And Crawling Things Lurk

Cedar City, California

Mid-February

Early afternoon

Jackie Simms set the bottle on the counter of Adobe Liquors, the only wine and liquor retailer in Cedar City that still allowed him in, and steadied it with a two-handed grip until he was sure it wouldn’t tip over. Still, he kept his bleary focus on it just to be sure he hadn’t misjudged. One hand then dipped into a pocket, withdrew a wadded-up twenty, and laid it beside the bottle. His eyes remained on the items on the counter to avoid looking into the eyes and the judgment behind the register. He watched a hand reach for the bill, then a matching one helped straighten it out to verify it was whole—even snapped it a couple of times just to be certain. He heard the register ding and the drawer open, but no change appeared.

He waited.

He was pretty sure the guy was waiting for him to just walk away with the bottle, not realizing he had change coming. He was also pretty sure he often did just that – but not today. He wasn’t that drunk yet. Might be after this one, though.

He didn’t say anything. If he spoke, he probably would have just mumbled something to make the guy mad enough to run him out of the store, so he remained silent and extended his hand with the palm up. Even then, the guy hesitated. After many long seconds, a few bills and some coins dropped onto the counter next to his extended hand. Jackie had no idea if it was the correct amount, and he wondered if the guy behind the counter knew that. With a mental shrug, he picked them up with deliberate care. It wouldn’t do to drop something on the floor and then have to try to pick it up. He wasn’t so sure he could do that without falling on his face. His bottle lifted away and came back to the counter in a brown paper bag.

With his money safely in his pocket, he picked up his purchase and headed for the door. He still hadn’t made eye contact with the proprietor, but he hadn’t for days, maybe even weeks. He often lost track of time these days. And, what the hell – he already knew what the guy looked like.

Jackie hugged the brown bag to his breast as he reeled from the impact of the closing door on his back and stumbled out onto the sidewalk.

They oughta fix that damned thing. It coulda made him drop the bottle he had just bought. Then he would have to go back in and buy another one. That’s probably what they wanted. That’s probably why they didn’t fix the door – just so it would slam into him. T’hell with ’em.

Before facing into the icy wind that promised a miserable night for anyone without a place to get out of it, he gathered his coat collar tight in one hand while cupping the bottle securely into the crook of his elbow with the other. Satisfied that both concerns were as well handled as he could manage, he tucked his chin, turned and began the trek back to the Hole, back to where he could enjoy his bottle without all the judgmental crap.

He stumbled off the curb at mid-block and meandered across both lanes of traffic. One irked driver laid on his horn as he went past and yelled something out the window that Jackie didn’t bother to catch. But the next one slowed enough for him to hear the words “ass,” “stupid” and “drunk” in some combination with other words so Jackie mumbled his usual “Go t’hell” and reeled on. Just as he stepped up the curb on the far side, an old, faded blue van swerved over far enough for its wheels to send a spray of dirty water sheeting up from the gutter and across the back of Jackie’s legs. He shouted something intelligible, and the van rolled on down the street trailing laughter muffled behind closed windows.

A prolonged gust slipped in past the tightly held collar of his coat. It was enough to bring to mind the last time he didn’t wake up in time to go home and thought he was going to freeze to the ground before he managed to crawl to his feet. And it wasn’t like it was years ago, either. It was maybe a week ago. Maybe two. Probably would have froze right to the ground, too, if it hadn’t started to rain. He didn’t want to go through that again. It was early, though, so he should have plenty of time for this one, last bottle.

He only had a little over two blocks to go when he encountered Doug Keller, a local merchant who considered Jackie and his ilk to be unworthy of the breath of life, or anything else that might cost him money in the taxes he so diligently – and so begrudgingly – paid. With Keller was Abe Miller, another one of Cedar City’s citizens who considered anyone who paid fewer taxes than he had waived whatever rights to dignity might otherwise have existed.

As Jackie neared the corner, he heard, “Oh, shit! Here’s the wino.” He managed to tune out whatever comments came after that. But when he veered left to go around them, Keller stepped sideways to block him. Jackie stopped just in time to avoid bumping into him and turned to go the other way around. That’s when Keller reached out and snatched the brown bag from his hand.

“What’s this shit?” Keller said as he lifted the bottle out and allowed the bag to blow out of his hand. “Rot gut. Pure rot gut.”

“Hey! Gimme tha’!” Jackie’s reaction was slow, but it was there. “Tha’s mine!”

“Well, I don’t think you should have it, you retarded, drunken bum. What do you think of that?”

“Tha’s mine! Gimme!”

When Jackie grabbed for it, Keller held it up just beyond his reach, forcing Jackie to stagger and reel all the way around him as he turned about. Then, after just over one full circuit of teasing the dog with the bone, Keller cracked the seal, twisted the cap off and dropped it on the sidewalk. He was taller than Jackie and had no trouble holding the bottle too high for him to reach, and Jackie was far too zonked for it to even occur to him to jump after it

“You don’t really want to drink that crap, do you?” Miller said, joining in the fun even though he was standing on the sidelines.

“Gimme!”

Keller’s grin got even wider as he slowly tipped the bottle. His eyes never left Jackie’s face and its show of growing agony as Jackie watched the stream of purple fluid splatter on the sidewalk, blend with its sheen of water and flow over the curb and into the gutter.

“No! Gimme!” Jackie yelled and grabbed for the bottle, but Keller jerked it back.

“You really want it?” said the big man with the big grin. “Okay. Here, lap it up.” And with that, he opened his hand. When the bottle landed in the gutter, only the accumulation of trash and sediment, muddy from an earlier, misty drizzle, prevented it from shattering. It hit base first with a soft thud and toppled onto its side, its contents dribbling out to soak into the muck.

“NOooo! Don’t!” Jackie cried and dropped to his knees. He grasped the bottle and raised its neck to stop the flow. Using both hands, he lifted it and cradled it to his breast. He picked up the discarded screw cap and replaced it. Then he peered up at the two men laughing over him. “Wha’d you do that for?”

This got an even louder laughing response along with, “Because I felt like it, you drunken retard,” as they walked away. They were still laughing when they stepped up the curb across the intersection.

Jackie worked his way back up to his feet, always keeping a firm grip on his bottle, and staggered off. He turned left at the next corner and onto the eastern, cracked and potholed portion of Dogwood Street that the town’s street department had apparently forgotten. Four short blocks later, the final one being beyond the last side street, a set of train tracks along the west bank of the river at the stub end of Dogwood. But, because the land ended just beyond the end of the street where it dropped away to the level of the river basin a dozen feet lower, the ancient rails were mounted on a piling supported, wooden trestle whose far side jutted out past the solid ground. He stumbled up over the curb and onto the splintery wood. Like a fence thrown down to mark the edge of the land beyond which lay the abyss where the damned must dwell forever unloved, those ancient boards seemed to hover out over the lower, west bank of the river. Still on autopilot, he stepped over the first rail, turned and stumbled along thirty feet or so before turning back left toward the river. He stepped across the second rail and out onto ground that sloped downward. He leaned back just enough when he descended to keep from falling, either backward or forward. At the bottom, he turned left far enough to avoid the marshy mud at the edge of the water. He went around the left side of a clump of reeds instead of the right, which would have taken him right back to the water’s boggy edge after only a dozen steps.

“Hey, Jackie,” called out a gravely voice. “What’cher got there, hon? Got a bottle?”

He glanced over at Erica walking toward him from her space a little farther along the embankment beneath the trestle.

“I was jus’ thinkin’ how nice a little nip ’uld be.”

He turned away from her and staggered over to a smooth place in the ground next to an old wooden crate near the bottom of the bank. Above him the trestle stuck out like an awning, although not far enough to provide much shelter from the falling mist. Instead of maneuvering around to settle down into his special space, though, where he could face back out to his view of the small, muddy river, he just plopped onto the crate with his back to Erica, his bottle still clutched to his breast.

“Aw, come on, hon, gimme a taste. Jus’ a sip.”

Jackie hugged his bottle tighter. Everyone wanted to take it from him – and it was his! He worked his tongue around all the problems he had already confronted, shuffling and sorting them to convey all his frustration and rage. He opened his mouth, and out dribbled, “No – mine!”

He noticed the shadow of another figure approach and stop beside Erica. They all wanted his bottle. When he looked around and got both eyes focusing together again, he saw it was Josie. Even she was trying to take his bottle.

Jackie started to yell at her, too, to tell her to stay away from his bottle, but he looked into her eyes and remained silent. She had a way of telling him without saying a word that he was being an ass. She got a look in her eyes that tore right through the fuzz that might otherwise be shielding his perceptions, ripping asunder whatever rationalizations he might have constructed, cutting right into his heart, and he knew better than to try to put up any kind of defense. When she gave him one of her looks, it was like she held a mirror up to him, and he knew he wouldn’t like what he saw if he looked into it.

“Come on, Erica,” the younger woman said. “He’s being an ass today. Let’s go see if we can get into the shelter yet. I heard they’re having stew tonight. It’s gonna be another bitch of a night down here.”

Jackie watched them push their carts up the slope, the squeak of Erica’s was still audible long after they were out of sight beyond the trestle. He swept his bleary gaze around, looking wherever he could focus for anyone else who might want to take his bottle. Finally, no one.

Okay, so he was an ass. But, dammit, it was his bottle!

With a grin of anticipation, he gripped the cap and gave it a twist. The absence of the popping and cracking of the seal breaking reminded him that it was already open – half gone, even.

“Som-bitch! Som-bitch had no righ’! It’s mine,” and he tilted it up as his head went back. After the burn in his throat became pleasant warmth, his eyes came to focus on the end of the broken board sticking out at him from the tangle of others imbedded in the dirt of the bank. The spider was back.

Damn, he hated spiders.

He usually sat facing out toward the river, comfortably reclined in his preferred spot, the hollowed-out place in the ground at the bottom of the upper bank next to the crate. He had worn it down to fit his butt over the years by fidgeting and working his way into a comfortable position, smoothing out bumps and ridges, working loose protruding pebbles and twigs that dug into him – most of them, anyway. It had all the comfort of a soft, cushiony recliner, just without the soft and cushiony parts. But, now, here he was facing the wrong direction, and there before him was the dark beneath the support pilings and beams of the trestle that ran along the top of the upper bank, a confusing, tangled latticework against the rise of the dirt.

He didn’t like to look into the dark. Too often images would flit before his eyes, images he couldn’t place or identify, images like memories – unpleasant ones – just bits and pieces of them, like they had been cut apart, shuffled, and jammed back together in no sensible order.

And that other memory was still there, too, always pushing its way in if he wasn’t careful where he looked. It was from a long time ago, way back when he was just a little kid, probably no more than three or four years old. But it was as fresh, at times, as when it happened. His Uncle Charlie had jumped out of a closet just as Jackie was walking past, and he was wearing a paper bag over his head. He had drawn big, glaring eyes on it and a big, gaping mouth filled with big, sharp teeth. When Uncle Charlie jumped out and Jackie screamed, Uncle Charlie grabbed him by his arms before he could run and held him right up to his bag-covered face and growled “Jarrackierrrr! I’m a spider, and I’m going to eat you!” Jackie was so scared he couldn’t stop screaming. He even remembered he peed in his pants. Uncle Charlie thought it was so funny he couldn’t stop laughing. Uncle Charlie was an ass. Jackie had forgotten so many other things; why couldn’t he forget that one? So, he avoided gazing into dark places, places where nightmares dwell and crawling things lurk.

But, before the images started this time, the spider came crawling out to the end of the board. Damn, he hated spiders – even real ones.

Jackie was pretty sure the one looking back at him, glaring at him like it was daring him to make a move, was a real one. It didn’t run away, but it didn’t charge him like the others did, either. It didn’t grow larger as he watched it like they did. It just sat there near the end of the board, out near the tip, and stared at him with those black eyes. Not big, pointed and mean-looking eyes like Uncle Charlie’s, but dead, black eyes that had no depth, no color, no soul.

It was better to look at the spider than to let his gaze fall into the dark behind it, though, where other things might be waiting. Maybe spiders weren’t so bad.

Once he found a comfortable position, even perched on the crate and facing the shadows, he usually resisted moving except to reach for the bottle. Or, of course, to get another one after it was empty if he was still able to get up. That didn’t happen so much, anymore, not if he remembered to bring more than one bottle with him. ...Unless Joe or Josie or Erica was there to share with, then even three wouldn’t do...not unless Joe or someone also brought a bottle. But that hardly ever happened at all. They all just let him supply the bottles, like it was his job or something. No one even said thanks. It’d be nice, just once, to hear one of ’em say, “Hey, Jackie, thanks a lot for the wine, man. You’re the greatest.” Just once...

Brushing a lank, dirty tangle of dark brown hair from his face where it always flopped when he needed a haircut, he tilted the bottle to his lips and let the liquid gurgle into his mouth, let it run down his throat, and then he did it again. And, again, the hair was across his face. Probably oughta let Gramma cut it again like she wants. He hadn’t been to a barbershop in at least ten years, not since he came home from the hospital. And, still shy of his fortieth birthday, his hairline hadn’t receded enough to keep the hair from flopping forward in its usual disarray. Yeah, he’d let her cut it. At least she didn’t try to chop it all off like they used to do in the army. He didn’t remember much about those days, but he did remember that part, and he always hated it – he thought.

He looked over at the spider, and it glared back at him. There was still only one, and it still wasn’t growing bigger. That was good. It was probably real.

He let his eyelids droop over the top half of his eyes, just enough to cut down on the glare of the mid-February sun trying to break through the clouds, then he tilted his head downward just enough to cut down on the glare some more. It felt good, sitting in the sun down here out of the wind. Glad it stopped raining. Getting tired of the rain.

Another pull on the bottle, and the burning began. Beyond the normal warmth, which was nice, this started as a fiery coal in the pit of his stomach. He occasionally wondered and worried about that burning pain, even to the point of intending to mention it to Gramma, but somehow, he never got around to it. After a few moments, it spread and diffused to encompass his whole belly—the good burn. Oh, yeah. With that kind of heat, he could sit through a blizzard.

He had never been in a blizzard, not that he could remember, anyway. Not a whole lot of ’em around Cedar City, but he had seen pictures of them, and movies, too...probably. And he thought he remembered finding out what the cold and the wet of snow felt like when he was in the army. He sort of remembered one winter when his unit stopped off in Germany on the way somewhere else. He couldn’t remember where they were on the way to, but he was sure it must have been someplace important.

He glanced up at the spider, and noted it had more than four legs, probably eight, he recalled, if it’s real. He noted it had more than two eyes, black, soulless eyes. He leaned forward almost far enough to be able to count them before he caught himself and tilted back away from it. He didn’t really want to get especially close to those particular details.

Then he noted that, although it had that comfortable, fuzzy look to it, it seemed bigger. He opened his eyelids to get a better look at it, and it glared back at him. Then the damned thing puffed up to three or four times its original size. It shimmered and wavered and grew again. Then it opened its mouth, bared its rows of sharp teeth and growled at him, working his name into it, making it sound like “Jarrackkierrrr.”

It was supposed to be real, dammit!

He jerked back and raised his arm to throw the weight in his hand at the horror, but he caught himself just in time. The bottle still something in it, and he didn’t have a fourth one or the inclination to go for one. This one would have to do the job, the important job, the only job that really mattered, anymore. So, he yelled at the spider and waved his arm at it. Maybe if he waved it hard enough and long enough, he could erase it like chalk scribbles on a blackboard. He yelled and waved his arm some more, and he yelled again. The spider glared back at him. It was back to its original size, and its mouth no longer exposed rows of un-spiderish teeth. It didn’t shimmer or waver, anymore. It was just a spider, again. When Jackie laughed out loud at it, it backed up a few paces, then turned and skittered back into the shadows.

“Damned spiders!” he mumbled and dug a bent cigarette from his coat pocket. “Whyn’t they lea’me alone? Oughta burn ’em out. Get a torch and torch ’em. That’d teach ’em.”

He pulled an old hinged, Zippo lighter with an emblem for the U.S. Army out of his shirt pocket and flicked it open. It took three tries before his thumb found the wheel and spun it. Flame danced inside the wind protector and he vectored it to the tip of his cigarette and sucked until a curl of smoke circled his head. Then he waved the still blazing lighter towards the shadowy places beneath the trestle. With eyes squinting from the smoke, he growled past the butt, “Yeah, burn ’em out!”

He gazed up at the creosoted structure above the shadowy place of spiders until his mind waved red flags in his face as the potential for unintended consequences came clear. “Oops. Nope,” he muttered as he shook his head. “Better not torch ’em.”

The bit of momentum generated in his backward tilt carried him farther back, aiming his bleary gaze ever higher. When it climbed above the top of the trestle and registered the figure silhouetted there, a grimace twisted Jackie’s face, and he muttered, “Aw, shit!”