Faith turned back to her. The man in black had his arm around her shoulders and was walking her across the street to the abandoned lot, to where the red-shirted man was waiting. She was holding on to him and it looked like she was limping. He had his face buried in her ear.
The potbellied guy – who looked like he had walked right off the set of Deliverance – ventured out into the street. Faith could see now the bushy patches of hair stuck on his cheeks. Not quite a beard and not a mustache. He was agitated, pacing like an anxious dog trapped behind one of those invisible electronic fences that zap you if you step outside the perimeter. He took off the baseball cap and ran a hand over his bald head. She saw that one side of his face was red and raw-looking.
The man in black brought the girl over to him. She began to wave her arms and clung tighter to the first man. Then the three exchanged words Faith couldn’t hear and red-shirt shoved her back at the man in black before angrily walking off. The girl swayed on her feet, as if she might go down, but the man in black caught her and stroked her head. ‘We got us a Looky-Look!’ shouted the red-shirt, turning to point to where Faith was. He spat at the ground. ‘Come on out and play with us, Looky-Look! Don’t be shy!’ Then he started across the street. The invisible fence was down.
Faith reached with a violently shaking hand for the jumble of key chains that hung from the ignition.
The man in black stepped in front of red-shirt and pushed him with enough force that he stumbled backwards and fell in the street. ‘I told you I got it!’ he yelled. ‘Back off! Don’t fuck it up any more than it is.’
Red-shirt scrambled to his feet and, taking the girl by the arm, led her toward the wooded lot he had emerged from. Faith couldn’t hear what he was saying, but the girl wasn’t waving her arms any more. She turned and cast one last look in Faith’s direction. She smiled weakly and nodded. Then the two of them were gone.
It had all happened in a matter of minutes, maybe less. But exactly what had happened? Faith could hear her heartbeat pounding in her ears. She turned to check on Maggie, then thought of the man in black and whipped her head back so fast her neck cracked.
He was standing right outside the driver’s side window.
She jumped onto the console, smashing her hip again.
He tapped on the glass with a long fingernail. It made a screechy sound.
Faith tried to scream, but fear had completely closed her throat. The only sound she managed was a gurgle. She tried to force the gearshift. It wouldn’t budge. The car wasn’t on.
His hand went to the door handle. She could hear the click of the metal as he tried to open it.
She couldn’t get her fingers around the key, her hand was shaking so hard. Her foot, too. On the brake, off the brake. On, off. Flopping about like a fish out of water. With one hand she tried to hold her knee down.
The man cupped a hand around his eyes and put his face to the window. She saw he had dark brown eyes and long lashes. In his other hand he held a flashlight. He beamed it straight in her eyes, blinding her. Then he moved it down over her body and across the front seat. When he aimed it into the back, his face lit up, like a child who has spotted what he wants under the Christmas tree. He tapped on the glass with the flashlight and pointed.
Faith turned the ignition and the car started. She floored the gas and the engine screamed, but the car didn’t move.
The man stepped back into the street, raised a finger to his lips and smiled. It wasn’t the full-on freaky grin he wore with the girl. This was a smug, toothless, dark smile that made her skin crawl.
She threw the car out of park into drive. The tires spun with a screech and the Explorer lurched forward. She couldn’t see anything – the windshield was fogging again from her breathing so hard. She wiped it with her bare hand, but not in time. The truck smashed into a garbage can.
The plastic can careened along the sidewalk, belching whatever contents it still had left all over the road. She tore off down a street, praying that the road wouldn’t be a dead end, or a cul de sac, leading her right back around to where she’d just been. The garbage can lid tore off the top, scraping against the asphalt underneath her car, stuck on something. She made another quick turn. Then another.
The cane army excitedly welcomed her back into the maze, the rustling stalks whispering their false promises of refuge, swallowing her whole as the wind kicked up and the stalks closed ranks on the road behind her.
The girl burst out of the woods, hobbling on what remained of her battered foot and a possibly busted leg. She could hear the revving of an engine, the screeching of tires as they spun out, the bang as the car collided with something. Please, lady, wait! Wait for me!
She saw the Crazy, standing there in the middle of the street, waving goodbye as if the lady in the SUV was his wife, off to run an errand.
‘Stop!’ the girl screamed at the Explorer that was hauling ass down the block. But only a squeak came out. In her hand she clutched a chunk of Swamp Thing’s face that she had managed to rip off with her fingers.
For a moment she thought she might beat the odds again. Odds that had been against her since she’d first stupidly climbed into the Cute Crazy’s car two nights ago to make a little cash. Odds that would’ve had her dead already, or hanging from that beam in that shack. But she’d made it out of the horrible place that stunk of death, with its walls and floor stained with blood and torn fingernails and its floor of broken glass. A place she knew others had not made it out of. She’d made it across fields in the middle of a storm in the middle of the night. She’d survived being hit by a car as the Crazy Brothers hunted her down. She’d walked on shredded feet. She’d made it here. She’d found civilization in the middle of nothing but cane fields. She’d found a lady actually sleeping in her car in a town where there was not a single other soul around. It had to be a miracle. It had to be. She was so close to a happy ending – it couldn’t end here. It couldn’t end this way. ‘Stop! Please!’ she barked.
She saw the flash of brake lights and started to cry, but then the SUV turned down a street. Her body finally gave out. It could take no more. She collapsed on her knees, surrounded by garbage, her arms outstretched. Her leg felt like it was on fire. ‘Come back!’ she screamed.
But her voice barely made a sound. Fear had claimed it.
Swamp Thing was behind her – he wanted his cheek back. She tried to crawl away, but didn’t get far. He found her feet and dragged her like a caveman might, back toward the woods. Her fingers clawed at the asphalt.
The last thing she saw before the woods consumed her, and the mud and leaves and rocks filled her nose and mouth and eyes, was the other Crazy – the one she’d thought was handsome when she’d danced for him, with his long, dark waves and his scruffy beard and intense eyes. He had a hard body and strong hands. Hands filled with cash and, as her friend Loni liked to say, green made every guy look good. But the tall stranger hadn’t needed much help in that department. Now he was standing in the street, facing the direction where the SUV had driven off. His arms were raised up to the sky and he was laughing. As she was being dragged to the slaughter, he was laughing into the rain. Now she could see him for who he really was, for what he really was. He was the Devil, dressed all in black, daring God with his outstretched arms to come down from the heavens and perform one last miracle for His little lost lamb.
But there were no more miracles to be had. Not tonight.
The clouds gathered, seemingly at his command, consuming the moon again, and the biblical rain started up once more, washing away the drag marks that her body had left behind.