The Feet of God
I got a bad feeling in my
stomach as we followed Roger’s yellow Jeep along a gravel road that stretched
around the back of the lighted crosses and downward toward a dirt square next
to a man-made pond. Roger halted and
indicated we should do likewise. The
trailer and the van came to a grinding stop.
I asked Charlie, “Where are we?”
“Damned if I know.”
“You don’t know?”
“Alabama? I dunno. Maybe like Alabama someplace,” he shrugged
while he unshackled me.
Then there came an overpowering smell.
“Do you smell that?” I took a
chance on complete honesty. “Listen,” I
turned to Baker, “you know what that is, don’t you?”
“What?”
“Meth.”
I knew a meth lab when I smelled one, being from the wrong side of the railroad
tracks in Bakersfield. We stood there in
a lot they called the Christ’s Corral, and there was definitely a meth lab
located nearby.
Then I spotted about two dozen skinny, pale zombies with greasy hair, buzzin’
around from place to place with no real intention or destination in their
minds. About five or six of ‘em started
climbin’ over the big-rig truck itself, and a couple’a them was coverin’ the
windows and chrome with paper and tape while another six or so started washing
down the roof and sides of the truck, while a couple more begun running hose
and connecting them to spray-paint equipment.
They seemed somewhat harmless, not so’s you’d have to shoot ‘em in the
head to make ‘em stop whatever shit they was up to. Not that I was in a position to do anything
about it, you see.
And then, as smooth as could be, Roger slipped a gun from his coat pocket and
blew Able’s brains out the far side of his skull.