The Elegant Gathering of White Snows (10 page)

—30—

The Women Walker Effect: Rudy

Deputy Rick “Rudy” Rudulski was the kind of guy who was always waiting for a murder that didn't happen, a sink that never clogged, a taxi that never showed up. Rudy's dreams, meager as they might be, never quite materialized.

When Sheriff Holden told him he was being assigned to follow the walkers, he said, “No shit?” loud enough so the other police officers in the room would hear him. Then he slammed his black duty book against the side of his leg to look like he was pissed off.

But Rudy wasn't pissed off. He was so happy he could have flown right out the door and into his squad car. He knew there were reporters hanging around, and that something big might happen out there in the middle of nowhere with those goofy broads pounding the asphalt.

“This is
it,
” he told himself as he cranked the rearview mirror toward himself to check his teeth and the top of his brown wavy hair. “I can tell this is
it
.”

The only reason Rudy was even a cop was because he was standing in line to pay a parking ticket when he was handed an application to the state police academy.

With a decent but undistinguished work history, no dependents, no criminal record (or even the hint of one) and his Polish build that bordered on hulky, Rudy was a shoo-in for one of the two open positions.

Much faster than he had expected, Rudy graduated from the police academy and then found himself driving around the county in a slick uniform. With a gun on his hip, and not a clue as to how in the world he had come to be at the wheel of a squad car that had the biggest engine he had ever seen in his life and perpetual radio chatter about citizen business throughout the state, Rudy was privy to confidential information about everyone from the mayor to the mailman.

When Rudy caught himself dozing during his weekly runs across the county, he would quickly tell himself that he would either be promoted or that he was only doing it for the money until something better came along.

One of the many things Rudy didn't know was that his long-time girlfriend Michelle was about to dump him. His lack of interest in a permanent relationship and his inability to do something “wonderful, magical and brilliant” for her had made her almost physically ill over the seven years of their courtship. Michelle was an attractive, bright third-grade teacher who had passed up more than one dating opportunity to give her twenty-eight-year-old beau with a badge another chance.

In fact, this morning as Rudy drove out of the county garage and into the bright spring sunlight, Michelle had already packed up every single thing he had ever given her and placed them in two large cardboard boxes. She was going to dump them on his front step, along with a short but sweet note that told him to “get a life and eat shit.”

Michelle also changed her phone number and had already made plans to go to the Dungas Bay Inn for happy hour with her friend Jane, who was so happy Michelle was ditching Rudy that she planned to buy the drinks all night long.

Clueless, Rudy stepped on the gas as he pulled out of the garage so he could hear the tires squeal against the edge of the concrete right where the road started. He did that every morning, and every morning the barber across the street flipped him the bird because he was certain someday Rudy was going to come right through his front window.

Rudy's interactions with women left much to be desired. If he had been prone to do something as simple as think about this fact, he would have remembered his mother wiping his face in public when he was a teenager, telling him to stand up straight in front of his buddies and how she always spoke to his father in a tone of voice that sounded like fingernails on a chalkboard. He had lost touch with his sister Joyce after his parents moved to Arizona, and he had never dated much before hooking up with Michelle, which was fairly surprising because he often made more than a few women on the street pause and wonder what he might look like out of his uniform. Introspection was one of those things he never quite got around to. What he needed, but didn't know he needed, was a rather large glimpse into the heart of a woman.

As he moved out of the city and toward the stretch of highway some sixteen miles from Granton where he would find the women walkers, Rudy wondered briefly if he'd better start thinking about what his day might be like out there, but he could barely imagine anything. Rudy's lack of emotional involvement with the opposite sex gave him a huge disadvantage on this big assignment.

Rudy came from a nice family. His mother and father loved him, did everything they could to make certain he knew right from wrong and followed the rules, and provided at least basic direction to his life. Rudy was simply satisfied to stay in his hometown, never set a goal and never thought to look around the corner. Nothing inspired him, so goal setting wasn't his forte. He wasn't a bad person, just the kind of son who made his mother wear out one rosary after another praying fervently, “Pretty soon now, Rudy will . . .” and right there at the end of the sentence, she could fill in just about anything she wanted to.

Many people could, and in fact do, spend their entire lives living just like Rudy and never think twice about it. Except that way in the back of Rudy's mind, there was a question that needed answering. He couldn't answer it, however, because as yet he didn't know what the question was. He knew he wasn't happy. He always felt like he was in a state of suspended animation, like he was supposed to be somewhere else doing something else, but he had no clue what any of that could be.

Rudy stopped at the Super America for an extra-large cup of black coffee, two chocolate-covered donuts, and a copy of
The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
. He flirted with Diane the clerk; told Sam Witgby his rear tire was low; decided to walk around his car to inspect his own tires; then got back into the car, spilled coffee on the passenger seat and rubbed in the stain with the edge of his watch.

“Here we go,” he said to absolutely nobody as he pulled out onto the highway and turned left onto Wittenberg Road.

For the first couple of miles, all Rudy heard was the wind in the back windows, his own breath—steady and even—and one static hum that bleeped from the police radio. The sun was just stretching awake, and Rudy could tell that half of the country was still trying to accept the arrival of morning. He liked these first few minutes of a shift when anything seemed possible, when he had no idea what would happen, when he held the notion, even if misplaced, that this would be the day when something big would happen to him.

Those first thoughts could carry Rudy through the most boring day in the history of the world. He was actually one hell of an optimist, but he never bothered to assess himself that way or to wander into deep and uncharted philosophical waters. If a door fell on top of his head, Rudy would say, “A door fell on my head,” and not, “Why did that door fall on my head right here in the middle of the desert when there is not a doorway in sight?”

He let life steer him from one point to the next without ever thinking about what he really wanted to do with his gift of moments. He bought his pickup truck because it was the first vehicle he saw after he was told the engine in the car his dad had given him could no longer be fixed. His apartment was next door to his brother-in-law's office, in a fairly rundown and dirty part of town, but Rudy never considered moving. Today as he drove to his assignment, he had no insights into this group of women or their potential to change his life forever.

Just after he passed Grunkees Corner, Rudy began to notice those water bottles that athletes carry lying along the edge of the highway. Sheriff Holden had told him that some people were leaving water and food for the women, and not to disturb anything of that nature because when they were finished, he would send someone to collect it all and take it to the homeless shelter in Harrisburg.

There weren't that many bottles, but it seemed to Rudy as if they were pointing the way for him. “That's cute,” he said aloud.

They reminded him of his mother, because where he grew up there was still a milkman and she used to line up the empty milk bottles down the long wooden steps at his house. Sometimes she would leave a bag of cookies or a pie or fresh baked rolls near them. Rudy had not bothered to go and see his parents since they retired and moved six years ago. He had a sudden unexpected urge to talk to his mother and tell her something nice. The urge started as a slow thought that gradually took hold of him so fiercely he thought he might cry.

“Jesus,” he said, trying to shake himself out of it. “They're just water bottles on the side of the damn road.”

When the thought would not leave him, Rudy picked up his radio and called in to the station.

“Hey, Brocter,” he said to the dispatcher. “Papa Goose out here chasing the duckies. What's the 10-80? Are they airborne? Crawling? How close am I if I'm near Hanson's farm?”

“Rudy,” answered Brocter, “is that you?”

“Yeah, it's me, who the hell do you think it is, the fucking Queen of England?”

“You sound kind of funny.”

“Well, it's me, okay?”

“Yeah,” said Brocter, still not sure. “What did you want again?”

By now Rudy had actually forgotten why he called in.

“Rudy?”

“Listen, I'm just on this walking thing out here, and I want to know if anyone has seen them yet today, that's all.”

“Geez man, are you sick?”

Rudy thought to himself that anyone who hadn't bothered to see his mother for six years must be sick. Now, where that came from he had no idea but he told Brocter, “No,” when he really wanted to say “Yes, frickin' absolutely, what's it to you?”

Brocter's voice squawked over the radio. “Nothing yet, but maybe they slept late because they haven't stopped or anything for shit, what was it, two days or something.”

“Well okay, then I'll just wait, but if you hear anything, call.”

Rudy couldn't eat his other donut after that. He slowed down, rolled down the window, and took a whiff of the morning. The spring air filled up his lungs and he held it inside of himself for as long as he could, thinking something strange again. He was picturing what the women looked like as they walked down this very stretch of highway.

“I feel like I'm drunk or something.” He put his coffee cup to his nose to see if it smelled funny. “Maybe Brocter's right, and I'm sick or something. Shit.”

Rudy knew he was getting close to the walkers when he spotted one of those big television trucks festooned with antennas parked alongside a ditch. Ahead of that, two other cars and a group of people were standing in a circle sipping coffee out of Styrofoam cups. He had to break the news to them that they had to leave the women alone.

When Rudy got out of the car and his feet touched the highway, he felt as light as a feather, yet invincible, like he would do anything to make sure no one bothered a group of women he had never seen before in his life.

First he went to the television truck, totally forgetting that they had the power to send a vision of him clear across the county so fast it could make your head spin. He reviewed the sheriff's orders and warned them that if they went any closer, he would stop them. He said it in a kind way, softer than he might have on any other day of his life. Then he tipped his hat and walked toward the larger group of people. Rudy gave them a polite notice as well. A remark about the nice day, and then he was back inside of his car and studying his palms.