“Hey, a dugout! Very elegant.”
“Thanks,” Des said. “I found it at a flea market in Arlington a few weeks ago.”
Kelsey slid the wooden lid partly off one end of the dugout, and the tail end of a small ceramic pipe popped out. She retracted the lid further to reveal a second compartment. The smaller shaft held the pipe and the larger compartment the marijuana. “Where from?” she said.
“Jamaican,” Des said. “Timmy gave me an ounce last week. Let’s spark one up.”
Kelsey removed the pipe, tilted and tapped the dugout, and pressed the shallow pipe bowl into the side of the stash compartment to fill it. She withdrew the loaded pipe and closed the lid over both compartments with her thumb. Des looked to the right, where a pickup truck and another car had followed them on board to complete their row, screening them from the pilothouse. The driver of the pickup truck had tilted his seat back and closed his eyes. There were no cars in the final row behind them. “Better roll up your window a bit,” she said, rolling her own window to an inch or two from the top. “We don’t want to look like a chimney.”
Kelsey leaned forward to drop below the windows, then flicked the lighter and played it over the pipe bowl, drawing steadily. The flame drew down toward the bottom of the bowl as an encircling orange glow rose toward the surface. When the glow subsided, she exhaled and passed the ensemble to Miles.
He tapped the pipe against his boot to empty it, then ducked down to refill it for a long hit. A bud caught fire and he nodded in approval, exhaling with a cough as he passed the pipe to Des. “That’s good shit,” he croaked. Des dropped down and Miles popped up, eyeing their perimeter. No one was watching. A small cloud of smoke was forming in the car and drifting toward the tops of the windows and the open tailgate window. He looked out over the water upstream. They were halfway across the river.
Des surfaced, gave him a conspiratorial look, and handed him the dugout, pipe, and lighter again. He forwarded them to Kelsey but she pressed them back, and in the exchange the pipe fell to the floor and skidded under the seat. Miles rocked forward into a crouch and twisted to reach for it, and his back pushed the beams closer to the steering column. “Got it,” he said, thrusting his arm further under the seat and grasping the pipe. And instantly the car lurched, then started rolling backward.
“Shit, we’re in reverse!” Des said.
“Shift back!” Miles said, but the gearshift arm was pinned against the beams. He reached around them and tried to pull them away from the steering column as Des leaned into them from the driver’s side.
“Hit the brakes!” Kelsey said.
Des stomped her foot onto the pedal and the car accelerated backward. “Shit!” she yelled. She shifted her foot, stomped again, and missed both pedals as the wagon crashed into the gate behind them. The gate held for a split-second before the gate-post sheared in two at a rusty spot near its base. Carrying the snapped-off post with it, the gate swung wide over the water. The wagon’s rear wheels powered clear of the ferry and its undercarriage dropped quickly to the deck. Momentum kept the front wheels turning for another foot before the wagon stopped for an instant, its fulcrum defined. The paving stones prevailed, and the wagon’s tail fell with a powerful splash into the churning water behind the ferry. A wave coursed over the tailgate and into the car. The ferry’s transom scraped forward along the wagon’s undercarriage, hit and spun the front tires, gave a parting smack to the underside of the front bumper, and then left the wagon half-submerged in its swirling wake. The car’s front end tilted skyward as its tail sunk quickly under the weight of the stones. Water surged up to and over the dashboard.
“Windows!” Miles yelled, reaching past Kelsey to claw at the passenger door. Kelsey groped through the chest-high water until she found the handle, then spun the window open. The river poured in, knocking her back toward Miles. Her left temple struck the edge of a floating beam, and Miles saw a stream of blood flow across her cheekbone. Only a sliver of air remained between the car’s ceiling and the rising tide. Heart pounding, Miles tilted his head to capture a breath from the vanishing air pocket as water shot to the ceiling. It tasted like smoke. A counter-wave from his left pushed the beams into his ribs and he felt an arm against his lower leg, then a biting pain in his ankle. Underwater now, he twisted blindly toward the window and spread his arms. His right hand brushed Kelsey and found the frame of the submerged window. He opened his eyes and saw brown water, his own pale arm, the window frame, and Kelsey’s legs receding. Past the windshield, he saw the front end of the wagon drop below the surface.
He gripped the edges of the frame with both hands and pulled his head through the window. When his shoulders reached the opening he looked up to see light refracting through water, and he realized the wagon was sinking tail-first toward the bottom of the river. Fuck! He tried to pull himself past the frame but something held his ankle. He kicked with both legs and his chest began to burn. He could move his left foot a few inches, but whatever held his ankle would not let go. The water grew colder and darker.
He let himself float for a second and felt the chilled water flow past his chest and forehead as he stared upward at the receding light and the pressure mounted in his ears. His upper arms flexed violently against the window frame as his legs flailed. Three seconds. Four. Five. Rest. Can’t rest. Lungs burning. Motherfucker! He pulled his head back into the car and twisted toward his ankle, which felt like it was trapped somewhere under the front seat. All of the beams were askew now, floating randomly inside the falling wagon. Two of them were wedged against the underside of the dash, and he drove his shoulder into them as he groped downward to find what was holding his leg. Rest for an instant. Reach around the beams! No use. He twisted back to grab the window frame, then yanked fiercely against the vise that gripped his leg. Once. Again. Again! Goddammit! Lungs on fire. Exploding now. Hold. One. Two… release. The fire subsided as he exhaled a shower of bubbles. Don’t blow through your straw, Miles. He almost giggled when he realized he’d accidentally drawn a small stream of water into his mouth. He swallowed it, then instinctively took a full breath, and the river filled his lungs. I’m dying. The dugout floated across his field of vision, a strange symbol on its face. One last trickle of bubbles, then a crushing pain he could not expel. Waiting for the bus and Carlin said cry me a river. The tension on his ankle slackened momentarily as the wagon’s tail found the ancient riverbed. I said unchain my heart. His irises relaxed and his fingers unfolded toward the fading light.
Chapter 4
Candles
Sunday, October 22, 1995
Vin examined the bottles on the medicine rack in the pantry. “Doxycycline. Ivermectin. Diazepam.” Then “Gentamicin. Nicky Hayes, DVM. Spray affected area twice per day for 7-10 days. 04/19/96.” He shook the bottle to feel its contents slosh around – over half full. Must be part of Nicky’s stash from her residency at Tufts. He took the bottle back to the foyer.
Kelsey had stepped further into the room during his absence, and she smiled weakly at his approach. From a discreet distance she’d been studying the photo of Lee and K. Elgin on the table top. “That looks like an old shot of Great Falls,” she said. “Could I take a closer look?”