David Ohle - The Devil in Kansas

“So…you tried to burn the guy up? Is that what he said?”

“I did. I shot at him once, too. I missed. He didn’t press any charges. But he beat me. He says I like to be beat. Maybe I do.”

They pass a sign on a fence-post depicting a raw steak: A KANSAS FARMER FEEDS 109 PEOPLE PLUS YOU. Wheat fields stretch to the horizon, stalks waving in the wind.

“Kansas,” Kenny says. “No more purple mountains majesty, just amber waves of grain.”

A huge grain elevator looms ahead. A road sign says: Ulysses, Pop. 2, 014.

Kenny says, “There’s a good place for breakfast up here.”

The rig pulls into the parking lot of the Breadbasket Café, whose logo, displayed on a sign, is a sheaf of wheat. Lots of wheat-harvesting machinery and grain trucks are parked around. Kenny edges his rig into a tight spot not far from a wheat field abutting the lot. A number of stake-bed trucks are parked nearby. He says, “You two go on in and get a table. I’m gonna check my load.”

Sherry and Joe walk to the front of the café. When they are out of sight, Kenny approaches one of the stake-bed trucks. The boss of a wheat harvesting crew sits inside.

“You the boss?”

“Yeah.”

“Got twelve for you.”

“We’ll need ‘em. Lotta wheat this year. Lotta wheat.”

“They’re in the back there. It’s open. Go ahead and load ‘em up.”

Inside the café, the breakfast crowd, mostly wheat harvesting crews, is abuzz with conversation. Harried waitresses scurry from table to table. Two busy fry cooks work behind the counter, frying eggs, making toast, sweating. Sherry and Joe sit at one of the few unoccupied tables. Sherry looks at the menu, says, “I love breakfast. It’s my favorite meal.”

The waitress appears, bad makeup job, popping gum, her mind elsewhere. “Somethin’ to drink?”

Sherry orders coffee. “There’s three of us.” Joe orders a jumbo Mr. Pibb. The waitress sighs, lowers her head, as if he had said something unforgivably wrong. “We don’t have Mr. Pibb. That’s a Coke product. Is Pepsi okay?”

“If you want me to vomit on your floor.”

“What did he say?”

Sherry says, “He’s allergic to Pepsi. It makes him vomit. Order something else, Joe.”

“You got root beer?”

“Uh-huh.”

“The biggest size you got.”

Kenny passes the waitress on her way back to the kitchen.

After serving the drinks, the waitress says,“You want something to drink, sir?”

“Yeah, a glass of milk.”

“Y’all ready to order?”

Sherry orders two eggs over easy, hash browns, sausage.

“Toast or biscuits with that, ma’am?”

“Biscuits.”

“With gravy or plain?”

“Plain, thanks, butter on the side.”

“We don’t got real butter, you know. It’s Country Crock.”

“I know.”

“Sir, what can I get you?”

“Just the milk. You got any antacid up there at the counter?”

“We got Tums.”

“Great. Bring me a pack of Tums with the milk.”

The waitress turns to Joe. “You?”

“Two double cheeseburgers, large order of fries. Don’t cook the fries.”

“We use frozen fries. You want your fries frozen?”

“Solid. Right out of the freezer.”

“You serious?”

“Yeah. They’re great that way. Try it sometime.”

“All-righty then.” The waitress toddles off.

Kenny’s rig rolls through the Kansas plains. Now and then a grasshopper splatters on the windshield. Each splat seems larger and louder than the last. In his jump seat Joe plays “Home on the Range” on his saw. Sherry sings along. “Oh, give me a home where the buffalo roam, and the deer and the antelopes play….”

The grasshopper splats increase until the windshield wipers begin losing the fight against the thickening grasshopper goo. Kenny can barely see the road.

Joe snaps out of his saw-playing trance. The sound of grasshoppers hitting the rig intensifies. Some of the collisions are remarkably loud, as if it were raining chickens. Kenny opens the window and sticks his head out. When he does, dozens of grasshoppers fly in. “Holy shit!” He quickly closes the window. The light in the cab dims, as if a cloud is passing overhead. Grasshoppers crawl all around the cab. Sherry tries to shoo them with her folded bra. In all the confusion, Kenny loses control of the rig as it crosses a bridge over a rain-swollen creek. The hind end of the trailer tilts just enough to break the coffins loose from their moorings. The rear doors break open and into the rushing water tumble a dozen caskets. Once the load is dumped, the trailer rights itself.

Kenny, Sherry and Joe stand on the bridge over a culvert and watch the caskets float away. Kenny says, “I’m fucked now, man. I’m so totally fucked. I don’t believe it.”

A small town gas station. An employee cleans grasshoppers off the rig’s windshield with an ice scraper and plenty of glass cleaner.

Inside the station Joe feeds coins to a machine and selects a Mr. Pibb.

Sherry drinks a Coke and opens a king-size pack of Doublemint gum.

Kenny paces nervously.

An old farmer in a seed cap pays for gas. “They’re swarming right now. It’s a hell of a thing. Happens every fourth year. Just like the Bible says. When hoppers swarm, you got a plague on your hands. Ever read the Bible?”

Kenny says, “A little bit.”

“Son, you ever hear of Armageddon and all them plagues?”

“Yeah. I heard of that.”

“Well, that’s what we got here right now. A plague of locusts.”

“Tell me about it,” Joe says.

The farmer sticks a finger in his ear, wiggles it to get the wax out, wipes it on his coveralls and leaves as a sleek, silver first-edition DeLorean pulls up to a pump.

Both Sherry and Kenny see the car as simply a DeLorean. But Joe has a different point of view. He sees it as a “Car of the Future.” The driver’s side gull-wing door opens and Joe catches a glimpse of what’s inside — eight aliens, dressed in thrift store suits, sitting in one another’s laps, eating dough balls, cramped into the vehicle like clowns at a circus. They look fundamentally humanoid, but with hints of grasshopper. Their jaws work on a non-human principle and their mouths have many moving parts. They speak softly in a tongue that most resembles a blend of Spanish and Latin.

The driver gets out. Sherry and Kenny see him as just a dissipated lounge lizard in a shiny silk suit. Joe sees him as an alien in a cheap thrift store suit.

Kenny waves at him. “Nice ride, man.”

Joe drools. Sherry stuffs a handkerchief into his mouth and cautions him, “Don’t stare at the man.”

The man waves back, points to his stomach, then vomits all over the gas pump.

Joe sees the vomit as bright green in color, similar to grasshopper goo. Sherry guides him to the rig.

The rig barrels down a Kansas highway. Joe plays “Nearer my God to Thee,” a handkerchief dangling heavy with saliva. Sherry turns on the radio. A distant station broadcasts the news, barely audible. “One man was found shot to death execution style yesterday in a café near Hays City. Robbery has not been ruled out as investigators search for a motive in the killing.”

Kenny tries to dial in the station a bit better. “What was that? I couldn’t hear it.”

“Me neither,” Sherry says.

Joe stops playing. “Nothing. Some guy got shot in Hays.”

The Truck City Café in Dodge City. Kenny, Sherry and Joe finish breakfast.

Joe says, “This whole town smells like shit. And blood.”

Sherry puts a finger to her lips. “Shhh. Not so loud.”

Kenny is thinking. He says, “Look, you two hang out here. I’m gonna check a couple of places, see if I can find a load of something to take south, make a few bucks.”