Where is the hearse? I suddenly wondered.
The Traveling Vampire Show’s hearse, the black moving van and the bus were nowhere in sight. Maybe they’d been moved to the area on the far side of the bleachers.
Normally, I could look all the way through the stands and see whatever was over there. Normally, though, the stands were empty. Not tonight.
Tonight, the nearest bank of bleachers, about twenty-five or thirty feet high, was jammed with people. Through the spaces above and below the bench seats, I could see the backs of their legs. But I couldn’t see much of the arena or the stands on the other side.
Down on the ground, the ticket line looked no shorter but had a few different people in it. Several customers were entering the stands. Others were heading for the ticket line from the direction of the dirt road where they’d probably left their cars.
“Hey,” Rusty said.
I looked at him. He was still on his back, still clutching his arm, but now he had his knees up.
“What the hell’s goin’ on?” he asked.
“Stryker’s selling tickets….”
“The dog, man, the dog.”
“It’s a bad day for dogs,” I said.
“What happened to it?”
“How should I know? How’s your arm?”
“How the hell y’think it is?” He took his hand away. The sleeve of his shirt, dark with blood, was clinging to his upper arm.
“You’re gonna need rabies shots,” I said.
“Awww, man. Don’t say that.”
“And we’d better forget about trying to get into the Vampire Show.”
“Huh?”
“You can’t go in there. Not all bloody like that. The blood’ll bring vampires like chum brings sharks. You said so yourself.”
“Me?”
“This morning. To Slim.”
“Yeah, well…. Screw that. I’m not gonna miss the show.” He lowered his knees, sat up and took off his shirt. Then he looked at his arm. “Can’t believe it,” he muttered. “Fuckin’ dogs.”
I nodded, but he didn’t see me. He was too busy studying the holes in his arm.
“What is it,” he grumbled, “a fuckin’ conspiracy?”
I shrugged. “Just coincidences, I guess.”
“A fuckin’ dog made your
“Guess so.”
“Not to mention the fuckin’ one-eyed wonder.”
When he said that, I pictured that dog getting speared to death by Stryker and his gang.
Where is his gang? I wondered.
Looking around, I spotted a couple of them near the entrance to the grandstands, taking tickets. I didn’t see any others. Just those two, and Stryker in the shack.
Rusty used his wadded shirt to pat the bite wounds.
Just that morning, we’d tended to
Strange.
And if some other dog hadn’t caused Dad to crash his car, everything tonight would’ve happened differently. Much of it wouldn’t have happened at all.
Including what went on with Slim and me.
Very strange, I thought.
“Y’wanta give me a hand?” Rusty asked.
I softly clapped.
“Har har.”
So then I climbed over the side of the pickup truck and sat beside him. He thrust the bloody shirt at me. “Make me a bandage, okay?”
“With your shirt?”
“Why not? It’s wrecked anyways.”
“It’s a day for wrecking shirts.”
He frowned at me. “This has been a very weird fuckin’ day.”
“You’re telling me.”
I looked at his wounds. The poodle had left two small, curved rows of punctures near the back of his arm a few inches below his shoulder. Most of the bleeding was over, but they seemed to be leaking slightly. I tore a long strip off the back of Rusty’s shirt, then wrapped it around his upper arm. With another strip, I tied it in place. “There you go,” I said.
“Grassy-ass.”
I looked toward the shack. Stryker still stood behind the counter, but the ticket line had dwindled down to three people. A few others were straggling in from the area of the dirt road.
“You sure you wanta go through with this?” I asked.
As if there were any doubt.
“You kidding me?” he said.
“How’ll we get in?”
“We got our tickets, man. Why not walk in like anybody else?”
“We’re under age.”
“BFD,” he said. I don’t think anyone says BFD anymore. In those days, it stood for “big fucking deal.”
Chapter Forty-nine
Rusty leaned over the tailgate of the pickup truck and stared at the ground. I knew why. He was thinking about the poodle, wondering what had gotten it and wondering if the same thing might make a try for him.
So was I.
“Whatever it is,” I said, “I guess it’s full.”
“I don’t know, man. That was an awful small dog.”
“Wanta stay here and listen to the Vampire Show?”
He groaned, then leaped down. I jumped to the ground after him. Staying low, we rushed through the gap between a couple of cars. At the end of it, there were no more cars to conceal us. We stood up straight and walked toward the grandstands.
Over to the right, people were still in line to buy tickets. More were on the way. Stryker seemed busy behind the counter. I wanted to watch him the whole time to make sure he never looked at us, but I had to keep glancing at the ground.
In the glow of the stadium lights, the dirt looked pale gray. Broken glass glittered. Bumps and rocks cast dark shadows. Holes were blotches of blackness. I was looking for creatures. What I saw instead were cigarette butts, a mashed pack of Lucky Strikes, a flattened beer can, a dirty white sneaker…
Slim’s sneaker?
It might’ve been one of those Rusty had thrown at the one-eyed dog. I was tempted to pick it up. But it looked as if it had been run over. No telling what else had happened to it—maybe a spider had crawled in. Maybe if I reached down for it something would spring at my hand. Besides, what good would one sneaker do Slim?
If Rusty saw the sneaker, he either didn’t recognize it or didn’t care. He kept on walking.
I caught up to him.
