The Girl in El Paso

Mars drives the ice cream truck, tattooed with rainbows and chocolate cones. On the passenger’s side, it reads: I scream. You scream. We all scream for ice cream. As I watch the tumbleweed dance through the desert, I wonder which town we’ll visit next. Last time, it was El Paso.

I flip on the radio, greeted by the snap of wires and the sizzle of static. Mars screeches along to some one hit wonder, but he doesn’t know the words to the song or the boy band who sings it. He doesn’t know their career is crumbling like a dying star.

Mars knows a lot about stars. Under the skinny moon, he cuts the headlights, and we creep down a long, dirt road. We slither like night things with fangs and bellies, looking for a hidey hole. After we settle in for the night, he cracks open the roof and points at things in the sky. He never says the words out loud, but somehow, they blink to life in my brain.

I’ve seen The Big Dipper a hundred times, but I don’t really remember what it looks like. I’m too busy staring at my reflection in the mirror: oiled up lashes, hot-pink lips, and a geometric leotard too small for my breasts. I finger my feathered bangs, taste the crunch of three-day old hairspray. It feels like a nest on my head, a bird taking flight. Maybe I’m the bird trying to fly away. I need a shower in the worst way. I need new clothes too.

The girl in El Paso was smaller than me, but I managed to squeeze into her leotard. It felt so good to stretch out on her bed after being scrunched up in the ice cream truck for so long. I loved her bedroom. The cotton candy wallpaper. The shag carpet soft as clouds. The jar of taffy on the dresser. The mirror of heartthrob posters. The blue ribbons she won at the fair. The cage with a rabbit named Ginger. I even found a pair of roller skates in her closet, and Mars said I could keep them.

I always think about the girl in El Paso whenever I try to sleep. Her caramel eyes and chocolate hair melting all over me, her face a never-ending scream. A lightning bug in a jar. A mouse caught in a trap. Snap!

At dawn, Mars screeches me awake. I brush my teeth, a gurgle of warm water and mint gum. We drive for hours like we always do. And then, out of the blue, there’s a welcome sign for Arizona. Prickly saguaros sprout wings and fly, a blur of whistling green as we drive by. Mars taught me all about signs. I know what they mean. Tucson is 7 miles away.

“Are we stopping in Tucson?” I still say the words out loud.

Mars grins at me. “It’s hotter than hell in Tucson. It’s the perfect place to peddle ice cream,” he garbles. It’s hard to understand him, but I know what he means. He’s in my brain, grinding the gears. He’s so excited. His black eyes bulge. His throat swells up like a balloon. He buzzes like a wind-up toy, and I bet he’s every bit as empty inside.

We pull into a busy skating rink. The ice cream truck slows way down. Mars fingers the switch below the steering wheel, and the roof twinkles with little, white lights. And there’s music too. It sounds like a carnival ride. People gather around us.

“Are you ready?” He hisses.

“Uh-huh.” I snag a treat from the freezer and peel off the wrapper. Then I peep out the window. “Pink panthers are my favorite,” I squeal, chewing on the bubblegum eyes. Pop! I blow a bubble. Now, everyone wants ice cream.

Mars grins and scoops, scanning the crowd with his x-ray eyes, searching for the girl in Tucson. He looks normal enough with his mullet and whitewash jeans. People trust him.

After everyone gets their fill, they skate back inside, and we follow them. “You’ve been wanting to use your roller skates since El Paso. Now, you can,” he garbles.

I smile at him, sweet as pie, because I don’t know what else to do. Right away, I meet a butter-blonde girl, and we skate around the rink until our legs are jelly. We play hokey pokey under the disco ball. As soon as she wins the game and claims her prize, I know she’s the one. The girl in Tucson. Beaming, she pins a shooting star on her denim jacket. Mars loves stars. I feel him screeching inside me.

She pulls a paper fortune teller from her pocket. I’ve always wanted to make one, but I don’t have crayons or paper. She says I can keep this one because she has plenty more at home. I’m so excited my heart flips, but I also feel sad and scared. Run, girl in Tucson! I want to yell. You’re a lightning bug in a jar! A mouse in a trap! Snap!

Later that night, Mars drives her home. It’s easy to get her in the ice cream truck because she’s the kind of girl who needs a ride. Her parents aren’t good people, Mars garbles in my brain, but she doesn’t hear him. I figure she’s hungry, so I give her an ice cream sandwich. Then we say our goodbyes, and she slips into the safety of her house.

Mars peels out of the driveway, shiny blue, bubbling with excitement. We kill some time at the gas station. I chug a root beer and pick at a sticky tray of nachos. I’m not that hungry because I know what’s coming. My stomach lurches as we drive back to her house. I feel the punch before it lands, the sting before it bites.

Time is slippery. I’m not sure when, but I wake up in a haze, my right hand cuffed to the freezer. There’s a music box in front of me with a pink ballerina. Mars must’ve put it there for me. It’s the only thing of mine that’s really mine, the only thing from before Mars took me. It doesn’t work anymore, so I turn on the radio.

I sing along to some one hit wonder and play with the paper fortune teller the girl in Tucson gave me. My thumb lands on number 6. I choose the color blue. Then I pull back the flap. You’ll be famous, it says. More like forgotten. I shiver.

I know what Mars is doing tonight. I don’t have to be inside the girl in Tucson’s house to know. The house is inside me. Mars is inside me too, grinding the gears in my brain.

It goes something like this. The girl from Tucson is asleep in her bedroom. Mars shakes her awake, ties her up so she can’t escape, and wedges a chair under her doorknob.

Then he barges into her parents’ room, and they awake from a drunken stupor. Mars glares at them, his black eyes drilling holes in them, his glass-sharp fingers knifing away at their guts.

They run like wild animals in the dark. Her father’s glasses fly off his nose and Mars crunches them under his webbed feet. In one fell swoop, he slits her father’s throat with his razor-sharp teeth.

Her mother tumbles down the stairs, kicking and screaming, bones shattering. She gurgles and jerks, a mush of meat, but Mars isn’t finished yet. He grabs her by the ponytail and drags her, smearing blood all over the burnt orange carpet.

A flash catches my eye as Mars bursts through the front door. A spill of light follows him wherever he goes. He says it’s his starship, and one day, I’ll see it too. Then he tosses the girl from Tucson over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and flings her in the ice cream truck next to me. I wonder if that’s what happened to me. I wonder where my house used to be. I crank up the volume and pretend it’s all a bad dream.

I used to be like the girl in El Paso and the girl in Tucson. All smiles and taffy and cotton candy. Caramel eyes and butter-blonde hair. Blue ribbons and heartthrob posters. But I don’t know who I am anymore, and I guess it doesn’t really matter.

I feel sick and better all at the same time. I can’t really explain it. I’m just glad there are other girls like me. Other girls with music boxes and roller skates and paper fortune tellers. Other girls in ice cream trucks destined to be famous and forgotten.

***

Kacey Rayburn grew up in the Appalachian Mountains. Born into a family of granny witches and gravediggers, she enjoys long walks in the cemetery. She has a sweet fang for chai tea, mermaids, and aliens. Sing Our Bones Eternal is her debut novel. Her short fiction has also appeared in The Theatre Phantasmagoria. You can find her on Instagram @finsandfables and learn more about her at www.kaceyrayburn.com