest of the group found Mei, and we had to take off his arm. There was nothing else to do, no way to save it.
Daniel hadn't said much on the trip. He was still heavily grieving Cameron and had tried to make peace with that bear, but couldn't quite do it. Today was the first time I'd seen him perk up since the death of our son. Having tended to animals on our mountain, he was the only one of us who we knew enough about anatomy of mammals to safely remove Joe's arm. He barked orders. Get water and alcohol and clean rags. Start a damn fire, yes in this heat, and sterilize a knife over it.
Leo started the fire. Fran boiled water. I found the sedatives I had taken when Cameron died and fed a couple to Joe, who was writhing in pain on the desert floor. Mei looked on haplessly, her face wrinkled with sorrow. Jimmy helped tie Joe down so he would be still and then gave him some whiskey on top of the sedatives. Nothing could stop the pain though, and Joe cried out in a voice you don't normally hear from a man.
Leo removed Joe's shirt and put a towel under his arm while Daniel began cleaning the area around the bone and flesh. Despite the fact it was repugnant, we all looked on. We told Joe it would all be okay. His brown face grew pallid, his normally vibrant eyes pale gray.
"Used to ride horses all the time," Joe said in a half-whisper as the pain numbed his mind. "Wonder how I can ride so well with no arm."
"Your good arm is going to be saved," Daniel reminded him harshly.
Jimmy drank. He was the one who had shot the dogs afterward, killing them all except for one dog that ran off. Jimmy evidently had a thing about murdering animals, but it was either the dogs or his friends.
With surgery soon to begin, we huddled over Joe as close as we could get without smothering Daniel, who used a knife to cut off remnants of skin and meat, and then a hacksaw for the bone. Most everyone by now had turned away, but I kept looking. It was hard enough to deal with Joe's cries, but Daniel and I needed to see it. Seeing Joe's arm cut off somehow softened the blow we had experienced with Cameron's death.
Joe losing his arm gave us perspective. When it was over, when Daniel had severed the arm and cleaned it up and covered it tight with rags, we all breathed a collective sigh of relief.
Maisie took Jimmy's bottle and took a long swig of whiskey. She refused to give the bottle right back, and Jimmy understood. Maisie was the only one of us who knew Joe too well.
At the end of the day, Joe finally slept. Mei had said nothing to anyone, but sat by his side. We all hung back in the distance, drained of energy and scorched beneath an evening moon. That's when we saw a stranger approach our camp. Not a man but a dog.
"That's the fucking critter that got away," Jimmy said. He tried to stand up fast and reach for his gun but was drunk and fumbled.
"Don't," Daniel warned. Daniel approached the dog, which had lost its family and was no longer aggressive. Even though not belligerent, he was not at peace. He paced back and forth outside our camp, his head hung low.
Mei reached into a pocket on her dress, pulled out a piece of beef jerky, and threw it toward the dog. He gobbled it right up and howled. That's what it had wanted all along. The poor dog was so lanky and hungry its ribs were outlined beneath its skin. The dog didn't want to leave us, not then nor ever after, even though it would take him a long time to completely trust us and longer for us to trust him.
The logistics of our traveling camp were iffy to begin with, but even after just a few days on the road, things were dire. We'd gotten cold water from Colorado River but didn't have enough room in our wagon to carry it all. We'd picked up three more travelers and now a dog. We fed the dog jerky, and eventually he hopped up on the unused feed trough at the back of the wagon to travel with us.
We'd seen hundreds dead on the road, had had to find new water sources in the dry heat, and had seen the devastation of death and decay and paranoia.
Mei, I didn't know what to think of her. She had not uttered a word since Fran found her in the desert in Swansea.
We women had taken her to the wagon, shooed away the men, disrobed her to see she had been a virgin and raped--which explained the blood--and cleaned her of dirt and blood. She was tiny, though not as young as you would think of most virgins. We guessed at least in her early twenties. At first she did not want us to touch her, but after our soft pleadings and encouraging words, she acquiesced, only then resigned to daydream and stare away while we cleaned her up. Fran, also petite, gathered a clean tunic and skirt from her luggage and dressed the girl.
We didn't know anything about her, outside of what her purse contents told us, but assumed she may have been with the group we saw dead at the side of the road before pulling off into the Palo Verde trees. We guessed that she had attempted to escape from something or someone, and then was pursued by one or more perpetrators, gotten raped, and then left for dead i
n the desert.
We had wondered why they hadn't also killed Mei or taken her captive. But having another mouth to feed may have been one reason. Or maybe she had feigned death like Buddha. Or maybe someone had taken pity on her. But which would be worse: dying slowly in the desert or a quick shot to end it all?
Swansea was our home for a full day. Fran had not slept for two nights, due to driving the wagon, but insisted on coming with me to find water promised by the blue trees. We had Buddha and Caine walking behind us, dissolved in conversation, while most of the others stayed back at camp, including Joe, who was in great pain. Daniel and Leo had decided to hunt for food while we searched for water.
Daniel and I had not wanted to come on this trip and at first had refused the idea. Taking Kristy through an unknown land frightened us. But, in the end, what frightened us more was never knowing what might be happening to our beloved family that we knew from our Idaho mountain. And I wanted to see my father again as much as Fran wanted to see her mother.
Inside, we doubted our decision, though Fran had reminded me of an old saying we both adopted when young: No regrets, Coyote, by a long-gone songstress named Joni Mitchell.
We strode through the desert, silent. Fran and I were like one person when together, and few or no words needed to be spoken. Whenever we had a bit too much wine, however, we could talk for hours.
As we walked, I thought of water and Herman Melville. My favorite book was Moby-Dick, which I was reading for the umpteenth time during this journey. By now the book was in tatters, but the words still stood:
Why did the old Persians hold the sea holy? Why did the Greeks give it a separate deity, and own brother of Jove? Surely all this is not without meaning. And still deeper the meaning of that story of Narcissus, who because he could not grasp the tormenting, mild image he saw in the fountain, plunged into it and was drowned. But that same image, we ourselves see in all rivers and oceans. It is the image of the ungraspable phantom of life; and this is the key to it all.