The day grew red hot, and the closer we got to the head of the Island the stronger the scent became. The caterpillars cooked in the sun. The smell was worse at this time of day. People were usually out walking, but nobody was down this way except us.

Fellis passed the first sign that flashed “Caution,” and he drove the truck with one hand on the wheel while he put the other over his nose. The smell was worse than ever. I buried my face in my shirt. The road looked to be moving under us, and I wondered if Fellis put the truck in park and we sat there unmoving, whether the thousands of caterpillars would lift us up and carry Einhell on their backs to our destination.

Halfway through that road the place looked almost seasonless. Some trees were bare, and the limbs swayed naked like trees in the fall, but it wasn’t fall, and the road was slick like packed-down ice, but it wasn’t winter. The area looked half dead like spring, except it wasn’t spring. It was summer, and hot.

The truck tires skidded and Fellis let off the gas. The tires caught, and he pushed the truck on toward the bridge right there in front of us.

Then Fellis gagged, and it made me gag.

“Are you gagging from the smell?” I said. “Or are you sick?”

Fellis waved a hand at me and breathed deep. We were almost by the tribal museum, almost to the bridge and out of that rotting place, when Fellis pulled over.

“Can’t you wait?” I said. Fellis got out of the truck and dropped to the ground, hands and knees among hundreds of dead caterpillars, and he vomited.

The smell took over the inside of the truck. I gagged and went to open the door but it would not open. I pulled the handle time after time but the door stayed shut. “Fellis!” I said. “Fellis! Open my door, I’m gonna be sick—” But it was too late. I threw up on the floor of his truck, and as I heaved once more Fellis came around the truck and opened my door and he said, gagging, “Oh, man,” and I pushed him out of the way and heaved once more onto the street, which appeared to be squirming.

I sat back in the truck, eyes watering.

“We have to clean that up,” Fellis said.

“Drive,” I said. “We’ll clean it up at the store.”

“I ain’t driving with puke in my car.”

“Well if you didn’t lock me in here,” I said.

“I didn’t lock you in here, shithead, you have to jimmy the handle up and down for it to catch the latch in the door.” Fellis spat onto the caterpillars. “You know that.”

“Let’s go,” I said. I tucked my face into my shirt.

“Clean it first,” Fellis said.

“With what?”