Fiend (28 page)

Open it, KK says.

He tries the handle and it’s locked. I peer down the hall. The Chucks are grotesque in their costumes of death, their
cocks flapping, and they’re closing in fast. Derrick gets the door open and we go through. It’s damp like the most humid summer night. The whole room is lit though, everything a ghastly glowing red. It’s got to be some sort of mechanical room because the floor is grated metal and the ceiling is low, and it’s humming with sound, and the walls are covered in thick piping on both sides.

A crawl space, Typewriter says.

Waterline or something, KK says.

We’re moving again, ducking our heads to not hit the ceiling. This will lead us to some garage or power station or maybe to a sewer and it’ll be outside of County and it’ll maybe be off Kellogg and it will lead us to the river. Maybe the Chucks can’t swim, and that’s all it’ll take and we’ll be Huck fucking Finn with a raft and take the Mississippi down to New Orleans and then to the ocean. We’ll be safe and happy and Mardi Gras will come and we’ll smoke shit and KK will get pregnant and we’ll raise a little boy, Portland, and he’ll have KK’s fair skin but my nose. We’ll probably find another group of survivors living on an oil rig. We’ll have a giant lab set up so running out will never be a problem. There’ll be some motherly woman with kind eyes for Typewriter. We’ll pass the time reading books we’ve stolen from the library and we’ll celebrate Christmas with fresh fish and maybe a deer we killed back on land. One by one, we’ll repopulate our world. Our reputation will be that of God, the creator of modern mankind.

We reach another door at the end of the waterline.

Fuck, KK says.

Maybe she was thinking the same thing.

I put my ear to the door and it sounds clear. Derrick nods at me and I nod back. We open it and it’s dark again, then back to the flashing of white, and it’s like we didn’t even move, it looks like the same exact hallway we just came from. I try to calculate how far we just traveled. It had to have been at least a few hundred yards.

Which way? asks Derrick.

I go back to my imaginary blueprint. The same hallway. Different section. I see the architects thinking simplicity was best, most institutional, and I know left will lead us to a kitchen and then to a mess hall and then to a wide hallway with cell blocks on either end and I say, Go right.

One foot in front of the other.

I’m soaking wet from the overhead sprinklers. KK’s bangs are matted to her forehead. I tell her I love her.

There’s a T in the hallway. Derrick motions to the left and I nod because that’s the way out. I’m sure of it. The other way just puts us farther into the bowels of lockup. I barely notice the alarm anymore.

Got to be gettin’ close, Typewriter says.

For reals.

The fuck out of here, Derrick says.

Another door, our only option. Derrick opens it. Chlorine is the first thing I smell and the ceiling is much higher and I see a thin pool, a shimmering of blackness.

The fuck?

Pool, Type says.

No shit, but in County?

Privileges, yo, KK says. Good behavior and you get your recess in the pool.

We walk around the edge of the water. I’m picturing inmates playing Marco Polo. Criminals frolicking. I’m fucking thirsty. We start along the long side of the pool. It’s eerily calm. Then the water breaks. We all scream as a dark figure rises from the water. It’s a woman with long hair covering her face and water streaming from her in sheets. Typewriter’s standing too near the edge, and he’s staring at me for some reason with his stupid fucking confused lips, and nothing I do will ever make a difference and this Chuck reaches out with both hands and I’m screaming. My best friend gets his feet swept out from underneath him. He falls and slams his head against the concrete and then is gone, disappears, Typewriter nothing, dragged into the blackness of chlorinated water.

Derrick fires three rounds into the pool.

Still nothing.

I’m about to jump into the water but KK shrieks
no
and grabs me with both hands. I tell myself it’s for her, me not going in after Type, that I’m doing the responsible thing, that he’s already gone, that I’m doing it all out of love. I tell myself these things while my best friend’s disemboweled.

I’m crying. On my knees fucking crying.

Stop, stop, KK says.

I think about the first time I ever met Typewriter. We were riding the 21 bus. His eyes met mine and I could tell he wanted to get spun. He came back to my seat and stuck out his hand and said, John, but my friends call me Typewriter. I laughed at this, and so did he. I liked this kid, and we ended
up getting off the bus together, going to his place in the suburbs, smoking shit and playing Grand Theft Auto all night. I liked the way he laughed, the way he was so fucking innocent, even as I led him into hell.

I can make out an even darker patch in the dark water where he went under.

Derrick pulls me to my feet.

He holds the back of my head and meets my eyes and says, Your girl needs you.
I
need you. You feel me?

I don’t say anything.

KK and Derrick drag me away from the pool and my knife feels pathetic and so does my life and I’m seeing Type’s face the moment before he was dragged under and I want to apologize for feeding his addiction and about Maddie and I hope he’s happier. That he finds that shit he believed in. That his mother is waiting, his father too. That they spread out a blanket and he feeds the ducks and that his mom takes the Tupperware out of a wicker basket and inside it’s filled with watermelon.

We reach the entrance to some sort of locker room. I hear a single giggle and it’s hers, I know, the cunt from the pool. The locker room smells musty. We walk next to a set of lockers. We are three. Everything’s a possible threat, and now we’re running again, into a hallway and we’ve got to be getting close because we reach a set of double doors. Derrick finally gets them open. We glance behind us and they’re coming, an advancing wall of female walking dead, naked and vile, tits and chuckles.

We pass through a door, then a metal detector.

We’re so fucking close.

The next door is slightly ajar but jammed and Derrick can’t get it open. I yell to hurry the fuck up. I grab the edge and yank in desperate pries. Maybe this is the final door and then it’s the exit and I’m pulling and pulling and Derrick keeps screaming, Fuck.

He lets go and turns around and they’re right there at the door we just came through, the one right before the metal detector. Their angry fists crash through the double-pane glass.

Derrick looks around, then he runs over to an elevator. He’s like Superman pulling the doors of the shaft apart, his elbows turned out, the muscles of Apollo.

Get in, he yells.

Derrick’s whole body quivers under the strain and the door behind us is already breaking down. I peek into the elevator shaft. Red emergency lights flash. It’s at least a two-story drop to the top of the elevator. He yells to grab the cable but I can’t reach. Then I hear a screeching of metal, the security door breaks, and I crawl under Derrick’s arms. I look back to KK and she yells to jump and I do.

I’m weightless. I’m a feather. I’m my first hit of methamphetamines.

I grab the cable and wrap my legs around it and start to slip, but I press my stomach against the cable and that slows me down. As I slide, slivers of metal burrow into my hands. I hit the bottom on my back with a loud thud. I see KK jump, grab the cable, and slide down screaming and I try to break her fall but she kicks me in the face. She’s sprawled on top of me and I ask, Are you okay, are you okay?

Fine.

Sure?

Fine.

There’s blood over both of us.

Then I look back up. Derrick inches his way between the doors. I see a foot. I see a leg.

Jump, I yell.

I see sets of hands and I know the Chucks have broken through and then he throws the canvas bag down and then it’s his body tumbling. He makes for the cable and holds it for a split second, but his momentum is too much, his legs keep swinging, he loses his grip and falls.

He crashes onto the top of the elevator and the whole thing shakes and I’m at his side—Derrick? Derrick?—and his eyes open. They’re leaking water and maybe blood. He struggles to sit. I put my hand under his head. He looks at his legs and I’m telling him he’s good, that we’re almost free, that shit will work out. His eyes go wide and then he relaxes and closes them. I look at his leg.

His jeans are torn. Three inches of thick bone poke through.

It’s fine, it’s fine, I lie.

He shakes his head.

We’ll help get you out of here. One on each side. Can you sit up?

I help him get upright. The veins underneath the tattooed hands ripple.

Okay, good, good, now put your arm around me, one around KK.

I drape his arm around me and then I say, Good, now we’re going to stand. Put all your weight on me.

It’s like doing squats. He’s heavy as fuck and I stand and he groans. KK’s doing her best and we get him on his feet. Then he tries to put some weight on his left leg, and there’s a snap, a pop, loud like the cracking of a frozen lake. He screams and drops.

The bone juts out another few inches. Derrick hyperventilates.

We’re fucked. I’ll need to put him on my back. I tell him this. His bald head is covered in sweat, his face is smeared with blood and snot and he says, Leave.

Not leaving you here.

I can’t do it.

Shut the fuck up.

He’s not listening anymore and he takes out a huge shard of meth and grinds it into his palm and snorts it.

KK rubs his back.

I’m like, Yeah, get yourself good and spun. It’ll help. Need you, man, you can do this.

He snorts more dope.

I stare at his tattoo and I’m trying to get his mind off his fucked leg so I ask about it.

He says, Son of a preacher man.

This makes sense. A marring of flesh to remember where you came from. KK’s tattoo of her sobriety date and her burned stomach. All of us trying to document our failures. But it’s hope too. Hope that some part of us lives on. That kernel of humanity. The shit I’m going to save.

In his low voice, Derrick starts singing “Son of a Preacher Man.”

I say, Okay, now you’re ready. Let’s do this.

He nods.

I search the top of the elevator for the opening. I find a panel. It flips open.

This shit’s gonna hurt, I say. Have to drop you through. But that’s it, then I’m carrying you. Good?

Derrick nods. He stares into space. He hums Aretha. Maybe he’s pumping himself up. I let him have this moment.

He sets the bag of dope at my feet. There’s a flash of metal as he puts the pistol to his head and KK shouts and it’s over that fast, one deafening pop.

KK’s on her knees, silent.

She’s staring at Derrick’s head, the puddle under it that grows with astonishing speed. I crouch behind her. I don’t say anything, just wrap my arms around her—so thin, so delicate, so fragile, KK able to endure no matter what, KK the strongest woman I’ve ever known. We don’t cry. I hold her as tight as I can. My heart beats through her back. My face is buried in her neck. A close-up of her tattoo—the day she left me—is all I can see.

After a few minutes, KK leans forward and picks up the bag of dope. She hands it to me. She stands. She takes the pistol from Derrick’s hand and gives me that too. She hands me the knife.
I take all of these things. KK’s holding on to the short-barrel shotgun and she motions to the opening in the elevator’s roof.

Her calmness disarms me. I’m not sure how to take it. I’ve seen this before in the bathroom of our apartment when she burned herself, cigarette after cigarette.

She kneels down and lowers her legs into the elevator and I take her hand, bracing myself, and lower her the rest of the way. I follow. I try my fingers in the elevator doors but can’t get good leverage. I jam the knife between the doors. This gives me a few inches. I’m able to wedge my foot in, then a knee, then my body, and I’m sideways, and I get the sole of my shoe against one side, my back the other, and I open the doors. KK crawls through. Then I throw all my weight to my right and kind of roll out of the doors as they slam shut.

We’re in a basement. The emergency lights are red, solid. The alarm is faint. The walls are unpainted cement and I touch KK’s arm and she says, I’m good.

We walk. One foot in front of the other. Everything’s quiet.

We walk hand in hand. We’re bloodied and soaking wet, holding guns and a bag of dope and our fingers are interlocked. Our footsteps echo. I’m having déjà vu. I’ve been here before. This very moment.

I remember being in the psych ward. They were letting me out but KK had to stay another week for observation and this was some shit because we’d been talking about doing this together, sobriety. Meetings and living better lives. Never going back. I’d wanted to stay inside those locked walls because there
was a girl who understood me and who
was
me, who saw my fuckups as humanity, who pressed my finger to her wound. My parents were coming to pick me up. KK and I skipped lunch. We walked down the white linoleum hallway. It was so fucking bright. We weren’t allowed any physical contact, the staff Nazis about that shit, but she reached out and took my hand and our fingers were one and we were one and we walked toward the wall of windows. It was sunny. I wanted to spend my life with this woman. I wanted to be sober.

I was, I say now.

Was what?

Serious about it all. Wanted it more than anything.

KK squeezes my hand harder.

We walk.

She doesn’t have to say anything and that’s how we’ve always been and that’s how we’ll always be. I see a red door ahead. This is it, what we’ve been searching for.

Block letters are printed on its surface—
EXIT
.

I’m crying.

I’m crying because we’ll be okay. I know we will. Just like standing at the window, us saying good-bye and unsure of our futures, us silent and touching, I now know we’ll be okay.