Our Home is Nowhere (The Borrowed Land, Book 1) (6 page)

12

Joe woke to the sun peeking over a distant hill, its light filtering through the tree where he lay casting shifting shadows over his body. He had traveled through the night, his main concern being to distance himself from his old life as fast as he could, before  pulling off a good distance from the highway. The last thing he wanted was some renegade traveler spotting him while he slept and making off with his motorcycle—and, possibly, his life.

He patted his chest with both hands and suddenly felt very exposed. He was wearing only his jeans and boots. Then he remembered; he had stripped off his jacket and shirt to make a pillow. He grinned, thankful to be alone when he looked so ridiculous. He stood up slowly, brushing back his oily hair with his hand, reminded of when he went camping before the war. Back then it had been him, his mother and father, and sometimes a friend from school if his parents felt like having company. But mostly it had just been the three of them camping in their small tent beside Ascarate Lake for the weekend. Fishing had always been the first order of business each day, when Joe would help his father catch and gut the fish while his mother would sit in a lawn chair beside the lake drinking margaritas and watching them. Things had changed so drastically, and the bitch of it was, he had no control over any of it.

He needed water. He walked along the highway until he found what used to be a lake, now more of a pond, and dipped his head into the water. He wished he could afford a motel, but he only had enough money for gas and maybe a little food for the trip. He’d accepted the fact that for the next few months he’d be living hand to mouth, but how was that any different than life back home? At least now he was free to do what
he
wanted.

After giving himself a quick wash with the murky water, he tugged on his shirt and threw the jacket over his shoulder. His bike, perched in the tree’s shade, was cool to the touch. Cracks were forming in the leather seat, but even so, it was an obvious improvement over the cheap pleather used on foreign rigs. Joe ran his thumb over the slight indentations, thankful that his bike wasn’t showing any serious signs of wear.

The engine roared into life, sending leaves and dirt skittering across the hard ground. Joe secured the backpack’s strap around his chest and checked the gas gauge that showed only a quarter of the tank remaining. He tapped the smudged glass, pursing his lips, and for the first time, worried about making it all the way to Slushland. The nearest gas station could be ten miles away, or a hundred. He had no choice but to keep traveling on.

.........

The nearest gas station turned out to be a squat building fifty-nine miles from where Joe had stopped to sleep. He pulled beneath its broken awning, which peppered the ground underneath with spots of bright light, and parked beside a pump marked ‘6’.

The windows of the gas station were boarded up, marred with graffiti and coated in a layer of mold. Joe hoped the place wasn’t deserted. He didn’t know how much further
his bike could carry him. It’d been a long time since he had pushed the bike to its limits of gas capacity, and he wasn’t sure of its breaking point.

He loosened the backpack strap from around his chest and slid off the bike to check the fuel pump. A nervous chill shot through him when he discovered the patches of rust on the nozzle signaling that the pump was dry. He pulled the trigger slowly and shook it.
Nothing. ‘Shit,’ he mumbled, slapping the nozzle back into the pump’s holster.

Before venturing up to the building’s entrance, he took a look around the deserted station. A square, flat lot took up most of the space to the right of the building. A deep gash cut through the lot’s concrete like a wound. Buried in the grass were some old tires and rusted bits of abandoned vehicles, torn apart, strewn about. Joe wondered about the half-mangled chassis sunk in the grass several yards away. From the looks of it, the chassis had belonged to a larger vehicle, most likely a van. Had a family once taken road trips, possibly to Florida, in that van—a family with two kids and two happy parents, singing traveling songs as they drove lazily along the open road, en route to better times?

Joe tried the gas station door. It creaked open, sending motes of dust spiraling around his hand that he waved away.

‘Anybody here?’ he called.

Plaintive music wafted through the squalid air to where Joe stood at the doorway. After a couple of seconds, a voice joined in with the expertly strummed guitar, keeping perfect harmony.

Joe pushed the door wider. He poked his head inside and glanced around. A stationary fan vibrated against a far wall, sending waves of warm air circulating around a room filled with toppled food racks. The tobacco shelves behind the cashier’s desk had been looted, the ground covered in broken glass. Joe cut to the left, following the tune’s sad trail.

A black tarp hanging from the ceiling split the room in half. Joe slowed, staying as silent as possible, and listened to the voice and guitar that came from behind the makeshift curtain. He gripped the crisp tarp and slid it aside. A man with a full beard and wrinkled, tanned skin was lounging in a rickety wooden chair and strumming a threadbare guitar. Joe squinted at the worn out sack of a man whose smooth, calming voice didn’t match its begetter.

The man opened his eyes and saw Joe standing there watching him, but didn’t immediately stop playing. He sang one last verse, thumbed the final chord decisively,
then lay a gentle hand over the strings. ‘You ever hearda knockin’?’

‘Sorry,’ said Joe, motioning outside with his thumb. ‘I stopped in for some gas and—’

‘Ah,’ the man interrupted, setting the guitar aside. ‘I figgered you was here for the parade and apple pie.’

Joe tightened his pack around his chest, feeling uncomfortable.
‘Parade?’

The man sighed. ‘Damn, you’re thick.’ He stood up. Dust billowed off his clothes. ‘The last parade that came through here was before the war. And I ain’t seen apple pie for a long, long time.’ He stretched out a hand to Joe.
‘Name’s Dick.’

‘Joe.’

‘What’d you think of my blues?’

Joe shuffled his feet over the dirt-covered floor and eyed Dick’s guitar. ‘It was great. They don’t play music like that on the radio.’

‘Sure as hell don’t. Now they got all sorts of noise pouring through. Rather listen to static. So, you’re needin’ some gas.’ Dick went to the window and scrubbed his hand over the glass so he could see the parking lot. ‘Nice bike.’

He motioned towards the black tarp. ‘Let’s go outside.
Too damn muggy in here.’

Outside wasn’t much better. The temperature seemed to be rising by the minute, and the flies launched at them with the intensity of starving carnivores.

Dick led the way to Joe’s bike and stooped to look it over. He looked up from the wheels. ‘Fine piece of work you got here. Where you headin’?’

‘Slushland.’

The wind picked up, carrying with it the smell of rotten flesh from somewhere along the highway. Joe scratched below his nose, trying to ignore the stench.

‘What the hell is there for ya?’

‘I read about a job opening as a mechanic and thought I’d try my luck.’

Dick went from pump to pump, sniffing each for some remnants of gasoline. He shook his head. ‘You gotta be brave or just plain stupid to willingly strike out for Slushland, job or not. The old manager of this place, he was the latter and he was dead within a week of livin’ there.’ Dick slapped Joe on the back as he made his way to the station. ‘But you look like a tough kid. You’ll last longer I’m sure.’

Joe knew he wasn’t stupid. He had no unrealistic expectations about Slushland. He’d read plenty of newspapers, most he’d picked out of the trash; Slushland was a topic of discussion in at least one article per week. The homeless, who they called Slummers, were constantly touched upon, and so was the rise of the Guttermen, a group that had taken to the sewers some years after the war.

Slushland’s legendary poverty was another common subject in the papers. But Joe was quite accustomed to hearing about deprived territories. Hell Paso, being so close to the Mexican border, had been ripped in half after the war. Joe had been part of the rebuilding process, sometimes going with as little as seven meals a week. He was used to sacrificing worldly wants when it came to obtaining worldly needs, like a roof over his head and a cup of water, however filthy.

Dick pulled up a flimsy garage door to reveal a beaten car standing lopsided on broken shocks. A workbench crowded with unused tools sat beside the car, along with a flat tire and a stack of tattered comics with sun-faded covers. Joe noticed a pale pink smear on the floor behind the car that looked like it had been scrubbed multiple times.

‘This is Betty,’ Dick said. ‘And don’t get to laughin’. I’m sure you got a name for your bike out there. Betty died on me year before last, and I ain’t much good with tools. I was born with a green-thumb, not an oily one.’

‘Why are you introducing me to Betty?’

‘I’ve got some gas stockpiled,’ Dick explained.
‘Enough to get you to Slushland.’

‘So what do you need from me?’ Joe asked, already having an idea of the deal about to be struck. He’d learned in Hell Paso that mechanics were as sought after as doctors when it came to bartering services. Almost everyone had a broken-down vehicle, and they thought the key to their new fortune lay in the revival of that auto. On many occasions, Joe had been happy to trade a small repair for a meal, cigarettes, or a couple beers.

‘Instead of buyin’ it, how would you feel about a nice, clean trade. You get Betty runnin’ again and I fill up your tank.’

‘Let me take a look at her. You mind?’

‘Go right ahead.’

Joe popped the hood, wiping the sweat out of his eyes, and propped it up with his arm. He leaned over the engine covered in cobwebs and the remains of some small animal’s nest. He’d worked with cars like this before and was confident he could figure out the problem. He only worried that Dick might not have all the parts required for the repair. A car could always be jury-rigged, but Joe preferred his repairs to last for the long haul. With the proper tools, Betty wouldn’t take much longer than thirty minutes to fix, but Dick’s resources were slim and Joe had to work around that.

‘What d’you think?’ Dick asked.

Joe lowered the hood and pressed it firmly back into place. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

.........

An hour and a half later, Joe mounted his motorcycle. When he started her up, the needle on the gas gauge swung around violently to settle on ‘Full’. Joe smiled and patted the side of the bike.

Dick stood beside Betty in the garage’s shade, admiring her beauty as she rumbled with newfound life. As Joe rode past him, with his full tank of gas and the three comic books that Dick had tossed into the deal at the last minute, he nodded at the old man. Dick reciprocated with a broad smile and a hearty wave.

While Joe had been working on Betty, the idea had surfaced in his mind that he and Dick could become partners—turn the gas station into an auto shop for travelers clearing the gap between Hell Paso and Slushland, and all the other small towns in between. Dick could learn the trade easy enough with a teacher like Joe; they had most of the equipment that would be needed for basic fixes, and what they didn’t have could easily be picked up in nearby towns. But Joe’s daydream had come to an abrupt end when he remembered why he had abandoned his home: to get as far away from Terrance as he could; to make it impossible for anyone to find him. The winding streets of Slushland were a perfect spot for anyone to disappear.

After driving several miles down the highway, Joe once again caught the scent of rotten flesh carried on the wind. He slowed down, drifting to the edge of the asphalt, and looked out at a field of dry soil and corn husks on the right. He could see a wooden sign sticking out of the soil in the middle of the field, tilting lopsidedly at the sky. He pulled off the highway and killed the engine, dismounting slowly and checking back the way he’d come. Dick’s gas station shimmered hazily on the horizon.

He climbed the rickety fence that enclosed the field and made his way towards the sign, the putrid smell growing stronger the closer he got to it. Soon, the air became so rancid, he had to put his shirt over his nose and breathe in his own odor. He read the sign from a distance.

HERE LIE THE UNBURIED DEAD CLAIMED BY WAR

Gingerly he stepped
forward, his shirt still tented over his nose, and looked into the massive pit. Bodies upon bodies crowded the immense, bottomless hole. Dirt had fallen from the edge of the pit, filling the gaps between corpses. It looked as if vultures had already had their way with them: many were missing eyes, ears, and noses. Blood dried long ago by the sun had crusted over the anemic bodies.

Joe stumbled backwards, retching inside his shirt. The sign, baking beneath the sun, blared at him, demanding that he recognize these lonely souls. Joe backed away from the pit as quickly as he could, unable to take his eyes away from it, until he bumped into the wooden fence. Pulling his shirt down from his nose, he leapt the fence, started his bike back up, and tore away from the graveyard as if he’d been at the mouth of hell itself.