J.P. woke to pain in his arms. He was lying on his back, his arms underneath his body. It was dark. It was hot. He was moving and he smelled gasoline. He tried to scream through his cotton dry mouth, but he couldn’t move his jaw, and the sound he managed to get out couldn’t be heard above the constant rumbling noise of rolling tires on pavement. Something was over his mouth, preventing him from calling for help, and something was holding his hands behind his back, causing maximum, huge pain.
Instinctively, he knew he was in the trunk of a moving car. His hands were tied behind his back and he was gagged, like a victim in the old black and white cowboy movies his mom liked to watch-and he was afraid. Afraid to kick out against the trunk lid and cry out for help, because the man who had grabbed him from behind and put him here was surely the man who had killed his father, and if that man was the one that answered the racket his kicking feet made, there was no telling what he would do. And he was afraid not to kick out against his metal coffin, because what if no one ever came and he was left in the hot trunk to die?
But somehow he didn’t think no one would ever come. That man would come. The one who had done the horrible things to Christina and the twins. The one who had killed his father and Sylvia. The one who held him prisoner in this dirty, dark place. J.P. remembered well the story Rick had told and he remembered the Ghost Dog, and he knew who that man was.
When that man came, something bad would happen. J.P. was sure of that. But how bad, he asked himself? Real bad, he answered. He saw himself tied to a slow moving conveyer belt, a log in front and a log behind, heading toward a giant circular saw that would rip him in half, and nobody in white was coming to his rescue.
He felt the car go into a sharp right turn. Something fell and hit him on the head and he smelled the gas smell up close. From the bang the object made as it ricocheted off his forehead, he guessed it was a gas can. He tried not to gag on the fumes. It would not be good, he thought, to cough with his mouth taped shut.
The car made a sharp turn in the other direction, rolling him onto his side and something dug into his shoulder. He didn’t know what it was, it only hurt for a second, but it was sharp. He was afraid that if he rolled onto it again, it would cut him. He was worried that he would roll back and forth, with every turn of the car, and the sharp thing would cut into him like the pendulum in his favorite scary story.
One of the rear tires picked up a rock and it made a steady click, click, click sound that shot through to his heart, sending him shivers and clarifying the image of the swinging pendulum from the scary story.
Something moved over his legs. He heard it squeal. He wasn’t alone. He tried to lash out at the thing with his right foot and discovered that his feet were bound. Plus his shoes and socks were gone, he was barefoot. Now he was scared!
It moved again. There was no doubt in his mind about what it was. It had to be a rat. One of the rats from the pit. And the sharp thing was the sharp part of the pendulum. And every time the car turned, he was going to roll over the sharp thing, and it would cut him, and he would bleed, and the rat would smell the blood, and it would eat his blood, and it wouldn’t be enough to make it full, so it would eat him till he was dead.
The car turned again. One of the rear wheels must have gone over a curb, because J.P. felt the shock as the tire slammed down onto the pavement. The gas can bounced again, making a loud ringing noise that scared the rat into screeching and scurrying around the trunk. It brushed against him and he rolled over the sharp thing in a effort to get away from it. He was lucky it was lying flat or it surely would have cut him.
He wanted to use his legs to push away from the sharp thing, but he was more afraid of the rat and he was having a hard time breathing. He lay still, catching his breath, scared, worried and anxious. He felt something move by his feet and he bent his legs, tucking his knees into his stomach.
He listened to the steady click, click, click and his ears told him the car was slowing. It must be a red light, he thought.
“ Come on, Mister Rat, please move, so I’ll know where you are,” he whispered. The rat answered his prayers and crawled toward him. J.P. felt, more than heard, its advance. “Just a little closer,” he said. He felt it with his bare feet. For a flash of a second, the thought that the evil man had stolen his shoes sent a flash of red anger along his spine, chasing away the fear. He lashed out with his legs.
He caught the furry beast under his feet as he straightened his legs, dragging it along the floor of the trunk, crushing its tiny ribs under his heels, and the trunk was filled with its scream. For a second he thought that it didn’t sound the way the rats in the movies did, but he didn’t wait to puzzle it out. Once his legs were straight and his knees were locked, he rolled onto his back, tightened his stomach, raised his legs, like his mother when she does her leg lifts, and brought them down hard onto the small beast, smashing the life out of it with his bare heels.
And as the life ran out of the little animal, J.P. knew that it was no rat. He started to cry as the light turned green and the car started to pick up speed. He had done a terrible, horrible thing. He was saddened like he’d never been saddened before. He felt worse than he did when his father had moved out. Worse than when his first pigeon had died. Worse than when Janis went missing and her parents were killed. And worse than he did the other day when his father was killed.
It wasn’t right. He knew it wasn’t right, but he couldn’t help it. He didn’t make his father leave. It wasn’t his fault that the pigeon, or Janis, or her parents, or his father, or Sylvia were dead, but it was his fault that the little animal at his feet in the dark, smelly trunk was dead. If only it had been a rat, a big mean rat, a mean rat that was going to chew on his bloody side, a chewing rat that wouldn’t stop chewing till he was dead, but it wasn’t a rat, and he knew it wasn’t a rat. It was Torry and Swell’s cute, fluffy little kitten, and he hadn’t even named it yet.
She wasn’t going to eat him. She was probably as scared as he was-and he’d killed her. He wanted to get even with that mean, sleazy, lousy, punk of a man that scared him so much and tricked him into killing the little cat.
The car turned again in a wide arc. It felt like they were getting on a freeway as he slid toward the sharp thing and then he had an idea. Maybe it was sharp enough to cut the rope that was binding his hands behind his back.
He used his feet to push himself against the bottom of the trunk, moving the sharp thing from his upper to his lower back, so he could reach it with his hands. A small triumph. He felt the sharp thing and knew what it was. It wasn’t part of a sharp pendulum at all. It was a knife and as he ran his hands along the blade he knew what kind of knife it was and he was scared. It was a Jim Bowie knife.
He turned it and started working the rope against the blade, cutting into the fibers. His heart picked up speed. He began breathing fast, through his nose. He tried to stop his frightened tears and he started sniffling as his nose filled with snot. He sawed harder against the rope as panic rose. He wasn’t able to breathe. He tried to suck air through the tape that covered his mouth, but couldn’t. He felt his lungs scream as they cried for air. He swallowed snot. He got light-headed. He saw stars, gagged and passed out.
As he came slowly awake through a sleep-fog haze, J.P.’s subconscious was feeding him the words. Free the Dome Ring. Free the Dome Ring. Free the Dome Ring. He used to worry all the time about the Dome Ring. He wondered what it was and why everybody sang about setting it free. He thought some terrorists had it and wouldn’t let it go. Then on his fifth birthday he found out there was no Dome Ring. He felt foolish at first, but he’d grasped the idea of the Amazing Dome Ring held by evil bad guys and even if the real words in the song were Let freedom ring, he still saw in his mind’s eye, a silver and gold magic ring, with a small diamond dome on it, where the magic power powder was kept.
He opened his eyes in the dark place and he tried not to breathe so hard. The snot in his nose had dried and hardened, leaving dust-filled boogers behind. He wanted to pick his nose more than anything, but his aching arms were still bound. He lay quiet and listened, wishing he had some of that magic power powder.
Click clack, click clack, click clack, the clicking rock had acquired a clacking cousin, or maybe it had been there all along and he just hadn’t been able to hear it. He could hear it just fine now, though. His ears were wide awake, like they had never been awake before and his nose was sharp, too. He smelled the gas can, and an old dirty oil smell, and a cigarette smell, and they were all mixed with the dead cat smell, and it was hot.
His mind took him back to the black and white western and he saw himself tied on the railroad tracks. An old black steam engine, followed by a billowing, black-black cloud was bearing down on him, its wheels going, click clack, click clack, click clack. He had to stop himself from crying. If he cried his nose would make more snot. He would pass out again and maybe not wake up this time. He fought his terror and ripped his mind away from the TV western and the bearing down train.
He searched behind his back for the cold steel of the sharp Bowie knife. It wasn’t there. He felt along the floor of the trunk, somehow the knife must have moved, he thought, then he felt it. The steel blade seemed to be calling to him and he answered with bone-aching fingers, running them along the smooth surface and thanking God.
He inched the blade toward his bonds, by clutching the hilt in his left hand and the blade between the thumb and forefinger of his right. He sawed on the ropes the way two lumber jacks move a giant saw through the base of a giant redwood. A smile crossed his pursed lips when he felt the knife slice through the first layer of rope, and the blood drained out of them and went straight to his tingling hands. Then he sliced through the second layer and his hands were free.
He started to remove the tape from his mouth, when he felt the car slowing down and he was caught up in indecision. If the bad man was stopping for gas, he could scream and maybe the gas station man would save him, but maybe the man would kill the gas station man, then kill him. But what if he wasn’t stopping for gas? What if he was stopping because they were wherever the bad man wanted to take him? If he screamed then, the man would most surely kill him, like he had killed his dad.
The car stopped and he decided. He left the gag on and rolled onto his back, concealing the fact that he had freed his hands. He closed his eyes and pretended to be asleep. He heard the door open, then close. Then he heard footsteps walking on gravel. They were coming toward the trunk. He closed his eyes harder.
He felt the knife by his side and wondered if the Ragged Man would use it to kill him. He didn’t want to die and he was afraid like he’d never been afraid before. He tried to stop his jaw from quivering and his knees from shaking. He was hot, covered in sweat, dirty and he smelled as bad as the dead cat. His throat was parched dry and his hungry stomach ached for food, but he was determined not to cry, even though he couldn’t get that Jim Bowie knife out of his mind.
He shuddered and almost shit his pants when a loud explosion roared through the trunk. Then it was followed by another and he did. His bowels relaxed and it oozed out, hot and wet, filling his pants with the shit stinking stuff. He fought not to gag, because with his mouth taped shut, to gag was to die.
Then his ears rang for a third time as the man beating on the trunk said in a purely evil voice, “Are you alive in there?”
He squeezed his eyes tight, trying to shut out the stink and the fear.
“ Fee fi fo fum, I smell the blood of a spoiled little brat.”
“ These are the times that try men’s souls,” he mentally said, “when the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will shrink from their duty.” His father used to say that whenever times were hard, and times were hard right now, he thought, anxiously whispering the words, “These are the times that try men’s souls. These are the times that try men’s souls. These are the times that try men’s souls. Oh God, please make him go away. Please, please make him go away.”
But J.P. knew he wasn’t going to go away. He just wasn’t. The man was going to open the trunk and use the knife to cut him into pieces and it was going to hurt a lot and there was going to be an awful lot of his blood running all over his face and his body and his clothes. He wondered if the man would kill him in the trunk or if he was going to take him out. He hoped he would take him out. He didn’t want to die in this dark place. He didn’t want to die at all. He wanted the man to go away, but when he heard the horrible sound of the key sliding and clicking into the trunk lock, he bit into his lower lip, because he knew for sure the man wasn’t going to go away.
He heard the key turn and peeked out of his eyes. He saw light begin to enter and chase out the dark. He closed his eyes back tight, but his ears felt the whoosh of cool air and heard the clunking noise as the trunk popped open. He clenched his fists against the fear.
“ Shit, you stink,” the deep voice said.
J.P. hoped the man would think he was asleep and maybe leave him alone.
“ I know you’re awake, so you might as well open your eyes.”
J.P. closed them tighter.
“ Shit your pants, did ya? Well, I suppose if I was in your place I’d be scared shitless myself.” The man laughed.
J.P. felt the man brush his side as he reached for something in the trunk.
“ Know what I have in my hand?”
J.P. knew.