Joe Lansdale - Sunset and Sawdust

They fought bugs and got in the car and sat. They could see the apartment across the way. Close enough to walk to, but in this storm of bugs, not a good idea.

Sunset said, “I’m gonna drive right up close. Daddy, you and Bull, you take the front. Me and Clyde, we’ll take the back. We surprise them, away from their guns, we got a good chance. Much as I know you’d like to, don’t shoot you don’t have to. Try to arrest them. But they try and hurt you, then shoot to kill.”

“What do we do?” Clyde said. “Knock?”

“That’s one way,” Sunset said.

Sunset drove across the street. The insects were rising and falling in waves. The grasshoppers were so close together they looked like a great speckled ribbon of green and brown and gray and black. They wound around the town, the buildings, the cars, the oil derricks that poked up willy-nilly here and there.

No one was on the streets except them and the bugs.

Sunset drove them right up to the front stairs, then she took a ribbon from her shirt pocket and tied her hair back.

“I don’t know what more to say,” she said. “You’re through the front, we’re through the back.”

“That’s all I need,” Bull said.

“Personally,” Lee said, “I’d like something a little more specific.”

“Sorry, Daddy. I’m not Robert E. Lee on the war plans.”

“It’ll do, then,” Lee said.

“Everyone, please come back,” Sunset said.

She and Clyde got out of the car and ran around to the side of the drugstore. The insects were less there. They went along the side until they got to the back of the drugstore, the smaller set of stairs there. The bugs were thick again. They got low and went forward. Sunset had to raise the shotgun stock to cover as much of her face as possible and she could feel the little legs of the bugs working in her hair, in the long tail of it tied back behind her.

Pretty soon they were at the stairs and going up, Clyde pushing to try and get in front of her, but she didn’t let him, kept the lead, and finally they came to the back door.

Bull and Lee went up the front way, quick and ready, shotguns pumped full of a load, ready to cut down if need be, or simply ready to knock on the door, arrest all volunteers.

The insects were so thick they could hardly climb the stairs, and just as they were about to reach the top, a smear of insects splattered on the top stair caused Lee’s shoe to slip, and he slid and one leg went through the railing, and he did a kind of drop, as if the ground opened up below him, and there was a cracking sound like hot fire eating a dry stick, and Lee just sat, his one good leg poking through the railing, the other coiled under him like it had no bones. He let out a yell so loud it almost drowned out the plague of locusts.

“My leg. Goddamn it! It’s gone, Bull. It’s gone.”

Bull knelt down, said, “Sunset, she’s gonna be going through that back door. She’s gonna need right smart help. You gonna have to wait.”

“Oh, Jesus, it hurts. Go on. Do it, Bull.”

And as Bull went away from him, Lee jerked off his belt and stuck it in his mouth and bit down, trying not to scream again.

Bull went up and didn’t knock. Knocking was out. He went at the door with his foot and hit it hard and it flapped back like a nag’s tongue. He went in and it was dark in there as the door swung back in place, and there was nothing to see, but suddenly he felt something, something hot and at his spine, low down, and it took him a piece of a second to realize there was a knife sliding into him from behind.

Clyde hit the door with his body, but it was a good door, and it knocked Clyde back and almost made him fall down the stairs.

“Damn,” Clyde said, and he went at it again.

This time the door frame gave, but not completely, and Clyde hit it again, and Sunset hit it with him, and it went back, throwing splinters, and they went in, pushing the door closed to keep out the rush of grasshoppers.

Bull swung his shotgun butt back and around and caught something. The pressure on the knife went away. But the knife stayed with him, and he thought: Goddamn, taken from behind, that’s not right, not me, I’m always ready, but goddamn, I feel it, a knife in my back, tight as a bull’s dick in a chicken’s ass.

Now he turned toward his attacker and was grabbed by the front of his legs, and he knew, there in the dark, he had hit someone with the shotgun stock, knocked them down and they had hold of his legs and he was going to fall on the knife.

Bull twisted his body as he went down, tried to hit on his side, and did. Mostly. But the hilt of the knife caught some of it, and he felt it go in, like John Henry driving a railroad spike. Inside of him was all the fire of the world, then someone… or something… was crawling up him like a cockroach. And now with his eyes adjusted, light from outside coming in through the edges of the door where it had not quite closed, the light of morning filtered through the bodies of millions of locusts, he saw a black face, a head wearing a bowler hat. Then powerful hands were at his throat. He tried to bring the shotgun around, but the cockroach slapped at it so hard it was knocked from his hands, and the cockroach dropped all its body weight on him (one big roach) and it drove him down and onto the hilt of the knife and he let out a scream and there were black dots swimming in front of him and the light from the doorway went dim, then he was back, but not fully, seeing everything now as if through a piece of gauze. He tried to reach out and grab the cockroach by the throat, but all he did was knock the bowler hat off. He grabbed at the man’s head, trying to push him back. His thumb ran over something there. A scar. And now he was going weak, and he could feel something warm beneath him, his blood, running all over the floor, and he felt as if it were a great pond and he was falling back into it. He slipped his thumb around and caught the big roach in the eye, and the man twisted away, but it wasn’t good enough. Then the big man, the giant roach, wide as him, was pushing down again, making that knife really work. The face came close and Bull could see the man’s teeth as he opened his mouth and laid it over his own, began to suck, and he thought: This, this will make me mind my own goddamn business from here on out. Then he felt a wave of laughter, but couldn’t laugh. From now on. Yeah. I will mind my business. I won’t have any more business, mine or anybody else’s. And with the last of his will, Bull clamped down on Two’s bottom lip with his teeth and bit so hard he could feel his back molars crack.

Two leaped back and Bull reached at his belt, pulled his pistol and fired. The pistol kicked and flew out of Bull’s weak hand, but the shot hit Two in the stomach.

Two stood up.

Bull thought: Goddamn, and I thought I was tough. He had lifted his head a bit, but now he let it lie down, closed his eyes, thought: What’s gonna come is gonna come, cause I’m done.

Two put one hand on his stomach, stepped over Bull, toward the door, shoved it open. Insects hummed into the room. He stepped out on the stairway landing, and closed the door behind him, did it softly, like there was nothing the matter with him. He saw Lee on the top steps, his leg twisted up under him as if it were rubber, a belt in his mouth.

“We’ve been shot,” Two said.

Lee lifted his shotgun and let off a round. It hit Two and knocked him back and Two slammed against the railing and the boards cracked and went away and he went through, fell the long drop to the ground. Using one hand, Lee flicked another load into the shotgun, crawled over to look down, the belt clamped in his mouth like a hawk with a snake.

Two wasn’t there.

Lee wheeled as best he could, the pain in his leg making his vision waver, saw from his new vantage point that Two was up and walking down there, staggering up against Sunset’s car, holding his bowler in his hand. He opened the door, put on his bowler, got in behind the wheel.