Road Trip Read online

  Shan wandered around to the opposite side of the tarp, stepping gingerly over a pyramid of rusty cans and squeezing between an orange clothes-dryer and the rickety shelves that had already pulled their bolts a good quarter-inch out of the shredding not-so-drywall. He could taste the musty air as he maneuvered about the room. A dingy sign on the wall exclaimed “BLESS THIS MESS!” to no avail.

  Shan grabbed the edge of the tarp firmly in both hands.

  “Ready?” asked Mr. Parker.

  “Ready,” Shan said.

  Mr. Parker yanked, slamming Shan into the side of the car beneath and sending a cloud of ancient dust up his nose and down his throat. He spit and choked on the dust trying in vain to banish the taste of dry dirt from his mouth.

  “You’re supposed to count to three!” Shan yelled.

  Mr. Parker’s old face wrinkled up and his thick eyebrows squirmed across his forehead like white caterpillars.

  “Never mind,” Shan said. The tarp was off and he finally got a chance to look at the car. He paced around it with his hands folded behind his back surveying every detail—staring down the line of the hood, rubbing a finger on the chrome door-handle and kicking each white-walled tire in turn like he had seen men do. The huge grill resembled Godzilla’s enormous mouth with the addition of braces. Stubby fins graced the rear fenders and a thin line of chrome streaked down the hood, ending in a tiny face that stared into the wind like the dragon on the prow of a Viking longboat. The old man stood with crossed arms and a glorious grin, marred by the fact that his uppers were completely misaligned with the loose lowers. Shan took his time. A snap judgment or hasty remark would have a devastating impact, so the perfect choice of words was in order.

  Shan stopped in front of the smiling old man and waited.

  And waited. And waited a minute more until the smile vanished and a ghastly frown crossed Mr. Parker’s mouth and his ears wiggled and his eyes rolled three-hundred-and-sixty-degrees.

  Then Shan waited some more.

  “WELL?” said Mr. Parker, throwing exasperated arms to the heavens.

  Shan said, “It’s a piece.”

  “It’s a classic!”

  “The body is all dented up and the silver stuff is all coming off the bumpers.”

  “It’s a ’53 Cadillac Eldorado Convertible! You know how many of these are still in one piece?”

  “Nope,” Shan said. He closed his eyes and lifted his chin a notch.

  “I didn’t think so!”

  “It’s still junk.”

  Mr. Parker sighed and rubbed his hand over his face, contorting the baggy skin like unbaked dough. “Kids these days…”

  He stumbled from the garage muttering something about finding his keys, among an array of imaginative curses from a bygone era.

  * * *

  “I still can’t believe this thing actually runs,” Shan said, unintentionally spitting chunks of cheeseburger on the shredded vinyl bench seat. His feet only touched the floor if he stretched and he could barely see over the gargantuan dashboard. Mr. Parker, hunched as he was, wasn’t much taller. From the outside it must have looked like the car was empty. Shan could imagine the confused grimaces on peoples faces as the monstrous old car lurched slowly by without any visible occupants. But he couldn’t see them because he wasn’t tall enough to see anything but roofs and antennas over the door and bright blue sky above. He stared straight up at the sky and thought about the funny looks on peoples faces. He sucked as hard as he could on his chocolate shake but nothing would come up the straw. Sucking that hard was starting to give him a headache. He loved that. He sucked again really, really hard but the straw just collapsed in on itself.

  The Caddy rumbled and shook and rattled like keys in a blender but it mysteriously kept running. Mr. Parker swerved the car furiously. Shan slid across the huge seat and the window crank jabbed his side like a spear.

  “Damn kids!” Mr. Parker said. “Couldn’t they see me coming? They shouldn’t play so close to the street.”

  Shan rubbed his side. “What do you mean so close?”

  “What’d you say?”

  “I asked why this tuna-boat doesn’t have seatbelts.”

  “Survival was an option when they built this car. Heh, heh.”

  Shan didn’t really know what that meant so he nodded and smiled. That always worked on adults. He sucked on the straw and the tiniest bit of ice cold chocolate shake crossed his tongue and slid down his throat. He sat up on his knees so he could see over the dash. Unfamiliar houses lined the streets. “This isn’t the way home,” he said.

  “Course not. We’re going to New York to kill them zombies that was on TV.”

  “They don’t make TV shows in New York, you doofus. Everyone knows TV shows are made in Hollywood.”

  “Holy Moses! You’re right!” Mr. Parker cranked and cranked the mammoth steering wheel all the way to the left. Shan slid across the seat and the window crank without a knob nailed him right in the kidney again. The Caddy lurched over the center divider, across the other lane in front of a honking Yugo, up on an unsuspecting lawn blasting chunks of turf behind like some insane mower, and finally back over the curb and on to the street heading the opposite direction.

  Shan sat down and braced himself in the corner formed by the massive seat and door before saying, “You were headed the right way before. You just had the names confused or something.”

  Mr. Parker said something that sounded like, “Ratchafratchafriggamorten!” and spun the wheel again.

  * * *

  Forty-five minutes later they rolled onto I-5, the freeway that spanned the golden rural expanse between San Francisco and the L.A. basin. Shan lay on his back with his shoes off and his feet up on the edge of the door where the warm wind numbed his toes. He looked up at the gray hair growing out of Mr. Parker’s nose. “How old are you?” he asked.

  “How old you thinks I am?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I asked.”

  “Guess.”

  “I don’t want to guess.”

  “Go ahead. Guess. I ain’t going to tell you till you guess.”

  Shan surveyed the old man keenly. Picking out the liver spots on his hands and the baggy skin under his chin and the hair protruding from his nose and ears. The bushy eyebrows. The eyes buried under layers of wrinkles. Not to mention the physical ailments which he couldn’t see but knew were there—the trick knee, the myopic vision, the poor hearing. And the constant complaints about hemorrhoids. What those rocks from outer space had to do with anything Shan didn’t know, but Mr. Parker would walk around for hours griping about them.

  Mr. Parker was pretty darned old. “Thirty-seven!” Shan guessed.

  “Hah!” said Mr. Parker. “Not even close. Guess again.”

  Shan thought for a moment. “Higher or lower?” he asked finally.

  “I’ll give you a hint.”

  “Just tell me.”

  “I was a marine in the—”

  “Yeah. Yeah,” Shan said. “And you stormed the beaches of Eeponeema in Viet Nam. I heard it all before.”

  “It was Iwo Jima and it was World War Two, not Viet Nam.”

  “Same thing.”

  “Hogwash! It was entirely different. In the Big One the Russians were our friends.”

  “The Russians are our friends now.”

  “You got a point. But they was the enemy for a damned long time.”

  “I don’t remember that,” Shan said.

  “The Cold War, the Bay of Pigs, the Iron Curtain?”

  “Are those heavy metal groups?”

  The popping sound of lane dividing reflectors was Shan’s only answer as the driver’s side tires rolled over them unerringly, like hounds on the trail. Copper hills with the green puffs of trees in gullies hemmed in the fields of cabbage and cauliflower lining I-5. The stench of cattle mixed with burning oil from the ozone-devouring Cadillac engine. The tiny chrome face on the hood with its unflinching gaze seemed more in control of the car than t
he old man craning to see over the dash but under the loop of the steering wheel. Constant sunshine numbed the right side of Shan’s face.

  “This is boring. Are we almost there?” Shan asked.

  “Not even close.”

  “I have to go to the bathroom.”

  “So,” Mr. Parker said.

  “So? So I want you to stop somewhere so I can free willy.”

  “Ain’t stopping ’til we needs gas. Making good time.”

  Shan bounced up and down on the dead seat and crossed his legs. “Well what am I supposed to do, wet my pants? I’ve got to go!”

  “I think I gots a rubber band round here somewheres.”

  “Quit clowning,” Shan said. “Please.”

  “Please!” Mr. Parker repeated. “Never heard that word come out of your trap before. Please… I like the sound of that.”

  “So then you’ll stop?”

  “Hell no. Making good time. Ain’t stopping ’til we needs gas. Just go over the side and don’t sprinkle on the paint.”

  “Maybe I will.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “All right. I will.” Shan climbed over the seat onto the back bench that squeaked like it was packed full of mice when he stood on it. “I’m going to do it. For real,” he said, but Mr. Parker didn’t respond. Time was running out fast. He was about to explode like a giant yellow water-balloon—Splash! “What if someone sees my wang while I’m going?”

  “It’ll fall off.”

  But Shan couldn’t wait any longer. He pulled down his shorts and let loose, spraying like a broken fire hydrant. On and on. How much Tang did he drink? The silver glint of a car separated from the background. Hurry. Hurry! The stream appeared endless, like scarves from a magicians sleeve it kept going and going. The car grew—a blue station wagon with bags tied to the roof rack. They were getting closer and Shan still couldn’t stop. What if they saw? He imagined a bunch of white kids with buck teeth and freckles staring and laughing as his privates fell off and landed in the middle of the freeway. He’d never find it. The car was so close. It was too late. Shan slammed his eyes shut and screamed and held on with both hands as the wagon flew by.

  He breathed. Opening one eye, he looked down squeamishly. It was still there! And it was working, too! Shan laughed the laugh of kings and conquerors and wrote his name in the sky like yellow graffiti. When it was all over he hurdled into the front seat relieved in more ways than one.

  Mr. Parker tapped on one of the dash gauges with a finger. “Needs gas,” he said.

  * * *

  “I’m bored. How much longer.”

  “Not much longer. Couple hours at the most.”

  “Hours!” Shan let his head reel back against the seat. “This thing needs video games or music or something.”

  “Your wish is my command! Open the glovebox.”

  Shan did and it was full of black cartridges the likes of which he had never seen before. They had peeling labels with names like The Supremes and The Five Satins. “What kind of video games are these?”

  “They ain’t video games, they’s eight-track tapes. Put one in the player.” He pointed a shaking finger at the rusty box bolted crookedly under the dash. Shan inserted tape after tape into the machine listening to a few seconds of each selection before banishing it to the nether-regions of the back seat.

  “These suck! They’re all the songs from TV commercials.”

  “They was real songs in the sixties.”

  “Old people’s music,” Shan said.

  “It was kid’s music in the sixties. My friends called it jungle music—couldn’t believe I liked it.”

  Shan fingered another tape, liking the smooth curves of the plastic casing and the lines his touch left in the sheet of dust. “What’s jungle music.”

  “Never mind,” Mr. Parker said, with a look on his face like Shan’s mom would give him when he came home after the street lights were on but before she could get mad. “Put that one in. It’s a goodie.”

  Shan did and just when he was about to yank it and say it stunk it put a headlock on his brain. Grabbed him right around the throat with a melody that refused to let go. And noogied his scalp with its knuckles just for good measure. When that ocean floor bass voice hit the second bom-bu-bu-bom-bubom-bubom-bom badang-adang-dang Shan was ready and launched into “Blue Moon” right in time with the Marcel’s lead singer. He could remember one of his mom’s boyfriends singing all the parts to him as he lay cuddled under thick blankets in his pajamas. He knew all the words but singing along had always spoiled it so he closed his eyes listened to the silky words and felt the man’s breath warm on his cheek. Shan would make him sing it twice on some nights and even beg for three but the man just laughed softly and said “tomorrow” before kissing him on the forehead and pulling the covers up to his neck. The man was invisible and nameless like all the men he had known.

  Except Mr. Parker.

  Shan sang, his voice free floating on the open air, and the old man joined in on the bass parts with a baritone that belied his shallow lungs. Even the old Caddy seemed to shake, rattle, and roll in sync with the booming music. They were awful but it didn’t matter. They sang it over and over, pausing only while Shan cycled through the other songs to get back to “Blue Moon” so they could sing it again. And again. Nearly a hundred times until they edged over the last rise of the San Gabriel Mountains and gazed down on the L.A. basin lit by the golden orange of the setting sun.

  * * *

  Fourteen gas stations later they found the Cascades Hotel in downtown Hollywood. They parked the car at a 7-11 down the street and Mr. Parker yanked a black gym bag from the back seat. Inside was his old shotgun which he cracked open over his knee before jamming shells into the chambers.

  “Are you really going to kill those people?” Shan asked.

  “Ain’t people no more. They’s zombies and you’re damn right I’m going to kill’em.”

  “Are you sure it’s such a good idea?”

  Mr. Parker shrugged and snapped the shotgun closed. “Only idea I got.”

  They walked under the forty-foot marble pillars into the lobby of the Cascades Hotel. A bellhop in a red jacket with shiny brass buttons tried to take the gym bag hiding the shotgun from Mr. Parker but a polite wave of the hand was all it took to dissuade him. Shan wished he was more persistent. The phrase “Monster-Trouble” crashed around on the inside of his head. Mr. Parker marched them slowly by the tremendous waterfall centerpiece to the main desk. He set the gym bag on the counter in front of a woman with a cow face buried under a landfill of cosmetics. She chewed her cud for a minute before acknowledging their existence with a morose “May I help you?”

  “We’re with the Eduardo show,” Mr. Parker lied.

  Her eyes expanded like white balloons and darted back and forth from Mr. Parker to Shan once, twice, three times, Shan counted. “Ju-just a minute, please,” she said and walked the length of the desk to a phone. Shan grabbed the edge of the counter and pulled himself up so he could see over it, his feet dangling above the glowing tile floor. The woman kept glancing over her shoulder and spoke in hushed hysteria into the mouthpiece. She was on to them. Shan could tell. Oh man, she was calling the cops.

  Tugging on Mr. Parker shirt, Shan said, “Let’s get out of here.”

  “Can it.”

  The woman said someone would be with them in a minute and tried in vain not to glance in their direction every few seconds. Shan paced a circle around the old man who stood as still as possible which meant he shivered like a spastic chihuahua. Shortly, a tall man with a pony tail and a slick Italian suit approached them. He wore a Hollywood grin from ear to ear as if to prove the best actors weren’t always in the movies. “Chad Colbert,” he said, extending his hand to Mr. Parker. “I’m the Executive Assistant for guests of the Eduardo show. What can I do for you?”

  “We’re tired. Can you show us to our room,” Mr. Parker said. Shan faked a yawn, playing along, and stretched.

 
The smile from an orthodontists wet-dream never left Colbert’s face. “Come now—you don’t expect me to believe, as Ms. Peters did, that you are to be featured guests on our show about bizarre sexual relationships?”

  “And why not?” Mr. Parker said.

  “Yeah!” Shan said.

  “Believe me, your little ruse has been the absolute highlight of my day, but if you don’t tell me what you really want in the next five seconds my curiosity will lapse and you will be promptly deposited back on the street from which you came by hotel security.” He held his watch up to his face and calmly bobbed his head back and forth with each passing second.

  “Okay, okay. Hold your horses,” Mr. Parker said. “We come to see the zombies that was on today.”

  “Zombies, of course! For Heaven’s sake, I should have known. But they aren’t here.”

  “What?” cried Mr. Parker.

  “Oh yes. Long gone. You see, we tape shows several weeks before you actually see them on television. The people—I mean zombies!—which you seek went home nearly a month ago.”

  “Don’t suppose you could tell us where they live? The boy really wanted to see them and we come so far.”

  “I’m afraid that would be highly unethical.”

  “Guess so,” Mr. Parker said, hanging his head and turning away. “Come on, Shan. Lets go.”

  “Just a minute!” Colbert said. “I only said it was unethical; I didn’t say I wouldn’t tell you.” God’s own smile reappeared on his face. Several cell-phone calls later Colbert handed Mr. Parker a slip of paper with two addresses on it. “The other guest from that show lives out of the state I’m afraid. But he wasn’t a zombie anyway. If you really want it though, I can get it for you.”

  “No thanks, these’ll do fine,” Mr. Parker said.

  Colbert leaned, propping his ring laden hands on his knees, to narrow the gap between he and Shan. “So what are you going to do when you meet the zombies?”

  “Mr. Parker’s going to kill them!” He couldn’t help it. It just came out and he felt better now that someone who could put a stop to it knew. Maybe they wouldn’t get thrown in jail after all.

  Colbert just smiled and shook his head. “Yes, yes. Kill them. It’s the only reasonable thing to do. I should have known.”