---

 

This writing was accepted for publication in the 108 page perfect-bound ISSN# / ISBN# issue/book “a Stretch of Highway” Down in the Dirt, v179 (the January 2021 Issue) Order the paperback book:

Order this writing that appears in the one-of-a-kind anthology Excerpts from the Plague Years the Down in the Dirt Jan.-April 2021 issues collection book		get the 420 page Jan.-April 2021 Down in the Dirt 6" x 9" ISBN# perfect-bound paperback book:

Remnants of the Night

Harrison Linklater Abbott

    I shut the trunk and got into the front seat. It was a cool morning with a simmering pink in the sky. I drifted out of the neighbourhood and onto the main road. I’d already chosen the spot to hide him. In the fields, a half hour drive away. I left the town quickly and I saw nobody. Everything was going well so far.
    There was a magical hush to the morning. I reached the highway and the sky was some fantastic gradient of colour, from navy blue at the top to a piercing yellow at the very bottom of the horizon. I could still see the stars from the remnants of the night. It was all so beautiful considering how ludicrous my situation was.
    I passed the farms. I couldn’t hide him in these parts. The crop fields were too close to the road. At length I spotted a block of pine woods. They hung darkly in the distance. Good. That would be a better place to dig than any of the fields. I pressed down on the ignition.
    There was a stutter under my wheels and the car jolted. I first thought that I must have hit an animal. The car spluttered again and then it skidded to a halt. The front lights went out and the road went black. I turned the ignition on and off again and the engine gnarled briefly and then died.
    I couldn’t believe it. But I had to believe it. I got out the car. In about an hour the farm lorries would start coming along the road. The pine woods were too far off to drag him there. I had to revert to my original plan. The corn fields surrounded me. The stalks were tall and ripe. They would give me cover in the meantime. I got the spade from the back seat and I went around to the trunk.
    He seemed a lot heavier now. I heaved him out and dragged him across the road, gripping the spade at the same time. I dropped him when I got to the edge and he rolled down into the ditch. His face was screwed in a grimace. I jumbled him over the fence. The bright scent of corn leaves hit me. I pulled him through the stalks and their leaves whacked me about the head.
    The mosquitoes caught on to us fast. They seemed more interested in me than him and I couldn’t bat them off because I was holding him. I felt like screaming but I couldn’t.
    It’s astonishing how much we underestimate the sun. It was dark only moments ago, and now the crops were glowing with new daylight. I dropped his body for a moment and swiped the insects off. I looked around but couldn’t see back to the road. I was technically lost. Had I come far enough?
    Sweat whipped down my cheeks. Maybe this would be a decent place to dig. I picked the spade up. And dug.
    The ground was rough and filled with roots. I dug with a manic revulsion. Everything that I had done in the last 24 hours was a chunk of insanity. My biceps seared and a great thirst built in my throat. I dug and dug and lost sense of time. He was lying there beside his hole, face up, with that grimace, as if he was disgusted with my performance. Which enraged me further.
    A mosquito nabbed me on the elbow and I swore. I slapped it. Then a new noise leapt over the corn fields. It was a dog. Barking.
    I froze and listened. The barking swept through the stalks and grew louder. The corn rustled ahead of me and then a hound appeared. It took one look at the body and then at me and then barked hysterically.
    Just then I heard a man’s voice through the crops. “George,” he called, “George, what’s with you boy?”
    I dropped the spade and I ran. Diving through the crops I realised I was going to be caught. How could I have been so stupid? I found the road again. When I got into the road I saw my car in the far distance. I couldn’t go back to it. Running was the only option.
    There was another town fifteen miles away. If I could get there I could get a bus back to my hometown. Maybe then I would have a chance.
    I didn’t last long in the heat and the run lapsed into a jog and then a walk. And then a cattle truck hurtled down the road towards me. I jumped off the road into the fields. And hid in the crops and watched the truck pass me. I saw the cows huddled painfully in the back. Nobody was going to save them.
    When the truck’s echo died away I got back onto the road. The rest had helped and I reached a decent pace of jogging. The land opened up around me in the sun and the fields and hills were luscious and innocent.
    I jogged down into lower land where the road wound through patches of woods. Where the birds were manic and the sun made sharp shadows on the cement. At this point I was gasping for water and I longed to spot a stream running through the woodland.
    As I was looking around I didn’t even hear it come up behind me. A police car. I’d been caught. And a leaden acceptance washed over me. I stopped and I held up my hands. There was no point in running anymore.
    The car approached me slowly. The policeman’s face leered at me through the windscreen. And when the car stopped by me, there was a friendly-looking old man in the driver’s seat with his window pulled down.
    “Why’ve you got your hands up, son?” he said.
    I blinked.
    “You don’t need to put your hands up,” he said, “You’re not in trouble.”
    “Okay ... Officer.”
    “I was driving back to town, and I came across a car that was broken down a few miles back. Was that yours?”
    “Yes, Officer.”
    “Horrible luck. You were headed to the next town to get some help?”
    “Yes.”
    “Hop in, son. I’ll give you a lift to town.”
    I gulped. I hesitated, wondering whether this was actually happening.
    “Hop in,” the cop said, “you don’t want to run all the way to town, do you? Looks like you’ve run a marathon already.”
    I got into the police car and he drove us off. We came out of the shaded woods into the vibrant fields again.
    “So how come your car broke down?” he said to me. “It did look a bit old? Or was it just bad luck?”
    “It was my father’s car, yeah. It’s been around too long. It died on me without asking.”
    “Haha, yeah. I inherited my father’s car when I was a boy as well. It was a nice car but it moved like a tractor ... How old are you, son?”
    “Nineteen.”
    And that was the only dialogue inside the police car until we entered the town. There was a gas station on the town outskirts and the policeman suggested I use the payphone here for help. I got out and I thanked him.
    “No problem, kid,” and he drove away.
    I had money in my wallet and I needed to drink something. I went into the gas station and bought a bottle of coke and then went back outside. In the firm hot air I drank the coke and the sugar hit my gullet. There was a perfect blue sky above me. I didn’t deserve to experience this day, I thought. I downed the bottle until I’d finished it.

Copyright of written pieces remain with the author, who has allowed it to be shown through Scars Publications and Design.Web site © Scars Publications and Design. All rights reserved. No material may be reprinted without express permission from the author.

Problems with this page? Then deal with it...