splat chapter thirty-two

Suzie drove around, doing some thinking. She didn't pay attention to where she was going. She just drove. She didn't notice the landscape features, she didn't see the endless strip malls and fast food joints and gas stations. The only thing she noticed was how close the car was to conking out.

What Kind Of Fool Do You Think I Am? A tune she and her dad used to listen to went through her head. Everything Nelson had ever told her had been a lie. He loved her, that was a lie. It was special between them. He never got hard for anybody else like he did for her.

He'd been sleeping around the whole time. She should have known he wouldn't go as long as they had without sex. She expected every minute that he would tell her he had to see her, he had to have it, he couldn't bear to be without her, he needed to show her how much he loved her. They hadn't had sex in months, and it was because he was too tired from fucking other girls and couldn't get it up for her.

She felt her love for him like a boulder on a bungee cord. It plunged out of sight, then came snapping back up, just out of reach. But it was just a rock, what should she care?

Then why did she love him? She knew he was a shit, but he did something to her heart. Whenever they touched, a feeling like she was home came over her, and she felt an outpouring of love for him, a real soul connection. It frightened her. It scared him too; he said so when they kind of talked about it once. When she brought it up.

She thought on a practical level for awhile. She knew they were never going to live together, in the back of her head. But he was the best prospect she had, so she continued her feeble attempts to manipulate him into marriage. He would never be the best provider, but he was the one who made her feel the best, feel the most intense. The one she needed to have in her arms.

Hell, he was probably a terrible provider. Always buying and selling dope, always high. Thank God he didn't drink. There was that problem with crank he used to have. But he said he'd been clean for months, and she believe him.

She found herself driving east. Farms and pine trees and rolling hills. When she got to Madison, she turned north.

Suzie drove some more, suffering from her hangover. Everything irritated her; everything was too much. The heat was scalding. Dehydration parched her skin; she sweated dried salt. Her mouth sucked humidity out of the air. Her hands were shaky. She felt nauseous. She needed to sleep. She wasn't thinking clearly.

She fantasized about how she could help him if they were living together. Help him start his own business, give him a nice hot dinner and rub his shoulders when he came home, make love twice a day. He'd be less tense, less harried. If he worked for himself he could just work when he felt like it, and relax the rest of the time. They'd be happy all the time.

Suzie didn't have a whole lot of practical experience of life. She had a bunch of romantic ideas about how relationships were supposed to work. She'd picked up a mess of fancy notions from TV, like for example that the lot of the working class was amusing, and everyone partied a lot and shared lots of love. It was all good. After all, nobody in the sitcoms cursed the government, or got put in jail on a bad rap, or complained of being exploited by Wal-Mart. She took it for granted that life was supposed to be like that. But recent events had proved that life was entirely different from anything she'd seen on TV.

Okay, so she was finding that her hopes for a life with Nelson were a little immature. So fine, Nelson's out. He wasn't worth much anyway. So what that she loved him with all her heart? If she simply stayed away from him, then she wouldn't feel that soul thing that happened between them, and she wouldn't miss him. It sounded like a good plan to her. And, truthfully, for Suzie, Out Of Sight Out Of Mind has always won out over Absence Makes The Heart Grow Fonder.

She saw a dead deer on the road in front of her. Aw. Her heart bled for Bambi. As she got closer, she saw that it was a dog. Probly ran away from home and was out sniffing around for females. Dumb dog. As she passed it, she saw it was a truck tire peeled from a passing eighteen-wheeler. She called Uncle Daddy again, but there was no response.

But now what? No home. No boyfriend. No job. Which would she miss the most? Hmmm. None of the choices were stellar. If you asked her, she wouldn't have a good thing to say about any of them. Living in the apartments with the lost boys was ratty and dungeonlike, and they always made her feel small. The job was hell, with heaven just out of reach in the kitchen. The boyfriend. Cocksucker.

That reminded her of her feelings toward Ed. And Jerry. Her head started to pound. All men can't be like that. Why couldn't she find one she could stand?

Like her dad. Brave, strong and true. Her heart filled with love, a layer of harsh longing in the middle. He left her. She was all alone. She couldn't get his approval any more. And she so needed his approval.

He loved her no matter what she did, made light of even her worst faults. Honored her as a human being and a good girl, even when she wasn't. Made excuses for her stupid mistakes. He would have let her get away with murder if she'd wanted to go that far. But she always did what was right because she knew he'd be proud of her, and she always asked herself what he would think of whatever she'd done.

Would he be proud of her now? Having killed one. Wanting to kill another. Wanting to blow up Nelson's shop with him in it. Wanting to take a machine gun into the Club. These thoughts made her pause. Those were terroristic acts she was fantasizing. And that's not how a reasonable adult is supposed to behave. Even though most humans entertain murderous thoughts on a daily basis. It's just that you're not supposed to act on them. But she had. She'd killed Jerry. And she wanted very badly to kill Ed.

She'd have killed Hitler if given the chance. Wouldn't anybody? How about if you were around in those days? If you were, say an Allied spy, holed up across the street from where Hitler had a cozy thing going with a party wife? Wouldn't you fire if you had a clear shot? Knowing what that maniac was doing to the world? Wouldn't you be morally obligated to assassinate him? Wouldn't history justify you? I'm certain Pat Robertson would think so.

She came to a light just turning red, pulled the gearshift to neutral, then fluttered the gas and braked to a halt. It went to stall, but she gave it more gas, then it roared, so she let off the gas, then it started to stall again. She had to concentrating on zenning exactly the right pressure at exactly the right time until the light changed.

Suzie wondered, Am I bad? I probly should get some type of therapy. But no anti-depressants, she decided. Remember, speed kills.

She found she'd driven clear over to Athens, so she turned west, and because she wasn't thinking, she decided she would cut cross-country toward Atlanta instead of taking US 78, the main back road. She was tired of traffic.

Hours later she found herself in Morrow, well south of town. At least she knew how to get home from there. She came up Georgia 54 - Jonesboro Road - and bypassed the highway until she got to Lakewood, where she figured she might as well get on the Connector and finish her trip sooner. She was heading home. Such as it was.

Traffic was moving well. She passed one overpass after another, all of which could turn out to be the bridge she put her tag on. But each one had something wrong with it. One bridge was too visible to escape notice. One was too dimly lit. One vista showed Atlanta far away and small. One bridge showed Atlanta close up, but off to the side of the road. None of them were just right. The railroad bridge just before Pryor Street was still her best candidate.

She slowed down as she reached it and took in all the details. It had a big huge traffic sign in front of it, which marred the view of her proposed tag, but would protect her from notice from oncoming traffic. The bridge had an iron fence on the inside, a chain-link fence next to it on the outside, then a cement lip feet high, a maybe four foot recess and then eight feet of iron wall, rusty black, empty. And a twenty foot drop. She imagined it all in a flash of creative projection . I can do this, she thought, crossing her fingers for luck.

The on-ramp to I-20 East was fucked up from all the traffic still being rerouted from the south end of the Perimeter. So she got off at Turner Field and went home through Grant Park again. One of the original neighborhoods of post-Reconstruction Atlanta. Hundred-year-old Craftsman and Queen Anne houses. Wide porches, high ceilings, large rooms, stained glass, ancient trees, large yards. Renovated. Graceful, gentrified, intown living at its finest.

She took Boulevard north to Edgewood and tried to cut east through Inman Park, but the road was barricaded at Euclid. So she cut a little south to DeKalb Avenue to parallel the tracks, but they wouldn't even let her on the street. So she went over to cut south under the train tracks by the Krog Street tunnel, but it was closed and barricaded as well. So she went back to Boulevard and took it south to Memorial, and went east that way. Traffic was backed up when she got to Monroe, but at least it was moving, so she turned left and got in line, and eventually came upon a barricade.

It was at Wylie Street, right at the edge of her neighborhood. Cops were standing around directing traffic away from the area. Suzie parked the Trooper and got out to ask when they were going to start letting people back in.

They told her that the whole area was under an evacuation order. Reynoldstown, Cabbagetown, Little Five Points, Inman Park. Even the new shopping center. The CSX terminal was shut down. That meant no eastbound or westbound trains through Atlanta until further notice.

'Are you a resident?' the cop asked her, looming over her.

'Yes, I live in the apartments on Seaboard.'

The cop looked twice at her and backed off slightly. 'Wow. Were you there?' She nodded. 'You should go to the hospital, let them check you out. The whole area's a disaster zone, and especially that part. There's nothing to go back to.'

'I just wanted to see it,' she explained.

He took pity on her. 'We might let people in tomorrow or the next day,' he told her, though in fact it would be a week. 'They're still decontaminating.'

She considered walking in. They can't patrol all the backyards between here and my house, she thought. Then she thought about the toxic waste. And what did she want to see a burned out shell for? It would just make her headache worse.

Suzie went and got in the Trooper and tried to start it. The starter went rinna rinna for awhile, then caught. And the engine died immediately. Suzie concentrated on getting it to start again, one foot on the brake, the other on the gas.

She looked around when the car started up, triumphant. She wish people could appreciate what kind of skill it took to drive Nelson's car. Then she saw Ed the developer standing at the blockade, talking to the cops. He'd pulled his Mercedes up right next to hers, and she hadn't noticed. She could see the fake can of lubricant in the back.

Ed wanted to go into the area, and they were giving him the same story they gave her. She could hear him arguing with them, wanting them to make an exception for him. 'I've got a right to be in there,' he insisted. 'I have to see what kind of damage was done to my property. And my insurance people are on their way.'

The cops weren't impressed. Suzie wanted to yell out that he was the ultimate reason the place was being quarantined. But she held her tongue. Her head hurt too much to yell. And they weren't impressed with her, either.

Ed was still trying to get them to let him in. They asked if he was a resident, and he answered, 'Well, in a manner of speaking.' He spread his hands out to indicate the neighborhood. 'This is all mine now,' he said proudly. 'I bought it all up right before this happened, and I'm concerned for my investment.'

The cops seemed slightly more impressed. It was obvious to them that someone had been buying up the neighborhood. Ed pointed, indicating the new Edgewood shopping center down the hill. 'Yessir,' he insisted, 'part two of the long-awaited Southeast Atlanta renaissance. We're fixing to turn this area into a city within a city just as soon as we can get it cleared out.' He leaned over confidentially and said, loud enough for Suzie to hear, 'My job's a lot simpler with this little fire here. It's better to just let it burn and then call in the bulldozers.' The developer looked around and saw Suzie, but didn't recognize her.

She scoffed, What, if I'm not wearing a tux I'm invisible? She revved up the engine so it wouldn't stall, and pulled out fast, full of hate. Bastard, she thought. You're next.

But she didn't turn back and try to tail him. She drove on, instead, not ready to take action. As the minutes passed, she began to regret leaving the scene. She wished she'd caught the bastard out right there, followed him down Wylie as he tried to get in the back way. She could have gotten him back in those side streets, maybe stopping to tell him she knew a secret entrance, leading him in, and pushing his face into spilled nuclear waste.

She pictured him face down in a glowing green ditch. Pig. It really bugged her that he hadn't recognized her. He looked right at her, and never even noticed her. Of course, she was pretty filthy. Maybe he could smell her from there. Who would look at her, as bedraggled as she was?

She drove back down Moreland the other way, and stopped at Uncle Daddy's house. The car was there, the truck was gone. Nobody answered the door. Nobody answered the phone.

So Suzie put ten bucks in the tank and went for another lost drive. It was afternoon was all she knew. Or late morning. She drove south on Moreland past Intrenchment Creek. Across the still-closed 285 in the southeast part of town. Past Fort Gillem. South to Morrow, to Stockbridge. Far. Where the roads lead away from the city instead of toward it. Way down in the country. Suzie drove until she got lost, and then kept driving. Then she turned around and made her way back to town, still in the grip of her hangover, and feeling really sorry for messing her life up so badly.

She was just passing Confederate Avenue when Alex's phone rang. It was Uncle Daddy. She felt so relieved she started to cry. Her head pounded. 'Oh, Uncle Daddy,' she sobbed.

'It's all right, Baby Girl. It's all going to be okay.'

'But where have you been?' she whined. 'I've been trying to call you for days .'

'I left it my cellphone in the truck. I've been using your Auntie Mae's car recently. I haven't been home much, I guess.' He sounded depressed.

'I didn't have your cellphone number,' she sniffled. 'How's Auntie Mae?'

'The news isn't good, Honey. They're going to have to operate.'

'What is it?'

'Breast cancer.'

Suzie felt her heart break. 'Oh no. How is she taking it?'

'How does she ever take anything? She's cool as a cucumber, reading her Bible and saying nothing. She's a rock. I'm so worried about her.'

'How are you doing, Uncle Daddy?'

'Oh, I'm alright, Baby Girl, bless your heart. It's just a little sudden, that's all. Listen, I'm heading down to Macon right now with a load, but I'll be back around here late tonight. Call me anytime, you have my number now. Say, why don't you come around tomorrow morning late, and we'll go get some breakfast at the Waffle House?'

'Awful House,' she responded automatically. It used to be a game between them.

He chuckled. 'That sound okay? Fine.'

'I'm going to go see Auntie Mae.'

'Give her my love.'

She choked up. 'I love you, Uncle Daddy.'

'I love you too, Suzie Q.'

She went off to see Auntie Mae, parking on another street among several abandoned heaps. Nelson's car fit right in.

Auntie Mae was no longer in her hospital room craning her neck to watch TV or lying back reading her Bible. The nurse couldn't tell her where she was. Suzie still couldn't prove she was next of kin, and the nurse wasn't saying nothing. Heartless bitch.

Suzie wouldn't accept that Auntie Mae was just gone, and went barging into the room to make sure. There was another old black lady there, craning her neck to watch TV. Suzie looked at her, and then noticed Auntie Mae's Bible sitting on top of the air conditioning unit. 'Is that yours?' she asked the old lady. The woman shook her head. Suzie dashed over to the window to retrieve it. 'It's my Auntie's,' she explained, tucking it into her bag and walking out.

Her heart was sore thinking about Auntie Mae. Cancer. An operation. They were going to knock her out, and anything could happen to her when she was under the anesthesia. She could have a heart attack on the operating table, or in recovery. She could have a stroke, an allergy to the anesthetic, she could be given too strong a dose. The surgeon could leave medical instruments inside of her. She could be riddled with disease they wouldn't know about until they went in. Shit like that happens all the time in hospitals.

She called Uncle Daddy immediately, full of fear, and told him of Auntie Mae's disappearance. It was news to him. He said he'd call the hospital and then call her right back to tell her what was going on. He was already on the road, but he had all the numbers.

Suzie drove away from the hospital, afraid she'd never see Auntie Mae again. She flashed back on her dream vision of herself, attached to tubes and pumps, hallucinating a life while being pegged to a bed. The thought of Auntie Mae as helpless as that brought tears up and closed her throat, and then Suzie was driving down Boulevard sobbing, She had to pull into a parking lot, and then crossed her arms over the steering wheel and put her head down, bawling. She had such a headache.

When her tears ran out, she drove over to the Home Depot parking lot on Ponce and took a nap, curled up in the dusty Trooper under a scrubby parking lot tree, her hips on the driver's seat, her shoulders in the passenger seat, her middle suspended over the gearshift and console. She sobbed little baby sobs in her sleep.

When she woke up, the sun was below the houses bordering the shopping center, and her hangover had gone. She found the thought of food intriguing once again. So she counted her money, and then walked through the parking lot over to Eats a few feet up Ponce, deliberately violating the signs that said, Parking For Customers Of This Center Only Or We'll Boot Your Ass. She got the vegetable plate; a buck an item. Nothing better for replenishing those electrolytes than collard greens, cornbread, beans and rice, and sweet tea.

She sat in the crowded restaurant ignoring the people and trying to concentrate on flipping through a copy of Creative Loafing while she ate. There was a story about the new development planned for Reynoldstown. Her neighborhood. She found herself staring at the same artist's rendering Ed had shown her. There was her name above some shop. Like she would fall for that. What an asshole.

She sat there mopping up the juice from the greens with her cornbread. She thought about the Ed and Jerry show. Sexist, racist, selfish, conniving, murderous, mean ugly stupid bastards. Jerry was dead, and that must be a blow to the forces behind the new slavery laws. She felt righteous for a moment. But Atlanta was going to become a McDonald's kind of place if Ed continued unchecked. She realized that she had unfinished business. As Jerry went, so should go his best friend and co-conspirator.

She thought of how she felt when she shot Jerry. She'd had no question. It had been an instinct. Even questioning herself now, she immediately stopped and thought, No. It had to be done. She got the same response when she questioned her wish to kill the developer. He's a monster.

A news truck drove by. She thought how she could go home and catch the early news because she wasn't working at the Club any more. This made her think about how she couldn't watch the news because her house was burned down. And now she was jobless, homeless, illegal, a wanted fugitive, an outlaw. And it was all Ed's fault.

She drove over to Ansley Park and parked across the street from the Club's main entrance, waiting for him to finish his dinner. She wondered who he was mistreating tonight. She was very happy not to be going inside the iron gates to serve Atlanta's elite any more.

She called Uncle Daddy to find out what they'd said at the hospital. He'd had long phone conversations with various officials, and had been cut off several times going out of cellphone range, but he understood that they moved her to a new rehabilitation center to perform her operation this afternoon, and he would know more tomorrow.

'Rehab center?'

'Some cancer place. It's just opened up. Some new technology they're going to use on her.'

Suzie shouted, 'No! Uncle Daddy, you can't let them do it. It's untested. It's dangerous.'

'Baby Girl, the doctors wouldn't do anything that's not safe for Auntie Mae.'

'Yes they would! They're just waiting for the chance.'

'Honey, you need to calm down.'

'But I'm serious.'

'I know you are. I know you're scared. And I am, too. But we're in the doctors' hands now, and with the grace of God your Auntie Mae will be fine. She's already had her operation by now. Try not to worry.'

Suzie sat there and worried for several hours. Auntie Mae with a microwave pointed at her chest. Auntie Mae cooked from the inside out. Auntie Mae's swollen, staring eyes with her hair frizzed out like a maxi-afro.

She saw Ed's car come weaving down the drive at some point past eleven. The loss of his favorite waitress and his best friend hadn't made for drastic changes in his social habits. He cruised toward Piedmont and headed up toward Buckhead.

Suzie started the engine after a few seconds, and followed him out of the Club. She kept behind him, playing three-pedal twister trying to keep the car from stalling whenever they came to a light.

Stopped at Piedmont Circle, she had her right foot turned sideways, working the gas and the brake in turn while easing the clutch in and out of gear, cursing the broken emergency brake. He took a left and got onto Buford Highway heading north.

She followed him to Sidney Marcus, going fast. She applied the brakes as she came up to the light. The pedal squished down toward the floor without slowing her Trooper. Suzie shoved down on the brake. Nothing. She mashed the brake harder, but still nothing happened. The back of Ed's car was alarmingly close. In desperation, Suzie stood on the brake, her head pressing against the roof, pulling back on the wheel with both hands as hard as she could.

The car came to an agonizing halt a single coat of paint from his bumper. Suzie was sweating out of every pore, and she could feel her entire head and shoulders red and swollen with effort. She started breathing again and sat back down, unclenching her hands. After stopping the car with pure willpower, keeping the engine from dying was simple.

The light changed, and her feet danced a little letting the clutch out. She went slowly over the hill, pumping the brakes. The pedal firmed up and the brakes stopped the car just fine, now. An intermittent problem. Nelson didn't tell her the brakes had air in the line. Was he trying to kill her or did he think she liked these little challenges? She felt the sweat turning cold on her skin. Her breathing slowly returned to normal.

She actually liked driving the Trooper. It was high, and the engine was a real workhorse. Nothing automatic, nothing complicated. No frills at all. That's the way she liked her cars. Maybe she would keep it. It would need cleaning up, though. Maybe she could fit the back out as a sleeper and go to Florida for the winter. Say, Boca Raton, where you can live well under a bridge, and still send postcards home. Having A Wonderful Time.

The Trooper's interior was really filthy. The more she thought about having a mechanic's car, the more her enthusiasm dampened. Nobody drives as broken-down a car as a mechanic. It wouldn't get her halfway to Valdosta.

Ed turned right onto Georgia 400, and they were off. She was right behind him the whole way, and he never noticed. He took it up to 80 and hardly slowed at all going through the cruise lane, leaving Suzie screaming in fury as she stopped her car at the tollbooth.

Suzie got the Trooper into fifth gear and floored the gas. Soon she was going 90, and he was nowhere to be seen. The Trooper didn't really like going that fast. It hiccoughed and spat, and the wheel shimmied horribly when she tried to push it any faster. She sat on the edge of her seat, her hair whipping around her head, her short legs stretched to mash the pedal down, all her energy focused on catching up to the evil developer.

She noticed all the traffic cameras, one every few hundred feet, some of them peering down through the windshield at her lap, her face. Were they all recording, all the time? Maybe she should put the wig and glasses on. She drove as fast as she could, peering ahead for tail lights. She wondered how far he was going, which exit he'd most likely get off on. Roswell, Alpharetta, Cumming?

The road was empty. Every mile or so she passed a car plodding home at 65. Every five minutes, a car passed her like she was standing still. Georgia 400 is a drag strip. Cars routinely run it up to 175 and over when nobody's looking. And the cops never look.

She passed the exit for Roswell, and Holcomb Bridge Road. She still couldn't see him, but had to choose. She kept going. It was agonizing to know that he might be turning into his driveway in Country Club of the South while she was still speeding down the highway.

She checked the gas. A little under a quarter tank. Good. She kept her speed up as high as she could, but she still didn't see him. She got to the Alpharetta exits. How far ahead could he be? Did he already get off? It was driving her nuts. She felt as if a part of herself were getting off at each exit, scattering her attention along the road behind her.

Either he was already at home in darkest Alpharetta having a good long piss in the bathroom, or he was heading for Cumming, the back side of Lake Lanier. A house on the lake and boating around drunk on the weekends would suit him fine. Forsyth County's reputation for racism, too. Cumming, then. She kept going. She was getting low on gas.

The road got very lonely. The spy cameras ended at Windward Parkway, above Alpharetta, and after that there was nothing, just Suzie in Nelson's rickety dusty deathtrap, passing black pine trees and glowing black hills. The wind blew her hair all over. It got into her eyes. She could hear a succession of crickets. After awhile it sounded like one giant cricket keeping pace with her car. She began to get sleepy. She kept driving.

She passed the exits for Cumming and was heading north toward Dahlonega. There was still nobody on the road. She felt sure she had missed him. He must be home in bed by now. She prepared to take the next exit and turn around, her mouth full of bitter disappointment. Then she saw lights way ahead. It was a car getting over from the passing lane to take the next exit. Her heart rose into her mouth with excitement. There is a God.

He got off on exit seventeen, forty miles from Atlanta. She was right behind him, trying to decide what to do. He turned right, and sped on down the road into the darkness. Suzie pulled out and steadily gained speed. Two miles down the road, he turned right again. Suzie caught a glimpse of the sign as she skittered around the corner. Brown's Bridge Road. Then she had a discussion with herself about top-heavy vehicles and sharp turns, after which she pulled out her gun and loaded it with paintballs. She put it on her lap and covered it with her wig-and-cellphone assembly.

They were on a two-lane, unlit country road, going up steep hills and down steep hills, around bends and across intersections as fast as possible. Ed was a practiced drunk; he hardly weaved at all. They crossed a branch of Lake Lanier over a low bridge. Pretty. Sparkly black water, black pines. Suzie was following him, right on his bumper, trying to make up her mind whether to get behind him and ram him, or get beside him and push him off the road.

Wondering why she bothered when he hadn't recognized her before, she put on her wig and pushed her hair up into it. Then she spent a minute fumbling unsuccessfully for the scarf to tie down the whipping strands. They were leaving whip marks on her cheeks.

Blonde nylon hair went up her nose. She started sneezing. She looked at the dashboard and noticed again that she was low on gas.

He was weaving a little more now. Probly getting sleepy, she thought. Maybe she wouldn't have to shoot him at all. He drifted into the left lane and slowed down as they were going up a hill. Suzie felt like she'd won a battle without fighting. She came up alongside his car, suddenly infected with pity in case he was falling asleep and fixing to drive off the road.

Ed rolled his passenger side window down and shot at Suzie's car with a nine millimeter Baretta. Suzie screamed with fright. The bullet went wild. He shot again, and it grazed the roof. He shot again, and it hit the door post. She slammed on the brakes and dropped behind him. He slowed.

Ed was trying to kill her. This realization hit Suzie like a face full of cold water. He didn't know who she was; she was just some woman driving down the road, and he took offense and started shooting at her. Suzie's fury was matched only by her incredulity. How dare he? She grabbed her paintgun and sped to catch up with him.

She got the corner of his windshield with a psychotic yellow paintball. He squeezed off another shot at her hood. She was scared to death he was going to hit her, or she was going to lose control of the car. He kept shooting at her, and it was all she could do to keep driving and try to shoot back.

Now it felt like there was something wrong with the steering. A bushing, maybe. The car felt like it was stuck in mud - veering and threatening to turn over going uphill, the engine threatening to stall going downhill.

They were staggering down the road together, trying to kill each other. Suzie kept even with him and pumped off ten shots, covering the inside of his windshield, the dashboard, his seat. She reloaded in her lap and resumed shooting. She was aiming straight at his heart. A few balls fell into his lap and exploded. She could tell it hurt, even at her gun's puny speed. He yelled 'Ow' every time she hit his inner thigh. So she shifted her aim gladly. And miraculously, her aim improved. He stopped firing and covered his nuts with his gun hand.

Then she ran out of paintballs. He was quick to notice, uncovered his balls, and started shooting again. The next bullet went through her wig. She felt it hiss and smelled burning nylon. She snatched it off. That was too close. She started to panic, afraid for her life.

In an act of desperate frustration, she tossed the gun through his window, hoping to hit him, or deflect his aim, and maybe give her a chance to get away. She didn't throw it very hard, and the wind cut down on its speed, but as a flying object, it did pretty well, because it slewed around and whacked him upside the head with the barrel, which had the most heft of any part of the paintgun.

The blow didn't hurt him, but it made him mad, and he turned his full attention to her. His left arm was holding the wheel. It jerked as he swing toward her, his face purple and puffed out with anger, his eyes barely visible as cold, void-like black holes. Even with eight to ten feet between them, he was still trying to suck her in and drain the life out of her.

He was aiming at her now, not her car. It had become purposeful aiming, calm zenlike aiming. She could tell he was going to hit her the next time he fired a shot. She felt like prey.

Ed could no longer see through his windshield for all the paint, so he kept sticking his head out the driver's side window to see the road, and sticking his head back in and cranking it around to aim at her. His next shot went through Suzie's door.

She looked down to see something whiz by her knees as the door panel buckled and the rolled-down window shattered inside the door. She took her foot off the gas and slowed out of range while she thought about it.

She was stuck on the road with a drunken fool who had a gun and was out to kill her. And she was completely unarmed. If she turned the car around he'd be right behind her.

He stopped a few hundred yards up the road. Suzie had slowed and was preparing to turn and run away, amazed at her luck. But then she saw him turn around. Suddenly he darted forward, shooting out his driver's side window as he came. Suzie realized that she was going to die. He either didn't care if he was injured, or was convinced his Mercedes would survive a head-on that would flatten her Trooper.

She had never liked to play chicken. But when there was no choice, you pick what they give you. She was fixing to go up in flames or down in history. 'Want to play chicken?' She screamed, letting out the clutch and gunning it. 'I'll show you chicken.'

The two cars closed fast, aimed directly at each other. Ed was in the middle of the road and stayed there as they got closer and closer. He had the momentum, the purpose, the drive, the horsepower, the balls, the ammo. Suzie was only going along with it, hoping at every moment for a reprieve.

She was scared to death. She could see the whites of his eyes, green in the dashboard glare. He was right in front of her. Suzie veered at the last minute toward the ditch on her side of the road.

And then a miracle happened.

She felt the wind whump her as the developer's car flew by. She felt her right wheels flop down into the grassy margin toward the ditch. The car rattled violently. The wheel jerked out of her hand.

She lost control for a long moment as the Trooper decided whether to go straight or fall over on its side into the ditch. Finally she wrenched it back onto the pavement and slowed, gasping for breath, still praying.

She looked for Ed in her mirrors. She couldn't see him. Maybe he'd just kept going and was out of sight over the hill. Maybe he'd be waiting for her on the other side. Maybe she should just keep going in the other direction, or turn into the next driveway and shut off her lights and hide until dawn.

The road behind her stayed dark. She went halfway up the hill, stopped, and did a three-point turn in the road. Five hundred yards down the hill, Suzie noticed a trail of black screech marks in the road, leading into a ditch on the other side of the road. The tire marks were steaming. She slowed her car and peered out the passenger side window. There, ten feet down an embankment, upside down, was Ed's Mercedes, its wheels spinning.

She might have stopped. She probably should have stopped. But she was afraid. He might be conscious. He might still shoot at her. She didn't want to die. She looked at her dashboard, distracted by the gas pump light. The gauge was below empty. How far was she from civilization, anyway?

She looked back at Ed's car. There was no movement. It was quiet except for broken car sounds and crickets. His lights were still on, shining through the steam into the woods. She hoped he was wearing his seatbelt.

She put the car in gear and drove on. She didn't care about killing Ed anymore. She was satisfied to have immobilized him. Now he couldn't follow her. She was safe.

The nearest gas station was near Georgia 400, miles back the way she'd come. She got to the pump just as the Trooper was starting to sputter, and put her last five dollars into the tank. The gauge barely moved. She looked up to see cops going by in the direction she'd just come, driving purposefully.

She felt bathed in relief. Her spine tingled and her stomach fluttered. Her heart felt light, her shoulders straightened. She took a deep breath. Ah, ozone. Suzie thought about moving to the country, where it smelled like pine and you could see the stars.

She got back in the Trooper and headed back to Atlanta. All the way back, she thanked her guardian angels for the many miracles she'd been blessed with.

What miracle had occurred to save Suzie's ass? She'd thrown her wig at Ed as they'd passed each other. It hit him in the face, and the cellphone whacked him in the nose. He thought it was an animal and went apeshit.

* * *

next, suzie does something brave