by Joy Williams
The road led past the toilets and ramadas through a portion of landscape where every form of plant life was explained with signs, then back out onto the highway. Janice walked along it toward a group of vending machines. She loved vending-machine coffee. She felt it had an unusual taste and wasn’t for everyone. While waiting for the cardboard cup to sling itself down and fill with the uncanny liquid, she noticed a chalky purple van parked nearby. Two beautiful children stood beside it with their arms folded, looking around as though they had a certain amount of authority. They were rather dirty and blond and striking. A man and woman were rummaging around inside the open van. Both the man and the boy were barefoot and shirtless. The woman, who had long, careless hair, said something to the girl, who climbed inside just as the man triumphantly produced what appeared to be an empty pizza box. Janice could hardly take her eyes off them. She finished the coffee, which was now cold and tasted even more peculiar, and returned to Richard and their rental car, which had a small scratch on the hood that she had taken great pains to point out to the agency so they would not be held responsible for it. The grille had collected a number of butterflies. Without speaking, she got in and shut the door. She’d like to tell Richard how much she refrained from saying to him, but actually she refrained from saying very little.
As they passed the van, the man raised the scrap of box on which was now printed in crayon PLEASE: NEED GAS MONEY.
The colon in this plea touched Janice deeply. “Richard,” she said, “we must give that family some money.”
The man held the sign close to his chest, just above an appendectomy scar, as the children looked stonily into space.
“Richard!” she said.
“Oh, please, Janice,” he said. “Honestly.”
“Go back,” she said.
They had reached the highway, and Richard accelerated. “Why do you always want to go back. We’re not going back. Why don’t you do things the first time?”
She gasped at the unfairness of this remark. She considered rearing back and hammering at the windshield with her high-heeled shoes. “I want to give that poor family some gas money,” she said.
“Someone will give them money.”
“But I want it to be us!”
Richard drove faster.
“Look,” she said reasonably, “what if you were in the hospital and you needed a new liver and the doctor finally came in and he said, ‘I have good news, the hospital has found a liver for you.’ Wouldn’t you be grateful?”
“I would,” Richard said thoughtfully.
“Someone would have given you a second chance.”
“It would be a dead person,” Richard said, still thoughtful. “It would have to have been.”
“I wish I were driving,” she said.
“Well, you’re not.”
Janice moaned. “I hate you,” she said. “I do.”
“Let’s just get to Santa Fe,” Richard said. “It’s a civilized town. It will have a civilizing effect on us.”
“That tie makes you look stupid,” she said.
“I know,” he said. He wrenched the knot free, rolled down the window and threw the tie out.
“What are you doing!” Janice cried. The tie was of genuine cellulose acetate and had been painted in the forties. It depicted a Plains Indian brave standing before a pueblo. That the scene was incorrect, that it had been conceived in utter ignorance, made it more expensive and, they were told, more valuable in the long run. But now there was no long run. The tie was toast. She shifted in her seat and stared breathlessly into the distance ahead. She thought of the little family with grave compassion.
“I’m afraid I have to stop again. For gas,” he said.
He was pitiless, she thought. A moral aborigine. She hugged herself.
They rolled off an exit into a town that stretched a single block deep for miles along the highway and pulled into a gas station mocked up to look like a trading post, with a corral beside it filled with old, big-finned cars. Richard got out and pumped gas. Then he cleaned the windshield, grinning at her through the glass.
She did not know him, she thought. She was really no more acquainted with who he was than she was familiar with the cold dark-matter theory, say.
He tapped on the glass. “Want to come inside?” he said. “Shot glasses, velvet paintings, lacquered scorpions?”
He was a snob, she thought.
He sighed and walked away, patting the breast pocket of his jacket for his wallet. Janice moved across the seat quickly, grasped the wheel and drove off in a great rattle and shriek of sand. She was back at the rest stop in fifteen minutes. The children had climbed the van’s ladder and were lying on the roof. The woman was nowhere visible. The man was still rigidly holding the sign. Janice pulled up beside him.
“How you doing?” he said. He had bright, pale eyes.
“I want to give you twenty dollars,” Janice said. She opened her purse and was disturbed to find she had only two fifty-dollar bills.
“Rose!” the man yelled, lowering the sign. He had a long, smooth torso, except for the appendectomy scar.
The woman emerged from the van and regarded Janice coolly.
“Yes?” she said.
“I saw your sign,” Janice said, confused.
The children rose languidly from the roof and looked down at her.
“We have to travel seventy miles to our home and get these children in school tomorrow,” Rose said formally. “What we do, what our policy is, is we drive to the nearest gas station and at that point you give us the amount you’ve decided on. That way you’ll be assured that we’re using it for gas and gas only.”
Janice was grateful for the rules they had worked out.
“People will give you money at a rest stop whereas they wouldn’t at a gas station,” the man said. “It’s just human nature. They’re more at peace with themselves in rest stops.”
Introductions were made. The man’s name was Leo. The children were Zorro and ZoeBella. Janice identified herself too.
“Skinny Puppy’s my gang name,” Zorro said, “but use it at your peril.”
“Gang name my ass,” Leo said. “He doesn’t know anything about gangs. He signed a lowrider last week. Practically got us killed.”
“I didn’t know I was signing,” Zorro said. “I just had my hand out the window.”
“Bastard about run us off the highway,” Leo said.
Janice realized that she was gazing at them openly, a little stupidly. She suggested that they drive to the gas station so they could all be on their way.
“Can I go with you,” Rose asked. “I would like to feel like a human being, if only for a few miles.”
“Lemme too!” Zorro cried. He opened the back door of Janice’s car, tumbled over the front seat and snuggled against her. “Mnnnn, you smell fine,” he said.
“I don’t know where he picks that shit up from,” Rose muttered. “Certainly not from his father. Get out of that vehicle now!” she screamed.
The child flipped backward over the seat and out the door and jumped into the van. ZoeBella, who had not uttered a word, climbed in beside him.
Janice invited Rose to ride with her to the gas station, which Leo seemed to be familiar with. She felt blessed with social responsibility. She was doing well. It would be over soon, and she would be able to look back on this in the future. Richard had only one mental key and it didn’t open all locks, she had always felt this about Richard. And she had lots of mental keys, she thought gratefully, and that’s why she was moving so freely through a world that welcomed her.
Leo started the van with difficulty. Blue smoke poured from the tailpipe.
“That doesn’t look good,” Janice noted.
“Rings, seals, valves, you name it,” Rose said.
The van gained the highway and wobbled off ahead of them. Smoke appeared to be rising from the wheels as well. The sky was cloudless and sharply blue, and the smoke floundered upward into it.
“
Some people like the sky out here,” Rose volunteered, “but I prefer the sky over New York City. Now that’s sky. The big buildings push it back so it’s far, far overhead. It looks wilder that way.”
Janice agreed, thinking that this was a highly original remark. She felt splendid about herself. She looked at Rose warmly.
“That Zorro smudged your seat,” Rose said, regarding a dusty footprint on the car’s upholstery.
Janice waved this concern away. “Such beautiful children,” she said. “And such unusual names.”
“God knows I didn’t want to call him Zorro, but his father insisted. Those two aren’t from the same stock. ZoeBella’s dad, Warren, was blind. I hope that you, like many others, aren’t under the misperception that blind people are good people. It just isn’t so. Blind people don’t feel that they have to interact with others at all. They contribute nothing to a conversation. He had a wonderful dog, though, Mountain. Mountain came to Lamaze class with us. Lamaze encourages you to focus on something other than birth and I focused on Mountain week after week, but when it was finally time to have ZoeBella they wouldn’t let Mountain into the delivery room. A violation of infection-control procedures, they said. Well, I freaked, and I think the whole thing messed ZoeBella up too. Here I went the whole pregnancy with no cigarettes or liquor and then they won’t let the goddamn dog into the delivery room. It was a very, very difficult birth and Warren, the bastard, was no help at all. But we sued the hospital for not letting us have Mountain in there, and they settled out of court. Warren was long gone by then, but that money did us for four years, Leo and Zorro too. What an inspiration that was. I wish I could come up with another one that good. Have you ever fucked a blind man?”
“Why, no,” Janice said. “No, I haven’t.”
“Do it before you die, girl,” Rose said. “There’s nothing like it.”
Janice nodded.
“But don’t stick around afterwards. Get your cookies out of there,” Rose advised.
Janice nodded again. She was beginning to worry somewhat about Richard’s mood when she retrieved him. The van weaved smoldering before them. Janice felt a little queasy watching it. By the time they reached the exit, Janice found that she was gripping the steering wheel tightly. The van turned not in to the gas station where Janice had left Richard but into one across the street, where it clattered to a stop.
“Makes you want a cocktail just looking at that heap, doesn’t it?” Rose said.
“I’d like to give you fifty dollars, if you don’t mind,” Janice said. “I think you probably need some oil too. Wouldn’t you like some oil? To make it home safely?”
“Oh, you could drop a bundle into that thing,” Rose said. “It’s a suckhole.” She accepted the bill slowly from Janice’s fingers. “Thank you,” she said slowly. She seemed absorbed in some involuted ritual. She didn’t respect the money, it was clear, but she respected the person who gave her the money. Was that it? Janice wondered. Why was she giving her so much money anyway? Her own behavior was becoming increasingly suspect.
Rose got out of the car, stretched and ambled toward her family. Janice drove across the street. The trading post was locked tight. Four spotted dogs with heads the size of gallon buckets regarded her avidly from the car corral.
“Richard!” she called. The dogs went into an uproar. They raced around the enclosure, baying with the thrill of duty, upsetting their water dishes. Janice drove slowly in circles in the area of the trading post, then pulled out into the street and came to the end of town. The town simply stopped at an enormous Road Runner statue, beyond which were many thousands of acres of grazing land with not a single creature grazing. She stopped the car near the statue and got out, taking tiny sips of the superheated air, afraid to breathe too deeply. An elderly couple approached and asked if she would take a picture of them with their camera.
“Doesn’t it have one of those timers?” Janice said. “Can’t you place it on a rock, set the timer and let it take its own picture?”
The old couple looked puzzled and began to tremble.
“OK. Forgive me,” Janice said. “I’m sorry. Give it here.”
“Be sure to get it all in,” the woman said. “You have to back up.”
Janice backed up and raised the camera to her eye. There they were.
“You have to step back some still,” the woman said.
Janice moved farther back and clipped the side of her shoe against a trash can.
“That must be why they put that receptacle there,” the woman said.
“The receptacle marks the spot!” her withered companion shouted.
“Smile if you want to,” Janice said. “Done. Got it.” She had not taken the picture. She would not. It was a defensible right.
“Thank you so much,” the old man said.
“Most kind of you,” the woman said, “once you agreed.”
Janice returned to the car on her broken heel and drove back through the town, honking her horn frequently. Not only was Richard annoying he could actually be hazardous. His behavior was hazardous, she thought. She circled the pumps of the deserted trading post once again. The big-headed dogs were lying on their stomachs, sharing something fuscous and eviscerated. She drove across the street. Rose and the children were sitting on the ground on a bedsheet. The van was on a lift inside the garage.
“Are you looking for someone,” Rose asked.
“No,” Janice said. “I don’t look as though I am, do I?”
“You look hungry, then, or something,” Rose said.
“I’m hungry,” Zorro said. “Jesus I am.”
“Are those horse?” ZoeBella said, pointing at Janice’s shoes.
Janice was startled to hear her voice, which was soft and solemn. “What?” she said.
“Your shoes, are they horse?”
“I don’t know. They’re leather of some sort. That would be awful, I guess, if they were, wouldn’t it?”
“You seem uncertain,” ZoeBella said quietly.
Leo came up to them, wiping his greasy hands on his pants. Stripes of grease ran down his chest and there was oil in his hair. “We got a little problem but it can be fixed,” he said. “Man here’s going to let me use his tools. Why don’t you women and children get something to eat?” he said expansively. “Sit in a nice air-conditioned restaurant and get something nice to eat.”
Rose was particular about the restaurant. She wanted it dark, with booths, no salad bar, no view of the outside. They got into Janice’s car and drove up the street again. Zorro was sent into several establishments to determine their suitability. He had put on a T-shirt that said BAN LEGHOLD TRAPS. A number of birds and animals crippled and quite conceivably dead were arranged colorfully around a frightful black iron trap.
“He loves that shirt, but I don’t think he gets it,” Rose confided to Janice.
“You should bury that shirt, with Zorro in it,” ZoeBella said quietly.
Janice continued to scan the street for Richard. She saw no one who even remotely resembled him, not that she would have settled for that, of course.
“You sure you’re not looking for someone,” Rose asked.
“Not at all,” Janice said. “I’m just trying to be aware of my surroundings.”
ZoeBella leaned over the front seat and said softly, “I think that policeman behind us wants you to pull over.”
“Yes!” Zorro said. “There go the misery lights!”
Janice was told by the officer that she had drifted through a stop sign. He very much resembled the officer she and Richard had encountered at breakfast. While he was writing out the ticket, which was for two hundred dollars, Rose asked him which eating establishment he would recommend, and he recommended the one they were parked in front of.
“This kind of event calls for a cocktail,” Rose said to Janice. “It always does.”
Inside, Janice felt disoriented. ZoeBella placed her small hand in Janice’s and led her to a booth. They sat holding hands opposite Z
orro, whose T-shirt featured prominently in the darkness. Janice ordered a double gin with ice and Rose specified an imported bottled beer, then ordered turkey plates for everyone.
“Turkey plate’s always the best,” she said.
ZoeBella did not release Janice’s hand even after the food arrived. The children ate as though starved.
“Do you believe in God?” ZoeBella murmured.
Janice was trying to locate a hair that had found its way onto her tongue.
Rose said, “When I was ZoeBella’s age, every time I thought of God I saw him as something in a black Speedo bathing suit and I saw myself sitting on his lap, but this perception was drummed out of me. Just drummed out. Now whenever the name comes up I don’t think anything.”
“I think of God as a magician,” ZoeBella whispered, looking closely at Janice. “A rich magician who has a great many sheep who he hypnotizes so he won’t have to pay for shepherds or fences to keep them from running away. The sheep know that eventually the magician wants to kill them because he wants their flesh and their skin. So first the magician hypnotizes them into thinking they’re immortal and that no harm is being done to them when they get skinned, that on the contrary it will be very good for them and even pleasant. Then he hypnotizes them into thinking the magician is their good master who loves them. Then he hypnotizes them into thinking they’re not sheep at all. And after all this, they never run away but quietly wait until the magician requires their flesh and their skin.”
ZoeBella’s skin was very pale and her eyes were large and blue. “Goodness,” Janice said, perturbed. Only a piece of bread was going to find this hair, she decided. She pushed one into her mouth.
Zorro said, “I think of God—”
His mother yanked his arm sharply. “We don’t want to hear that again,” she said.
Zorro collected everyone’s forks and put them in the pocket of his shorts.