Strangers

"I think we were supposed to turn back there." Samira fussed, tapping her phone screen again. As if the reception was a goldfish that could be startled back into activity. "Nah, we're supposed to take a left at Old Jackson Mill road, remember? I saw it on the list of directions before we lost signal." Josh did his best to reassure her. Something about being on vacation never failed to rob his wife of her ability to relax. "I'm just worried we won't get to check in on time. What if they tell us we can't stay there anymore because we're late?"

"Then they wouldn't get their money first of all, and central Missouri doesn't exactly have a roaring tourist trade. Plus we don't check in for another forty minutes, so in my professional opinion we're solid." Samira fell quiet, but Josh could tell from the grooves populating her forehead that her anxiety was anything but. He sighed inwardly: the only cure was to get to the damn place. Maybe once she caught a buzz and got some food in front of her they could finally start enjoying themselves.

The vacation had been Samira's idea. Work, family, and friends alike had been putting her through the wringer the past few months and she needed a break. "Some time without a phone in my face, and nobody telling me bad news." Josh had been happy to oblige: watching the person you love get trouble from all sides was its own kind of heartache. He was looking forward to spending some time out in nature with Samira, feeling the sun on his face, not having anywhere he needed to be. If they could drink a few beers and smoke some hash while they were at it, so much the better.

They had settled on a cabin out in Eau Sombre, a weird, squat little place with a chainsaw carving of a brown bear on the front porch. Samira had voiced concerns about staying there: "It looks like it smells funky." However, it was within walking distance from the creek that gave the town its name and it had a fire pit on the front lawn. Strong selling points. True, a vacation out in possum-drop-nowhere wasn't ideal for two city kids, but a hundred dollars could stretch a lot further in the sticks than it could in Kansas City. Josh reached forward and turned down Doechii as he squinted at a street sign in the middle distance, the mustang slowing as he turned off cruise control. "Quiet isn't going to help you see better, babe." Samira ribbed, smiling softly.

"Yeah, but it'll help me concentrate, and I don't wanna miss this turn." The signpost was tilted at an odd angle, as though somebody had tried to run it over and then thought better of it halfway through. Echoing the drunken lean of the post, the weatherworn street sign pointed down to the runoff ditch, necessitating a tilt of the head to read it. Not just weatherworn, but scarred too. "Are those bullet holes?" Josh could hear the smolder of anxiety in Samira's voice as it latched onto a new piece of tinder. The flame was growing and he needed to stop it, soon. "Yeah, looks like a 22. Teenagers do stupid shit like that out here."

"Shooting at street signs?"

"This place isn't exactly overflowing with stuff for kids to do. You and your buddies get your hands on a case of beer and a hunting rifle, closest police station's two towns away, there's your Saturday night."

A shiver went up Samira's spine as a memory cast its shadow over her. When she was little there had been a bush outside her window; a wisteria that transformed nightly into a bramble of claw-like hands. Scratching, beckoning her to step a little closer. In the dark of her room it used to terrify her. The bush had only looked like a threat, and maybe the street sign belonged to the same category. A kind of redneck trompe-l'œil. All the same, an uneasy feeling was blossoming in her stomach. "Well would you look at that! Jackson Mill road." Josh smiled affably at her. "We've only got two more turns and then we should be at our cabin. Are you excited for vacation?"

"Yup."

Samira's answer must have sounded as halfhearted as it felt. Josh's smile fell a little and he refocused his attention on the road. "Alright honey, let's get moving before that cabin gets up and walks off." That's Josh, Samira thought, always trying to boost the mood.

The town looked about how Samira had imagined it. There was a Casey's with a couple of pickups parked in front, a Dollar General, some family owned ice cream place, and a high school overflowing with banners that loudly celebrated the football team. "GO PROSPECTORS!" "FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!" Welcome to downtown. As far as she could tell, the rest of Eau Sombre was a loose collection of ranch houses and bungalows built sometime before the turn of the century, probably pre-internet. The newest ones were gathered around the Casey's and the Dollar General. It unnerved her at first to see how empty the streets were. It was a kind of culture shock, noticing how few cars were parked in front of any given place. However, it made sense the more she thought about it: what reason did people have to leave their houses here? The last town she and her husband drove through had been almost a full hour away, and Samira could only imagine how tired she would get of looking at the inside of those same three businesses. Netflix and cheap merlot were probably the only things that made living in this place bearable.

"The fuck...?" Samira was dragged from her musing as the car slowed to a halt. There, in the middle of the street, was a little boy riding a tricycle. He had stopped, apparently unafraid of the vehicle bearing down on him, and fixed Samira with a steely gaze. "Do people just not teach their kids about cars here?" Josh scoffed. He gave the horn a light touch but the kid didn't even blink, much less move. "Maybe he's deaf or something?" Samira offered. "You should get out and see if you can get him to move on."

"Oh, so I've gotta be the one to get out and talk to this weird kid? The husband has to drive the whole way up, build the fire and wrangle errant children? What exactly are the wifely duties on this trip?" Josh ribbed. Samira gave no answer but to smirk and hit the emergency signal, earning a chuckle from her husband. "Punk ass."

"Hey buddy," Josh put on his friendliest smile, "where are your folks? They know you're playing out here?" The boy shook his head. "Can we move you out of the street real quick? It's not safe to play out where you can get hit, you know."

"Strangers don't come this way." The boy breaking his silence was so unexpected that Josh jumped a little.

"Oh wow, so you can talk!" Josh tried to downplay his nervousness. "I ask again, where are your parents, dude?"

"Strangers don't come this way." The boy gestured towards Samira in the passenger's seat. "She's not from here. Why is she here?"

Maybe the boy hadn't heard him fully, maybe it was just the way that small children will latch onto subjects and not let go, but it was unsettling all the same. "Well, buddy, neither of us are from here. We're here to stay at the cabin, not that it's any of your business."

"Then you'd best get moving." The boy only broke eye contact to pedal himself the remainder of the way across the street, the rasp of his wheels against the asphalt echoing eerily through the empty street. Josh shivered a little. There was something about the delivery of that last sentence. It had sounded like a warning.

*****

"She's not from here?" Samira wore an expression that was part disgust, part fear. "I still can't believe that. Like, how old was that kid? He couldn't have been more than six and he's already out patrolling for brown people?"

"Yeah, babe." Josh grunted with effort as he lifted their suitcase out of the trunk. "That kid was creepy as hell. I hated the way he stared at us, you know?"

"Josh, he wasn't staring at us. He was staring at me." Samira paced at the boot of the car. "Why did we have to choose this place? What if we've gone and dropped ourselves into the center of some kind of last refuge for, oh... I don't know."

"Baby, baby, listen." Josh smoothed the furrows on her brow with his thumb as he cupped her face. "Yeah, the kid was weird, but there's also a non-zero chance you're the first brown person he's ever seen in his life. Plus, he was just off in general. One weird interaction doesn't mean we've booked a stay at the triple-k ranch and resort."

"Habibi, I just..."

"Habibi nothing." Josh planted a tender kiss on her forehead. "We're going to be staying at the cabin both days. We've already paid for it, plus it's not like there's anything we'd want to go into town for anyway. We'll have two glorious days of fire pits, nature walks, drunken revelry and hot dogs and then guess what?"

"What?" Her tone was exasperated, but it was hard not to be taken in by Josh's enthusiasm.

"We leave and we never come back! Now help me take all this shit inside and I'll roll you a joint."

*****

Samira hated being right sometimes. The cabin could have been charitably described as "rustic" twenty years ago. Now, it would have been better to sleep in a tent. Half of the decor was comprised of dust and spiderwebs, the other half seemed to be jingoistic prints of civil war battle scenes. There was a tiny oven that leaned noticeably to the left, a stack of well-loved Deer & Deer Hunting magazines by the door, and a dark green couch situated in front of an old television with a built in VCR. The place was dark, too. Like the light couldn't get in somehow. "Wait." Samira breathed, a chill skating across her back. "Josh, those paintings..." She could already feel the damp stench of the cabin clinging to her t-shirt. "Are those...?"

"What, honey?"

"Those all look like confederate victories."

Josh scanned the art before cupping her face again and answering. "Two days, then we leave."

It was decided that it would be better to spend the first evening outdoors. Josh busied himself with building a fire while Samira sat back on the porch and lit a joint, watching the yellow-white smoke as it drifted out of her nostrils and lost itself in the breeze. It was peaceful here, she decided. Maybe they really could have a nice time out in Eau-Fucking-Sombre Missouri. "Sweetheart?" She called. Josh looked up from his fire building. "I'm getting hungry. Make me a sandwich?"

"Heard." He blew her a kiss and went inside, rustling and clanking as he dug through their stores. "Samira?"

Uh oh. They only used each other's real names when something was wrong.

"I've got good news and bad news."

"Good first, please."

"We have all twelve of the Modelos that we packed for the trip."

"Bad?"

"We have none of the food."

"What?" Samira shot up from her chair, turning to face the mouth of the cabin. "What do you mean? We don't have any of the food?"

"Unfortunately."

"But it was right there on the counter! I swear we packed it. Maybe we put it in the other bag by mistake?"

"Already checked. And I mean..." Josh leaned against the kitchen counter, scratching his head in that way he did whenever he was about to tell her something she didn't want to hear. "We were in one hell of a rush to get out of the house this morning. Maybe it just got left behind?"

"Whoa, hold on. Are you implying that because I wanted to get here on time we wound up leaving our food?"

"Not trying to place blame on anybody, I'm just stating my perspective."

"Well that's what it's..."

Josh stepped out of the cabin and silenced his wife with a kiss. "It's not a big deal, baby." Samira started to protest, but he continued. "They sell pizzas and other junk food at that little gas station in town. I'll drive out there and get us some supplies for the weekend."

"Then I'm going with you."

"You don't have to if you'd rather stay here, babe."

Samira looked back at the murky doorway of the cabin. "I want to pick the pizza." She chirped but truthfully the thought of being left in that place, surrounded by those enshrined confederate ghosts, made her skin crawl.

*****

Samira didn't put stock in old-fashioned concepts like "women's intuition". However there was a voice in the back of her mind, some instinct of self-preservation, that was asking her if the food was worth what was waiting for her in that gas station. As the anemic whine of the door chime announced her entry, she realized she should have listened.

The man wearing the trucker hat and leaning against the counter looked at her with shock that curdled into visible revulsion when he saw Josh touch her. The toothless 30-something woman stocking shelves stared at her as though she were an alien. The clerk behind the register looked her directly in the eye and spat on the floor. None of them said a word. Josh had busied himself with digging through their liquor selection and was totally oblivious. He looked up at her and grinned, pointing to the bottle of off-brand reposado in his left hand. Samira did her best to smile back, the ambient whine of 90s country circling her head like a mosquito. Finally, someone spoke.

"What're you two in town for?" It was the man in the trucker hat. He was missing three teeth.

"Vacation." Josh answered cheerily.

"You picked a bit of an odd spot." The man in the hat was looking directly at her now. "Strangers don't come this way." All at once, the air left the room.

"Is that like a town motto or something? That's the second time we've heard that today. Exact wording, too." There was an edge to Josh's voice now, he was finally picking up on the threat. Yes! Yes, you gorgeous idiot, now let's get the hell out of here! If Samira had been telepathic she would have been loud enough to give him a headache.

"More of an observation. You and her together?"

"Married three years this September." Josh turned to look at the store menu and switched the bottle in his left hand to a club grip. "Why?"

"Ain't any white women where you're from?"

There it was. Finally bold enough to step into the light. "Alright fuck this, actually. Josh, put the bottle back. We're leaving." To his credit, Josh didn't hesitate or argue. He set the bottle back on the shelf and stalked towards Samira without saying a word. "Where you going? Something wrong?" The toothless woman cackled like a witch, the clerk and the man in the hat joined her in a chorus of bestial laughter.

*****

"Josh, let's get the fuck out of here." Samira slammed the car door shut and buckled her seatbelt in one fluid motion. "What about our stuff at the cabin?" Her husband queried stupidly, fumbling with the keys.

"Fuck all that, just take us home! We'll figure it out later."

"Right." The car sprang to life and Josh pulled a three-point exit that made the tires howl, Jackson Mill road's crooked turns stretching in front of them like the path out of hades. The interior of the mustang fell into stunned silence as he navigated their exit, broken only by whispered oaths and soft exclamations of disbelief. As they passed the Dollar General Josh spoke. "Honey, I am so so..."

"We didn't know. We didn't know, Habibi."

"Yeah but still, I..."

The blind corner that took them past the Dollar General opened onto what felt like the only straight stretch of road in the whole town. Flanked by old cottonwoods and a weathered anti-abortion billboard. Josh, absorbed in his apologies to his wife, had turned his attention away from the road to look at her as he spoke. He didn't see the boy in the middle of the road, but Samira did.

"Josh!"

Josh wrenched the steering wheel to the right, slamming on the brakes, but they were going almost sixty. For a fraction of an instant, Samira met the boy's eyes as the car swerved past him on the left. It was the same look as before. The steely gaze that she now recognized as animosity. Learned hatred. She didn't feel it when Josh's mustang hit the tree.

Consciousness returned to Samira like a drip of cold honey. She was aware, in an abstract way, of pain in her ribs and her shoulder. Another pulse of awareness and she saw Josh, his face a bloody mess. Josh. There was something else, too. Footsteps approaching the car. Somebody whistling softly. It was a familiar melody. But they were too far away, or her brain was too scrambled, to fully recognize it.

Just before she lost consciousness again, just before the footsteps reached her door, the words came to her with a sickening clarity:

I wish I was in the land of cotton / old times there are not forgotten / look away, look away, look away, Dixieland.