“Is he dead?” Nelson asked. He struck his pale palms along the top center of the double birch dresser. Bill stepped to the open bathroom window between the large lighted mirror of the vanity and the toilet. Nelson’s body quivered to the desert night’s shrill coldness.
Bill’s deer knife lay bare on the windowpane.
A gigantic shadow of a Juniper bush, despite being common in the austere Utah desert, gave Nelson utter discomfort that he shifted his glance from the bathroom window toward Bill and came closer to the bulbs of the vanity mirror. Nelson saw Silverback was tied to the toilet with braided nylon rope.
A cruel smile settled on Bill’s shiny face. “Silverback? The glorious leader of the Mountain Gorilla motorcycle gang,” Bill, rubbed away a spray of bloody spit on his dark mustache and walked onto the dirty navy carpet into the bedroom.
Nelson peered at Silverback. The leader of the appalling Mountain Gorillas was grievously beaten by Bill inside the spacious, blood-covered lavatory.
The giant moon that ruled over them all was unforgiving. The swollen, brutal cuts on his cheeks were halfway duct-taped. Silverback had a broad, appealing chin like Bill’s, only now it appeared grotesque. Nelson thought it was impossible to distinguish who was the maniac in the motel room anymore.
Bill tossed the stained washcloth into the wastebasket beside the round table. “Diabetes fucked your hearing?” He enjoyed the startled look on Nelson.
“No,” Nelson said. He shot Bill a venomous look. He wasn’t much older than Bill at thirty-six, but was the brother cursed with ill health. A slight urge arrived to protect Silverback from sadistic Bill. Nelson staggered to the window, recognizing that the key fob to the Jeep Wrangler was missing.
There are no allies in the austere desert. He stared at the striking desert stars in bleak recollection of the early part of that day.
Nelson had shielded Silverback’s lady friend, Ivory, from a barbaric rape in the back seat of the Jeep Wrangler. Nelson has been self-aware of a similar bizarre interest in Ivory. He silently recalled the escape with his brother Bill as he stared at the desert stars that shone like the rearview mirror in the Jeep Wrangler.
Nelson had watched Bill make Ivory swallow a warm golden liquid. She coughed, spilling some onto the brown leather back seat and dropping it onto the clear mat. Bill unbuttoned and unzipped Ivory’s shorts. Nelson was repulsed by Bill’s extreme perversion and pretended he received a text from The Boss.
“Bill, The Boss has orders and wants you to deal with Silverback alive,” Nelson said. “With a warning that he is probably The Beast, the maniac of the Utah canyons.” Bill continued, but less earnestly, to kiss the side of Ivory’s neck with the beauty mark.
The road narrowed among the numerous wildflowers, desert cacti, and stiff sagebrush as the blackened southern West side of the desert seemed fraught with monstrous dread.
Bill was forced to yield to it.
Ivory stared at the dark dusk with glazed eyes. Bill had refastened her bra. “Silverback,” Ivory said. “The Gray Wolf is coming.” She passed out on the drugged syrup Bill made her swallow.
Nelson looked over to the passenger seat. Silverback was bleeding from a stab to his shoulder, but he was physically fit and could bide his time like a wounded moose in the forest.
The striking desert stars provoked more than their strange drive up. Nelson considered that his life had become as sordid, barren, and horrendous as his brother Bill’s. His regret slew the spell of the striking desert stars, and he moved slowly away from the birch dresser. He noticed the key fob to the Wrangler was lying underneath the armchair where Bill was now seated.
“Right! There was no text with new orders from The Boss.” Bill stood up and spat inside the giant square aquarium, which housed freakishly large, red-bellied piranhas. “We’re in the godforsaken desert where there is nothing! Only bristlecone pine and sidewinder rattlesnakes.”
Bill shoved Nelson into the wall next to the aquarium. “Stuck here in a fucking cryptic and abandoned motel.”
Nelson was ambushed.
Bill had a metal curtain rod pressed hard against his neck. “Stuck here in a fucking cryptic and abandoned motel.” Bill bent the rod as if it were a clothesline.
“You don’t have to repeat it.” Nelson struggled, staring fixedly into Bill’s depraved black eyes. He felt like a dying wasp sprayed with an evil poison, and Bill dropped the rod on Nelson’s dress shoes at the loud, odd noises that seemed to come from inside the Jeep Wrangler.
Bill’s eyes locked in the trunk’s direction, where they kept Silverback’s lady friend, Ivory, captive. “Well, my Utah Lily, Ivory is awake,” Bill said. “I’m going to have a madly fun night with Ivory. Go and get her for me, dear brother.”
“No. You can’t afford that risk,” Nelson lied. “Silverback will never tell us the ring’s location. We’ve got an unbelievable debt that we must pay to The Boss. Nelson took a deep breath. “We don’t know when the motel owner will be back.”
“You mean the wacko with pet piranhas the size of small dogs swimming around with crazed teeth and appetites?” Bill replied.
“Hey, nothing’s abnormal or wrong about a person who owns a damn aquarium. All right? It’s a hobby, and I’m dying to smoke weed outside.” Nelson walked around Bill.
Nelson headed outside, vulnerable to the Gray Wolf and numb to any crawling scorpions and centipedes. He was desperate to take advantage of the merchandise they had robbed at Ivory’s store, Smokies. They could sell weed and cocaine anywhere, like Canada, Mexico, and Alaska. Fuck there was universal demand. Nelson walked to the Jeep Wrangler and perched himself on the front hood. He lit up a joint he saved in the back pocket of his fitted silver trousers.
“Hey, Nelson. It’s probably a son-of-a-bitch fairy tale. The Great Horned Owl Ring, “Bill shouted. “Made with the rarest scarlet diamond.”
Nelson could hear Bill’s vile laughter through the open front window near the closed door when he proceeded to the back of the customized Jeep Wrangler to check on Ivory.
He opened the trunk. Ivory was gone.
Bill ran outside and into the vast, terrible desert with his deer hunting knife and the quilt he ripped from the queen bed to wrap up Ivory’s body once he captured her. Bill had no reservations about killing, and Nelson lost sight of him.
Nelson had retreated inside after a couple of hours of searching for them. It was midnight when he seated himself in an armchair. And he was exhausted from calling for Ivory and trying hopelessly to save her.
He blocked the bathroom door where Silverback was still lying unconscious. He admitted to himself that he was terrified of what stalked the desert. Nelson stared at the moon again; it was brilliant white, like a bride’s gown.
The moon refracted in the piranhas’ eyes. The desert stars had become like the mustard-yellow sand outside, removing the fog from the freshwater in the aquarium.
“I can’t find Ivory.” Bill had returned despite the desert’s vastness and silent threats of The Beast.
Nelson thought it was pathetic that Bill feared Silverback’s reputation and believed in The Gray Wolf.
“Silverback’s nickname is Demon,” Nelson said.
Nelson and Bill shook their heads simultaneously as if they knew Ivory’s cosmic omen was genuine. Bill lay across the width of the uncovered mattress and fell immediately asleep. Nelson stayed awake and deliberated about abandoning his brother. Some hours passed, and The Boss gave another call.
“The Mountain Gorillas are freakish. Cosmic demons, Nelson.” Bill had screamed after he woke from a nightmare.” Bill punched his forehead on a bed pillow.” I kidnapped their leader and his lover. I don’t imagine any road having the distance to keep me alive.“
Nelson had soothed him back to sleep at 3:00 A.M. Nelson was watchful and listened intently. He heard only a few horned toads and squirrels. He was sure The Gray Wolf was coming as Ivory had said, and a ghostly ache clasped his neck and shoulders.
Nelson’s tongue tingled with thirst. He crept toward the bathroom door where Silverback remained. He unlocked the doorway, opened it slightly, and visually checked the nylon ropes. There were no frays or shredding. Nelson recalled what Bill confessed to him. What Ivory said before he stabbed her in the shoulder, as he did her companion, “Silverback is diabolical like a Utah bobcat. He will slaughter you and your brother, just like farm mice.”
The desolation and many secrets of the desert were nothing short of terrifying. Ivory had hidden somewhere in yucca and cacti. Bill had almost killed her, the goddess of the mountain basin. The piranhas’ clinking sounds of teeth and thrashing tails against the rim of the aquarium seized Nelson’s attention back inside their room in the motel.
In less than a week, the desert was entirely dry. Nelson and Bill drank all the bottled water.
There was nothing left but the fresh water in the piranha aquarium. Nelson shared some with Silverback, but he thought it was likely too late. An overwhelming and wretched rot of an animal. Or was it from Ivory’s corpse? Nelson wasn’t sure, but whatever spread over the autonomy of the desert was ghastly.
The piranhas smelled death, which made them more ravenous. The boundary line of their water was lower, and they were beginning to suffocate. Nelson and Bill couldn’t reach Silverback for information on where the Scarlet Owl Ring was kept.
Silverback spat blood and called for his lover, Ivory, when Bill walked in to interrogate him again. “Ivory’s opportunities to help you have expired, though my older brother had no good desire to witness her pain.” Bill’s mind is entertained by the chaos in the square aquarium and the mesmerizing red glow of the head of the piranhas.
Adam Silverback’s heart was speeding like a jackrabbit attempting to make an irregular escape from a bald mountain eagle. He lifted his head and opened his sore eyes when Bill removed the duct tape and left. He recognized the motel bathroom when he smelled Ivory’s rose lavender perfume bottles. And the dominant desert star was like an ancient crystal in the enormous oval window. He saw Bill lying on the bed, armed with a metal curtain rod. Nelson sat in the velvet armchair beside the aquarium, his eyelids heavy.
The piranhas were Ivory’s gift; they swam agitated whenever they were ready for more worms. One had always stared at Silverback, its eyes ink-black like the tattoo of The Gray Wolf on his neck.
“They aren’t evil.” Ivory would frequently say. She sympathized with them and treated them like pets. Subsequently, Silverback suffered a savage motorcycle accident that left him with head trauma, memory loss, and an erratic, animal-like physical intensity. She nursed him to health with marijuana.
The abandoned motel was located in a remote area, far from the great forest and townships. Travelers had grown tired of the messy maze of faded, interconnected roads decades ago. He and Ivory had trespassed after they accidentally discovered it. They enjoyed it because it was away from the Mountain Gorillas. Nevertheless, their stays were becoming shorter and less frequent. They had a mysterious yearning to wander with their Harley-Davidsons to scout new places to make theirs.
Adam Silverback’s head throbbed, and blood ran down his polo shirt and denim pants. His sweat loosened the braided nylon rope and duct tape. He understood his animal-like power would return; he had to wait for that and the rise of The Gray Wolf.
He snapped his wrists and ankles free, and the noise alerted Nelson. The Mountain Gorillas would show no mercy to Bill and Nelson. He activated the replica scarlet diamond GPs on his finger.
Nelson picked up Bill’s knife from the windowpane. The blade was dyed rich scarlet with Silverback’s and Ivory’s blood. Nelson headed for the Jeep Wrangler. Several times, the Gray Wolf encircled the Jeep Wrangler, nearly concealed by the incredibly dark shadows. Nelson couldn’t see much of anything except the moon, the commander of the desert night.
“Bill!” Nelson yelled before getting into the driver’s seat of the Jeep Wrangler.
The aquarium was tossed like a washcloth through the windowpane and shattered into a hundred pieces. Silverback was standing unbound, chewing on the red-bellied piranha. Nelson turned on the Jeep’s Wrangler headlights, and Ivory stepped in front of Silverback, her left shoulder wrapped in a bed pillowcase.
The Gray Wolf jumped onto the Jeep’s front hood, its massive teeth gripping Bill’s middle finger, which wore a signet ring with the letter SF. It attacked the windshield with its great paws.
Nelson panicked and reversed the Jeep Wrangler. Horrified, he took flight without waiting for Bill. Scared for his life, he prayed. And he would attempt to be righteous and make a promise to God for the first time.
“It wasn’t my wish to burglarize Smokies,” Nelson cried nervously. “I never realized there was merit to Silverback’s reputation; I believed it was total bullshit. But the Scarlet Owl Ring was indeed real.”
Ivory had worn it that whole time as a navel piercing. Nelson scrutinized while he tilted the rearview mirror lower. The Scarlet Ring had rolled away from the shadow of the seat belt’s buckle.
“I have it! I won’t be a moving archery target for The Boss. So, fuck the Mountain Gorillas and their leader, Silverback!”
The red-bellied piranhas swam in multiple directions inside the basin of the plugged sink of the lavatory. The piranhas have been ungoverned for too long; they began cannibalizing each other despite their mistress’s return.
“The Mountain Gorillas are coming, worse than the cosmic Gray Wolf. Because they were vengeful,” Silverback said. He listened for Ivory’s soft voice, the strikes of roaring engines, and The Gray Wolf’s icy howl.
Celia Garza 