A Thirst for Fire

Randall Metz was doing ninety miles an hour down a straight stretch of Illinois 20. His dark green ’66 Dodge roared like a blast furnace, passing mile after mile of farmer’s fields in the scarlet August twilight. Although the car was five years old, it ran hot. The engine was strong and mean.

The boy looked small inside the car, more child than man. His sixteen years of country life had not prepared him for such dramatic speed. Even the cigarettes rolled up in his tee shirt sleeve and his tight fitting jeans could not hide his age. His hair was greased back like James Dean but his freckles told the truth. He was a kid, alone on a highway with four hundred wild horses tearing at the reins under the crack of his whip.

He pressed the pedal down and glanced quickly at the speedometer, grinning slightly when he saw the red indicator showed one hundred miles an hour. A little scared by the speed, he backed off the accelerator. He took a quick breath. The rattle of the exhaust taunted him with a loud blaring voice, as if it knew his fear. He reacted in anger, sneering. Gritting his teeth, he pushed the pedal all the way to the floor. His nervous eyes watched the road like someone watching a doorknob turn when they are home alone.

His pride conquered his fear. Determined to hit top end, he drove his foot hard into the floor. He had to do it. The speedometer read one hundred five. The front end shook a little. “It’ll be alright,” he thought, “It’s probably just a tire out of balance.” He held the steering wheel tightly and bent over it to make sure he had it under control.

One hundred ten. The front end stopped shaking. The car became airborne over several small hills. Hot nails of adrenaline drove into his chest; then he remembered he had been over those hills before with his brother Mike. Sweat appeared on his forehead and there was a painful cramp in his gut. He winced as he hit another hill.

One hundred twenty. The Dodge could do no more. Everything in the engine was strained to the limit, acknowledging the driver was the victor. The battle was done. The car screamed for mercy and waved its own flag of surrender. The driver was merciless; he kept his foot buried in the floor. He wanted to ensure the total annihilation of his enemy.

Randall could see grey smoke in his rearview mirror, the smoke his brother’s friends had told him about. “You know you hit top end when she’s cleaning out all that carbon.” He remembered how they laughed like jackals, as if they were seasoned veterans who knew the intricacies of mechanical engines and aerodynamics. He remembered, too, how they said the car was too big for him, how they laughed at him and made their girlfriends giggle when they said he wouldn’t be able to see over the steering wheel. His brother’s friends were at the house the day he bought the Dodge.

Dalton Tuttle Briggs was there. “D.T.,” the guys called him. He owned a red Corvette and he had a mouth to match. “Hey Puppy, what you gonna’ do with such a powerful mo-sheen?” he asked Randall. The boy thought he was going to gain their respect by getting the Dodge. They just kept on chuckling.

With the images of their faces in his head, his foot stayed jammed to the floor, and his leg was shaking. In his adolescent mind, he had done it. He had reached manhood. No one would ever tell him he was a kid ever again. And even if they did, he would know better. The car flew down another three miles of road.

Rich smells of hot summer night added exhilaration to the speed, a pure sweetness that comes after rain and heat when the sun goes down. The Dodge passed a thousand rows and hundreds of acres of swollen wheat. The boy could smell them and he knew they were there but he could not see them. He had to pay attention to the road flying beneath him. Flashes of the Daytona 500 rushed through his head as the thunder poured out of his engine.

“All my work was worth it,” he thought, as he passed an old farmhouse. “All those hours in the fields were worth it. I got what I wanted.” He had saved every dime, every cent from his work on Beckter’s farm, baling hay, shoveling manure, draining out silos when it was a hundred degrees, and milking cows when it was too early to get up. He stayed with it because he wanted the Dodge. He wanted to drive the fasted thing in the county. And now he had it.

Just as a slight curve came up in the road, he backed off the gas and turned on his headlights. The glaring green eyes of a dog appeared. It snarled with great ferocity. Yet all the anger in the world could not have stopped the car from the killing. The dog froze.

Randall locked up the brakes as he heard a sickening “clump” against the bottom of the car. The tires on the Dodge moaned as if they knew what had been done. Eighty feet down the road, the engine quit. The car was sitting sideways in the quiet of the country night. There was a strange hissing in the corn fields, the kind of thing that happens when the days are hot and long.

He ran his hands nervously through his hair, wondering what to do. “I didn’t mean to hit him,” he said, again and again. A tear started to form in his eye. He shook his head, fighting it back, not allowing the feeling of sadness to grow any stronger.

He looked out his passenger window at the dog, a tragic picture framed in chrome. The sun was down, and only a thin edge of maroon rested on the horizon, yet there was enough light for the boy to see the dog lying in the center of the highway.

With some forced relief in his voice he said, “It’s only a mutt, some stupid farm dog that probably chased every car that ever came by here. It was only a matter of time before it got hit. That dog shouldn’t have been out on this road. The road’s for cars. Stupid dog.”

He turned the key over in the ignition. The engine came to life again. It rumbled deeply now. The screaming had stopped. Randall slowly rolled away from the scene, glancing back only once in his rear view mirror. He thought he saw the dog move a little but he wasn’t going back to find out.

He worked at Beckter’s the next day, dragging himself through the chores. Old man Beckter yelled at him a couple times because he was working so slowly. The boy said nothing. He finished what he had to do by 3:30 and left.

On his way home he stopped at Pug’s gas station for a fillup. As Randall pulled in, he saw old Pug Phillips leaning against the door, his teeth mauling a short brown cigar. Pug had one of those stupid looking faces that betrayed his ability. He was an excellent mechanic but it was hard to tell by looking at him. His fingers kept snapping a rubber band on a greasy deck of cards that he always carried around, even when he was working.

“So that’s your new car, eh?” Pug asked, chewing hard on the burned out cigar as he filled up Randall’s tank.

“Well, how d’you like it?” Randall asked proudly, expecting much praise from a man who knew the power in the Dodge.

Pug snapped the rubber band on the cards a couple times; then he walked around the vehicle, squinting a little. “A car’s a car, Kid. They all got troubles, just like people. I’ve worked on everything from caddylacks to ponyacks to fords and shivvies. They all got troubles; ain’t none of ‘em ain’t got troubles. Looks nice, though.” He smiled his stupid smile again.

The gas pump clunked to signal the tank was filled. Randall got out of the car, thinking about what Pug said. As he walked toward the station to pay for the gas, he noticed some fur on the grill. A flash of the accident exploded in his mind. He quickly looked to see if anyone else saw the evidence. Pug had walked inside to the cash register, and there were no other customers. Randall sighed and went in to pay for his gas.

As he was handing Pug his money, he heard the loud howling of an engine downshifting. It was D.T. and his girlfriend.

Randall walked to his car, trying not to notice. He wanted to get home without having to deal with D.T. today.

“Hey Pug, put some gas in this thing and don’t scratch the paint,” D.T. shouted.

“Be right with ya. I got a phone call.”

D.T. had time on his hands, so he got out of his ‘Vette and walked over and leaned on Randall’s window. Randall turned the engine over and depressed the accelerator, just to make it growl a few times. D.T. reached in and turned the key off.

“Hey, leave your hands off my car!” Randall said sheepishly.

“Well, Boy, how does she run? Have you gotten her over thirty yet?” D.T.’s girlfriend laughed on cue at the exchange.

Randall sneered and squinted at D.T. “Did over a hundred and twenty last night.”

“Bull. You didn’t. You ain’t got the guts.”

“Probably coulda’ went faster, I didn’t even have my foot to the floor.”

“You’re lying, Metz. You didn’t do a hundred and twenty in this car. The only thing around here that can do a hundred and twenty is the red mo-sheen sittin’ over there.”

Randall looked at the girl again. She giggled at D.T. The boy pulled the handle on the door. “Let me out,” he said to D.T.

“Why, you gotta’ go potty?”

The boy gritted his teeth. “Let me out.”

Pug was watching the incident with some concern. “D.T.,” he called, “how much gas d’you want?”

D.T.’s concentration was broken for a second. Randall got out and opened up the hood. “Hey Pug, would you say that a 440 with two quads could do a hundred and twenty?”

“Probably more. Got plenty ‘a power.”

D.T. looked under the hood. There was enough muscle inside that engine compartment to eat his 327 Corvette alive, and he knew it. His face twitched a little. The girl stopped giggling. Randall closed the lid so fast he nearly hit D.T. in the head.

“She’s filled up, D.T…That’ll be fifteen bucks.”

D.T. walked inside the gas station, looking back at the Dodge and Randall Metz. The boy was leaning against his trunk with his arms crossed, staring at D.T.’s girlfriend, smiling like the Cheshire cat.

A rusted GMC pickup drove into the lot. The driver pulled up to a pump and turned off the engine. Two small children were sitting on the front seat. A boy of twelve was holding his four year old sister. Both were crying, but the boy was obviously torn apart by something terrible. Even in the hot August morning, he held his sister closely, more to comfort himself than anything. Randall stopped smiling at D.T.’s girl when he saw the children.

Pug came to the window of the truck. He knew the driver.

“Fill ‘er up, Bill?”

“No, just five bucks worth, Pug. I want to get this over with.”

Pug saw the children crying in the front seat. As he opened the cap on the gas tank, he heard the sound of whimpering in the back of the truck. He looked over. A big collie was lying on her side, her coat matted with blood. She was in terrible pain. Pug quickly put the gas in and took Bill’s five dollars.

“What happened?”

“Some fool hit her last night. We’re not sure when. We found her on the side of the road this morning. She’s got to be put to sleep. It’s the only right thing to do. She’s in terrible pain.”

The truck drove out of the station slowly enough for Randall to get a look at the it was a collie. It seemed big but not pretty like that dog. I thought it was a mutt.”

Pug was watching him. “What’s the trouble, Randall?”

“Oh nothin’ – everything’s fine,” Randall answered, but he knew Pug had figured out something. Pug was too damn smart for a guy who looked so stupid.

The two looked at each other for a second, entwined in a gaze of conscience and wisdom. The boy wanted to tell someone, anyone to get this off his mind. Pug would have been the best choice. He could trust Pug. The man studied the boy carefully, waiting for it to come out. Pug had known Randall Metz since he was in diapers. He hated to see these kids grow up and become hard hearted and thick headed. He wondered if the boy had crossed the boundary where the truth is no longer as important as covering your tracks. Was the boy going to tell him what happened?

“Pug, I’m the one that hit that dog.”

“Let’s go inside the station,” Pug said, comforting the boy.

D.T. stopped them at the door. D.T. had been fighting with his girlfriend all the while. “So you two think Randall’s car is faster than mine. Well you’re both wrong. I got a hundred and fifty dollars that says my ‘Vette can outrun him.”

Pug stood between them. “We can talk ‘bout that later. Why don’t you take your girlfriend for a nice ride in the country? She’ll appre’shate that.”

D.T. blocked the doorway with his arm. “I said I got a hundred and fifty dollars that says his car is a dog. Now let’s get on with it.”

Pug grabbed D.T.’s forearm and clamped on it with a hand that had been strengthened by thirty years of pulling wrenches. D.T. cried out. His face flushed when he saw his girlfriend had been watching him.

“Like I told you before, D.T., we can talk about that later.” The man had reached his limit of patience. D.T. knew it was time to go.

“O.k., Pug, I don’t know what’s so godawful important that we can’t set up a time to race.”

Randall answered him flatly. “I’ll race your car, whenever and wherever you like. I’ll be glad to take your hunnerd and fifty bucks. With a car like you got, you ought to change your name to Dayton Turtle Briggs. My Dodge is goin’ to blow you away forever.”

Briggs stung a bit, but he kept his head. Pug was too close by. “O.k., Metz, I’ll see you tonight at 7:00. Illinois 20, just past the oak tree where 20 crosses highway A. Don’t be chicken now, ‘eh Metz. I’m countin’ on you bein’ there.”

Randall didn’t say a word. He walked inside the station and Pug followed him. D.T. Briggs and his blonde girlfriend drove away.

“How fast were you goin’ when you hit her?” Pug asked him.

“Don’t know. Maybe ninety. I can’t say for sure. I never meant to hurt her, Pug.”

“That’s the problem with all the stupid things we do, Boy, we never mean to hurt nobuddy but sometimes we do. That dog is paying for your mistake. You oughtta’ go out there to Bill’s place and tell ‘em what you did. You oughtta’ apologize to them kids, mebbe’ get ‘em anuther dog. You oughtta’ do somethin’.”

“GO OUT THERE? ARE YOU CRAZY? Bill would kill me.”

“I doubt it. You oughtta’ do somethin’ – those kids were really tore up. Remember, it’s only been a few years since you were that young. How would you’a felt?”

“I AIN’T DOIN’ IT. I AIN’T GOIN’ OUT THERE.”

Randall stormed out of the station and revved up his car. His tires squealed and smoked for fifty feet and the engine roar paused briefly as he shifted, then burnt rubber again.

Pug watched him fly into the distance. He watched him long after he could no longer see the boy, but he heard the raging anger in the tires. Pug had seen lots of anger in his life; two wars, a broken marriage, dissatisfied customers. He had seen lots and lots of anger. But there was something about this young and boiling anger that was as strong as it was irrational. The tires squealed one last time. Even though he was an older man who had learned to conquer his fear, he knew he should be deeply afraid. He was.

D.T. Briggs could not get the word “turtle” out of his mind. He had always hated his middle name, but Randall’s sarcasm cut him in half. With his girlfriend standing by saying nothing, he worked on the engine of the ‘Vette all afternoon. Now and then the engine would growl like a crowd gone mad; then everything would be quiet again. He changed plugs, checked everything four times to make sure the car was running as hot as it could. Then he put the top down. At six o’clock he was ready for the boy with the Dodge.

Throughout the rest of the afternoon, Randall sat alone in his father’s barn, up high where no one could see him. Pug’s words pounded the inside of his head until he thought he would go crazy. And there was the problem of racing that stupid D.T. Briggs. “What a mess this day turned out to be. What a lousy mess,” he kept saying as 7:00 grew nearer.

Briggs arrived a bit early, wanting the advantage of being there when Metz showed up. He didn’t have to wait long. The green Dodge rolled smoothly up t

“Well, Metz,” Briggs said, “Which way do you want to run and how far?”

“I ain’t racin’.”

Briggs twitched a little. “What’s the problem, Metz? Are you chicken or what?”

“I drove this thing at a hunnerd and twenty last night and I don’t need to prove nothin’ to you.”

“Wait a second, Metz, that’s not the point. The point is that my car is faster than yours and I’m going to prove it.” D.T.’s girlfriend looked at him with fake admiration.

“I ain’t racin’. It’s too dangerous.”

Briggs laughed that hyena laugh again, the one Randall had heard so many times before. Randall felt his resolve slipping.

Briggs goaded him. “Dangerous? Did you say dangerous? Well if it isn’t Randall Metz, Mr. Safety. Since when did you get so conscious about danger?”

“I hit a dog last night when I was drivin’ this road. Probably killed it.”

“Oh, come on, Metz, a dog? What’s your problem? I thought you made it, Metz. I thought this Dodge mo-sheen was going to bring you around and make you a man. Toughen up. It’s only a stinkin’ dog. I really thought you made it. I thought you had become one of us.”

Randall shook at the steering wheel. He closed his eyes and could feel the deep anger flowing again. He had tried so hard, but he could not fight what he really felt. A switch flipped in his head. “Two miles from here there’s a stretch of perfect road. Let’s go.”

Briggs smiled widely. He knew he had already won the race. The two cars flew up the road, the red ‘Vette behind the Dodge. Briggs stayed on Randall’s bumper the whole way, applying every bit of pressure he could devise. Briggs’s girlfriend looked at him strangely. “I don’t want to be in the car when you race him,” she said.

“Why? You scared too? You’ve been with me before when I raced. What’s the problem?”

“This is different. This guy is too hungry. I’m getting out before you race.”

“Fine, just fine.” When the two cars arrived at the starting point, the sun was beginning its descent. Briggs’s girlfriend got out of the car and sat down beside an old oak tree.

“I’ll be back to pick you up in a few minutes,” Briggs said in a cocky way.

Metz piped in. “How about I get to pick her up if I win, and I get to take her back to town?”

Briggs rolled his eyes. “Let’s just get on with this race. We start here and finish at county A. Got it?”

“I got it.”

The two engines roared as the cars stood side by side. Briggs called out to his girlfriend, “As long as you’re staying here, why don’t you do something useful and flag the start?”

She walked about thirty feet in front of the cars and held her arm up. When she dropped it she thought the world had come to an end. Two monsters came to life, each threatening the existence of the other. This was beyond racing. It was a survival test for two human egos, each with its own primal drive. D.T. Briggs hadn’t told anyone about his fear, and Randall Metz became anger incarnate. Pitch black smoke filled the air as if Hell itself had come to watch. The two cars swerved down the road, shifting and blasting, each gaining a quick advantage on the other, then losing it. When both cars hit fourth gear they were far away from the blonde girl watching nervously by the tree. Then it happened.

One and a half miles up the road, both cars were running side by side. Metz looked straight ahead, his hands gripping the steering wheel like a weightlifter pressing five hundred pounds. Sweat poured off his head in those brief moments, the hot sweat that comes from the heat of heavy thought and brutal anger. Briggs smiled at him as they hit one hundred and twenty. Both cars were flat out when a farmer pulled a wagon onto the road.

Briggs screamed. The tractor was in his lane. Metz saw it and stayed even with him, not allowing him to move into the other lane. Briggs hit the wagon at one hundred miles an hour. All his girlfriend could see was a ball of flame and smoke rising into the sky. Metz drove down the road and never looked back.

D.T. Briggs was buried two days later. Randall Metz attended the funeral. He could not cry, until he thought of the dog and the children and the truck. Then he wept uncontrollably. And everyone in the town was sure that Randall was sorry for what happened to Dalton Tuttle Briggs.

Everyone except Pug Phillips.