Side by Side

by Jenni L. Walsh

  Then, Jones makes his break, his thumb in the air. I plant my rear end in the passenger seat before any of us change our minds.

  Now just the two of us, the days and weeks start ticking by. Side by side, in our newest Ford.

  Clyde exchanges telegrams and phone calls with Pretty Boy ’bout extra hands to help us plant guns at the prison farm. Clyde doesn’t like it—relying on people who ain’t Buck or Jones—but he doesn’t have a choice if he wants to get Farm Number One done.

  I remember his words: I got to do one damn thing right.

  But then, “Bonnie,” he says to me one random day in November. “I can’t go to Eastham yet.”

  “Clyde…” With our pattern of two steps forward, I’ve been bracing myself for the inevitable one step back. And here it is, hitting me square in the face.

  “No,” he says. “I ain’t hesitating like last time. It’s just that I need to see my ma. It’s been eating away at me. She deserves to know what happened to Buck. Not whatever cockamamie shit the law fed her.”

  “Are you saying you want to go home?”

  “I want to go home—first—then, I swear to ya, Bonnie, we’re going to Eastham. At home, we’ll see your mama, too.”

  That does it, that gets me to agree, and Clyde points us toward Dallas. Like the first time we left home, the open road plays tug-of-war with my head and heart. My head’s obviously sayin’ it ain’t smart to go near Dallas. My heart don’t care. It’s been too long—so long, in fact, that I ain’t sure how many days and months have gone by since I’ve seen my ma. In my head, I’ve pictured her plenty, always pacing, fingering the blinds as if she’d see me walking up our front path. But we know I can’t do that, and now she’ll know it, too. There’s too much to think ’bout.

  I’m content staring out the window at the passing landscapes. My mind protects me better this way, from my ma, but also from Buck and Blanche. When my gaze catches the sideview mirror, glimpsing the rear seat, the void is obvious. There’s a thin line between out-of-mind and top-of-mind. It’s easy to force Buck’s death and Blanche’s incarceration into the recesses of my mind. But the truth is that those thoughts don’t sink deep. They surface in a snap, like a rabbit from a hole.

  Iowa becomes Nebraska becomes Missouri becomes Kansas. We rest. Kansas becomes Missouri becomes Oklahoma becomes Arkansas. We rest. It’s not the quickest path, we could’ve cut out Nebraska, Kansas, and Arkansas, but the extra miles allow us to hug the state lines. At the first sign of danger, after a car seemingly follows us for too long or if we know there’s a bridge up ahead, we cross back into the state we came from. Then over the line again.

  All the back-and-forth ain’t good for my nerves. We finally hit Texas. Pretty Boy’s been our eyes and ears and, this time, also our helping hand. The fella coordinated a secret rendezvous with our family outside the town of Sowers, only twenty minutes from Dallas.

  “Why’s he putting his neck out for us?” I ask Clyde. After all this time, I never thought to ask. “You two have history?”

  “Guess you can say we got a lot in common. He came from a farming family. Dirt poor. And”—Clyde presses his lips together, bobs his head—“we’re of like minds. Neither of us will go back to prison.”

  I’ve heard that a time or two.

  “He’s got news on Blanche,” Clyde says.

  My eyebrows rise in a flash.

  “Can’t say I expected it of her, but the lass pled guilty. Wouldn’t testify against my brother.” He swallows. “Even though he’s gone.”

  I’m heavy all over. My head slumps forward, and the back of my neck feels tight. Too tight, every muscle all wound up. “How much time did they give her?”

  “Ten years.” Clyde cups my chin, bringing my eyes back to him. “Darling, say the word and I’ll move heaven and earth to get her out.”

  “No.” That’s all I say. Clyde doesn’t need me to explain further. This is Blanche’s chance to start over. She’ll show the little girl from her poem. Blanche will do her time, and then be free. Though I know she won’t ever truly be free, not really.

  Those aren’t thoughts to be having now. Sowers is upon us. It’s got a stretch of road where our car will meet nose to nose with another car. Pretty Boy Floyd said Clyde’s parents, my ma, and Billie should be waiting for us, inside the parked car. Buster won’t be there. He doesn’t support our ragamuffin mode of living. That’s okay; I don’t support it either. Sure wish I could see my brother’s face, though.

  Night casts shadows over the dairy farms on either side of the road. All I see are hulking figures, cows that’ll be called into their barn soon. Clyde slows our car. Blanche once said it’s best to never look a cow in the eye. “They’ve got a direct way of looking at you. It’s best to take a step back and not wonder what they’re thinkin’.”

  To this day, I still ain’t fully sure what Blanche meant by all of that.

  “There they are,” Clyde says. We decelerate a hair more. I slide on some cheery red lipstick. “At least I think it’s a car,” he adds.

  Clyde flashes our headlights, like we’ve planned.

  They signal back, and our speed picks up. My heart hammers in my chest.

  “Don’t help me out of the car, okay?” I say to Clyde. “I want my ma to see I’m all right, even if I’m down the use of one leg.”

  His smile’s tight, as if he’s remembering it’s ’cause of him. But then it eases, as we roll closer to our families. I know he’s dreading facing his ma ’bout Buck, but seeing family is a spark that lights a fire in both our hearts, more powerful than any dread that’s darkened it.

  The other car’s headlights illuminate the inside of our car. We’re just ’bout there. Ours does the same to theirs.

  My heart swells at the faces of those I love. Then, “That ain’t Buster behind the wheel, is it?”

  Clyde cocks his head. “Don’t think so. Sorry, Bonnie.” He squints. “Fact is, I don’t know who it is. Reckon we’ll soon find out.” He snorts. “I’m going to give ’em a small bump to say hello. Billie sure looks happy to see you.”

  “She does.” I meet her grin, start to wave. Off to the side, in the ditch running parallel to the road, a shadow catches my eye. A line of shadows. Heads, if my eyes ain’t playing tricks on me.

  “Clyde,” I breathe.

  We’ve been set up.

  26

  The gunfire is loud. It’s terrifying.

  Bent in half, my chest pounds against my thighs. I turn my head toward Clyde. Glass shatters. Clyde’s position mirrors mine, his head twisted to the side to avoid the wheel.

  He screams in pain.

  Pain radiates through my body, too, but it’s hard to pinpoint where.

  All I know is pain.

  Our car goes dark. It takes me a moment to realize it’s from the other car’s headlights turning off.

  Clyde screams out again. The firecracker of gunfire keeps coming.

  My body jolts as the car flies backward with a jerk, and another.

  “Hold tight, Bonnie,” Clyde says, and I shudder at the fear in his voice.

  We go back, back, ’til Clyde shifts his foot, moaning, and we fly forward again. Still hunched down below the dashboard, he drives blindly, only his arms and hands exposed. In between bullets, the sound of our car scraping against the other car sends chills down my spine. Then it stops. We go faster. Our back windshield shatters.

  Clyde straightens, and I scream, “No!”

  “I got to see. I got to drive.”

  I stay down, arms wrapped ’round my legs. That’s when I realize the slickness of blood running down my good leg, starting from my knee. “I’ve been shot,” I say, deadpan, as if realizing the truth of it. I’ve been shot at, I’ve been burned with acid, I’ve been unconscious, I’ve been cut by glass, but I’ve never had a bullet in my body before.

  Dizziness washes over me.

  “Stay with me, Bonnie. I ain’t strong enough to do this without you.”

  I blink,
and lean back in my seat, feeling an array of notches in the leather from bullet holes. Headlights flash in the rearview mirror. “Coppers,” I say. “Behind us.”

  “Aye.”

  It’s all Clyde says. His head is rolling ’round on his neck. I move closer, propping him up with my body. Our blood mixes on the floorboard.

  “I need you to get my shoe off,” he says. “My foot keeps slipping.”

  Head first, I rip off his shoe and sock. The car slows in the seconds it takes before his bare foot is back on the pedal.

  “Quite the team, ain’t we, Bonnie.”

  I wish his teeth didn’t chatter as he said that. But he focuses on the road, his gaze flicking to the rearview mirror every second or so. We go faster. Clyde veers ’round a turn. We crash through a fence, rumble ’cross a field.

  The next time we look back, there’s nothin’ but blackness with no headlights or bursts of red chasing us.

  We end up with our own headlights beaming ’cross a river—and Clyde’s body slumped against the wheel. I lean over, flick off the lights. I thank the Lord adrenaline pounds through me stronger than the pain. It’s the only reason I’m able to get Clyde out of the car and both of us into the dark river. The river is the reason why he got us here; I know it. It’s cold, the air itself only being a jump above freezing, but that coldness is what we need to staunch our wounds and to stay alive.

  Submerged, I lean my head back against the bank and close my eyes.

  * * *

  I must’ve passed out. I wake shivering, the moon in the same spot in the sky. Clyde’s slumped beside me, his head teetering on the water’s surface, and I panic. Barely able to move from my injuries and the onset of what can only be hypothermia, I struggle to get myself, then Clyde out of the water.

  My breath comes out in small poofs, then when Clyde moans, my breath’s one big exhale.

  We both strip. The movement brings some of our senses back, and we find our way to the rear seat and into each other’s arms.

  Clyde stutters, “We’ve really done it this time, haven’t we?”

  The air I breathe in and out into his neck is warm. I want to sink my whole body into it. “Clyde Barrow, you’re going to be the death of me.”

  “Not today, darling.”

  And he means it. Clyde’s got a resolve that could stretch ’round the world. With sheets that have traveled with us from car to car, we tear strips to wrap our wounds. Clyde’s got four gunshots, in his left arm and leg. One of the bullets got past him, lodging into my knee. With our window blown out, it saved our lives that we both bent ourselves in half. But bullets still ripped through the car’s metal door.

  We use what’s left of the sheets to wear ’em, creating holes for our head and arms. It’s ridiculous how we look, how close we came to death, how close we still are to death, needing real medical attention. It’s a miracle no one found us licking our wounds, and as soon as we can, we leave Sowers behind. The whole time we drive, Clyde grips my hand.

  “Where we going?” I ask.

  “My brain’s still thinkin’ that over. It’s all clogged up, trying to figure how that mess back there happened. I could really use a smoke, but they got soaked when you threw me in that river.” He tries for a smirk, but it’s more of a grimace ’cause of how badly he’s hurt.

  “And saved your life.”

  He kisses my hand.

  I say, “Ma and Billie ain’t capable of double-crossing us. It had to be that fella driving.”

  “We’ll find out who he is. And what the po-lice gave him for tattling ’bout where we’d be.”

  “From Pretty Boy Floyd?”

  “Yeah … and that’s where we’ll go. His brother’s up in Oklahoma, last I heard. Owes me a favor.”

  The thought of getting all the way up from Texas to Oklahoma is daunting. So is the thought of not finding the place or Pretty Boy’s brother not being there anymore. I grip a map.

  Each rattle of the car rattles my knee and my breath. The air’s cold, colder with how fast we move. My sheet does nothin’ but fill up with air, chilling my skin. Clyde ain’t faring much better, and by the fifth hour I see him wavering. His skin has lost all color. When he veers, I right the wheel. I talk, with nothin’ really to say, for the sake of him hearing my voice. I struggle to stay awake myself, the sun now creeping up over the horizon.

  By the skin of our teeth, we make it to Carl Floyd’s home, on the outskirts of town. Clyde has a rare lapse in judgment, laying on the horn. With how he falls against it, I realize it wasn’t a lapse. It’s all he’s got left.

  I’ve never met Carl before—or Pretty Boy Floyd, for that matter—but I reckon it’s Carl who lumbers out of the house and hangs on our car door, poking his head in the window, careful not to touch the shattered edges of glass.

  “I don’t got to ask who you are,” he says, taking in the sight of our bullet-riddled ride and blood-soaked sheets.

  “Carry her in first,” Clyde insists. And Carl does, into his three-story row home.

  I’m put in a bed, and when Carl holds up a bottle of morphine, I all but rip it from his hands, elated for the release from pain and into sleep. I wake a number of times to a soft voice and soft hands. A woman tends to me by flashlight, and I never see her face. I reckon that’s the point; she can’t see mine either. She gently but swiftly removes the bullet fragments from my knee. My leg is put into a splint and hoisted into the air by a hanging device made from bedsheets. When the woman—an educated nurse, I’ve gathered by this point—insists I need surgery, Carl only responds with how that’s not possible.

  “She’ll need therapy, at the very least. See her other leg? How it’s bent?” the nurse says. I listen, my eyes closed. “Her tendons and ligaments restricted while they healed. This leg needs to be worked or this young lady will lose the use of this one, too.”

  I’m glad my face is hidden in the shadows, so my reaction can’t be seen. Though I’m not sure my face can look any more downtrodden. I imagine my skin washed out, my hair disheveled, the scar on my chin.

  I’m at a loss for words to explain all my body’s been through. And Clyde … he was in worse shape than me, this time ’round.

  I wait for the nurse to leave. Carl follows. When the door creaks open again and Carl steps in, light illuminating him from behind, I clear my throat and ask, “Clyde?”

  Carl’s got broad shoulders, a thick body, a square jaw—and he gets knocked aside a moment later. The door’s wide open, light flooding into the room. On a crutch, Clyde hobbles toward me.

  “There she is,” he says.

  I can’t see the bandages under his clothing, but I know they are there, along with the many puckered scars ’cross his body from previous wounds. “You shouldn’t be on your feet,” I snap.

  “You shouldn’t be dangling from the ceiling.”

  Clyde stares ’til my smile starts, then his does, too.

  I say, “We’re a sorry pair.” My mind slips to the bullets hitting our car, lodging into our bodies, whizzing over our heads. And I realize … those bullets were also fired at the other car as we escaped. “Our families?” I dare ask in a low voice.

  “They’re all fine, Bonnie.”

  I sigh, but my hands still ball into fists that the law would shoot in their direction. All ’cause of us. “We came close to dying, didn’t we?”

  He whistles. “The closest. Other two times, they came with warrants, knocking on our door. ’Course we responded with guns to save our hides. But that there in Sowers, they aimed to kill us. Straight off.”

  His crutch bangs against the ground—once, twice—the sound pounding in my head, before his fingertips touch mine. His grip is soft. His fingers tighten. My hand’s shaking good under his. “Yet, here we are, and here’s the thing, Bonnie. I’m done. I ain’t going to hurt us no more.” He sighs. “I don’t need Eastham anymore.”

  I flip my hand to lace our fingers together. The prison farm always was important, a stepping-stone to our farm
land, a way for Clyde to move on from his past. But now, I say, “Clyde, you need it. I do, too. Those lawmen didn’t only fire at us.” My voice bubbles with the threat of fresh tears, but is also ripe to yell my next words. “They shot at our family. They didn’t care a lick if my ma or sister or your parents died while they came for us. That’s sick. It’s sick, Clyde.”

  “So, what do you want to do?”

  I blow out a breath. “I know those officers at the prison ain’t the same ones, but in my mind, they’re all the law. I want to get ’em back. Let’s boil their blood like they’ve done to ours.”

  “By busting out Skelley and the others?”

  “That’s right. And I want the law to know we’re behind it.”

  “All right.” Clyde squeezes my hand. “Let’s get this leg workin’, then.”

  Over the next few weeks, fury pushes me as Clyde bends and straightens my knee. I grit my teeth, knowing each movement is strengthening the muscles, ligaments, tendons, and anything else that needs to properly function inside my leg. It don’t feel good. But I distract myself with teaching Clyde. In between moans and groans, I spell words, I read words. He says ’em back to me.

  We talk ’bout what needs to get done, all starting with planting guns on the prison farm for Skelley to retrieve. For that, we need men to help us carry out the particulars.

  In December, men start showing up at Carl’s house. A fella, old enough to be my daddy, named Mullens. And Raymond’s older brother, who goes by Hamilton. They ain’t who Clyde wants helping us, but who Clyde wants is gone, shot down by the law.

  That anger surrounding Buck’s death only flares when Prohibition ends. I can’t help thinking if that amendment was ratified seven months earlier—just seven months out of the thirteen years Prohibition was in effect—maybe we never would’ve been ambushed at the Oak Ridge apartment, the law thinking us bootleggers. Maybe Buck would still be alive. Seven godforsaken months.

  By January, my knee’s working enough to get myself ’round Floyd’s house. I keep an eye on Mullens. He’s a fidgety sort. Could be that he’s a dopehead, looking for his next fix. He’s frail enough, little more than skin and bones. Or could be that he’s passing information back to the law, ready to lead us into another trap.