Alone

The bullet ricocheted, making impact with her flesh with a soft sound.

“Shit!” Her ears thrummed with the sounds of her heartbeat as she felt the cold thrill of adrenaline coursing through her veins.

Turn Miles. Turn, turn turn! FUCK! Why isn’t he turning?!

Lillian focused her attention on Miles, her eyes devouring information and churning out details. Her mind needed only a moment to evaluate the scene in front of her. Miles’ vest shredded and his left hand bloody and mangled. Shreds of skin barely holding to the bone. His right hand gripped the steering wheel as his head fell downward, causing their CL Imperial Phaeton to shift sharply towards the shoulder.

Lillian only had time to yell “Hold on!” Before they drove off the shoulder and the vehicle dove towards the earth far below.

A 1929 Studebaker Commander pulled over and two men, one large and one small, exited the car. Their eyes were rapt on the smoking wreckage at the bottom of the wash.

“Waddya think Sonny?”

“I think we oughta make sure they’re dead.”

“Fine, you do it. I’ll be in the car.” Jimmy turned back to the Studebaker.

Sonny hesitated before shrugging. “Uh, I’m sure it’s alright.” He followed Jimmy into the car and closed the door. He sat there for a moment before lighting up a cigarette. The two men kept watch.

“That sun is burning a hole through me. Sonny, can we go?” Jimmy complained, his whiny voice at odds with his large frame.

“I know but hold steady. We need to make sure no one crawls out.”

“This place is a shithole.” Jimmy complained, eying the lightly tanned hills.

“Agreed on that big guy, but do you wanna be the one to tell the Boss that we don’t know for certain they bit the dust?”

Jimmy shook his big, dumb head slowly. Sweat dripped down his pronounced forehead. “Nah, Sonny. I don’t wanna tell the Boss that, but they’re dead. No one could survive that fall.”

They watched in companionable silence as the crushed can of a car smoked at the bottom of the hill. He hesitated before starting the engine, and then spun the car around, towards the east. “They’re dead. Let’s go.”

Jimmy was too busy watching the hills, intent on finding a mountain bluebird or a big-horned sheep before they crossed back into Idaho. His swift, intent eyes caught a glimpse of an antelope and a lone jackrabbit, but he failed to see the signs of life within the wreckage. Soon their taillights were pointed towards Nevada, away from the destruction which they had caused and the retribution which they had wrought.

Lillian, Lilly to her friends, crawled from beneath the wreckage of the car. She ignored the cuts and scrapes accrued through the crawl. Shards of glass, dirt, and metal seeming to stick to every piece of skin.

Miles’ pride and joy, the sky-blue CL Imperial Phaeton, now a black, bent, broken wreck.

Smoke and a sizzling sound belched out from under the hood. Lilly wiped at the fresh blood on her forehead. She sighed and bent to pull Miles from the car. He moaned, but did not waken. That’s a bad sign.

Lilly crawled back into the car to make sure Jenn was alive. Bleeding and talking incoherently, she was alive and awake. A bonus.

Lilly pulled, pushed, and cajoled Jenn out of the car.

She strove to persuade Jenn to help her drag Miles’ limp body, but instead Jenn slumped in shock on the bare earth. Lilly noted a small trail of black ants crawling over her friend, surely biting, but Jenn ‘Shakes’ Maleo gave no indication that she felt any pain.

Lilly bit her lip and pulled alone. God you’re a heavy S.O.B. Miles.

She stumbled and fell as she pulled Miles from the wreckage.

Once completed, she fell to her rump on a rock near Shakes. She tried to convince her to get up and move into the shade, but either Shakes ignored her, or the girl was still in shock.

“Well Miles,” she spluttered while wiping mud, sweat, and tears from her cheeks, “it’s gonna get cold around here.” The rabbit brush and sandy hills were familiar to her. The reason why she had urged Miles to drive at such reckless speeds.

We’re close to Reno, she had told him. We’ll be safe there. She had lied. Except, we weren’t, and we didn’t even make it that far.

 “My mom’s dad used to live out this way when I was a girl, so I know how the temperatures plummet after dark. I’ll have to get us to shelter soon…” she trailed off.

“Wait right here,” She tried to lock gazes with Shakes, but the other girl wouldn’t meet her eyes. “Just… don’t go anywhere. I’ll be back in a jiff.” Hopefully.

Lilly bent down, lacing up her burgundy alligator, handstitched shoes. They were made for a man, but these shoes were her pride and joy. They had cost her a whopping five dollars, the first dollars that she had earned working for Frank Nitti. Frank had worked for the man himself. The big boss. The fat cat. Al Capone.

She began walking.

The direction she picked at random, or rather on the vaguest notion of a memory.

 “I think that there was an old mining camp around here somewhere.” She mused aloud. Grandpa used to point it out every time we passed it. She climbed the nearest, lowest hill and saw the telltale sign of glinting off a metal roof. Careful to watch her footing, and to not take the light from her sight, she travelled towards it.

When she was within a few feet she saw a weathered, mud-splattered old sign. She pulled out her old handkerchief and to wipe the grime off the sign. It read Seven Troughs - 3 miles.

She sighed heavily before turning back around to corral her partners. To her credit she only briefly thought of leaving them to their own fate.

Once back at the car she took stock of their situation. Lilly was wounded but could walk. The wounds to her head and hands had stopped bleeding, but no doubt they would need further tending to once they made it to shelter. Shakes was shellshocked and Miles was still out cold. Great.

A light breeze stirred and threatened to gather in strength. This made their trek on the dirt road they followed a challenge. The road climbed and grew steeper as it led her deeper into the nestled hills. In daylight it would have been a captivating view. As it was, the shadows lent the air a creepier disposition than she cared for, especially for a city girl. Somehow, they made it the three miles to Seven Troughs by following a lone, blinking light.

Lillian Jamison.

The hills called her name, her full name. They whispered it, but she knew that there was no one there. She tried to hurry their pace but was obstructed by the walking dead demeanor of her dearest friend and the dead weight of their shared lover.

They stopped at the most stable seeming structure. Luckily, it was also the nearest.

It was a single story, bedraggled remnant of better times. The paint had long since faded, and the closed door had gaps large enough for lizards to crawl through. More than once, Lilly caught glimpses of one slipping in and out as they neared. She noticed a light peering from underneath the door.

“Hang in there, Miles. You too Shakes.” She said with a nod to her partners.

She thumped on the door as she held Miles tightly to her left side. Lucky for me he isn’t a big man. Else I never would have made it this far…we would never have made it this far.

She glanced down, the light that had seeped from beneath the door had gone dark. “Hello? Is someone home?” She called out waiting for a response. She hoped to hear someone and feared that she would receive silence.

Shakes, eyes still firmly planted on the ground at her feet, had not said a word on their trek from the wreckage. “Cold.” She muttered and shivered ostentatiously.

“Hello?” Lilly hollered again, cautiously pushing the door open. Faintly, she heard the words “C’mon in,” and then the trailing sounds of children playing and laughing were followed by silence.

The house, little more than a cabin, was a single-roomed building. Firewood was piled haphazardly near the door and there was an old, pockmarked dining table in the center of the room. The only other furniture was a small cot set in the corner. Lilly didn’t like it—this place made her skin crawl, but she didn’t see any other choice but to stay the night.

There was a single kerosene lantern on the table and two settings. Silverware and plates set as if the owners of the house had just stepped out.

Once Lillian set Miles down on the cot, she spoke in short, concise language to get Shakes sitting at the table. It’s like I’m talking to my three-year-old sister. She’s still shivering though. That’s not fucking good. She refused to think about it further. Shakes was always the brain.

“Lantern’s still hot…” The finding sent chills up Lillian’s spine. She said it expectantly glancing at Shakes, hoping that she would contribute something, but her eyes were glued to the table. The only sign of life was when her teeth chattered.

Lilly turned the knob on the lantern, ignoring the fact that the lantern was warm to the touch. With a small squeak, the lantern lit the room. Lilly scooted it closer to Shakes in the hopes that it would help warm her.

“There you go Jenn; I hope it helps. Now let me see if there’s any food hereabouts.”

First, she turned to check on Miles and felt his neck for a pulse. She was relieved to find one there. It was weak, but it was there. Shit on him if he dies. It’s his fault we’re here, anyways. He’s the one who had to get greedy with the boss. She fumed because it was only half true. It had been her idea, but it was his guts that had put her idea into action.

There was one rule in their line of work, don’t screw with the big boys. Not only had their little gang done just that, but they’d been caught red-handed. Caught with their hands in the proverbial cookie jar and where had that got them? Two thousand miles from home in the high desert, shot to shit. In fucking Seven Troughs, whatever the Hell that means.

All of them were hurt and she doubted that Miles would make it through the night, even if he was a tough bastard for a little guy. She rubbed absently at the wounds on her arms, compliments of their wrecked Imperial Phaeton. She worried for Jenn. Jenn was hurt bad, real bad, but Jenn had neither the know-how nor the supplies to do much about it.

They had met as girls, on the wrong side of the tracks in Chicago. They had grown into fast friends, and then best friends. Inevitably they had gravitated from trouble at school into more damning activities. Both danced in and out of illegal activities, neither of them balking at such things as prostitution or facilitating armed robberies. No one ever suspects the pretty girl that dressed respectfully of being a lookout or getaway driver. It had seemed like the natural step for her to seek out Machine Gun Jack, a man she knew worked for the Big Boss himself. He liked our pluck. Said we were easy on the eyes, and that he could use us.

A noise nearby brought Lilly back to the grim reality of today. What was that? Lilly’s eyes became huge, a feeling washing over her that felt as if someone had walked on her grandmother’s grave.

“They whisper all around.” Jenn said, her tone so low that Lilly had to lean in close to hear her words. Her words were barely above a whisper when she repeated them, over and over.

“Good Jesus,” Lilly laughed, holding a hand to her chest, “I don’t care for this place too much, and god-dammit if you didn’t startle the shit outta me.” She laughed again, an attempt at trying to shake the ominous feeling that clung to her.

Ignoring the whispers and the shadows that clung to the edges of her sight. They were there until she turned her head, then nothing. Nothing would be there except for the fickle illumination offered by the lantern’s glow.

“Good Lord, Shakes. Your lips are almost purple they’re so damned blue.” She held a hand to Jenn’s forehead, and although Jenn’s shivering had diminished, she was cold, frozen to the touch.

She felt a small breeze pass over her left shoulder, and then she heard the caterwauling of a cat in the distance no more than a quarter mile from the cabin.

Lilly turned her attention to Miles and the cot.

“Sorry Miles,” Lilly apologized, peeling the blankets from the cot around him, “Jenn needs these more than you do.”

She bundled Jenn, an arduous task, as Jenn was in no state to assist. Shake’s eyes stared straight ahead, while occasionally muttering words beneath her breath that Lilly either could not understand or was too tired to decipher. Once bundled with just her eyes, mouth, and nose protruding, she appeared either very young, or as an old, withered husk of a woman by the feeble lanternlight.

“Hang in there, girl.” Lilly grasped her shoulder, fighting back a torrent of tears. What’s done, is done. Jenn had always been the stronger of the two girls. Lilly had always felt more—brittle. A branch of an oak tree, strong until it needs to bend and then *crack* it snaps. Jenn was more a willow tree. She’d bend clear down to the ground, but she’d never break.

We shouldn’t have killed that guard. That’s when everything turned to shit.

The wind, an irritant until this point that Lilly had been content to ignore, was a howling behemoth of sound. A nearby bush or tree touched branches to the cabin in an irritating repetitive sound. *tik tak* *tak tik* *tat tat tat*

She pulled down the blanket that served as a cover for the one window overlooking the hillsides below. She thought she saw a small, black-furred creature scurrying away and heard the screaming of a cat, but she could not be sure over the sounds of the wind. The night was dark and strive as they might, her eyes could not uncover the darkness below. She could see the tops of the sagebrush and rabbit brush bowing in the winds and little else.

“Forgive me Father.” She whispered aloud, as she stole the bread that had been placed on the table. Still fresh. She broke off half and fed it to Jenn, still not herself, and alarmingly pale. She gave no indication that she heard any of the words that Lilly said, nor did she babble any longer.

Eventually, Lilly’s eyes refused to focus on anything around her. Her head felt as if it was being squeezed between two enormous boulders and her eyelids felt as if they weighed a thousand pounds each. She didn’t even have the energy to complain. Imagine that—a Lilly so tired and bruised that she could not even complain. Despite how tired she was she smiled at the imaginary voice of Shakes. It was exactly what she would say, if she could.

Smiling, she took the chair next to Shakes and opened her mouth in a giant yawn. She was so exhausted that she didn’t even remember falling asleep, let alone note all the small scrapes and cuts that coated her body. The second half of bread still in her hand. It was all at the edge of her mind, vaguely discomforting, but lesser a call to that of rest.

Shortly after, Jenn ‘Shakes’ Maleo, Lilly’s dearest friend gasped for breath and with a small whimper, she breathed her last breath in this world. Small pools of blood had seeped through her clothes and beneath her chair. Her head lay, resting on the table, and it would appear in the morning that she had but gone to sleep.

Miles’ breaths too grew shaky, his skin waxy with shock as his body fought to keep him amongst the living.

A dim miasmic force coalesced into the visible spectrum, but there were none awake and living to witness. It clutched at Miles’ helpless body and possessed.

“I feel like Hell.” Miles grumbled sitting up gingerly, prying open his eyelids. His face creased with worry.

His motions across the room to the table were an awkward caricature of natural movement. His every movement stiff and sharp, such as a marionette wielded by an amateur puppeteer.

“I won’t let you hurt her.” Shakes said, her form glowing softly, her eyes as fierce in death as they had been in life.

“Oh girly, I just need a body. Yours is gone, and hers is all that is left.” A chuckle erupted from what once was Miles. “You can’t stop me.”

Jenn did not waste any more words, but a hot burst of light was her answer. Miles’ empty body toppled to the floor, and both spirits were gone.

In the early rays of dawn, Lilly found herself alone. Her friends both dead. She sobbed until her whole body ached. No longer the same girl that had once had a friend and protector named Jenn.