Daeios- 140 Feet Down, page 3
“I’m telling it like I heard it, dear. Different scientists are predicting a new ice age, claiming the earth is reversing its polarity.”
“The news.” Mother shakes her head. “I believe what they’re preaching at church. The weather is a sign of God’s wrath for the immorality in the world. Murders. Suicides. Abortions. When they started terminating pregnancies in teenagers to lower the teen birth rate …” She clears her throat, indicating Maya.
Dad takes up the dropped baton. “It’s like we’re under siege. No mail service, no phones, no food. We’ve been sheltered from the worst, though. Some cities are in chaos. Store owners are staying home with their families, so people are breaking in and taking whatever they need. Or want. I don’t think people realize this is the end.”
“Shea?” It’s Maya. She nods toward Jace, who’s trying to untangle himself from the wet comforter. The deep wound on his neck has reopened, blood seeping from the thick black scab. I hurry to them, snatching a towel from a neat pile on the table and blot my dripping hair. Maya’s pixie cut is almost dry.
“Jace, hold on, I’ll help you.” He starts to thrash and scream, afraid of the comforter, the wild animal that’s holding him down. I put my hand on his blanketed shoulder to draw his attention from his raving mind. He startles and stares at me, wild-eyed. I can’t help but think, again, that he seems like a child, and he’s frightened out of his wits.
“Shea, what’s going on back there? Do I need to stop?” Dad asks, turning his head just enough to direct his question back to me.
“You most certainly will not stop, Aidan,” Mother says. “You wanted to bring him. Deal with his behavior as you drive.” She didn’t want to bring him? She crosses her arms and stares straight ahead as if she’s willing the RV forward.
“Thay.” Jace says my name, sort of. He recognizes me, at least. I notice his mouth breathing more now that he’s alert. His face is pinched and blue-gray around his nose and lips. He isn’t getting enough oxygen. Gloss makes users appear shiny and young when they first put it on, but it shrinks everything it touches, drying the skin and membranes when it sinks in. Jace’s skin is starting to dry out and shrivel like fragile, dried leaves in autumn. He used so much.
“What should I do, Shea?” Maya asks.
I feel like I’m in command, which is something I’ve never felt before. “Get him some food, something soft such as a banana or pudding, and a bottle of water.” Maya hops out of her seat and brings a small container of chocolate pudding and a bottle of water from the fridge. She hovers nearby, awaiting further instructions. “Wet a washcloth or sponge for me. I’m going to clean him up.”
She disappears further back into the RV and returns in a few moments with a sponge, latex gloves, and a small basin of warm, soapy water. The rain is pattering on the roof of the RV, and it’s tapping out a rhythm that doesn’t sound too threatening. Maybe I’m getting used to it.
“You’re good at this. Thank you,” I tell her, trying to smile as we wriggle our hands into the gloves. “Let’s sit him up. See if he’ll eat or drink anything while I give him a sponge bath. Don’t touch his skin with your skin.”
We’re able to get him into an upright position without much trouble. Jace acts calmer now, but his breathing is loud and raspy. He lets the wet comforter fall away from his bony shoulders and exposes himself to us. Maya turns away, blushing. She probably hasn’t seen a grown man’s genitals. I hope not; she’s only fourteen. She clears her throat and spoons some pudding from the cup to Jace’s waiting mouth as I cover the lower half of his body with the blanket.
“Shea? I don’t know if it’s true, but I heard the wind is so strong in some places that it’s carrying pets and little kids away. Do you think it could be true? Every time I see a poster of a missing child, I wonder.” Maya’s eyes are wide. She’s quiet for a moment, then, “We’re never leaving Daeios, are we?”
Jace chokes on the pudding, and Maya wipes his chin with the towel and gives him a drink of water. He guzzles noisily and chokes again.
“Try giving him smaller bites of food and small sips of water,” I suggest.
She nods and does as I say. She doesn’t repeat the question I don’t want to answer. Jace eats and drinks as a toddler does, his unblinking eyes following the food and water from Maya’s hand to his mouth. His usually blue eyes, the color of my favorite jeans, are all pupil, and I shiver at their blackness. He doesn’t look human.
“Let’s not give him too much, or he might throw up,” I say. She stops after one plastic cup of pudding and a half bottle of water, sets them aside, and fetches a dry towel to help with the sponge bath.
“I hate seeing him like this,” Maya says. “But at least he’s with us.”
It is hard seeing Jace like this. I miss my real brother. A couple of years ago, he completed the Ironman in Tempe in fifth place. He was so happy and full of life. I admired him so much. He stood up for me when Mother was being Mother. Now he regards Maya and me as his salvation.
I plunge the sponge into the soapy water and start wiping the worst of the grime from his face, ears, and neck. He smells like a yeti vacationing at a pig farm, and I have to stifle my gag reflex. I wash the blood off his neck and shoulder and clean the wound the best I can with a sponge. It’s an ugly wound. He leans his head back, closes those disturbing eyes, and looks peaceful, which calms me.
Jace’s terror of Y Chromo drove him to drug addiction. Everyone dreads Y Chromo, its cruelty and disregard for male human life. The chromosomal disorder causes the failure of two or more organs or systems at once. Many males die painfully and soon after the first symptoms arise. Some survive for months or years in agony, fighting for breath, losing tissue to gangrene, weak and unable to resist infections. Some, perhaps the lucky ones, enter low levels of consciousness, even coma. They’re the only ones who get relief from the misery. Most of the males affected by Y Chromo are infertile, even before showing symptoms of the disorder. If they do father male children, those children will likely have the disorder.
I’m afraid for my brother. I say a little prayer.
The RV drives over something large and yielding—tender?—on the road and slams to the right. I reach for Maya, but she falls to the floor. Dad takes a second to steer the unwieldy machine straight. Mother grips the dash and Dad’s seat like she’s being pulled down the drain. Some of the water in the basin splashes onto the floor, and Jace tips toward Maya, panicking again. He can’t right himself. Maya gets up and sets him upright using the damp towel, hugging him for a moment through the towel. He calms down again.
We continue with the sponge bath down his chest and over his shoulders, me sponging, and Maya toweling, until the RV slows down. The rain cascades down the windshield, the wipers at top speed and not keeping up. It’s not yet one o’clock, and it’s dark outside, like the frightened sun has already set.
“What’s wrong, Dad?” I ask, raising my voice over the noise of the rain on the roof and the slap-slap of the windshield wipers. Lightning tracks across the sky, giving us a show we didn’t pay for and don’t want. Thunder booms, following us—it has caught our tail.
“I can’t see well, Princess. I didn’t see what we hit back there, but another bump like that could damage the RV. It would be impossible to fix anything in this downpour, with the wind blowing debris. The radio went out a short time back, and with no phones or GPS, we’re on our own. Better safe than sorry.” Mother shoots him a look that could turn him to granite, but it doesn’t work.
Maya changes the grayish-pink water and finds a clean sponge and towel, and we work on cleaning Jace again. He looks better with a clean face. The wound continues to bleed. We’ve established a rhythm and have almost finished the front of his torso when he shits himself.
“Oh, my God.” I turn away, and Maya retches into the towel. Jace seems not to notice. But he notices that we’ve stopped bathing him and whimpers like a forgotten puppy.
I do not want children.
I go stand behind Dad’s seat and yell over the rain and the frenzied wipers. A long, leafless, tree branch flies in front of the windshield. “Dad, you’re going to have to stop and help us.” He’s driving almost thirty miles per hour. We’ll never get to Daeios at this rate.
“Good Lord, what is that smell?” Mother asks. Dad pulls onto the narrow shoulder and turns on the hazard lights. At a standstill, the heavy RV shakes in the wind.
My face flushes; I feel protective of my brother. “Jace had an accident. Dad’s going to have to prop him up in the shower and clean him.”
“Oh,” she says, without any of her usual fiery contempt. She faces front again and sits motionless, perhaps hypnotized by the rain. Dad shuts the wipers off before leaving his seat, and the rain comes down in a sheet across the windshield. It continues its tap dance on the roof, and I’m getting tired of hearing it.
Dad moves back to us, ducking his head and putting his arms out for balance to walk through the rocking RV. We help him wrap the damp blanket around Jace. Maya brings him a pair of yellow latex gloves. Dad puts them on and carries Jace, in the blanket, to the shower. After a few minutes, Dad brings Jace out, and he’s clean and no longer shiny from gloss. Dad removes the gloves and holds Jace in a standing position, facing away from me, while I towel him off. I hurry so he doesn’t shit on me.
I ask Mother if she brought any clothes for Jace. “Of course I packed for him,” she barks at me like I’m stupid. “His bag is the navy blue one.”
Swallowing hot words, I retrieve the bag and search for something Jace can wear that we can put on him without much difficulty. I find a pair of sweatpants, a zip-up sweatshirt, and a pair of boxer briefs. Unfortunately, there are no adult diapers. I return to Dad and Jace and start to help my wobbly brother get dressed.
“I’ll do it, Shea,” Dad says and takes over. Jace’s clothes hang on his gaunt frame. Dad heads back to the cockpit after helping my brother sit. He hasn’t said a word to Jace all day.
We approach Flagstaff—I can tell by the increased traffic—although it’s not your usual Saturday afternoon traffic. No spooks clogging the road for once. Since the cars have no drivers, they have no reason to flee to safety. The rain has slowed. There’s an occasional arc of lightning and burst of thunder. It’s not as dark as it was earlier. Dad’s still white-knuckling the steering wheel, but he’s increased his speed to match that of the surrounding traffic. Jace appears to have melted into the bench seat and is snoring loudly, with Maya in close attendance. He’s coming down from the drug, or he wouldn’t be sleeping. The shower speeded up the detox process.
I go up to talk to Dad, peering through the windshield. Debris blows around, leaving litter and broken branches everywhere.
“How’s it going, Dad?” It’s almost two o’clock. This may be the longest trip of my life. “Are we there yet?”
“Very funny. It’s not too bad, Princess, it seems to be letting up a bit.” He gives me a halfhearted smile. “We have a little more than a buck-and-a-quarter to go.”
“Let’s see. At thirty miles per hour, we’ll get there in—”
“Smart aleck. I’ll have you know we’re going sixty right now, and there’s not much traffic. We should be there in a couple of hours, barring any other … incidents.”
Mother scoffs. I throw her a dirty look, and she tosses one back. I go sit next to Maya, and she lays her head on my shoulder. She smells like baby powder.
We get through Flagstaff without any trouble. Thank God, it’s not backed up as it was when I left school. We can’t steal around traffic on the shoulder in an RV.
Dad maneuvers the RV onto Highway 89 North again, and I start to relax. I finger the pendant around my neck, looking down at the yellow gold sun—its rays glisten with tiny diamonds. It summons the pain of the day Scott broke up with me. He said something I didn’t understand and flashed me that adorable crooked smile of his. He stood up, tapped the end of my nose with his forefinger, and walked out of my apartment and out of my life. We were only together three months, but those three months meant everything to me. I loved that he called me “Babe.” I think I loved him. Love him. Since then I’ve been going crazy: drinking too much, not eating enough, smoking, and sleeping with guys who don’t care one heartbeat about me. They all leave in the night. Now I’ll never know if I had Scott’s love and left it behind. I rub my eyes to keep the tears in.
The radio lets out a gurgle of static, and Dad tries to tune in a station, but there’s nothing more. Lightning lights up the sky and the whole interior of the RV. Jace turns over with a grumble and a loud snort. Thunder crashes so loud it sounds like it’s ripping the top off the RV. Maya lets out a little scream and covers her ears, so I hug her and feel comforted by her warmth.
Something strikes the RV with a boom. We all cry out, and Jace sits bolt upright like he’s spring-loaded. The RV shuts down, and Dad steers toward the shoulder. He’s unable to make it off the road, and the hazard lights don’t work.
We sit in tense silence for a moment, the wind shaking the RV, until Maya says in a shrill, shaky voice, “Did we just get struck by lightning?”
It feels like my waist-length hair is standing straight up and the electricity is coursing through me.
“Is everyone okay?” Dad asks.
Everyone is okay, and no one needs to change his pants. Jace lies down and starts snoring as loud as a bull elephant, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to sleep again.
Dad gives the verbal command to start the RV, but it doesn’t respond. He tries it again. It doesn’t start. Mother screams a command, but she doesn’t scare the RV into starting either.
“Helen, will you get me the key from the glove box?”
“Where did you put it?” she asks as she opens the compartment.
“I didn’t put it anywhere. I thought you did,” Dad says. “Did you put it in your purse?”
Mother growls in irritation and starts digging through her ugly black purse, which is about the same size as my car. “I don’t know, Aidan. We did all this planning, and you didn’t put a key in the glove box?” She throws her purse at her feet in a fit of temper. “I don’t see one. What are we going to do?”
Maya goes to her. “Mom? You can’t find anything in your purse digging through it that way. Let’s dump it out on the table and go through it better.”
Mother hands the bag to Maya. We empty the contents of the purse on the table, and Maya and I sort through it while Mother and Dad watch from their seats. No key.
I open the purse and find a bunch of inside pockets. After going through several pockets of useless crap, I finally find a large key and take it to Dad. The RV starts, and Dad lets out a long breath and revs the engine with satisfaction. “Thank God it didn’t fry the electrical system, or we’d be driving the Zipper to Daeios.”
I picture the Flintstones in their Stone Age car as I scrape the junk on the table back into Mother’s gigantic purse and set it behind her seat.
About an hour later, Jace startles awake, sitting up and looking around him like he’s been fired upon.
“Where’d you put my mask?” he asks, and he gets up and stumbles around the RV. “Where’d you put my goddamned mask?” He’s not looking at any of us, but at someone or something we can’t see.
I clutch his shoulders and try to get him to sit. “What mask, Jace?” He starts at the realization that I’m there and throws my hands off.
“My mask, I need my mask. Everything depends on my mask!” He’s shouting now, walking in a circle and picking at his neck wound, smearing fresh blood onto his face. I’m afraid of him. I push Maya behind me and back away from him. We may be in more immediate danger in the RV with a drug-addled Jace than we would be outside in this terrible storm.
“What’s going on back there?” Dad says over his shoulder.
“I don’t know, Dad, he keeps saying something about a mask.”
Jace sits again, pulling his uneven blond hair, getting blood in it, and rocking. He repeats, “Mask. Mask. Mask. Mask,” as he picks at his wound. I don’t know what to do for him. I’m afraid he might attack me.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, he’s having withdrawal symptoms,” Mother says. She was a nurse before she married my father. Her bedside manner must’ve frightened patients into quick recoveries. She unbuckles her seatbelt and comes to us while Dad slows the RV to a crawl. Although an inch shorter than I am, she seems much taller because of her erect posture and imposing demeanor. “I was afraid of this, but no one listens to me.”
I think she was going to leave him behind. His own mother.
She kneels at Jace’s feet, wrestles his hands down, and holds them on his skinny thighs. Sweat’s running down his face, and his sweatshirt is wet. A bloody blotch grows on the collar under his right ear.
“That wound is a problem. Girls, get me a cool rag, the first aid kit, and a bottle of water.” Maya goes.
Jace pulls his hands from Mother’s and holds his head again. “No, no, no, no, no!”
“Give me the water, Maya,” Mother says, without taking her eyes off Jace. She tries to make him drink the water, but he spits it in her face.
“No use trying to bandage the wound with him acting that way. The doctor can deal with him when we get to Daeios.”
She takes my towel and wipes her face and hands as she makes her way to her seat and buckles herself in. Dad speeds up again. She helped for five whole minutes before resuming her throne.
Maya tries to put the cool cloth on Jace’s forehead, but he slaps it away. I see the hurt in her sweet face. He lies down on the bench seat and emits great sobs, easing to little whimpers, until he cries himself to sleep a few minutes later. Maya and I exchange worried glances. It’s so hard to see him suffer.
I was naïve when I thought this was going to be the longest trip of my life. It may be the longest trip of my afterlife, too.
Not long after Jace has settled down, his lips rattling with snores, the rain picks up in earnest again. Dad turns the wipers up high, and they battle to keep the windshield clear, but he has to slow down to see the road. After a few minutes, he says, “Uh, oh.”
“The news.” Mother shakes her head. “I believe what they’re preaching at church. The weather is a sign of God’s wrath for the immorality in the world. Murders. Suicides. Abortions. When they started terminating pregnancies in teenagers to lower the teen birth rate …” She clears her throat, indicating Maya.
Dad takes up the dropped baton. “It’s like we’re under siege. No mail service, no phones, no food. We’ve been sheltered from the worst, though. Some cities are in chaos. Store owners are staying home with their families, so people are breaking in and taking whatever they need. Or want. I don’t think people realize this is the end.”
“Shea?” It’s Maya. She nods toward Jace, who’s trying to untangle himself from the wet comforter. The deep wound on his neck has reopened, blood seeping from the thick black scab. I hurry to them, snatching a towel from a neat pile on the table and blot my dripping hair. Maya’s pixie cut is almost dry.
“Jace, hold on, I’ll help you.” He starts to thrash and scream, afraid of the comforter, the wild animal that’s holding him down. I put my hand on his blanketed shoulder to draw his attention from his raving mind. He startles and stares at me, wild-eyed. I can’t help but think, again, that he seems like a child, and he’s frightened out of his wits.
“Shea, what’s going on back there? Do I need to stop?” Dad asks, turning his head just enough to direct his question back to me.
“You most certainly will not stop, Aidan,” Mother says. “You wanted to bring him. Deal with his behavior as you drive.” She didn’t want to bring him? She crosses her arms and stares straight ahead as if she’s willing the RV forward.
“Thay.” Jace says my name, sort of. He recognizes me, at least. I notice his mouth breathing more now that he’s alert. His face is pinched and blue-gray around his nose and lips. He isn’t getting enough oxygen. Gloss makes users appear shiny and young when they first put it on, but it shrinks everything it touches, drying the skin and membranes when it sinks in. Jace’s skin is starting to dry out and shrivel like fragile, dried leaves in autumn. He used so much.
“What should I do, Shea?” Maya asks.
I feel like I’m in command, which is something I’ve never felt before. “Get him some food, something soft such as a banana or pudding, and a bottle of water.” Maya hops out of her seat and brings a small container of chocolate pudding and a bottle of water from the fridge. She hovers nearby, awaiting further instructions. “Wet a washcloth or sponge for me. I’m going to clean him up.”
She disappears further back into the RV and returns in a few moments with a sponge, latex gloves, and a small basin of warm, soapy water. The rain is pattering on the roof of the RV, and it’s tapping out a rhythm that doesn’t sound too threatening. Maybe I’m getting used to it.
“You’re good at this. Thank you,” I tell her, trying to smile as we wriggle our hands into the gloves. “Let’s sit him up. See if he’ll eat or drink anything while I give him a sponge bath. Don’t touch his skin with your skin.”
We’re able to get him into an upright position without much trouble. Jace acts calmer now, but his breathing is loud and raspy. He lets the wet comforter fall away from his bony shoulders and exposes himself to us. Maya turns away, blushing. She probably hasn’t seen a grown man’s genitals. I hope not; she’s only fourteen. She clears her throat and spoons some pudding from the cup to Jace’s waiting mouth as I cover the lower half of his body with the blanket.
“Shea? I don’t know if it’s true, but I heard the wind is so strong in some places that it’s carrying pets and little kids away. Do you think it could be true? Every time I see a poster of a missing child, I wonder.” Maya’s eyes are wide. She’s quiet for a moment, then, “We’re never leaving Daeios, are we?”
Jace chokes on the pudding, and Maya wipes his chin with the towel and gives him a drink of water. He guzzles noisily and chokes again.
“Try giving him smaller bites of food and small sips of water,” I suggest.
She nods and does as I say. She doesn’t repeat the question I don’t want to answer. Jace eats and drinks as a toddler does, his unblinking eyes following the food and water from Maya’s hand to his mouth. His usually blue eyes, the color of my favorite jeans, are all pupil, and I shiver at their blackness. He doesn’t look human.
“Let’s not give him too much, or he might throw up,” I say. She stops after one plastic cup of pudding and a half bottle of water, sets them aside, and fetches a dry towel to help with the sponge bath.
“I hate seeing him like this,” Maya says. “But at least he’s with us.”
It is hard seeing Jace like this. I miss my real brother. A couple of years ago, he completed the Ironman in Tempe in fifth place. He was so happy and full of life. I admired him so much. He stood up for me when Mother was being Mother. Now he regards Maya and me as his salvation.
I plunge the sponge into the soapy water and start wiping the worst of the grime from his face, ears, and neck. He smells like a yeti vacationing at a pig farm, and I have to stifle my gag reflex. I wash the blood off his neck and shoulder and clean the wound the best I can with a sponge. It’s an ugly wound. He leans his head back, closes those disturbing eyes, and looks peaceful, which calms me.
Jace’s terror of Y Chromo drove him to drug addiction. Everyone dreads Y Chromo, its cruelty and disregard for male human life. The chromosomal disorder causes the failure of two or more organs or systems at once. Many males die painfully and soon after the first symptoms arise. Some survive for months or years in agony, fighting for breath, losing tissue to gangrene, weak and unable to resist infections. Some, perhaps the lucky ones, enter low levels of consciousness, even coma. They’re the only ones who get relief from the misery. Most of the males affected by Y Chromo are infertile, even before showing symptoms of the disorder. If they do father male children, those children will likely have the disorder.
I’m afraid for my brother. I say a little prayer.
The RV drives over something large and yielding—tender?—on the road and slams to the right. I reach for Maya, but she falls to the floor. Dad takes a second to steer the unwieldy machine straight. Mother grips the dash and Dad’s seat like she’s being pulled down the drain. Some of the water in the basin splashes onto the floor, and Jace tips toward Maya, panicking again. He can’t right himself. Maya gets up and sets him upright using the damp towel, hugging him for a moment through the towel. He calms down again.
We continue with the sponge bath down his chest and over his shoulders, me sponging, and Maya toweling, until the RV slows down. The rain cascades down the windshield, the wipers at top speed and not keeping up. It’s not yet one o’clock, and it’s dark outside, like the frightened sun has already set.
“What’s wrong, Dad?” I ask, raising my voice over the noise of the rain on the roof and the slap-slap of the windshield wipers. Lightning tracks across the sky, giving us a show we didn’t pay for and don’t want. Thunder booms, following us—it has caught our tail.
“I can’t see well, Princess. I didn’t see what we hit back there, but another bump like that could damage the RV. It would be impossible to fix anything in this downpour, with the wind blowing debris. The radio went out a short time back, and with no phones or GPS, we’re on our own. Better safe than sorry.” Mother shoots him a look that could turn him to granite, but it doesn’t work.
Maya changes the grayish-pink water and finds a clean sponge and towel, and we work on cleaning Jace again. He looks better with a clean face. The wound continues to bleed. We’ve established a rhythm and have almost finished the front of his torso when he shits himself.
“Oh, my God.” I turn away, and Maya retches into the towel. Jace seems not to notice. But he notices that we’ve stopped bathing him and whimpers like a forgotten puppy.
I do not want children.
I go stand behind Dad’s seat and yell over the rain and the frenzied wipers. A long, leafless, tree branch flies in front of the windshield. “Dad, you’re going to have to stop and help us.” He’s driving almost thirty miles per hour. We’ll never get to Daeios at this rate.
“Good Lord, what is that smell?” Mother asks. Dad pulls onto the narrow shoulder and turns on the hazard lights. At a standstill, the heavy RV shakes in the wind.
My face flushes; I feel protective of my brother. “Jace had an accident. Dad’s going to have to prop him up in the shower and clean him.”
“Oh,” she says, without any of her usual fiery contempt. She faces front again and sits motionless, perhaps hypnotized by the rain. Dad shuts the wipers off before leaving his seat, and the rain comes down in a sheet across the windshield. It continues its tap dance on the roof, and I’m getting tired of hearing it.
Dad moves back to us, ducking his head and putting his arms out for balance to walk through the rocking RV. We help him wrap the damp blanket around Jace. Maya brings him a pair of yellow latex gloves. Dad puts them on and carries Jace, in the blanket, to the shower. After a few minutes, Dad brings Jace out, and he’s clean and no longer shiny from gloss. Dad removes the gloves and holds Jace in a standing position, facing away from me, while I towel him off. I hurry so he doesn’t shit on me.
I ask Mother if she brought any clothes for Jace. “Of course I packed for him,” she barks at me like I’m stupid. “His bag is the navy blue one.”
Swallowing hot words, I retrieve the bag and search for something Jace can wear that we can put on him without much difficulty. I find a pair of sweatpants, a zip-up sweatshirt, and a pair of boxer briefs. Unfortunately, there are no adult diapers. I return to Dad and Jace and start to help my wobbly brother get dressed.
“I’ll do it, Shea,” Dad says and takes over. Jace’s clothes hang on his gaunt frame. Dad heads back to the cockpit after helping my brother sit. He hasn’t said a word to Jace all day.
We approach Flagstaff—I can tell by the increased traffic—although it’s not your usual Saturday afternoon traffic. No spooks clogging the road for once. Since the cars have no drivers, they have no reason to flee to safety. The rain has slowed. There’s an occasional arc of lightning and burst of thunder. It’s not as dark as it was earlier. Dad’s still white-knuckling the steering wheel, but he’s increased his speed to match that of the surrounding traffic. Jace appears to have melted into the bench seat and is snoring loudly, with Maya in close attendance. He’s coming down from the drug, or he wouldn’t be sleeping. The shower speeded up the detox process.
I go up to talk to Dad, peering through the windshield. Debris blows around, leaving litter and broken branches everywhere.
“How’s it going, Dad?” It’s almost two o’clock. This may be the longest trip of my life. “Are we there yet?”
“Very funny. It’s not too bad, Princess, it seems to be letting up a bit.” He gives me a halfhearted smile. “We have a little more than a buck-and-a-quarter to go.”
“Let’s see. At thirty miles per hour, we’ll get there in—”
“Smart aleck. I’ll have you know we’re going sixty right now, and there’s not much traffic. We should be there in a couple of hours, barring any other … incidents.”
Mother scoffs. I throw her a dirty look, and she tosses one back. I go sit next to Maya, and she lays her head on my shoulder. She smells like baby powder.
We get through Flagstaff without any trouble. Thank God, it’s not backed up as it was when I left school. We can’t steal around traffic on the shoulder in an RV.
Dad maneuvers the RV onto Highway 89 North again, and I start to relax. I finger the pendant around my neck, looking down at the yellow gold sun—its rays glisten with tiny diamonds. It summons the pain of the day Scott broke up with me. He said something I didn’t understand and flashed me that adorable crooked smile of his. He stood up, tapped the end of my nose with his forefinger, and walked out of my apartment and out of my life. We were only together three months, but those three months meant everything to me. I loved that he called me “Babe.” I think I loved him. Love him. Since then I’ve been going crazy: drinking too much, not eating enough, smoking, and sleeping with guys who don’t care one heartbeat about me. They all leave in the night. Now I’ll never know if I had Scott’s love and left it behind. I rub my eyes to keep the tears in.
The radio lets out a gurgle of static, and Dad tries to tune in a station, but there’s nothing more. Lightning lights up the sky and the whole interior of the RV. Jace turns over with a grumble and a loud snort. Thunder crashes so loud it sounds like it’s ripping the top off the RV. Maya lets out a little scream and covers her ears, so I hug her and feel comforted by her warmth.
Something strikes the RV with a boom. We all cry out, and Jace sits bolt upright like he’s spring-loaded. The RV shuts down, and Dad steers toward the shoulder. He’s unable to make it off the road, and the hazard lights don’t work.
We sit in tense silence for a moment, the wind shaking the RV, until Maya says in a shrill, shaky voice, “Did we just get struck by lightning?”
It feels like my waist-length hair is standing straight up and the electricity is coursing through me.
“Is everyone okay?” Dad asks.
Everyone is okay, and no one needs to change his pants. Jace lies down and starts snoring as loud as a bull elephant, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to sleep again.
Dad gives the verbal command to start the RV, but it doesn’t respond. He tries it again. It doesn’t start. Mother screams a command, but she doesn’t scare the RV into starting either.
“Helen, will you get me the key from the glove box?”
“Where did you put it?” she asks as she opens the compartment.
“I didn’t put it anywhere. I thought you did,” Dad says. “Did you put it in your purse?”
Mother growls in irritation and starts digging through her ugly black purse, which is about the same size as my car. “I don’t know, Aidan. We did all this planning, and you didn’t put a key in the glove box?” She throws her purse at her feet in a fit of temper. “I don’t see one. What are we going to do?”
Maya goes to her. “Mom? You can’t find anything in your purse digging through it that way. Let’s dump it out on the table and go through it better.”
Mother hands the bag to Maya. We empty the contents of the purse on the table, and Maya and I sort through it while Mother and Dad watch from their seats. No key.
I open the purse and find a bunch of inside pockets. After going through several pockets of useless crap, I finally find a large key and take it to Dad. The RV starts, and Dad lets out a long breath and revs the engine with satisfaction. “Thank God it didn’t fry the electrical system, or we’d be driving the Zipper to Daeios.”
I picture the Flintstones in their Stone Age car as I scrape the junk on the table back into Mother’s gigantic purse and set it behind her seat.
About an hour later, Jace startles awake, sitting up and looking around him like he’s been fired upon.
“Where’d you put my mask?” he asks, and he gets up and stumbles around the RV. “Where’d you put my goddamned mask?” He’s not looking at any of us, but at someone or something we can’t see.
I clutch his shoulders and try to get him to sit. “What mask, Jace?” He starts at the realization that I’m there and throws my hands off.
“My mask, I need my mask. Everything depends on my mask!” He’s shouting now, walking in a circle and picking at his neck wound, smearing fresh blood onto his face. I’m afraid of him. I push Maya behind me and back away from him. We may be in more immediate danger in the RV with a drug-addled Jace than we would be outside in this terrible storm.
“What’s going on back there?” Dad says over his shoulder.
“I don’t know, Dad, he keeps saying something about a mask.”
Jace sits again, pulling his uneven blond hair, getting blood in it, and rocking. He repeats, “Mask. Mask. Mask. Mask,” as he picks at his wound. I don’t know what to do for him. I’m afraid he might attack me.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, he’s having withdrawal symptoms,” Mother says. She was a nurse before she married my father. Her bedside manner must’ve frightened patients into quick recoveries. She unbuckles her seatbelt and comes to us while Dad slows the RV to a crawl. Although an inch shorter than I am, she seems much taller because of her erect posture and imposing demeanor. “I was afraid of this, but no one listens to me.”
I think she was going to leave him behind. His own mother.
She kneels at Jace’s feet, wrestles his hands down, and holds them on his skinny thighs. Sweat’s running down his face, and his sweatshirt is wet. A bloody blotch grows on the collar under his right ear.
“That wound is a problem. Girls, get me a cool rag, the first aid kit, and a bottle of water.” Maya goes.
Jace pulls his hands from Mother’s and holds his head again. “No, no, no, no, no!”
“Give me the water, Maya,” Mother says, without taking her eyes off Jace. She tries to make him drink the water, but he spits it in her face.
“No use trying to bandage the wound with him acting that way. The doctor can deal with him when we get to Daeios.”
She takes my towel and wipes her face and hands as she makes her way to her seat and buckles herself in. Dad speeds up again. She helped for five whole minutes before resuming her throne.
Maya tries to put the cool cloth on Jace’s forehead, but he slaps it away. I see the hurt in her sweet face. He lies down on the bench seat and emits great sobs, easing to little whimpers, until he cries himself to sleep a few minutes later. Maya and I exchange worried glances. It’s so hard to see him suffer.
I was naïve when I thought this was going to be the longest trip of my life. It may be the longest trip of my afterlife, too.
Not long after Jace has settled down, his lips rattling with snores, the rain picks up in earnest again. Dad turns the wipers up high, and they battle to keep the windshield clear, but he has to slow down to see the road. After a few minutes, he says, “Uh, oh.”
