One Second After (6 page)

“Come on, buddy,” the one worker said, his voice now edged with a taunting edge. “Help the lady. We'll push her over for you; then we'll climb over and you can give us a lift as well.”

She looked back at the four.

“I don't need your help,” she said coldly.

The drunk laughed softly.

John felt trapped, especially as he spared a quick glance back to Jennifer. Suppose the car was taken right now; it would be a long haul back for her.

At that moment he caught a glance from the truck driver. There was a slight nod and ever so casually he let his right hand, which had been concealed behind his back, drift into view. He was holding a light-caliber pistol. There was a moment of gut tightening for John, but the exchange of glances said it all. “It's OK, buddy; I'm watching things here.”

John looked back to the woman.

“Ma'am, I'm sorry, I've got to get my kids home. You just walk a little less than a mile to the west and you'll find food and shelter.”

“Rotten shit,” the drunk growled, and moved to start climbing the fence.

“Girls, into the car,” John snapped, and there was no hesitation. The doors slammed behind them. John backed up to the car, the drunk had a hard time negotiating his footing. John slipped into the driver's seat, slammed into reverse, and floored it.

“Son of a bitch, all we want is a lift,” and as the drunk half-dangled from the fence he flipped John off.

Flooring the gas, John continued to back up all the way to the turnoff to their road, threw the gear into forward, and roared up the dirt road.

“John Matherson, I can't believe you left that lady like that. Especially with those men around her.”

“I have a family,” John said coldly, looking into the rearview mirror to where Elizabeth and Jennifer were in the backseat, both of them silent. He could sense their accusation, that Dad had chickened out. He shook his head and said nothing.

He pulled into the driveway, the dogs started to bound around him but then, sensing his mood, shifted their attention to Jennifer and Elizabeth.

“Girls, it's getting dark. Remember the hurricane last year when we all piled into my bedroom? It'll be like that tonight. Elizabeth, get out the Coleman lantern; you know how to light it. Jennifer, you help her.”

“Come on, Dad; I think you're being a little uptight.”

“Just do it, Elizabeth,” he said slowly and forcefully.

“All right.”

The two headed to the door, Jennifer pestered Elizabeth as to what her birthday present was.

“And Elizabeth, after you get the lantern lit, help Jennifer with her injection. Don't keep the medication out of the fridge any longer than you have to.”

“OK, Dad.”

“Then feed the dogs.”

“Sure, Dad.”

The girls went in. John fished in his pocket for a cigarette, pulled it out, and lit it.

“Are you going back to help that woman?”

“No.”

Jen was silent for a moment.

“I'm surprised at you, John.”

“I know I'm right. I go down to that highway and those bastards might take this car.”

“But what about her? The woman? Does it bother you?”

He looked at Jen sharply.

“What the hell do you mean?”

“That woman. And there was another one with a small child. They could be raped.”

He shook his head.

“No, not yet. Those guys weren't all that bad. The drunk was out of hand; the loudmouth one was just trying to show off in front of his buddies and the woman. Sure, it's strange, our car running, the others not, and if I went back down they'd be tempted to take it. Or worse yet, I'd be stuck all night running a shuttle service for everyone stalled on the highway, and running into yet more drunks with a bad attitude.

“But rape? No, too many others down there are OK. Everyone else is sober; the truck driver down there had a gun in his hand, though you might not of seen it. He'll keep order. That woman and the others will be OK. I wouldn't worry about that yet.”

“Yet?”

He sighed, shook his head, let his finished cigarette fall, then fished out another one and began to smoke it.

“I'd like you to stay here tonight, Jen. The girls would love it.”

“You worried about me?”

“Frankly, yes. I don't like the idea of you driving around alone at night in this monster,” and as he spoke he slapped the hood of the Edsel.

“I'll stay.”

He looked down at her, surprised there was no argument, about the cat needing to be put out or some other excuse. It was dark enough now he couldn't see her face, but he could sense her voice. She was afraid.

“It's so dark,” she whispered.

He looked around. It was dark. There wasn't a single light down in the town, except for what appeared to be the flicker of a Coleman lamp, some candles. All the houses rimming the valley were dark as well. No reflected lights from the highway, none of the annoying high-intensity lithium glare from the service stations at the exit, not a light showing from the skyline of Asheville. There was a dull red glow, what looked to be the fire up on the side of the mountain towards Craggy Dome.

The stars arced the heavens with a magnificent splendor. He hadn't seen stars like this since being out in the desert in Saudi Arabia . . . before the oil wells started to burn. There was absolutely no ambient light to drown the stars out. It was magnificent and, he found, calming as well.

“Head on in, Jen. I'll be along in a minute.”

She left his side, moving slowly. From inside the house he could now see the glare of the Coleman and, a moment later, heard laughter, which was reassuring.

He finished the second cigarette and let it drop, watching as it glowed on the concrete pavement of the driveway. It slowly winked out.

Opening the door of his Talon, he slipped in and turned the switch. Nothing, not even a stutter from the starter motor, no dashboard lights . . . nothing.

He reached under the seat, pulled out a heavy six D-cell flashlight, and flicked the switch. It came on.

When he went into the house the girls were already making a game out of camping out.

“Dad, Jennifer's new tester doesn't work,” Elizabeth said.

“What?”

“The new blood tester. I found the old one, though, and we used that. She's OK.”

“Fine, honey.”

Somehow, that little fact now did set off more alarm bells within. The new testing kit was a high-tech marvel with a built-in computer that kept a downloadable record of her blood levels. In another week she was supposed to be fitted out with one of the new implanted insulin pumps . . . and something told him he should be glad they had not yet done so.

“OK.”

Elizabeth started to turn away. He took a deep breath.

“Elizabeth?”

“Yeah, Dad?”

“Ah, you and Ben,” he felt embarrassed suddenly, “you know, is there anything we should talk about?”

“Come on, Dad. Now?”

“Yeah, you're right. Get your sister settled in and let's call it a night.”

“Dad, it's not even eight yet.”

“Like the hurricane, kid. We went four days then and by the end of it we were asleep when it got dark and up at dawn.”

“OK.”

He looked into his bedroom and Jennifer was, to his delight, lining up her new Beanies along what she had already claimed was her side of the king-size water bed. Clutched under her arm was her beloved Rabs, the stuffed rabbit that Bob and Barbara gave to her the day she was born and which had been Jennifer's steadfast companion for twelve years.

Once a fuzzy white, old Rabs was now a sort of permanent dingy gray.
Rabs had survived much, upset stomachs, once being left behind at a restaurant and the family drove nearly a hundred miles back to retrieve him while Jennifer cried every mile of the way, a kidnapping by a neighbor's dog, with Dad then spending two days prowling the woods looking for him. He was patched, worn smooth in places, and though she was twelve today, Rabs was still her buddy and John suspected always would be . . . until finally there might be a day when, left behind as a young lady went off to college, Rabs would then rest on her father's desk to remind him of the precious times before.

The dogs had finished up chomping down their dinner and he let them out for their evening run. Ginger was a bit nervous going out, since usually he'd throw on the spotlights for them. At this time of year bears with their newborn cubs were wandering about, raccoons were out, and the sight of either would nearly trigger a heart attack. She did her business quickly and darted back in, settling down at Jennifer's feet.

“No school tomorrow?” Jennifer asked hopefully.

“Well, if the lights come on during the night, you'll know there's school. If not, no school.”

“Hope it stays pitch-black all night.”

“You want me in the guest room?” Jen asked, carrying the Coleman lantern.

“In with us, Grandma,” Jennifer announced.

“That puts me in the middle,” Elizabeth complained, “and Brat here kicks when she's asleep.”

“All right, ladies, I'll be out in my office. Now get to sleep.”

Jen smiled and went into the bathroom, carrying the lantern.

“Night, girls.”

“Love you, Daddy.”

“Love you, too.”

He closed the door and went into his office. He sat down for a moment at his desk, setting the flashlight on end so that the beam pointed to the ceiling, filling the room with a reflected glow.

The office had always driven Mary crazy. She expected “better” of a military man to which his retort always was that she had also married a professor. Stacks of paper were piled up on either side of his desk, filed, he used to say, by “geological strata.” A floor-to-ceiling bookshelf to his left held books two rows deep, the references for whatever he was working on
at the moment, or what interested him, on the nearest shelf. The other walls were lined with photos, his framed degrees, Mary's degree, pictures of the kids.

He stood gazing at the bookshelf for a moment, pulled several books from the outer layer aside, found what he wanted, and fished the volume out. He had not opened it in years, not since leaving the war college.

Sitting down and propping the book on his knees, he held the flashlight with one hand, checked the chapter headings of the work, a mid-1990s dot-matrix computer printout, then sat back and read for half an hour. He finally put the report down on his desk.

Behind him was a locked cabinet, and opening his desk, he pulled out a single key, unlocked the cabinet, and swung the door open. He reached in, hesitated for a second, deciding which one, then pulled out his pump 20-gauge bird gun. From the ammunition rack he opened up a box of bird shot, and slipped three rounds in. The bird shot was not a killing load, except at very close range, but definitely a deterrent.

Next was the pistol. It was, he knew, an eccentric touch. A cap-and-ball Colt Dragoon. A big, heavy mother of a gun, the sight of it enough to scare the crap out of most drunks.

John had actually been forced to use it once for real, back in his undergraduate days, before he met Mary. He was living off campus, in a farmhouse shared with half a dozen other guys, all of them rather hippieish that year, long haired, the year he definitely smoked a little too much dope . . . something that Mary had made clear would stop on day one if they were to date.

Some local good old boys had taken a distinct dislike to “long-haired faggots” living nearby and one night did a “drive-by,” blowing out the kitchen door with a load of buckshot, yelling for the faggots to come out and get what they deserved.

His roommates were freaked, one of them cried that they were in the middle of
Deliverance
. But their attackers had not counted on one of the “faggots” being from New Jersey, already into Civil War reenacting, and someone who knew guns. He had come out, Dragoon revolver in hand, leveled it, and fired off two rounds of his cannon. Not aiming to kill, just to make them duck a bit. After pumping out the two rounds, he lowered his aim straight at the chest of the redneck with the shotgun.

“Next shot's for real,” John said calmly.

The rednecks piled into their truck and disappeared in one helluva hurry, his buddies standing on the porch, in awe as he walked back, feeling more than a little like Gary Cooper in
High Noon
.

“Peace through superior firepower,” he said calmly, then went inside and poured himself one helluva vodka to calm down while his roommates chattered away, reenacting the drama for half the night.

What had truly scared him? The realization that he was ready to kill one of the bastards if they had tried to venture another shot. Reflecting on it later, he didn't like that feeling at all, and hoped he'd never have it again . . . though he would, years later in Iraq, but at least then he was not pulling the trigger just ordering others to do so.

The following morning, a Saturday, the landlord had come over with a case of beer, asked to see this now-legendary gun, and said that “you boys got some respect now.”

A month later, stopping in a roadside bar with a couple of friends to get a beer, John had run into one of the four who had been his harassers. John recognized him, there was a tense moment, and the redneck broke out laughing, brought John a beer, and told everyone the story, concluding with “this Yankee boy's OK,” and they shook hands.

Damn, even then he did love the South.

The revolver was already loaded, and he put it on his desk.

He suddenly realized someone was in the room and looked up. It was Jen in the doorway.

“This is serious, isn't it?” she asked.

“Go to sleep.” He hesitated. “Mom.”

She stood silent for a moment, nodded, then disappeared.

Without taking his shoes off, John stretched out on the sofa in his office, laying the shotgun down on the floor by his side.