The sound of the bike clattering to the pavement snapped Robby back to the present. His mouth hung open as he looked at the bike lying on its side. The back wheel spun, producing a slow tick, tick, tick. Its rhythm almost lulled him back into his trance. He shook his head and glob of spit flew from his lower lip.
The front tire of the bike was touching the wet streak on the pavement. But it wasn’t just a wet streak anymore; near the tire enough liquid stood to smooth out the surface of the asphalt. The fluid looked deepest right around the bike’s tire. The whole bike jerked and Robby heard a hissing sound from the front tire. The rim settled into the puddle as the tire deflated.
Robby reached for the back wheel so he could pull the bike away from the swelling puddle. When he gripped the metal rim of the tire, his fist closed hard around it. His hand clenched against his will, like his fingers were magnetized. One of the spokes dug into the webbing between his index and ring fingers. Despite the pain, Robby couldn’t relax his grip. His arm throbbed with the effort of his clasping hand. Numbness started to spread up Robby’s arm from his hand. Robby gave up on trying to let go of the rim and instead pushed back with his legs to pull his arm from the bike. His grip didn’t waiver, but he pushed his way to his feet.
The bike pulled away from the puddle until the front tire was just about to break contact with the water. At that point, the liquid seemed to exert some kind of force on the front tire. As Robby pulled and leaned away from the puddle, the bike held him from backing away. He lifted the back half of the bike off the ground with his pulling as the puddle held the front tire.
Robby grunted with effort. Where it gripped the rim his hand felt ice cold. The gloves he pinned under his armpits fell to the pavement as he raised his left hand to tug on the wrist of his right. The numbness in his right arm worked its way up to his shoulder.
Robby sprawled backwards when the puddle gave up its grip on the front tire of the bike. His hand immediately came free of the rear rim and he hit himself in the forehead with his cold right hand. Robby flew back a couple of feet and landed on his back on the asphalt. As soon as he hit, he scrambled backwards with his legs and left hand. He held his right arm to his chest. Pins and needles stabbed his right arm as the feeling rushed back into the limb.
The bike looked to be free of the puddle now, but Robby didn’t want anything to do with it anymore. He got to his feet and backed away without taking his eyes off the part of the puddle that ate the bike tire. The fluid was still collecting there; it grew deeper each second. Before he could get any farther away, he noticed the liquid ebbed and flowed, like back at the Best Buy.
Pain came with the return of feeling to his right hand.
Robby turned and ran from the liquid trail on the pavement. He crossed the sidewalk and kept going, running full-speed across a scrubby vacant lot bordering a gas station. The station had a little convenience store and Robby pressed himself flat against the side of the building while he tried to catch his breath. He rubbed his hands together. The feeling started to return to his cramped right hand.
The faint wet streak down the middle of the road was just barely visible from the store, but Robby kept his eyes locked on it as he backed around to the far corner of the building. The back wall of the store had two steel doors and a narrow alley between the store and a tall stockade fence. He jogged down the length of the building.
On the other side, he found a vacuum machine with a big “QUARTERS ONLY” sign and a corpse face-down in the parking lot. Just past the dead guy, Robby saw a beat-up truck. He sprinted the few steps to the corpse and gave him a big shove to roll him over. The exploded eyes still shocked Robby. He could barely take his eyes off the man’s face as he patted down the guy’s pockets, looking for keys. No keys. Robby rolled his eyes and let out an exasperated sigh. He tucked his hands in his own jacket pockets and looked around for another body to search.
Robby looked at his own right hand and flexed his fingers. His hand still felt a little numb, and his palm was red where he’d gripped the rim, but it looked okay. It felt like an electric current, but without the buzzing sensation. Robby had shocked himself experimenting with electricity, and this was almost the same feeling.
He glanced back at the corpse’s right hand. The man’s hand was closed around on something. Robby ignored the exploded eyes and went right for the fist. The corpse’s fingers gripped a set of keys. Robby smiled and pried them free from the cold fingers. The chain didn’t have a fob for unlocking the doors, but the truck was the only nearby vehicle, and the key said Ford just like the grill of the truck.
Robby found the truck unlocked. The key fit the ignition and the truck fired up.
“Yes!” Robby said. He slammed down the door lock on the passenger’s side and then took care of his own door before he turned to look around. The truck was just a two-seater, so he didn’t have to worry about something jumping up from the back seat, and the bed of the truck was empty. Robby adjusted the seat so he could reach the pedals.
He dropped the transmission lever down to drive and cranked the wheel around. He took a hard right on the asphalt to stay as far away from the wet streak as he could. When he straightened the wheel out, he floored the gas and nearly lost his grip on the wheel as the old truck burst forward. He took the next turn a little fast. The truck swayed and felt out of control. Robby stabbed the brakes and tried to wrestle the vehicle back under control. He took his feet off of both of the pedals and let the truck slow down and straighten itself out instead of fighting it.
“That’s more like it,” he said, smiling. He adjusted the rearview mirror. “Now let’s get the hell out of here.”
Robby accelerated gently and leaned back.
This road was mostly empty. Only a couple of derelict cars remained in the travel lanes, so Robby didn’t have to weave at all. He reached down and turned on the blower. It made a chirping, bad-bearing sound, but warm air leaked out from the vents and made the noisy truck a lot more pleasant. He read the signs carefully—he could get back on the highway up ahead and continue his southward trek. The skies were packed full of sooty clouds, but to the south they looked brighter. He thought it possible he might even find clear skies before the sun went down completely.
The gas gauge showed more than a half tank of gas. Robby turned on the radio just loud enough to hear the static and hit the seek button. The frequency display spun quickly up through the numbers without pausing. He watched as the numbers worked up through the low hundreds. A shadow across the road caught his eye just before the explosion. As the shadow crossed under the front of the truck’s hood, Robby realized it wasn’t a shadow at all. The dark pavement was a wet spot.
The front tires of the truck fired off at the same time. They blew out with a spectacular bang. The idiot light on the dashboard of the old truck—the one to remind Robby to fasten his seat belt—was dark during the trip up until this point. At the very instant the information could no longer help, the light flashed on.
The tires didn’t just explode—they actually stuck to the road where the pavement was stained dark with fluid. Robby figured this out as the back of the truck started to rise. The truck’s momentum was forcing the engine down towards the pavement, and the rear up in the air.
Robby tried to brace himself against the steering wheel, but his arm strength was no match for his own inertia. He flew forward into the wheel. Like the seat belt warning light, the truck’s airbag was sluggish to respond. Robby’s chest almost made contact with the top of the wheel when the vinyl under the horn sprung out of the way of the inflating bag. The airbag’s deployment was almost as violent as the sudden, jolting stop, so Robby was now thrown backwards and his momentum deflected upwards.