The Devil in Silver

So that night he’d passed through every room on Northwest’s second floor. Surveying the discarded furniture where he’d made his nests, the wiring he’d chewed through, it was surprisingly difficult for him to give up the grounds he’d cultivated, no matter how barren and lifeless now. He might not have gone through with it, but then he heard the humans nearby. They’d found their way into his realm. Sure, there’d been the old woman, who sometimes sprinkled bits of food on the floor for him, but this night there were a dozen humans crashing around. Howling and battling and encroaching on his territory. This, finally, was what convinced LeClair to go. He thought he might make his way to that place—Outside—where the other rats had gone. Maybe he would find some of them. Or maybe he would die. But at least he wouldn’t be stuck in here, bereft, adrift, alone.

This is how LeClair the Rat came to be in a section of the air duct when Loochie appeared. She found that big old rat directly ahead of her.

Wow! She could scream. The only thing that shut her up was when the rat turned toward her. She thought LeClair the Rat might charge and bite off her nose. This threw her into a dazed silence.

She tried to turn around, or scoot backward, but pushing back only seemed to wedge her in tight. She imagined getting stuck here, unable to wriggle free, dying in a fucking pipe. She didn’t know what to do. She could slide her hands up in front of her, one at a time. At the very least she could try to guard her face. Bat the big rat back if it came at her.

But what did LeClair the Rat know about this human in front of him? Zip. As far as he was concerned, this body in the air duct might be kin to With Teeth. It hadn’t been able to catch LeClair, so it sent this smaller one. It wasn’t only Loochie who was smacked with a sudden case of fright.

Loochie watched the rat.

And LeClair watched her.

Finally, the rat turned away from Loochie. It moved again.

Loochie thought she’d wait long enough to let the rat disappear. That was what her revulsion suggested she do. But she had to admit that she felt lost. The air duct hadn’t just run a straight line out of the building. The air duct twisted here and there like bends in a road. She wasn’t entirely sure if, at the end of her journey, she’d be looking out on a night sky or just back into the second-floor hallway, where she’d started. Pepper hadn’t given her Dorry’s map after all. In here, she was on her own.

In her mind, she’d already retraced her path to the bus stop in front of Sal’s Famous Pizzeria. (Or whatever it had been called.) She was already looking for the tree that leaned so far over that its leaves touched the roof of one home. She was already planning on the face she’d pull when she pretended she left her MetroCard at home and could the bus driver please just let her ride to the depot. She imagined the letter she would write to her mother, explaining why this, as wild as it seemed, was the sanest choice she’d made for herself in many years. For all her hesitation, her fear of hurting her mother, Loochie was already determined to leave.

Then Loochie thought about that rat. Like rats fleeing from a sinking ship. That’s the cliché, right? But the point of the line, really, is this: Life wants to live. She didn’t know her way around an air duct, but she bet that rat did. If she followed it, where would it lead? Right back into the building, maybe. But in that case she wouldn’t be doing any worse than she already was. But the rat might also make its way outside. And she would come tumbling after it.

Loochie followed the rat, at a distance. She could barely make it out ahead, its claws scritching on the air-duct metal as it moved. But she managed. And in this way, for once in his life, LeClair the Rat helped someone without being a prick about it.

Loochie reached the end of the air duct. The panel here had been knocked off by hordes of fleeing rats long ago. She saw the big gray rat slip right out. She saw the starry night ahead. She peeked out. A Dumpster sat directly below the duct, lid closed. A one-story drop. Dangerous but manageable. Even if she would have to go out hands-(and head) first.

Loochie watched the rat where it lay on the Dumpster. It surveyed the open parking lot. She shifted in the duct, making noise. The rat looked up at her. Then it shot off the Dumpster and ran into the parking lot. She watched it dart between parked cars and off into the distance. As silly as it sounds, she wished that big old rat well.

She slipped partway out of the duct. She inhaled the air, hoping it would be fresh, but nothing so poetic awaited her. She was right over a Dumpster. She smelled garbage. She hadn’t reached the last step, but the next step. She looked down at the drop. She tried to breathe slowly.