The Long Walk

by Richard Bachman

On up toward the hour of witches, he thought. When churchyards yawn and give up their moldy dead. When all good little boys are sacked out. When wives and lovers have given up the carnal pillowfight for the evening. When passengers sleep uneasy on the Greyhound to New York. When Glenn Miller plays uninterrupted on the radio and bartenders think about putting the chairs up on the tables,

even the horror wears thin. There’s a surfeit even of death.

I could go crazy, Garraty thought. I could go right the fuck off my rocker.

For no reason Garraty could put a finger on, he felt as if he had just walked through a Shirley Jackson short story.

“Ray.” McVries was tugging at his sleeve. “He won’t tell me, Pete, make him tell me, make him say his name—” “Don’t bother him,” McVries said. “He’s dying, don’t bother him.”

45 fell down again. Footsteps quickened as boys scattered. Not long after, the guns roared. Garraty decided the boy’s name must not have been important anyway.

It was low tide, dead ebb, the time when the sea washes back, leaving slick mudflats covered with straggled weed, rusty beer cans, rotted prophylactics, broken bottles, smashed buoys, and green-mossed skeletons in tattered bathing trunks. It was dead ebb.

The rest of the last three and a half hours was nothing but a dream montage, an insomniac’s half-sleeping wakemare.

But it wasn’t a game anymore, it was a three-dimensional reality,

spread his head like a dollop of wet glue on the rocks.

It looked to be a perfect day, and Garraty greeted it only half-coherently by thinking: Thank God I can die in the daylight.

The first heat of the day touched Garraty’s face gently, and he welcomed it.

“Sinless in thought, word, and deed,” McVries said sententiously.

“You look like shit,” he said, and suddenly burst out laughing. McVries grinned. “You don’t exactly look like a deodorant ad yourself, Ray.”

It was enough to make you wonder what Socrates had thought about right after he had tossed off his hemlock cocktail.

wondered if Barkovitch wasn’t really one of the smart ones. With no friends you had no grief.

A few minutes later the word came back, and this time the word was a knock-knock joke. Bruce Pastor, the boy just in front of Garraty, turned around to Garraty and said, “Knock, knock, Garraty.” “Who’s there?” “Major.” “Major who?” “Major buggers his mother before breakfast,” Bruce Pastor said, and laughed uproariously. Garraty chuckled and passed it back to McVries, who passed it to Olson. When the joke came back the second time, the Major was buggering his grandmother before breakfast.

The scar stood out in dead white contrast, like a slashed exclamation mark, and for one fear-filled moment Garraty thought he was having a stroke.

“Goddam trees everyplace! Is there a city in the whole damn place?” “We’re funny up here,” Garraty said. “We think it’s fun to breathe real air instead of smog.” “Ain’t no smog in Joliet, you fucking hick,” Collie Parker said furiously. “What are you laying on me?” “No smog but a lot of hot air,” Garraty said. He was angry. “If we was home, I’d twist your balls for that.” “Now boys,” McVries said. He had recovered and was his old sardonic self again. “Why don’t you settle this like gentlemen? First one to get his head blown off has to buy the other one a beer.” “I hate beer,” Garraty said automatically.

“He’s buggy,” McVries said. “Everybody’s buggy this morning. Even me. And it’s a beautiful day. Don’t you agree, Olson?” Olson said nothing. “Olson’s got bugs, too,” McVries confided to Garraty. “Olson! Hey, Hank!” “Why don’t you leave him alone?” Baker asked. “Hey Hank!” McVries shouted, ignoring Baker. “Wanna go for a walk?” “Go to hell,” Olson muttered. “What?” McVries cried merrily, cupping a hand to his ear. “Wha choo say, bo?” “Hell! Hell!” Olson screamed. “Go to hell!” “Is that what you said.” McVries nodded wisely.

He thought about Jan again. He needed her. I love you, Jan, he thought. He wasn’t dumb, and he knew she had become more to him than she actually was. She had turned into a life-symbol. A shield against the sudden death that came from the halftrack. More and more he wanted her because she symbolized the time when he could have a piece of ass—his own.

wiffle haircut

He felt a loosening in his chest all the same, and heard Baker let out his breath. It was stupid to feel that way. The sooner Harkness stopped walking, the sooner he could stop walking. That was the simple truth. That was logic. But something went deeper, a truer, more frightening logic. Harkness was a part of the group that Garraty was a part of, a segment of his subclan. Part of a magic circle that Garraty belonged to. And if one part of that circle could be broken, any part of it could be broken.

“I like to think I’m quite an engaging bloke, really. People I meet consider I’m schizophrenic

Scramm, 85, did not fascinate Garraty because of his flashing intelligence, because Scramm wasn’t all that bright. He didn’t fascinate Garraty because of his moon face, his crew cut, or his build, which was mooselike. He fascinated Garraty because he was married.

“I dropped out of school when I was fourteen. There was no point to it, not for me. I wasn’t no troublemaker, just not able to make grades. And our history teacher read us an article about how schools are over-populated. So I figured why not let somebody who can learn sit in, and I’ll get down to business. I wanted to marry Cathy anyway.”

“No one tried to talk you out of it?” “There was a guidance counselor at school, he gave me a lot of shit about sticking with it and not being a ditch digger, but he had more important things to do besides keep me in school. I guess you could say he gave me the soft sell. Besides, somebody has to dig ditches, right?”

He waved enthusiastically at a group of little girls who were going through a spastic cheerleader routine, pleated skirts and scabbed knees flying.

“Well, Cathy’s pregnant right now. She said we should wait until we had enough in the bank to pay for the delivery. When we got up to seven hundred, she said go, and we went. She caught pregnant in no time at all.” Scramm looked sternly at Garraty. “My kid’s going to college. They say dumb guys like me never have smart kids, but Cathy’s smart enough for both of us. Cathy finished high school. I made her finish. Four night courses and then she took the H.S.E.T. My kid’s going to as much college as he wants.”

Garraty could almost hear the machinery up there working: slow, ponderous, but in the end as sure as death and as inescapable as taxes.

the heat already walked among them.

erotic almost to the point of insanity.

“Couldn’t,” he was sobbing. “Wasn’t enough time and she wanted me to and I couldn’t… I…” He was weeping and staggering, his hands pressed against his crotch. His words were little more than indistinct wails. “So you gave them their little thrill,” Barkovitch said. “Something for them to talk about in Show and Tell tomorrow.” “Just shut up!” Gribble screamed. He dug at his crotch. “It hurts, I got a cramp—” “Blue balls,” Pearson said. “That’s what he’s got.”

He looked like a stunned weasel.

“He’s almost there now,” McVries said at his elbow, startling him. “When they start half-hoping someone will shoot them so they can rest their feet, they’re not far away.” “Is that right?” Garraty asked crossly. “How come everybody else around here knows so much more about it than me?” “Because you’re so sweet,” McVries said tenderly, and then he sped up, letting his legs catch the downgrade, and passed Garraty by.

“Harkness,” McVries said. “Ol’ Harkness bought a ticket to see the farm.” “Why don’t you write him a poime?” Barkovitch called over. “Shut up, killer,” McVries answered absently. He shook his head. “Ol’ Harkness, sonofabitch.” “I ain’t no killer!” Barkovitch screamed. “I’ll dance on your grave, scarface! I’ll—” A chorus of angry shouts silenced him. Muttering, Barkovitch glared at McVries. Then he began to stalk on a little faster, not looking around.

Like you wonder who cuts the barber’s hair or who operates on the doctor for gallstones. See?” “It takes a lot of gall to be a doctor,” McVries said solemnly.

“Lung cancer. Six years ago.” “Did he smoke?” Abraham asked, waving at a family of four and their cat. The cat was on a leash. It was a Persian cat. It looked mean and pissed off. “No, not even a pipe,” Baker said. “He was afraid it would give him cancer.” “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” McVries said, “who buried him? Tell us so we can discuss world problems, or baseball, or birth control or something.” “I think birth control is a world problem,” Garraty said seriously. “My girlfriend is a Catholic and—” “Come on!” McVries bellowed. “Who the fuck buried your grandfather, Baker?” “My uncle. He was my uncle. My grandfather was a lawyer in Shreveport. He—” “I don’t give a shit,” McVries said. “I don’t give a shit if the old gentleman had three cocks, I just want to know who buried him so we can get on.” “Actually, nobody buried him. He wanted to be cremated.” “Oh my aching balls,” Abraham said, and then laughed a little.

“No. I think your uncle jinxed her.” “Jinx? How do you mean?” Baker was interested. “Well, you have to admit it wasn’t a very good advertisement for the business.” “What, dying?” “No,” McVries said. “Getting cremated.”

“Fastest crap I evah took!” he said, badly out of breath. “You should have brought a catalogue along,” McVries said. “I never could go very long without a crap,” Baker said. “Some guys, hell, they crap once a week. I’m a once-a-day man. If I don’t crap once a day, I take a laxative.” “Those laxatives will ruin your intestines,” Pearson said. “Oh, shit,” Baker scoffed. McVries threw back his head and laughed. Abraham twisted his head around to join the conversation. “My grandfather never used a laxative in his life and he lived to be—” “You kept records, I presume,” Pearson said. “You wouldn’t be doubting my grandfather’s word, would you?” “Heaven forbid.” Pearson rolled his eyes.

Hail Mary full of grace, let us blow this goddam place.”

“Want a party favor?” Baker asked crazily. “Who asked you, you goddam redneck?”

“I thought it never got hot in Maine,” Pearson said. He sounded more tired than ever. “I thought Maine was s’posed to be cool.” “Well then, now you know different,” Garraty said shortly. “You’re a lot of fun, Garraty,” Pearson said. “You know that? You’re really a lot of fun. Gee, I’m glad I met you.” McVries laughed. “You know what?” Garraty replied. “What?” “You got skidmarks in your underwear,” Garraty said.

“Shut your stinking trap,” McVries said coldly. “You want to try and make m—” “No, I don’t want to try and make you. Just shut up, you sonofabitch.”

Older heads are wiser heads.

Just ahead a family of five—mother, father, boy, girl, and white-haired grandmother—were spread beneath a large elm, eating a picnic breakfast of sandwiches and what looked like hot cocoa. They waved cheerily at the Walkers. “Freaks,” Garraty muttered. “What was that?” McVries asked. “I said I want to sit down and have something to eat. Look at those people. Fucking bunch of pigs.”

They’re animals, all right. But why are you so goddam sure that makes us human beings?”

Scramm grinned at Garraty through a mouthful of cheese spread and said something pleasant but untranslatable.

McVries was slowly eating chicken spread. His eyes were half-lidded, and he might have been in extreme pain or at the pinnacle of pleasure.

He smiled a hollow, concentration-camp smile that made Garraty’s belly crawl.