Cruel World(43)

“It’s better not to look.”

Ty sang to himself in the back seat, his voice a high falsetto that came out surprisingly beautiful. After a time, Quinn turned to Alice, tipping his head toward the melody that poured quietly out of the little boy.

“He’s singing OneRepublic.”

Alice nodded, her eyes never leaving the road. “He sings whatever I listen to or what’s on the radio. He’s got an unbelievable memory.”

“He’s got an unbelievable voice.”

“I can hear you talking about me up there. I’m blind, not deaf,” Ty said, as he paused between lyrics.

Quinn laughed and put a hand over his mouth while Alice’s eyebrows came up and she glanced in the rearview mirror.

“You watch that sassiness, mister.”

Ty giggled and began to sing again.

A stilt burst from the right-hand tree line and ran up the embankment toward the Tahoe.

“Shit!” Alice yelled, swerving hard to the left.

The stilt flew toward them. Its long, bony limbs pumping, broken teeth bared in its oblong face. Its eyes stared into Quinn’s, locking there with hunger. The driver’s side tires cut into the grass and gravel beside the turnpike as the stilt reached for the SUV.

They hit its outstretched arm at sixty miles per hour.

The appendage ripped off at the creature’s shoulder with a wet thump, spraying Quinn’s window with crimson and fleshy shrapnel. It spun once in the center of the highway and fell to its knees, a gout of arterial blood jetting out and coating the road. It stared after them, unmoving, until they crested the next hill and dropped down the opposite side.

Alice and Quinn let out a held, collected breath.

“Where the f*ck did that come from?” she asked.

“From the woods. It was just there all of a sudden.”

“Fuck they move fast.”

“It was waiting,” Quinn said, shifting so he could see through the back window. Ty had quit singing and was staring straight ahead, fingers gripping his seat belt.

“Waiting? What did it think it was going to do, rip us out of the car?”

“I don’t know, but that’s very aggressive.”

“You can say that again.”

Quinn shifted his gaze to Ty, took in the boy’s stoic fear.

“It’s okay, Ty. We’re okay.”

Ty nodded once and swallowed as he continued to twist the seatbelt. He didn’t sing another note the rest of the ride to the city.

~

Portland appeared on the edge of the ocean amongst a tangle of overpasses and onramps. Quinn leaned forward as the signs announcing the city’s distance counted down. The stalled cars became more prevalent here, but Alice was able to weave between them without slowing below thirty. A large cove opened up on the right and he surveyed the choppy, shining water. A half dozen boats bobbed there, tethered in place by anchors, and a long sailboat drifted past them, sails furled, its deck empty.

They took an off-ramp that pointed toward the first business district and pulled down a narrow street with dozens of cedar-shaked houses lining its sides. Ahead a small grocery store advertised lobster at eight dollars a pound. The sidewalks were deserted, the only movement a myriad of twisting pinwheels before a tourist shop. Alice took a right and drove down the street, passing dentist offices, a stone-sided restaurant, and a bakery with its front door hanging from broken hinges.

“How far to the facility where your mother lives?” Quinn asked.

“Another two miles.”

Quinn’s head swiveled from side to side, watching not only for the threatening movement of pale flesh but also drinking in the rich colors of the city. The houses, the storefronts, the signs of so many people and life, yet there was none. The city held a voided quality, dreamlike but so vivid he could not look away.

They came upon their first dead body while turning a corner where the street narrowed. Two cars had crashed and one had burned. The body of a partially charred man lay in the center of the street. One of his arms was charcoal-black and his scalp was blistered and purple. He faced mercifully away. Quinn was reaching toward his door handle and anticipating the cold touch of the body in his hands when Alice sped up.

“What are you—” he managed before Alice drove over the corpse.

There was a sickening double thump as the Tahoe’s wheels crushed the man’s skull and legs, and then they were speeding up again. Quinn’s stomach rolled and his mouth opened as Alice glanced at him.