26

 

EMERY’S HAND REACHED FOR Adam. They’d been driving for a few hours. The strange quiet mixed with bad classic rock forced her to squirm. She wanted out of these clothes. She wanted out of this cramped space. She wanted a hot shower, wanted someone to hold her, for real, and tell her it’d be all right, that she’d make it out of this thing.

Bruce reached for the gearshift and stroked the inside of Emery’s thigh. She wasn’t sure if it was accidental or on purpose. She cringed nonetheless, closing her knees as awkward thoughts raced within her. How long until they reached Bethpage? What did Adam expect to find there? She still didn’t have a clue why she trusted him, only that he’d gotten her out. But the uncertainty ahead was still bothering her.

 “Are you all right?” Adam asked.

She stared back in aggravated silence.

“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.”

That was close, but it still wasn’t enough.

 “No need for you kids to whisper,” Bruce said, showing off his toothy grin. “We’re all friends here.”

There was something un-right about him.

Adam swallowed hard, trying to keep his cool. “So how long have you been driving big rigs?”

“Ahh, heck, ask me a real question, kid,” Bruce replied. Once the quiet had its play, he continued, “About eighteen and a half years, I guess, give or take some months. It’s a weak job, but the pay ain’t too bad for the work, and there’s a few other added perks.” His wink insinuated something indiscreet.   

“One-night stands…charming,” Emery sighed under her breath.

“Plus meeting roadies like you gives me a reason not to drive this big rig into a sycamore at seventy-five just outta pure boredom.” His eyes panned the cab space. “Rather interesting, though, don’t ya think?”

“What?”

“My coming along right as you and the hostile one—” Bruce sent another playful wink her way, “—are storming outta the gates of hell. You’d think you were abducted or somethin’.”

Emery squeezed Adam’s hand. Her pores thickened with sweat, and the lingering seconds were several lifetimes. Her cheeks and neck itched.  

“Relax,” Adam whispered. “He doesn’t know anything. You’re safe.”

“Easy for you to say. He isn’t groping your thigh like a horny sophomore.”

“Just…relax,” Adam said.

“Now, friends,” Bruce started with a groan, “you’re making me feel all left out.”

“Oh, it’s nothing,” Adam replied, sticking his head out to get a good look at the stranger. “She was just telling me one of her friends lived off that last exit back there. It’s been years since they’ve seen each other.”

A nod. “Oh, want me to drop you off there?”

“No, no,” Emery said firmly, the slits of her eyes like razors. “It’s all right. My buddy here just doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut.”

“You sound ticked off.”

“She’s fine,” Adam said.

My hero, Emery thought mockingly.

“No worries. Just trying to be friendly.”

A little too friendly, she thought.

“So, got any kids?” Adam said. He was bad at small talk.

“Two. A daughter that won’t talk to me and a son that hates my guts. Oh, and an ex-wife that’d relish any opportunity to eat my heart out with a spoon. Yeah, I got me some family.”

Their faces shifted from nervous to disturbed.

“Rough.”

“Yup, well, they caught me well and good…in bed with their aunt. Mommy and the kids didn’t respond too fondly to the family reunion, let’s just leave it right there.”

“Got any regrets?” Adam asked.

“Do I got regrets?” Bruce slurred. “Some, but that isn’t one of them. Shoot, I was gone to them before the rendezvous with ol’ Aunty. Good riddance. Geez, you two stink like a crapshoot. Should we stop and get you cleaned up? I’m no Betty homemaker, but you two are filthy as a mother.” His nostrils flared as he distracted his mind from the smell with more idle chatter. “You know something, kid. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry’s got their thing. Infidelity was mine. Doesn’t make that tramp any better than me. I mean, let me tell ya, she had her issues, same as the rest.”

Emery sank into herself. Her mind wandered to thoughts of her parents. How her mom had done to her what this peculiar trucker had done to his family. It wasn’t right. It was sick. Her stomach flipped, and she felt the crunch in her nose as the grungy stranger carried on.

“I loved their mother, and I loved them good, cross my heart.” He took a moment. “But I guess I just loved myself more.” That toothy, stained grin of his came out of hiding a second time.

Emery snarled.

“Suppose they’d be about your age. Haven’t called ’em in a while, you know. Last I heard, my daughter was afraid she’d been knocked up by some reckless card player and Zach was busted for possession of marijuana. A lot of marijuana.”

Emery wasn’t sure if this guy wanted sympathy or an award for Best Deadbeat Dad. It was alarming how dysfunctional parents, families, everybody could be. There was no normal anymore. There just wasn’t any room for normal. Dysfunctional was the new normal. Heartache was the normal. Separation. Lies. The more she sat and listened, the more she wanted him to shut up. She found herself wishing they’d never jumped out in front of this truck, never asked for a ride.

“You know, no matter whatcha do, history’s destined to repeat itself.” He popped open a can of beer. Suds spilled onto his crotch and dripped down the bucket seat, but he ignored it. The conversation, it seemed, had gotten the best of him.

Adam and Emery shared a concerned stare.

Bruce’s eyes moved over Emery. She was starting to panic. No way this was safe, or even legal, for that matter. She wanted to get out. She blinked. With his free hand, Bruce brushed her hair away from her face. He saw Adam flinch but did it anyway.

It felt like spiders were dancing along her sickly face.

“Kayley, my baby, she even looks kinda like you, come to think of it. Real pretty face, you know, without all the sexy scars.”

I want my mask. I want my freakin’ mask. I want Arson.

Emery chewed her bottom lip. Anger tugged at her eyes and pulsed in her forehead. “I want my mask,” she finally said.

“Ha-ha, what?” Bruce cackled.

“I said I want my mask, you sick slob.”

“Emery, take it easy. We’re getting closer.”

“Not close enough. This pig is making me nauseous.”

“Now, now, pretty bitty, what’s got you all worked up?” There was something sick in his smile, something twisted in the way Bruce spoke. Stiff hairs covering the lower half of his face started to move when his hot breath blew out. His flashing eyes were violent, black needles.

 “Nothing, I’m just fine,” Emery said with gritted teeth, nudging up against Adam.

“C’mon, freakshow, I won’t bite…I’ll only nibble.”

“Bruce, lay off the beer. And leave her alone. You’re making her uncomfortable,” Adam ordered.

Bruce burped. “Maybe you should shut your trap when I’m talking to the little lady.” His palm pushed a strand of filthy hair behind her ear.

The seconds between his words and his touch were horrifying. No one had touched her since Arson. And she didn’t want anyone to. She despised the thought. Why didn’t Adam just take care of it? 

“Don’t touch me, you creep. I’m not one of your messed-up kids you can feel up and use. Now leave me alone.”

Bruce got ugly and took his focus off the road. Beer suds coated his toothy, blonde smile. Before the next blink, he swung at Emery, his knuckles slicing her cheek open as if his hand were a blade.

She screamed.

Bruce took another swing, his can of beer slipping from his grip and spilling onto the floor mats. The stench of beer filled the cab. With a curse, he tore at her with his fingernails. The dirty claws were like rusty nails.  

A shower of panic washed over them with the screech of slick tires sliding across the interstate. They doubled over, Adam’s temple crashing against the dash enough to sting. Adam’s stare jumped from the road ahead to Bruce’s tormented composure and back to the road again. The truck was a wild beast on wet, black silk. Other eighteen-wheelers steered clear of the scene, speeding off into the mist.

“Let us out. Let us out now!” Adam ordered.

How much longer? Emery wondered. God, how much longer? She felt filthier. She felt rage, filled with panic and a longing for someplace safe. A place removed from the nightmare of these last…how long had it been? She wanted to escape, from that facility, from this trucker. From all of it. Get me out, she thought as she began to cry. Just get me out.

Adam suddenly jerked Emery’s body forward, accidentally shoving her chest into the gear shift, and with a quick thrust he jammed the heel of his hand into Bruce’s beet-red mug. The trucker’s jaw crunched and seemed to hang limply in the air, part of the bone jutting out of baggy, stubbly skin.

Nearly shredding to pieces from the pain, Bruce cut the wheel to the right hard. The road divots shot vibrations up their seats as the truck slid toward the breakdown lane.

 “Got a pair of brass balls on you, don’t ya, kid?”

Adam didn’t flinch. Instead, he struck the driver a second time with his knuckles and Bruce’s head quickly turned the driver’s side window into a spider web of cracked glass. As he beat the hound, Adam saw pictures of some young punk’s face. A child. The hard, calloused eyes betrayed the child, though, and so did a mouthful of spiteful words. “Prove it! Prove it! You think you’re special, freakwad? Prove it!” Adam’s neck twisted as curses tore through the filthy air of the cramped space.

Emery glanced up from her hunchbacked position and saw Adam’s eyes flash. He looked like an animal finally free from its cage.  

 “Arson.” She didn’t mean for it to come out, even if it was breathed to life in the form of such a faint whisper.

“Prove it!” The voices screamed in his ears, so loud it was like it was happening right here, right now. “Prove it, or we’ll hurt her!” In an instant, he was inside that small body of his, smaller and frailer than the one he now possessed. He was wearing a black t-shirt, one with a fiery bird sketched into it. Bits of the bird’s color and skin hadn’t survived the numerous wash cycles, but its vivid depiction of the phoenix reminded him of some weary soldier who’d been given a second life. A chance to become…something new.

She was there among the mockers. They danced around her, taunting her because of him. His sister. His beautiful baby sister. They tugged at her ruby-red hair, its brilliance an enduring and mystifying thing, unique and beautiful. He’d counted the freckles on her face before and claimed he knew each one by name, by shape, by hue. A row of not yet fully formed teeth hung down from a pair of lips that seemed wider than a face her size could hold. He had to save her. The young mob tore at her skirt, her thin legs shaking and afraid. Her teeth chattered; her eyes were lost in the pale and unconcerned dark.

Adam blinked and returned Bruce’s wounded grunts with more blows, his knuckles shredding the man’s cheek and tearing into a withering jaw. Blood and meat dripped over the ridges of a violent hand. The inside of his chest was a shotgun. “Don’t you ever touch her again!” he screamed.

Emery sat still and witnessed Adam’s elbows, wrist, forehead, and knuckles tear and wound. There was no sound but the sound of smacking and coughing, and then the stillness. Adam finished by grabbing Bruce by the throat. With one squeeze, his dirty fingernails bit into the trucker’s hairy gullet, and drips of red suddenly burned black. There was a vengeance in Adam’s stare.

“Adam!” Emery screamed as the truck spun toward a ditch. Frantic, he twisted the wheel, fighting to gain control again, but it was lost. The truck jackknifed and then crashed, its wheels a slippery mess and the three of them thrown over one another’s bodies. The driver’s window exploded, and glass showered over them, cutting up their arms. Then the truck ripped off the road and tore through a wall of soaked trees. Emery’s head swam.

The color faded from Adam’s skin. He fought for breaths. “Are…you…k, Lana? You o—…won’t let them hurt you. I won’t let him hurt you.”

He faded completely.

She was still shaking. She couldn’t stop. Bruce wasn’t moving. Adam wasn’t moving, but she knew he was still alive. How long before Adam woke up?

She wanted to scream, but her lungs wouldn’t give. The pain was a hornet’s sting. It pulsated through her body. It swelled and ached. The rain bled on her face, cold, as she whispered Arson’s name again.