by Chris Offutt
“You must fill that out,” she said.
“They never said nothing about that at the farm.”
“It’s necessary for government records.”
Virgil arranged a smile that he hoped appeared fake. He was almost beginning to enjoy this. The woman spoke softly.
“Do you need me to write this for you?”
Virgil passed her the clipboard. He stared at his lap, trying to seem embarrassed. He was elated. Now there’d be no record of his handwriting on file.
“You do have a birth certificate,” she said.
Virgil crossed his leg. He retrieved the document from his sock and unfolded it and offered it to her. She didn’t take it, but waited until he placed the paper on her desk. Virgil hoped that she’d remember this behavior instead of his face. He supplied her with the address for the mailbox in Lexington and left.
In the morning he crawled under his trailer and disconnected a heat duct that led to a large vent in the kitchen floor. The air was cool and slightly damp near the earth. He squirmed to daylight, cut scrap plywood to fit the measurements, and crawled below the trailer again. He nailed the new piece of plywood to the joists below the vent, making a shelf. He hunched on his knees, working over his head. Each strike of the hammer shook the trailer and dropped dust into his eyes. He finished and replaced the tin siding that served as a hatch. Inside the trailer, he placed the wallet and birth certificate in the duffel bag, lifted the vent cover, and set the bag on the shelf. The cover fit snugly back in place. From the proper angle, a flash of the gray canvas was visible through the grate, but he had few guests and no one would be looking close.
August began with, unusual rains that made the air sodden and thick. Day-old trash smelled as if it had moldered in the heat for a week. Virgil’s new distance protected him from the bickering that resulted from laboring in the humidity. At night he opened his trailer to the outside world and hung wet towels over the windows and doorways. Insects treated his house as part of their domain. One morning he woke to find a raccoon on his kitchen table.
In the Lexington mailbox, he found a Social Security card for Joe Tiller. He watched in astonishment as he participated in the events he’d set in motion, bringing about a situation from which he could not easily escape. He advertised his truck for sale, and by the end of the week he’d accepted a reasonable offer. He bought a cheap car he despised, but he was a few thousand dollars ahead. He kept the money in the duffel bag. He began to grow a beard.
In Lexington he took the written exam for obtaining a driver’s license in the name of Joe Tiller. He’d considered a number of plausible stories as to why he didn’t have one—service in Africa as a missionary; an army license overseas that got revoked; being recently released from prison. He discarded each as being too cumbersome. Claiming to be from Pick County was enough. Nothing was expected of such people, and they could submit no surprises.
His work buddies regarded his change of cars as a sign of impending marriage, and Virgil encouraged the rumor by not denying it. It was an ideal cover that explained his preoccupied silence. He avoided his family, except for short visits to his mother late at night. They talked of mundane events.
From a pay phone in Rocksalt, Virgil arranged with a driver’s training company to use a vehicle for his road test. The following morning he shaved his beard but left a mustache. He drove to Lexington very early. At dawn the city was quiet and empty, and he could see it as a field of cement, patched with sections of grass, bordered by the buildings where people lived and worked. He could almost imagine living there if no one was around.
The driving instructor was younger than Virgil expected, a man with a ponytail and an earring. Virgil wondered if he was funny-turned. The man accompanied him to a parking lot where a state trooper sat in the passenger seat and adjusted his gunbelt. Virgil held the steering wheel tightly.
“First license?” the cop said.
Virgil nodded.
“Pick County, huh? I used to know some Atkinses over in there.”
“They’s two or three bunches.”
“I knew the rough ones. I used to operate out of that post in Rock-salt.”
“You did.”
“What’d you do, lose your license and forget to reapply?”
“No. Never had much call to leave the holler. My brother did most of the driving. Then Daddy died and things just generally went to hell.”
The cop gave instructions. Virgil drove into the street and stopped at the appropriate distance from the stop sign. He made a right turn, a left turn, and parallel-parked. They returned to the lot and the cop completed the form.
“You did good,” he said.
He signed the form and handed a copy to Virgil.
“Carry this until you get your license,”
Virgil nodded.
“You know, one of my first investigations had some Tillers in it,” the cop said.
Sweat began forming on Virgil’s forehead. He didn’t want to bring it to the trooper’s attention by wiping it off.
“A kid’s death,” he said. “They gave it to me because I was a rookie. Routine accident report. Any kin to you?”
Virgil swallowed in order to speak.
“Cousin,” he said.
“I always wondered what happened to the parents. It graveled them up pretty hard.”
“They moved.”
“Look, I don’t mean to bring it up again. They were nice people’s all.”
Virgil grunted.
“Back then,” the cop said, “I never thought I’d wind up giving driver’s tests. Things change. Yessir, a man can’t tell where he’s headed, can he?”
Virgil shook his head. The cop left the car and the driving instructor got in.
“Congratulations,” he said. “Man, you look nervous. Don’t worry, I’ve seen people wet their pants.”
“You drive,” Virgil said.
“No problem, man. We can do a doobie if you want.”
“A doobie?”
“Yeah, man, you know.”
He made a subtle motion with his hand to his mouth and Virgil realized that he’d been right, the man was funny-turned. It bothered him that the guy thought he was, too.
The Department of Motor Vehicles was the final step. The woman behind the counter fed the name Joe Tiller to a computer and linked it to the new Social Security number, which became the driver’s license number. Virgil knew nothing about computers, but he didn’t trust them. He thought of his grandfather’s immense suspicion of electricity and hoped that he wasn’t being as hard-headed as the old man. His grandfather wouldn’t allow a clock in his house and had never owned a driver’s license.
The camera operator told him to stand at a line painted on the floor with, his back touching a gray backdrop fastened to the wall. In a rash of fear, he wondered what the camera would see. The man waited with an expression of bored patience as Virgil moved cautiously into position. He’d never taken a stand on anything and now that he had, he understood that it was a terrible stand. He felt like a train shunted to a private track, hurtling toward a dead end.
The bright lights flashed twice and he sat in a hard plastic chair to wait. He remembered his father teaching him to drive fifteen years ago. He had set Virgil loose in the cemetery at the top of the hill and said not to worry, that if he wrecked, he couldn’t kill anybody.
“Tiller,” the woman called.
Virgil received a piece of thin plastic that contained his photograph beside the name Joe Tiller. The mustache was a stripe across the middle of his face that made his head look wide. It was all that separated him from the new name. He hid the license in his trunk and drove home, proud that a lowly Blizzard boy like himself could pull this off. He wished he could tell someone. He recalled his mother quoting the Bible: “Pride goeth before a fall.” The snake’s punishment for the Fall was condemnation to a life of crawling on its belly. He wondered what sort of animal it had been before.
At home, he carefully s
haved his mustache. The face on the license belonged to no one.
Two weeks later he took another Friday off, acceptable behavior at the maintenance department of Rocksalt Community College. Most work crews quit unofficially at noon on Friday anyhow. If a man was willing to forgo a day’s pay, no one cared if he missed work. Virgil rose at dawn, filled a wallet with his new identification, and placed it in the trunk with the cash he’d made from selling his truck. He spread a map over the hood of the car and traced his route with a finger. Getting to Cincinnati was easy—drive to Lexington and make a right.
The night before, he’d stayed awake late working out the day’s plan. Now he was filling in the blanks, the way a child stayed within the lines of a coloring book. Virgil Caudill was the inventor and Joe Tiller was the outcome, while he, whoever he was, was merely a facilitator.
Virgil crossed the Ohio River with caution, unsure if he should drive fast to get off the bridge sooner or go slow to prevent undue vibration of its struts. The water was dark and muddy. He was amazed by its width. He stopped at a gas station in Ohio and asked the attendant for directions to the airport. The attendant wore a narrow beard that surrounded his mouth like a stain. A single tattoo of a dark blue rectangle covered his entire forearm. Virgil tried not to look at it.
“Go over the bridge and hang a right,” the man said. “It’ll take you in.”
“No, I mean the Cincinnati airport.”
“Like I said.”
“I Just came over that bridge.”
“Well, you went too far.”
“Too far for what?” Virgil said.
“You want the airport?”
“Yup.”
“Go over the bridge and hang a right.”
“I already did.”
“No, man. The Cincinnati airport’s in Kentucky.”
“That don’t make much sense.
“A lot don’t. I tell you something else, too. Louisville Sluggers are made in Indiana.”
“Anything else?”
“Man o’War never ran a race in Kentucky.”
“He didn’t,”
“There’s tons of weird shit like that. This country ain’t been right since Elvis joined the army.”
Virgil left and recrossed the river. There was another bridge in view and two more around a bend. It seemed like a waste to have so many bridges over the same stretch of water. He followed signs to the airport, A plane went past his windshield as if suspended on wires.
He switched wallets, put the money in his pocket, and entered the terminal, curious as to why the doors were so tall. A man gave him a card that said he was deaf and mute and wanted money. Virgil looked at the man, thinking that such a malady was handy in a place as noisy as an airport. The man took the card back.
Virgil bought a newspaper and scanned the automobile ads. When he found one in his price range, he called for directions, walked to a taxi service, and asked for a ride to a town called Rabbit Hash. Having never ridden in a cab, Virgil hesitated at the door.
“Get in the front,” the driver said. “This ain’t no limo.”
Virgil climbed into the car.
“Just get out of the can?” the driver said.
“What?”
“Only guys I seen traveling light as you were convicts coming home,”
“Not me.”
“Hey, nothing personal. Just that you don’t look like a business traveler.”
“I got business in Rabbit Hash.” Virgil handed him the address. “See a man about a car there.”
They passed a hitchhiker leaning against his pack.
“Ever do that?” the driver said.
“Once.”
“It ain’t a good habit. I got picked up by a dude in a station wagon, man. Made me sit in the back seat. After a while I noticed my shoes were wet. Battery acid. Dude had about a hundred batteries in the back, leaking all over hell. He asked me if I knew any dirty jokes. I told a couple and the dude never laughed. All I could see were his eyes in the rearview mirror. They were bad-looking, man, like bum holes in leather. All of a sudden he pulled over and told me to get out. Last thing he said to me was, ‘Anybody knows jokes that good deserves to live,’ Two weeks later he was on TV getting arrested down in Missouri. He’d killed four hitchhikers. That’s when I started driving a cab. I ain’t been out of radio contact with the world since.”
Virgil nodded. The more he saw of the world outside of the hills, the less he desired contact.
They left the highway for neighborhoods that reminded him of Lexington, and he wondered if all cities were laid out in blocks. At home the roads ran beside creeks, while foot paths followed game trails. Without animals or water, the cities had no underlying sense of organization.
They reached the address, the last house on a dead-end street that butted against a chain-link fence. Virgil left the car and knocked on the door. A man wearing a Hawaiian shirt opened it. His hair was long and gray, and his face looked unable to produce a beard, Virgil had no idea how old the man was.
“The car,” Virgil said, “I called about the car.”
The man looked at the cab and his eyebrows rose.
“My brother-in-law,” Virgil said. “It’s his day off.”
The man gestured with his thumb toward the rear of the house. “Key’s in it.”
Virgil walked around the house and found a plain two-door Chevrolet with a stick shift. All four corners were dented. The side mirror was gone. The driver’s seat was sprung and an S-hook held the glove compartment closed. The ashtray and radio were missing.
He had to lift the door to close it. There was no lock. He turned the key and was astounded at the engine’s power and its steady rumble. He backed out of the drive and circled the block. The cab driver met him on the street and opened the hood.
“Rebuilt V-8 three-ninety-six,” the driver said. “What the fuck kind of car is this?”
“I don’t know,”
“Hell, this baby could run a stock car. How much is he wanting?”
Virgil told him the price and the cab driver whistled.
“It’s the real deal,” he said. “Best make sure it ain’t warm.”
“Warm?”
“Stolen or wanted or something.”
Virgil went back to the house. The gray-haired man sat on an ancient rusty glider. He spat a brown line of tobacco off the porch.
“She’ll run,” the man said. “Pull a hill in the winter. Haul block up a creek bed.”
“Tires are slick.”
“It’s got a spare.”
“Have to light a candle to see if the headlights are burning.”
“Loose wire’s all.”
“Generator, I’d say,” Virgil said. “Man’d have to put an awful lot of work against it being much count,”
“Sure be something when it was done.”
“How come you’re wanting to sell it?”
“Raise money for my boy,” the man said, “It’s his car.”
“Why ain’t he selling it his ownself?”
“They got him locked up.”
“Not for stealing cars, do they.”
“Hell, no,” the man said. His voice was indignant. “I didn’t raise no thief. They got him on drugs, what else. That’s what they’re after all the boys for these days. Every time you turn around there’s some politician saying he’s sorry for being a drunk, and my boy’s in jail. Let me ask you something—how come being hooked on whisky’s a disease and smoking pot’s a crime?”
“I don’t know.”
“Insurance companies.”
“How’s that?”
“If you make being drunk a disease, insurance will pay for treatment.”
“I never thought about it that way.”
“Not everybody does.”
“How bad you want to sell that car?”
“Bad enough.”
Virgil removed some money and counted it into his palm, offering half the asking price. The gray-haired man narrowed his eyes
at the cash.
“You take this and we’re done,” Virgil said. “No more phone calls. No more talking to people who just want to dicker and ain’t got no money. Here’s the money and there’s the car.”
The man hesitated and Virgil knew he was trying to calculate how much more he could get by holding out. Virgil turned to leave.
“Well, buddy,” he said. “It was good meeting you.”
“Wait,” the man said.
Virgil knew he could have offered less. The man signed the title, transferring ownership of the car to Joe Tiller.
“Remember,” the man said. “Drunks kill people. Potheads don’t.”
Virgil followed the cab to Erlanger where a garage gave the car a tune-up and fluid change. The mechanic told him it should go three thousand miles before needing attention. Virgil drove to the airport, parked in the long-term lot, and walked to his other car. He put the new tide and leftover money in the trunk and headed for Lexington. The sun lay to the west, the whole of the continent sprawling beside him.
In Lexington he returned to the Department of Motor Vehicles. There was a long line at the registration window, and he wondered how people could work inside all day, dealing with strangers in a world of numbers. Virgil could never do it although he knew that many people felt the same about running a garbage route. He registered the car and bought a license plate. There was an insurance company nearby and he arranged for minimum coverage.
He was becoming comfortable with negotiating New Circle Road—go slow, read the signs, and be prepared to backtrack. It was much like following game in the woods. By the time he got home the light was fading behind him. The hills were dark humps in the dusk. Virgil put the plate, title, registration, insurance, and leftover cash in the duffel bag beneath the floorboards. The evening air held the edge of a chill that marked summer’s demise. He felt sad that he’d miss the bulk of autumn, his favorite season.
A dog’s bark carried along the ridge, followed by another. Virgil recognized them by their cries, knew their habits and who owned them. They were sounds of comfort, the same as freight trains that rumbled the tracks at the bottom of the hill. He wanted to hear them for the next few days, smell pine, walk in glistening dew that made his legs damp. His body sagged beneath the weight of impending loss. He went inside and lay in bed. Sleep took him as if he’d drowned.