Kristy tossed her purse inside the ambulance, then grabbed hold of the side of the door, pulling herself up. The music was still going, reaching some sort of climax, with a lot of thundering guitars. “Bert,” she yelled, “can you please turn that down?”
“No,” he yelled back.
“Pink Floyd. It’s my punishment, he knows how much I hate it,” she explained to me. To Bert she said, “Then can you at least turn on the lights back here for a second? Macy can’t see anything. ”
A second later, the fluorescent light over her head flickered, buzzed, and then came on, bathing everything in a gray, sallow light. It was so hospital-like I felt the nervousness that had been simmering in my stomach since we’d left the house—ambulance phobia—begin to build. “See, he’ll do it for you,” she said. She stuck out her hand to me. “Here, just grab on and hoist yourself up. You can do it. It’s not as bad as it looks.”
I reached up and took her hand, surprised at her strength as she pulled me up, and the next thing I knew I was standing inside the ambulance, ducking the low ceiling, hearing the buzz of that light in my ear. There was now an old brown plaid sofa against one wall, and a small table wedged between it and the back of the driver’s seat. Like a traveling living room, I thought, as Kristy clambered around it, grabbing her purse on the way, and slid into the passenger seat. I sat down on the couch.
“Bert, please turn that down,” Kristy yelled over the music, which was now pounding in my ears. He ignored her, turning his head to look out the window. “Bert. Bert!”
Finally, as the shrieking was reached a crescendo, Bert reached over, hitting the volume button. And suddenly, it was quiet. Except for a slow, knocking sound. Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.
I realized suddenly that the sound was coming from the back doors, so I got up, pushing them open. Monica, a cigarette poking out of one side of her mouth, looked up at me.
“Hand,” she said.
“Put that out first,” Bert said, watching her in the rearview mirror. “You know there’s no smoking in the Bertmobile.”
Monica took one final drag, dropped the cigarette to the ground, and stepped on it. She stuck her hand out again, and I hoisted her up, the way Kristy had done for me. Once in, she collapsed on the couch, as if that small activity had taken just about everything she had.
“Can we go now, please?” Bert asked as I pulled the doors shut. Up in the passenger seat, Kristy was messing with the radio, the wailing woman now replaced by a boppy pop beat. “Or would you like another moment or two to make me insane?”
Kristy rolled her eyes. “Where’s Wes?”
“He’s meeting us there. If we ever get there.” He pointed, annoyed, at the digital clock on the dashboard, which said 7:37. “Look at that! The night is just ticking away. Ticking!”
“For God sakes, it’s early,” Kristy said. “We’ve got plenty of time.”
Which, I soon found out, was a good thing. We’d need it, with Bert behind the wheel.
He was a slow driver. More than slow, he was also incredibly cautious, a driver’s ed teacher’s dream. He paused for green lights, came to full stops before railroad crossings that hadn’t seen trains in years, and obeyed the speed limit religiously, sometimes even dropping below it. And all the while, he had both hands on the wheel in the ten-and-two position, watching the road like a hawk, prepared for any and all obstacles or hazards.
So it seemed like ages later that we finally turned off the main road and onto a gravel one, then began driving on grass, over small rises and dips, toward an area where several cars were parked, encircling a clearing with a few wooden picnic tables in the center. People were sitting at them, on them, grouped all around, and there were several flashlights scattered across the surfaces of the tables, sending beams of light in all directions. Bert backed in, so we were facing the tables, then cut the engine.
“Finally,” Kristy said, unbuckling her seat belt with a flourish.
“You could have walked,” Bert told her.
“I feel like we did,” she said. Then she pushed her door open, and I heard voices nearby, someone laughing. “I’m going to get a beer. Anybody else want one?”
“Me,” Monica said, standing up and pushing open the back doors. She eased herself out with a pained expression, then started across the grass.
“Macy?” Kristy asked.
“Oh, no thanks,” I said. “I’m fine.”
“Okay.” She climbed out the front door, letting it fall shut behind her. “Be right back.”
I watched them cross into the clearing and walk past one of the picnic tables to a keg that was under some nearby trees. Two guys were standing by it, and one of them, who was tall with a shock of red hair, immediately went to work getting Kristy a beer, eyeing her appreciatively as he did so. Monica was standing by with a bored expression, while the redhead’s friend shot her sideways looks, working up to saying something.
Bert was sitting on the back bumper of the ambulance, scanning the crowd, and I joined him, letting my feet dangle down. Most of the faces here were new to me, which made sense, since this was more of a Talbert High crowd, while I went to Jackson, on the other side of town. Still, I did recognize a few people I knew from school. I wondered if any of them knew me.
I looked across the clearing then, and saw Wes. He was standing with a group of guys around an old Mustang, talking, and seeing him I felt that same sort of lurch in my stomach as I had the first night I’d met him, and the night he’d pulled me out of the hole, and just about every time we’d crossed paths since. I couldn’t explain it, had never felt it before: it was completely out of my control. So idiotic, I thought, and yet there I was again, staring.