Mars in Retrograde. Chapter 7.

You can bring your cunt.

Still here? That’s kind of you.

Chapter 7. You can bring your cunt.

What if there was a hurricane so large, so swept up by the changing currents that it moved like God’s great claws raking the earth to shreds, tearing homes and schools and governments and people to thin-sliced scraps? Marshall read once that the wind on Venus can reach up to 1500 miles per hour. His stomach lurches sadistically just thinking about it. On Jupiter, winds can reach 900 miles per hour and because of the planet’s atmospheric composition, the winds are constantly flinging little shards of glass about in an endless vacuum. It’s so awful, incomprehensible in the breadth of its potential for destruction. Maybe it could all end like that. Maybe things will start moving so quickly that everyone is just torn up by the speed of it and all there will be is violent movement, all matter churning together in an endless cut up sludge. There might be something in his backpack for that.

Marshall imagines what might be happening back at the trailer. If the police believe Truck–which they will because a guy named Truck is the sort of guy the cops will always believe–then they’d be busting down the rusted trailer door right about now. They’ll find Elaine asleep on the ratty old couch, only maybe waking up to the pounding on the door but probably not. She doesn’t keep drugs in the house so they can’t arrest her but they’ll probably take her in for questioning and she hates cops so she’ll likely be difficult and obstinate and maybe that will piss them off and they’ll scrounge up something they can use to press charges and she’ll have seen Marshall’s goodbye note so maybe she’ll spill in the end anyway because she knows next to nothing about what makes Marshall Marshall but she does know that he killed his father because she was there and he almost hopes she just tells them so she can stay out of trouble. They’ll put it all together one way or another.

Marshall is on the run forever now. He’s figuring that he’s gotta accept that sooner rather than later. So he chooses now. Situation accepted. Except he didn’t expect Jamie to be here, too. Why is Jamie here, too?

“Why’d you come get us?” He asks now.

Jamie is driving them back to Lana’s. It’s the safest place to figure out the best course of action. His lips are pressed together like floodgates. He’s got stuff to say but no will to say it. Instead, he takes one hand off the steering wheel and jerks his thumb back toward Beaver who’s fallen asleep in the backseat. Marshall nods. Maybe it’s just impossible to know that kid and not care deeply for him. Maybe that’s why his parents are dead. They refused to care for the easiest thing to care for and their apathy split their souls from their bodies out of spite. Not a sharp knife or too many drugs in the blood, just a lack of empathy.

Then Jamie puts his hand on Marshall’s knee, squeezes hard and returns it to the wheel, eyes on the destination.

Marshall is filled with an instant aching in the spot where long fingers had put pressure on his clothed skin. How different it would have felt to feel skin on skin, Jamie’s palm and all its lifelines compressing the hair on his legs, the warmth of such unbreakable contact. What did that touch mean? Marshall could barely get beyond the feeling to give it reason. He’s just happy that he’s not alone.

“What about your family?” He asks. “The store?”

Jamie shrugs indifferently but Marshall notices the way his eyes dart to the rearview mirror to look back in the direction of his home. Is he really giving his whole life up for this kid he met only a week ago?

“You don’t have to come,” Marshall says to his fiddling thumbs. “You can just drop us off at Lana’s and we’ll figure it out from there–”

Jamie’s eyes dart back to Marshall now and he shuts up. There is no pliancy in this gaze, no hesitancy or regret. Jamie has made his decision. Marshall nods calmly and that’s it. He’s got help and he is accepting it.

They pull into Lana’s drive and find that the party is still going. In the summer morning light that is already cutting lines of heat into the air like a warm butter knife, the lights still strobe, the beat still pulses through the broken windows. It all looks much sadder without the guise of the dark night to hide the looks of longing and loneliness painted across faces fighting their emptiness with the insincere texture of a drug.

Beaver stays in the car–they don’t need anyone seeing him in any particular context in this town again. The guy who’d been planking on the stairs hours ago is still there, still looking for something in the expanse beyond the world as it turns from speckled obsidian to patchwork blue like the ocean dappled with seafoam. His crotch is stained from his bladder’s inevitable release.

They find Lana on the roof smoking a cigarette. She looks no different than she normally does, perhaps a bit paler, gaunt, but it’s unlikely that she’s slept of course. She greets them as if they never left. “My handsome darlings, are you having fun?”

She already seems less high than she had several hours before and the look on Jamie’s face must sober her further. She draws her knees up to her chest and flicks the cigarette butt onto the lawn below. Jamie takes a seat next to her but Marshall doesn’t bother.

“I’m getting outta here,” he says.

“The little boy?” she asks.

“He’s coming. Only cops and foster homes left for him here.”

She seems calm but there’s a tightness in her shoulders that she’s trying to conceal. “And you, J?”

Jamie nods in reply. They fall quiet for a bit. Marshall can see the truck from up here, see Beaver neatly tucked into the backseat.

Marshall clears his throat. “Listen, we came here to give ourselves some time to figure out where we’re headed but you should know…a high school kid that was here last night recognized Beaver. The cops are gonna end up here eventually asking questions, Lan. They won’t find Beaver here, but…”

She mutters something under her breath and drags her fingers through her tangled hair, oily hair. “You’re lucky I love you both dearly.”

Jamie places a hand on her knee and squeezes and Marshall realizes that’s just something he does. It fractures his heart a bit. Feels a bit embarrassing. 

“Suppose I should come along then,” Lana says.

Marshall cocks an eyebrow. “Oh. Really?”

She shrugs the tightness from her shoulders. “Unless it’s a dicks only kinda trip. You’re the ones bringing the cops here. I’m sick of partying anyway. High time I get clean and see some stuff.”

“Just like that?”

“Long as you don’t mind me in intense withdrawal for several days. And so long as it’s not a dicks only kind of trip. You gotta tell me it’s not dicks only or I’ll be thinking about my cunt the whole time.”

“Not dicks only, just dicks majority,” Marshall says. “Cunts allowed.” He tries and fails not to think about what Jamie’s dick looks like and he kinda wishes it was dicks only for horny reasons but it’ll be nice to have Lana around once she’s done exorcizing the drugs from her body. Marshall has never known her sober, not in a committed way. Who will she be without the drugs?

Lana spends the next hour waking the house yelling, “COPS ARE COMING, GET THE FUCK OUT,” and gathering a seemingly random assortment of items to take with her. A bread knife, an empty pill bottle, a ripped pleated skirt. Once the house is cleared, Beaver comes in with a map that Jamie grabbed from the Quik-Mart. While Lana packs and sings to herself and the lights continue to strobe, the boys sit on the porch and stare at the pile of spaghetti called the US Interstate System and try to find a direction to head in.

Beaver wants to go South, follow the coast to the Gulf of Mexico and find a boat to live on. Jamie wants to go west with no destination in mind; Marshall imagines it’s the stretch of land that appeals to him, that they could go so far and see so many things and maybe never have to stop moving long enough to think about where they came from. Marshall wants to go North, follow the Appalachian mountains to some serene basin in a conifer forest where they can build a house far from other people, evade the cops and the end of the world and anyone ever asking him to kill again.

The boys argue over their reasons back and forth for a while. They aren’t reasons so much as longings and intuitions. Perhaps they each feel pulled toward a place they knew in a past life.

In the end, they decide there is no right decision or best decision unless one of them can divine the future and though Jamie expresses with several gestures and expressions that he is frequented by Deja vu, this is not the same as clairvoyance and so they have to make a decision based on facts rather than intuition.

The facts don’t get them much further. Where can they go to evade the law? Nowhere, the country is a sprawling surveillance state. Where can they find easy work and cheap housing? Also nowhere, every job is a productivity-fueled anti humanitarian nightmare and inflation has swallowed the country in a big helium balloon. Where could they find a plot of land to call their own and settle without being bothered? Believe it or not, nowhere. Every inch of land has been consumed by private ownership or begrudgingly ceded to its original habitants in miniscule portions.

They’ve been making lists and tearing them up, engaging in silent psychic arguments, listening to Beaver prattle on about things he’d like to see when Lana finally appears with three bags slung over her shoulder and slaps a hot pink finger down on the map. “Right here.”

“That’s Canada,” Beaver says.

“Good eye, kid,” she replies.

“Why Canada?” Marshall asks.

“They accept refugees.”

“Refugees…from America.”

“Correct.” She has her hair pulled up into a ridiculously messy bun and is wearing a sweatshirt that says ‘My other ride is your mom’s four door sedan.’ “Canada is fucked too but they stay watchin’ our schools get shot up, our geriatric presidents lettin’ racism slip through the dementia cracks, all our land on fire setting all their land on fire. Everybody knows America is a death trap now except for most Americans who think it’s still utopia because they can shout slurs and then get an anchor position on Fox News. So yeah, they take refugees.”

Jamie cocks an eyebrow.

“I’m glad you asked. We can be anything we want. Climate refugees. Queer refugees. Opioid epidemic refugees. I’m not sayin’ it’s an easy process but our best bet is getting out of this country while we still can. For several reasons.”

Marshall considers this. “Why up here?” He points to the area she’d indicated. Canada’s west coast, north of Washington, British Columbia province.

She gathers all of the saliva in her mouth and launches it over the railing with pursed lips. “Well, like I said I got several reasons. For one, it offers everyone what they want. It’s a long fuckin’ drive so Jamie gets to see the country. We go up past Vancouver and there’s no fuckin’ people up there so we can find somewhere quiet to settle for a bit in the woods or whatever and we’ll stay near the coast so Beaver gets his water. For two, or I guess four, we can cut across the midwest, less people, less chance of getting caught.”

Marshall strokes his chin. “What about you? What do you get out of it?”

“I get to leave this fucking town and this piece of shit house and live the rest of my days with a couple of big dick boys who don’t love me back.”

Marshall’s face flushes. She’s right, his dick is big, but he’s embarrassed to have Jamie know this. “You really won’t miss this place?” Subtle redirection. “Not many people own a house at twenty two with nothin’ to pay for it.”

“I’ve been fucked or vomited or been fucked till I vomited in every room and there’s no windows and my daddy killed himself here and I don’t give a fuck about owning property, you think I’m some sort of Christian?”

“Jamie is Christian,” Marshall offers.

Jamie holds up the tiny golden cross with the dead man on it that hangs around his neck and shrugs. He doesn’t really care. It’s just something to believe in.

“Can we go now?” Beaver asks.

“Yup,” Marshall says.

And then they go.

---

Jamie’s piece of shit truck is a piece of shit. It’s too old for bluetooth and besides they smashed their phones and left them in a dumpster behind a Wendy’s where a guy was smoking a cigarette and jerking off, so they are stuck with the radio or a minimal selection of cassette tapes. Still, the music can barely be heard over the sputtering, grumbling engine. There’s barely enough room for two people in the cramped backseat so Lana lays on her back in the flatbed and watches the clouds speed by above and it’s probably for the best because she has to throw up every few minutes.

They’re listening to Bruce Springsteen in a gay way with all the windows down. The fresh air whips past Marshall’s face to the backseat and cycles back around to deliver the scent of Beaver chomping on Wendy’s chicken nuggets.

The first hour after they cross into the next town and drive on carries a shocking sense of freedom. All Marshall can see is open road, boundless space, endless opportunity and infinite possibility. The world is the biggest thing in the entire world. Three towns over, they stop for gas and he’s reminded that this is no vacation. Their every move could lead the police to them and their every dollar has to be wisely spent. They are far from free.

They roll on through kudzu country. Everything out here is draped in the parasitic green like fine silks. Trees are swallowed whole by the crawling, creeping, devouring vines, leaving the leaves beneath to die in darkness. Marshall read somewhere (don’t ask him where. Being asked to cite his sources is enough to make Marshall so upset that he has to go kick a old can down a dirt road for at least an hour to calm down) that kudzu grows so rapidly only because ancient humans in China used to harvest it for weaving baskets and tools and it evolved to be used by humans and humans stopped using it and so it grows unchecked without its partner in crime. People forgetting their place in nature, a recent and incessant overture. Marshall wonders how he will grow now severed from the place that kept him in check. What is he going to devour and kill with his greedy need to move and expand?

Two hours and they’ve crossed state lines and Jamie is pulling into a supermarket parking lot to gather supplies.

Marshall leans against the side of the truck in the afternoon sun. They’ve agreed it’s not wise for him to show his face anywhere with cameras so he’ll stay with Beaver out of sight. Jamie and Lana probably have a few days before they’re implicated, maybe less for Jamie who will be missed more quickly.

“How you feeling?” Marshall asks as Lana climbs from the bed of the truck and stretches her thin limbs. Her hair is knotted and tangled from whipping around in the wind, bun lost to the forces of nature.

“I’m right as rain,” she says with a serene grin. “Withdrawal will probably hit me later tonight and that’s when I’ll start shaking, throwing up, hitting myself in the head, et cetera. Good now, though.”

“Okay,” Marshall says.

They pool their combined money together in the palms of Jamie’s hands. Together, they have $2,632.44, most of which is Jamie’s. He has more in his bank account but they agree that they won’t take anything unless it becomes urgent. Money should be used only for gas and food. They can make do with whatever else they’ve got.

Jamie and Lana head off and Marshall lets his thick skin bake in the sun and taps an inconsistent rhythm against the truck’s rusted metal. Though they’ve only been gone for a few hours he already misses his landscaping guys. He misses the quiet work, the Latin music playing from someone’s shitty phone speaker, working his muscles until he was doused in sweat, eating lunch with the guys beneath the shade of a tree they’d just planted. If he closes his eyes and trains them on the orange and yellow spots that dance across his eyelids, he could be anywhere, any time, even back before anything went wrong. Or was it always wrong?

He opens his eyes and looks across the parking lot. There’s a Planet Fitness. A Kohl’s going out of business. A Starbucks with a drive through line wrapped twice around the building, the cars idling and pumping hot gas into the atmosphere. An Ace Hardware, of which the outdoor display catches his eye. There are some basic summer items–grills, firewood, pool floats in cardboard boxes with happy diverse children on the front. And luxury tents in tight bundles.

He sucks in hot air through his front teeth. Money is for food and gas only. He turns to Beaver who is looking out across the parking lot at the weeds growing through crack and crumble of the pavement, the endless spill of cars across the freeway. What is he feeling? He seems calm. Marshall feels anger at the thought of John Beaver feeling anything but peace.

“Hey kid,” he says. “Close your eyes.”

Beaver pouts. “Why?”

“Just do it. Don’t open them ‘till I say so.”

Beaver follows direction begrudgingly. Marshall jogs across the hot pavement to the hardware store. They’re close to the freeway but it’s still a drive-through state, Nowhere, America. No cameras out front. Mostly empty lot. Marshall grabs three tents and jogs back to the car, tossing them into the flatbed with a clatter.

“Kay,” Marshall calls out.

Beaver opens his eyes and looks back at the flatbed. “You stole those,” he says matter-of-factly. 

“Yup.” Marshall rests his arms on the car door, chin on his forearm.

“I knew you were gonna do that.”

“I knew you knew I was gonna do that,” he agrees.

“So why didn’t you want me to watch?”

Marshall looks somewhere past Beaver toward the freeway and all the places it might take them. “I saw a lot of stuff when I was younger, your age. And even though I always knew this stuff was happening, I still wish I hadn’t seen it. Wish I hadn’t had to learn from it. All that shit made me a bad person, I think.” He knocks gently on Beaver’s helmet. “I’m just tryna do right by you, kid.”

“You killed my pa,” Beaver replies.

“You asked me to.”

He swipes at his nose with the back of his thumb, feigning disinterest. He asks, “Does that make me bad?”

Marshall closes his eyes again. He could be anywhere but it doesn’t change where he is and how he got there. “It means you want a good life for yourself, John. Nothin’ bad about that. You tell me if I’m not giving you a good life, okay? You gotta tell me.”

Beaver nods. “Yeah, okay. I can do that.”

They’re quiet for a while. Sweat pools at Marshall’s lower back. He dreads the days to come of sitting still in the car for hours on end.

“Jamie’s still wearing your hat,” Beaver notes, watching the two figures coming out of the grocery store.

Marshall turns to watch. They’re laughing at something but their lips are still. Jamie’s face is still swallowed by the shadowy brim of the cowboy hat.

“I suppose it’s his now,” Marshall replies.

Beaver laughs to himself. “Adults are weird. I don’t think I could ever like someone that much.”

Marshall smirks. “You might someday. And you might not. But you let me know if you do, yeah? I gotta make sure they’re good enough for ya.”

Jamie and Lana start loading the groceries into the car, Beaver tucking as much as he can under his legs on the truck’s floor. The sun is beating down now and they move sluggishly in the heat. Sweat falls like clockwork, drip drop drip drop drip. The sky is blue like the sea and cloudless. 

“You guys really aren’t leaving me?” Beaver asks quietly.

The three of them stop what they’re doing. There’s a crack beneath the serene calm, the strange thirteen year old stoicism.

“Not plannin’ on it,” Marshall says.

Lana climbs into the flatbed and sticks her head through the tiny square window. “I think we’ve all had enough leavin’ in our lives.”

Jamie hasn’t uttered a verbal word since the night prior, since sparks soared high above two men looking at something obvious and he’s still quiet now but he offers Beaver a warm look that softens like a boiled egg and Beaver nods.

They settle into the car, bare thighs sticking to the leather seats and burning. The engine sputters a few times before roaring to mechanical life. They have everything they need for a journey up north and they should be safe.

“Do you think we’re all gonna be okay?” Beaver asks, adjusting his helmet, his buck teeth hanging over his lip like curtains. “You think anything bad will happen to us?”

Marshall and Jamie exchange a look. It says something like, lying is bad, optimism is good.

“I think we’re gonna be good,” Marshall says. “We’re gonna make it up North and everything is gonna be alright.”

END: PART ONE.

TOMORROW: PART TWO. THE CULT AND ALL THE WAYS IT KEEPS THEM FROM GETTING UP NORTH AND GENERALLY BEING ALRIGHT.

green things swallow the trees / I didn't think this could happen again / I've always been apart of the vine

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Table of Contents.

Sure hope that cult thing doesn’t cause any problems. Probably not. As a reminder, if you wanna skip the wait for chapters, you can grab your own digital copy of the whole book on my website or on amazon for your e-reader. I leave that decision up to you.