Fiends

Desert pickup

‘All right!’ He felt lucky about his one. Walking backward along the roadside, he stared at the oncoming car and offered his thumb. Sunlight glared on the windshield. Only at the last moment did he manage to get a look at the driver. A woman. That was that. So much for feeling lucky.

When he saw the brake lights flash on, he figured the woman was slowing down to be safe. When he saw the car stop, he figured this would be the ‘big tease.’ He was used to it. The car stops, you run to it, then off it shoots, throwing dust in your face. He wouldn’t fall for it this time. He’d walk casually toward the car.

When he saw the backup lights come on, he couldn’t believe his luck.

The car rolled backward to him. The woman inside leaned across the front seat and opened the door.

‘Can I give you a ride?’

‘Sure can.’ He jumped in and threw his seabag onto the rear seat. When he closed the door, cold air struck him. It seemed to freeze the sweat on his T-shirt. It felt fine. ‘I’m mighty glad to see you,’ he said. ‘You’re a real lifesaver.’

‘How on earth did you get way out here?’ she asked, starting again up the road.

‘You wouldn’t believe it.’

‘Go ahead and try me.’

He enjoyed her cheerfulness and felt guilty about the slight nervous tremor he heard in her voice. ‘Well, this fella gives me a lift. Just this side of Blythe. And he’s driving along through this… this desert… when suddenly he stops and tells me to get out and take a look at one of the tires. I get out - and off he goes! Tosses my seabag out a ways up the road. Don’t know why a fella wants to do something like that. You understand what I mean?’

‘I certainly do. These days you don’t know who to trust.’

‘If that ain’t the truth.’

He looked at her. She wore boots and jeans and a faded blue shirt, but she had class. It was written all over her. The way she talked, the way her skin was tanned just so, the way she wore her hair. Even her figure showed class. Nothing overdone.

‘What I don’t get,’ he went on, ‘is why the fella picked me up in the first place.’

‘He might have been lonely.’

‘Then why’d he dump me?’

‘Maybe he decided not to trust you. Or maybe he just wanted to be alone again.’

‘Any way you slice it, it was a rotten thing to do. You understand what I mean?’

‘I think so. Where are you headed?’

‘Tucson.’

‘Fine. I’m going in that direction.’

‘How come you’re not on the main highway? What are you doing out here?’

‘Well…’ She laughed nervously. ‘What I’m intending to do is not… well, not exactly legal.’

‘Yeah?’

‘I’m going to steal cacti.’

‘What!’ He laughed. ‘Wow! You mean you’re out to lift some cactuses?’

‘That’s what I mean.’

‘Well, I sure hope you don’t get caught!’

The woman forced a smile. ‘There is a fine.’

‘Gol-ly.’

‘A sizable fine.’

‘Well, I’d be glad to give you a hand.’

‘I’ve only got one shovel.’

‘Yeah. I saw it when I stowed my bag. I was wondering what you had a shovel for.’ He looked at her, laughing, and felt good that this woman with all her class was going to steal a few plants from the desert. ‘I’ve seen a lot of things, you understand. But never a cactus-napper.’ He laughed at his joke.

She didn’t. ‘You’ve seen one now,’ she said.

They remained silent for a while. The young man thought about this classy woman driving down a lonely road in the desert just to swipe cactus, and every now and then he chuckled about it. He wondered why anybody would want such a thing in the first place. Why take the desert home with you? He wanted nothing more than to get away from this desolate place, and for the life of him he couldn’t understand a person wanting to take part of it home. He concluded that the woman must be crazy.

‘Would you care for some lunch?’ the crazy woman asked. She still sounded nervous.

‘Sure, I guess so.’

‘There should be a paper bag on the floor behind you. It has a couple of sandwiches in it, and some beer. Do you like beer?’

‘Are you kidding?’ He reached over the back of the seat and picked up the bag. The sandwiches smelled good. ‘Why don’t you pull off the road up there?’ he suggested. ‘We can go over by those rocks and have a picnic.’

‘That sounds like a fine idea.’ She stopped on a wide shoulder.

‘Better take us a bit farther back. We don’t wanta park this close to the road. Not if you want me to help you heist some cactus when we get done with lunch.’

She glanced at him uneasily, then smiled. ‘Okay, fine. We’ll do just that.’

The car bumped forward, weaving around large balls of cactus, crashing through undergrowth. It finally stopped behind a cluster of rocks.

‘Do you think they can still see us from the road?’ the woman asked. Her voice was shaking.

‘I don’t think so.’

When they opened the doors, heat blasted in on them. They got out, the young man carrying the bag of sandwiches and beer. He sat down on a large rock. The woman sat beside him.

‘I hope you like the sandwiches. They’re corned beef with Swiss cheese.’

‘Sounds good.’ He handed one of them to her and opened the beer. The cans were only cool, but he decided that cool beer was better than no beer at all. As he picked at the cellophane covering his sandwich, he asked, ‘Where’s your husband?’

‘What do you mean?’

He smiled. It had really put her on the spot. ‘Well, I just happened to see that you aren’t wearing a ring, you understand what I mean?’

She looked down at the band of pale skin on her third finger. ‘We’re separated.’

‘Oh? How come?’

‘I found out that he’d been cheating on me.’

‘On you? No kidding! He must have been crazy.’

‘Not crazy. He just enjoyed hurting people. But I’ll tell you something. Cheating on me was the worst mistake he ever made.’ They ate in silence for a while, the young man occasionally shaking his head with disbelief. Finally, his head stopped shaking. He decided that maybe he’d cheat too on a grown woman who gets her kicks stealing cactus. Good looks aren’t everything. Who wants to live with a crazy woman? He drank off his beer. The last of it was warm and made him shiver.

He went to the car and took the shovel from the floor in the back. ‘You want to come along? Pick out the ones you want and I’ll dig them up for you.’

He watched her wad up the cellophane and stuff it, along with the empty beer cans, into the paper bag. She put the bag in the car, smiling at him and saying, ‘Every litter bit hurts.’

They left the car behind. They walked side by side, the woman glancing about, sometimes crouching to inspect a likely cactus.

‘You must think I’m rather strange,’ she confided, ‘picking up a hitchhiker like I did. I hope you don’t think… well, it was criminal of that man to leave you out in the middle of nowhere. But I’m glad I picked you up. For some reason, I feel I can talk to you.’

‘That’s nice. I like to listen. What about this one?’ he asked, pointing at a huge prickly cactus.

‘Too big. What I want is something smaller.’

‘This one ought to fit in the trunk.’

‘I’d rather have a few smaller ones,’ she insisted. ‘Besides, there’s a kind in the Saguaro National Monument that I want to get. It’ll probably be pretty big. I want to save the trunk for that one.’

‘Anything you say.’

They walked fardier. Soon, the car was out of sight. The sun felt like a hot, heavy band pressing down on the young man’s head and back.

‘How about this one?’ he asked, pointing. ‘It’s pretty little.’

‘Yes. This one is just about perfect.’

The woman knelt beside it. Her shirt was dark blue against her perspiring back, and a slight breeze rustled her hair.

This will be a good way to remember her, the young man thought as he crashed the shovel down on her head.

He buried her beside the cactus.

As he drove down the road, he thought about her. She had been a nice woman with obvious class. Crazy, but nice. Her husband must’ve been a nut to cheat on a good-looking woman like her, unless of course it was because of her craziness.

He thought it nice that she had told him so much about herself. It felt good to be trusted with secrets.

He wondered how far she would have driven him. Not far enough. It was much better having the car to himself. That way he didn’t have to worry. And the 836 he found in her purse was a welcome bonus. He’d been afraid, for a moment, that he might find nothing but credit cards. All around, she had been a good find. He felt very lucky.

At least until the car began to move sluggishly. He pulled off the road and got out, ‘Oh, no,’ he muttered, seeing the flat rear tire. He leaned back against the side of the car and groaned. The sun beat on his face. He closed his eyes and shook his head, disgusted by the situation and thinking how awful it would be, working on the tire for fifteen minutes under that hot sun.

Then he heard, in the distance, the faint sound of a motor. Opening his eyes, he squinted down the road. A car was approaching. For a moment, he considered thumbing a ride. But that, he decided, would be stupid now that he had a car of his own. He closed his eyes again to wait for the car to pass.

But it didn’t pass. It stopped.

He opened his eyes and gasped.

‘Afternoon,’ the stranger called out.

‘Howdy, Officer,’ he said, his heart thudding.

‘You got a spare?’

‘I think so.’

‘What do you mean, you think so? You either have a spare or you don’t.’

‘What I meant was, I’m not sure if it’s any good. It’s been a while since I’ve had any use for it, you understand?’

‘Of course I understand. Guess I’ll stick around till we find out.

This is rough country. A person can die out here. If the spare’s no good, I’ll radio for a tow.’

‘Okay, thanks.’ He opened the door and took the keys from the ignition.

Everything’s okay, he told himself. No reason in the world for this cop to suspect anything.

‘Did you go off the road back a ways?’

‘No, why?’ Even as he asked, he fumbled the keys. They fell to the ground. The other man picked them up.

‘Flats around here, they’re usually caused by cactus spines. They’re murder.’

He followed the officer to the rear of the car.

The octagonal key didn’t fit the trunk.

‘Don’t know why those dopes in Detroit don’t just make one key that’ll fit the door and trunk both.’

‘I don’t know,’ the young man said, matching the other’s tone of disgust and feeling even more confident.

The round key fit. The trunk popped open.

The officer threw a tarp onto the ground and then leveled his pistol at the young man, who was staring at the body of a middle-aged man who obviously had class.