Eric couldn’t think of what was happening to Birdie. Or what had happened. His imagination was detailed, cruel and violent.
Without Birdie, the island was unimportant. Once the thought of it had soothed him. Now it left him feeling empty. As he walked, step after step, he struggled to find some kind of reason to keep moving. He could not imagine the island without Birdie. Sitting on the island without her, brooding over his loss and guilt, seemed to him an acute torture. Birdie had trusted him and he had failed her.
When they came to a road, Route 32, Eric felt immeasurably tired. He felt as if any moment, he might just stop. He felt it in him. Just stop and never move again. What was the point? Everything was gone. Why not him?
Suddenly Sergio grabbed him, and the three flung themselves to the ground at the side of the road. A moment later, a car flew by and then a truck. In the back of the truck, men and women, rifles pointed in the air, were laughing. They sped past, leaving silence and a few fluttering leaves in the air. One of the trucks Eric recognized as belonging to the group who had abducted Carl Doyle.
It was the laughter that did it. Eric stood up, kicked at the ground, and then strode swiftly up the road. He stuck his head in the nearest vehicle. There were no keys.
“What’re you doing?” Sergio called.
Eric threw open the door to the next car and looked inside. There were keys, but when he slid inside and turned it, nothing.
“Eric, please, stop it,” Lucia said, right behind him.
“Stop it, man!” Sergio pleaded. “You’re going to get us killed! Every gang around will notice us driving around!”
Without a word, Eric got out of the car and then walked to the next one, a burnt out pick-up. But the steering wheel was melted and bent, so he continued down Route 32, car by car.
“Stop it, Eric!” Lucia exclaimed. “Sergio’s right, you’re going to get us killed!”
Eric whirled around to face them. “So what?” He glared at them. “I told Birdie I would protect her! And that’s what I’m going to do!”
“Eric,” Lucia said gently.
“Carl Doyle knows where she is,” Eric said. “I’m going to find him and he’s going to tell me. I’m not giving up on her!”
Lucia tried to stop him. “Eric, please—”
“You don’t have to come,” Eric said. “I can’t live with myself if I leave her. I’d rather die than abandon Birdie. Don’t you understand? I’d rather die!” Eric turned away from them. He heard them follow him, but didn’t turn. Up the road, he found a car that started. Lucia sat in the front while Sergio slipped in the backseat.
Eric had never driven before. He put the car in gear and hit the gas. The tires squealed in response, the car slid gently to one side, and then straightened out.
He would find out what happened to Birdie or he would die doing it.
The car was a 1989 Ford Probe, sleek and silver and responsive. Eric had seen commercials for the car as it drove around corners to the tune of electric guitars. He had wanted one so badly. It would make him cool. He would be someone other than the fat kid. Now he cared little for anything but Birdie. Still the music of the commercial echoed meaninglessly in his head as he swerved the car around wrecks.
Have you driven a Ford lately?
The Probe slid past a sign that said Cairo. Underneath it, painted on a piece of plywood in garish, bloody red, were the words: NO MINUTEMEN ALLOWED.
“I don’t like this,” Sergio said as they swung around three overturned vehicles and then into the town itself.
Up ahead, there was a crowd of vehicles parked haphazardly in the street and on lawns. Eric pulled out his .22 and set it on his lap.
The vehicles, mostly trucks, were parked in front of a plain, block-style church, with only the faintest hint of a steeple, a mere box crouched upon the church like a gargoyle. Wide double doors were propped open. Above the door, like the masthead of a ship, was a wooden black bear, with one paw forward, as if it was trying to say hello. Directly over the door and under the bear was a sign, painted in blue. It read GOOD PRINCE BILLY.
Crowded around the church were about two dozen people. Above a pit dug on the lawn a deer slowly roasted over an open fire, and two other carcasses waited, skinned.
Nearly every one of those dozen people had a rifle. And they were pointed at them.
Eric shook off Lucia’s arm and stepped out of the car with the pistol in his hand.
“Who are you?” one of them called.
“You one of them Minutemen?” another added.
Eric walked toward them. “I’m looking for a man in a pith helmet,” he said.
“What the hell is a piss helmet?” The crowd laughed.
“I think you picked him up this morning,” Eric continued. “I just need to talk to him.”
A dozen rifles tensed toward him.
Eric thought about Birdie. He could see her in his mind. It was the only thing that kept him from dropping his pistol and holding up his hands.
“Kid,” said one of them. “I think you best get in that car of yours and keep moving.” Before he could respond, a figure emerged from the church, a stocky old woman with bold hair, curled and silver.
“Hold on,” she said. “Put your guns down, for crissakes. Jim, Rudy, Beth. Come on now, these are just kids.”
They lowered their guns. “That’s a kid with a gun, Billy,” one said defensively.
“I’d have a gun too if I were them,” the woman said. “Wouldn’t you, Jim? World ain’t exactly welcoming these days.” She walked up to Eric and extended her hand. “My name’s Billy,” she said. “They call me Good Prince Billy around here. Welcome to Cairo.”
Good Prince Billy had rough, dry hands.
She was short, even shorter than Eric. She wore jeans and a denim shirt over a plain, pink t-shirt. Her face was wrinkled, and a crease that made her seem constantly reflective dominated the bridge of her sharp nose. Cunning eyes seemed to cut into him as she appraised him. Eric felt small and embarrassed under her gaze. Despite himself, he handed over his pistol.
“That’s for the best,” she said, taking the gun and winking at him. “Don’t want no misunderstandings.”
Eric shook his head. “I didn’t mean to, you know,” he stammered. “You know, scare anyone.”
“I know you didn’t, honey,” Good Prince Billy said. She slipped the gun into her pocket and turned toward the crowd. “All right,” she said, waving at them. “Get back to whatever it was you were doing. I’ll take care of our guests.” She motioned at them with a round wave of a hand and a thin, somehow humorous smile. “Follow me,” she said.
And they did.
The pews had been removed from the inside of the church. At each end were rows of bunk beds. “We all sleep in here,” Billy said. “People need each other, especially in times like these.” She looked them over. “That’s what happened to your friend,” she said. “Too much solitude will sour a man, drive him crazy.”
“He’s not our friend,” Lucia said.
“Well,” Billy said, “friend or not, he’s not right in the head. Don’t help he’s got the Vaca B neither.”
“Can we see him?” Eric asked.
Billy sized them up. “Why?”
Eric swallowed. “He took one of our friends, a little girl named Birdie. We want to know what he did with her.”
Billy stared at them. Her eyes softened. “Sorry to hear that,” she said. “It’s a hell of a world, ain’t it?” She walked to the back of the church and then opened a door.
They followed her down steps lit by a fluorescent light. It was the first time Eric had seen artificial light in some time. Billy noticed him looking up at it. “We got a generator down in the cellar,” she explained. “Let’s us have light, powers the kitchen upstairs. Keeps us sane.”