Coda

by Keith Knapp

* * *

  Bringing up the rear, Mike and Jillian walked in silence. Despite the coming of night, the air was still as warm as if it were day. Another anomaly that brought Mike closer to the idea that wherever they were, it was far from home.

  And that dream. Jesus, how he couldn’t shake that dream. So vivid, so real, so…creepy. And the kid, Brett, he had had some bad dreams, too. Probably just a coincidence; after all they were all under some pressure to say the least. But still.

  He had to get his mind off of it, and the silence wasn’t doing anything to help.

  “So,” Mike said, turning to Jillian to break the quiet, “what do you do?”

  “Truck driver.”

  “Really?”

  “Don’t look so shocked,” she said. “There’re plenty of female truck drivers.”

  “I’m sure there are. I just never met one.”

  “Now you have. Congrats. I haul produce, mostly. Every now and then I’ll go up north for some ice road work, but I usually stay down in the southern states.”

  “Sounds…nice, I guess.”

  “Total freedom,” she said. “What about you?”

  “Mechanic.” He thumbed his nametag—Mike in cursive—and right below it MIKE’S COMPLETE AUTO REPAIR.

  “You the same Mike?”

  “Built it from the ground up myself,” he said.

  “Sounds nice,” she said, then smiled. “I guess.”

  Mike gave her a smile back and they both cracked open with laughter, the first either of them had heard since the earthquake. It was a wonderful sound, an infectious sound. If they didn’t put a lid on it, the rest of the group would think they’d jumped over the edge of sanity.

  Which, Mike thought, maybe they had.

  They came to a small hill as Mike and Jillian suppressed their temporary jubilation. Leading the way up the incline was Sophia, as she had been for the past few hours. Mike wondered just how long they had been walking. Time had lost all meaning since leaving the shed. Had it been four hours? Five? He was surprised any of them were still able to stand, let alone walk.

  Sophia stopped as she came to the crest of the hill. When the others came up beside her, they saw why. At their feet was a thin dirt trail, designed for no more than two people to walk side-by-side. The little road went in the direction they were heading and into a valley.

  In that valley below, no more than two miles away, was a small grouping of lights and structures.

  A town.

  22.

  The sun peered over the horizon as they approached the town. Rays shot their yellow way over the mountain range. Sophia and Roscoe guided the group toward the wooden buildings ahead of them. Ten minutes ago they had noticed a small sign posted into the ground—not unlike the sign found in front of the shed—on the outskirts of the modest town. None of them could make out what was painted on it. The letters once again looked like they had been done by hand. It was the shed all over again, and that little fact comforted no one.

  The dirt path stretched out in front of them, becoming a road wide enough for six people side-by-side, ending in shadows two blocks away. On either side of the street were wooden buildings, all looking like they’d be at home in any John Wayne or Clint Eastwood western. Similar to the shed, they were all worn and rustic. The entrance to the town was like that of an amusement park—there was only one place to officially enter: where the sign was. The rest of the town had been fenced off, as if to keep the horses (or people) in. Or maybe it just signified the property line, as it was just a fence. The town branched out in either direction a block ahead of them. From above the little community might look like a giant cross.

  Roscoe, who trotted peacefully by Sophia’s side, gave the woman a sideways glance and butted his head against her leg. The dog’s weight made her skip a step. She looked down at the St. Bernard, not at all annoyed. He nudged her again, this time letting out a small gruff.

  I got your back, lady.

  Thirty feet from the sign and they were finally able to read the words painted on it. It was the paint-job of a child: sloppy, done in more of a rush than anything, like a homework assignment no one wanted. A drop of the still wet bright red paint spilled down from the “W” of the first word. It traveled down the cracked wood and onto the dirt below.

  Mike adjusted his Dallas Cowboys cap (a move Sophia was quickly becoming annoyed with), and said, “They sure don’t have much imagination around here, do they?”

  Welcome to The Town

  Pop.:

  And that was it. Apparently no one had ever bothered to do a census reading and record it on the sign. Or the painter had seen them coming and run off in a hurry (it was still wet, after all). But there were no footprints in the dirt, no sign that anyone had been here before them except for the wet paint.

  Sophia scanned the street in front of them for the painter—he/she could not have gotten far. She didn’t see anyone in the town, at least not on the main street. She glanced over to Mike, who was also studying the view ahead.

  “None of this can be good,” he said.

  Puffs of dust kicked up from Sophia’s shoes as she passed the uninformative sign. Her right arm snapped back. She looked behind her to see Roscoe holding still by the sign. His eyes darted down the street, he sniffed the ground, then sat. As far as he was concerned, that was as far as he was going.

  “Dog agrees,” said Mike. “Maybe this one ain’t so dumb.”

  “Come on, boy,” said Sophia. “It’s not that scary.”

  Roscoe stared at her. Yeah it is, lady.

  Mike reached into his pocket and once again tried his cell phone. Twirling around, eyes locked on the screen, trying to get at least one bar.

  “Would you quit that already?” Sophia exclaimed. “You’re not gonna get a signal.”

  “How do you know?” Mike asked.

  “She’s right,” Rachel said from behind. “Wherever we are, that thing won’t work.”

  Mike looked at her sideways. Huh?

  Snaking a finger in the air, Rachel pointed at nothing and everything. “Have you seen a tower anywhere?”

  Rachel was right. Their whole time here none of them had seen a cell tower, a cable line, a power line—nothing that would suggest civilization of any sort. They were in the ultimate definition of a dead zone.

  The phone went back into Mike’s pocket.

  Sophia walked back to Roscoe and bent down. The dog looked away, perhaps embarrassed by his cowardice. Ruffling the fur behind one of his ears, she said, “Look at me, boy. Look at me.”

  He did.

  “We have to go in there, and we’re not leaving you behind,” she said. “So man-up and let’s go.”

  After a few seconds of going over Sophia’s words, Roscoe stood on all fours and heeled at her feet.

  “Just gotta know how to talk to ‘em,” said Sophia.

  She started forward, passed the sign again, and let her eyes wander the modest town as she stepped onto the threshold of the main street.

  The first building to her right was a two-story hotel, which was easy enough to figure out by the word “HOTEL” stenciled above the front entrance. Directly across the street from it was a saloon—and in the same stenciled styling of the hotel sign, the kind seen in almost every wanted poster in almost every western flick—the simple word “SALOON” had been painted above the drooping swinging doors. Next to the saloon was an ice cream parlor, which Sophia figured would be a good place for parents to drop off their kids as they went to the saloon to drown their parenting sorrows. The ice cream shop didn’t have a sign, but the happy dancing ice cream cone painted on the front window was enough of one.

  All of the buildings had an old-worldly feel to them. All were made of wood and seemed like they had been standing for eons, or at least a few hundred years. Speckles of rot had started to flourish in the lower corners of the saloon where the building met the raised wooden sidewalk, and the hotel had a more than a few broken windows on its upper floor.


  Brett took hold of Rachel’s hand. “I don’t like this place, Rach. It’s like Old West Days at Disneyland, ‘cept creepy.”

  As they moved further into the town, it didn’t take any of them very long to figure out the strangest aspect of all: there were no people. That did little to calm their nerves, as they had all clearly seen lights coming from here just a few hours ago. And someone had painted that sign, dammit.

  Ahead and to the left was a blacksmith’s shop and a bath house. On the right was a general store and two buildings with no signage, then the street became a four-way intersection. The next block up was marred in shadows and none of them could make out the nature of any of the buildings there.

  “Hello?!” Mike shouted. “Anybody here?!?”

  Sophia turned and thought of giving the man an angry “shh” sign, then retracted the idea. There was no point in them being quiet. In fact, they should be making all the fucking noise in the world if there was any hope of finding-

  “JODY!!!”

  They all jumped at Sophia’s yell, Brett most of all—the kid’s nerves were really getting a workout. Sophia stayed silent for a few seconds. Listening. Hoping. Praying. When she was answered with nothing but the sound of her own breathing, she let her daughter’s name fly out of her mouth again.

  Jody’s name reverberated off the walls of the buildings and came back to Sophia.

  Jillian squinted at the saloon, the hotel and a sheriff’s station she spotted down the street.

  “Correct me if I’m wrong,” Jillian said, “but I don’t remember a cowboy town in L.A. County.”

  Mike held up a finger with a “shh” coming out of his mouth. He wanted things quiet. He cocked his head, much like Roscoe was now doing. They were both listening. Mike aimed an ear at the saloon.

  “We’re not alone,” he finally said.

  “I hear it, too,” Jillian said.

  Rachel, Brett and Sophia concentrated. Then Sophia nodded as Brett lifted his head to look at the source of the noise. They’d all heard it.

  It wasn’t there before but sure as hell was there now. Coming out of the saloon were voices, the clinking of glasses, and in the background: an old rock song with lots of piano.

  “I’ve heard that tune before,” Mike said.

  Without a second thought, Sophia began to walk toward the saloon. Jillian reached out and grabbed her by the arm.

  “I don’t think it’s safe,” warned Jillian.

  The corner of Sophia’s eye met Jillian’s face. “There’re people in there. Where there’s people, there’s help.”

  “Like those nice ladies that tied us to their beds,” said Jillian.

  “I don’t care,” said Sophia. “I’m goin’ in. You can come with me or not. Maybe my fucking daughter is in there.”

  * * *

  The hinges, rusted from time, creaked and grinded in their housings as Mike pushed the saloon doors open. They were the kind he remembered seeing in just about every western movie he saw as a child, the kind of saloon door that didn’t get quite high enough to block the face of the bad guy walking into the bar, and didn’t go quite low enough so that the cameraman could get a good shot of the sheriff’s spurs on his boots as he strolled in to stop a brawl or kill the bad guy in act three.

  Although they had all heard voices, clanking glasses, and the song Mike was positive he had heard somewhere before even though he couldn’t quite place it), the saloon was empty. Dust covered most of the bar to their right. Five shelves of liquor bottles rose up behind it to the ceiling, most of them half empty, none of them with any labels. Ten round wooden tables were scattered about the room with three chairs each to match. More dust sat on the tables and chairs than the bar. No one had been in here in ages except for one sign pointing to a recent customer.

  Sitting on the table nearest them, out of place from everything else, was a half-finished slice of pizza. New York style, the kind that drips cheese and oil off the plate. This one was a pepperoni and had about four bites left. Suddenly Mike was ravenous. How long had it been since he’d eaten anything? A day? The pizza looked good but not that good. He could wait a little bit longer.

  “Just so I know I’m not crazy,” Jillian said, “but we all heard shit in here, right?”

  “Yep,” Mike said.

  Cautiously, like someone would jump out from under one of the tables any second and let him know he was on Candid Camera and scare the ever-living shit out of him, Mike moved toward the bar. He leaned over the cash register—which like almost everything else in the establishment was from a day long past—and spied into the work area. Beneath the tower of liquor were half a dozen grubby beer glasses. A rag that had once been white but was now stained piss-yellow sat crumpled on the floor.

  “Looks like whoever was here left in a hurry,” Rachel said.

  * * *

  Rachel’s comment was lost on Sophia, her voice less than a whisper to the yelling in her head. The sight of the empty bar solidified the fistful of fright in her chest that Jody wasn’t here hiding in the dank and dirty shadows of the saloon.

  She’s not here. Jody’s not here. She must be out there. She’s gotta be. I’m comin’ for ya’, baby, so you better be out there somewhere.

  Following his new mistress out the saloon doors, Roscoe’s ears pricked up as Sophia’s third banshee yell of her daughter’s name grew louder and louder.

  Up and down the streets of the town Jody’s name echoed. Once again, any reply was limited to an echo. She was about to yell a fourth time when she abruptly stopped herself. All the energy drained from her body, exhaustion set in and despair took a hold of her heart. It was that fast.

  Sophia slammed her hands down on the hitching post in front of her. The leash went limp as Roscoe ambled to her side and sat, his big brown eyes filled with worry. Sophia had always found she was quick to become friends with those in the animal kingdom, and Roscoe was proving to be no different. Despite the recent loss of his previous mistress, she felt that the dog was okay with her being a suitable replacement for the dead woman in the station wagon.

  The vacant, dusty streets of the town stared back at Sophia as she searched for any signs of life other than her own and the dog’s. As before, there was nothing to see except for a few blocks of old buildings. Her index finger rested in a dimple on the post left by rope; this was once a hot spot for horse parking.

  A hand rested on Sophia’s shoulder. Mike’s hand, warm and strong. Secure. Rachel and Brett were right behind him, exiting the saloon. They all looked at her with a pity-look that mirrored Roscoe’s.

  “Don’t worry,” Mike said. “We’ll find her.”

  “You don’t know that,” Sophia whimpered.

  Rachel moved to Sophia’s other side. “She can’t be far.”

  Sophia slammed a fist down on the wooden railing in anguish. Dirt and dust drifted from the bottom of the hitching post. The wind took some of it and tossed it in Roscoe’s direction. The dog squinted his eyes in protest and sneezed.

  A horrendous yell then erupted from Sophia. Brett put his hands to his ears. It sounded like she was again calling out her daughter’s name, but her voice was so cracked, her throat filled with such sorrow and misery, that none of them could make out her exact words. Tears swam down her face as she collapsed next to the dog. Roscoe moved closer, licking her tears away with his big sponge of a tongue.

  Rubbing a palm on Sophia’s shoulder, Mike offered what little comfort he could. He looked across the street at the hotel. Its two stories would shadow the deck of the saloon by mid-morning. It had once been painted white, but the paint was now cracked and falling apart, giving the building an odd military camouflage look.

  “I can’t feel her anymore,” Sophia said through heaves of breath. “Usually I can feel her, you know? But I can’t anymore.”

  The mother-daughter connection, Sophia knew, had been severed. She could feel the hole in her heart growing by the second and there would be nothing that would be able to fill it
ever again.

  “Come on,” Mike said. “That’s one building out of many. Let’s check that hotel next.”

  23.

  Jody Baker’s head smacked against the bottom of the table, producing a trippy yet utterly annoying star-effect before her eyes. Cursing, she massaged the top of her head. She had been dreaming of her mother, and the cries in the dream had had woken her up.

  It wasn’t a dream, it was a nightmare. Hell, the past twenty-four hours had been nothing but a nightmare.

  First she had woken up in a shed and there had been dreams—bad dreams—about her father. Then she had fallen asleep again to the sight of three ladies in white, and when she awoke next she was below a sign welcoming her to a town that had no population.

  A bit worse for wear but otherwise alright, she had entered the town. What else could she do? The place seemed to be deserted, so she had gone to the first building she found that had a locking door: the ice cream parlor. Once inside, the need to sleep was overpowering. There was no backroom to hide in for a siesta, so she did the next best thing by covering herself with a crusty blanket she found behind the counter and hid underneath a table.

  Although exhausted, sleep did not come easy. She laid there for hours, shivering from fright, crying. The blanket could cover her but it couldn’t keep away the bad thoughts and boogeymen. If she fell asleep again, her father might be there waiting for her.

  She heard the first noises three hours later. Soft at first, then louder. The sound of feet pitter-pattering across the dirt road outside. Not just one pair of feet, either. A group of people was out there. One of them pitter-pattered to the front door. Jody heard something sniff-sniff-sniff. Something scratched against the door itself, trying to get in. Not a person.

  A quiet bark came from one of the things that went pitter-patter. Dogs. There was a pack of wild dogs out there. The bark pulled the one at the door away, then she heard them running off into the distance, presumably into the woods for some hunting or humping or both or whatever it was wild dogs did with their time.

  After that her body’s need for sleep was overpowering, and she thankfully succumbed. There were dreams of the earthquake, of her mother, and shall she not forget, her father. What her mother ever saw in him she’d never know. But he was gone now, out of their lives for good.