Rudy noticed the holes in the store’s inventory on his second walk though. Aside from the cigarettes ripped from the hood above the counter, there was no beer left to speak of in the cold case; just a few 40-ounce bottles way in the back and a lonely six-pack of O’Doul’s, which really didn’t count as beer anyway.
Rudy shook his head as he passed on his way to the canned goods, hoping whoever murdered Javiar would be reduced to cannibalism once the party was over.
4
The back of the Cherokee was nearly filled when the battered Chevy Suburban swung into the parking lot, the silhouettes of two men with billed caps in the front seat. They killed the headlights, settled on a slot in front of the ice machine, then the bills of their caps turned to regard Mike and Keith, who were shifting some of the items around in the back of the Cherokee. Rudy was still in the store, collecting a few last items that hadn’t immediately crossed their minds like toilet paper and tampons.
The doors of the Suburban creaked open as if they were old and arthritic, all its joints corroded with rust. The two men inside eased out, their boots touching softly on the asphalt.
Mike and Keith paused in their work, eyeing them with suspicion as they approached the pumps instead of entering the store, a .45 revolver swinging casually between them.
“Evening,” one of them said, tipping his Texas Rangers cap by way of greeting. His teeth were brown and gritty with tobacco, the sleeves of his shirt spattered with blood. “How y’all doin’ tonight?”
Mike shrugged beneath the raised hatch, aware that the rifle and the shotgun were in the front and back seats; useless and out of reach. “Could be better,” he admitted, reaching up and closing the hatch, locking all their groceries safely inside. He glanced at Keith, standing by the pump with a pale sheen of sweat slicking his forehead.
The second man, whose John Deere cap was soiled with greasy stains, looked inside the Cherokee and brought up the gun. “I gotta agree with you there, bro. Things could most definitely be a
whole
lot better. For
you
, that is.”
Texas began to strut around the Cherokee, his eyes gazing deep inside the windows. “Looks as if the two of you have been doin’ some shoppin’,” he commented, head bobbing with approval. “Gas tank all topped off too, I bet?” A greasy chuckle rose up into the kiosk, crackling off the white fluorescents. He looked at Keith with a lopsided grin. “
Outstanding
, Soldier, but it seems you’ve left your rifle there in the front seat, and I’m afraid that’s gonna cost you.” He reached behind his back and pulled a flashy pistol from his waistband. It was flat and chrome and its eye seemed to wink with gleeful intent.
“What is it you want?” Mike asked, looking back and forth between the two of them, the quaver in his voice unfortunate and unmistakable. He wondered if either of them had spotted Rudy’s shotgun yet. His eyes glanced beyond the immediate threat and saw the top of Rudy’s head over the store’s aisles, oblivious to what was happening out at the pumps.
“Well how about your
keys
to start with, seein’ as you’ve gone to all this trouble for us.” Texas held out his hand, palm up, bloodstains sewn into the lines crisscrossing there.
Mike reached into his pocket.
“Easy now,” Texas warned, arm stiffening, his thumb cocking back the hammer. “Take it nice and slow.”
The keys came out on a ring that trembled on the end of Mike’s finger. The keys to his apartment and the house on Quail Street were also on the ring. The apartment he didn’t give a damn about, but the sight of the house key gave him a moment’s hesitation. He saw the Cherokee pulling into the driveway, his bloodstained driver’s license clipped to the sun visor, the address clearly visible beside his smiling photograph, the face in the rearview mirror grinning beneath its Ranger’s cap.
He wondered if he was going to die here on the corner of 10
th
and Valley View and thought it strange he didn’t already know; this corner he’d passed a thousand different times…
The world seemed to be shrinking around him, folding itself up to the size of a brightly-lit stage, complete with guns and gas pumps.
“Hand ‘em on over,” Texas beckoned, tongue licking greedily at his lips. “C’mon now.”
The next thing he knew, the man had his keys.
The two thieves laughed softly, their guns relaxing the slightest bit, the cold metal seeming to bob and laugh right along, to nod and congratulate the men on their wolfish cunning.
Texas grinned at his companion. “Well Ed, what do you think? Should we just take their shit and leave, or should we have ourselves a little more fun?”
“Fun is fun,” Ed asserted, adjusting his John Deere cap, pulling it down so only the lower half of his face was visible, “so let’s have fun.” He gestured at Keith. “This one here’s been starin’ at me like he thinks I’m queer or something.” He coughed phlegmy laughter. “I’ll bet he wouldn’t mind gettin’ down on his knees and suckin’ my big old wad.” He started around the front of the Cherokee, arm stiff and the barrel of his gun pivoting on Keith. “Whadaya say, Soldier-boy? You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
Texas nodded encouragingly. “Have him do it right here at the pumps, Ed. Give the folks drivin’ by a nice show. Let ‘em know that strange days are here.” He tipped back his cap and laughed. “Strange days, indeed.”
“Good idea,” Ed agreed, his free hand crawling downward like a blind spider, feeling for his fly. “Be just like back in stir.” The grin on his face hardened, turned black as he glanced at Texas. “Keep an eye on that one,” he warned, jerking his head in Mike’s direction. “See that he stays put.”
Ed’s fingers worked and his jeans slumped down around his knees. He cocked the hammer of his giant six-gun. “All right now,” he said, grinning at Keith. “Down on your knees.”
“Suck your own dick,” Keith said, his voice strained.
The .45 lashed out, describing an angry arc through the fluorescents, its notched barrel striking Keith hard across the right temple. The blood that pattered to the concrete pad looked black under the stuttering lights. Keith wiped his face and looked hard at Ed.
Ed smiled, all his teeth coming out for the occasion. “This here gun has
real
bullets in it, Soldier. Sure as I’m standin’ here, they’ll open you up like a goddamn zipper. I seen it once tonight already,” he assured them, shifting his eyes to include Mike. “Now you’ll get on your knees and do what I say or you’ll suck on this gas pump instead and when you’re done I’ll light you on fire. At this point I don’t particularly care which; I get off either way.”
Slowly, Keith planted his palms on the scuffed concrete and knelt down, his gaze never leaving the gleeful sparkle floating beneath the bill of the man’s cap.
“That’s more like it,” Ed grinned. He hitched his thumb into the waistband of his shorts and his penis fell out, limp and unwashed, like something that had been fermenting in the soil. The shadow of the gun hovered over Keith, threatening, but not quite steady. “Nice and gently now,” Ed instructed. “Make me feel it.”
Texas giggled, delighted with the show. His gun wandered slowly out of line with Mike.
Rudy, whose view of the proceedings was obscured by the gas pumps, stood at the checkout counter with a dozen or so bulky items and began sorting through them. “Stay Free Maxi-Pads,” he said in a loud, clear voice, holding up the package like an obscure offering to the security camera. “Six boxes.”
The declaration cut right through the broken windows and bounced across the parking lot, startling the two newcomers. Ed jumped, his head swiveling sideways as Texas swore out loud.
What happened next happened very quickly.
Keith Sturling had played a little football in high school, mostly running back, but he’d hit the blocking sleds enough to know what to do at that moment. The trick, as the coach had explained, was to run
through
the obstacle in your path, to make a ramrod of your body and not let it bounce you back on your ass. And that’s exactly what Keith did: launched himself at the spindly legs and elongated penis in front of him and ploughed through them like a bull in a Halloween corn maze.
Ed made a startled and breathless sound, something between a hiccough and a grunt, and as he hit the concrete the gun fired into the wings of the kiosk above their heads. One of the florescent tubes exploded and a hail of broken glass tinkled down.
Mike launched himself at Texas as the sleek, chrome pistol swung round toward Keith. Keith had his hand in his pocket now, reaching for the 9mm Mike had given him out of his glove compartment. He pulled it free, checked the safety, and pointed it at Ed, whose own gun had clattered away.
Rudy ran out of the store dropping tampons as Keith assumed a shooter’s stance and squeezed two quick rounds into Ed’s ribcage. His body twitched with the impact of each slug and then lay still in the bright glow of the filling station, his pants twisted around his ankles and his penis lying across his belly like a dead mackerel. Blood began to ooze out from under him, searching for cracks and channels in the concrete as Mike and Texas struggled for the shining silver gun.
The struggle ended when Keith walked over and put Mike’s pistol in the would-be thief’s face.
A shocking spray of blood and brain splattered against the gas pumps. The man’s Rangers cap flew away and landed near Rudy’s feet. It had a ragged hole the size of a baby’s fist punched through the crown.
The three men looked at one another in the ringing silence.
The world had suddenly changed. They found that they were changing with it.
Strange days, indeed.
“Grab that last load you went in for,” Mike told Rudy, then bent down and took the former Rangers fan’s gun from his cold, dead fingers. “Then let’s get the hell out of here.”
Keith took a step toward the Cherokee then stopped, his expression clouded, unable to recall what he’d been doing before the Suburban pulled into the lot.
“Grab that gun,” Mike said, pointing to Ed’s .45, lying several feet from the man’s outstretched hand. “And check their rig. See if they brought any spare ammunition.”
Keith nodded, grateful for the distraction.
Three minutes later they rolled back onto Valley View, heading west this time, back to Quail Street. Back home.
On the way they passed a brightly-lit Subway franchise. The booths were empty and the young girl behind the counter looked bored, ready to wrap up her meats and cheeses and close up for the night.
Rudy marveled at this, knowing that two blocks away a 7-Eleven had just crumbled off the face of the Earth.
Part Three:
The Living
1
Three days passed.
During those three days gunshots could be heard at a distance and the electricity went on and off, as if a heated battle were being waged around a master switch at the local substation.
The men of Quail Street (a subdued Larry Hanna included) stood in a knot at the end of Bud Iverson’s driveway, trying to divine which way the storm was heading. For the most part it seemed confined to town, but occasionally a charged volley would erupt much nearer.
Rudy suggested they might better use the time reinforcing their homes, nailing up plywood and bracing their doors with 2x4’s, working in pairs to get it up quickly and efficiently. At the same time he broached the subject of a last safe fallback room with Larry, reminding him of his bomb shelter.