Shut The Fuck Up And Die! (6 page)

“
Hunting cabin up near Slater’s Pass.
Used to be my dad’s place back in the day.”

Earl glanced away from the road and studied
the new passengers with a quick sweep of the eyes.

“
Don’t look like no hunters to
me.”

Mona giggled and hid her face in Matt’s hair
as she shook her head. Patting his wife’s thigh, Matt grinned and a
private joke seemed to pass between the two before he replied to
the driver’s statement.

“
You’d be surprised.”

“
We’re on our honeymoon.” Mona finally
chirped in. “Just got married the day before yesterday.”

“
Hope your husband there fucks better
‘n he can drive.”

Earl’s words hung in the air for a moment and
dissolved the smile from Matt’s face. His jaw clenched and Mona
felt him stiffen beneath her as he took a slow breath through his
nostrils.

“
Now you wait just one minute, Mister,
that’s my wife you’re talking . . . .”

Daryl slapped him on the back and laughed as
easily as if they were old friends sharing a joke over beers.

“
Earl’s just ribbin’ ya, mister. Don’t
pay him no mind.”

For a moment, the four of them sat in silence
and listened to Dolly Parton beg Jolene not to take her man. The
radio crackled and popped as the music struggled to maintain its
dominance over static. Within moments, the song faded and was
replaced by the deep baritone of the DJ.

“
Comin’ right up, we’ve got some Waylon
Jennings on tap followed by a shot of Patsy Cline. But first, the
news . . . .”

“
How much farther did you say it
was?”

“
About eight, nine miles I reckon.
‘Course five of ‘em are off the hard road. Be in for bit of a bumpy
ride before we get to the house.”

“
You sure she won’t mind? Your mother,
I mean?” Mona asked.

When they’d first gotten in the truck, Daryl
had said that a whore had a better chance of keeping her virginity
than they had of finding a tow this time of night. The nearest town
was Chester and, apparently, the sidewalk was rolled up right
around the same time the sun went down. So the offer had been made
for Matt and Mona to spend the night at their place and then,
providing the coming storm didn’t knock the lines down, they could
call for help in the morning. The newlyweds had balked at first,
arguing that they couldn’t impose upon their kindness any further,
but the brothers had insisted, countering that the only other
alternative was dropping the two off alongside the road where
they’d be in no better shape than when they were first picked
up.

“
Oh, Mama won’t care. She just loves
company. ‘Specially a pretty young thing like you.”

“
. . . unconfirmed reports that
evidence was found at the dump site that may shed light on the
identity of the murderer . .”

Mona shifted on Matt’s lap as if the cab of
the truck had suddenly become too cramped and she glanced at her
husband with eyes that seemed to be clouded with nervousness. He
glanced at the two men and then gave her hand a gentle, reassuring
squeeze.

“
You fellas mind turning this crap off?
Stuff like this tends to make my wife a little
skittish.”

Earl glanced at the woman with the corners of
his mouth turned up into something that was halfway between a smile
and a sneer. His eyes sparkled in the light of the dashboard and
his words seemed to spill out of his mouth in a mocking
sing-song.

“
Poor little girl scared of the big,
bad wolf? That it, darlin’? Afraid it might hop outta these here
trees and gobble you right up?”

“
I . . . I’d just rather not hear about
it, if it’s all the same to you.”

“
Be over before ya know it. I ain’t
missin’ out on Waylon.”

The rest of the trip passed in relative
silence with only the soft strains of country music to combat the
rumbling of the engine. True to Daryl’s word, they turned off the
main road onto what was nothing more than a winding, dirt path
buried beneath mounds of snow. The truck rattled and bounced
through ruts so frequently that it almost felt as if the road was
nothing more than a series of ruts and ridges; pine trees gradually
overtook all other species and, after what seemed to be an eternity
of jostling, the headlights finally revealed an old farmhouse in a
clearing. The walls were gray with paint peeling from the faded
boards and smoke curled from a chimney that jutted up from a tin
roof pile high with snow. Only a single window had light spilling
from it and, off to the side of the house, Matt could just make out
the silhouette of some sort of shed.

“
You folks wait here.” Earl ordered as
he eased his bulk out of the truck. “Mama loves company, but she
hates surprises. Won’t be more than a minute or two, I
reckon.”

Daryl slid across the seat and followed his
brother’s lead, winking at the couple just before he slammed the
door shut.

“
Y’all sit tight now. Don’t you go
nowhere.”

The pair stomped the snow from their boots,
opened a screen door so rusty that the creak of the hinges could be
heard even from within the truck, and then disappeared into the
house. Mona looked Matt in the eye as he curled his hair around her
index finger.

“
You sure about this, baby? I mean, we
really should get that car off the road as soon as
possible.”

Closing his eyes, Matt leaned in toward his
wife’s touch like a cat enjoying the soft stroke of a hand.

“
I don’t see that we have much choice,
honey. You heard what he said. Even if we could find someone this
time of night to come get the car, I don’t think they’d be able to.
Not if the road’s been closed.”

“
Still, I don’t like it. We shouldn’t
be around . . . .”

“
Look, we’ll make a couple minutes of
small talk with the old lady, tell them how tired we are, and then
go to sleep, okay? First thing in the morning, we’ll get the car
and figure out what our next move is.”

Mona’s gaze dropped to the keys dangling from
the ignition of the truck and she bit her bottom lip.

“
Maybe . . . maybe we should just take
this one. We’d probably be gone before they even know and . . .
.”

“
Mona, these people have been nothing
but nice to us! Are you really suggesting we just steal their
truck? After all they’ve done?”

“
I don’t like it, Mattie. That’s all. I
want it to be just you and me again. Like it’s always been, you
know?”

“
And it will be, sweetie. Soon. It’ll
be morning before you know it. Besides . . . they’re already coming
back. See?”

Daryl beckoned from the porch with his hand
like a policeman directing traffic and Matt brushed his lips
against his wife’s soft cheek.

“
Come on, babe. I mean, it’s not like
they’re the ones who killed that woman in the dumpster,
right?”

The inside of the house was like a museum to
dust. It covered everything from the rickety coffee table to the
picture frames on the wall with a dull film and Mona fought the
tickle in her nose as she perched on the threadbare couch. Besides
looking as if it had been years since a thorough cleaning had been
done, the place smelled old as well: there was a musty odor that
seemed to permeate everything and was only overpowered by the scent
of pine as logs crackled and popped within the fireplace. Like most
homes with elderly occupants, the air was so warm and dry it almost
felt as though every droplet of humidity had disappeared through
the cracks of the bowed, hardwood floor.

Matt sat beside her and shifted positions
every few seconds in an attempt to find a way of sitting where the
springs of the couch didn’t press into his butt and legs like some
sort of medieval torture device. He glanced around the room ,
taking in everything from the deer head mounted on the wall to the
yellowed curtains that hung like funeral shrouds over the windows.
The panes were so old that the glass had a rippled texture when
viewed in just the right light and a draft must have seeped around
the edges, for the curtains rustled gently.

Earl and Daryl had excused themselves, saying
that they wanted to change clothes and wash up, leaving the
newlyweds alone with the old woman. She’d promptly disappeared into
the kitchen and they could hear water boiling from the other room
as a high pitched whistle gathered strength.

“
I want to thank you again, Ms Gruber,
for allowing my wife and I to stay the night. You don’t have to go
to any trouble for us. We’ll be out of your hair before you know
it.”

“
No trouble at all, young man.” the
woman called out amid the clinking of dishes. “I reckon the two of
you woulda caught your death of cold on a night like this. Least we
can do is take in a couple down on their luck.”

Feeling the need to add something to the
conversation, Mona chimed in.

“
You . . . you have a beautiful home,
‘mam.”

Shaking his head, Matt chuckled softly and
squeezed his wife’s leg as he winked at her. Mona, in turn, punched
him on the arm and then pushed him away as she arched her eyebrows.
This only caused his grin to widen, but he immediately straightened
as the old lady appeared in the doorway with a tray of teacups
balanced in her hands.

“
And please,” she insisted, “call me
Mary.”

She shuffled across the room and placed the
tray on the table in front of them. As she glanced at Mona,
something flickered in her eyes. For a second, her face seemed to
be nothing more than a paper-mache mask that hid something dark and
twisted behind its pale wrinkles. Something that stared out through
the eye holes with the cold, emotionless gaze of a primordial
predator; but, as quickly as this image appeared, it faded with her
smile.

Mona accepted the tea with a smile of her own
and breathed in the tendrils of steam that curled from brown
liquid. Raising the chipped rim to her lips, she sipped carefully.
Almost immediately, a taste as bitter as a bad walnut flooded her
mouth and she took another drink, hoping the heat that flowed into
her throat would wash away the aftertaste. If anything, however, it
only made it worse.

“
Mmmm . . . .” she lied, “it’s really
good.”

“
It’s a little old, I’m afraid. The
boys like their coffee and it seems prideful to put out a full pot
just for me.”

“
It is just a little bitter.” Mona
admitted.

“
I reckon I might be able to scare up
some sugar if’n you . . . .”

“
No, it’s fine.” Matt added. “You’ve
went to another trouble on our account.”

Mary lowered herself into a chair that looked
as if a cat had sharpened it’s claws on the armrest with rabid
abandon. Tufts of stuffing blossomed from the jagged tears that
hadn’t been repaired with patches of mismatched fabric and Mona
could just make out the wooden supports, peeking through the
batting and flaps of upholstery like an oaken skeleton.

“
If you don’t mind my sayin’, young
lady, you’re the spittin’ image of Audrey Hepburn. Hair’s a little
different, mind you, but if’n you don’t got her face then the
Devil’s my daddy.”

“
Why, Ms Gruber, you are far too kind
with your compilments.”

Though Mona’s lips moved, it was not the soft
lilt of her own voice that passed through them.. The tones were
rich and the clear enunciation was colored by an accent that seemed
refined and rebellious all at the same time: it was almost as if
the spirit of the Hollywood legend had somehow possessed the young
girl used her as a mouthpiece to communicate from beyond the
grave.

“
Well, I do declare . . .”

Mary’s jaw had dropped open and her eyes grew
wide and round behind her spectacles. She glanced at Matt, as if
expecting him to share the same expression of shock and amazement;
however, he simply chuckled between gulps of tea.

“
Mona can imitate just about any voice
she hears.” He explained. “You should hear her do Sarah Palin . . .
it’s uncanny.”

Mona blushed and dropped her eyes to the tea
remaining in her cup. She seemed to almost pull back into herself,
as if the praise were something that she felt the need to
instinctively retreat from.

“
It’s nothing, really. And I can’t do
men’s voices at all . . . .”

Stifling a yawn, Matt blinked several times
and shook his head as if he could fling off the exhaustion that had
suddenly made it feel as though his muscles were as weak and
ineffectual as the tea bag string that dangled over the rim of his
cup.

“
Gotten you out . . . of trouble on . .
. on more than one occasion . . . .”

There seemed to be some sort of fog that made
the corners of the room look as fuzzy and indistinct as an out of
focus photograph. As he watched, the haze consumed more and more of
the room and also seemed to seep into his mind; it was like his
words and thoughts had become lost in the gloomy clouds. They
bumped against one another and struggled to reach out to their
fellow refugees before being pulled away by the roiling
tendrils.

“
I . . . feel . . . I don’t . . . think
. . . .”

Matt turned to look at Mona, who swayed back
and forth with half-closed eyes. Though she sat so close to him
that their hips touched, she somehow seemed to be receding into the
distance. As if the fog were attempting to claim her just as it had
his thoughts.