Lucid Dreaming (9 page)

I grabbed my ear and bit some air.

“Now now, young lady, none of that!” Mama called out. “We have other punishments here, too. You'll learn.”

She waved over a young girl, who bent and listened as she whispered, then ran to the food servers. “For now,” Mama said around another mouthful of beef, “no food for you tonight.”

I had it; she really
was
starting to sound like my mama. “
Y'know
what I think you are, Mama? I think you're just some poor white trash who probably lived in some dinky little two-bedroom shithole before everything fell apart, and secretly you're probably thanking your God for the dreaming sickness, because now you got this big fine house and a chance to play queen to your hand-picked
shitkickers
. Well, guess what? Teddy and me don't want to play.”

I swear I could see the woman physically swell. Her face was red and twitching all over, and it took her a few seconds to put herself back together. Then she just smiled tightly and said, “Are you done now?”

“I can keep going all night, if you like.”

“Oh, you're wrong. You could keep going all night if
I
liked, and I don't.” She waved Johnny over.

“Tie 'em both up.”

At least Johnny didn't try anything other than tying us up. Well, he did cuff Teddy around a little, but stopped when Teddy made me proud by threatening to bite off his other ear.

Colby came again in the morning to untie us. She brought us each a plate of eggs, milk…and beef. What a surprise.

Fuck it, I thought. We need our strength. I ate my portion of meat and Teddy's, and gave him all my eggs. He wasn't nuts about even eating eggs, but he knew he had to.

“I'm supposed to fill you in on some of our rules today,” said Colby.

“You don't sound too thrilled about it.”

She shrugged. “I don't exactly have anywhere else to go for better rules.”

“Yeah,” I said to her, “I know, what with that asshole Hank keeping all the car keys and stuff…”

Colby laughed, kind of bitterly. “Oh, that part wouldn't be a problem—Hank's my husband.”

Oh, I thought. “Oh,” I said.

“It's okay. He
is
an asshole. Or at least he is now. We were having problems even before all this; in fact, I was about to file for divorce. He was a mechanic back in Amarillo, and I was a waitress. We did have a nice little house, but Hank, he…” She trailed off, since she didn't need to explain any more.

“So how'd you wind up here?” I asked.

“Did Mama mention that her daughter-in-law was a pharmacist who figured out the thing with the
Prolixin
? That was Judy. She was one of my best friends.”

“‘Was'?”

Colby toed some
cowshit
in the dirt and nodded. “She was kind of like you—smarter than the rest of 'em around her. It may have been Mama's idea, but Judy was the one who found this place, got enough of us on the
Prolixin
to come out here and fix it up. But she and Mama didn't see eye-to-eye, and they started to fight about a lot of stuff, like who got
Prolixin
and who didn't. Finally Judy said she wanted to leave, and Mama said she couldn't. So one day she got in one of the trucks and tried to take off.”

She exhaled a long, shaky breath, and then added, “Hank shot her.”

Teddy and I exchanged a look. Jesus, how much worse could this get?

“Her husband—Mama's son—was Johnny.”

It could get
that
much worse.

So we became part of “the family.” We worked and obeyed the rules just enough to make sure that we got fed and sheltered.

They stuck me in a sort of outbuilding that served as a dorm for the working single women. They had a similar building for the men, but none of the crackers would sleep with Teddy, so he got his own little shed.

There was a lot about what they'd done already and were planning to do that was pretty cool, actually.
Mama'd
really thought it through, I have to give her credit for that much. They had plenty of meat, but were taking good care of their herds to make sure they lasted; likewise the dairy. They were working on getting farming going, to provide grains and vegetables, and the greenhouse could be used for herbs and things like tomatoes. They had a well, so water was plentiful, and there were half a dozen working oil derricks around, so they had fuel. They had medical supplies and one woman who'd been a registered nurse, who was almost as good as a doctor. They had music and movies, and even a working still.

But they were seriously fucked up. They were fucked up in terms of religion and education and art. There were no books in that entire huge house except Bibles, and Colby once told me that Mama had had all the other books burned after she'd moved in (“said those books had filled people's heads with bad ideas for too long”).

There was the way they treated Teddy, even while claiming that he was part of “the family” now.

And then there were the women.

I'd provided them with enough
Prolixin
so that they could've woken up all those dreaming women, but the truth is Mama just didn't want to. She used every excuse from
Prolixin
effecting the unborn babies to “keeping the
menfolk
happy,” but I think the truth is she just didn't want other women around. They were somehow a danger to her.

I was.

Because I'd considered offing her.

This place wouldn't be so bad with someone else in charge. It didn't even have to be me—it could be Colby. Someone who'd let the human race come back better than before.

But I realized that even if I could kill Mama and get away with it, the rest of 'em here would never listen to anyone else. After all, they'd had a chance once to listen to somebody else, and they'd shot her instead. They actually
liked
life under Mama, probably a lot more than they'd liked it before. They'd been poor white trash before; now they were rich. Still white trash, but rich, with all the steaks and Garth Brooks CDs and pink wallpaper they wanted.

Fuck it. If this was the future of humanity, then let it die out.

Teddy, of course, was scared all the time and miserable. He was losing too much weight because he wouldn't eat meat and was too anxious to eat anything else. Their little cruelties and taunts were becoming more and more open, and I knew it wouldn't be long before he'd either blow up at one of them or they'd just decide it was time for a little tractor accident. We'd been happy and healthy out on the road, and could be again.

So I thought about escape.

I know you're probably thinking, Just walk away, just sneak out one night and go! Well, it wasn't that easy. For one thing, we were in the middle of
bugfuck
nowhere; walking away was out of the question. That left horse or car, and I didn't know how to ride a horse. And I wasn't anxious to learn—truthfully, the big animals scared me silly.

That left car. And keys. And Hank.

Hank kept the car keys in a lockbox attached to a wall in the kitchen. He was the only one who could open that box. Sure, I considered just smashing it, but there was
always
someone in the kitchen. And Hank never went without a gun.

We couldn't just go without some supplies. Food we could get, but the
Prolixin
was kept in Mama's office, and she locked that door when she wasn't in there.

And then there was the spy.

The pinch-faced woman who'd watched us the night of that first dinner was
still
watching us. I'd learned her name was
MaryKay
, and her gig was to curry favor with Mama by
narcing
. Seemed she wasn't very good at any particular work, but she was guaranteed her daily
Prolixin
by ratting out everybody else.

So, you can see why we needed a plan that involved more than just a long stroll out of there.

First, I figured out the
Prolixin
:

Mama locked the door to her office, sure…but not the window. I'd noticed it a couple of times, and was pretty sure she never locked it.

I waited one night until it was very late, all the women were in our little dormitory, and I heard nothing but the sounds of peaceful breathing around me; then I got up, moving very quietly. The door would squeak a little when I opened it, but if anyone bothered to ask I could say I was just going to the outhouse.

Nobody said anything.

I did cross to the outhouse, just in case
MaryKay
was sneaking a peek at me; I even went in and used it. When I came out, I looked around, then ran over to the main house and found the window for Mama's office. It was one of those old-fashioned kind of windows that slid up, and so I grabbed the sides and pushed. Sure enough it went up, without a sound. I moved it up so I could even stick my head in the office, and saw moonlight glinting off the bottles of
Prolixin
.

I didn't take any then, but I knew I could get to it when we were ready.

I snuck back to the dormitory, opened the door, and tiptoed back to my bunk. I was just feeling pretty triumphant, settling back down under my sheets, when a voice hissed in the darkness:

“Where you been?”

It was that bitch
MaryKay
.

Fuck
, I thought.
How long has she been awake? Did she see me?

“To the bathroom. Is that okay with you?”

She grunted, and I heard her roll over. So she hadn't seen me after all.

I'd dodged another bullet.

Two nights later, a sixteen-year-old kid named Jed was caught jerking off out behind the barn at sunset. Just before dinner, Mama had him brought out in front of everyone, stripped of his pants, and whipped twenty times with a riding crop.

That was bad enough, but the real breaking point for me was when the rest of 'em applauded and started eating.

I found Teddy, who was gripping himself and trembling all over. I whispered three words to him:

“We're leaving tonight.”

I didn't care how risky it was, I wasn't going to stay there any longer. They were bad and getting worse. Being shot would be better than staying there.

I was about to fill Teddy in when he grabbed my arm urgently and looked past my shoulder. I shut up and turned to see that pinch-faced
MaryKay
sidling up to us.

“Something I can help you with,
MaryKay
?”

She leered, proving it was possible for her to get even uglier. “I got a message for you from Mama: She says you're not to talk to that colored man anymore.”

She gestured vaguely in Teddy's direction, but apparently found him simply too vulgar a creature to actually look at.

I almost decked her. But instead I swallowed back, and said, “All right.”

I turned to Teddy a last time, and mouthed one word to him:

Tonight.

As before I waited until it was the middle of the night, and everyone else was asleep. The weather was cooling off, and if anyone did see me leaving they wouldn't question me being dressed.

Getting the
Prolixin
was no problem. As before the window wasn't locked, and slid up easily. I crawled in, shoved two bottles of
Prolixin
into my coat pockets, and then left again, being careful to close the window silently behind me.

The next part of the plan involved me getting Teddy.

For a change, I was thankful they kept him in a separate building. I ran over to it, hoping to see him ready and waiting, but there was no sign of him. I walked around and peeked into the dark windows—and nearly screamed when a face popped up in one, peering out at me. Fortunately it was Teddy, and he was pointing at the door and mouthing the word “locked.”

Jesus, they locked him in at night.

Fortunately it was just a simple slide-bar thing, so I slid it back and opened the door. Teddy stepped out, looking nervous but energized.

“What now?” he whispered.

“You go wait for me behind the barn, where the cars are parked. Take these.” I handed him the bottles of
Prolixin
. “I'll be right there.”

“Be careful,” he said, and gave me a quick kiss that made me want more. As soon as we were away from here.

We separated, and I headed for the kitchen door to the main house. I reached it and was about to step through when I looked in—

—and saw
MaryKay
. She was seated at the kitchen table, a cup of tea in front of her, as if she was just waiting.

Oh, and she had a gun.

She must have heard me get up, and figured this was her big chance to be a heroine. Maybe she could even become Mama's best friend, and they could whip adolescent boys together and reminisce about the good old days when the Home Shopping Network was still on.