American Boy - Larry Watson [61]
“Mom,” said Johnny, hurrying after his mother’s fleeing form. “Wait ... I don’t think . . .”
She stopped at the front door, almost as if she were going to open it and stand exposed to the storm. One hand clutched at the open collar of her blouse, the other was clamped tight over her mouth.
“Did you try calling—?” Johnny asked.
“They left the hospital close to two hours ago. So keep your eyes open on the road, in case they’re stuck in a ditch somewhere. Or in case you pass right by them.”
“They left the hospital ... ?”
“Did you hear me?” she said sharply. “That’s my husband out there! If you can’t do this for me...”
Johnny replied feebly. “It’ll be dark soon—”
But before he could finish his protest Mrs. Dunbar interrupted, “So get going!” Her voice hit a pitch just this side of a scream, and Johnny clamped his jaw and walked away.
For a moment I considered taking up the argument on his behalf, but Mrs. Dunbar’s half-wild look stopped me. Here was another item for Louisa’s list: Mrs. Dunbar will endanger her son in order to keep her husband from another woman’s company.
I caught up to Johnny as he was buckling his overshoes.
I started putting on my own boots. “Should we take a thermos of coffee?” I asked. “Maybe a couple apples or candy bars? That way we won’t starve if we get stuck and have to wait out the storm. And we should take a few blankets, too. We don’t want to freeze to death.”
“What’s this ‘we’ shit?”
“I thought I’d ride along. Just to criticize your driving.”
“Don’t be stupid. No sense both of us going out in a fucking blizzard.”
“Sunday afternoon,” I said. “I’ve got nothing better to do.”
He stood, stamped his feet into his overshoes, and jammed his arms into his coat. He stared at me for a long moment. On the rare occasions when Johnny Dunbar was mad, his usually ruddy cheeks became blotched with white, as if anger pulled his flesh so tight that bone showed through. “Fine,” he said. “It’s your own fucking funeral.”
“Then we should throw a shovel in the trunk.”
He opened the door before I’d finished buttoning my coat. “Since when did you become the voice of reason?”
We stepped out into the storm. The snow on the porch was already three feet deep, and the top of the drift had been carved sharp by the wind. We hunched and turned our heads away from the icy sting of wind and snow. I shouted my reply to Johnny. “Weird, isn’t it? It must be a new phase I’m going through.”
17.
FOR A TIME IT LOOKED AS IF MRS. DUNBAR’S prediction would prove to be correct. As Johnny drove us up out of the valley, the snow did seem to be diminishing. The air actually lightened, almost as if a window shade had been raised. The road was relatively clear, scoured free of snow by the same wind that had drifted over the streets of Willow Falls.
But then the road climbed and curved, and we were above and beyond the hills and trees that had temporarily sheltered us. On the prairie there was nothing to block the wind, and gusts rocked the car. The snow came at us in great swirling bursts.
Johnny clung determinedly to the steering wheel. The defroster worked hard, but was losing the battle with the multiplying frost stars that crept down the glass. The snow was of the drier variety, which allowed the wipers to keep the windshield clear.
There were no other cars on the highway, and this was a good thing, since the shoulder and center lines had been erased. Where the snow had succeeded in spilling out of the ditch, drifts crossed the road, and Johnny had no choice but to charge through them. The car hit them with a whumpf, and each time it did I expected the car to gasp and come to a halt.
We’re not going to make it, I thought. And when our frozen bodies are finally discovered, would anyone think to attribute our deaths to the same cause as Lester Huston’s?
Johnny must have had similar thoughts. We were barely ten miles out of Willow Falls when he leaned forward and hunched over the steering wheel. “I can’t do