Biker

by Baron, Mike;

  “County impound lot. It’s on the way out of town, back the way we came. We have to check out first.”

  They returned to Chic’s Best Western, retrieved their personal belongings and settled with the teenage clerk.

  The impound lot was a quarter mile off the highway on the way out of town, two acres surrounded by a hurricane fence topped with concertina wire. Pratt’s bike sat on a concrete slab next to a rat Honda 750 by the refrigerator-white trailer that served as an office.

  Pratt inspected his Road King like the DEA going over a box from Panama. They’d done a nice job impounding. Although covered in dust, the Road King was blemish-free. Pratt went into the office and used his credit card to pay the $125 impounding fee. The clerk was a buzz-cut Pillsbury dough boy in Oshkosh B’Gosh coveralls.

  “You know where there’s a loading ramp around here I can use to get the bike in the truck?”

  “You might try the Piggly Wiggly down at Ahrens Plaza. You passed it on the way out of town.”

  “Thanks.”

  The bike started with the first nudge. Pratt led the way back into town to the modest shopping mall anchored at one end by Piggly Wiggly. They drove around back. There was a loading dock at exactly the height of the pickup’s tailgate. Pratt carefully rode his bike up the concrete ramp to the dock, then guided Cass in so that the truck bed was level with the dock. With Cass pushing down, Pratt bungeed the bike, front and rear.

  On the way out Pratt sat in the truck while Cass ran into the PW for a quart of orange juice, bananas and granola. She came out and bumped Pratt from the driver’s seat.

  “Let’s roll.”

  Cass drove while Pratt tried to sleep. His eyelids kept popping open like a sprung window blind. His gaze roamed. McDonald’s, Arby’s, Auto Zone, Shell. Anywhere USA. Shiny franchises gave the world a happy, homogenous face. They passed through the exurbs and entered a bleak terrain of wind-smoothed rock and sere prairie.

  How long had it taken Moon to achieve his desired affect? A year? Two? Was he still at it, interrupted only by Pratt’s arrival? Is that why he had a mountain lion? Sioux/Chinese juju swam in Pratt’s head. His desire to destroy something was almost overwhelming.

  Cass jerked the wheel and the truck juked like a fullback with the ball. “Pratt, what are you doing? Stop banging the dash! You scared the shit out of me!”

  “Sorry, sorry,” he said, staring out the window at the flat, featureless landscape.

  “You’re thinking about that kid, aren’t you?”

  “I can’t get him out of my head.”

  “You’ve got to.”

  “I won’t get him out of my head until we find him, one way or another.”

  Pratt’s cell phone rang. He checked the lead—Calloway. “Pratt here.”

  “Pratt, Calloway. Got word the War Bonnets have put out a contract on you.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Pretty reliable shit.”

  “Shit fuck piss, cunt cock crap. Sorry, Heinz. It’s been a rough couple of days.”

  “We got an OPB on your boy Moon with the FBI, Homeland Security, DEA and local jurisdictions.”

  “I thought he was in Hong Kong.”

  “I hope so.”

  “What about the War Bonnets? You tell the Munzes?”

  “I spoke with the Flintstone guy. Very impressive bunch. Ex-military. The Munzes are very well protected.”

  How do you protect against a ghost?

  “Pratt? You there?”

  “Sorry, Heinz. I’m not so sure.”

  “’Bout what? Trust me, this dude ain’t coming within a thousand miles of Wisconsin right now. Half the state is looking for him.”

  “Yeah. Right.”

  “Gotta go. Don’t do anything stupid, and if this kid turns up let me know.”

  “Yeah.”

  The rally was winding down. There were fewer bikes on the road, although they were still everywhere. Everybody in America who ever dreamed about a motorcycle already owned one. Gold Wings bearing bulbous couples pulling trailers, bumper stickers on the trailer. Hard-core bikers on hard-tails, numbed up on painkillers. Squids on sports bikes, asses in the air, heads down. They all passed the truck. America was on the move.

  Halfway across South Dakota, Pratt fell into some real sleep. He jolted out of it three hours later as they crossed into Minnesota. It was dark but he could smell the change. The air was redolent of living things and moisture, the faint sweet smell of horse manure.

  “Where are we?”

  “Pipestone,” Cass said. “How you feeling? You need to stop?”

  “Yeah. Pull in at the next rest stop.”

  The next rest stop said CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE and had orange plastic mesh across the entrance.

  “Budget cutbacks,” Cass said.

  They drove on until the lights of a truck stop beckoned.

  CHAPTER 40

  The sign hovering over the freeway said LITTLE AMERICA. A black Tahoe pulled away from the pumps as they pulled in. Cass took its place.

  “I’m going to go freshen up a little. Can you take care of the gas?”

  “Sure.”

  She blew him a kiss. “Love you.”

  Pratt grabbed the pump. “PLEASE PAY BEFORE PUMPING,” said the little sign. There were seven Harleys parked in and around the pumps. Dudes in face scarves, black leather vests and beards nodded as Pratt walked to the front door. Pratt nodded back. It was still in the mid-eighties at two o’clock in the morning.

  Pratt laid forty dollars on the counter. “Pump eight.”

  The zit-scarred youth behind the counter took the money, set it on the box and pushed a button.

  Pratt returned to the pump, popped the cap and pumped regular. A yellow sign said, “10% ETHANOL FOR A CLEANER AMERICA.” There wasn’t a biker alive who didn’t hate ethanol. It screwed up old engines, melted plastic fuel tanks and slowed the bike.

  Bullshit, Pratt thought. Riders pulled in and pulled out. Semis roared by two hundred feet away. It was louder than a Tool concert. A dog yelped in terror. The sound sawed its way through the aural storm like a heat-seeking missile and hit Pratt’s ear. He looked around.

  Was he hallucinating?

  There it was again. A dog crying. Not fake crying, real crying as if it were in pain. Pratt looked around. Men were busy pumping their rides. No one else appeared to have noticed. There it was again. Had to be coming from the sides or back. Leaving the pump on auto, Pratt stiff-walked briskly toward the corner, feeling stitches and bandages flinch and stretch. The Patchwork Man. He turned toward a green dumpster. The yelping was louder here, coming from beyond the dumpster. Pratt rounded the corner.

  A man held a shaggy mutt on a short chain, whacking it with a flashlight. The man wore coveralls and had a gut like a watermelon. He wore an Xtreme Energy Drink hat turned sideways. He had a gold chain around his neck.

  “You stupid son of a bitch!”

  Whack!

  “That’s the last time you piss in my truck!”

  Whack!

  Pratt wasn’t aware he was running, wasn’t aware stitches snapped and bandages tore. Pratt grabbed the man by his greasy black hair and yanked backward, jamming his right foot into the back of the man’s right knee. The beater hit the worn asphalt with a thump. Pratt stomped the dog beater in the sternum with his foot. The dog beater let out a loud whoosh, eyes screwed shut and grimacing. Pratt kicked him in the ribs, exulting in the snap of bone. He kicked the man repeatedly, using his heel for maximum penetration.

  “How … do … you … like it?” Pratt grunted, maneuvering to attack the dog beater’s gut and sides.

  “Help!” the man screamed. “Somebody help me!”

  Pratt was in a red haze. He was unaware of the popped stitches, blood oozing from his arms and face. Just him and evil incarnate and this time he had the upper hand. This time he would not stop until he killed it.

  Strong arms seized Pratt and dragged him away from the writhing and screaming man. Prat
t looked from side to side. Two jumbo-sized bikers had him in a vise-like grip.

  “Okay, calm down,” one of them said.

  “What the fuck’s goin’ on here?” said the other.

  “He …” Pratt was suddenly exhausted, his entire body shrieking in protest. If pain were noise he would have sounded like a tornado siren. He went limp. “He was beating that dog …”

  “I told you I heard something,” one of the bikers said. His patch said “Tiny.” He must have weighed 330 pounds. He had a ZZ Top beard and snakeskin boots.

  “Yeah,” the other biker said. He was trim and muscular and had a shaved skull. “Well good on you brother for delivering that righteous beating. Now I suggest you get the hell away from here before somebody calls the cops.”

  “You really did a number on that dude,” Tiny said.

  Pratt looked at the dog beater. He lay on his side in a fetal position. A man stooped to ask him how he was feeling. Pratt shrugged loose.

  “What about the dog?”

  “We’ll take care of the dog. Don’t worry. That motherfucker isn’t getting it back.”

  “I’m gone.”

  What the fuck was I thinking?

  Pratt went back to the truck. Cass was behind the wheel giving him the stink-eye.

  “What happened to you? Oh my God you’re bleeding again.” She waited until he climbed in the truck and examined him in the harsh lights of the truck stop. “Let me get out the kit and we’ll get you patched up. What happened?”

  “Please, Cass, let’s just go.”

  They drove in silence for ten minutes.

  “Stop the car!” Pratt wailed.

  Cass swerved hard to the right, pulling off into the entrance to a cornfield. Pratt was out of the truck even before she stopped rolling. He went into the corn a little ways, knelt and vomited energy bars, banana, chocolate and jerky. Cass stayed behind the wheel until he was finished, came back to the truck and used some napkins to wipe his mouth. He got back in, rummaged through the glove compartment for a tin of Altoids and tossed one back.

  “You okay?”

  “I feel better,” Pratt said.

  Cass cautiously put the truck in gear and pulled back onto the highway.

  CHAPTER 41

  Three hours later they came to LaCrescent, winding down the steep embankment, crossing the Mississippi on a series of span bridges anchored in islands, nose out to LaCrosse, Wisconsin. They took a break in the Welcome to Wisconsin Center on the Wisconsin side. The lot was filled with bikes either going to or coming from. While Cass hit the john, Pratt stretched, splashed water on his face and looked in the mirror. His face resembled a catcher’s mitt mauled by a bear. A dark blue circle surrounded his left eye.

  All in all not too bad. He wasn’t sleepy. Quite the opposite despite the fact he’d been up for over twenty hours more or less. His nervous exhaustion translated into alertness.

  They pulled into Pratt’s driveway at seven in the morning. Callaway had told him to steer clear of known haunts but fuck it. Moon wasn’t a superman and wouldn’t waste time watching an empty house. Even so, Pratt insisted on going in first through the rear door and swiftly checking all the rooms. The place felt empty as he’d left it. He’d thought about getting a dog but he was on the road so much it wouldn’t be fair to the dog.

  Now that he had an old lady, she could watch the dog.

  But who was going to watch the old lady?

  Pratt went out through the front door, grabbed Cass’ bag and led the way back in. “I’ll unload the bike later. We need sleep.”

  Leaving Cass’ bag in the bedroom Pratt went downstairs. His man-cave was furnished with red shag carpeting, a 42-inch plasma TV and a fake zebra hide rug. Bike and babe posters decorated the walls. Pratt went through the door to the utility room and his vertical gun safe. He dialed the combination and opened the safe.

  He reached for his Ruger .40 S&W. He reached for boxes of ammunition. And he reached for a Sanyo voice recorder. He stuffed the gun, recorder and clips into a leather fanny pack. He headed upstairs. He went into the bedroom. Cass was splayed across the bed in her birthday suit smirking.

  Fifteen minutes passed.

  Pratt stared at the ceiling, naked body cooling in the AC. Cass lay next to him, resting her head on her arm, an unlit cig dangling from her mouth, a half bottle of vodka on the nightstand.

  “Don’t worry about it. It happens.”

  “Not to me.”

  “It happens to everybody,” Cass snickered. She brushed his hard chest, fingers trailing over the stitches. “You look like a Persian rug that’s been torn apart and stitched back together by sail makers.”

  Cass turned around and reached for the lighter. Pratt looked at the tat on her rump. Harley Davidson. Like they were making women now. Cass lit her cig and lay back, blowing a perfect smoke ring. The AC whisked it away.

  “Is there anything I can do?” she said.

  “It’s that kid. I can’t stop thinking about him.”

  “Well stop.”

  “Yeah right.”

  The susurrus of the air conditioner wrapped them in a protective cocoon. Pratt might never sleep again if he couldn’t turn off that eidetic image of Eric in the Quonset hut. That nest of filthy blankets. His phlegmy voice.

  Pratt would pursue Moon to the ends of the earth if necessary. His hatred was an obsidian crystal lodged in his chest. You think you’re a hunter?

  That time that big kid, what was his name, Vazquez, gave Pratt a black eye. He remembered it vividly because Duane had brought home pizza for dinner, which he had done maybe five times in his life. Pratt tried to hide the shiner beneath his cowlick but Duane reached across the linoleum kitchen table and tilted Pratt’s head back.

  Not what happened? but, “Where is he?”

  Pratt didn’t want to give it up.

  “Where is he?” delivered in the exact same flat voice. SMACK.

  Pratt led Duane back to the playground and there was Vazquez’ old man, two hundred and fifty pounds of Mayan beef, and Duane went straight up to him and cold-cocked him with one punch. Spent the night in the pokey while the police farmed Pratt out to CPS.

  Duane conned some buddy into posting bail and picked his son up the next morning.

  Cass lay on her side snoring lightly. Pratt lay back knowing he wasn’t going to be able to sleep. The enormity of Moon’s crime had created a singularity in his soul. He fought with all his strength to prevent being sucked in. Those images, the idea would live with him as long as he lived. He recognized the temptation to pull the switch.

  Pratt thought about his guns downstairs in the locker and the ones he’d brought upstairs. So close. That’s how he’d do it. That’s why he—and a lot of his friends—had guns. When the time came they’d decide for themselves.

  Pratt could almost convince himself he’d hallucinated the whole thing and would wake up any minute safe and secure in his cell at Waupun. The wish segued into a shallow dream where he knew he was sleeping and every detail stayed with him when he woke up.

  Chaplain Dorgan was making his rounds. Pratt went to the bars.

  “Chaplain,” he called, but Dorgan ignored him. Passed right by without looking at Pratt.

  “Hey Dorgan!”

  Without looking the chaplain held one hand behind him, throwing Pratt the bird.

  “Well fuck you, Dorgan! And fuck God too!”

  A great fear came upon him, a tidal wave of wrath, an oceanic wall of destruction. It rolled over him and crushed him down into the black depths of despair. Was there some point to all this? He was less than a mote, less than a flicker, almost gone. Hanging on by a thread. He shivered uncontrollably.

  “In my wrath, I will unleash a violent wind,” he said in his dream. “And in my anger, hailstones and torrents of rain will fall with destructive fury.”

  Someone shook him. He woke up gelid and bone tired. Cass looked at him with saucer eyes. “Are you all right? You were shouting.”

 
“What did I say?”

  “Biblical shit.”

  “Just a bad dream.”

  She planted her fists on his chest and looked straight in. “Don’t do that to me, Pratt. I love you. You scared the shit out of me.”

  “Sorry, babe. It was only a dream.”

  Pratt thanked God that it had only been a dream.

  Then he remembered the boy.

  CHAPTER 42

  Pratt woke with a jolt. It was ten-thirty. He’d been out for three hours. The stomping of prison feet in his dream became steady knocking at the front door. Cass sawed away beside him. Pratt swung his legs out of bed, pulled on his jeans and headed for the front door. Louise Lowry stood on the stoop with a bundle of mail.

  Pratt opened the door and stepped out into the morning sun. Louise’s expression of happy anticipation morphed into alarm. She put a hand to her mouth. “My God, Josh! What happened?”

  Josh grinned. “I got caught in a cement mixer. Thanks for taking in my mail, Mrs. Lowry.”

  “Josh, please. It’s Louise. What really happened?”

  “I had a motorcycle accident. I’ll be fine.” Twinge of guilt for lying. When Jesus came to Pratt, he came hard. Sometimes it was okay to tell little white lies. Chaplain Dorgan had told him that. The truth was too complicated and would only have burdened Louise.

  “Thank God for that. You know Dave and I are having a little party tonight for some friends of ours and we’d love it if you could attend.”

  “We’d love to come,” Cass said, appearing behind Josh wearing his old blue plaid robe. She stepped outside and elbowed Josh over. “Hi, Louise.”

  “Good. We have a pretty interesting crowd.”

  “We’ll be there. What time?”

  “Fivish.”

  Pratt wanted to kick Cass. He hated parties and wanted to get out of town, but he kept that grin plastered on his face and nodded agreeably.

  Inside, Cass turned on him. “What?”

  “I was hoping to get out of town.”

  “And go where?”

  “Danny’s got a place nobody would think to look. He got it off some drug dealer.”

  “Do you mind? Only for an hour. I’d love to see it!”