Page 17 of Road Refugees

This evolved into every woman chanting “eat, eat.” Some even punched each other on the bicep, something we’d never do in Cornucopia! In many ways they were like my tribe of women there, but in many ways they were different.

After I downed most of the soggy chips with melted orange goo, Orchid showed me how to dial the phone. Sort of. Well, she mostly did it for me. At least I remembered how to hold it to my ear.

But the guy said he’d never heard of an Arkie. When I asked how long he’d been working there, he said since the dispensary first opened. He was the owner, Lytton Driving Hawk.

“Maybe he’s got a road name,” Lytton suggested.

“Arkie is the only thing I’ve ever called him,” I said morosely. “He’s got a big nose, and is sort of a dork?”

“That could be anyone.”

“Shut the front door,” I muttered.

“Wait,” said Lytton. “Are you Mormon?”

“Yes!” I cried, nearly bashing over my beer glass.

“That’s got to be Sock Monkey. He’s from St. George in Utah.”

”Yes!”

I knew it in my heart of hearts! I’d finally found my brother! I had no idea why they’d call him Sock Monkey, but it was too big of a coincidence that they’d have a worker from St. George. The women at my table cheered and I couldn’t hear what Lytton said next.

“What? What?”

“Listen, I’ve got to verify your ID first, if you know what I mean. I’ll have Sock Monkey call you back.”

He seemed to already know my phone number, so I hung up and breathed a thousand sighs of relief. Orchid squeezed me so tight, I remembered how badly my shoulder still hurt. But I was on the road to find Arkie!

By this time, I felt pretty good with my buzz. I accepted another beer from someone, and one woman said,

“That’s Bare Bones territory. Their mother chapter is in Pure and Easy.”

“Shit,” said a couple women, and the light, boisterous mood calmed down.

“Well,” said Orchid, holding my hand, “you just sit tight and wait for your brother to call you back.”

Someone invited me to play pool. I recalled doing it a couple times in high school, so I consented. Everything became a bit blurry then, but I asked one girl,

“Don’t the Bare Bones have a bar down the street?”

Her answer was noncommittal, just a shrug. I remembered Orchid telling me not to go into that Bare Bones bar. I “scratched” the felt of the pool table with the tip of my cue, and that’s when Nina came in and told me my brother was on the phone. I had to come with her down the street.

I followed her, reeling like a drunken English king. “How come he didn’t call on my phone?”

“He thought it was secure to call on our phone.”

“Isn’t that the Bare Bones bar? Where are we going?”

She quickly hustled me past The Drawing Board. When I noted Kelsey peek out from behind a storefront entrance, I recall feeling a little apprehensive. She was Byron’s woman and had stood up for his low treatment of me.

I tugged on Nina’s sleeve. “Hey, hey. Bring your phone into the lambs bar, will you?”

She whipped her head to look at me with flashing eyes. Wow. No one in Cornucopia would dare display that kind of anger. “We can’t. Listen, do you want to talk to your brother or not?”

“Of course I do, but—”

Now Kelsey took over. She exuded that phony kind of cheer, and I just wished I was back with the lambs. I trusted them. But wasn’t Nina one of them too?

Kelsey fingered the sleeve of my conservative striped button-down shirt. “Come on in,” she chirped, indicating the swinging doors of a dark store.

Being lured into a dark spot must’ve hit some brain button. Terror gripped my heart, and now I know what that means, because it was like a hand squeezing every last blood drop from my ventricles. I cried, “Why can’t you bring the phone out here? I can’t go into another dark place! No!”

This is when things became very tumultuous. Nina shoved me from behind—and at six feet tall, that wasn’t hard for her to do—while Kelsey wrenched my forearm to tug me in. I banged my head once again on the swinging wooden door. That’s when I saw Stomach’s horrifying face, utterly looming before mine. I could’ve testified that I could smell the deep indigo incision that bisected his skull. It looked like the Grand Canyon with a sandy lip and a bloody interior.

“Cumon, you cunt,” he said as he made a swipe for my other arm.

Good God in an evil world. Was this my penance for turning on God, being left with no trust or hope? I’d had my hopes crushed time after time. Why bother having them anymore?

When Byron’s figure stepped out of the darkness, flicking a Bowie knife with his thumb, I knew I’d committed the ultimate crime. I’d dared to have hope, hope that I talk to my brother once again.

I screamed like a woman in a horror movie.