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“(Northwoods Pulp Reloaded) Three intensely told stories capped off with a visceral crime novella, this is a seemingly easy escape read, but the writing is smart and deeper than expected, from high-stakes morality parables to and illicit adventures that quickly get out of hand. For any reader who has ever pointed their fortunes north and let their moral compass waver, or loves reading about well-crafted antiheroes, O’Neill’s collection is an intense but entertaining dive into another world.” – SPR review
“Hole in the World”
It’s nice and warm inside the Caddy but Roy is a little bit antsy. The guy on the radio is finishing up the weather report. Big storm, he says, maximum late winter blizzard. Like we can’t already see that.
“This is payback for the mild El Nino winter,” Roy says. “We better hope it’s melting by the lake.” He shuts off the radio. “This is getting bad. Almost need a four-wheel drive. At least reservation four-wheel drive.”
“What the hell is reservation four-wheel drive?”
“A big old rear-wheel drive American sled with a few hundred pounds of junk in the trunk. Old wheels, rocks, sandbags—anything with weight. You get some decent snow tires you can go almost anywhere in one of those boats. We’ll probably plow snow in some places with this beast, but we’ll make it.”
Now I’m nervous. This weather and all, out here in the middle of nowhere—I’m not used to this. It’s like nothing cares about nothing up here. No one or nothing around—forever. I’m just not used to it. Walking inside a nice clean bank in the morning before it opens—that’s more my speed. Pushing a gun barrel against the pasty neck of some guy in a suit—I can handle that. But this shit— Christ—you could die out here.
We roll by the spot of the accident, plowing snow here and there like Roy said we would. You can feel the car bog down. I’m sweating over the decision to come up here in a stolen car. Proves why you shouldn’t drink and take drugs.
Another mile or so closer to the lake and Roy says it looks like it’s going to be better up ahead.
“How can you tell that, man?” I say. Snow is blowing directly in our faces and the windows are fogged. In a Cadillac, you’d expect better. I can barely see the road, let alone four miles ahead.
I hear it first, kind of a VAROOM, then look behind us and see the derelict Charger roaring out of the dull gray nothingness. Now he’s trying to pass us on the left and the Charger is throwing out a cloud of gray-white mist, only the mist has weight and you can hear it hitting the side of the Eldor like ice cubes. You can feel it pushing us toward the ditch. My heart’s beating fast and I’m thinking about the gun and then they’re by us, disappearing again into the blizzard, the raw growl of the Charger’s exhaust fading quickly.
Fuck, Roy says.
I breathe a sigh of relief.
“We almost got sucked right off the road,” Roy says. “You get caught in the wrong windrow, you’re gone—see you when it melts, dude. Ditch devils drag you right in. Ah, but not to worry. We are home free now, Don, my man.”
A little later he says, “Why don’t you roll a joint, man? The shit’s in my pocket.” He lets off the gas, lifts his ass of the seat and digs his hand into his tight black jeans. “Grab the wheel, will you?” he says, digging further into his pocket.
I grab the wheel and look through the smeary windshield at the oncoming blur.
Then I see it.
“HIT THE FUCKIN’ BRAKES, GODDAMN IT, ROY! I holler, my hands death-gripping the steering wheel.
Slow motion now, coming right at us.
No—we’re coming at it.
It’s not moving.
It’s stopped.
“BRAKES, MAN, BRAKES!”
Sliding, sliding, sliding, antilock brakes chattering, Roy on the wheel now, trying to steer out of it.
No room.
THUMP.
Big collision. T-bone job
Pain. Neck and back.
What the fuck? Where are those crazy fucks? Why the hell did they stop in the middle of the road? Why didn’t the goddamn airbags work? Goddamn General Motors.
Roy has a strange, haunted look about him and his face is vibrating, turning feral. “It’s the name game, Donny,” he says. He grins oddly. “Get ready to play….”
“You all right, man? You hit your head or something? I—”
Roy jerks open the door and jumps outside. One of the Indian punks is coming out from behind the Charger. He’s charging. Roy stands his ground and throws a short right cross and the sonofabitch crumbles face first in the snow.
I’m reaching down for the Glock when a long-barreled pistol with a drunken Indian in a greasy blue parka on the other end of it pokes through the open driver’s door. I straighten back up and squint into the swollen red eyes. His breathing is heavy and fast. “Just sit there, asshole,” he slurs, steadying the gun at my face. “Don’t move.”
In the middle of the road now the one in the blue soldier coat is holding a deer rifle on Roy. And the guy Roy drilled is returning the favor by punching Roy in the back of the head and kicking him in the ass as they slog toward me in the knee-deep snow. Steam billows from the Caddy’s fractured radiator and the sick-sweet smell of antifreeze hangs in my nose.
And out of the blue, Roy starts singing that “Name Game” song, using my name. He’s giving it the “Donny, Donnys, the banana fanas, the fee fi fos”—the whole nine yards. Then he starts up with Roy and goes through it all again.
This is pissing our rifleman off. He’s grinding his teeth. His gaze jumps around at me and Roy, the two vehicles, and the great cloud of driving snow. The feathers in his hair shake in the wind and ice forms on his thick black eyebrows.
The other guy is still slapping Roy from behind. He’s rasping, “Cap him. Cap the fucker. Cap the asshole. That’ll shut him up.”
As this goes on the one holding the gun on me— Christ does the motherfucker stink—tells me to open the glove compartment and push the trunk button.
Roy is still singing.
In the rearview mirror I see the war-painted one lifting up the trunk lid. He looks at the one holding the rifle and yells, “Take him out in the woods and shut the smart-ass city boy up.”
The asshole with the rifle motions for Roy to move.
The bizarre threesome heads off towards the woods.
Passing by my window, Roy stops and looks in at me. “What’s in a name, Donny?” he says, face strangely calm. “It’s only a label. Just a surface to be lifted and thrown away when you choose, eh, paisano? Just play the name game, Donny my boy.”
Dude pokes him in the back with the rifle and Roy starts up the song again as they lead him toward the woods. Roy’s singing all kinds of crazy names now and it’s like nothing I ever heard before.
Warpaint goes searching through the trunk. First thing he comes out with is Roy’s satchel. He brings it around to the side of the car to show his buddy, who’s still holding the pistol on me. I see their eyes light up when Warpaint unzips that fuckin’ bag.
Warpaint’s voice is thick with emotion: “Look at this, Leon. Told you they were drug dealers or something—car like this—shit—I told you.” He sets the satchel on the roof of the Cad and goes back to the trunk. I hear a war whoop. Found the money sack. My guard takes a look back to see what all the commotion is about and I jab my hand under the seat, feel the cold plastic. Guy I bought the Glock from said you couldn’t knock anybody out hitting him with a plastic gun. I showed him I didn’t need it for hitting. Broke his jaw with a straight right hand. He was an asshole.
Indian with the long-barreled pistol never knew what hit him. I put two in his chest so fast he only has time to fall down. Then I roll out the door into the thick snow and come up with the pistol ready, looking for Warpaint. I see him off and running towards the Charger with my money sack clutched under his arm like the Christmas turkey. I steady the gun with both hands, squeeze away and put three hunks of lead in his back, about halfway up. He jerks and falls forward and the bag flies up in the air, bills scattering everywhere, flapping and flying in the wind.
I’m scrambling around frantically grabbing bills and stuffing them back in the sack when I hear the other two coming out of the woods. They’re shouting and arguing. I run over and crouch behind the dented Charger.
I hear one of the dudes yell, “Did you hit him, you fucker?”
“Don’t call me fucker, you little asshole,” shouts the other. “Of course I got him. Even though you let him break away, I still got him. I never miss.”
“Don’t know how he did it. Slipped out of my hands like he fuckin’ wasn’t there. And then I couldn’t see for a second. Fuckin’ weird. And if you hit him like you say, why isn’t he on the ground somewhere?”
Then they stop dead in their tracks as they come upon the two bodies and the occasional snowbound Treasury note. I jump up and cut loose. Hit the one with the rifle and he goes down screaming and writhing, starts crawling toward the ditch. He doesn’t make it; bullets travel faster than flesh. The other prick is moving fast down the road now and I do the same—in the opposite direction.
It’s the name game.
(To be continued)
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