Balustrade Read Free Page A

seemed, but the engine noise drowned out the sound. Hilary couldn't help herself. She reached for the button and opened the window, just a crack, turning her head to listen.
    “ Go back now. Only God can save your marriage. The devil will fuck the soul out of you.”
    Hilary glowered, unusually shocked at the woman’s declaration. “That's really offensive,” she said.
    Jack nodded, glanced toward the edge of the religious nuts’ defensive line and then stepped on the gas, swerving and tearing across the dry prairie. The fanatics, sensing their plan was falling apart, broke ranks and rushed for the car, bounding over furrows and sagebrush. Soon, they were beating at Hilary's side. Pushing through, framing herself in the center of the cracked window, their leader.
    “ It's true!” The dark woman screamed, running alongside them now, her eyes wild, seemingly genuinely terrified.
    They were crazy. Unhinged.
    Like those freaks that picketed “suspected” gay funerals and screamed horrible things at grieving parents and lovers or the wives and children of the dearly, but very-much-heterosexually departed. It made her sick and before she could think it through, Hilary’s middle finger sprang up in the female minister's grimacing face.
    “ Suck it!' she mouthed. “Suck. It.”
    The woman’s palm splayed against the window and then was dragged away down the side of the car as Jack sped up. Hilary turned as they passed, keeping her focus on the figure who stood apart from the others now. Her hands clasped together at her waist and her head slowly shaking from side to side.
    Once past the group, Jack maneuvered the car back onto the dirt road and sped up. A cloud of dust veiled the zealots, skittering gravel muffling their cries. Breathless, Hilary held a hand to her chest.
    “ What the?” was all she managed to say.
    Jack reached out and slipped his hand into hers, drawing it away from h er heaving chest. “I don't know,” he said. “I really don't know.”
    A few minutes later, they reached the edge of an arid field. The prairie gave up any pretense of fertility here and the dirt road widened infinitely stretching as far right and left as they could see.
     
     

2
     
     
    Miles of constant vibration lulled Hilary into an uneasy fugue. She was vaguely aware of motion, of the car moving, of rocks popping in tinny orchestrations on the car’s underside, of Jack’s monotonous humming, but beyond that, shit started to blur. Images of the gauntlet holding vigil behind them floated into her consciousness like dust motes in dim light, superimposed on the static desert of the scablands…
    More rocks.
    Stick-straight horizon.
    Construction paper clouds incapable of an ounce of moisture.
    In the dream, t he minister, face shaded under her sun hat orchestrated a mournful prayer circle at the mouth of the road. Candles flickered in their hands. The parishioners sang softly, some weeping, some wailing. Not a single one stepped a foot on the rocky loam of the field; not even to venture the crinkled tip of a pointy boot. They actively avoided it as though some invisible barrier was there, some division, a warning, reticence creasing their faces as they watched Hilary and Jack drive further away.
    As if fear itself dwelled in that flat field.
    Hilary’s eyes fluttered open. Her heart hammered inside her.
    She twisted sideways in her seat and focu sed on the side of Jack’s face. His jaw pulsed as he ground his teeth. Nervous.
    “ Suppose,” she started, suddenly breathless. “That those people weren’t crazy. That they truly were warning us away. Where would that put us?”
    Jack winced. “What do you mean, Hilary? Of course, they were crazy. They don’t come any crazier than when they’ve got God on their side.”
    She nodded. “Of course, right. But what if this place isn’t what it seems? What if we’re heading toward some kind of danger? Not demonic and ass-rapey, obviously. That’s ludicrous. But something.”