By Thursday evening it was done, or as done as it was likely to get. Every man, woman, nonbinary and child she could find from the ranch to the Zen farm to the Nature Conservancy buildings down on the point was bagged and in the back of the truck. Which now rode pretty low on its axles – three-hundred-some bodies packed in like sardines pushed it well past its recommended carrying capacity. Now all that was left was deciding what to do with them.
She’d already decided part of it, she realized as she cut into her steak that night, the daily crying jag already behind her. Burial simply wasn’t an option – she’d need earthmoving equipment to dig a mass grave, and didn’t know where she could find any or how to run it if she did. Cremation made more sense, but for that she needed a safe location, and Marin County in late summer was already prone to wildfires. A building would be a better option.
But the reason Marin was prone to wildfires was that it was prone to trees. The Nature Conservancy building would’ve been perfect – big enough, isolated from the rest of town but with a paved road leading to it. But it was surrounded by trees on all sides, with branches reaching far enough that a fire could jump from them and head up to town in a literal flash. Everyplace else she could think of was either too close to town, too close to the forest, or had no way to get the truck there and back.
It wasn’t until the next morning that Kelly realized she’d been thinking about the problem from the wrong end. She’d been looking for an enclosed space to put the bodies in … but weren’t they already in an enclosed space? She didn’t have a use for the truck once she was done with this – and given what she was doing with it right now, she’d rather not use it ever again. She just needed a safe spot to take care of it.
And if she would no longer be using it, she wouldn’t have to worry if it was bogged down in sand, would she?
A 17-foot U-Haul is not build for off-roading, especially not on steep downgrades. She rode the brake all the way from the Sayler Beach parking lot down the access path to the beach proper, hoping and praying that it wouldn’t tip over. Unless she was badly injured, she’d be able to get out, but one more difficulty on top of all the others would do her no good. She finally wrestled the beast down to the beach, where she got halfway to the water before it was up to its axles in grit.
She got out and looked around – good, not a plant within a hundred feet except some washed-up seaweed. Then she went to the passenger-side door and hauled out a few more things she’d gotten from the store – some big sorting tubs they used for produce, a gallon container for making juice, a case of charcoal lighter fluid, a hundred feet of twine and an eight-foot metal ladder. Cremation, redneck style. Good thing she had the fire suit.
Using the blunt end of the fire ax as a hammer and the crowbar as a chisel, she punched a hole in the bottom of the truck’s gas tank and let it drain into the sorting tubs. Once that was down to the occasional drip, she used the gallon jug to scoop it and splash it into the back of the truck from the ladder, aiming high so it would hopefully soak all the bodies. She tossed the sorting tubs except one in on top when they were empty.
Next, she broke out the lighter fluid and sprayed every other part of the truck, inside and out. She unrolled the twine, cut it in half with the ax blade, and used it to soak up the last of the gasoline in the remaining sorting bin. Chucking the bin into the cab, she shoved one end of the first piece of twine into the hole in the gas tank, one end of the other under the nearest body in the back, took the other ends and moved as far from the truck as she could without pulling the twine free.
That was it. It was all set. She took Ganj’s Zippo lighter out of her pocket. “God, please protect me from what I’m about to do. I release the people of Sayler Beach into Your keeping. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. May light perpetual shine upon them.” She sighed – it was all she could think of to say. “Amen.” She crouched, lit the homemade wicks, stood and ran away as quick as the fire suit would allow.
It was overcautious of her, but she only knew that afterward. The truck didn’t explode – much – but it did burn wonderfully. She watched it for a while, trying not to inhale through her nose. She’d read it in stories and had no reason to disbelieve it, but burning humans really did smell like pork – she could tell even through the scents of metal, plastic, rubber and petrochemicals. Once she knew it wouldn’t go out too soon, she walked back up the hiking trails and didn’t stop until she got to the Matchicks’.
When she arrived, feeling like every emotion had been scraped out of her, she tossed the fire suit into the coat closet, flopped onto the living room couch and stared at the ceiling for awhile, going through the details of the situation. She was the last person here. Everyone else had died. She’d given them the hillbilly equivalent of a Viking funeral. Later, either tomorrow or Sunday, she’d go back with another bottle of lighter fluid to make sure everyone had burned. Maybe she’d put up a marker
