More Bedtime Stories for the Apocalypse

by Joel Arnold

  Once. In twelve years. The most expensive week they'd ever spent.

  Just say no, Clifford. Please say no.

  They started walking toward the booths, Frank Green leading her husband like he was helping a lost boy find his mother.

  She called out once more, her hands cupped around her mouth. "Clifford Dwight Bailey!"

  It was no use. Clifford walked with Mr. Green to the sky blue trailer. Green ushered her husband inside. The trailer door shut behind them.

  Clara shook her head. Please don't sign anything. But she knew her husband. Once he bought into the initial come-on, he was a goner. Green probably had him at ‘It'll only take a moment.’

  What was he selling? What dreams? What lies?

  Shades were pulled over the trailer's windows. The glow behind them intensified briefly, dimmed, and intensified again, as if electricity surged through the many cables snaking along the ground.

  The shades went dark.

  She saw the cart behind the trailer. A door opened in the back. Two full black garbage bags were tossed into it. The door closed. The cart man pushed the cart away from the trailer, gaining speed as he hit the midway.

  From the top of the Ferris wheel, over the shrieks of laughter, the music blaring crazily over dozens of loudspeakers, she heard the cart man shout, "Comin' through. Comin' through."

  And she swore she could see in the glare of the multi-colored light bulbs flashing in syncopated rhythms, reflecting off the dense black bags - she swore she could see the flash of a face pressed up against the black plastic.

  Clifford?

  She lifted the camera and zoomed in on the bags as close as she could.

  Clifford's face. Pressed against the bags. His mouth open in a scream, his lips moving slowly, and my God, my God, Clifford -

  With a violent lurch, the Ferris wheel moved. Clara barely felt it as it rotated once again, the giant axis screaming with effort. She barely registered the brief stops as passengers got off below her. Barely registered a thing until the door of the gondola opened with a crack, and there was Cowboy grinning at her, his face red and sweaty under the bright carnival lights. But instead of letting her out, he climbed in with her and shut the door. He motioned toward the control box. Someone else had stepped in for him. The wheel began to turn.

  He leaned forward. "Ma'am," he said, shaking his head, adjusting his cowboy hat. "Believe me, it's not what you think. You're not seeing the whole picture."

  Clara stared, her face as blank as chalk.

  "So you saw a few things you weren't supposed to. Things that might just give you the wrong idea about us. I saw that camera of yours, the telephoto lens - I could see your mind turning, putting two and two together, and believe me, ma'am - it don't equal four."

  "Please. Let me off this thing. I'm getting sick."

  "Hell, this is the first time the Ferris wheel's broken down since I've been here, and I've been here a long damn time. A part broke is all. But we replaced it. Simple as that. Replace the parts that need replacing, and I guarantee, this'll run another three, four years with no problem."

  Clara felt helpless. Weak. Old.

  "All I want is an understanding between us. I want to hear you tell me you don't know exactly what it is you saw. And better yet, that you don't care about what you saw. I want that assurance. You follow me, ma'am? I need that assurance."

  Clara watched the carnival grounds rise and fall as the Ferris wheel continued to turn. She blinked, her eyelids sore and heavy. She looked wearily up at Cowboy.

  "I don't know what I saw," she said. She took a weak breath. "I don't care about what I saw." She had to say it. If she didn't, she figured the ride might keep on turning until she was too old to stand, too old to speak.

  Cowboy studied her face. He nodded. Looked up at the sky. Whistled. "It sure is a beautiful night."

  He gave a wave to the man at the controls, and the wheel soon ground to a squeaky stop. "Ma'am," he said. He helped Clara to her feet and escorted her off the ride.

  She wandered aimlessly down the midway, the screams of people, of gears turning, the smell of horse manure all mixing together, assaulting her mind with sensations. When she reached the center of the midway she stopped. Looked to her left and right.

  This was where he crossed. Right here. If he wants to cross again, he's going to have to run me down, because I'm not moving a goddamn inch.

  She closed her eyes. Stood resolutely. The carneys’ chatter, the laughter and shrieks of children, the squeak of metal, the electrical sizzle of bumper cars. She could hear it all, smell it all. Taste and feel it all. Right here. Right at this spot. It was as if she stood on a giant heart pumping the carnival out in all directions. She felt all the memories she'd had as a child fly out of her head, could almost see each thought catapult away and stick to the booths, the rides, the carnies, as if the carnival consumed her, fed off the remnants of her childhood. She waited there, at the carnival's equator, the carnival's soul, where the man –

  – "Comin' through. Comin' through."

  – hurried back and forth with his cart full of - of -

  Clifford?

  My God, there he was. Standing not more than thirty feet away, rubbing the back of his neck, looking a bit bewildered at all the lights and commotion.

  Clara ran to her husband, the man with the cart missing her by mere inches. She threw her arms around him and let her tears flow warmly onto his cheek.

  "Oh God, Clifford . I thought - "

  She felt something rough below his chin. She ran her fingers over it. She felt Clifford tense.

  Stitches ran in a rough circle around his neck, dots of blood seeping through the thick thread. She felt more stitches running along his shoulder blades and across his back.

  "Clifford."

  "It's all right, Clara. They guaranteed me five more years. At least five more years. We'll have so much fun together. That's what you want, isn't it?"

  Clara's grip loosened on her husband. She felt something else. Something hidden beneath the fabric of his shirt. Her hand trembled as she reached between two of his buttons.

  Clifford stepped back.

  "What are those for?" Clara asked.

  Clifford's eyes sparkled with a newfound vigor. "With your health and all, they can guarantee you at least another ten years."

  She watched the midway lights shine and dance on the black plastic exposed between Clifford's buttons, the rest of which was hidden behind his shirt, held against his chest.

  "I promise it won't hurt," Clifford said. "The important thing is crossing the heart of the midway. Just one trip across is all."

  Clara stood staring at the man who was once her husband, the black bags folded against him aching to be filled with her.

  "Ten years at least," he said. "Guaranteed. Won't it be nice to know? Won't it be nice to know?"

  * * * * *

  * * * * *

  The Opportunity

  Dale adjusted his glasses and concentrated on the road, or at least what he saw of it. The snow didn’t fall so much as slam dance on the windshield. It blew up, down, sideways and in circles creating disorienting, hypnotic patterns. It was hard to focus. Hard not to stare at the big, thick flakes, his eyes having a hard time seeing beyond their white lunacy.

  “Can’t you step on it a bit?” Linda asked.

  The posted speed limit was sixty-five mph, but he’d be damned if he took it over forty. Not in these conditions. “Do you want to drive in this crap?” Dale replied.

  “Do you want me to drive?”

  “Ha,” Dale said. “No.” It was a four-lane divided highway. That helped a little bit.

  Linda sighed. “Tshh,” she said. Her usual off-putting response.

  The taillights of a van materialized a short distance ahead through the swirling wall of snow. It crept along much slower than Dale. He tightened his grip on the wheel, signaled, and eased into the left lane. The wheels skidded for a heart-stopping second or two, but then regained
the road. Dale squinted, forcing his focus through the snow and finally passed the van in what felt like two eternities. Only after putting the van some distance behind them, did he let out his breath and loosen his grip. But only slightly.

  “This is the longest ride of my life,” Linda said.

  Dale set his jaw in a rigid line. “I bet it’s a lot longer for all those cars we’ve seen in the ditch.”

  “One car,” Linda said. “One car in the ditch.”

  “Three,” Dale countered. “Just because you didn’t see them doesn’t mean they weren’t there.” He blinked. “Why don’t you just put the seat back and close your eyes. Try to sleep.”

  “I would if I could find some decent music.” She futzed with the radio dial, and then turned it off.

  Dale put a little more pressure on the gas, hoping to shut her up. They’d just dropped Alison, their youngest, off at the university after a two-week long winter break. In good weather, the drive was two hours, past farmland and forest, but tonight they’d already driven two hours and were barely halfway home.

  “That’s more like it grandpa,” Linda said.

  Ah yes, there it was; grandpa. But he never got speeding tickets. He never caused their insurance rates to increase.

  He tried not to let his rising anger interfere with his concentration. Don’t let it get to you.

  Ahh…but it had been good to see Alison and David again.

  It was Alison’s first year away from home. She seemed to have adjusted to campus life quite well, the calls home growing less frequent as the first semester wore on. Their son David was an accountant in Las Vegas, of all places, and it had been great that he’d been able to take a week off and fly out to see them. Now it was just the two of them again. Dale and Linda. Their twenty-sixth anniversary was fast approaching, and now they were a couple of empty nesters.

  A couple of empty nesters on the verge of – divorce. Dare he think it? Dare he say it? It became easier to contemplate the more he said it out loud to himself in front of the bathroom mirror. Linda – I want a divorce. He didn’t look forward to what would come after uttering – no, saying with conviction – those words. But this week he was ready to do it. Or next week, for sure. At least before spring break rolled around.

  The kids would understand. Surely they had felt the tension these last half-dozen or so years. The mostly silent, but occasionally loud, nasty tension. And really, Linda shouldn’t be too surprised. Perhaps she’d even welcome it. They weren’t getting any younger. And they certainly weren’t getting any happier.

  Dale squinted through the maddening reflection of snow in the headlights. There was a glow up ahead, growing quickly; a snow plow moving slowly in the left lane, its many bright lights illuminating a globe of snow dancing around it.

  “Oh great,” Dale muttered. “Just what the doctor ordered.”

  “Hmm?” Linda said. “What now?”

  Dale said, “Nothing. Go back to sleep.”

  “Tshh.”

  The massive wall of snow created by the plow was largest on its left side where the plow pushed into the wide median. But with the wind blowing so hard, the snow wasn’t neatly corralled. Gouts of it flew in every direction, and the plows lights and Dale’s headlights turned the uprooted and falling snow on both sides of the plow into white sheets.

  Dale slowed and eased in behind the powerful vehicle. Thirty miles an hour. Twenty-five. Dale adjusted his glasses. This drive just got a bit longer, he thought.

  To get around the plow meant he’d have to pass it on the right side and hope the plow didn’t suddenly change lanes, since surely the driver wouldn’t be able to see Dale’s compact Toyota sneaking past him. It also meant he’d have to drive through that blinding wall of snow and ice the plow kicked up, taking a leap of faith that he’d come through the other side free and clear. He’d literally be driving blind while passing the thing. If a deer happened to be on the road, or God forbid, a stuck vehicle, then that would put a quick stop to this little jaunt home.

  He glanced over at Linda, hoping her eyes were closed. Instead, her head was turned toward him, eyes on his eyes, an annoying smirk on her lips as if to say, You don’t have the guts. He quickly faced forward again. But he could feel it on him – that smirk, that stupid you don’t have the guts, grampa, smirk.

  He tightened his grip. Took a deep breath. Focused. Go for it. Just step on the gas, and for a few brief moments take that leap of faith. At least then she couldn’t call him gramps. Not this night.

  He pressed his foot on the gas and drove into a blinding, furious wall of whiteness.

  Luckily, when their white compact flew off the road and rolled four times down the hill, both Linda and Dale had their seatbelts on. Luckily, too, the frame of the car held as it was meant to when it finally came to rest on its roof in the deep snow. The snow softened the impact and cradled the car. At first, the only thing that seemed to have gone wrong was that the window of the driver’s door had cracked, and the door had bent out an inch, letting in a cold draught.

  All was quiet save for the whistle of wind through the door, and the gasps and panicked breathing of Dale and Linda as their minds finally caught up to their present reality.

  It had happened so fast. Dale was disoriented, trying to make sense of what he saw. Something dug painfully into his chest and gut. And his glasses – where had they gone?

  I’m upside down, he realized. The seatbelt – it held him in place, pressing painfully across his chest and nestling beneath the base of his growing potbelly. He felt a cold stream of air caress his face. He knew that the windows had been rolled up tight, the heater on, and now somehow the cold air was entering the car stinging his cheeks.

  What time is it? It seemed important to know, but there was no glow from the digital clock readout, no lights on in the car whatsoever. The engine died.

  He remembered his daughter. Oh god. He was about to call out her name, but then he remembered; they already dropped her off at school.

  There was the highway and the snow and then...

  The plow.

  And –

  “Linda!” he gasped. He turned his head slowly to his right. It hurt to do so, but he didn’t think anything was broken. He saw her silhouette, black against slightly lighter black. She was also strapped in, and her feet, like his, rested on the undercarriage of the dashboard. Gravity pulled at her long hair, splaying it across the roof.

  “Linda?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Linda!”

  He sensed movement in the dark. Her hand moved to her face. She groaned. “What happened?”

  Something bubbled out of Dale’s nostril and ran down along the side of his nose into his right eye. Blood? “We were passing a plow, and...”

  “Jesus,” Linda said.

  “Where’s your phone?” Dale asked. He pressed the release button on his seatbelt, but it wouldn’t give. Stuck.

  Linda moaned “Geez, I hurt.”

  “Your phone – can you reach it?”

  “I don’t know. It hurts to move. What about your’s?”

  “It’s in my pocket, but I can’t quite – if I could get this belt unbuckled, then maybe...” He tried the button again, pressing until his fingers went numb. Damn. Totally stuck.

  But wait. There. He felt the flat, rectangular shape of the phone in his jean’s front right pocket. It would take some work, but maybe...

  His jeans were too tight, and with the seatbelt there and the way his hips and torso were angled, he couldn’t get his fingers inside his pocket, but if he pressed on the edge of the phone through the denim, perhaps he could coax it out just enough so that he could grab it.

  There. It gave slightly. But...

  He paused. “Linda? How are you doing?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Linda?”

  Another moan. “I think I’m hurt pretty bad,” she said.

  It hurt to take a full breath. His nose continued bleeding, and the result
ing trickle ran past the inside corner of his eye, over his brow, and collected in his scalp. “Anything broken?” he asked. “Are you bleeding?”

  “I don’t know. It’s hard to breathe.”

  Am I okay? Dale wondered. What about internal damage? At least the nosebleed won’t kill me, will it?

  He tried untucking his shirt to press against his nose, but the buckle held it tightly in place. When he tried lifting his left arm to his face, he realized it was numb. He flexed his fingers.

  There. The feeling of pins and needles as blood flowed back into his hand.

  How bad is Linda, though?

  He listened to her breathing. It sounded labored. His eyes had adjusted to the darkness, and he turned to look at her again. But without his glasses, she was blurry.

  “The plow,” he said. “The driver must’ve seen us go off the road. I’m sure he called someone.”

  Linda didn’t answer.

  He envied her in that at least she had kept her winter coat on. He couldn’t stand wearing his while driving, especially with the heater on. His coat was in the back somewhere, his gloves in the pockets of the coat, his knit winter cap (that Alison had made him as a sophomore in high school) stuffed in one of the sleeves.

  “Linda?” he said.

  “Stop,” Linda said.

  “What?”

  “Stop asking if I’m okay. It hurts to talk.”

  “Oh.”

  He could slide the phone out if he really tried, but…

  A nagging thought.

  At first he tried resisting it, but he let the thought out a little at a time, let it surface in his brain bit by bit just to see how it felt. Like when he first started thinking of the D-word.

  And the way the thought felt scared him. Because the thought felt sort of –

  Good.

  He could slide the phone out if he really tried, but –

  “I can’t get my phone out. It’s really stuck,” he said.

  Linda groaned.

  “I’m trying, but it’s too damn tight in there.”

  How bad was she, really? Did she need to get to the hospital right away? Was this a life or death situation?