Jagged- Chapter Five

Chapter Five
I propped myself up on a crate and forced myself to look at nothing but the road ahead. In the hoary light of the closing day, I saw weren’t the only ones to have traveled this way. At first it was just a few, but then there were dozens of them: cars left abandoned right on the road. Some of the owners hadn’t even bothered to move off to the shoulder. Mr. Elsa had to maneuver the mules around the lanes like the cars were boulders scattered in a river.
Where were all the people?
Then, we passed a minivan a little too close and I wish I hadn’t wondered. The young woman in the driver’s seat was young, probably near my age. The back of her blonde head was craned against the headrest, as if she were staring up at the sunroof of her red Volvo. But as we passed, she didn’t blink. She didn’t turn at the sound of the creaking wheels. Her mouth hung open slightly, dried blood streaking down booth edges.
Bile filled my throat and I threw up over the side of the trailer. My hands felt cold and wet.
Margaret was beside me in an instant, clucking her tongue. “And here I thought you were recovering so well.”
I allowed her to clean my mouth with a scrap of cloth. “It’s not that. It’s— the cars.” I couldn’t bring myself to look back at the line of discarded vehicles.
“Oh.” Her voice dropped an octave. Gently, she coaxed me to sit back down so that my only view was the dusty wooden planks and blankets.
The shaking of my spine was from more than the potholes on the road. “What—” my voice jolted, “what happened to all those people?”
Margaret played with a threaded string. “There were more back in the city. You were unconscious— you didn’t see—”
I didn’t even want to imagine. Imagining always led me back. To the condo; with the view of the park. “But. All the way out here? In Kansas?”
Margaret twisted the sting around her thumb. “They were probably trying to drive away.”
Like us.
“The effects seem to be a lot less the further you get away from the cities.”
There was that word again. “Effects from what?” I felt incredibly naïve, everyone else seemed to know what was going on.
Margaret tucked a strand of red hair behind her ear. “I think it is nuclear radiation.”
“Like from a bomb?” That would explain the collapsing buildings, but again, my naivety was at an all-time high.
She nodded.
“But this is the U.S. We can’t get bombed.” The frown that formed on my brow caused the bandages on my forehead to pull. “Who would bomb us? Everyone knows we would attack back ten-times worse.” Right?
Margaret’s thin lips twisted to the left. “We haven’t heard any official reports, or anything, of course. But, we talked to a woman from Washington, an elderly couple driving up from Georgia and even a teenage kid from Massachusetts. They were all hit the same. I think it might be like this all over the east coast. Every major city has been attacked.”
The words scooped a dip pit in my chest. But she wasn’t done. “This isn’t like 9-11. Whoever did this was going for more than terror. More than war. They were going for inhalation.”
I looked over the trailer, not at the road, but out at the flat land stretched tight under the gray haze. Our country. The United States of America. Sentenced to Capital Punishment.
A chilly tear tore down my cheek. “But we’re still here.” The words were just a whisper on my cracked lips.
“That’s right.” Margaret took my hand. “We’re still here.”
And there were others. Mr. Elsa’s face was bright that night as he talked about his niece and her family in Hays. He didn’t have much family around. Fortunately, Hays, Kansas wasn’t a big enough town to draw a direct attack. We wouldn’t have to spend the next night on the ground. There would be beds. Fresh food. Hot showers.
As Margaret and Mr. Elsa pulled their blankets up close to ward off the chill of the September night air that had picked up, I tucked my knees to my chest and stared at the flames. Sleep wasn’t something I did well out in the open, so exposed; the darkness a constant reminder of the darkness of that early morning in the exercise room.
I yearned to sleep. For the sweet oblivion of unconsciousness. Then the muddled mess of my own life, mixed with the fresh horrors of the dying world, couldn’t haunt me.
But in the early morning hours, as sleep did finally take me, my dreams were even worse. I was back on the treadmill. Could feel my ponytail swishing against my shoulder blades as my feet pounded on the belt. Then there was a loud crack. The glass on the walls shattered and the ceiling came tumbling down.
I managed to dodge a large support beam and scramble out of the basement and up into the main level. More dry wall showered down as I passed the place where the lady was speared through by a pole and jumped out into the street.
But once on the street, everything went silent. The buildings continued to crash down around me, obliterating cars and life as they fell, but there was no sound. It was like someone had pushed a mute button during the middle of an action scene. The explosions and trembling of the ground seemed like nothing more than cheep effects.
My hands flew to my ears. Have I gone deaf? I spun around to see a lamppost fall onto the hood of a blue Taurus, smashing it into two.
The city was going to collapse upon me. Run, Catherine. Get out of there. I stepped onto the street, prepared to bolt toward 84th street and away from the silent horror, when a sound stopped me. It wasn’t the moaning of failing buildings, or the cackle of fires out the windows. It was the cry of a baby.
The tiny wale was the only other noise I heard as the city continued to crumble upon itself. I couldn’t stop. I had to get out of there. But still, the baby’s cry held me.
What is it doing here?
My eyes darted to the burning cars and dusty clouds rising up from demolished foundations. Where is it coming from?
The cry got louder. It pierced my ears and rattled my brain like a shock wave.
Get it to stop. Where was its mother?
I turned back toward 84th street, but found that there was a weight on me I hadn’t noticed before. Terrified, I looked down to see that the crying baby was in my arms.
Its little hands stretched up to me, fingers splayed. Toothless mouth wide open.
I was its mother.
“No,” I screamed and threw the baby from my arms. It fell, arms flailing like a fallen chick, inches, then feet into the open air. I tried to grab it back, but it was too late.
The baby hit the grimy pavement, and as it did, its small body knocked a hole into the asphalt. The infant disappeared into the black gap, its wails going down with it, but the fissure continued to spread. Angry arms branched out, ripping up the street, causing more asphalt to tumble into the pit. The ground between my feet split, jarring every bone in my body. Then I too was falling down, down into the blackness. Nothing to grip onto. The hazy smoke-filled sky growing more distant above me. And still the baby’s cries detonated in my ears.
Usually the rise of the sun, weak and gray on the horizon, brought a sense of relief. But after awaking from that dream, there was no relief from the guilt and horror I felt. Soon, Mr. Elsa would be feeding the mules their ration of grain and within minutes, I’d be dosing off again in the back of the bouncy trailer. But that morning was different.
Margaret and I shared a can of concentrated orange juice and a protein bar for breakfast. I didn’t have the stomach for it, but getting low blood sugar wasn’t going to help me any. I forced the food down just as I tried to force the shards of the dream away.
I was more than indebted to these two people, I realized. My entire survival depended upon it. Without them, I’d be just another body rotting on the side of the road. Their foresight and preparation were my salvation. Mr. Elsa had been storing barrels of sealed grain, jugs of purified water for decades. There were cans of peaches, apricots and applesauce he had his late wife had grown on their own land and boxes of protein bars, like the ones we subsisted upon now. It was like someone had tipped him off that something like this would happen one day. His first aid kit, combined with the one Margaret kept in her car were the only reason I hadn’t bled to death. And though his dog was more than annoying, and the rifle that he kept under his seat which was the size of a small tree made me nervous, I was grateful to be with them.
But as I forced myself to swallow the thick bar down that morning, the unease in my stomach didn’t leave. Why did that baby always have to cry? I tried to push the memory of the sound away by humming a Cold Play song. The air was tangy and metallic, and the wind only seeming to make it more rank. The road was as barren as ever, but the hair on my arms stood up. I jumped as a bunch of leaves rustled across the highway.
Fifteen minutes down the road, as we passed more darkened houses, the vibrations of the trailer on the pavement made my eyes start to droop despite myself. But before I could really drift off, Mr. Elsa reined back on the mules and said over his shoulder, “It’d be best if you stay down, ladies.” I’d never heard him use that tone of voice: tight and low. It made my stomach wring itself into a tight wad.
Before we could ask what was going on, there were voices coming up from the right side of the road. Gruff, deep, male voices.
“What ‘ya got in the back there?” one demanded, making me wish Mr. Elsa hadn’t stopped at all. That voice didn’t sound like he had very neighborly intentions. Margaret and I kept ourselves down as instructed. The sound of boots grinding on the pavement got closer. My heart beat frantically in my chest. I focused on the back of Mr. Elsa’s brown hat and his curly black hair.
He kept his voice even. “Just a couple of things I’m bringing to my sister’s family in Uma.”
“Is that right?” the same gruff voice replied. It sent shivers down my back. “Well I think we’ll just take a look for ourselves. What do you say boys?”
Deep snickers echoed. How many of them were out there?
Mr. Elsa straightened. “Now, I don’t want to cause no trouble here. If you please, I’ll just be on my way.” He brought the reins up but stopped at the man’s humorless laugh.
“We won’t cause no trouble neither.” There was a click. Like something metal. Mr. Elsa sucked in a breath. “We’ll just take a look and then you can be on your way.”
Before Mr. Elsa could answer, the clank of boots came around the right side of the trailer. My eyes shot to Margaret. Her body was rigid, unmoving; eyes wide, jaw clenched tight. I pressed my back into the planks of a crate, wishing I could melt into it.
There were five men. The first to appear at the gate was young, not more than eighteen or so. He had un-cut brown hair that fell around his face like a mop, and a shadow around his jaw; clearly an attempt at a beard. His hazel eyes pulled back at the sight of Margaret and I crouched between the crates and hale bales. “Shawn, look at what we got here,” he exclaimed.
The man named Shawn’s thick chest and curly brown beard which reached his collar bone, came into view. All I could focus on was the rifle he held up like a trophy in the air. That must have been the click I heard. “Well, well,” he smacked his tongue, his black eyes passing over Margaret and resting on me, “this is quite the load you got back here.”
The three other men, all as equally unkempt and filthy as the next, joined the first two. Wide smiles creased the dirt on their faces, a hunger in their darting eyes, like they’d just struck gold.
Shawn spoke again. “I think we’ll just take some of this off your hands.” Mr. Elsa was about to protest, but Shawn wagged the barrel of his riffle at him and Mr. Elsa sank back into his seat. “Go on boys,” Shawn snarled, and like trained dogs, his cronies jumped up into the trailer. My whole body was shaking. I scrambled to think. Margaret stood up and started shouting as they grabbed boxes and barrels of supplies and threw them down to the others on the ground. One of them slapped her cheek, causing her to fall into the hay bales, an angry red mark across her face.
“That should shut her up,” they laughed and tossed more canned goods out of the trailer. “We won’t be hungry tonight.”
“What about that one?” the young guy said, pointing at me. My heels kicked me back into the far corner, as far away as I could get. But I was pinned, without escape.
Shawn turned from the box of peaches he had cut open, his small pin-pricks of eyes on me. Just his gaze made me flinch. The men waited the command.
“Bring her here.”
The kid grinned like a puppy about to be given a bone. Two of the bigger ones came at me. Margaret and Mr. Elsa were shouting. Shawn fired a round into the air, silencing them.
“That’s enough,” he said his mouth an ugly hole. “The next shoot goes into your brain. Bring her,” he repeated. The men’s hands reached for me. I kicked the first in the shin, and thrashed my body, but I was a hooked fish. And there was Shawn’s riffle to think about. They wrenched their arms under me and dragged me out of the trailer.
“Stop,” I shouted. “Let me go.” But I was no match for them.
On the pavement, I realized just how much bigger Shawn was than me. He towered over my head by almost two feet. The skin on my arms burned as I squirmed against the men’s rough hold, but I was hopelessly weak. Like a mouse in a cat’s paw.
Shawn’s eyes roamed up and down my body. “This one’s got some spit fire,” he grinned as if he couldn’t be more pleased with my resistance. His filthy fingers touched my jaw, turning my head side to side.
“Get your hands off me,” I spat in his face.
He didn’t even blink, but wiped his nose. “Her face is a mess,” he said to his men but never took his eyes off me. Then, he grabbed the loop holes in my jeans, lurching my hips forward. “But it’s what’s in here, that matters.”
The men hollered.
“Throw her in the pickup.” He tossed me back. “We’re going to have us a good time tonight!” The thick arms pulled me back, away from Margaret and the nearly empty trailer. The men had gotten their fill of supplies and were now loading them into the bed of a rusty red truck.
My screams ripped the air. I writhed with all my might but the men were bent on taking me. I couldn’t flee. Couldn’t even get them to slow. I craned my neck to look back at the trailer. Margaret was yelling profanities, tears cutting down her chin. Mr. Elsa just stood there like a tall dark tree. Shawn kept them at bay with the aim of his riffle.
It was in their eyes as they watched me be dragged off the road and down the ditch: it was over. That truth sank into my heart. There was nothing I could do. Nothing they could do. They knew it. I knew it.
The men piled the crates of supplies into the bed until the tailgate nearly brushed the ground. Then the men got out a chord, the same pale red kind that Mr. Elsa used to bind his hay bales. They spun me around, so that I faced the road again, and tied my wrists together.
Shawn seemed pleased with their progress. He left his post, turned his back on the trailer and walked toward the truck.
A sick, self-satisfied grin spread across his face as he looked past me at his truck of stolen goods.
But an instant later, that self-satisfied smirk was replaced by his eyes pulled back wide, pupils dilated, and mouth hanging open. For a moment I didn’t understand why. His body teetered, like a cut tree, and then fell face-forward onto the pavement. A large whole was blasted into his back, red blood oozing out.
All the men in the truck turned, gaping at the fallen body of their leader. Before any of them could move, Mr. Elsa came around the trailer, his riffle still smoking from the shot, and picked up the gun out of Shawn’s still hand. The men stared, open mouthed. Mr. Elsa, a riffle in each hand now walked slowly toward the truck.
“You boys have had enough fun around here, I think. Why don’t you let the girl go and help put back those crates nice and neat the way you found them.” His words were polite, even conversational but the men took one more look at the weapons and didn’t second guess him.
The rough hands released me. Blood rushed back into my arms. I tripped a bit as I hurried toward the trailer, away from the truck and the man shot dead on the road.