The Dark Roads (8 page)

Sweetgrass, MT

March 10, 2021

10:51 PM  96*F

Richie was the first to see the Canadian border. The customs center was almost camouflaged by the grime that had gathered upon it. He saw that it must've been a madhouse near the end. Cars were lined up for half a mile on the U.S. side, empty of passengers. Large trucks were pulled across the lanes to try preventing the mass migration.

There were bodies all over the place, but it was impossible to tell how long they'd been there, or how they'd actually died. The flesh had been distorted by many days of direct sunlight.

He still smiled before turning back to his friends who'd been walking twenty or so feet behind him. They were looking in the same direction, but hadn't yet made out what the building meant. He would tell them in a moment, but right now he was too busy marveling at what they'd done. He was nearly elated by the notion that they'd made it this far and had only lost one of their original group.

His mood was hampered only by the thought of the one they'd lost.

***

Benny. Benny hadn't ever been the best of them. He was weak in a fundamental way and had proven it not long after they'd begun the trip to Alaska. Even before things went bad with the world, Benny was always afraid of something, whether it be a bully giving him a hard time, or a teacher that made him take a test over when he didn't think he should have to.

He wasn't necessarily intelligent and had no athletic gifts. They'd always taken pity on him. Even when he'd go too far with teasing Elvis, the others were quick to forgive him because he didn't really understand what he was doing.

Buddy had been the one to finally lose his patience with Benny while they were still south of the Alabama line.

Benny had been quiet, isolating himself from the rest of the group for some time. During the first weeks of their trip he'd been a constant complainer, rubbing against the nerves of everyone, but that fell away once he'd stopped conversing. On his last night of life Benny seemed to burst out of his shell. He became manic and was screaming at the top of his lungs.

"I sure am glad I get to walk up this fucking road until dawn! It sure is great!" Benny yelled at the top of his lungs.

"Enough Benny," Richie had said to him, quietly.

"No way! I'm so goddamned excited about this that I just have to shout it out!"

Buddy was staring at him, now, but Elvis kept walking with his head down. He didn't like yelling, even when it was safe, and Benny was a champion screamer. The shouting put them all even more on edge than they'd already been.

"I'm just gonna walk all night long! Maybe I should sing about it!" he continued.

The singing, Richie thought as he neared the last car that would be waiting in line forever to get into Canada, was what set Buddy off. The shouting would've bothered him enough to say something, but the singing was what made him act.

Buddy quickened his pace so that he could round on Benny and be in front of him. He stopped, halting Benny in his tracks, and so did Richie and Elvis. They could see that it was going to go bad, but they couldn't have predicted how so. Neither of them, however, wanted to stop Buddy. Enough was enough.

"If you say one more fucking word, Benny," Buddy told him, their faces now only a few inches apart.

"What are you gonna do, Buddy?" Benny asked in that same faux happy tone, "You gonna hit me? I sure would like that! Go right ah-"

Benny was on the ground before he could finish his rant. Buddy stood over him, shaking and enraged. He was done listening to it and had made that clear with a fist to the jaw. Benny was quiet, finally, so surprised that he couldn't even think about getting up off of the ground.

"I warned you, Benny. That kind of shit could get us all killed. If you get up, do it slow and easy. I'm not going to let you hit me back."

Richie noticed that Buddy hadn't even removed his glasses, as he'd done on the few other occasions where some altercation might come to blows. He was confident that Benny wouldn't even try to strike him in retaliation.

"Now get your shit and let's go."

Benny did get up, but left his pack on the ground. He looked Buddy in the eye without saying a word before turning to the others. He seemed to be studying them, trying to find something in their faces.

Richie stared back at him and was unsettled by the look in his eye. It was that moment when Richie realized that Benny had cracked. Buddy's punch had been the last straw. Benny had been steadily worsening since they had left Miami, but Richie hadn't thought much about it. They were all under an incredible strain, but were handling it. From the look of things, Richie knew now, Benny had stopped handling.

"You can all fuck off," Benny told them quietly before turning to walk in the direction they'd already been going.

They all started the walk, again, Buddy picking up Benny's pack and shouldering it by one strap. He didn't look like the extra weight was affecting him, but after a while Elvis took a turn with it and Buddy didn't try to stop him. Richie took the pack from Elvis after a few miles and they began taking turns with the thing until they were ready to stop for the night.

Benny didn't speak, nor did anyone try to break words with him. The time for cooling down mentally had come.

Later, when they came to a place with cellar doors on the side, Benny didn't walk toward it. He just kept moving down the road. When Richie ran to him, trying to pull him back to the house, and finally screamed at him that it would be dawn and he was going to get himself killed, Benny simply pulled his pistol and aimed it at Richie's face.

"Fuck off," Benny whispered, "I'm not going anywhere with you pricks."

"Come on, man. Don't be stupid," Richie told him, trying to ignore the black hole of the pistol.

"Stupid?" Benny started, "I've followed you and Buddy around for fucking
years
. I've put up with all of your bullshit. I even helped protect your pet moron over there."

Elvis looked up sharply, a shadow of anger strolling across his features. Buddy didn't move toward Benny, but he didn't try to help Richie pull him in either. There would be no love lost between those two.

"You want to die Benny? Is that it?"

Benny pointed the pistol away from Richie, fired it, and returned his aim as the barrel puffed out a stream of acrid smoke. His eyes never left Richie.

“I said to fuck off,” Benny said in a voice that was almost unrecognizable.

Richie could only raise his hands and back away. If Benny was going to shoot him for trying to save his life, then he could go on his way. Elvis said nothing during the exchange, nor had Buddy. They watched as their old friend walked away without so much as a look back over his shoulder.

They stepped past his blistered body the next night, a mutilated figure huddled in the road as if he’d lain in wait for death. Each of them mourned Benny in some way, but they did it alone.

***

Richie and his friends stepped into Canada over two hundred days after they'd left Miami, Florida. They'd traveled more than 2600 miles on foot and had a long journey ahead of them before their faction would reach Alaska. They were happy, but it was a subdued joy.

“Fucking Canada,” Buddy said.

“Hopefully they’re still the polite type,” Richie added.

Elvis laughed heartily.

Coutts, AB

March 11, 2021

2:31 AM  94*F

Richie was working through his maps by lantern glow, outlining the same roads over and over with the yellow highlighter. Consequently, the lines on the map had gone from black to a muddy yellow.

His eyes were dry from staring at the paper without blinking for too long. His enthusiasm for Canada's s shortest route to Alaska had been fading over the last few minutes. The roads looked straight, not too many blind curves for them to navigate, so that was good.

The thing that kept cycling through his mind was the discernable lack of civilized areas once it ran through the Yukon. He'd begun debating as to whether they'd be able to find accommodations. Once upon a time the ground was more frozen than not through most of northern Canada so they might not have been really fond of digging out cellars.

Buddy, who'd found a paperback when they'd ransacked a drugstore earlier in the day, was sharing his light. He was laying on his stomach like a young kid, enraptured in the story of the thing. Richie didn't really know why he didn't carry a book in his pack all of the time. The weight wouldn't slow him down. It was just something that Buddy didn't like to do.

Richie had seen the look on Buddy's face when he’d spotted an abused book on the coffee table of his cousin's apartment. He'd looked as if someone had jabbed him with a needle. Maybe he just couldn't bear to damage a book in the way he would if he packed it away. Maybe.

Elvis was playing with his slingshot, having killed every rat in their current basement lodgings within an hour.

It was funny that the rats had survived. The only other animals he'd seen were lizards. Hell, even the insects had been mostly killed off. Rats were survivors as long as they weren't being targeted by Elvis' sling. It was just another of those things about the world that made little sense to Richie.

He didn't know if the others had questioned their good fortune at still being able to get hold of some kind of meat, but he'd made the choice not to ask too many questions long ago. By the grace of God, the survival of rats and men would always be.

He shook his head from side to side, as if to clear it of these thoughts, and looked at the map again. He would have to voice his concerns to the others soon.

"Water?" Buddy asked, offering his mostly full bottle without looking up from his book.

Richie took it, swigged the warm stuff, and handed it back to him. It wasn't too bad, a bit gritty, but otherwise okay. Piss warm. Probably warmer.

"Elvis wants music," Buddy told Richie, his voice barely audible, "You know. Like a guitar or something."

"Can he play?" Richie asked.

"Says he can. I've never heard him play before, but he was saying that he wanted to get a guitar if we see one again."

"Elvis playing guitar? I gotta see the king play."

They were grinning at each other over the lantern like a couple of kids. They turned to Elvis, but he didn't immediately look up at them.

"Little brother," Richie called to him, "You wanna get a guitar and be a rock n' roll star?"

Elvis' face pinched as if he was waiting for someone to strike him, but the look cleared away almost instantly. He smiled at them, knowing that Richie wouldn't make fun.

"Nope," Elvis replied through a dopey grin, "I wanna be the King."

They all laughed with him, not at him, and that was alright with Elvis.

***

Milk River, AB

March 12, 2021

1:02 AM  95*F

They were walking along the northbound lanes of Highway 4 in the only direction that mattered. The three men were side by side and looked more like 35 than 22 by this time.

They were road weary and haggard, but still walking, still breathing. The one in the middle had sprouted a thin beard, the auburn facial hair making his pale skin look even more white.

All three had long and tangled hair, but the man walking on the right side looked as if he'd been growing his deep brown curls long before the others had begun. His glasses shone in the moonlight, hiding his eyes from outside speculation.

The third had the beautiful, smooth, face shared by most of those born with Down Syndrome, but his eyes were sharp and alert under a mane of, considerably, darker hair than the others.

When the man in the middle spoke the other two didn't turn to him, but were listening intently nonetheless.

"Well you better share, then," Buddy said as he held a fresh bandana behind Richie's back for Elvis to take.

"Yeah," Elvis agreed, trading out his drenched rag for Buddy's fresh offering.

"How many of those things do you two have?" Richie had to ask.

"Dude, I have like ten folded up in my pockets. By the time the wet one, over there, gets through with all of them the first one's dry again."

Richie regarded Buddy with amusement. He'd not snapped at Elvis about the bandanas in a long time, and Richie was pleased to see that they had gotten a system down in order to avoid any more anger over such small fare. He hated to aggravate their good thoughts with his trepidations, but there wasn't an alternative.

"We've got choices to make as usual," Richie offered, "There are two routes that'll get us to where we want to be and both of them suck. One a little more than the other."

"Doesn't sound like we're going to have to think real hard on this one," Buddy said.

"Why's it suck more, Richie?" Elvis asked, "No stores?"

"Kind of. The first option is switching roads a lot and being able to get supplies up until we hit a spot in British Columbia. After that it gets dicey. The road's also curvy as shit."

"And the second option?" Buddy asked.

"We go up 4 until we hit 2. We get on 16 and walk forever. We hit 37 from there and we're home free. It's a pretty straight route with few curves that runs through the middle of nowhere. It would also save us about a month of walking."

"Sounds like the better way to go."

"Yeah," Elvis said, "We don't need no more curves if we don't gotta."

"But we don't know if there'll be houses with those nice basements to squat in," Buddy said as if he were pulling the words from Richie's mouth.

"Or places to get supplies."

"We should find a gas station," Elvis suggested.

"A gas station? For what?" Buddy asked.

"They got those books, sometimes, where it tells you where you can stop when you're goin' somewhere. My mom used to get em' when we'd drive up north."

Richie nearly slapped himself on the forehead. He hadn't thought of that at all.

"You got it Elvis!" Richie laughed, "There's bound to be some info on the road to fucking Alaska. Why didn't I think of it?"

"Cause you're a little slow, sometimes," Elvis told him.

***

Truck stops had been fairly easy to find along the major highways of the U.S. and, luckily, Canadians had followed the same philosophy when building their routes of transportation. They found a sizeable one a couple of miles down the road, the parking lot filled with tractor trailers and RV's.

As they walked through the graveyard of recreational vehicles, Richie couldn't help but think about how much easier things would have been if they had left Florida just two months earlier. The cars had still been running, though not well, and the trip wouldn't have taken more than a few weeks at a snail's pace.

The automatic doors at the front of the building were wedged open, saving them the headache of picking the lock. Elvis strolled in as if he were stopping in to grab some candy and a soda for the road. He probably could've had the candy, but it was likely that the taste of it would've already been stolen by the heat.

With the doors open as they were, there wasn't anything that the elements hadn't gotten to. They kept their eyes open and weapons at the ready. Buddy and Richie cleared the place while Elvis searched for a book that would tell them something more about their new environment.

"We're good here," Buddy said, "Want to check for a basement?"

"Will do," Richie said looking at his watch, "It's only two, you know."

"Yeah, but it can't hurt to know something more before we keep going."

Richie nodded his agreement and veered toward the back of the store. He strode away from them and began his search. He could hear Elvis muttering to himself as he passed.

The beam of the penlight Buddy had turned over to him was weak, but there wasn't a need for anything brighter in the dark corners of the truck stop. Their night vision had become quite strong since they'd become primarily nocturnal beings.

Richie could see everything he needed to see under the soft light and was in the midst of checking behind the closed doors of the place when he spotted something on the floor in front of one of them. He stopped moving, listening for the smallest of dins.

Richie tapped the light against the barrels of his shotgun lightly, hoping to get Buddy and Elvis to notice that he wanted them there without speaking. They did, both of them quickly and silently walking over to where he was standing.

Buddy's eyes were wide in question while Elvis saw the problem right off. He looked at the floor and then back up at Richie in alarm. Richie nodded toward the door, asking for their opinions with the gesture.

Elvis nodded. Buddy hesitated, but nodded also. They could've left and found what they needed somewhere else, but they were here already and didn't know how long that would take.

Buddy stared at the trail of blood they'd found on the floor leading into a door marked "Storage" that was very likely a basement. Richie reached for the latch, his hand pausing over it for a moment as he listened for the sounds of another person and heard nothing. Elvis stood back from the doorway, aiming his rifle at the lower half of the thing. Richie turned the latch quickly and opened the door.

Darkness. Until Buddy took the penlight back and aimed it down the stairway, there was only darkness. Once it was brightened, however, many things came into view.

There were boxes on shelves that would have been used and restocked hundreds of times. There were crates of aluminum cans and plastic water bottles. There were two sleeping bags laid messily on the floor, blood spattered along the length of one of them. There were two middle aged people huddled in a corner, one a man and the other a woman.

One of them was unconscious from the look of his posture while the other was facing them with a stern expression on her face. She seemed to be protecting her man from something. At the moment, Richie guessed,
they
were that "something".

"Leave us alone," she said, firmly, her voice raspy but strong.

"We ain't gonna hurt you," Elvis told her.

"Do you have a gun?" Buddy asked her, "If you do, don't shoot us. We're coming down."

Richie hadn't lowered his weapon, but his friends were putting theirs away. He wasn't afraid of the two they'd found, but he wasn't going to trust them until he knew more. He wouldn’t let his guard down just yet.

"We don't have a gun, anymore," the woman said, "We dropped both of them."

She was visibly shaking, though she still looked as if she was going to defend against them, no matter what. The man behind her hadn't been awakened by their talk. He was definitely out.

Richie thought he might be the one bleeding. Something occurred to him, suddenly, and he had to ask the question that seemed to eclipse every other thought in his head. These people looked like they were being hunted.

"Is anyone after you?"

Elvis and Buddy turned toward Richie with confused looks, but recognized his reasoning without much delay. People didn't hide without motivation. They also didn't bleed without a cause.

"We ran. They were chasing us," she replied, tears coming suddenly, "You aren't with them?"

"Fuck. Elvis, go clean up the blood on the floor. Make sure you get it all. Make it look like nobody was ever in the store and get your ass back down here," Richie ordered, "Buddy find a first aid kit if you can. Clear the medicine aisle if you have to. Don't use the light much and hurry it up."

Buddy cursed as he ran up the steps with Elvis on his heels. They went as swiftly as they could, hoping to find the things they needed to accomplish their orders. Richie turned toward the couple.

"Is he shot? Stabbed?" Richie asked, putting his pack down and opening the top of it. He didn't set his gun down, couldn't let it out of his grasp, but he didn't point it at anyone either.

"Shot. It's his shoulder," the woman said, still tensed for a fight, "They shot him and he bled all the way back here. He passed out a few minutes ago."

"Once my friends get back we'll need you to let us see him. He could be bleeding out."

"Are you a doctor?"

"Lady, do I look like a fucking doctor to you?" Richie snapped, and was immediately ashamed, "We've all had to learn some things recently. I've found a talent for not getting myself killed and bandaging people who are bleeding to death."