Big Driver Read online

  Here’s something else I believe: if you’re going into a very dark place—like Wilf James’s Nebraska farmhouse in “1922”—then you should take a bright light, and shine it on everything. If you don’t want to see, why in God’s name would you dare the dark at all? The great naturalist writer Frank Norris has always been one of my literary idols, and I’ve kept what he said on this subject in mind for over forty years: “I never truckled; I never took off my hat to Fashion and held it out for pennies. By God, I told them the truth.”

  But Steve, you say, you’ve made a great many pennies during your career, and as for truth … that’s variable, isn’t it? Yes, I’ve made a good amount of money writing my stories, but the money was a side effect, never the goal. Writing fiction for money is a mug’s game. And sure, truth is in the eye of the beholder. But when it comes to fiction, the writer’s only responsibility is to look for the truth inside his own heart. It won’t always be the reader’s truth, or the critic’s truth, but as long as it’s the writer’s truth—as long as he or she doesn’t truckle, or hold out his or her hat to Fashion—all is well. For writers who knowingly lie, for those who substitute unbelievable human behavior for the way people really act, I have nothing but contempt. Bad writing is more than a matter of shit syntax and faulty observation; bad writing usually arises from a stubborn refusal to tell stories about what people actually do—to face the fact, let us say, that murderers sometimes help old ladies cross the street.

  I have tried my best in Full Dark, No Stars to record what people might do, and how they might behave, under certain dire circumstances. The people in these stories are not without hope, but they acknowledge that even our fondest hopes (and our fondest wishes for our fellowmen and the society in which we live) may sometimes be vain. Often, even. But I think they also say that nobility most fully resides not in success but in trying to do the right thing … and that when we fail to do that, or willfully turn away from the challenge, hell follows.

  “1922” was inspired by a nonfiction book called Wisconsin Death Trip (1973), written by Michael Lesy and featuring photographs taken in the small city of Black River Falls, Wisconsin. I was impressed by the rural isolation of these photographs, and the harshness and deprivation in the faces of many of the subjects. I wanted to get that feeling in my story.

  In 2007, while traveling on Interstate 84 to an autographing in western Massachusetts, I stopped at a rest area for a typical Steve King Health Meal: a soda and a candybar. When I came out of the refreshment shack, I saw a woman with a flat tire talking earnestly to a long-haul trucker parked in the next slot. He smiled at her and got out of his rig.

  “Need any help?” I asked.

  “No, no, I got this,” the trucker said.

  The lady got her tire changed, I’m sure. I got a Three Musketeers and the story idea that eventually became “Big Driver.”

  In Bangor, where I live, a thoroughfare called the Hammond Street Extension skirts the airport. I walk three or four miles a day, and if I’m in town, I often go out that way. There’s a gravel patch beside the airport fence about halfway along the Extension, and there any number of roadside vendors have set up shop over the years. My favorite is known locally as Golf Ball Guy, and he always appears in the spring. Golf Ball Guy goes up to the Bangor Municipal Golf Course when the weather turns warm, and scavenges up hundreds of used golf balls that have been abandoned under the snow. He throws away the really bad ones and sells the rest at the little spot out on the Extension (the windshield of his car is lined with golf balls—a nice touch). One day when I spied him, the idea for “Fair Extension” came into my mind. Of course I set it in Derry, home of the late and unlamented clown Pennywise, because Derry is just Bangor masquerading under a different name.

  The last story in this book came to my mind after reading an article about Dennis Rader, the infamous BTK (bind, torture, and kill) murderer who took the lives of ten people—mostly women, but two of his victims were children—over a period of roughly sixteen years. In many cases, he mailed pieces of his victims’ identification to the police. Paula Rader was married to this monster for thirty-four years, and many in the Wichita area, where Rader claimed his victims, refuse to believe that she could live with him and not know what he was doing. I did believe—I do believe—and I wrote this story to explore what might happen in such a case if the wife suddenly found out about her husband’s awful hobby. I also wrote it to explore the idea that it’s impossible to fully know anyone, even those we love the most.

  All right, I think we’ve been down here in the dark long enough. There’s a whole other world upstairs. Take my hand, Constant Reader, and I’ll be happy to lead you back into the sunshine. I’m happy to go there, because I believe most people are essentially good. I know that I am.

  It’s you I’m not entirely sure of.

  Bangor, Maine

  December 23, 2009

  GALLERY BOOKS PRESENTS

  “UNDER THE WEATHER”

  A NEW STORY FROM

  STEPHEN KING…

  I’ve been having this bad dream for a week now, but it must be one of the lucid ones, because I’m always able to back out before it turns into a nightmare. Only this time it seems to have followed me, because Ellen and I aren’t alone. There’s something under the bed. I can hear it chewing.

  You know how it is when you’re really scared, right? Your heart seems to stop, your tongue sticks to the roof of your mouth, your skin goes cold and goose bumps rise up all over your body. Instead of meshing, the cogs in your head just spin and the whole engine heats up. I almost scream, I really do. I think, It’s the thing I don’t want to look at. It’s the thing in the window seat.

  Then I see the fan overhead, the blades turning at their slowest speed. I see a crack of early morning light running down the middle of the pulled drapes. I see the graying milkweed fluff of Ellen’s hair on the other side of the bed. I’m here on the Upper East Side, fifth floor, and everything’s okay. The dream was just a dream. As for what’s under the bed—

  I toss back the covers and slide out onto my knees, like a man who means to pray. But instead of that, I lift the flounce and peer under the bed. I only see a dark shape at first. Then the shape’s head turns and two eyes gleam at me. It’s Lady. She’s not supposed to be under there, and I guess she knows it (hard to tell what a dog knows and what it doesn’t), but I must have left the door open when I came to bed. Or maybe it didn’t quite latch and she pushed it open with her snout. She must have brought one of her toys with her from the basket in the hall. At least it wasn’t the blue bone or the red rat. Those have squeakers in them, and would have wakened Ellen for sure. And Ellen needs her rest. She’s been under the weather.

  “Lady,” I whisper. “Lady, come out of there.”

  She only looks at me. She’s getting on in years and not so steady on her pins as she used to be, but—as the saying goes—she ain’t stupid. She’s under Ellen’s side, where I can’t reach her. If I raise my voice she’ll have to come, but she knows (I’m pretty sure she knows) that I won’t do that, because if I raise my voice, that will wake Ellen.

  As if to prove this, Lady turns away from me and the chewing recommences.

  Well, I can handle that. I’ve been living with Lady for eleven years, nearly half my married life. There are three things that get her on her feet. One is the rattle of her leash and a call of “Elevator!” One is the thump of her food dish on the floor. The third—

  I get up and walk down the short hall to the kitchen. From the cupboard I take the bag of Snackin’ Slices, making sure to rattle it. I don’t have to wait long for the muted clitter of cockerclaws. Five seconds and she’s right there. She doesn’t even bother to bring her toy.

  I show her one of the little carrot shapes, then toss it into the living room. A little mean, maybe, and I know she didn’t mean to scare the life out of me, but she did. Besides, the fat old thing can use the exercise. She chases her treat. I linger long enough to start the coffe
emaker, then go back into the bedroom. I’m careful to pull the door all the way shut.

  Ellen’s still sleeping, and getting up early has one benefit: no need for the alarm. I turn it off. Let her sleep a little later. It’s a bronchial infection. I was scared for a while there, but now she’s on the mend.

  I go into the bathroom and officially christen the day by brushing my teeth (I’ve read that in the morning a person’s mouth is as germicidally dead as it ever gets, but the habits we learn as children are hard to break). I turn on the shower, get it good and hot, and step in.

  The shower’s where I do my best thinking, and this morning I think about the dream. Five nights in a row I’ve had it. (But who’s counting.) Nothing really awful happens, but in a way that’s the worst part. Because in the dream I know—absolutely know—that something awful will happen. If I let it.

  I’m in an airplane, in business class. I’m in an aisle seat, which is where I prefer to be, so I don’t have to squeeze past anybody if I have to go to the toilet. My tray table is down. On it is a bag of peanuts and an orange drink that looks like a vodka sunrise, a drink I’ve never ordered in real life. The ride is smooth. If there are clouds, we’re above them. The cabin is filled with sunlight. Someone is sitting in the window seat, and I know if I look at him (or her, or possibly it), I’ll see something that will turn my bad dream into a nightmare. If I look into the face of my seatmate, I may lose my mind. It could crack open like an egg and all the darkness there is might pour out.

  I give my soapy hair a quick rinse, step out, dry off. My clothes are folded on a chair in the bedroom. I take them and my shoes into the kitchen, which is now filling with the smell of coffee. Nice. Lady’s curled up by the stove, looking at me reproachfully.

  “Don’t go giving me the stinkeye,” I tell her, and nod toward the closed bedroom door. “You know the rules.”

  She puts her snout down on the floor between her paws.

  *

  I choose cranberry juice while I wait for the coffee. There’s OJ, which is my usual morning drink, but I don’t want it. Too much like the drink in the dream, I suppose. I have my coffee in the living room with CNN on mute, just reading the crawl at the bottom, which is all a person really needs. Then I turn it off and have a bowl of All-Bran. Quarter to eight. I decide that if the weather’s nice when I walk Lady, I’ll skip the cab and walk to work.

  The weather’s nice all right, spring edging into summer and a shine on everything. Carlo, the doorman, is under the awning, talking on his cell phone. “Yuh,” he says. “Yuh, I finally got hold of her. She says go ahead, no problem as long as I’m there. She don’t trust nobody, and I don’t blame her. She got a lot of nice things up there. You come when? Three? You can’t make it earlier?” He tips me a wave with one white-gloved hand as I walk Lady down to the corner.

  We’ve got this down to a science, Lady and I. She does it at pretty much the same place every day, and I’m fast with the poop bag. When I come back, Carlo stoops to give her a pat. Lady waves her tail back and forth most fetchingly, but no treat is forthcoming from Carlo. He knows she’s on a diet. Or supposed to be.

  “I finally got hold of Mrs. Warshawski,” Carlo tells me. Mrs. Warshawski is in 5-C, but only technically. She’s been gone for a couple of months now. “She was in Vienna.”

  “Vienna, is that so,” I say.

  “She told me to go ahead with the exterminators. She was horrified when I told her. You’re the only one on four, five, or six who hasn’t complained. The rest of them …” He shakes his head and makes a whoo sound.

  “I grew up in a Connecticut mill town. It pretty well wrecked my sinuses. I can smell coffee, and Ellie’s perfume if she puts it on thick, but that’s about all.”

  “In this case, that’s probably a blessing. How is Mrs. Nathan? Still under the weather?”

  “It’ll be a few more days before she’s ready to go back to work, but she’s a hell of a lot better. She gave me a scare for a while.”

  “Me, too. She was going out one day—in the rain, naturally—”

  “That’s El,” I say. “Nothing stops her. If she feels like she has to go somewhere, she goes.”

  “—and I thought to myself, ‘That’s a real graveyard cough.’” He raises one of his gloved hands in a stop gesture. “Not that I really thought—”

  “It was on the way to being a hospital cough, anyway. But I finally got her to see the doctor, and now … road to recovery.”

  “Good. Good.” Then, returning to what’s really on his mind: “Mrs. Warshawski was pretty grossed out when I told her. I said we’d probably just find some spoiled food in the fridge, but I know it’s worse than that. So does anybody else on those floors with an intact smeller.” He gives a grim little nod. “They’re going to find a dead rat in there, you mark my words. Food stinks, but not like that. Only dead things stink like that. It’s a rat, all right, maybe a couple of them. She probably put down poison and doesn’t want to admit it.” He bends down to give Lady another pat. “You smell it, don’t you, girl? You bet you do.”

  *

  There’s a litter of purple notes around the coffeemaker. I take the purple pad they came from to the kitchen table and write another.

  Ellen: Lady all walked. Coffee ready. If you feel well enough to go out to the park, go! Just not too far. Don’t want you to overdo now that you’re finally on the mend. Carlo told me again that he “smells a rat.” I guess so does everyone else in the neighborhood of 5-C. Lucky for us that you’re plugged up and I’m “olfac’trlly challenged.” Haha! If you hear people in Mrs. W’s, it’s the exterminators. Carlo will be with them, so don’t worry. I’m going to walk to work. Need to think summore about the latest male wonder drug. Wish they’d consulted us before they hung that name on it. Remember, DON’T OVERDO. Love you–love you.

  I jot half a dozen X’s just to underline the point, and sign it with a B in a heart. Then I add it to the other notes around the coffeemaker. I refill Lady’s water dish before I leave.

  It’s twenty blocks or so, and I don’t think about the latest male wonder drug. I think about the exterminators, who will be coming at three. Earlier, if they can make it.

  *

  The walk might have been a mistake. The dreams have interrupted my sleep cycle, I guess, and I almost fall asleep during the morning meeting in the conference room. But I come around in a hurry when Pete Wendell shows a mock-up poster for the new Petrov Vodka campaign. I’ve seen it already, on his office computer while he was fooling with it last week, and looking at it again I know where at least one element of my dream came from.

  “Petrov Vodka,” Aura McLean says. Her admirable breasts rise and fall in a theatrical sigh. “If that’s an example of the new Russian capitalism, it’s dead on arrival.” The heartiest laughter at this comes from the younger men, who’d like to see Aura’s long blond hair spread on a pillow next to them. “No offense to you intended, Pete, it’s a great leader.”

  “None taken,” Pete says with a game smile. “We do what we can.”

  The poster shows a couple toasting each other on a balcony while the sun sinks over a harbor filled with expensive pleasure boats. The cutline beneath reads SUNSET. THE PERFECT TIME FOR A VODKA SUNRISE.

  There’s some discussion about the placement of the Petrov bottle—right? left? center? below?—and Frank Bernstein suggests that actually adding the recipe might prolong the page view, especially in mags like Playboy and Esquire. I tune out, thinking about the drink sitting on the tray in my airplane dream, until I realize George Slattery is calling on me. I’m able to replay the question, and that’s a good thing. You don’t ask George to chew his cabbage twice.

  “I’m actually in the same boat as Pete,” I say. “The client picked the name, I’m just doing what I can.”

  There’s some goodnatured laughter. There have been many jokes about Vonnell Pharmaceutical’s newest drug product.

  “I may have something to show you by Monday,” I tell them.
I’m not looking at George, but he knows where I’m aiming. “By the middle of next week for sure. I want to give Billy a chance to see what he can do.” Billy Ederle is our newest hire, and doing his breakin time as my assistant. He doesn’t get an invite to the morning meetings yet, but I like him. Everybody at Andrews-Slattery likes him. He’s bright, he’s eager, and I bet he’ll start shaving in a year or two.

  George considers this. “I was really hoping to see a treatment today. Even rough copy.”

  Silence. People study their nails. It’s as close to a public rebuke as George gets, and maybe I deserve it. This hasn’t been my best week, and laying it off on the kid doesn’t look so good. It doesn’t feel so good, either.

  “Okay,” George says at last, and you can feel the relief in the room. It’s like a light cool breath of breeze, there and then gone. No one wants to witness a conference room caning on a sunny Friday morning, and I sure don’t want to get one. Not with all the other stuff on my mind.

  George smells a rat, I think.

  “How’s Ellen doing?” he asks.

  “Better,” I tell him. “Thanks for asking.”

  There are a few more presentations. Then it’s over. Thank God.

  *

  I’m almost dozing when Billy Ederle comes into my office twenty minutes later. Check that: I am dozing. I sit up fast, hoping the kid just thinks he caught me deep in thought. He’s probably too excited to have noticed either way. In one hand he’s holding a piece of poster board. I think he’d look right at home in Podunk High School, putting up a big notice about the Friday night dance.