Three Dudes Makes it Easier

Gabe sits behind the wheel of the Tran Am for a few minutes. Not one car passes him. He grabs his duffel bag, locks the car and starts walking. The sun becomes occluded with thunderheads. Darkness envelops the sky. Off to the west the landscape is bright but the miles above are ready to open and they do. Drops so fat you can dodge them plop on the hot pavement sending up steam and the smell of the passed away summer. Plop, plop they fall heavier and closer together and at last there is no dodging them and the rain is all sound now like someone just started up a saw after a few preliminary minutes of hammering. The rain dances on the road and soaks the young man in his light blue jacket which belongs to his father and his own shirt and jeans and his father’s penny loafers. Wet and sloppy and the bag wet too and a wet gun will be a rusty gun.

The destination is forward that’s all he can do is take one step after another and wonder with his thumb out who would be insane enough to pick him up, no one because no one trusts anyone anymore. When did that change. When did we get too afraid to help one another out? There were always killers out there. When did we decide to stop being a Samaritan? Gabe has no answers and has no experience picking people up. He remembers hitching with his mother, a child on the side of the road feeling afraid, an understanding that life had changed. Once there had been a car or a bus or a van or a VW bug. Now there was the thumb and Gabe and another little girl child of the hippies a sad thing with red dress and black shoes played with a doll and sat on a military backpack and they all waited for someone to stop, Gabe and the girl and Gabe’s mother and the girl’s mother. Who would stop and what would be said, groovy chicks with groovy kids. Got drugs? Wanna blowjob? Who knows? Who knows who cares? Just get me somewhere warm out of the Minnesota rain even more numbing than the Minnesota cold. The rain the drizzling shits like this one. People stopped back then. People don’t stop now.

Five minutes later a white beat to shit Chevy Nova passes him, slows down, stops, taillights fried and broken, a hand out the passenger window waves. Gabe jogs down the shoulder with the bag bouncing the heavy gun at the bottom with the extra socks. He reaches the car and a skinny dude with bad teeth sitting in the passenger seat says where ya goin’ friend.

Anywhere I can get to a phone says Gabe. I’m outta gas.

The skinny dude says something to the driver, a fat boy in overalls no shirt then the skinny dude says we can give you a ride to Krotz Springs down the road here.

Thanks man says Gabe and he opens the door in gets in the car. The backseat is filthy with piled bags of fast food and beer cans. Material hangs from the ceiling in rips. The windows are fogged and leaky.

The driver drops the car in gear and tells the skinny dude to find something good on the radio. Some Zeppelin he says.

Fuck Zeppelin says the skinny dude. I’m tired of that old shit.

The driver takes one hand off the wheel and punches the skinny dude hard in the shoulder. Never say that in this car says the driver. Fuck that. Never say that around me. Fuck Zeppelin? I should kill you for even thinking that.

The skinny dude rubs his arm and punches a button on the radio. Thanks a lot man he says. Now my fucking arm is numb.

You’re lucky that’s all I did. He looks in the rearview mirror and says you like Zeppelin right?

Hell yeah says Gabe. Best band ever.

Now we’re talking. Where you heading brother?

Washington. I’m actually on my way back to New Orleans but I ran out of gas. I have family in Washington.

Well there’s a gas station in Krotz Springs says the fat boy.

Yeah says Gabe. I got no money is the problem. I lost my wallet.

Whoa says the fat boy, sucks to be you.

Sure does says the skinny dude punching buttons and filling the car with everything except rock and roll until at last the sounds of Ratt come tomahawking through the cruddy speakers and the woofers are half dead and the speaker screens are caved in or missing and the whole wagon sweeps along the highway with one wiper barely making any progress and the driver has to lean forward and wipe the windshield with his crumpled shirt because the defrost doesn’t work either and it is wicked wet and steamy out there a last taste of summer before winter and in almost every direction the sun seems to shine except right above their heads. Round and round what comes around goes around I tell you why.

We could lend you a few bucks for gas says the fat boy.

Sure says the skinny dude. We even got a gas can.

Wow says Gabe that would be excellent. I would really appreciate that.

Not a problem says the driver. We’re just fucking off today anyway, got nothing else to do.

Did ya’ll watch the game?

Nope says the fat boy. Last I heard the score was a lot to a little and not in favor of the Saints.

That sucks.

Yeah it does.

It sure does.

I could mail you guys the money says Gabe.

Sure says the skinny dude. We’ll work something out.

Gabe sits in the middle of the backseat and rides in that violated womb through the showered-upon landscape letting his eyes fall a moment and take in the grind of the guitars like a house being simultaneously torn apart and put back together and he is blessed and grateful for these Samaritans who have saved his narrow ass. So sleep just a moment young Gabe and what feels like an hour will pass in two or three minutes and then he wakes with a start and sees the two Atchafalaya bridges approaching in profile on his right. One is a modern parabola suspension bridge built and held aloft by god’s own magnetic powers. The other is a cast iron daughter of the Huey Long Governorship, all rust and rivets and the boom when you cross it and the rails and the superstructure all about you like a poorly maintained cage. And whereas the new bridge allows traffic in either direction east or west the old bridge is strictly two lanes heading the same way, east, back to the past and better or worse times. And the old bridge is a killing bridge for there are many small markers somewhere at the foot of the bridge with a little white plate and a black X marks the spot and that tells the mowers of public land and that there lies the dead. For it is on that bridge that Gabe’s aunt was hit from behind and thrown from her car and she hit her head on the concrete and went to sleep and never woke up. She died and took god with her. Gabe’s father thought that someone who looked so perfect in a coffin could not be dead. And if praying for it to be different did no good then prayer obviously was bullshit. And maybe the old bridge is the family Doucette themselves for it is locked down in old victories and old crimes and what is needed is the agility of the new bridge to slide effortlessly in either direction and embrace an unknown future and flee or return to a decaying and impolite past.

They pull into a gas station in the nothing town of Krotz Springs and all get out of the car. The fat boy pulls a plastic red gas can from the trunk, an identical twin to the can Terry used.

We’ll tell the dude to put two bucks on pump two says the fat boy and he and the skinny dude head inside.

Gabe uses the gas-gun cautiously recalling as always the time the gas-gun busted while his father was pumping, spraying gas all over his father and the car. Nearly blinded his father jumped in the car, foolishly started it up and roared away from the pump. Gabe and his brother sat in the backseat. Gabe knew what had happened but his brother thought they were stealing a tank of gas what with the hasty departure. We’re outta here he said with glee to which his father shouted shut up. The boy cried as they ran every stop sign back home. His father parked and ran in the house. Fortunately Agnes was in the bathtub. Get out get out he shouted I’ve been gassed I’ve been doused with gas. She leapt from the tub as he stripped and jumped in balls hanging socks still on. Aaaaahhhhh he said.

The fat boy and the skinny dude emerge from the gas station with a sack of beer. Gabe puts the gas can back in the trunk and gets in the car. They offer him a beer and sure why not. Beers are popped and a toast is made to new friends. The skinny dude produces a skinny J and around the car it roams. The acrid burn, the eyes clenched in pain. You don’t get off until you cough.

Look at that bitch says the fat boy.

Yeah says the skinny dude.

A good-looking blonde is parked at the pumps. She gets out of a silver Mustang and walks inside to pay for gas. A moment later she emerges and walks over to the pump. She opens the gas tank door, pulls the pistol-grip pump out of its holster and slides it in the tank.

Fine as a mutherfucker says the fat boy.

Hell yeah says Gabe.

Hell yeah says the skinny dude. I’d eat a mile of her shit to get within an inch of her asshole.

Thant’s nasty dude says the fat boy but I’d definitely drink her bathwater.

The blonde is wearing shorts that show a lot, her hair pulled back in a pony tail. In the backseat there appears to be a large basket of laundry. College girl going back to mama. She finishes pumping gas, gets in her car and pulls slowly away from the pump. The fat boy drops the Nova in gear and they follow the silver mustang out of the gas station and onto the highway. When the girl gets on the bridge the fat boy continues to follow her over the Atchafalaya.

What are we doing says Gabe.

We’re following that chick says the fat boy.

I can see that says Gabe. Why.

Why. Tell the man why.

The skinny dude turns in his seat. We’re gonna get her he says.

Get her. What does that mean, get her?

Get her dude. We’re gonna get her and fuck her ass. You can do it with us man. It’ll be fun.

What the fuck are you talking about says Gabe.

I’m gonna hit her car says the fat boy and when she stops we’re gonna throw her ass in our car and take her somewhere and fuck her. We do it all the time dude. It’s fucking awesome.

The mustang exits off the bridge in a big loop down to river road. On one side is the levee, on the other a bank of woods.

Perfect says the fat boy. He punches a button on the stereo and it comes to life with the opening chords of Immigrant Song. The fat boy yowls and turns the music loud. He guns the Nova and begins closing ground on the girl.

Pull over says Gabe. Pull the fuck over.

What?

He doesn’t want to do it says the skinny dude.

Why not says the fat boy looking at Gabe in the rearview mirror. We bought your gas and we’ll give you a ride back to your car. Come on man we just wanna have some fun with this bitch. Three dudes always make it easier. With two sometimes the bitches get hurt.

Yeah they do, says the skinny dude.

Yeah they do, says the fat boy. They sure do.

Dude says Gabe pull the fuck over and let me out of this car right now. I am not doing this.

Yeah you are says the skinny dude turning in his seat to point a little automatic pistol at Gabe. You ain’t got a choice dude. You do this with us or I’ll shoot you in the face.

Yeah you will, says the fat boy.

Yeah I will, says the skinny dude. I sure will.

Gabe looks at the gun and sees the chipped front sights and his eyes go up the barrel of the gun which he knows to be a cheap .25 automatic of some foreign breed probably a Titan and up the skinny dude’s skinny jailhouse tattooed arm and up his shoulder and into his face and his chipped front teeth mirror the sights of the gun and into the eyes and the eyes are bluer than the Caribbean and veined with red like marbled Tuscan hills and those eyes with their narrow practically invisible pupils are having the time of their lives. And now like all good ninjas Gabe must take four deep breaths. One, clear the mind. Two remove all doubt. Three visualize the action. Four become the action. Gabe sweeps his left hand across his face and slams the gun into the back of the fat boy’s head and the gun goes off and the driver’s window shatters and the car swerves off the road and into a ditch and flies up out into the air and as it soars Gabe thinks yes it does feel like a movie and then the Nova goes headlong into a cypress tree and it is man versus nature and there’s no contest boom. All fly forward and the skinny dude cracks his back against the dashboard and the fat boy smashes face-first into the windshield and Gabe hits the back of the front seat with a solid nose-bloodying whack.

He remains conscious but neither the driver nor the passenger are moving or saying a thing. The engine settles and steams and ticks. Immigrant Song continues to play. A turn signal clicks. In his left hand Gabe holds the skinny dude’s gun. Indeed it is a Titan 7 shot .25 automatic. His father has one just like it. Ah to know and be able to use the vocabulary of guns. Gabe feels his face. Nose bloody but that’s it. Nothing else seems to be broken or crushed. Gabe grabs his duffel bag and gets out of the car. The silver mustang is long out of sight. If she saw their wreck she wisely kept on trucking. Gabe tosses the Titan in a culvert, bang and a flash of orange. He looks back at the wrecked Nova. Oh well. He says a silent prayer for those two lost souls and then heads back down river road. He reaches the old bridge and begins his ascent. There’s the narrowest of room to walk and the big rigs come bearing down upon him blowing black smoke, their polluting parts per million. There’s nothing to fear. You’ll never know what’s coming next but you’ll know what to do when you get there. Gabe lifts his arms to the sun burning through the clouds like a hundred hydrogen bombs. Down below is the fat muddy river. A big rig blows by, its horn echoing Gabe’s shout of joy.