Short Scary Stories

Los Perdidos

The broken blade flashed as it streaked above the desert, circling end over end then striking the rocky ground with a clink. It lay there gleaming in the slanted rays of the sun like lost treasure. The other half of the blade remained lodged firmly between spiky ranks of spines in the barrel cactus, only an inch of the cleanly snapped edge protruding.

Alex would have cried in despair and fury if he’d had any tears left but they were long gone, his eyes as dry as the sandy soil he knelt on. His head pounded and his muscles cramped anew, aggravated by the effort required to fling the knife away in disgust. It was late afternoon on Sunday. He’d run out of water 24 hours ago, every cell in his body aching for replenishment. Though his meager supply of food was a distant memory, driving thirst had long since made him forget the hunger pangs. A long-forgotten scene had pushed to the forefront of his brain: someone in a nameless movie – a Western – cutting into a barrel cactus and drinking the life-saving reservoir of fluid inside it. Hope had briefly seized him, but that hope shattered along with his cheap pocket knife. His swollen tongue clumsily maneuvered a small, smooth pebble around his mouth in an attempt to generate moisture, but it was akin to coaxing water from a bag of cotton balls.

Friday morning had been the start of a well-deserved four-day weekend. It was early May and warm, but still weeks away from the brutal heat of true summer. On a whim, Alex stuffed his sketch pad and pencils, a granola bar, an apple, and a liter bottle of water into his backpack, threw the lot into his pickup truck, and hit the road. He’d wanted to take a day trip west of Tucson since he and Jenna had moved there nine months ago but day-to-day life kept intervening. Envisioning a peaceful morning of hiking and sketching the desert landscape, he sought the most uninhabited and undeveloped area possible. Leaving the city far behind he drove still further, signs of civilization vanishing bit by bit, and was delighted to finally discover an unmarked dirt road well off the beaten path. Without hesitation he turned onto it and bumped along its twists and turns for uncounted miles and minutes until the road became little more than a trail, small desert shrubs and grasses whipping the sides of his truck as he drove.

Carefully coaxing the reluctant truck up a small hill, steering through an obstacle course of large rocks and gaping crevices, he navigated a particularly primitive stretch. The reward at the top of the rise was a stunning view of unbroken miles of Sonoran desert, its rocky ground green with spring and surmounted by an impossibly blue sky that wouldn’t know clouds until the monsoon season started in July.

With the engine idling and both windows rolled down he paused to take in the view, crunching the apple. Dry desert grasses waved gently in the warm breeze and a profusion of spring-green leaves sprouted from a nearby ocotillo. A noisy dispute between two cactus wrens caught his attention and so absorbed was he in his surroundings that he didn’t at first notice the small flames licking the right side of the truck’s hood. By the time the dancing motion of the fire registered in his peripheral vision, small flames had become large ones, hungry for more fuel and sending searing feelers up the windshield. He stared in disbelief for a second then in a panicked single motion grabbed his backpack, flung open the door, and fled, his discarded apple rolling down the dirt trail in his wake.

Assisted by the breeze and the open windows, the engine fire swiftly and greedily spread to the cab, gradually petering out and dying after a brief but savage feeding frenzy. When smoke ceased belching from the engine, Alex cautiously approached and surveyed the ruins. His truck was a useless, smoking lump of metal, the ignition melted and the engine fried. Burned scraps of his jacket littered the blackened passenger’s seat like confetti and his phone – his lifeline – lay shattered and warped on the dashboard next to the now defunct GPS system.

He took stock of his situation: he had no transportation, no phone, and no real idea of where he was. Jenna was in Ohio visiting her family for the first time since the couple moved to Tucson and she wasn’t expecting to hear from him until Monday afternoon. He wasn’t due back to work until Tuesday morning and in any case, he hadn’t told any co-workers about his excursion. The odds of encountering someone else traveling the rough, overgrown road anytime soon seemed infinitesimally remote.