The Road Home by Clifford Beck - HTML preview

Chapter 53

Continuing east on Route 90, Maya kept a watchful eye for landmarks and, pointing them out, relayed them to Eli, whose hands gripped the wheel as he tried to see through the darkened sky. Although the landscape was bathed in moonlight, the anxiety of nearly driving blind with only the faint cast of celestial glow forced his body to stiffen into an almost catatonic state. When he began trembling, Maya intervened. “Eli,” she began. “Pull over.”

Unable to release his grip from the wheel, Maya stepped towards him and, putting a hand on his shoulder, spoke with a tone of urgency. “Eli,” she continued. “Pull over. You’re going to get us killed.”

His anxiety had quickly become unmanageable. He heard every word she said but was unable to respond and with his muscles beginning to cramp, he was incapable of releasing his foot from the gas pedal. If Maya was to stop the RV, she would have to be more aggressive and may have to physically pull him out of the driver’s seat. “Aurora, come here,” she said.

Getting up from her seat, Aurora walked to the front near the seat.

“What can I do?” she replied.

Route 90 had been constructed in a fairly straight line, giving them time to gain control over what could amount to a fatal crash, despite their relatively slow speed. At Maya’s direction, Aurora was to kneel down and pull Eli’s foot off the gas pedal as Maya took control of the wheel. There was only one issue with her plan. They would have to stop and under the circumstances, this could be as dangerous as crashing the RV. They had no knowledge of the city’s layout – where someone might choose to hide, ready to attack. Their stop would have to be extremely brief.

With both hands, Aurora held a firm grip on Eli’s ankle and on the count of three pulled his foot off the gas. At the same time, Maya steered the RV to the side of the highway but with cars crowding each side and Eli’s tense muscles, executing a clean stop was impossible. As a result, she scrapped the side of the RV against several cars before bringing the vehicle to rest. But in the process, they felt the front right tire hit a sizeable bump. With the highway littered with bodies, everyone knew what they had hit. “Oh my God,” Aurora said. “Did we just run over someone?”

Eli, never having been involved in even a fender-bender, looked at Maya with an expression of horror.

“Fuck, man,” he said. “Did I just kill someone?” Maya stepped up to his side and putting a hand on his shoulder attempted to ease his quickly shattering nerves.

“Eli,” she began. “I’m going to go out and take a look, okay? It’s probably not as bad as you think. You don’t have to go if you don’t want to.” In spite of her assurances, Eli insisted on taking responsibility and going outside with Maya inspected the front right corner of the RV. Bringing a flashlight, they looked at the area in front of the tire and saw nothing. Shifting their attention, they examined the rear of the tire and saw that its surface was covered with a dark fluid that bore the odor of decay. With their mouths and noses covered, they directed the flashlight’s beam further back from the tire and were sickened by what they saw. Eli was only half right. He had run over someone but they appeared long dead. Maya wanted to get a closer look and against Eli’s wishes to move on bent down, and aimed the flashlight under the RV. What she saw could hardly be considered human. With discolored skin having slipped off and smeared across the pavement, the once living vessel had become bloated but the weight of the RV had resolved this causing the body to explode. Now, the abdomen was nearly flat with fluids of decomposition spattered on the vehicle's underside and along the outside behind the wheel. Eli was horrified and immediately thrown into sickness and turning his back to the gruesome sight, he rushed to the side of the highway, dropped to his hands and knees, and began retching violently. The realization that he would likely see more of this delivered a shock to his soul and he began to wonder if he had reached his limit of what death could force upon him.

Maya interrupted her examination and going to Eli’s side began questioning him, wanting to see if he had mentally unraveled. Answering without hesitation, Maya was relieved to see that he had kept himself together but emotionally he was rapidly losing ground.

“I don’t think I can handle this,” he said. “I feel like I’m losing my mind.”

These words were followed by tears as Eli began to question if any of the events they had witnessed were real. Maya was not too familiar with human psychology and what she learned in college was limited to the practice of law. Taking Eli by the shoulders, she gently turned him around so that they could face each other.

“Eli,” she began. “I’m afraid that all of this is real but we’re all here for each other, right?” Lacking the words to respond, Eli simply nodded his head leaving Maya to wonder if he truly understood. They had experienced enough trauma without losing anything to the deep end of the insanity pool. She motioned to Aurora for a bottle of water and handing it to Eli watched as he drank his fill. But with water left over, she took from his hand and poured the rest over his head hoping the cool sensation might further soothe him.

Not having fully recovered his senses, Eli walked to the front of the RV and leaning against the grill began talking out the horror of what had just transpired.

“This is so fucked up,” he said. “I don’t even know if that was a man or a woman and just because they were already dead doesn’t make this any easier. And I still feel like I killed someone.” His eyes continued welling up as he resumed his attempt to emancipate himself from the grotesque image that he would likely carry with him for the rest of his life. Maya walked around to the front of the RV and leaning against the grill next to him offered a more physical means of comfort. Somewhere between talking and crying, Eli felt her arm slip around his shoulder. The warmth of her body caused his muscles to relax as he experienced himself deflating. Within moments, Eli found himself sitting on the fender with his head in his hands quietly weeping. Under such traumatic circumstances, Maya felt the need to comfort him further and stepping around to face him wrapped her arms around his shoulders and pulled him in. The effect was immediate resulting in a mind-altering state of physical and emotional relaxation as Eli’s face sank into Maya’s breasts. One thing is certain; the warm softness of a woman’s body can sometimes act as a cure-all for a man in distress. Perhaps it is something primal but a woman’s breasts, especially, can be quite soothing.

Feeling Eli’s body turn to a doughy mass of masculine flesh, Maya began speaking to him in a soft voice. She knew that for the group to survive they had to stick together and if one of them took ill – in any way – the other two would be that less effective.

“Better?” she asked.

With his face tucked between her breasts, Eli quickly began to recover to the point where his sense of humor returned.

“Yeah,” he replied. “This is nice. We should do this more often.”

Maya understood the power of physical contact but enough was enough and gently pulling herself away responded in jest.

“I wouldn’t count on it,” she said. “Come on, we’ve got to get out of here.”

Giving him a friendly slap on the shoulder, she walked back around to the side door and opening it heard Eli make a comical request. “Wait,” he said. “Can I put my face between your tits again?”

Maya tried to hide the grin that suddenly appeared on her face and without hesitation called for him to get in.

“Oh, come on,” he continued. “Just one more time? I’ll be your best friend.”

Although Maya would likely never offer him that degree of sympathy again, her sense of humor brought out one last response.

“You wish.”

Disappearing into the RV, Eli quickly followed and closing the door headed back to the driver’s seat.

“Oh, no,” Maya said. “After what just happened. No, get your ass out of that seat, I’m driving, now -- I can’t have you sketching out again. Now, get up, lie down, and chill out for a while.” Eli was not accustomed to her demanding nature but knew she was right. He felt damaged by the sight he was forced to confront and needed to decompress. Sleep seemed to be the way to achieve any degree of healing and as exhaustion set in he decided to retreat to the back bedroom. This was the first time he had seen the RV’s complete interior, and as he made his way to the back bedroom, Eli commented on how modern everything was.

“Jesus,” he said. “Did you guys know that there’s a flat screen and a DVD player in here?” Aurora’s curiosity got the better of her and wanting to see for herself, she got up and wandered through the RV’s spacious interior. “Holy shit,” she began, “Look at all of this.” She opened cabinet doors and drawers, looking for anything that would satisfy her growing curiosity.

“Jesus Christ,” she continued. “There’s a DVD library here. This isn’t just an RV, this is a fucking castle on wheels.”

Before Eli entered the bedroom, he ventured over to the cabinet and examined the generous collection of DVDs.

“I’m disappointed,” he said. “There’s no porn here -- God dammit.”

Aurora, seeing that Eli was, in fact, well on his way to emotional healing, commented on his choice of movies.

“You know something, Eli,” she began. “You can be a real disgusting piece of shit sometimes.” At a lack of any sarcastic words, Eli could only stand next to her, a giggle. But unbeknownst to Aurora, Maya sat in the driver’s seat also giggling quietly at her remark. Although there was no humor intended in her statement, she was nonetheless correct in her assessment. Eli had always been and would likely always be a dick, full of childish remarks and lewd innuendos. The girls suspected he would never truly grow up despite their circumstances, but life had other plans for him.