The monster is a reflection. A scattering of light bent back on itself. Set to no purpose of its own, it takes the form of our own dumbstruck faces. We stand in the dark, caught wondering if it suggests an intruder lurking around the next corner. But it is just a reflection.

Because I am recalling this fact, we can be certain that I have survived with my fingers intact. Whether there is a mind attached to the nerve endings of those digits is an inference you will have to draw. If I have no facility to press these words into text, then I have already forced one mind or machine to hear my monologue. Through the editorial filter of dictation, at least, we may have some confidence that an ending can be reached with some reason still guiding the tale. But it is just a reflection.

***

Three hours south-east of San Jose I spied a well-paved road which had no corresponding entry in my navigation sheaves. I made a note of the branch, but I did not slow my vehicle by much. The remains of Interstate Five in that area were remarkably untouched by time and I was enjoying the pleasant drone of my genuine rubber tires across pavement from the era for which they were intended. I rolled down the windows (with a crank, no less!) just to hear them better. The dry, dusty wind of the Central Valley stung my eyes, but that only enhanced the experience. The discomfort helped distract me from calculations of how few miles I had left to extract from the antique parts of the car, especially if I insisted on subjecting it to the desolation of abandoned country roads.

Besides, the unlisted exit was almost certainly a service road for a Bullet Tunnel substation. The desicated carcasses of Stockton, Fresno, and Bakersfield were disused save the access they provided to underground facilities. The swaths of wasteland in between these lonely places were fortunate to even serve that purpose. And so I assumed the little road was listed in some corporate filing that had yet to find its way to the forums from which I had pulled my renderings of the region. Though I look back on it regretfully now, would anyone consider this minor disjunction between knowledge and observation worthy of scrutiny?

My second discovery, however, was impossible to ignore. Speeding down the straight track, I had let my thoughts wander away from the driver’s seat. There is a certain kind of daydream that can only be dreamt from behind the wheel. This place is where I let Linda and our daughter visit me now. I refuse to say they are the only reason I devoted so much of my time and income to this obsolete hobby, for it provides many points of interest. But the serenity of their voices on the wind is as important as it is fleeting. They, as well as the smooth sound of the wheels, were blown out of existence by a grating, thumping noise that made me panic for the health of the roadster as if it were my own body. I applied the brakes too forcefully and was equal parts devastated and thrilled by the squeal of the suffering rubber; how many miles had I burned away in one stroke! The thought lingered with me as I sat, static and alone, in a minefield of potholes somewhere on the Five.

The exact location was easy to determine from the guidance system built into each navigation sheave. Yet this did not restore my confidence. The projection which imposed itself on the highway before me matched the curvature (straight) and incline (flat) of the landscape surrounding my vehicle, but the state of the road bore no resemblance. But I did not need technology to tell me this. I had studied the interstate thoroughly in preparation for my sprint to Los Angeles and I knew the points of danger. This was not one of them. Stepping out of the car only made the interruption more mysterious. The pavement was not split by desert weeds (the tenacious fools) nor the scoring of overweight freighters. What I saw before me had only one analogue: flood damage, an impossibility in the parched valley.

Well, impossible or no, my hopes for completing the journey were dashed. I had been toying with cutting the day short after wasting most of the morning just to get through the favelas in the Sacramento hills. But my energy had been restored when I steered through the last of the metal wreckage that blocked the onramp. The open interstate was like an outstretched hand after the urban bubble that lay behind me. Now it had closed to a fist.

I was only welcome on the path I had come by, so I counted my blessings (one for each tire, mercifully un-popped) and began planning my reverse. I scanned the region into a fresh navigation log, satisfied at least I had some novel analysis to share with my fellow enthusiasts. Had I considered at that moment to upload the data I may have noticed the weakness of the signal. Would that have been enough to change my next decision? Perhaps not, for I was confident with my ability to survive in solitude. I dutifully checked the solar throughput before restarting the adaptive engine. I even made a little tap on the high-voltage booster battery which rested below the passenger seat, away from litigious eyes. It answered with a charming fzzt that told me it was ready to push me through twenty thousand leagues yet!

I swung the roadster around to face the wrong direction for highway driving. No patrol car stopped me. In a few bumpy moments I was back to smooth sailing, but my mind did not return to daydreams. I began to piece together an alternative route to salvage my failed expedition. A fresh review of the maps had put the idea in my head that the mystery road could be a shortcut to the ruins of Fresno. Built for an access tunnel, certainly, in which case it may come to a dull end, but the possibility of a destination was too tempting to disregard. In any case, I had more than enough time and energy to make the return trip. Before I could come up with a single mark against the plan, I had already navigated the wrong-way exit and found myself on the single lane into the barren valley.

***

The unmarked road stretched east. At least, it began as such. Looking forward as far as it could stretch it seemed to face the mountains without ever confronting them. One could believe it transcended the Sierras entirely, without ever crossing a pass, and cut through Nevada into the heart of the country. But the helm of my vehicle told a different story. My left arm rested in the gap of the open window, my right was equally restful atop the wheel. Gradually my shoulder strained to pull the car ever-so-slightly left of center. Then a bit further left, and further still, until finally my brain caught up with my body and wondered how I could be pointing so far north (towards home) when the way east remained as straight as a compass arrow. Perhaps the steering was misaligned in this antique, as so many mechanical things were, and was becoming more so as the miles passed. After all, if I had truly been turning for so long I would be facing west, but I could clearly see the reflection of the setting sun in my rearview mirror.

It was then that I discovered the afternoon had passed me by.

There is a state of mind that the road invokes. Not the daydreams of remembrance (sweet Linda) which look only to the past. There is another mode in which one accepts whatever the current scenery has to offer because one can see a new vista just a short drive away. It is serene, yes, but with too much acclimation comes an unspoken belief that the future may solve the problems of the present. An empty battery now will be fixed by full charge later, and other absurdities. It was with this delusion that I let the question of the lost hours be answered by yet another mystery: the reek of manure affronting my nose upon the damp breeze through my window.

The real devil of this line of thinking is that once an absurdity is accepted, others may climb atop its shoulders. The question of the manure was answered by the cows. They tromped across the flat land, some still lazily grazing on grass as they went. And not the radiation-warped ricegrass that endures in the badlands, but genuine green Bermuda fit for a conservatory. The question of the grass was answered by the farmer – horseback cowpoke guiding his citizens home – while the question of the farmer was answered by the farm. All of this came to me along the road, stacking impossibilities like bricks until the resulting structure was as quaint as the farmhouse which lay at the end of the drive.

There were still beef and dairy farms, I knew, in the northern agridomes that could still sustain such luxuries. Were any of them, I wondered, operated by such a woman as the farmer who hailed me from her ample front porch? Her auburn hair bore only a few patches of silver that threatened to glint in the twilight. She showed no hesitation leaving from the wood steps and covering the muddy ground in her boots (could they be real leather?) until she stood in front the roadster, running her hand knowingly across the apple-red finish. I was challenged by her readiness. I let my driving shoes plunge into the soft dirt and the smell of earth that enveloped me turned sweet. I outstretched my hand and she shook it firmly.

“Mrs. Boue, I presume.”

I assumed she understood my reference to the sign that stood at the entry to the dirt driveway. She made no reply except to return her attention to the car.

“You have an eye for classics, I can tell.”

This made her chuckle, which was charming though I did not understand the joke. She gestured to her farmhouse, the barns, and the stable. She could have been mocking me, but somehow I knew it was a statement of humility. I am the antique here, it said. But still she did not speak until she had finished her circumnavigation of the car, whereopen she blessed me with the words I longed to hear:

“You must stay for dinner.”

And I did.

***

Tess and George, as they would introduce themselves, had no concern about my intrusion into their bucolic paradise. It would be impossible to find two hosts more welcoming than they. George grilled steaks for us – great pounds of meat – without a hint of concern for the expense of such a luxury dish. Between bites of tender flesh I made conversation, with continued gratitude that they brushed away.

“I do feel silly, mistaking your road for a public one. Indeed, such access must be crucial for your thriving business.”

Tess nodded and took a healthy drink from her glass of water, fresh from the farm’s well. I was quickly growing accustomed to how she let George speak for her, when it came to mundane details, at least. He dabbed his mouth with a hand towel, a remarkably delicate action for his thick, calloused hands and sun-darkened lips.

“We exchange beef and dairy for what we need, yes,” he confirmed.

“And you operate the farm all by yourselves? You must have quite some automation in place!”

“Less than you are imagining, I am sure.”

He gestured to the head of the table, and though I thought he was prompting Tess I realized he was actually addressing the portrait hanging on the wall behind her. A woman, done up in oils, with a babe on her knee with an honest-to-goodness bonnet on her head. The woman’s soft cheeks and dimple in her chin made her relation to Tess quite apparent.

“We do things just about the same as Madame Boue did in her day. The land and the livestock provide for us. The work isn’t as hard as you all think, coming from out there.”

Tess nodded, leaving her eyes on me.

“Not even a farm hand, then?” I asked. Then, as if I had not intruded enough into their lives, “Or a son to help you, at least?”

This did make Tess look away. George took her hand, thinking he had hid the comforting gesture beneath the table. My prying tongue had gone too far at last. I could only think to break the silence by offering something of myself in exchange.

“Linda was my wife’s name. Our daughter… well, she never had her name. It has been ten years, eleven this June, and I have gone through every name we might have chosen but none of them ever felt quite right. I just know Linda would have picked the one. Would have made it right for her, and for me.”

The truth was old, not a fresh pain, but I wished my glass of water was something stronger all the same. Tess reached out as well, but not for her glass. She took my hand, and the three of us sat there in a triangle, holding our old bones in the old house on a farm from another era.

Eventually George cleared his throat, softly.

“We do not know a loss like yours, though we have imagined it many times. You see, we have come to find that I am simply not able to provide a child-”

“You provide so much for us,” Tess reassured.

“Yet we imagine a daughter, a little Lady Boue,” George faltered.

What passed between us then was an understanding that only silence can bring. George claimed their grief was not the same as mine, but the pulse of his heart that I felt through Tess’s fingertips told otherwise. Was the future leaking into this moment as well? Was the child I would come to meet in the room with us then, or was it just the painting of the babe in the bonnet reflected in the pitcher of well water?

***

They did not ask me to stay the night in so many words. Dinner gave way to smoke on the porch, the ambient odor of cattle somehow sweet on the cooler night air. I satisfied their curiosity with tales of desolation exploration. In turn George offered me a tour of their little niche. Tess thought this was a splendid idea, and I had to agree. The plan for tomorrow settled, Tess showed me to their spare room. She wished me goodnight but lingered in the doorway, watching me take in the space. There were a few pieces of furniture which, except for the bed, were covered with dusty beige sheets. One half of the room was taken up by a circular rug, woven in colors that I’m sure were once quite vibrant. Two amorphous structures stood on it, one tall and the the other low so that I almost stumbled over the thing in the dim light.

With Tess’s eyes still on me I walked over to the bed and gave it an inquisitive squish. I gave her a satisfied smile, which she returned with a nod. Still she did not depart. Unsure if she expected me to fall asleep under her gaze, I turned instead to the window. The moon was still low, a sliver, dimly hinting at the edges of an evening mist. Actual mist! In this dehydrated valley! Mr. and Mrs. Boue had entertained my tales of the world beyond, but they did not seem to understand how wondrous I found their little oasis. There was George now, leading a dozen cows from one paddock to a barn in the heart of the mists.

“Does he always work so late?” I turned to ask Tess, but she was gone.

I watched out the window for a moment longer, but the mist became too thick to see the barn. I moved closer to the window and once again nearly tripped. This time my curiosity needed to be satisfied, so I pulled the cloth away, careful to keep the dust as still as possible.

The structure was a dollhouse; a castle, in fact, with ramparts and turrets and flags that gave the little place a powerful illusion of height. The revelation that this was (or would have been) their daughter’s room made my heart ache. I stepped back. There on the colorful rug was an imagined image of my own little girl playing with king and queen figurines. A rare visit from this dream, I let myself idly watch her for quite a while.

When I turned away I still heard the creaking of the wooden drawbridge. In an attempt to distract myself I grabbed the sheet on the other structure. I pulled it away too forcefully, the dust erupted into plooms that clouded my eyes. As it settled I took in the outline of a mirror that stood tall in its ornate copper frame. Within the glass was the castle and my little girl still sitting on the floor, even clearer than how I imagined her. She laughed, she walked the queen along the ramparts, and then she turned to offer the doll to someone. Standing in the reflection of the bedroom door was another girl. I only saw her – imagined her, though I had never envisioned that figure before ­– for a moment, but I knew from a glance that she was cross. Her bitter frown frightened my girl who began sobbing instantly. Before I could realize my foolishness I turned and dropped to my knees to comfort the child.

But she was gone. My dream had faded. A blur of movement in the door was the last of it, though perhaps that was just George passing on his way to bed. I decided it was time for me to do the same. I shut the door tight first.

I slept soundly. Nothing visited me in my dreams. The soft creaking of the old house stood out against the absolute silence of the country outside. Old, wooden noises were comforting after the electric drone of the city.

Footsteps pounding the floorboards woke me. The sun was not even hinting at the horizon, but I was rested enough to know morning was not far. I heard my hosts waking up, hurried movements, yet George’s voice was calm through the walls. I slipped on my own clothes (the one change I had packed for the journey) and found myself in the hall just as they were about to descend the stairs. George paused, apparently undecided, until Tess waved me to follow.

“Ah, well,” George offered as we exited through the back door, “a great opportunity for you. The perfect start to the day. Get to see Tessy at work, too.”

Mrs. Boue was ahead of us, getting ready some kind of a kit from a shed between the house and the pastures. She handed us aprons like the one she wore. The material was slick, old rubber or perhaps just oil cloth. George cranked the starter on an old generator. The gasoline engine turned over once then kicked into gear. Energy pumped into the halogen lamps that George handed me. He told me to point the light wherever they needed it, then rushed to help Tess who was already kneeling behind a water trough. Beside her was something dark and massive. George disappeared behind it.

I stumbled forward with the lights. Under the halogen the thing was still a supple black, but white spots rippled across it at random. Tess reached into that space, unafraid. Her arms slipped into shadow. Around her were legs. Two, then four, then six. She pulled the beast forward into life.

Tess handed the calf over to George, who cleaned its pitiful face with water from the trough. Its matted fur looked a little healthier, then. Its pink tongue flailed, grotesque at first, but less so when its gleaming eyes blinked open. George carried the creature into a bed of hay, then urged me to refocus the light on Tess. The birthing cow was groaning something awful still.

“Twins, eh?” I exclaimed, a bit giddy. George shook his head.

A moment later another head emerged. Tess guided this one out, handed it to George, and turned right back to the bovine womb. Sweat gleamed on her brow, a few strands of auburn strayed from her ponytail and blocked her ice-blue eyes. Her focus on the mother did not break. A third calf, then a fourth (how many legs!), all pulled into life by her hands. They stumbled into the hay, thirsty tongues flopping asunder, the teat they hungered for still strained by the sisters who kept coming to join them.

By the time the sun rose the cow’s struggle had finished. All told, ten calves came from her. Each who was a gross little monster under the harsh lamps was a gleaming cherub under the light of day. Tess rubbed them down with water from the trough like a baptism for the little angels. George patted me on the back, saying she could handle them from here. We put away the equipment, not that it had done much; nature had showed us its way that morning.

***

After a robust breakfast of steak and eggs, George was back to work and I with him. He kept me active. I felt more like an apprentice than a tourist, which satisfied me immensely. Feeding, milking, butchery – the density of labor was astounding.

The cattle were the stars of the show, but George made it clear what set the stage: the water. We checked the pressure in the pipes that served the house, filled the troughs, and irrigated the fields. George told me of the expansive aquifer that stretched beneath their farm, keeping this one patch of agriculture alive in fifteen-thousand square miles of withered land. The great Madame Boue bought the property in search of oil, that pyrite of a mournful age. Her initial failure turned out to be a much better investment in the future, one that the family kept discrete. The rest of the valley reached farther and farther for water, until nothing was left to drain. Only one reservoir remained.

I asked, in passing, if the Boue family ever considered sharing the water, or selling it. George ignored the question, so I mentioned the state would have offered them a fortune for it when the climate turned. He still did not engage with the idea, except to say it was impossible. That they never could have known. From this I realized just how generous my hosts were, bringing me into their confidence as much as into their home. I promised I would share nothing of this secret in my writings nor by word of mouth. George did not seem concerned. He opened a spigot and under the stream of secret stuff we washed the day’s dust from our faces.

Before supper I made a brief attempt to research some queries that I had not felt comfortable asking George. Chiefly, how many calves does a cow usually birth? Unfortunately I still had no signal. I was starting to feel the craving for connection to the wider world, despite the refreshing day I had spent on the farm. In the living room I found a shelf of paper books, including antique encyclopedias. I was skimming the “C” volume when Tess called me to the dining room.

The meal was a meaty one again and I set upon it ferociously, ravenous from the day’s work. Mr. and Mrs. Boue did not match my appetite, instead focused on a conversation whose beginning I seemed to have missed.

“His work satisfied you?” Tess inquired.

“Oh entirely. Spirited, curious, and really appreciates what we have here.”

“Yes, the fact he found us out here was enough of a sign, but it is lovely to see him take to it.”

I washed down some red juices with a gulp of water. They were clearly speaking about me.

“Well it sounds like I passed the interview,” I offered with a chuckle. “Shame I didn’t know there was a job.”

Tess returned my laugh. George gained a new interest in his food.

“Dear, I am sorry to speak of it as labor. We really didn’t mean it like that. It’s just nice to feel for a moment that we have a family again.”

She rested her hand on the table where I could take it in mine if I wanted. I almost did, remembering the enriching conversation the day before. But George’s hand was not offered. He was buried in his steak. Tess’s eyes were on me alone.

“You know,” she continued, “I can bear children.”

I was taken aback. Her soft eyes suggested nothing of this transition from bonds of grief to… whatever this was.

“My husband has provided many things for this farm, but there is one thing he cannot provide for me.”

Tess’s words were soft, yet I could not imagine how hard they must have hit George’s ears. He did not wince, or flush with embarrassment. Perhaps it was a fact he had come to accept. We all come to accept these things when we reach a certain age. Tess’s hand still rested so close to mine. A hand that had pulled almost a dozen lives into the world that morning.

“Fertility services…” I looked to my plate for a bite that could give me a moment to think, I had already picked it clean. “They can do amazing things, restoring the verve you might need, to make… it possible. Or,” I drank from my glass, “a donation, of course.”

Tess did not retract her hand, but she did at last address George.

“He still thinks us old fashioned, dear.”

George nodded.

“Well, he’s not wrong. But it’s a matter of love.” She turned to me. “You’re not wrong. But you know we love this place.”

“It is immensely charming,” I agreed.

“And it will grow to charm you even more tomorrow, if you would stay.”

“Stay the week!” George interjected.

“A lovely idea, husband. He says you are curious about our family history. A few days more and we shall,” her hand moved at last, closing the distance to caress my fingertips, “satisfy your curiosity.”

An answer formed on my lips, but what it was, or whether it was the truth, I will never say. Would acceptance have saved me? Did the possibility of my refusal cause what happened next? For, the moment I felt her touch on my skin, a cracking of wood broke our trance. Storm shutters slammed closed and rattled open again. The whistling wind brought the rain rushing into the gaps.

George was up in a blink, but he did not go to the windows. He was out the door, letting Tess seal the inside. I called out to caution him. Tess stopped me at the threshold.

“He can face a storm, he knows what to do.”

“But, so sudden?”

“You are best in bed. It will pass, I’m sure.” Then, as if we had never been interrupted. “You’ll stay, yes.”

I heard the rain pound on the roof of the farm house in the abandoned valley of dry wasteland.

“Yes,” I lied.

***

Shutting the door in the guest room I noticed something had changed. The dollhouse was gone, leaving the room even more bare. The mirror stood reflecting the emptiness. I was glad that was all it reflected. I decided to replace the cover over it before retiring to the bed to formulate my plan. As I walked past the window I saw George pushing through the rain down below. He was pulling cattle on a line, how many it was hard to tell in the darkness. I lost sight of them somewhere near the lonely barn.

I rested on the bed, hoping a moment of sleep might soothe the anxious feeling in my gut that told me to leave. It did not, it only urged me to check my devices for a signal that I knew would not appear. An hour ticked away. The rain subsided. The thumping wind gone, I strained my ears to hear any movement of my hosts. Only a soft dripping in the gutters filled the void.

The door must have swelled with the moisture, for it popped and scraped when I tried to open it smoothly. Fortunately, it did not summon anyone to the hallway. Were they even in the house? No matter, I was down the steps and out on the porch in a single breath.

From the porch I could see the roadster was gone. There was no question of where it had been: deep dirt grooves showed where the weight of the wheels had rested. Still I stumbled up and down the driveway thrice before acknowledging the turn of fate. I threw my knapsack to the ground and cursed, then nervously looked back at the house for any sign I had awoken my hosts.

My captors? Surely not. George must have just put the car away to protect it from the weather. He did not have a key, but an ingenuitive man like him could tow it without a problem. There, now, the tracks in the mud did lead directly towards shelter: the lonely barn where, perhaps, vehicles were stored.

These thoughts, or the lack of any alternative route out of that place, ushered me deeper into the farm. The high gabled roof blocked the quivering moonlight that had lit my way. From my pocket I drew the device that, still disconnected from civilization, was nothing more than an overengineered torch. Its blue glow showed the frame of the barn door which was open wide enough for my vehicle to have entered.

When I moved closer the door began to slide shut. Pale fingers I saw there, wrapped around the edge of the door. They were small, could only belong to a child, but they were driving the heavy door with such force my way forward was quickly disappearing. I leapt into the barn torch-first, hoping to stun whoever lurked there. But my light caught nothing except a long white arm extending into the darkness. I turned, baffled, as the door latched behind me. The hands that controlled it were small, yes, but they were no child’s. The wrists met at a single elbow that joined the two appendages and three of their accomplices at a muscled intersection. This fist of fists was larger than any man’s. I choked back a scream, but my failed silence mattered little as the palm of palms closed its grip around my mouth and pulled me into the dark.

Soft but strong. Like a newborn, I thought. Was it playing peekaboo with me when little glimpses slipped between those nested fingers? I saw the next elbow – truly a knuckle of an even greater fist – when it dragged me down into the pit the barn sheltered. Then fingers over my eyes. The world gone. Where is it? There it is! My eyes wide, just trying to take in the dim images of flesh forking around me. The roadster, a drowned cow, then gone again. Forever? No. Peekaboo!

When the last hand took its grip away from my mouth I sipped air cautiously. On my elbows and knees, I could feel the edge of the water waiting for me slip in. Opening my eyes, my head seemed to be above water, so I gulped breaths while I still could. My arms were sinking into the mud. Pushing backward only pulled me closer to the dropping depths. Craning my neck only revealed more of the lake’s surface. A flat expanse stretching underground. Home to something that refracted the darkness.

But there was not just darkness in the water. I blinked tears from my eyes, and it blinked back. Amber and rhythmic, I thought it was toying with me again until I recognized my old friend: the roadster. Fifteen feet down, buried nose-first in the mud, the submerged vehicle had enough juice left for its turn signal to send me a final farewell. Right, right, right, my boy. Down, down, down we go.

A rumbling, sucking sound from the far end of the cavern told me the time was upon us. I took a last gasp as my head slipped under the surface. I could see the car better then. Its doors were torn asunder, its body holding together less than whatever electronics kept the indicator light alive. A thought took hold of me then, an urge to drive the road ahead. I let myself sink underwater, limply at first, and then propelled by the thought of the limbs that were hunting for me under there. They found me in short order, but not before I made it to the passenger seat. With a last breath squeezed from my lungs by a child’s fist punching my diaphram, I pressed the button.

Fzzt!

***

The shock was not enough to kill that thing. Do not imagine for a moment that it might be resting there, defeated, unable to protect its liquid horde. If you seek it out, you will only prove to be a nuisance to it, as was I. Not that I could help you find the place, anyway. The rushing tide that carried me out of the pit flooded plains and canals that crossed the valley at impossible angles. The surveyors who found me could trace the path of destruction, but not its source. The thirsty landscape welcomed the flood, absorbing it in mere days, leaving only a thin sediment of history.

I still drive. Not the Five, but I do. I need that place where Linda can visit me. Where I can see, in the rear-view mirror, in the back seat, our little girls.