“Ryan Dean”—Joey looked over his shoulder at me—“I really think you should try to go to sleep.”
He sounded a little stressed.
Joey started the car forward slowly.
I said, “Here, Joe. Do you want a cough drop?”
I dropped one of the paper-wrapped lozenges in his hand.
“Thanks,” he said.
“Don’t thank me. They taste like crap. But they keep you awake.”
“Then stop eating them.”
“I think it’s just up ahead,” Ned said.
That’s exactly when the driver’s side of the car lurched downward sharply and the axle struck against something hard, with a grating, metallic clang. We were in a hole up to the top of the car’s wheels. Joey tried backing the SUV out, but we were stuck.
Oh, yeah, and that’s when the water started coming in through the bottom of Joey’s door, too.
“Fuck!” Joey said.
“Don’t give him any ideas,” I warned.
“This isn’t the place,” Ned said. “I’m sure of it.”
And that’s probably about the time that Joey seriously considered throwing the old man out too. If it wasn’t precisely at that moment, I’m sure he felt like it when Ned started screaming insanely in wild terror.
You know, there is something especially frightening when you’re stuck in the darkest depths of hell, in the middle of a raging torrent of mud, and the insane old lost guy in the front seat starts screaming like he’s going to die. I mean, I figured Ned had probably stared Death in the face more than a few times in just the past four or five hours, let alone since the discovery of fire, so when you hear a guy who you know has gone through as much shit as Ned has—in a lifetime that was undoubtedly measured by geologic periods as opposed to calendars—screaming like that, well . . . you just know you’re going to die too.
“Fuck!” Joey said again.
“Aaaaaaahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!” Ned shrieked.
Oh, yeah.
Fun times.
Honestly, though, I have to admit to the selfish pleasure I took in the fact that the water was pouring in on the two fuckers in the front seat and not on the guy in the back who never would have come up to Ned’s abattoir for adolescent boys if Joey wasn’t so goddamned nice all the time.
Then Ned added something extra special to his scream. It kind of went like this: “BBBLLLLLAAAAARRRRRHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAGG!!!!!!!”
Which, I think, was probably Mrs. Singer’s first name.
But, anyway, the bloodcurdling sound was so unnerving that I screamed too, and just like a girl, which didn’t make Joey very happy.
“Fuck!” Joey said.
And when I screamed, it made Ned scream even more insanely.
I began laughing so hard, I was actually crying, which probably had something to do with the fact that I knew we were going to die and now I decided I didn’t want Ned to kill Joey first, because watching him do it would scare the shit out of me.
Ned shrieked again. It was a good one, too. Probably a solid fifteen seconds. And it was so high pitched that I’m pretty sure a pod or two of migrating gray whales in the Pacific veered off course for a minute, paused and looked landward, and knew exactly where that hundred-and-fifty-year-old asshole was, even if Joey and I didn’t have a fucking clue.
I laughed so hard, I thought I was going to throw up.
“What’s so fucking funny?” Joey said.
I could hear the wheels spinning uselessly in the muddy water outside, and the splashy-soothing-fountain sounds of Joey’s and the insane guy’s feet up front.
Then all I could hear was another scream. If I wasn’t laughing so hard, I probably would have beat Ned with his walker.
“I’m sorry, Joey.” I laughed. “Now I can finally say I told you so.” I paused. “Bitch.”
That’s technically not cussing.
I laughed.
Ned shrieked and wailed.
Joey said, “Fuck!”
“Okay, Joe. I’ll get out and see if there’s anything I can put under the wheels to get some grip.”
“But you’re sick, Ryan Dean.”
“Dude, Joey,” I said (scream). “Believe me, there’s nothing I want more than to get out of this car right now.”
I opened my door and looked down. The water rushed past the car’s running boards so fast, it looked like we were in a motorboat or something. I could see how the back wheels were spinning uselessly, kicking back rooster tails of mud in the dark.
I knew I’d end up getting soaked, which wasn’t a good idea, so I slipped off my socks and shoes and left them on the car seat. Then I pulled up the legs of my sweatpants as high as I could and stepped out into the cold and muddy flow.
Ned screamed again.
Damn, he had quite a set of pipes for an old guy.
I waded around to the back of the SUV, already wet up to my waist.
I yelled up to Joey, “Stop gunning it. I’m going to look for something to wedge under the wheels.”
Ned gave me an approving “EEEEEYYYYAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHH!!!”
I paused.
I slogged up to Joey’s window and knocked on it. The water was streaming into the rip in my sweats, pulling them away like a drift net. I hoped salmon didn’t bite.
I knocked on Joey’s window again.
He lowered it halfway.
“Joey,” I said.
Ned screamed, and Joey tensed and closed his eyes like it physically hurt him.
“Suppose I had a gun. With only one bullet in it. And I gave it to you. Would you shoot Ned, me, or yourself?” I laughed. Life doesn’t present a guy with too many the-lady-or-the-tiger kinds of lessons.
Joey flipped me off and raised his window.
Ned wailed.
Through the open back door, I heard Joey say, “Fuck!” It sounded kind of nice. It lifted my spirits.
I waded away. I actually considered, momentarily, just leaving Joey and Screaming Ned there, so I could become the Wild Boy of the Eighth Circle of Hell, but I did want to get back to Pine Mountain and Annie and a certain kid of French descent whose dreams still needed some serious crushing.
And, besides, we had another rugby game coming up that week, and the team would never be able to get by without Kevin, our winger, and our starting fly half.
When I got out of the creek we were stuck in, I found enough fallen tree bark and rocks to begin making sufficient braces all around the rear wheels. On the first trip back to the car, though, I fell down in the river, so I took my hoodie off and tossed it onto the backseat with my shoes and socks. No sense getting everything I owned soaked and muddy. I knew it was stupid, because I was sick, but I figured I’d be able to scrounge up something dry to wear among our new Halloween costumes.
Everything looked ready to go. I waded to the car and told Joey to try backing out, and that I’d stand away and watch. Before I closed my door, Ned screamed again, and then I said, “And, Joey? We are either going back to the store or I’m not getting in this car ever again. It’ll be you and Ned. Alone.”
Joey didn’t say anything.
I closed the back door and walked over to the side of the mud road.
The rain slowed to a drizzle, but the level of the creek didn’t change at all.
