The Last Exit to Normal Page 9

  She looked at his smashed legs, then bolted up. “Come on, Ben.”

  I looked at her, not believing she would leave.

  She ran toward her truck. “Come on!” she screamed, and I followed her. We reached the truck, and I realized she was a step away from being hysterical. “Grab that shovel in the bed and go back up. Hurry!” Then she popped open a toolbox and scrounged through it. I ran back up to Morgan with the shovel. He looked at me through the rain and I asked him if he was all right. The words sounded hollow. Blood seeped from his mouth, and through his torn shirt I could see that the first impact had crushed his ribs before the tractor slid to his legs. He wasn’t all right. He was dying.

  “Get on out of here, boy, and you take my Kim with you.”

  Then she was there beside me, with several thick blocks of wood. She stared at her uncle, then turned to me, her knees in inches of muck. “Start digging him out, then use the wood to brace it if you can. I’m going for help.”

  I stared at her.

  She dropped the blocks. “You can’t drive, Ben. Not in this. I’ll be back as soon as I can. Just get him out before it goes.”

  I nodded, a bolt of lightning illuminating the panic on my face. Then she was gone, running back to her truck. When Morgan saw what was going on, he leaned his head against the ground and closed his eyes. I studied his midsection, and it was already swelling. I could actually see the broken ribs poking the skin out. I grabbed the shovel. “I’ll try not to hurt you.”

  He clenched his jaw. “Already does. Just do it.”

  I started digging, afraid I’d cause the tractor to move.

  “Hard and fast, boy; don’t be afraid.” He winced. “You see this thing go, you get your ass away from it, understand? I won’t have your death on my name.”

  I accidentally hit him in the leg with the blade of the shovel. He grunted. I kept digging. “Sorry.”

  He looked at me. “What’s your name?”

  “Ben.”

  He laughed, then coughed up blood, then groaned. “Figures I’d die with a stranger.”

  I ignored him, digging furiously even as the mud oozed back into the hole I was digging under him. “I’m not a stranger now, and if you die, your niece is going to kill me.” I jammed two blocks of wood under the cab, but they sunk in.

  “Got a liking for her, do you?” he muttered.

  I dug. The mud sucked at the shovel and fought me the whole way, and my arms ached as I slung load after load to the side. It didn’t seem like I was making any difference, and then the machine shifted, sliding a few inches to the side and grinding against his legs. A deep moan came from Morgan and I dug faster, panic and fear flooding my chest with adrenaline. My ruined hands didn’t even hurt I was so scared.

  Morgan groaned. “Get out.”

  “Shut up.” I could barely talk, and it came out a gasp. I was tired of being told to go away. Rivulets of water ran down the slope, filling the trench I was making beside him. “Shit.”

  He laughed. “Nothing like a good rain.”

  I began digging under him, scooping out mud as quickly as I could and ignoring his pain as I bumped him with the shovel. Time dragged on forever, and the only way I could tell that it was passing was my shoulders screaming at me, the air that wouldn’t get to my lungs, and a dying man cracking jokes about the rain.

  So I dug. I dug like a madman until I thought I couldn’t do any more; then I dug some more. Morgan leveraged his elbows into the muddy stubble, crying out as he inched himself to the side. “Keep going, boy.”

  I kept going, and a few minutes later, I leaned over his chest and grabbed his shoulders. “Going to hurt again, but you’re going to have to help.” Then I yanked, digging my knees in and pulling him out from under the mud. This time he screamed, but in a few seconds we were clear of the machine. He lay panting on his back, his legs a mangled mess of broken bones. I leaned over again and puked, stars coming to my eyes as the rain poured on us.

  The lightning and thunder were almost nonstop now, and I eyed Morgan’s truck fifteen yards up the hill. “How long will it take for her to get back?”

  He closed his eyes, the rain falling on his face as he gasped. More blood seeped from his mouth. “Too long.”

  I looked at the truck again. “I’ll be right back.” I staggered to the truck, the mud sucking at my boots with every step and my head spinning. The keys were in it, so I cranked the ignition. I’d driven enough to get around fine on paved streets, but I’d never driven a truck, and I’d certainly never driven one through a mud bog in Eastern Montana. I cursed myself. He’d die if I fucked this up.

  The truck was an automatic, thank God, and I put it in gear, taking a minute to turn the lights on and find the wipers. I eased the truck down the slope, letting the idle take it closer to Morgan, then jumped out and ran to him. “Can you help me get you in the truck?”

  He looked at the door. “I’ll try.”

  I got behind him and slung my arms under his, helping him to a sitting position. He gritted his teeth and tried to get a foot underneath himself, and I lifted. He screamed again, and we both fell. Then he was silent, his eyes closed. I sat there, gasping and panting and miserable as he lay unconscious next to me. I had to get him in. I couldn’t lift him, though. Not with the muck and mud and my arms like wet noodles.

  I felt tears coming, and the familiar fear of always messing things up when it meant the most gripped me. No. Not anymore. Ben the screwed-up teenager didn’t have a place here. Then I thought of Kimberly’s brother smirking at my hat. He’d be able to do this. These stupid rednecks could do anything, and I wasn’t about to let this man die.

  I moved behind Morgan and hooked my arms under his to try again. My boots slid and sunk into the field as I dragged him toward the truck. My back wrenched painfully, and I felt the muscles popping in my legs. It seemed like it took forever, but I finally got there and opened the passenger door. I reclined the seat as far as it would go and bent over him, feeling his breath on my cheek as I lifted, shoving and pulling and pushing and sliding him up the side of the seat and rolling him into it.

  Once he was in the seat, I shut the door, ran around to the driver’s side, and jumped in, putting the truck in gear. The four-wheel-drive light glowed on the dash, and I slammed the truck into the lowest gear and eased it down the hill to the track. Then we were going.

  I couldn’t go too fast, and I felt like an idiot trying to keep the tires on the track, but every side slope brought the truck sliding toward the edge. I did what I’d seen Kimberly do on the way in, steering upslope from my slide and giving the engine gas, and in a few minutes I had things somewhat under control.

  Morgan groaned when I accidentally slid into a gully and had to gun the engine, mud flying everywhere as I tore out of it. He opened his eyes. “That hurt like a sonofabitch.”

  “Sorry.”

  He looked down at his busted body. “Funny-lookin’ legs, that’s for sure. Ain’t supposed to be bent that way.”

  “You’ll go over like a fart in church.”

  He looked at me.

  “Kimberly told me you say that all the time.”

  He smiled weakly. “I suppose I do.” He lay silent for a minute. “You never answered me.”

  I gave it gas and spun up a hill, closer to the farmhouse. “What?”

  “You like my niece?”

  I nodded.

  “Gonna have to switch hats. Doesn’t suit you.”

  “I’ve heard that already. Thanks.”

  He leaned back and sighed, closing his eyes. “You’ll do.”

  “Don’t fall asleep. You hear me?” I reached over and nudged his shoulder.

  He nodded. “Just resting.”

  By the time I reached the farmhouse, the rain had lessened some, and three trucks, one of them the sheriff’s, had converged on the place. I recognized Mr. Johan’s truck next to Kimberly’s, and when he got out, my dad was with him. Another man in Kimberly’s truck got out, too, along wi
th Kimberly and her brother, Dirk.

  As they ran toward me, it took them a second to realize Morgan was in the truck. The man I didn’t recognize ran back to Kimberly’s truck and brought back a bag, rummaging through it and taking out a syringe. I glanced at the horizon as the doctor gave Morgan a shot, and I saw clear skies breaking. Kimberly came up to me. “You got him out.”

  I nodded.

  Tears ran down her face. “Thank you.”

  I shrugged. “No prob. Do it all the time.”

  She sobbed, then threw her arms around me and kissed my cheek. A kiss was a kiss, sure, but under these circumstances it wasn’t the romantic interlude I thought it would be. She whispered that she wouldn’t know what to do if he died.

  “He’ll be okay. The doctor will patch him up, right?”

  She looked toward the others. “Yeah. Sure. He’ll be fine.”

  “You country people are different, right? All tough and stuff.” I squeezed her shoulder, my eyes flicking to her dad, Edward’s words about shotguns flashing through me. “He will be fine, Kim.”

  I heard the sheriff talking about a helicopter coming in to take Morgan to some hospital, and then my dad was in front of me. His face was lit with panic, and he began to wrap his arms around my rain-soaked and mud-caked body, but stopped, glancing at Kimberly. He backed up a step, nodded, cleared his throat, and looked me up and down. “You okay, son?”

  I wiped the mud from my arms. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

  CHAPTER 12

  Morgan Johan had two broken legs; five broken ribs, two having punctured his lungs; and a broken pelvis. He almost died in surgery that night. I didn’t see Kimberly for two days, but her father stopped by to thank me. That evening, I shook his hand, Dad and Edward invited him in for a beer, and they talked for an hour or so about Morgan, life, and Rough Butte.

  Two days after that, the town of Rough Butte did something that taught me a lot about this place. They went out to Morgan’s farm and cleared his fields for him. A total of seventeen combines, twenty flatbeds, and over one hundred men, their wives and kids, showed up and got three weeks of work done in two days. Morgan’s wife, Helen, cooked for every one of them. Miss Mae and several other widows helped her with the food assembly line.

  Kimberly invited me on our second date. We spent two days baling hay and doing a bunch of other farm stuff at Morgan’s place with the rest of the town. It sucked, but I kissed her on her porch the second day and she liked it. Oh, yeah—I ditched the hat, too, keeping the jeans and boots but settling on my spikes. The bad news was that Dirk was staying at Uncle Morgan’s for a while. The dude scared me.

  Mr. Hinks didn’t participate in helping the Johans. He complained loudly of a sore back, and Miss Mae, ever the opinionated old woman, told him he could help the women.

  An odd thing happened to Mr. Hinks about a week after the whole me-saving-Kimberly’s-uncle-from-certain-death thing. It seems that somebody, gosh knows who, took all the antlers off his garage wall. I stood at my window, watching him file a report with the sheriff. Billy stood by his father’s side with his hands in his pockets, staring at the de-antlered wall.

  I closed my closet door, careful not to disturb the fifteen pairs of antlers I’d spent all night cutting off the wall. Norman Hinks could take his pile of bricks and shove them up his ass.

  A few minutes later, Miss Mae yelled at me from downstairs. I walked down and the sheriff stood at the front door. Miss Mae stood resolute, her face stony as she stared at me. “Sheriff wants to talk to you.” Then she barged out, leaving me with him.

  Sheriff Wilkins hooked his thumb in his gun belt. “Miss Mae says your daddy and Edward are out.”

  “I just woke up.”

  He eyed me. “Late night?”

  I nodded.

  “Mr. Hinks is mighty upset about his property being stolen. Says it’s twenty years’ worth of hunting down the drain.”

  I shrugged. “Somebody around here must not like him very much.”

  “Says you did it.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  Sheriff Wilkins studied me for a moment. “You’re treading a fine line here, Ben.”

  “With who?”

  He tipped his hat up, adjusting it. “Well, with Mr. Hinks for sure. And me. You know if I find out you did it, I have to charge you.”

  “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”

  He raised his eyebrows, paused, then went on. “You be careful around him, you hear?”

  “Maybe you should tell that to Billy.”

  “I’m not here to discuss Billy. I’m here to warn you. Norman Hinks should be left alone.”

  After pondering my possible death at the hands of a crazy ex–Pentecostal preacher, I put my gloves on and walked over to the Hinks house, knocking on the screen door. I don’t know why I did these things, because the pit of my stomach always contracted and my back tightened, but something inside just compelled me to be an asshole sometimes.

  Billy answered, didn’t say anything, and ran into the kitchen. A few seconds later, Mr. Hinks came to the door. He stared at me, the vein in his skinny neck throbbing. “You got something to say to me?”

  I smiled. “I need Miss Mae’s wheelbarrow. Is Billy done with it?”

  His eyes were chipped flint, and the skin around that neck vein turned red. “You baiting me, boy?”

  “No, sir. Just asking for the wheelbarrow.”

  His mouth turned into an ugly smear, and I was sure he was about to erupt. But he didn’t. He growled that it was in the back, then slammed the door on me.

  An hour later, I’d dug the first posthole and had the concrete mixed to set it when Mr. Hinks came out the back door with his keys in his hands. He stared at me over the fence the entire way to his car, got in, and backed out. I smiled and waved as he drove away.

  “You are one smart-alecky young man, and I should have your hide for the torment you cause around here.”

  I turned around, and Miss Mae was standing there. She’d come out every fifteen minutes or so to tell me what to do next, since I’d never fixed a fence before, and now she stood with her hands on her hips, looking at me. I smiled. “I’m good at torment.”

  She narrowed her eyes, studied my work, then turned back toward the house. “You get those antlers out of my house by tomorrow or I’ll strap your backside raw.”

  I watched her go, my jaw slack in amazement. I should have figured she would snoop in my room, and that didn’t weird me out so much. What she’d just said had. She knew, and she wasn’t telling.

  I went back to mixing the concrete, set a four-foot post in a hole, and poured some concrete into it. Billy came out the back door and grabbed a rake. “Hey, Billy.”

  He didn’t answer, so I bent to my work again, grabbing another post and throwing it to the next hole. As I wheeled the cement over, I looked up and he was standing there, staring at me, his big eyes and big shaved head looking oversized on his skinny body. I ignored him, taking up the shovel and clearing dirt from the hole.

  “How’d you do that trick?”

  I straightened. “What trick?”

  “That one where you spin the board over and land on it.”

  “A kick spin?”

  He nodded.

  I glanced to the street. “Where’d your dad go?”

  He looked at the driveway. “Car auction in Big Springs.”

  “Get your board and I’ll show you. Meet me.” I took my gloves off and watched as he ran over to his house, moved a piece of lattice from the side, and scurried into the crawl space under the porch. I went into Miss Mae’s house, grabbed my own board, traded my work boots for the worn-out and faded skate kicks I’d had for a year, and came out to the porch. Billy stood in his driveway, his knees dusty from crawling. I laced up my All Stars and met him. I dropped my board. “Your dad going to be mad if he catches us?”

  He nodded.

  “You sure you want to do this?”

  He looked at the
board in his hands. “I want to do a trick.”

  “Okay.” I hopped on my board, gesturing for him to do the same. He set it down and stepped on it, wobbly as he tried to gain his balance. I smiled. “You can’t learn a kick flip until you learn other things first. It’s too hard.”

  “I can do it. I saw you.”

  “Okay. Try.”

  “Do it again so I can see.”

  I did, pushing off and kicking up the board, spinning it with my toe, and landing on the deck.

  Billy pushed off, tried to kick up his board, and fell back flat on his butt, grunting when he hit the pavement.

  I smiled. “Hurts, doesn’t it?”

  He scrambled up, shaking his head no.

  “Here, just try doing the kick. Almost like a wheelie on a bike, and you don’t have to be moving. Like this.” I showed him, and then he tried. He didn’t fall on the third try. “Good job. You can turn when you’re doing the wheelie.” I did a one-eighty. “See?”

  He tried it and the rear wheels slid out. Down he went, this time saying “Ouch!” as his hip hit the driveway.

  I laughed. “Get used to it. I’ve burned about a billion times. Everybody does.”

  He smiled, embarrassed. “I can do it. Watch.” He did, then, and stepped the nose of the board over a foot or so.

  “Awesome. Just keep doing that and things will start coming. It gets easier.” I showed him a couple of other tricks that involved kicking the board and he practiced doing them himself, each time pausing to stare intently at what I did. I stopped for a while, lighting a cigarette and watching him. Then I nodded to the lattice. “Is that the secret place you were talking about? Where you put the stuffed animal?”

  He shook his head.

  I knew he was lying. “You ever see your mom?”

  He didn’t answer, but turned his back to me and tried a one-eighty.

  “Never?”

  “She’s gone.”

  I inhaled. “Mine is, too.”

  “You got a mom?”

  I hopped on my board and did a three-sixty. “Yeah. Everybody does.”

  He didn’t answer for a minute. “Your daddy’s a faggot. That means he likes other guys. How’d you get a mom that way?”