“I never thought they’d make it. To be honest, I don’t think poor Vanda would have been happy with anybody for long. There was just something missing in her, something she could never fill, no matter how beautiful she was. But…”
Ida had to stop and take a deep breath before she could force the words out.
“I never in a million years would have guessed it would end that way. For any of them.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The vending machine at my motel didn’t have water or root beer, so when I reached the turn at the convenience store, I pulled over to get both. That’s probably where I picked up my tail. They were waiting for me, either there or somewhere else just past Ida’s.
The business was small, only the two gas pumps outside and three aisles of goodies inside. One aisle was taken up by items ranging from motor oil to feminine products. Not the kind of goodies I was looking for. I roamed for a while, discontent. I’d forgotten to bring a novel with me this trip, and I really wanted something suitable for vegging. The literature section consisted of a wire rack that lurched dangerously and screeched when it turned. Selection was limited to romances and some sort of religious fiction, a combination apparently only I found ironic. I settled for an entertainment magazine and a novel that looked, quite literally from the cover art, to be a bodice-ripper.
I didn’t notice any other customers when I checked out, so they must have been parked around back. It was around 9 p.m., recently dark with the moon either not yet risen or hiding among the clouds. The road was nearly deserted. Although there were headlights behind me, I didn’t meet a single car, driving in content if not blissful ignorance for about 20 minutes. The road was narrow, largely policed by a double yellow line, and when I came to a short passing zone the vehicle behind me zipped by without hesitation. I was glad to have his headlights out of my rearview mirror, but my relief was short-lived when I realized there was another vehicle behind me, a pick-up or something with similarly torturous high headlights.
Shortly after passing, the driver in front of me braked hard for a deer.
At least that’s what I thought, having seen a doe and fawn earlier by the edge of the highway, partially screened by the overgrown grasses. I braked hard as well, and a slight rush of adrenaline buzzed through me. The bright headlights looming behind me in my rearview mirror added to my adrenaline. I wondered what my insurance coverage was like on a rental. I didn’t wonder why the lead pick-up’s headlights went off, or why no dome light came on inside the pick-up when its doors swung open.
The knock on my window startled me. I hadn’t seen anyone approach from behind in the blinding headlights. A figure was standing directly next to my door, so close that all I could see was dark clothing on a torso. Was he waiting for me to get out? I rolled down my window. A gruff voice asked if I was all right. Years of cultural conditioning won out over baser instincts of self-preservation, and I unbuckled my seatbelt and opened my door. I was even apologizing, for what I can’t imagine, as I slid out.
“Hey, I’m sorry, I didn’t—“
Didn’t have a chance to finish. As soon as my head emerged from the rental, the world went even darker. A musty, scratchy hood was thrown over my head. An arm hooked around my throat in a V, dragging me the rest of the way from the car. I tried to get my feet under me to kick out, get some sort of control, but all I could do was hang on to the crooked arm to keep from choking. One of my sandals caught on the edge of the car and came off. Miraculously, the other stayed on as my feet left the ground and my calves smacked hard against what I suspected was a pick-up’s tailgate. I could hear heavy boots stomping on the metal bed around me, and even through the hood I could smell the sour body odor of the man who’d grabbed me.
The smelly man pulled me firmly against him. He was sitting, probably with his back against the cab of the truck, and he had his legs raised on either side of me. His position was offensively intimate, and I flailed my arms around and pulled my feet toward me to try to get some leverage. Hands gripped my forearms and ankles tightly, pulling my legs straight, and there was a sudden bony weight upon my shins.
The smelly man’s arm moved slightly into a chokehold, squeezing on either side of my throat. Spots danced across the darkness of my wide-open eyes as the hood brushed my eyelashes. Going limp just before I actually fainted, I pulled my hips forward slightly as I slumped, creating a little space between my rear and his groin. If I had to keep feeling the bulge in his pants, knowing that me being a helpless captive caused it, I’d lose the tenuous hold on my control.
Handlers on nature shows place hoods over animals’ heads so they aren’t unduly stressed by their capture. My hood seemed to have the same effect, although I’m sure that wasn’t intended. Unable to see, to visually assess the risks to me and determine what persona to present to my captors, there was nothing to do but wait. My lower back started to cramp, but I stayed motionless as we continued down the highway.
I had no sense of time, except that of increasing discomfort. Eventually we pulled off onto a bumpy road, one that was either poorly paved or not paved at all. The pick-up slowly maneuvered over and between bone-jarring ruts and potholes, its springs creaking in protest. The soft flesh of the torso behind me kept my upper back and head from smacking any edges, but there was no friendly fat between my tailbone and the ridged metal of the pick-up bed. I gasped in pain once before I could stop myself. Hopefully the sound was lost among those of the engine and tires and metal bits. I tried to reach out with my senses, to become grounded enough in the world around me that I’d have my wits when the hood was removed. They’d remove it. They’d want to see my terrified face. The hum of insects was audible over our mechanical sounds, but I was unable to smell anything except heavy, humid air and the stinking man who held me in a chokehold.
Sure enough, when the pick-up came to a stop, Stinky Guy moved from behind me and I could feel bodies shifting around, presumably to block my escape. I did a quick crab-walk until my back was against the cab, and a moment later the hood was ripped from my head, along with some of the curly delicate hairs that grew along the base of my neck.
There are certain kinds of immediate pain that trigger a rage in me totally disproportionate to the amount of damage actually done. These triggers include hard head bumps getting in or out of cars, jammed bare toes and fingernails, barked shins, and just about anything where it seems an inanimate object has expressed malice toward me, or I’ve been really dumb. I discovered that night that hair pulled out at the root is another trigger.
“Ouch! You stupid shit!”
My hands flew to the back of neck, to protect it from further outrage and massage the sting away. So much for keeping my wits about me, and encouraging the image of a helpless, frightened little woman.
My outburst shocked the men into silence and gave me a chance to look around. The pick-up had turned its headlights off, but there was just enough ambient light from the sky to tell that we had pulled off a dirt road into a small clearing in the trees. The arboreal silhouettes looked different in size and shape, more like forest than the tree rows of timber land. There were three men crouched in the back of the pick-up with me, and slamming, rattling doors announced the imminent arrival of at least one and possibly two more men from the cab. All of them wore black clothing, gloves and ski masks. The raw tingling in my neck had momentarily burned the fear away, and I wondered where they’d found ski masks in Florida. I took my time looking them over. They all looked really big.
“Hot enough for you?” I asked. My God, I really was insane.
The man nearest me abruptly smacked me across the face. I was surrounded, but not in any way restrained. Once one of them crossed the line and struck me, I had no reason not to be physical as well. So says rationalizing hindsight. At the time all I knew was that my face ached and I’d just found another trigger.
My remaining sandal was a sensible shoe, with a hard chunky heel about an inch thick, so it had a bit of heft. Because of the way
they crouched, the men’s most coveted and vulnerable targets were tucked out of reach of my short legs, but that posture did bring a couple of heads within striking distance. I braced myself on extended arms, raised my ass and kicked my leg out hard. I didn’t get much power behind it, and I lost my shoe, but I did manage to connect with someone’s chin. It wasn’t the man who’d slapped me.
Then I flipped over onto my knees and scrambled back toward the cab, hoping to climb over the top. As I did, I could feel a presence behind me and swung my leg up and back. This time the gonads gods were smiling on me and I heard a warbling yell. I hoped it was my slapper, but I couldn’t be sure. Whoever it was, he should be thankful I hadn’t been wearing my shoe.
Finally on my feet, I started climbing the cab, but Number Three grabbed my left arm, squeezing so hard I could feel bones and tendons grinding. Like many women, I haven’t cultivated arm strength, so with him too close for kicking I fell back on my favorite fifth grade defense—fingernails. I raked from the elbow toward the wrist, but, while he had some choice words for me, he didn’t let go. Then I dug in, squeezing my fingers into his squishy flesh with all my might, feeling one of my nails bend. Number Three maintained his hold on my arm with one hand but let go with the other, reaching for my scratching hand and clamping it with his own. I tried to hang on, but heard myself yelp with pain as he twisted my hand free.
I’d forgotten about Chin Guy. By this time, he’d recovered from my wussy kick and approached me from behind. He clamped his large hands on either side of my head, squeezing hard for a moment. His hands were so large they overlapped, and I felt the straight metal post of my right earring jamming into my head. Then he threw my head forward, smacking my forehead into the cab window. I bounced. My body fell at an angle, as if on a tether, until Number Three let go of my arm. My body came to rest on the truck bed on my side.
Meditation has never been my forte, but that moment of stillness, of freedom from pummeling, was bliss. In my scrambled brain, the seconds stretched on for eons, and I felt some great transcendental something. I was on the verge of Enlightenment, Nirvana, whatever, and I must have smiled.
“Lady, you are some kind of fucked up,” I heard from far away.
I kept smiling until someone shoved his hand into the curly mass of my hair and began dragging me to the end of the pick-up. Some part of my brain knew to scuttle along to minimize my need for a hairpiece, but I still wasn’t doing any higher order thinking.
Soon I became aware of someone slapping my face, lightly this time, to bring me around. My body was lying across the lowered tailgate. I’d lost track of my attackers, but when the man slapping my face stopped and leaned close, I could smell his familiar body odor.
“What do you want to go passing out for?” he asked, pinching my cheek hard with rough fingers in a faux caress. “We’re not done with you yet. Nowhere near.”
He pushed my hair back from my forehead. “Be a shame if you lost all that pretty red hair. Don’t suppose any of you boys happened to bring a razor?”
I was still lying flat on my back with Stinky Guy at my head and another of the men at my feet. At the word razor, I could feel my stomach go hot and my skin go cold. My chest grew tight and I thought I’d suffocate. It wasn’t my hair I was worried about.
“Nobody? Ah, well. We’ll just have to think of something else.”
He stroked my hair again. The masks covered their mouths as well, but I knew he was smiling. He’d seen my fear, and he enjoyed it. I breathed deeply through my nose, trying to stay calm without outwardly panting.
“Red hair, huh? Are you a real redhead or is that one of those dye jobs? Looks real, but that’s why you pay the big bucks, so it’ll look real. I hear there’s only one way to tell for sure.”
He buried his right hand in my hair, gripping it tightly, and inserted the index finger of his left hand behind the top button of my pants. They were button fly. He gave one great yank and my pants ripped open, exposing my underwear. I could feel the bile rising in my throat, and I thought I’d either throw up or choke on it soon. The base of my throat burned with the acid. Stinky Guy was transfixed by my underwear, and I knew he’d forgotten about the other men surrounding us.
“Leopard print, huh?” There was movement behind his mask and I could hear him swallow. “I bet you just fuck everything coming and going in those beauties, don’t cha?”
It’s amazing the things you can do to trick your brain, like a magician with a little misdirection, a shift of focus. For example, I don’t like to cry in theatres, so when I feel tears coming I’ll keep looking about 10 degrees to the right of the screen. Gets your emotions under control and nobody can tell you’re doing it. Your brain can do that for you, too. It latches on to things that are trivial or meaningless, 10 degrees right of center, to keep you functioning when you just want to shut down from sheer terror. And you don’t even see it coming.
My underwear was not leopard print. It was my favorite pair, cotton and well-worn with the pattern fading. I hadn’t been able to find a replacement, so I hand-washed them and hung them to dry every time in a vain attempt to stave off their disintegration. With this misapprehension on his part, my brain had something else to focus on. Or my psychotic nature reasserted itself. Take your pick.
“No, it’s not leopard.”
I rolled toward him, swinging my legs down and reaching for his eyes. I missed and settled for his nose instead, and as I twisted it and dug my fingernails through his mask into his face I screamed at him.
“Leopards don’t have stripes, you stupid pervert son of a bitch!”
Stinky Guy gave a girly squeal of his own and backed up, throwing his hands up to shield his eyes from my berserker rage. When he backed away, I ran for the trees. One of the other men—Chin Guy?—grabbed me, but someone else shook him loose. I think it was one of the guys from the cab. I kept running.
Instinct kicked in. I jumped, barefoot, over obstacles I never really saw, fallen trees and rocks and who knows what. My right hand was no longer functional, so with my left I gripped the waist of my pants, not wanting to stop to button them but afraid they’d fall down and take me with them. I counted in my head as I ran.
When I got to 500 and saw there was no one on my heels, I stopped, panting. I couldn’t hear anything over the sounds of my own labored breathing, and my vision was clouded with spots and darkness. Bending over, hands on thighs, I breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth until I could see again. Then I fumbled with one useless hand to get my pants buttoned again. Fortunately they were worn enough that the buttons slid right in. Otherwise I’d never have managed it.
I closed my eyes and listened. Nothing. Wait—damn, there was something, and close. The canopy above was thick, but there wasn’t much undergrowth here to provide cover. Still, I’d have to make do. I couldn’t outrun anyone anymore. I was exhausted, and I thought I was going to throw up. I hunkered down behind a large tree trunk in a patch of ferns.
He was quiet. If I hadn’t heard him before, I wouldn’t have seen him, all dressed in black in woods so dark the only shadows were the silhouettes of objects rather than cast by them. I breathed through my nose until that started sounding loud and I got paranoid that my nose would whistle. Then I literally held my breath. He stopped a few feet away, looking in every direction but miraculously not seeing me. Or so I thought.
Then he spoke.
“Wait until I’m gone,” he whispered, “then keep heading in that direction.”
He tilted his head up a fraction, like a dog scenting the wind. “Eventually you’ll hit another road. Pray he doesn’t come back.”
He said all this without ever looking at me, then turned around and walked away. I counted to 500 again. Around 175 I thought I heard yelling far away, like someone reporting in from a search, but I might have imagined it. I didn’t hear anything else, real or imagined, and at 500 I set off again, stumbling through the trees.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
The
following hours are a half-remembered dream, with disjointed bits and pieces in no apparent order. Occasionally the pain of stepping on something not meant for my soft urban feet would bring my mind into focus, but like the pain, the focus rarely lasted longer than a few moments. I threw up at least once. I recall looking up to see several raccoons sitting on their haunches, watching me as I wiped my mouth on my sleeve. One tilted his head and rubbed his chin in thought, before turning to share his thoughts with his friends. He was a wise raccoon, or a wealthy one, because all of the other raccoons nodded their heads in agreement with his staccato chatter. Then they waved little paws, dropped to all fours, and wobbled away.
In time, I came to another road, as the hooded man had promised. Minutes or hours later, all I knew was that it was still dark. The growth was tangled close to the road with thorny vines and branches. Although an occasional set of headlights pierced the leaves, I felt pretty well screened from view. Sometimes I’d become aware that time had passed, but couldn’t tell if I’d been awake or asleep during that time. The only thought I was able to hold in my mind was that nothing in this world could get me to set foot on that road before daylight.
The slow arrhythmic popping of a diesel engine brought me to my senses soon after dawn. My body was vibrating like a high-strung dog, but I got to my feet with the aid of a nearby tree. Fortunately the engine sound was from a slow-moving tractor, and by the time I made it to the road it had only just passed me. I tried to speak, to yell to the driver, but the flesh in my throat was stuck painfully together and no sound would come out. The hard paved road was torture on my bruised feet, and anything more than a fast, careful walk was beyond me.
I got lucky. Somehow the man driving saw me. I guess tractors have rearview mirrors. He stopped, put on the hazard lights and climbed down. I knew I must look like a wandering lunatic, so I tried to smile as I slowly approached him, but I couldn’t tell if my facial muscles were actually responding. The man stood next to his tractor, one hand on his hip and one toying with a crisp Atlanta Braves cap, and looked me over. He took off his cap and raked his hand over wisps of gray hair and a mostly bare skull. Then he slammed his cap back on his head, decision made, and walked back to his tractor.
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