Cotton Crossing

  Christ, like tampons? Or yoghurt? “Okay.” A funny, fluttering feeling in the pit of her stomach would not stop. She ignored it, and decided now was the time to set the tone for all their future interactions, so help her God. “So we’ve established you have good reasons for asking me to stay here, right. What about the other bit? The don’t leave the house bit?”

  “I, uh.” Lee all but winced. “I may have said that wrong.” He didn’t quite look ashamed of himself, but it was close. His shoulders went down a little and his chin dipped, like a teen boy called on in a poetry workshop.

  You think? “Yeah. You might have.”

  “Listen.” He set his mug down on a pinkish Formica counter losing its color around the edges. “I ain’t exactly easy in my mind about leavin you here alone. So I’m askin you, please, to be careful when you take Traveller out.”

  “Much better.” She set her own mug down, just as carefully, and folded her arms like she’d been wanting to do all along. Sometimes the little things helped. “You don’t have any neighbors, Lee. So unless there’s starving bears with a yen for Manhattan girls in the trees, there’s something else. Right?”

  “Uh.” A number of expressions crossed his face, settling somewhere between chagrin and unwilling admiration. He pushed at his hair with one hand, settling the longish bits on top. “Well. They was talk about things in the woods, Miss Virginia.” His accent had thickened, and maybe it was deliberate. Maybe it wasn’t.

  “But you’re okay with Juju taking Traveller out, right?” Oh, logic. A woman’s best friend.

  Lee shifted, uncomfortably. “It’s daylight, and he knows how to handle himself.”

  As if she didn’t. Well, to be absolutely honest, “handling” herself had not been high on her list of Life Skills. He was right. “Well. I’ll be sure to exercise all appropriate caution. When are you leaving?”

  “Huh?” His slow, sleepy blink might have bamboozled someone else into thinking he was confused, but not her. Oh, no. Ginny thought she had a pretty good handle on Mr Lee Quartine, smarter than he liked anyone to know and used to letting his drawl and his good-ol-boy aw-shucks do the work for him.

  Her arms tightened, her fingers digging in. “It’s a simple question. When are you leaving?”

  “Uh, well. Soon as we can, I reckon.”

  “All right. Go on, then.” She restrained herself from saying shoo by sheer force of will.

  Now he looked downright chagrined, head a little down and his bloodshot gaze half-wary. “I didn’t mean—”

  “Oh, I know what you meant, Mr Quartine,” she informed him. “But I’m not in the Army, and you don’t bark orders at me. Are we clear on that?”

  “Yes ma’am,” he mumbled, and exited hastily. She got a good whiff of him as he did—male, a faint tang of leather, a little bit of citrus, and a faint fading note of alcohol. Maybe that was the circles under his eyes.

  Right now, she was only a little irritated that he hadn’t shared.

  Pink Bedspread

  Pink bedspread, pink curtains, a big mirrored closet. The bedroom even smelled like a girl, a powdery pretty odor with an undertone of apples. A wicker hamper near the door held laundry, and the mirrored closet was half open, showing part of the room and soft blue reflected snowglow.

  Wild horses wouldn’t drag it out of him, but Mark Kasprak sometimes had dreams about sleeping next to Steph Meacham. Not like this, though, with both of them huddled fully clothed under all the blankets in the house, and Steph making those soft agonizing sounds when the nightmares started.

  He didn’t blame her. This was some nightmare shit, and he was almost glad he hadn’t been to his own trailer yet. Maybe his dad was worried, maybe not, but Mark had some ideas about the deep, racking cough his dad had been complaining about. The same damn cough Mr and Mrs Meacham had, to hear Steph tell it, and maybe the same fever too.

  Steph’s dad. Now there was a nightmare, one he hadn’t been asleep for. Mark moved a little, restlessly, trying to shake it out of his head. Steph whimpered in her sleep, and he wished he could comfort her. There probably wasn’t any damn comfort, really. Not for this.

  Here he was, next to a girl who made his insides turn over and all of him sweat whenever he saw her at school, and he couldn’t even get a hard-on. Maybe it was the cold, but Mark didn’t think so.

  Bull Meacham had run right out of the house and at the truck, his jaw working and his big broad hairy chest naked to the wind. Barefoot, in striped pajama bottoms, he’d thrown himself on the hood, and Steph had started to scream. The only reason Mark didn’t scream too was because the truck slid sideways as he jerked the wheel, flinging Steph’s father off. The old man hit pavement with a cracking sound, and that hadn’t been the worst.

  Oh no. Not by a long shot.

  The worst was Mrs Meacham inside the house, in her housecoat and slippers, her eyes gone all grey and funny and her throat swelling as she made that awful, horrible growling. She hadn’t been able to get too loud because something, or someone, maybe even Mr Meacham, had chewed most of her throat right out.

  It was no use. He wasn’t gonna be able to sleep, but it was too cold to get up and walk around. Steph flat-out refused to leave the house yet, even though they’d had to barricade the front door with furniture to stop Mrs Meacham—or whatever it was—breaking back inside. With the power out, it was a cave. Was his truck gonna freeze? He should have plugged in the engine block warmer. Dad had told him to make sure he got one, if he was gonna spend his money on a piece of crap car.

  It wasn’t a car, it was a truck, even if it was yellow. It was freedom. And there was no fucking power, so the engine heater was dead anyway.

  And he’d run over Steph Meacham’s father with his truck. The old man got caught on the undercarriage, and dragged up into the front yard. Throwing the truck into reverse hadn’t helped, just dragged him into the driveway, the tires making weird sounds and Steph making an inarticulate sound that rhymed with noooooo…

  Mark jerked awake. His arm, under Steph’s head, tensed, and she woke up with a squeak and clutched at him. “What is it? What?”

  “Nothin.” Mark cleared his throat. Here he was in a girl’s bedroom. Pink bedspread, under all the damn blankets. He was sweating, for God’s sake, and he didn’t even remember falling asleep. “Bad dream.”

  “Me too,” Steph whispered.

  She wasn’t even angry, or at least, she wouldn’t let him leave. Maybe it was what they’d had to do to her mama, or the 911 not working, or any of this fucked-up situation. And how fucked-up was it that Mark was glad he could stay here? It was better than home at the trailer, that was for damn sure. And his dad, drunk more likely than not. Yelling at him about the truck when the old man spent all his monthly on rotgut, for God’s sake? Mark didn’t feel bad at all about leaving his daddy alone, and that was a sure sign he was a sinner, like his grandmother would say.

  But Lord, he did feel awful about Steph’s mama. Getting into the house and finding her had been bad enough, and to hear Steph scream Mama no Mama no Mama no please while the lady tried to get her teeth on them both…Mark hadn’t even really thought about it. He’d just done, like hittin a woman—someone’s mama, for Godsake—was an action just waiting under his skin to be let out.

  Was he really like his daddy? Blood tells, everyone said. He wondered if Steph would move, so he could pull his arm free. It was already numb.

  “Mark?” Steph, whispering again, her breath hot against his shoulder. He was sweating, goddammit, and probably reeked. In a girl’s bed for the first time in his life, and he couldn’t even smell right.

  “What?” He used his free hand to yank the pillow down a little more. Had he been snoring? That would just put the icing on the cake, right?

  “I’m glad you’re here.” Like it was a secret.

  “Me too.” He didn’t realize it was the truth until he said it. “I’m sorry about all this, Steph.”

  She shifted a little, cuddling closer. “You th
ink he was gonna hurt me?”

  “Maybe.” He didn’t even pretend he couldn’t guess what she was thinking. “Stands to reason. I know she was.” Great. Remind her that you killed her mama.

  Or you tried to. Her mama ain’t dead. Mrs Meacham was out there in the storm with a hole in her throat, making that awful grinding noise with her teeth.

  “But my mama…” She sniffled a little. “What’s goin on?”

  It was the same conversation they’d had all evening. At least there was food in the house. Sandwiches and milk were just fine by him, even if he had peanut-butter breath now. “Well.” He searched for something to say that didn’t sound crazy. “I, uh. You’re gonna think I’m nuts.”

  “I’m thinking I’m nuts.”

  So he said the word out loud. It sounded ridiculous, and for a few seconds he was afraid she was gonna start laughing at him, that the whole thing was a hallucination or it was some sort of hidden camera thing and it was gonna be all over the internet and the assholes at school weren’t just gonna laugh at him because he was poor and his shoes were worn out and his mama had run off with some insurance salesman but because he was stupid, too, and—

  “Yeah,” Steph said. “That’s what I was thinking too.” She snuggled closer again, and everything inside Mark loosened. Warmed up. His arm didn’t feel quite so numb anymore, either. She even repeated it, too. Like she couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing. “Zombies. Mark?”

  “Huh?”

  “Your arm okay?”

  Hell, he couldn’t tell if it was still attached. But something else had decided to start working, right in his pants, and if he moved at all she might figure that out. Her leg was over his knees, and oh, dear Lord, what was he gonna do now?

  “Fine,” he whispered. “Just fine.”

  A short while later, while both teenagers slept clinging to each other like shipwreck survivors, dawn rose pink and gold. Around Meacham house, long dragging tracks circled, filling up with snow.

  Goin On Touchy-Feels

  “You look like you been hit on the head.” Juju squinted at the white-blanketed road, his hands sure and deft on the wheel, and feathered the accelerator. Chains bit deep, and the feeling of them digging in was comforting.

  Comfort was hard to find this morning. “Do I now.” It was nice not to be driving. But it meant Lee had little to do except watch the mirrors, the buried road, and think about how he’d put his feet wrong with Ginny all morning. If it wasn’t her taking exception to them leaving her with the dishes it was her raised eyebrow when he told her to stay inside.

  “You really like her.” Juju was enjoying this. He all but grinned at the windshield, his bomber jacket zipped up all the way and two thick sweaters under it. His gloves lay on the seat between them, with Lee’s own.

  Oh, for cryin’ in the mud. “She’s a nice lady.” A ghost of her perfume and shampoo clung to Lee’s shaken-clean shearling, or maybe he just imagined it.

  “No, I mean, you really like her.”

  Lee restrained the urge to cuss. “Yeah, well, it ain’t gonna do me much good if I do, now is it?”

  “Why you say that?” Juju glanced at him, perplexed. “She likes you too.”

  How can you tell? But there would be no end of teasin if he asked. Lee’s discomfort mounted another notch. “Juju, watch the damn road.”

  “Can’t see it. Goin on touchy-feels.” But the younger man sobered, his full lips turning down. “What the hell is goin on, Lee?”

  “Wish I knew.” And wasn’t that the damn truth. Except Lee had a few ideas, each more uncomfortable than the last.

  Juju shook his head a little. With his hair smashed flat under a hunter-orange ski cap and his nose a little raw from the cold, he looked like a teenager. “Sounds like the Pocalypse to me. End Times. My mama would say so.”

  It was the first time Lee could remember Juju saying anything about his family. Lee rested his hands on his knees, not looking at the scrapes or scars across his knuckles. There was still engine grime under his nails, you couldn’t scrub that shit out. Not like Ginny, clean and perfect. She even made his bed neatly when she got up, though he hadn’t bothered once he left the Army and Nonna passed on. It felt like a rebellion at the time, but now it just seemed…sloppy.

  Embarrassing. Even Juju made his bed, nice and tight-cornered like he was back in basic.

  “Would it still be the end times if someone did it?” Lee turned the sentence around in his head, wiggled his toes a little inside his Army kickers. It was nice to have decent socks. “I mean, one of us. Insteada God.”

  “You mean, like the guvmint?” Juju chewed over the thought, then nodded. “I guess. God might as well do it that way.”

  Which was uncomfortably close to Lee’s own thinking. “Guess it don’t matter.” Snowglare lit the inside of the four-by; there was no dust on the dash. Everything was neat and shipshape as Juju’s own tidy self.

  Juju drifted the four-by into a curve, careful and cautious. “Well, prayin’ might help.”

  Never knew you were one for that, soldier. “Goin beggin’ don’t suit me, Juju.”

  “Me neither. We ain’t really lookin for a car, are we.”

  “Oh, we’ll take one if we find it.” Lee supposed he should feel bad about telling Ginny what was technically a lie, but the last thing he wanted was her worrying. She seemed to be a right champion at it.

  “I reckon we’re lookin for ammo.” He sucked his lower lip in, made a soft thoughtful sound. “And maybe other things.”

  “You’d be right.”

  Juju absorbed this. He was the cautious half of the Martin’s Garage duo. When he spoke again, it was soft, meditative. “You think Tip’s in hell? Because…”

  “Nah.” He had enough of that in the service, and so did you. “I’m thinkin it’s more like the Rapture. Got taken because he was a good ’un.”

  “Well, then you’d be gone too.”

  Now that was downright polite of Juju to say. Lee contented himself with a simple, “Huh.” Neither a confirmation nor a denial. “More like you would.”

  “Shit.” Juju drew the word out, managing to convey shy thanks and discomfort at the same time. “I got me another question.”

  I’ll bet you’re just fulla them this morning. God knows I am. “Shoot.” Lee’s mouth twitched, realizing that was probably the wrong way to say go ahead at this point.

  “Well now.” Juju eased off the accelerator as the road sloped down. “You think Imma catch what Tip had? That why you asked if he bit me, I figger.”

  “If you ain’t got it by now…” Lee let the sentence trail off.

  “I been thinkin. Seems like people been talkin about a flu goin around, lately. Old lady Harlowe got sick, Patty Dupree at the Lightning tole Tipton half her church was out sick. I heard a lot of coughin last week.”

  Lee shifted uncomfortably. “Winter comin in. People stayin inside and breathin on each other.”

  “But half a church out with the sniffles fore’nit snowed?”

  Margie at the diner had said something similar. “I dunno—shit!” Lee didn’t mean to yell, but the shadow darting from the ditch was too scuttle-quick, and both his feet dug into the floor like he was the one driving, hitting clutch and brake at the same time.

  Juju was a little ahead of him, downshifting even though the four-by was an automatic, and not stamping on the brake or twisting the wheel. The four-by slowed, its black hood gleaming with melted snow, and the darting thing skidded to a stop, its head upflung and its gray-filmed eyes rolling. Foam spattered hot and rank from its working jaws, and veinmaps of livid crimson threaded from the corners of its lips.

  It wore Pat Cambell’s duct-taped boots, his orange hunting overjacket with the fringes of duct tape hanging from each sleeve, and it had Pat’s shock of rusty hair. His Campbells were Irish to the east, distinct from the German ones who lived west of the Crossing. And ne’er the twain shall meet, Nonna once said, working at bread dough with her capable
hands. Pretty, like Ginny’s, even when she got old and so thin a hard wind could knock her over. Don’t you never put the Campbells at the same table, less’n you want some trouble.

  “Easy there,” Juju said. “Jesus Christ, he ain’t movin’.” The four-by drifted forward, its tires sinking through the crust, chains gripping hard. “Lee? He ain’t movin.”

  “Keep goin.” The sweat was all over him now, and his legs refused to relax. He was trying to stand up in his seat, and it wasn’t working. The seatbelt gripped his hips, dug into his right shoulder. “See if he does.”

  “What if I hit him?” Juju sounded steady enough, but his knuckles stood up on the steering wheel and the whites of his eyes had swelled.

  “It don’t matter.” Lee realized it didn’t, a split second after the words left him. “If he don’t move you just bump him.”

  The thing wearing Pat Campbell’s skin made a queer little movement with its head, for all the world like a dog trying to figure out which direction a sound was coming from. Its jaw kept working, and as the four-by crept closer, moving at an idle now, its filmed eyes rolled and its tooth-champing increased.

  “Jesus,” Juju whispered. “He ain’t gonna move.”

  “Don’t let that worry you.” Lee searched for something else to say. “He always was an asshole.”

  A shaky exhale, half laugh and half whistling anxiety, shook out of Juju’s throat. He still didn’t touch the brake, which showed he was thinking. “Drives a Dodge. A half-ton, right? Big-ass truck.”

  “Never changes the damn oil in it.” Lee thought it unlikely Irish Pat would ever drive again, but thinking about the truck was probably better for Juju’s nerves than anything else, at this point. The thing’s filmed, sightless gaze was downright creepifying, as well as its air-chewing. Everything about this was creepy as fuck, but at least they were in a car. Relatively safe, unless the thing decided to go through the windshield. But no, it just stood there, its head moving snakelike and its arms hanging loose, disjointed. “Huh.”