Mammoth

by Douglas Perry

  King shook his head vigorously. “No, we can’t do that. We’ll drive over the mountain. To Stockton. Come on, let’s go. Right now.”

  Janice studied her boyfriend’s face. She wondered, for the umpteenth time, how she ever fell for this guy. Her parents, clearly, had done a number on her. “Do you even know what’s going on?” she said. “This is serious shit.”

  “I know—that’s why we have to go. Come on.” He motioned for her stand up.

  Janice realized his plan did make sense. She acquiesced with a nod, but she couldn’t let him think she believed he was actually right. She insisted on washing her face first, changing her clothes. “No,” he said, “there’s no time.” He tried to guide her toward the front door, and she pushed him away with both hands, resisting the urge to really sock him one. Once in the bathroom, she let out a long, slow breath. God, she could really use a rolf. She thought about Johanna, her massage therapist, about the strength in the woman’s hands. A good rolf was better than sex. Who was she kidding? It was sex. She splashed water on her face as King made noises in another room, banging cabinet doors, dropping things. She stared at her sharp, foxlike features in the mirror. She needed to grow her hair out, she decided. Soften up her look. Guys dig chicks with long hair.

  “Come on, let’s go,” King mewled, appearing in the mirror behind her. “We need to leave right now.”

  Janice dried her face and dropped the towel into the sink. “All right, I’m just going to put something comfortable on.” She pulled her stockings down to her ankles, leaned against the doorframe and yanked them off.

  “We don’t have time, Jan. We have to motor.”

  She spotted his oversized Swiss army backpack by the door, stuffed to the gunwales. She looked around for another bag, maybe the small pink suitcase she used for overnight trips. Nope. Infuriated, she grabbed the backpack, pulled it open. She pawed through his T-shirts, underwear, Levi’s. A toothbrush. A packet of those disgusting peanut-butter-flavored Space Food Sticks he wolfed down every day. A fucking Fritz the Cat comic book.

  “And what about me?” she said, wheeling on him. “Do I get a change of clothes? Do I get any reading material for this ’round-the-world trip we’re taking?”

  “I—” he stammered. “I . . .” Janice could see the gears shifting behind his eyes, first this way and then that. What an idiot her boyfriend was.

  “I thought . . . you know . . . you’d want to pack your own things.”

  “Let’s just go, Oscar,” she barked. “I don’t need anything. I’ll read about Fritz’s scintillating adventures while you’re driving.”

  Janice grabbed her purse and stormed down the driveway, her nose still pulsing from the epinephrine. At least she wasn’t scared anymore. She was too pissed off. She stepped into the driver’s seat, started the car. King leaned in through the open passenger-side window.

  “I thought I was driving.”

  “You want me to leave you here?”

  King climbed in, and Janice steered the Camaro into the street. “Here,” King said. “You forgot this.” He dropped the inhaler in her lap. Janice ignored it and instead concentrated on pushing the car hard. She careened into turns and punched the accelerator. Heading east, up the mountain, they were the only ones on the road. It was eerie, this emptiness. It had all happened so fast, with no warning. She’d come out of the bathroom at her office, still sniffling from her morning crying jag, and found her secretary gone. Tania had marched down the hall to get Janice a cup of coffee twenty minutes before and apparently never returned. Janice sat at her desk for a while, first trying to get her boss on the phone, then just sitting. She had started to sift through her index cards—her own unique way of keeping track of projects—when Veronica ran past the door. Actually ran. A full-out sprint. Janice made it outside in time to see Veronica disappear inside her Ford Pinto and screech into the street. There were only four cars left in the lot, including her own. Janice felt she was always the last to know—and she didn’t know anything.

  King gabbled at her non-stop as she drove. Something about the feds taking over the town, about how he’d escaped with some quick thinking and a head fake, about how this would make a great movie. Typical King nonsense. She peered down side roads cut into the mountain, searching for signs of life. She spotted empty gravel driveways, looming trees that seemed to be trying to tell her something. All the while King kept talking: more about the feds, a fire somewhere, his radio show. They made it to the turn-off for Route 120 in less than twenty minutes, which was long enough for Janice to make a decision. A long-overdue decision.

  “You want a bite?” King said, snapping a peanut-butter stick in half with his front teeth.

  “King, listen, this isn’t going to work.”

  “No, this is right,” he said. “I drove this once with Charlie. It’s beautiful up here. Don’t you think?”

  Janice kept her eyes straight ahead. “I mean, us. You and me. This hasn’t worked for a long time.”

  King stopped chewing, swallowed.

  “King, you hear me?” She dared to glance his way.

  “You can’t break up with me, Jan.”

  “I do believe this is still America.”

  “No, I mean. It’s not us. We’re fine. It’s the situation.” He put his hand on Janice’s leg, kneaded her flesh. “We’re going to be okay.”

  “We’re not. You know this.” His hand burned her leg. It was going to leave an impression. She pried his fingers off of her. “This is for the best.”

  King rolled his head against the back of the seat. “It’s this place, Jan. It’s Mammoth View. If we go to New York everything will be better.”

  “You know that’s not true.”

  “I can make it,” he said. “I know I can. I’ve put it off too long. I’ve been saying that for years. This thing—this thing that’s happening—it’s just what I needed, to give me a push, to force me to get on with my life.”

  “You think you can make it,” Janice said, shaking her head. She was talking to herself, or maybe to the Fates, not to King. She realized she was pressing down on the accelerator harder than she meant to. She rolled the car into a turn on the tight mountain road, felt her stomach lift and float.

  King’s eyes bulged in outrage. “You should have seen me when I was starting out, before I settled for a safe life,” he responded, his voice breaking. “My Jimmy Porter in Look Back in Anger? That production could have gone to Broadway.”

  Janice snorted. She couldn’t help herself. “I doubt it. You need to get a grip.”

  “I need to get a grip? You didn’t see the show.”

  “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

  “That’s exactly my point!”

  Janice laughed, short and angry like a karate chop. How was she supposed to reason with him? She shook her head. “So off to New York, then,” she said. “I’m all for it.”

  King clapped his hands. That was easy. “Right on. Fantastic. All right.” He let out a long breath. “I was looking at Variety the other day. Lots of shows, lots of parts. Look, you’ll love it. We can find an affordable place on the Upper East Side—”

  “I meant for you, not me. King, I like Mammoth. Assuming it doesn’t blow up today.”

  King bent forward in his seat. He gaped at her. “You like Mammoth? You do marketing for a ski resort. You go to travel-industry conferences. You write brochures.”

  “Yeah, and I like it. I like Mammoth View.” She glanced at her leg. The finger burns were still visible, a dull pink against her white skin. If she touched it she would be able to feel indentations.

  The back of a station wagon reared into her peripheral vision. Wood-paneled. She looked up and hit the brake. The wheels locked and slid, and King threw his left arm against her chest as the car shuddered to a stop.

  “You okay?” King asked.

&nb
sp; Janice ignored him. She should have worn a bra today. That’s the last time you get to cop a feel, she thought. She checked the rear-view mirror, then pushed the door open and climbed into the road. A clutch of teenage girls, folded over one another like origami, peered at her through the station wagon’s windows. She felt another attack coming on, that familiar tingly tightening in her throat, like a gulp of Pepsi had gone down the wrong way. A middle-aged man in a T-shirt and gym shorts approached. He had a tragic face—cratered cheeks and basset-hound eyes—beneath a sweat-stained baseball cap. His legs were hairy and thick, with bulging calf muscles like cancerous growths. A rust-brown Monte Carlo idled in front of the station wagon; the tragic man had been talking to the driver, a stocky woman, until the screaming brakes distracted him. Ahead of the Monte Carlo sat another car, a red sedan.

  “Hello, there,” the man said. “That was a little too close for comfort.”

  “Yeah.” Janice looked at her car—and at the foot or so between her front bumper and the back of the station wagon.

  “You know what’s going on?”

  Janice nodded, struggled to swallow. “That’s why we’re out here,” she gasped.

  The man leaned in close. “We’re trying not to get the girls too worried.” He nodded toward the station wagon. “I’m sure you understand.”

  “Right. Of course.”

  King appeared at her side. “What’s going on here? Everybody all right?”

  “I think so, yes,” the man said. “We’re headed for Stockton, but our lead car got away from us.”

  “Well, you really can’t get lost. This road will take you all the way in.”

  The man pulled on the bill of his cap as if giving a secret sign. “Understood. We were just reevaluating, is all. Wondered if maybe we were overreacting. It’s a long haul to Stockton. Especially with a carload of girls.”

  “I don’t know,” King said. “I can tell you that I’m glad to get out of Mammoth.”

  Now the man took the cap off and rubbed it like a lantern. The bald patch on the top of his head gleamed in the sun. “What exactly did you see?”

  “Well, there wasn’t much at first—” King paused, enjoying that dreamy feeling that always came over him when he made up a story on the fly. “But once the explosions started to go off, you know? All around town? People went crazy. It was every man for himself.”

  “Explosions? From the earthquake?”

  “No. No, this was different—” King heard a door close, and glanced over his shoulder. Janice had returned to the car. The engine turned over, and the Camaro jolted into the street. Janice pulled hard on the wheel to avoid hitting King and his new friend.

  “Janice!” King yelled. “What are you doing?”

  Janice jammed the inhaler into her left nostril and set the epinephrine free again. The medicine lit her up, filling her with confidence and a sense of her own power. For the life of her, she couldn’t remember why she had been so stingy with this stuff. She gunned the engine and, as King reached for the door handle, roared away, past the other vehicles and into the horizon. The cars disappeared behind her in a matter of seconds.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Hello?” Tori called out. “Is anybody there?”

  She wiped at her face with both hands. Her stomach was spinning, her fingers tingling. It was inevitable that she would cry, and so she didn’t even try to hold it back. Why bother? Everybody had been rescued but her. Everybody in the camp. Everybody in this town. Everybody everywhere.

  The thought of it made her double over. She put her hands on her knees and spat. Something unnatural shifted in her gut. She was going to throw up. It was coming. She’d always believed the worst feeling in the world was being spurned by the love of your life. She’d been preparing for it since she was thirteen. But this—being left behind, being the last person in the world—had to be worse. So much worse.

  She straightened up. The vomit didn’t come. Her nasal passages opened. She forced herself to stop sobbing. She snorted hard, sucking a wad of snot up and away, like her brain was a vacuum cleaner. She couldn’t just give up, she decided. What would her dad think if she did that? She started walking again. Teachers thought she was a loner because she didn’t talk much, but she liked people. She liked being a part of the group. She simply liked someone else to speak first, to let her know it was okay to join in, that her friendship or opinion was welcome. Then she could talk until the cows came home. Being here in this empty town by herself, with no one to judge herself against: it was a very good approximation of Hell. She lengthened her stride, hoping that the real world and all its people were right around the next corner.

  There had to be an explanation for this, she thought. Maybe this wasn’t a real town. She didn’t remember driving through it on the way to Spritle’s. She could have been dozing or listening to the radio, but she didn’t think so. It could be a movie set, like the place in Arizona where The Gunfight at the O.K. Corral was filmed. That was one of her dad’s favorite movies, and they’d driven out there when she was twelve, stayed a night in a motel. They’d had a photo taken in old-time Western outfits—she’d been shocked when he suggested it. It was so unlike him. The black-and-white picture was still on the refrigerator, her dad glowering from under a bulbous cowboy hat, a fake six-shooter in each hand, his preteen daughter pressed against him wearing a fancy “Saloon Sweetie” dress and a garter. She was squishing her lips into an exaggerated smooch, because that was what the woman in line ahead of them had done.

  Tori stopped walking. She shook out her legs, first the left one and then the right. No, this was real. Nobody could mistake Old Tucson for a real town, and nobody could mistake this place for a fake one. So where was everyone? There was no earthquake damage that she could see. Lights shone in some of the buildings, and she could make out a low humming sound: probably an air conditioner. Someone had to be here somewhere. She figured there must a lot of good places to hide, basements and backrooms and under porches. But why were people hiding?

  “Hello? Is anyone there?” she called out again. “Please answer!”

  Tori felt the creeps roll through her. Once the echo from her voice died out, the returning silence hit hard. The quiet seemed so complete this time—she couldn’t even make out the air conditioner anymore. Had she ever heard it, or was that in her mind? She found herself turning all the way around, carefully eyeing every inch of the street and alleys and buildings within the radius of her sight. Her stomach plummeted once more, landing in the center of her groin. She buckled, and had to catch herself with her hands on her knees. There was no denying it. The town really, truly was empty, as empty as the camp.

  She swallowed but it got stuck halfway down. Acceptance of reality was good. Then you could solve whatever the problem was. Miss Dawkins, her math teacher, had told her that when she was having trouble with her homework. Except this time Tori didn’t have the equation that would lead to the answer. She had accepted reality, but she couldn’t do anything with it. Or at least she didn’t know what to do with it. She took a deep breath, but it was too late. Panic hit like a sneaker wave. This time she wasn’t strong enough to fight it off. Her limbs went numb and then seemed to liquefy. She fell to her knees. Tears rushed down her face, harder than before, and she heaved. Her stomach muscles, already sore from her attempts to control her breathing, trembled through a long spasm. She recognized that she was out of control, finally, and let it take her away. “Daddy!” she called out between racking sobs. “Daaadddyy!”

  She stopped only when she noticed the car about half a block ahead, the driver’s side door wide open. The vehicle had apparently tried to take the corner too fast and ended up halfway on the sidewalk. She swiped at her face with her arms, snorted at a new round of snot in her nose. She had her driver’s permit. She’d circled the school parking lot in her dad’s car on three evenings, her father offering obscure instructions about the
side mirrors and the brake. She could drive out of this place, drive and drive until she found the rest of humanity. She jerked around, suddenly realizing that somebody could be watching. She scuttled to the car—a Chrysler—and climbed in. The keys weren’t in the ignition. She slammed her hand on the steering wheel. Pain rocketed through her arm and into her chest. The palm of her hand throbbed. “Shit!” she said. “Owww!” She sat back in the seat and squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t want to cry anymore. She wanted to be in control. She wanted to think her way out of this situation. She wanted to be logical. She was about to press down on the car’s horn—to blow that horn until she woke up the dead, it was the only thing she could think of—when she heard a sound. A hard, faraway tuck, tuck, tuck, regular but not consistent. She popped her head out of the car and stood. She turned to her right, tracking it. Tuck, tuck, tuck. Tuck, tuck, tuck. She stepped down to the sidewalk, still trying to identify what it was and where it was coming from.

  Tori moved around the car and started to jog. Her head swiveled this way and that, desperate not to miss it, whatever it was. She reached the end of the street, sniffed the air, and headed east. The buildings were smaller here, nondescript. A single-pump service station was on her right. The bay door stood open, and inside it a mud-spattered white Jeep hung in the air. The other direction offered a small road that twisted into a line of trees. She assumed it was houses back there. At last it hit her. A basketball. That was the noise. Somebody was dribbling a basketball. A person, obviously.

  The world hadn’t ended.

  She continued to follow the sound, down a side street and through the covered outdoor eating area of a school. She looked out over a large lawn and spotted him. The basketball player, wearing only a pair of brown corduroy shorts, was across the field in the middle of a rectangular asphalt court. A basket loomed on each of the four sides. The ball banged against the farthest backboard, clanged out of the rim, and fell to the ground.

  The boy gathered it in, twirled, and juked an imaginary defender. He lofted a skyhook that banged and clanged again. Tori guessed the boy was a little older than her. Seventeen or eighteen. Crouching, she rounded the edge of the lawn, staying near a line of trees, and sneaked to within about fifty yards of him. She settled behind an old sycamore whose exhausted branches nearly touched the ground. She watched, fascinated and relieved. If this boy was here playing basketball without a care in the world, then everything was all right. She had nothing to worry about. She had been afraid for no reason. She took a deep breath and let it out. She suddenly felt silly for all the blubbering and panic. She liked to think she was grown-up, that she could take care of herself. How many of her friends cooked for themselves, did their own laundry, and made it to school every day without parental badgering? She did it all the time. Her father’s confidence in her made her feel important, like an adult. But she wasn’t. She’d just proven that. When the going got tough, the tough got going, her father said. When the going got tough for her, she’d cried like a baby.