Mark Tufo - A Plague Upon Your Family

The drive up the highway was damn near uneventful, which in itself is a good thing. We saw an occasional bloated frozen cow or sheep. The more disturbing ones were picked to the bone. That could only mean one thing. There were some cars abandoned on the road, most likely from expired gas tanks. I pitied the fools that had got out to walk, and then I thought back to the bone frameworks previously mentioned. Nothing like a mass exodus had happened here. Sure North Dakota wasn’t known for its population explosion but still.

“Here Mr. T.” Tommy said as he handed me a heavy brown paper bag. Normally I would tell him to wait because I had to concentrate on driving. I was pretty sure some pimply faced teenager wasn’t going to be coming in the other direction texting his friend lying about who he had banged the night before.

“What you got here, Tommy?” I asked as I took the bag. Although from the weight of it and the feel of the glass bottle it couldn’t have been anything other than booze.

“I got you some Jeff Daniels.” He answered.

I laughed, again thankful for the small release of endorphins. “I think you mean Jack.”

“That’s what I said.” He answered.

“But why Tommy, you know I can’t stand the stuff.”

“Oh it’s not for you.” He answered with a smile.

Tracy turned to look him in the eye. A mischievous grin spread across his face. He knew something and he wasn’t going to spill all his beans at once.

“Tommy, I’ll hide your pop-tarts.” Tracy said, going right for the jugular. Dancing lightly around the subject had never been at the top of her repertoire. Tommy grabbed his backpack and pushed it behind himself. “I’m serious.” She added, making a mock attempt to reach around him. I watched in the rear view mirror as the sheer look of terror came over his face. It released an even bigger amount of happy juice into my veins. I didn’t laugh out loud though. If Tracy couldn’t get that bag from him she might make me try and I had no desire to be such an abject point of fear for the kid.

She resorted to less than honorable tactics. She started tickling him. Tommy’s face turned a bright crimson. His laughing shined everything around him. The minivan swayed down the highway as his bulk thrashed back and forth in a vain attempt to get away from her ministrations.

“Alright…alright.” He croaked out in between laborious inhalations of breath. When he had hesitated for a fraction more of a second longer than Tracy was willing to tolerate, she started up again. I felt for the kid, if he had been older I would have feared his heart wouldn’t be able to take much more. “I’ll tell!” He squealed. Snot, tears and chocolate goo coalesced in a pool on his shirt as he fought to regain control. On anyone else that would have been the most disgusting sight I had seen, on Tommy it was merely endearing. “Aw I messed up my Star Wars shirt.” Tommy said as he looked down at his belly.

“Tommy!” Tracy shouted as she held her hand up high in a claw like fashion, ready to strike and do more damage.

“Ok, ok stop, but my shirt.” Tracy’s hand got higher. “Your mom likes Jeff Daniels.”

“Jack” I said

He looked over towards me. “That’s what I said.”

Tracy looked over at me pissed that I was helping Tommy stall. I might be a big bad Marine but I’m as ticklish as a puppy. If she started that crap with me, this minivan would be cart-wheeling down the roadway in about ten seconds. “We’re good.” I said holding up my hands.

She redirected towards Tommy, convinced that I would no longer interfere with her. She was right.

“Ryan said your mom likes Jeff Daniels!” He yelled out before Tracy could descend back on him.

She sat back down hard in her seat, a look of bafflement, relief and wonderment across her face. After long seconds of processing the information she turned back towards Tommy.

“You sure?” She asked querulously.

Tommy beamed. No answer was necessary at that point.

“Ryan said my mom likes Jack Daniels?” Tracy reiterated, nearly sobbing.

“Yep Jeff Daniels.”

“Jack.” I said adding my penny and a half.

“That’s what I said.” Tommy said looking at me through the mirror like I had lost my marbles. The earnest way that he was looking at me made me wonder if maybe he had said Jack and I was slowly going insane. Okay so ‘slowly’ would probably be the wrong descriptor, something along the lines of breaking the speed of light might be more apt.

My eyebrows knitted of their own volition. “Tracy what did Tommy say?” I needed help.

“Oh Mike he said my mom was alright.” Now she was full on crying.

Now whether Tommy had said Jack or Jeff was open to debate, but not once did he say Carol Yentas was okay. Sure it was implied. Dead people don’t really like anything except maybe staying dead. I’d be damned though if I was going to be the one that pissed on her cheerios, rained on her parade, took a dump on her tulips, whatever. We had a glimmer of hope in a sea of somberness. The home team needed a win and right now Tommy was pitching a gem. Tracy fairly bounced in her seat the remaining hour of our journey. I could tell she was wavering with bouts of happiness and fits of caution. It is a tough thing to open one’s self to the prospect of something happening that is beyond the belief of what is expected and then once you attain that state of inner balance to have what you hoped for ripped from you.

To get the full effect of this analogy, just for a moment consider yourself a huge, NO HUGE Red Sox fan (like me) and it is the magical year of the lord nineteen hundred and eighty six and it is game six, the Sox are ONE FUCKING OUT from winning the World Series, something you never expected to see in your lifetime. You suck Babe Ruth! A dribbler, a DRIBBLER is hit up the first base line. I had literally along with all my friends popped that bottle of champagne. Cold liquor was bubbling all over my hand as I watched in disbelief as the ball went through BILLY BUCKNER’S legs. I had never known up to that point in life what getting a dream crushed felt like. It was something akin to running over rabbits with a lawn mower. Blood, fur and bone bits everywhere, yep it was pretty much like that. So I’m basically saying that I could empathize with her, in a roundabout way.

The rural road that led up to Carol’s, was for the mini-van, nearly impassable. It had seen some random traffic and if I kept the speed low enough I could follow in the barely visible grooves some other traveler had made. On two occasions some gentle bumper pushing from Jen had got me out of some deeper furrows.

“Maybe we should let Jen go first, she can make a better trail for us hon.”

Tracy’s unspoken look of ‘Not a fucking chance’ shut me up.

When we got to 7 Washburn Road, we were met with a sea of white. An unbroken blanket of snow a foot deep, it might as well have been a moat, there was no way this car was getting through it. The old Victorian style house was set a good two hundred yards off the roadway but even from here it was impossible to not see the blotches of crimson that dotted the yard.

“Talbot is that blood?” Tracy asked. We both saw the giant dream-crushing boot hovering over us. “Where are the bodies?”

“My guess is under the snow.” My thoughts however traveled a little darker. I figured that they had got what they came for and had long since left. Tracy had started to fumble with the door lock. “What’re you doing?”

“I’m going up there.” She said matter-of-factly. “I’ve got to see what happened.” She gulped.

“Hold on. You can’t walk up there. That snows at least a foot deep if something or somebody is still here you’ll never be able to run for it. We’ll hop in the back of Jen’s truck.”