Empire Of Salt (22 page)

"Hi," she said.

He was appraising her just as she was him. He kept thrusting out his jaw.

"You have food?" he rasped.

Natasha looked at the bag in her hand, then offered it to him.

He stepped forward and snatched at it, then fell back against the wall. He looked inside and pulled out the water first, downed half of the liquid, and ripped into one of the tinfoil-covered tamales. He crammed two bites into his mouth, then chugged the rest of the water. He chewed furiously for a moment, before swallowing.

Then everything changed. He dropped the bag and fell to his knees. Water and pieces of tamale hit the floor in a sickly spatter. The soldier wretched again, rolled onto his back and clenched his stomach, wiping spittle from his face.

"It's the DTs," Veronica said from the doorway. When Natasha gave her a blank look, Veronica gestured toward the writhing soldier. "Look at him. He's an addict, and he's been one for a long time."

"An addict?"

"Look at his hands and face. Looks like he lost a lot of weight too. He's been using for a long time."

"What drug is he on?" Derrick said.

"Meth, crank, whatever you want to call it. Makes you feel like Superman for a while, then breaks you down until you can't even eat someone's homemade tamales. Some Superman he turned out to be."

"Kryptonite," whispered the soldier. "It's the kryptonite that's killing me."

Veronica rolled her eyes. "And he's a comedian to boot." She took his duffel bag, pawing through it while the soldier struggled to bring himself under control. "Not much here. A couple of changes of clothes, some comic books and a box of medals."

"Let me see those."

She passed the medals to Derrick.

He opened them and whistled. He mouthed a
wow
as he looked from the solider to the objects in his hand.

"Those are mine," the soldier said. He struggled to get to his feet, sliding himself up the wall. He licked his lips and wiped his face with the back of a hand. "I said, those are mine. I thought you were here to help me, but now you're stealing from me?"

"I was just looking, Mister." Derrick handed back the box.

"Are you okay?" Natasha asked.

"Yeah. Just not used to regular food." He glanced at the others. "It tasted good. Did you make this?"

"My auntie did," Veronica said.

"Tell your auntie she did good." When he got no response, he added, "You held back in the hallway to make sure I wasn't going to attack your friends, didn't you?"

Veronica nodded.

"Smart."

"Is what she said true?" Natasha asked.

"About the meth?" The soldier shrugged. "Sure. And I used to be Superman too. Now I'm just..."

Derrick used the opportunity when the man trailed off to ask, "Did you win those medals in the war?"

The soldier laughed hollowly. "You don't
win
a medal. You get one for surviving."

Derrick laughed with him for a moment, but then stopped when he saw the man's eyes.

"So what's your name?" Veronica asked.

"Metzger."

"Is that all your parents gave you? Just
Metzger
?"

"Shane. Shane is my first name." He looked down, realized that his hands were clenching and unclenching and stuck them into his pockets. "But everyone calls me Metzger."

"I'm Veronica. This is Natasha and this is her brother, Derrick. We're the Bombay Beach Welcoming Committee." She looked around to see if anyone would add anything. When they didn't, she opened her arms and declared in a mock-dramatic voice, "Welcome."

"Uh, thanks. I think."

"So what is that place you and your soldier buddies were being driven into last night?"

"Don't know. A bunch of us were in Track 3 Rehab for Meth Addiction. A Colonel came and enrolled us into a special program. He said we'd get clean and earn bonuses besides."

"Some special program," Veronica repeated. "Did he say it involved those creatures?"

Metzger stared at Veronica beneath heavy lids. "Of course not. They just said we'd get clean and never have to worry about it again. The Colonel told us we were going to be like astronauts. Lots of rigorous training, he said. He said we'd be astro-mechanics or some shit like that."

"Astro-mechanics." Derrick said. "What do you suppose one of those does?"

"Fixes astros?" Veronica said, then realized it sounded like a joke. "Seriously, what's an astro?"

"I think it means space or something like that. Like in astronomy." Natasha shook her head. The soldier was a piece of work. He looked like he was standing two inches from death's door. She'd only known one other drug addict before and she'd died in gym class her senior year. The soldier, Metzger, had the same hollowed eyes and cheeks as that girl had had. "I think they lied to you, Metzger. I think they had something else in mind."

They talked for the next few hours.

Natasha told him about her life in Pennsylvania. She told Metzger about her mother and how she'd passed away. She told him about her father, and how she wanted to hug him sometimes because he looked so miserable, but she knew that if she did he'd get mad because his unhappiness was supposed to be some big secret.

But more than telling him about her life, she listened and began to understand why Metzger was the way he was. She didn't press when he talked about the war, but when he mentioned the ocean she probed further.

As it turned out, he'd been raised in Destin, Florida. His father had been in the Air Force. Metzger had wanted to become a Green Beret, so he enlisted in the Army instead of following in his father's footsteps and joining the Air Force. He'd grown up on the type of war movies where red, white and blue heroism didn't carry with it the smell of blood, guts and shit. He'd wanted to be a hero. He'd wanted to be someone they'd make a movie about. So Metzger spent his childhood preparing and pretending at every possible opportunity to be a soldier.

Living on the Florida panhandle, there'd been no end of trips to the white, sandy beaches where he'd sit back and stare at the water. Then when a roadside bomb in Iraq ate a great hole in the side of his Hummer and his friends had evaporated into nothing, he'd spent the next three weeks on a hospital ship in the Persian Gulf, haunted his friends and by the moans of the wounded below decks. He spent as much time as he could on deck, away from the others, staring at the depths of an ocean that connected halfway around the world to the beach he'd once called home.

But now the sea no longer calmed him.

It made him nervous.

The Army brought him back stateside and stationed him at Norfolk, Virginia to recuperate, and the water messed with him. He didn't even need to see it. He could smell it, hear it, feel it in the air. And then he would be transported back to the Hummer ride along Highway 80 in Iraq - to the explosion - to the MEDEVAC chopper - to the sight of bloody bodies in the bowels of the hospital ship, the gray deck flooring splotched with the blood of wannabe_heroes and other mothers' sons.

At first Metzger had thought he would get used to it, but it got so bad he couldn't even look at the water. His mother called it anxiety, but the government called it Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. And they spent the next three months trying to cure him while he self-medicated meth.

When the sun went down, Derrick left with Veronica to get more food, water and some candles.

Natasha felt perfectly safe on her own with the soldier.

She saw Metzger differently than she had before; he was more than an anonymous addict. Still, his face looked worn, and his eyes seemed old even though he was really only a couple of years older than she was.

They could have been two people together anywhere in the world, talking, resting, looking each other in the eyes. Anywhere else they would have been allowed to continue. Not in Bombay Beach.

Tommy Klosterman wasn't at all what Abigail expected. Seeing him outside all of these years she'd expected him to be much more an animal; after all, the only thing she had to go by was the way his own grandparents had treated him, and they kept him chained outside. And oddly enough, she felt safe with Tommy.

After he'd taken Trudie from her, he'd held the small body for a very long time. Abigail didn't think that he knew the dog was dead. He acted as if it were a stuffed animal, clutching it tightly to his chest, making noises to it, petting it with his sausage-sized fingers. But then he'd gotten hungry and had gone out into the yard to the length of his leash. He'd hollered loud and long for his "Omammie," but he'd never received an answer. It wasn't until midday that he came back inside, grumbling and pounding the floor with his fists.

While he'd been outside she'd taken the opportunity to stretch her muscles. She'd sat up, trying to get as comfortable as possible. Inside, it was nothing like a doghouse. It was like a shed, or a small house, or a child's fort. There was enough room for her to stand; light filtered through the door and the ventilator in the roof illuminating walls with crayon-scribbled characters, a stained futon and an immense box of toys.

She found Trudie lying atop the box of toys. She touched the fur gently, telling herself that what had been her dog no longer occupied the body. Trudie's spirit, that thing that made her such a special dog, had gone elsewhere leaving nothing but dead flesh behind. She told herself this, because she had to, or else she'd go crazy with the knowledge that Tommy was playing with the corpse of her dead dog.

When he'd returned after his grandmother had failed to feed him, she'd gone back to her original position, curled into a ball near the entrance. He'd ignored her when he entered and had thrown himself onto his futon, whining into the mattress and rocking back and forth.

Abigail wondered what had happened to his grandmother and why she hadn't come outside to feed her grandson, as she always did. But as Tommy Klosterman cried on his mattress like a small child, Abigail came to believe that she knew the reason.

An hour later, after Tommy fell asleep, Abigail gathered her courage. In a burst of energy, she rolled out the door. She scrambled to her feet and ran as fast as her old legs would take her until she reached the porch.

Behind her came a growl of frustration as Tommy awoke. The door opened, followed by the crash of chain against wood as Tommy ran towards her, but then was forced to stop as he reached the end of the leash. He hollered after her, "Omammie! Omammie!"

As scary as Tommy was, the plaintive wail tugged at her heartstrings. "I'll see where she is, Tommy," she said. "Don't worry."

A baseball bat leaned against the outside of the trailer beside the door. She held it ready in one hand as she tried the handle. It was unlocked and she went inside.

The interior was awash in cool air. The kitchen area was empty, as was the living room. She noticed the front door was open and went to close it, scanning the front yard as she did. No one was there.

"Agnes?" she called. "Henry? Where are you?"

Down a short hallway, she checked the bathroom and both bedrooms, but the trailer was empty.

As she turned around, she noticed that several of the pictures on the walls were hung askew. She straightened them, discovering several drops of dried blood on the glass.

She returned to the front door and looked at the doorjamb. She ran her fingers across the splintered wood. Something - or someone - had forced its way in here. Abigail looked around at the apparently tranquil home. She knew how quickly it had happened. Had it not been for her Trudie, she might have fallen victim to the same fate, for it was the warning her dog had given her that had given her the chance to survive.

"Omammie!"

Tommy was still calling from outside. He had to be starving.

But first things first.

Her bladder was about to burst. She went to the bathroom, and after taking care of business, washed her hands, face and neck in the sink, relishing the feel of hot water and soap against her skin.

Finally feeling human again, she entered the smaller of the two bedrooms. There was a twin bed, but it appeared to be little used. She found a clean set of clothes and was about to take them into the kitchen, when she heard a noise from the other bedroom.

She set the clothes down on the bed, grabbed the bat with both hands, and crept into the hall.

The noise came again.

She stepped into the room, prepared to swing the bat with every ounce of strength she had. She was a small woman and had never thought of herself as particularly strong, but the events of the past several days had created a rage within her. She focused on the image of her beloved Trudie lying atop Tommy Klosterman's toybox.

"Hello. Is anyone there?"

A rustle answered her, from where the bed met the wall on the other side of the room. She saw a dark gap.

She stepped to the foot of the bed, then back, wary of something beneath the bed reaching out to grab her feet. She scooted to the wall and tried to peer into the shadows next to the bed.

"Agnes? Is that you?"

A groan came from the space beside the bed.