Anthem of a Reluctant Prophet

by Joanne Proulx

  I started to push myself off the couch, but Fang, already two steps up, pointed a finger at me and told me to stay where I was. I have to admit, I was sort of relieved. For the past couple of years I’d avoided climbing those stairs, afraid of running into his wasted mother or her wasting absence in equal doses.

  Fang was back in a few minutes, his eyes still blank and bloodshot. When I asked him what happened, there was no long, steady stare. He barely even looked at me.

  “Like I told you, Luke.” He said my name hard so I’d know not to push any further. “It was nothing.”

  ELEVEN

  An hour out of the basement, Fang and I trudged along the dark corridor of road cutting through the wetlands park on the outskirts of town. Thoughts of a bigger, brighter, more musical world on the other side of the park pushed us along, until we were backing up the I-75 on-ramp, our little frozen cocktail-weenie thumbs struggling for attention beyond the Stokum city limits. It was after seven o’clock by this time and, being early December, already midnight black. The lights of the cars tooling up the ramp blinded us as we shuffled backwards through the snow that had started falling, like, two minutes after we’d left Delaney’s in our lightweight concert garb. The rotten weather and the bang in the basement right before we’d left had pretty much killed the fun we’d had going on, and behind me, Fang was stomping his feet and bitching. We were never going to get a ride, he was freezing his ass off, his feet were fucking soaked—all the usual cold-weather complaints. I was less vocal about the crap weather, was more concerned with how close and how fast the cars were ripping past us.

  I guess, ever since I sat down and made the list of dead men, I’d started thinking about dying. I mean really thinking about it. I hadn’t had a personalized death premonition or anything like that, but I knew that sooner or later it would be my turn to go. And given the present setting—a dark, treacherous bend of blacktop—it was pretty easy to come up with something good. A car heading into the slippery curve a tad too fast. Time freeze-framing as the guy behind the wheel locked eyes with the hitchhiker—trapped in the headlights and unable to dodge the thousand pounds of steel sliding straight at him. The scene would unlock with the quick, heavy thud of a body on a hood, then warp-speed into a scrambled collage of bent limbs and black pavement and broken glass. The driver would scream as the hitchhiker, and maybe his friend, disappeared under the car, crunching beneath the heavy snow-packed wheels.

  Fang, still grumbling about the frigid temperatures, had no clue. How I’d squeeze my eyes shut and choke down a scream every time a set of headlights nailed us. How I wrestled with death on the edge of the slick winter pavement. Turns out I shouldn’t have worried, because it was always just a push of cold air, a splash of icy slush and a fresh “Fuck” from Fang that hit me as car after car swept past and onto the highway.

  When a big black rig finally pulled over, brakes wheezing, engine rumbling, I ran for it, leaving the nasty death scenario stalled at the side of the road. And there was no arguing over who would do the talking. That had been decided about ten years previous, so of course it was me climbing onto the running board and yanking open the passenger door.

  The trucker, wearing a welcoming smile, the standard-issue baseball hat and a plaid shirt, was pint-sized behind the wheel. He leaned forward and turned down the folksy shit spewing from the radio. “Where you headed?” he asked in this weird high-pitched voice.

  “Detroit.”

  “I’m going to Windsor. Jump in.”

  Fang and I climbed aboard. Pretty much right off, it was evident the driver was a talker.

  “Nice weather for hitching,” he said with a laugh, which, seriously, I can only describe as jolly.

  “Yeah. Thanks for picking us up. We were freezing out there.”

  “I bet!”

  He opened his window, stretched out a stubby arm and cleared the snow from his side mirror. As he waited for an opening in the traffic, I checked him out, and man, he couldn’t have been over five feet. He was pulled in tight to the wheel, and it was lucky the driver’s seat was split from the passenger’s, otherwise it would have been a long, uncomfortable ride for Fang and me, pretzeled against the dash. Since we had some room, Fang took advantage. He stretched right out, leaning his head against the cushioned wall of the cab and pretending to nod off, a common avoidance-of-conversation-withstrangers tactic of his, one which left me to entertain Shorty.

  “So what’s taking you to Dee-troit on a night like this?” he asked, shooting me a friendly grin.

  “Concert.”

  He looked pleased to hear it. “Really? I’m a music lover myself. Who you seeing?”

  “Red Hot Chili Peppers.”

  “Never heard of them. That’s probably no big surprise. Don’t have any kids your age. Don’t have any kids at all, for that matter. Doctors tried some experimental drugs on me when I was eight, nine years old, so I’d gain a bit of height. Technically, I’m classified as a dwarf, but I’m on the tall end of the scale. Had a hell of a time getting my commercial license, but I can drive a rig as well as the next guy, big or small. The buggers finally had to give it to me, no rule against it when I applied, although they’ve changed that now. Any-hoo, the drugs messed up my reproductive apparatus. Don’t get me wrong, everything’s still functioning, but, well, not to put too crude a point on it, I’m shooting blanks, as they say.”

  I pretended not to hear him. “It’s Exit 81, in Auburn Hills, just before you get to Detroit, actually.”

  “Right.” He reached forward and fiddled with the radio before snapping it off and giving me another warm grin. He went on a bit then, filling me in on the rest of his limp life history. I thought I was going to be able to settle back and just let him roll, but he wrapped things up pretty fast, then set his sights on me.

  “So, what should I call you?” he asked, giving me a formal sort of nod.

  “Luke. And you?”

  “Little Bob. You hitchhike often, Luke?”

  “Nope.”

  “Your parents know you’re hitching?”

  “Nope.”

  “Kid your age probably shouldn’t be hitching.”

  “Guy your size probably shouldn’t be picking up hitchers.”

  Little Bob let rip another jolly laugh. “You’re probably right about that. But I pick up a lot of people and I’m still here to tell about it.” He raised both hands from the wheel and waved them at me, demonstrating just how “here” he was, before remembering the rules of the road and grabbing the wheel. “Truth is,” he said, swinging the truck into the passing lane, “I like people.”

  He nodded, smiling and waiting and smiling some more. He looked so pleased with himself, I felt obliged to hold up my end of the conversation.

  “That right?” I said, sounding as bored as possible.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Personally, I think a lot of people are assholes.” I managed a bit of enthusiasm for that line, backed up as it was by my experience with pretty much the entire Stokum population.

  “Well, sure, there are some of those out there. But you know what I find?” He paused, beaming, and I could just tell he was getting ready to lay some impotent elfin wisdom upon me. “I find pretty much everybody has some good in ’em. You look long enough, you’ll find a bit of holiness. I’ll tell you something else. People who make good choices in life, they unleash that holiness on the world. Great men know how to do this, fearless men. And once in a while someone really spectacular comes along who reveals the godliness of all humanity. Once in a damn long while.”

  He glanced over at me, to see if I was listening. I pretended I wasn’t. Ignoring safe trucking practices once more, Little Bob fixed his eyes on me. “You want to play a game?” he asked.

  “A game?” I made those two words sound exactly like an “Are you fucking serious?” four.

  “Yeah, a game.”

  Bob was starting to mildly freak me out. “You don’t seem like a real trucker.”

 
; “I’m real.” He lifted one hand off the wheel and held it out in front of me, palm skyward. “Take my hand,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Take my hand. It’s part of the game.”

  “I’m not holding your frigging hand.”

  “I don’t want you to hold my hand. I want you to rest your hand in mine. I’m a bit of a mind reader, see? Just put your hand here and I’ll tell you what you’re afraid of. Then we can move on.”

  “Move on? Move on to what?” By this point I was fairly certain I was about to get a dose of just how much Little Bob really liked people.

  “Just take my hand …”

  “Listen, I’m not afraid of anything, okay? Can we just talk about something else?”

  “Not afraid of anything?” he said, acting all surprised, shooting his eyebrows up under the peak of his ball cap. “Well, there’s always a first.”

  “And I don’t believe in mind reading and shit like that.” My hands were safely stowed in the pockets of my jacket, out of reach of Little Bob, but under the dash my feet were twitching.

  “Doesn’t matter if you believe or not.”

  Fang shifted beside me and let out a low moan. I gave him a shove, trying to wake him up so Tiny Trucker would have someone else to harass, but Fang actually seemed to be sleeping.

  Little Bob jiggled his hand in front of me. It looked soft and pudgy, was no bigger than a kid’s. “Come on,” he said, his eyes darting from me to the windshield. “It’ll only take a second. And I concentrate best when I block out external stimuli, so I wouldn’t waste any time if I were you.” He flashed me a crazy smile, closed his eyes and started humming. The truck rocketed blindly up the snow-covered highway.

  “Watch where you’re going, for God’s sake.” My attempts at keeping the terror from my voice were unsuccessful, but Bob just pumped his hand up and down, kept his lids locked tight. The truck was still solidly in the middle lane, but through the flurry of flakes the taillights ahead seemed to be getting clearer and brighter as we gained on the car in front. And I could see my name on the list: Luke Hunter. December 4, 2002. Killed in weather-related traffic accident. There’d be no mention of the tall, reckless dwarf behind the wheel.

  “Give me your hand,” he said.

  And I did. I put my hand on his. There was no freaky electric shock. It was warm and dry, just like it looked. I watched his face. His smile widened an inch or two before he gave his arm a little wobble and lifted his lids. I snatched my hand back and shoved it into my pocket.

  “That wasn’t funny,” I snapped.

  “No, it wasn’t.” He squinted into the storm. “Good Christ, it’s coming down.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s easier to notice shit like that when you’ve got your eyes open.”

  “Good point.” He chuckled as he reached around the wheel and flipped a switch. The wipers slapped faster, trying to keep up with the fat, chunky flakes bombarding the windshield. Then, for the first time since I got in the truck, Little Bob was quiet. The cab must have been well insulated, because I couldn’t hear the wind outside at all. We rode for a while listening to only the low, blanketed hum of the engine and the rhythmic snap of the wipers, until I couldn’t take the fun and games any longer.

  “So?” I asked. “What’s my big fear factor?”

  “Well,” he said, dropping his voice an octave or two so he sounded all serious, “like a lot of people, you’re afraid of being in a vehicle when someone’s driving with their eyes shut.” He let out a whoop, thinking he was quite a riot.

  “You’re fucking hilarious, you know that? You could have killed us.” Then, in a pouty, pissed-off voice, “My friend just died, you know.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” It was light and earnest, the way he said it, like he just knew there was more to come.

  And I barely even hesitated. “And here’s something that’ll blow your mind. I knew it was going to happen. Knew everything. Every frigging detail.”

  “Ahh. Really?” He brightened at this bit of news, like a bulb all lit up for Christmas. “Thought you didn’t believe in that stuff.”

  “I don’t.”

  “But you have a gift.”

  “A gift?” I spit out a laugh. “It’s a fucking curse, is what it is.”

  “Suppose, like a lot of things, it’s all how you look at it.”

  “Yeah, well, whatever way I look at it, it sucks.”

  “Then my advice to you is this: Keep looking. It’s like the assholes—eventually you’ll find something good.”

  “Yeah, right. Whatever.” I checked out Fang. He was snoring softly, and I knew it was for real because his mouth was unbuckled, which put the tusks on display, something he’d never allow if he was even semiconscious. “Want to give him a go?” I asked, jerking my head at Fang.

  Little Bob shook his head. “No need. I could tell the minute I laid eyes on him what he was afraid of.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Everything. And nothing.”

  When we pulled off the interstate a while later, Fang woke up instantly and jumped right out, but for some reason I stayed put. It was warm in the truck and I guess I just didn’t have any big desire to hop out into the cold night. I rested my head on the back of the seat and closed my eyes, but even like that I could tell Little Bob was smiling beside me, waiting and smiling and watching.

  Finally I came up with something good. “You know, what I don’t get is why. Why this is happening to me.”

  “Why not you, Luke? Why not you?” He put a bit of heat behind those words. “That’s the question you should be asking yourself.”

  I rolled my head to the side and looked at him. “You think so?”

  “I do.” He nodded solemnly. “Now, go on. Get outta here.” Tiny Trucker was back to friendly. “Go unleash yourself on Dee-troit.”

  TWELVE

  The warm-up band, Queens of the Stone Age, already had the crowd jumping by the time Fang and I shoved our way to the periphery of the mosh pit. It was hot and smoky—every time the lights panned the audience, the big dope cloud was evident—but we had some room where we were. I raised my arms and howled, but the stoner-metal tunes must have seriously connected with Fang, because he melted into the throbbing mass of bodies and was gone. When we reestablished contact during the break, he looked pretty wiped out, was all sweaty and shit, and his breathing was kind of ragged. He said he could use a drink, but I told him there was no way I was losing my spot, so we stayed put and let the crowd fold in around us.

  The Peppers’ fans were crotch-to-ass tight when the first searing chords of “Give It Away” ripped through the Palace. Everyone went wild, pogo-ing up and down, both hands raised in the rocker salute. Flea, the bassist, was phenomenal, and the front man, Anthony Kiedis, was a cyclone, lunging and pacing and whirling in every direction, belting out the lyrics. Four huge screens hung above the stage, rotating flashing psychedelic images, but about halfway through the song I just closed my eyes and leaned back, pounding the killer rhythms on my gut. Standing there in the dark with the music running through me, propped up by a thousand other bodies, I disappeared into the greater, wilder, more joyful whole flooding the Palace, the perfect place to be.

  Unfortunately, the band was only partway through the set, had just charged into “Can’t Stop,” when I was slammed from my sweet spot. Someone hit me from behind, hard, knocking me into the guy ahead. A second later, clumsy hands grabbed at my shoulders, trying to haul me down. I staggered under the weight, felt my knees buckling, before the hands slipped away.

  I managed to turn around. Fang was on the floor, crumpled in a fetal ball position, propped upright on one dark leg. His face was wild-eyed scared, his mouth a huge dark oval. I could see he was choking, gasping for air that just wasn’t coming. I grabbed for him, but the leg he was leaning against jerked, knocking him sideways and out of my reach. The crowd shifted. The forest of jeans between me and Fang thickened. I could see his arm stretched out on the concret
e, could see the big black boot come down on his hand and then another one on his shoulder, and then everyone was pushing and tripping over him and I was screaming for them to stop, but no one could hear me above the wailing guitars and I was pushing back as hard as I could because I knew Fang was getting trampled. Finally, some guy clued in and made a dive for the body on the floor. He caught hold of the back of Fang’s jacket and I shoved my way toward him and together we jerked upward until Fang was wedged between us and we started dragging him away.

  We pinballed through the crowd, pissing everyone off. People were swinging at us as we pushed by. The guy helping me was taking most of the abuse because he was in the lead, turned half sideways, shouldering his way through the bouncing bodies. He was a small, strong dude, and as we battled our way out, I noticed he had this harelip scar running from the center of his mouth up into his left nostril. His upper lip was flattened and his nose was sort of squashed, and through the throbbing blur of panic and noise and people, I felt like bawling.

  We were barely holding on by the time we hauled Fang into one of the corridors leading off the stadium floor. We half dropped, half laid him on the ground, but he scrambled onto his hands and knees and rounded his back, fighting to get some air into his lungs. Even with the music raging, his long, tortured wheezes filled the hall. I fell onto all fours beside him, trying to get a look at him, screaming, “What’s wrong? What’s wrong?” After one particularly labored pull, he lifted his head and looked me in the eye and said really clearly, “I can’t breathe.” No shit, buddy. No shit.

  “Looks like an asthma attack to me,” the harelipped dude said behind me. I glanced up at him and told him Fang didn’t have asthma, and he said everybody has asthma these days. To prove his point he went and shook down the crowd and came back a minute later with a half-dozen inhalers that he dropped on the floor in front of us. Fang selected one in a snazzy puke green container, jammed it into his mouth and took a couple hits.

  That seemed to do the trick. His breathing slowly settled into a steady, life-sustaining rhythm. My body loosened up then, and I started to breathe again too, but the easy-living party in the corridor didn’t last. A minute later Fang was gasping for air again, and if possible he seemed even worse than before.