5.
Keyes has always hated the look of the untamed wilderness. Give him cable, a comfortable seat, and a wait staff to cater to his every whim and he will die happy. This is the life he has known, this is the life he has chosen. The Keyes drive along the barren stretch of asphalt swaying along this mountain road of Maine’s Route Nine. Seeing what most would describe as the natural beauty of Maine running between Brewer to Woodland. They have been driving for just over an hour and a half before Keyes spots a sign stating the last gas station until reaching the other end of Route Nine coming up in a half mile. Keyes looks to the gas gauge to see they are between half and a quarter. Airing on the side of caution he decides he’ll pull in to top off the tank.
Pulling off the highway, he steers onto the heavily rutted faded gray asphalt of the gas station’s parking lot. The SUV comes to a stop with the pumps standing to the right of the vehicle and switches off the engine. Keyes removes the key from the ignition and presses the strap release of his seat belt.
“This is the last stop until Woodland. Everyone gets out - stretch your legs. Go to the bathroom if you must or grab a snack if you want,” Keyes suggests.
“No we are fine. We’ll wait here,” Mrs. Keyes replies.
“Suit yourself,” he surrenders followed by the driver’s door opening to find the air here heavy and fresh almost giving him an instant spinning headache. Stepping out of the vehicle he closes the door and makes his way around to the backside of the vehicle to stand beside the pump. Setting his hand on the handle he lifts it off its holder and flips the mechanism to start the pump’s motor, but he hears nothing switch on. Pulling the trigger once the nozzle is in the tank’s spout does nothing, except to release the air trapped within the line steeped heavily in gas fumes. Looking to the front of the pump’s old seventies-style analog face he finds a yellowed piece of white paper scribbled with black writing mostly faded, pay inside, to turn on pump. Resting the nozzle back on its holder he walks to the front door of the station mumbling hate-filled curses under his breath. He makes his way to the front of the building where a small, but wide rectangular concrete slab is set between two glass doors. The one to the right leads into what looks like a long-closed dinner with its walls halfway covered in white tile. This door has a long worn-out and faded piece of paper tanned by the sun telling customers to Use Other Door. To the left, the door leads into an old looking mom and pop convenience store. Overall, the place looks to have not been updated since early 70’s decor was coursing through the mainstream. Keyes makes his way up onto the single step of the slab. A lone man sits just off to the entrance’s left on a cheap plastic chair made up of multi-colored strips of plastic. Keyes can only describe the man as looking the part of a backwoods redneck. A man of later years, near to his 70’s, Keyes would guess with his thick gray hair having been brushed to its right side forming its appearance into a singular wave. The man holds a well-loved dark red-bodied pipe, which he lifts to his wrinkled lips to take a quick series of short puffs. He holds the smoke for several seconds before exhaling into the air like exhaust burning oil. Keyes walks by without making eye contact. An action he purposefully does, because he has grown tired of having to hobnob with low-minded illiterates. He opens the door accompanied by a long high-pitched creak coming from off the door’s rusted-out hinges. Stepping into the building he finds he’s looking at the same typical interior of any mom and pop store he’s stopped in across all the fifty states. Three aisles run the full length of the interior. On stepping inside a closed counter greets him to his left along the wall. Behind the counter a woman reasonably the same age as the man sitting outside greets him with a friendly nod.
“Late mornin’ to you, mister,” says the woman. “Looks like another wonderful day coming.” Keyes looks out the half window nearly covered by product brand stickers. The window faces the front of the building with his sight setting on his SUV, where his wife and kids are finally crawling out of. He turns back to the woman’s yellow-toothed smile.
“Quite,” he returns in a polite tone. “I’d like to top off my tank.” She nods in the same greeting as before causing Keyes to look over his left shoulder. On following her line of sight he jumps back nearly climbing onto the counter. Turning to look he sees the old man from outside standing directly behind him. Not until he spotted the man did Keyes notice the ashy odor of smoke on his breath.
“Need a fill on Pump One, Dad,” the woman says with a croak to her cheery tone.
“Sure thing Ma,” the old man returns with a snarled smile on his face. The old man moves back to the door with the same ear-shattering sound. Mrs. Keyes and the girls step into the store with the old man holding the glass door wide open out of polite courtesy. Keyes does not recall hearing the door creak open when he was speaking to the woman behind the counter. The man nods to the newly arrived patrons before passing through the doorway to fill up the parked vehicle. Keyes gives his wife a questioning look.
“Alexa has to use the restroom,” she answers obediently. She looks past Keyes to the woman. “Do you have a restroom we could use?” The woman leans to her left to look around Keyes to see the little girl with the worried cross-legged expression.
“We have one reserved for staff only . . . however, seeing as this is an emergency. I think we can make an exception,” the woman says with her smile still intact. “Follow me to the back.” The woman sidesteps from behind the counter to lead the pair to the back with a naturally acquired waddle in her step. Ashley stays with her father by the counter. A minute later the woman returns to sidestep back behind the counter. She looks to Keyes and the child who stand waiting for the old man to finish filling the SUV. “Where are you folks headed?” Keyes figures she doesn’t really care only asking to break the silence of the room. Keyes finds her reasoning for chitchat a refreshing one and it makes him long for the city’s lack of concern for one’s fellow man. He chooses to answer the question honestly and politely.
“Calais,” he replies. His gaze returns to look out the window at his vehicle.
“Calais, you say,” she repeats. “There’s a short cut you could take. It can cut near to twenty minutes off your trip. That is if’n you’re interested?” Keyes looks back to the woman with an air of interest in his stare.
“We are running a bit more behind than I would like. Where is this short cut?” he asks. She grins back with a warm smile. To Ashley the smile reminds her of a cartoon cat smiling just after eating the bird or mouse, depending on what cartoon you prefer.
“Near to twenty miles passed here there is, on the right, a two-lane dirt road directly after the Cranford Baptist Church,” she explains. “Rather I should say the long abandoned Cranford Baptist Church. From the look of the old girl’s exterior, along with the partially collapsed roof to the rear, it looks like any Almighty who’d lived there had abandoned his flock long ago. Anyways, take that road there.”
“A dirt road?” Keyes questions with a frown on his brow. Her smile widens, as though she can read his thoughts about seeing this ‘short cut’ suggestion in countless horror movies back when he was a kid.
“Oh sweetie, don’t worry about that. Half a mile down the road it bounces back onto hard asphalt for the rest of the trip,” she comforts.
“Forty eight dollars even,” calls the old man who now stands directly behind Keyes. The old man’s sudden appearance gives him another startled jolt due to the unexpected silence of his appearance.
“Thanks Dad,” she returns. Keyes watches the old man heads back outside returning to his chair and pipe. By this time, Mrs. Keyes and Alexa make their way back to the front where the other half of their group waits. She shuffles the kids back out the door and into the SUV. Keyes steps up to the counter to pay for the gas in cash. He does not want to use his business card and leave any more of a paper trail than he already has. With the transaction finished he makes his way out the front door and onto the asphalt just off the porch.
“Cute kiddos you have mister,” comments the old man as Keyes passes.
“Thanks,” he returns without shifting his gaze from off his SUV. The woman behind the counter steps out the door to join the old man sitting by the porch. Her presence is alerted to him by the creak from the door’s rusty hinges.
Keyes turns the ignition, followed by shifting down into drive before pulling out of the cracked asphalt parking lot to his right to return onto Route Nine. This section of road is a long straight away stretching nearly two miles before the asphalt river veers left. For no real reason Ashley stares out the back window watching the odd couple step toward the pumps. She can’t help, but to feel that they are setting their attention square on her. Deep down she knows they cannot see her behind the dark tint of the SUV’s rear window. The woman begins to wave to her in a slow and odd sort of way. The other thing Ashley finds frightening about the couple is their eyes. Their eyes look to have turned into a kind of flickering yellow color. Their eyes remind her of what the color of a rolling fire looks like when you watch it through closed eyelids. The station rapidly falls farther back into the passing landscape. She notices the two people and the station are becoming harder to see. Not from growing smaller in the distance, but rather they are gradually fading or growing fuzzy, like a mirage in the desert. This illusion gradually grows worse until the station vanishes completely, consumed by the untouched forest. Turning around she has every intention of telling her parents what she just witnessed. Both her parents sit in silence with their attention focused squarely on the road ahead. She opens her mouth to speak, but finds nothing will come out. Closing her mouth she sits in silent thought. She does not believe what her own eyes saw, how can she expect either of her parents to believe her. They would only say she made it up. Best thing for her to do is sit quietly and try to forget it. Unfortunately, that memory will play repeatedly in her head for the rest of her life.
6.
Keyes has been pondering whether to take the shortcut suggested by the woman or not. The time for a decision is nearly upon him. They have just passed the town line sign, Welcome to Cranford Maine. With his decision made he keeps his eyes peeled for the abandoned church. He turns along one of Route Nine’s many long rolling turns to see at the end of the turn the white paint-chipped building of worship with its multi-colored collage of indecipherable graffiti stretching across the side of the structure. The small bell tower at the roof’s center is leaning backwards from the partially collapsed roof to the rear. The two black doors hold to the frame skewed to one side with a large chain barring open access into the church’s interior. On first spotting the church, the building’s appearance gives Keyes a shudder for reasons even the most devoted of followers will relate. The church gives off a haunting vibe, a physical manifestation for what so many feel throughout their daily lives, that their faith and their god have forsaken them. They roam this world empty and alone with no one to care for them. Following the discovery of the church he sees the two-lane dirt road approaching quickly on his right. Even though his decision has already been made a part of him still nags if this is the right choice. He treads over this inner turmoil with the SUV still moving at full speed. Finally with a ‘what-the-hell’ attitude he commits to the short cut. With a sharp cut of the wheel he swerves onto the crunching uneven terrain. The abrupt shift causes those inside to be jolted with a startled yelp from Mrs. Keyes and wild chuckles from the girls due to the sudden shift and uncomfortable texture of the new route.
“Why are you driving like a mad man and why are we turning this way?” demands Mrs. Keyes with her brow pointed down in the center showing her irritation at her husband’s strange behavior.
“It is a short cut told to me by the woman back at the station,” Keyes explains. “It should shave twenty minutes off the trip.” Even with the very good shocks every passenger inside is bouncing around from the loose gravel and rocks forming the road.
“But it’s a dirt road, Alex?” she comments.
“It is?” Keyes quips back with an irritated tone of sarcasm. No need for him to look at his wife. He knows full well what sort of expression she is burning into the side of his skull. “It will return to black top shortly, dear. Relax, would you?” The SUV has traveled along the dirt road for several miles with no signs of approaching black top nor any other glimpses of civilization.
“I think you’ve been sent on a goose chase, Alexander,” Mrs. Keyes states in a disapproving tone. Keyes shakes his head, rolls his eyes and sighs in frustration at his wife. He is feeling the burdening frustration that has been welling up in him all these years of marriage. His self-preservation has run dangerously thin. He treads ever closer to boiling over and causing the unwanted result of speaking his mind to his wife. He has let slight irritations go like her snobbery at the hotel yesterday evening. It’s a practice he has maintained all these years, because without her he would not have access to her family’s immense wealth. However, with all his personal and professional issues mounting ever higher he is at the point of breaking. Any release would give him a new lease on life; it would be like flipping the reset button to his own inner light. “That has always been your problem, Alexander.” She speaks with a calm tone harboring a sharpened tongue. To anyone else it would sound like a perfectly innocent comment. To Keyes, who knows her every function in conversation knows the innocent comment holds a venomous barb. On this he is certain, because he’s learned much of his verbal art, including the ‘Crockpot’ burn from being a firsthand witness to her performing the burn on him many times over the beginning years of their marriage. His thought is interrupted by her voice of chalkboard nails scratching into his ears. “If we had stayed on Route Nine we would be sure to get there. Now, you’ve just added more time to our trip. After you decide to abandon this stupid short cut. We’ll have to turn around and head back, retracing all those many added miles just to get back to Route Nine. So, this wonderful short cut that a perfect stranger gave you will have added even more time to our already overblown trip that you find so taxing.” Keyes is quietly clenching his teeth while simultaneously biting his lower lip. He can taste the faint flavor of blood on the tip of his tongue. He tries to calm himself, because his piling nerves are almost ready to breach the surface. “Are you going to say anything?”
“This is the problem with our whole marriage,” he states with each word underlined by a raw primal growl releasing his anger, like steam from a teakettle. “You have never backed me.” She looks to him with an expression of utter shock.
“I have backed your play with every half-baked notion you’ve ever attempted,” she counters. “I have gone to bat with most of my family who have begged me to kick your sorry ass to the curb. Most of my family sees you as a money-grubbing loser.” Her words fall onto his already deaf ears, because he’s void of any thought except for his own self-loathing. “I have fully backed this fundraising company of yours, even though I don’t understand the first thing about it. I have even dragged the girls and myself all over the United States in support, which you seem to have found discomforting from the very start.”
“No, NO! You’ve only ever backed me enough to give yourself dirt to dump on me some more,” argues Keyes. Due to their distraction neither sees the bump sign beside the fast-approaching asphalt with its raised edge near to two inches over the accompanying dirt road. When they hit, the car lifts into the air only to land with Keyes trying desperately to regain control of the steering wheel with the SUV swaying on and off the asphalt’s right shoulder. The SUV sways off onto the shoulder allowing the inside of the rear tire to scrap against the rough outer edge of the asphalt. Keyes gives a hard tug on the wheel to the left forcing the vehicle back onto the smooth blacktop only to be greeted by the popped thumping sound associated with a flat tire. The shaking of the wheel reinforces the notion of a flat tire. Keyes pulls to the side of the road but refrains from pulling back onto the shoulder. “Damn it! Just what I needed, shit!” He sets the SUV into park, turns the key to switch off the engine. He rests his forehead on the steering wheel. After unbuckling his seat belt Keyes steps out to look over the damage. The sun is warm and shines down on him with a fair amount of heat considering where they are. He first looks to the driver’s side finding the front tire sitting on the asphalt by its aluminum rim with rubber lying flat under the tire’s rim. Moving across the front of the vehicle he looks to the passenger side. This time he is greeted by a pair of tires resting on their silver rims with the rubber flat and lifeless. His head lowers with a sway showing an aggressive movement to his motion. He looks at the asphalt around and below. Keyes notices the blacktop is not so much as black, but a faded gray color, due to years of the sun beating down on it. Cracks run along the asphalt in a variety of varying sizes with many of the mid to large cracks having an ample amount of vegetation sprouting from below. From all these clues he can tell this road was paved quite some time ago and since then the road does not appear to have had seen much traffic, if any. Keyes looks back down the road to see a couple hundred yards down the way is where the start of the asphalt begins. Mrs. Keyes watches her husband walk back along the shoulder of the road through her mirror. He stops where the two forms of road converge. Keyes crouches down to inspect the road and even runs his fingers along the start of the faded black top. With a sputter of inaudible words, but words she knows all too well, he walks back to the SUV. Coming up to the driver’s side Keyes opens the door and climbs back in. His first action on returning is to check his cell’s reception. The phone’s signal is at ultimate zero. He tosses the cell back onto the middle compartment under the car’s radio. “No signal. I should not have expected anything less from this backwoods state.”
“Flat tire?” asks Mrs. Keyes. He nods with a resigning feel to the gesture. “Well, we have the spare. We’ve changed them before, and then we can get back on the MAIN road.” Keyes catches that stung stab of phrase and again takes a deep breath. Though he feels it’s done little to quench the agitation.
“Alright,” he replies snidely. “What do you suggest we do about the other two flat tires?”
“Three tires are flat? How’d that happen?” she asks with a shocked expression.
“The beginning edge of the black top is thick and over time the edge has been worn down to a jagged row of sharp rocks, probably due to the weather here,” Keyes explains flatly. “That took out the front tires, or at least the driver’s side. The back passenger tire had to have happened when we scrapped along the side of the shoulder. Meaning the front passenger tire could have been taken out by either method.” Keyes looks around them in all directions to be met only by a wooded forest. “There are no houses in sight. Not even power lines running along the side of the road.”
“What are we going to do?” she asks with a worried look on her face. “Since we’ve been on this road we haven’t seen any other traffic or anything that would lead me to think anyone ever comes down this road. There haven’t been any houses since we turned off.” Silence falls over the vehicle for several minutes between the couple. She thinks to herself, luckily the girls are fast asleep in the backseat and are still unaware of our current predicament.
“You guys are going to have to stay here. I’m going to walk back up the road to find some help,” he explains, while opening the driver's side door.
“Honey, can't you wait here with us for a car to pass by?” she asks. Mrs. Keyes grabs hold of his lower right arm.
“Like you said, we haven’t seen any other traffic on this road,” he counters. “I’m not waiting all day to see if help magically arrives.” He pulls his arm free from her grip and shuts the door after stepping out. Mrs. Keyes sits in the SUV and watches from the rearview mirror as her husband walks back to the dirt road section of the short cut in search of someone who will help. She knows deep down, if she is being truly honest with herself, he will not find help. However, the human heart loves to cling to hope when hope is merely a dream. In hope she wishes to see him heading back soon with help in tow. For now, she sits in her seat watching him shrink ever smaller until he's merely a featureless speck amongst a green wooded backdrop. She looks back to her girls finding through it all they have managed to sleep in utter peace. In a vain attempt she picks up her husband's cell to see if there is any signal. She looks at the half triangle signal only to be shocked into a bewildered expression. She looks up from the screen to the mirror. A mix of shock, sadness and horror passes across her face with the realization that the cell phone has full bars.
Keyes has always hated the look of the untamed wilderness. Give him cable, a comfortable seat, and a wait staff to cater to his every whim and he will die happy. This is the life he has known, this is the life he has chosen. The Keyes drive along the barren stretch of asphalt swaying along this mountain road of Maine’s Route Nine. Seeing what most would describe as the natural beauty of Maine running between Brewer to Woodland. They have been driving for just over an hour and a half before Keyes spots a sign stating the last gas station until reaching the other end of Route Nine coming up in a half mile. Keyes looks to the gas gauge to see they are between half and a quarter. Airing on the side of caution he decides he’ll pull in to top off the tank.
Pulling off the highway, he steers onto the heavily rutted faded gray asphalt of the gas station’s parking lot. The SUV comes to a stop with the pumps standing to the right of the vehicle and switches off the engine. Keyes removes the key from the ignition and presses the strap release of his seat belt.
“This is the last stop until Woodland. Everyone gets out - stretch your legs. Go to the bathroom if you must or grab a snack if you want,” Keyes suggests.
“No we are fine. We’ll wait here,” Mrs. Keyes replies.
“Suit yourself,” he surrenders followed by the driver’s door opening to find the air here heavy and fresh almost giving him an instant spinning headache. Stepping out of the vehicle he closes the door and makes his way around to the backside of the vehicle to stand beside the pump. Setting his hand on the handle he lifts it off its holder and flips the mechanism to start the pump’s motor, but he hears nothing switch on. Pulling the trigger once the nozzle is in the tank’s spout does nothing, except to release the air trapped within the line steeped heavily in gas fumes. Looking to the front of the pump’s old seventies-style analog face he finds a yellowed piece of white paper scribbled with black writing mostly faded, pay inside, to turn on pump. Resting the nozzle back on its holder he walks to the front door of the station mumbling hate-filled curses under his breath. He makes his way to the front of the building where a small, but wide rectangular concrete slab is set between two glass doors. The one to the right leads into what looks like a long-closed dinner with its walls halfway covered in white tile. This door has a long worn-out and faded piece of paper tanned by the sun telling customers to Use Other Door. To the left, the door leads into an old looking mom and pop convenience store. Overall, the place looks to have not been updated since early 70’s decor was coursing through the mainstream. Keyes makes his way up onto the single step of the slab. A lone man sits just off to the entrance’s left on a cheap plastic chair made up of multi-colored strips of plastic. Keyes can only describe the man as looking the part of a backwoods redneck. A man of later years, near to his 70’s, Keyes would guess with his thick gray hair having been brushed to its right side forming its appearance into a singular wave. The man holds a well-loved dark red-bodied pipe, which he lifts to his wrinkled lips to take a quick series of short puffs. He holds the smoke for several seconds before exhaling into the air like exhaust burning oil. Keyes walks by without making eye contact. An action he purposefully does, because he has grown tired of having to hobnob with low-minded illiterates. He opens the door accompanied by a long high-pitched creak coming from off the door’s rusted-out hinges. Stepping into the building he finds he’s looking at the same typical interior of any mom and pop store he’s stopped in across all the fifty states. Three aisles run the full length of the interior. On stepping inside a closed counter greets him to his left along the wall. Behind the counter a woman reasonably the same age as the man sitting outside greets him with a friendly nod.
“Late mornin’ to you, mister,” says the woman. “Looks like another wonderful day coming.” Keyes looks out the half window nearly covered by product brand stickers. The window faces the front of the building with his sight setting on his SUV, where his wife and kids are finally crawling out of. He turns back to the woman’s yellow-toothed smile.
“Quite,” he returns in a polite tone. “I’d like to top off my tank.” She nods in the same greeting as before causing Keyes to look over his left shoulder. On following her line of sight he jumps back nearly climbing onto the counter. Turning to look he sees the old man from outside standing directly behind him. Not until he spotted the man did Keyes notice the ashy odor of smoke on his breath.
“Need a fill on Pump One, Dad,” the woman says with a croak to her cheery tone.
“Sure thing Ma,” the old man returns with a snarled smile on his face. The old man moves back to the door with the same ear-shattering sound. Mrs. Keyes and the girls step into the store with the old man holding the glass door wide open out of polite courtesy. Keyes does not recall hearing the door creak open when he was speaking to the woman behind the counter. The man nods to the newly arrived patrons before passing through the doorway to fill up the parked vehicle. Keyes gives his wife a questioning look.
“Alexa has to use the restroom,” she answers obediently. She looks past Keyes to the woman. “Do you have a restroom we could use?” The woman leans to her left to look around Keyes to see the little girl with the worried cross-legged expression.
“We have one reserved for staff only . . . however, seeing as this is an emergency. I think we can make an exception,” the woman says with her smile still intact. “Follow me to the back.” The woman sidesteps from behind the counter to lead the pair to the back with a naturally acquired waddle in her step. Ashley stays with her father by the counter. A minute later the woman returns to sidestep back behind the counter. She looks to Keyes and the child who stand waiting for the old man to finish filling the SUV. “Where are you folks headed?” Keyes figures she doesn’t really care only asking to break the silence of the room. Keyes finds her reasoning for chitchat a refreshing one and it makes him long for the city’s lack of concern for one’s fellow man. He chooses to answer the question honestly and politely.
“Calais,” he replies. His gaze returns to look out the window at his vehicle.
“Calais, you say,” she repeats. “There’s a short cut you could take. It can cut near to twenty minutes off your trip. That is if’n you’re interested?” Keyes looks back to the woman with an air of interest in his stare.
“We are running a bit more behind than I would like. Where is this short cut?” he asks. She grins back with a warm smile. To Ashley the smile reminds her of a cartoon cat smiling just after eating the bird or mouse, depending on what cartoon you prefer.
“Near to twenty miles passed here there is, on the right, a two-lane dirt road directly after the Cranford Baptist Church,” she explains. “Rather I should say the long abandoned Cranford Baptist Church. From the look of the old girl’s exterior, along with the partially collapsed roof to the rear, it looks like any Almighty who’d lived there had abandoned his flock long ago. Anyways, take that road there.”
“A dirt road?” Keyes questions with a frown on his brow. Her smile widens, as though she can read his thoughts about seeing this ‘short cut’ suggestion in countless horror movies back when he was a kid.
“Oh sweetie, don’t worry about that. Half a mile down the road it bounces back onto hard asphalt for the rest of the trip,” she comforts.
“Forty eight dollars even,” calls the old man who now stands directly behind Keyes. The old man’s sudden appearance gives him another startled jolt due to the unexpected silence of his appearance.
“Thanks Dad,” she returns. Keyes watches the old man heads back outside returning to his chair and pipe. By this time, Mrs. Keyes and Alexa make their way back to the front where the other half of their group waits. She shuffles the kids back out the door and into the SUV. Keyes steps up to the counter to pay for the gas in cash. He does not want to use his business card and leave any more of a paper trail than he already has. With the transaction finished he makes his way out the front door and onto the asphalt just off the porch.
“Cute kiddos you have mister,” comments the old man as Keyes passes.
“Thanks,” he returns without shifting his gaze from off his SUV. The woman behind the counter steps out the door to join the old man sitting by the porch. Her presence is alerted to him by the creak from the door’s rusty hinges.
Keyes turns the ignition, followed by shifting down into drive before pulling out of the cracked asphalt parking lot to his right to return onto Route Nine. This section of road is a long straight away stretching nearly two miles before the asphalt river veers left. For no real reason Ashley stares out the back window watching the odd couple step toward the pumps. She can’t help, but to feel that they are setting their attention square on her. Deep down she knows they cannot see her behind the dark tint of the SUV’s rear window. The woman begins to wave to her in a slow and odd sort of way. The other thing Ashley finds frightening about the couple is their eyes. Their eyes look to have turned into a kind of flickering yellow color. Their eyes remind her of what the color of a rolling fire looks like when you watch it through closed eyelids. The station rapidly falls farther back into the passing landscape. She notices the two people and the station are becoming harder to see. Not from growing smaller in the distance, but rather they are gradually fading or growing fuzzy, like a mirage in the desert. This illusion gradually grows worse until the station vanishes completely, consumed by the untouched forest. Turning around she has every intention of telling her parents what she just witnessed. Both her parents sit in silence with their attention focused squarely on the road ahead. She opens her mouth to speak, but finds nothing will come out. Closing her mouth she sits in silent thought. She does not believe what her own eyes saw, how can she expect either of her parents to believe her. They would only say she made it up. Best thing for her to do is sit quietly and try to forget it. Unfortunately, that memory will play repeatedly in her head for the rest of her life.
6.
Keyes has been pondering whether to take the shortcut suggested by the woman or not. The time for a decision is nearly upon him. They have just passed the town line sign, Welcome to Cranford Maine. With his decision made he keeps his eyes peeled for the abandoned church. He turns along one of Route Nine’s many long rolling turns to see at the end of the turn the white paint-chipped building of worship with its multi-colored collage of indecipherable graffiti stretching across the side of the structure. The small bell tower at the roof’s center is leaning backwards from the partially collapsed roof to the rear. The two black doors hold to the frame skewed to one side with a large chain barring open access into the church’s interior. On first spotting the church, the building’s appearance gives Keyes a shudder for reasons even the most devoted of followers will relate. The church gives off a haunting vibe, a physical manifestation for what so many feel throughout their daily lives, that their faith and their god have forsaken them. They roam this world empty and alone with no one to care for them. Following the discovery of the church he sees the two-lane dirt road approaching quickly on his right. Even though his decision has already been made a part of him still nags if this is the right choice. He treads over this inner turmoil with the SUV still moving at full speed. Finally with a ‘what-the-hell’ attitude he commits to the short cut. With a sharp cut of the wheel he swerves onto the crunching uneven terrain. The abrupt shift causes those inside to be jolted with a startled yelp from Mrs. Keyes and wild chuckles from the girls due to the sudden shift and uncomfortable texture of the new route.
“Why are you driving like a mad man and why are we turning this way?” demands Mrs. Keyes with her brow pointed down in the center showing her irritation at her husband’s strange behavior.
“It is a short cut told to me by the woman back at the station,” Keyes explains. “It should shave twenty minutes off the trip.” Even with the very good shocks every passenger inside is bouncing around from the loose gravel and rocks forming the road.
“But it’s a dirt road, Alex?” she comments.
“It is?” Keyes quips back with an irritated tone of sarcasm. No need for him to look at his wife. He knows full well what sort of expression she is burning into the side of his skull. “It will return to black top shortly, dear. Relax, would you?” The SUV has traveled along the dirt road for several miles with no signs of approaching black top nor any other glimpses of civilization.
“I think you’ve been sent on a goose chase, Alexander,” Mrs. Keyes states in a disapproving tone. Keyes shakes his head, rolls his eyes and sighs in frustration at his wife. He is feeling the burdening frustration that has been welling up in him all these years of marriage. His self-preservation has run dangerously thin. He treads ever closer to boiling over and causing the unwanted result of speaking his mind to his wife. He has let slight irritations go like her snobbery at the hotel yesterday evening. It’s a practice he has maintained all these years, because without her he would not have access to her family’s immense wealth. However, with all his personal and professional issues mounting ever higher he is at the point of breaking. Any release would give him a new lease on life; it would be like flipping the reset button to his own inner light. “That has always been your problem, Alexander.” She speaks with a calm tone harboring a sharpened tongue. To anyone else it would sound like a perfectly innocent comment. To Keyes, who knows her every function in conversation knows the innocent comment holds a venomous barb. On this he is certain, because he’s learned much of his verbal art, including the ‘Crockpot’ burn from being a firsthand witness to her performing the burn on him many times over the beginning years of their marriage. His thought is interrupted by her voice of chalkboard nails scratching into his ears. “If we had stayed on Route Nine we would be sure to get there. Now, you’ve just added more time to our trip. After you decide to abandon this stupid short cut. We’ll have to turn around and head back, retracing all those many added miles just to get back to Route Nine. So, this wonderful short cut that a perfect stranger gave you will have added even more time to our already overblown trip that you find so taxing.” Keyes is quietly clenching his teeth while simultaneously biting his lower lip. He can taste the faint flavor of blood on the tip of his tongue. He tries to calm himself, because his piling nerves are almost ready to breach the surface. “Are you going to say anything?”
“This is the problem with our whole marriage,” he states with each word underlined by a raw primal growl releasing his anger, like steam from a teakettle. “You have never backed me.” She looks to him with an expression of utter shock.
“I have backed your play with every half-baked notion you’ve ever attempted,” she counters. “I have gone to bat with most of my family who have begged me to kick your sorry ass to the curb. Most of my family sees you as a money-grubbing loser.” Her words fall onto his already deaf ears, because he’s void of any thought except for his own self-loathing. “I have fully backed this fundraising company of yours, even though I don’t understand the first thing about it. I have even dragged the girls and myself all over the United States in support, which you seem to have found discomforting from the very start.”
“No, NO! You’ve only ever backed me enough to give yourself dirt to dump on me some more,” argues Keyes. Due to their distraction neither sees the bump sign beside the fast-approaching asphalt with its raised edge near to two inches over the accompanying dirt road. When they hit, the car lifts into the air only to land with Keyes trying desperately to regain control of the steering wheel with the SUV swaying on and off the asphalt’s right shoulder. The SUV sways off onto the shoulder allowing the inside of the rear tire to scrap against the rough outer edge of the asphalt. Keyes gives a hard tug on the wheel to the left forcing the vehicle back onto the smooth blacktop only to be greeted by the popped thumping sound associated with a flat tire. The shaking of the wheel reinforces the notion of a flat tire. Keyes pulls to the side of the road but refrains from pulling back onto the shoulder. “Damn it! Just what I needed, shit!” He sets the SUV into park, turns the key to switch off the engine. He rests his forehead on the steering wheel. After unbuckling his seat belt Keyes steps out to look over the damage. The sun is warm and shines down on him with a fair amount of heat considering where they are. He first looks to the driver’s side finding the front tire sitting on the asphalt by its aluminum rim with rubber lying flat under the tire’s rim. Moving across the front of the vehicle he looks to the passenger side. This time he is greeted by a pair of tires resting on their silver rims with the rubber flat and lifeless. His head lowers with a sway showing an aggressive movement to his motion. He looks at the asphalt around and below. Keyes notices the blacktop is not so much as black, but a faded gray color, due to years of the sun beating down on it. Cracks run along the asphalt in a variety of varying sizes with many of the mid to large cracks having an ample amount of vegetation sprouting from below. From all these clues he can tell this road was paved quite some time ago and since then the road does not appear to have had seen much traffic, if any. Keyes looks back down the road to see a couple hundred yards down the way is where the start of the asphalt begins. Mrs. Keyes watches her husband walk back along the shoulder of the road through her mirror. He stops where the two forms of road converge. Keyes crouches down to inspect the road and even runs his fingers along the start of the faded black top. With a sputter of inaudible words, but words she knows all too well, he walks back to the SUV. Coming up to the driver’s side Keyes opens the door and climbs back in. His first action on returning is to check his cell’s reception. The phone’s signal is at ultimate zero. He tosses the cell back onto the middle compartment under the car’s radio. “No signal. I should not have expected anything less from this backwoods state.”
“Flat tire?” asks Mrs. Keyes. He nods with a resigning feel to the gesture. “Well, we have the spare. We’ve changed them before, and then we can get back on the MAIN road.” Keyes catches that stung stab of phrase and again takes a deep breath. Though he feels it’s done little to quench the agitation.
“Alright,” he replies snidely. “What do you suggest we do about the other two flat tires?”
“Three tires are flat? How’d that happen?” she asks with a shocked expression.
“The beginning edge of the black top is thick and over time the edge has been worn down to a jagged row of sharp rocks, probably due to the weather here,” Keyes explains flatly. “That took out the front tires, or at least the driver’s side. The back passenger tire had to have happened when we scrapped along the side of the shoulder. Meaning the front passenger tire could have been taken out by either method.” Keyes looks around them in all directions to be met only by a wooded forest. “There are no houses in sight. Not even power lines running along the side of the road.”
“What are we going to do?” she asks with a worried look on her face. “Since we’ve been on this road we haven’t seen any other traffic or anything that would lead me to think anyone ever comes down this road. There haven’t been any houses since we turned off.” Silence falls over the vehicle for several minutes between the couple. She thinks to herself, luckily the girls are fast asleep in the backseat and are still unaware of our current predicament.
“You guys are going to have to stay here. I’m going to walk back up the road to find some help,” he explains, while opening the driver's side door.
“Honey, can't you wait here with us for a car to pass by?” she asks. Mrs. Keyes grabs hold of his lower right arm.
“Like you said, we haven’t seen any other traffic on this road,” he counters. “I’m not waiting all day to see if help magically arrives.” He pulls his arm free from her grip and shuts the door after stepping out. Mrs. Keyes sits in the SUV and watches from the rearview mirror as her husband walks back to the dirt road section of the short cut in search of someone who will help. She knows deep down, if she is being truly honest with herself, he will not find help. However, the human heart loves to cling to hope when hope is merely a dream. In hope she wishes to see him heading back soon with help in tow. For now, she sits in her seat watching him shrink ever smaller until he's merely a featureless speck amongst a green wooded backdrop. She looks back to her girls finding through it all they have managed to sleep in utter peace. In a vain attempt she picks up her husband's cell to see if there is any signal. She looks at the half triangle signal only to be shocked into a bewildered expression. She looks up from the screen to the mirror. A mix of shock, sadness and horror passes across her face with the realization that the cell phone has full bars.