Free looked at her and smiled. All the tension seemed to go out of him in an instant, which made her relax as well. “You’re right, babe,” he said. “We shouldn’t drink and drive.” He turned back to the guy. “Ring it up any way you want, man.”
They left the store a minute later, without the beer. In the car they handed Poppy her cigarettes. She accepted them with a soft thank-you. Free leaned over and checked the gas gauge as Teresa turned the key to start the car. “We should get gas,” Free said.
“I have three-quarters of a tank,” Teresa said.
“We might as well top it up while we’re here,” Free said, getting back out. “Pull up to the pumps. Stay in the car. I’ll take care of everything.”
Teresa did as she was told. Free disappeared inside. Behind Teresa, Poppy lit another cigarette. Teresa adjusted her rear-view mirror so she could get a better look at the girl. Poppy didn’t have a problem with her nose being too big. She was beautiful with big grey eyes and creamy white skin. She was extremely pale, it was true, but her colouring made her look ethereal. With her mane of black hair and her black leather coat she was halfway to being a vampire at a masquerade ball. She, too, looked tired. As she leaned her head back against the seat, Teresa watched the orange light of her cigarette glow in the centre of her dark eyes.
“Are you satisfied?” Poppy asked.
“I don’t understand,” Teresa said.
“You’re checking me out. I don’t mind. You’re the one who’s giving us the ride. Do you like what you see?”
“You’re a pretty girl, Poppy.”
“So are you, Teresa.”
“No, I’m not. I’m just OK.”
“Why do you say that?” Poppy asked.
“Because it’s true.”
“You don’t say it because you want me to disagree with you?”
Teresa trembled. “No. Why do you say that?”
Poppy was already losing interest. “Because I’m an amateur shrink. Does my smoking bother you?”
“I told you, I don’t mind.”
“I wish I could quit.”
“Why don’t you?” Teresa asked.
“It’s too late.”
“Does your father live near Big Sur?”
“Yeah,” Poppy said. “He lives in a big old church.”
“You were joking when you said he was a priest, weren’t you?”
“Nope.”
“Do you really want to see him on the way up?” Teresa asked. “The reason I ask is we'll definitely have to take the coast road then and it will take us longer. But I don't mind. I was thinking of going that way anyway.”
“Do you want to see him?” Poppy asked.
Teresa chuckled. “Why would I want to see a priest?”
“He could listen to your confession.”
Teresa shivered, although she still felt hot. Her shirt was damp with perspiration. “I have nothing to confess,” she said.
Poppy closed her eyes. “We all have something to confess.” She took a drag on her cigarette and coughed. “Some bloody thing.”
Free reappeared a minute later. Teresa was surprised to see he had the two six-packs of beer with him. He explained that he had found his licence. He set the alcohol on the front seat and casually topped off the gas tank. Then they were back on the road, back on the freeway. Heading north, with no clear destination in mind.
CHAPTER TWO
They didn’t reach the coast until an hour and a half later, after they had driven through Ventura. On the drive up Free drank four beers, Poppy two, and Teresa one. Closing on Santa Barbara, the black Pacific on their left, they finished the last of the doughnuts and milk. Finally the air tasted fresh and salty. Free dazzled Teresa with more card tricks and was in a jolly mood the whole time. He did one trick where he had Teresa name a card and then – he said he definitely used magic this time – made it appear in the back pocket of her trousers. Try as Teresa might, she couldn’t figure out how he had done it.
“I could have made it show up in your underwear,” Free said as he took the card back and slipped it into one of his deep pockets.
“I'm beginning to believe it,” Teresa said, blushing. She was easily embarrassed when it came to talking about sexual matters, particularly with a cute guy. She had begun to like Free – his outrageous charm, the pleasure he took in everything she said, his exaggerated displeasure with everything Poppy did. Of course, Poppy didn’t say or do much of anything, except smoke and stare out the window at the rain-washed night. Teresa almost wished that Free had been hitch-hiking alone. She didn’t actively dislike Poppy, not really – the girl just had problems that Teresa couldn’t deal with.
Free fidgeted in his seat. He simply couldn’t sit still. “So, what are we going to do next?” he asked.
“Do you want to listen to the radio?” Teresa asked. She loved to crank the music up while she drove and drown out her thoughts. But so far they hadn’t turned on the radio once. Free brushed aside her suggestion.
“I’m not into canned entertainment,” he said. “I need something live, something that’s got guts. Hey, I know what! Let’s tell stories.”
Teresa frowned. “What kind of stories?”
“Ghost stories,” Free said. “Horror stories. Real life stories. Anything, I don’t care. Poppy and I do this all the time while we’re on the road. It helps pass the time. Doesn’t it, Poppy?”
“The time always passes without our help,” Poppy said.
Free turned round. “You’re in a lousy mood tonight. You should be the one to start. Come on, Poppy Corn, tell us the story of your life. Tell us how you became a big star.”
“I would rather hear a story I haven’t heard before,” Poppy said.
Free raised an eyebrow. “Such as?”
“I would like to hear Teresa Chafey’s story,” Poppy said.
Teresa giggled uneasily. “I don’t know any stories.”
“No,” Free said. “Poppy wants to hear the story of your life.”
“I’m eighteen years old,” Teresa said. “It would take all night to tell you everything that’s happened to me.”
“We have all night,” Poppy said.
“Don’t pressure the girl,” Free snapped. He spoke to Teresa gently. “Why don’t you tell us what’s going on in your life?”
“How do you know anything's going on?” Teresa asked.
Free shrugged. “You haven’t told us where you’re going, and why you’re going there in the middle of the night. Poppy and I’ve got the impression you’re running away from home. I mean, if you are, that's cool. I mean who wants to live at home when you can be out on the road? But hey, we’re like everybody else. We’re curious, we’re nosey. We want to hear the dirt. Did you kill somebody or something?”
Teresa laughed. She laughed so hard she almost steered the car off the road. Only Freedom Jack could have asked such a serious question and made it sound so trivial.
“No,” Teresa said when she had calmed down enough to speak. “I didn't kill anybody. I wish I had, though.”
“Who?” Free asked.
“This guy,” Teresa said. “This jerk I know.”
“Who?” Poppy asked from the back seat.
Teresa hesitated and felt a lump rise in her throat. She continued to feel hot. Maybe she was getting sick. Maybe she just needed to unburden herself. These two – they were strangers and they would talk on the way up the coast, maybe even become casual friends. But then they'd go their separate ways and never see one another again. Who better to confide in?
She decided right then to tell them about Bill.
The awful thing he had done to her.
“His name was Bill Clark,” Teresa said. “He was my boyfriend.”
“Why do you wish you’d killed him?” Free asked.
“I have my reasons,” Teresa said.
They met at the mall during Christmas vacation. The place was packed because it was only two days before the big holiday. Teresa was there
with her mother trying to finish up some last-minute shopping. Actually, even though they were at the mall together and had come in the same car, they weren’t shopping as a happy mother daughter twosome. Teresa couldn't buy anything with her mother present because her mother inevitably told her how stupid she was being. Her mother didn’t approve of anything she did, which caused Teresa to keep a low profile in her presence. Her mother didn’t even like how she studied, lying on her bed and listening to music. And here she was a straight-A student and everything.
For the moment, thankfully, Teresa was alone to make her own decisions. She was hungry and stopped at the food section, which was huge, the selection vast. She could have Mexican, Italian, Chinese or American. She ended up at a Carl’s Jr – she liked the char-grilled chicken sandwiches. She had to get in a long line. After a minute or two the guy in front of her turned round and his hands were also laden with bags. He had brown hair and brown eyes, a nice build. He also had dimples; she noticed those first. She always liked dimples on a guy; they made anyone look less dangerous. She hadn't dated much and guys still scared her a little. This one was about her age.
“It looks like it’s going to be a long wait,” the guy said.
Teresa nodded. “At least fifteen minutes just to put our orders in.”
He nodded at her bags. “Do you have something for everybody?”
She smiled. “No. I ran out of money. I’m going to have a lot of people mad at me this year.” Actually, that wasn’t true. She had bought something for everyone who might conceivably expect a present. It had broken her to do so. She had spent over four hundred dollars. She’d make it back, though, she told herself. She gave guitar and piano lessons every day after school. She had been playing both instruments since she was nine and was considered very good. She also sang and wrote songs, although only a few people knew that. Her best friend, Rene Le Roe, was one. She had spent a hundred dollars on a cashmere sweater from Nordstroms for Rene.
“You can’t please everybody,” the guy said.
“Ain’t that the truth,” she said. She was always trying to please people and thought it was because she was a nice person. Although sometimes she did worry that she just wanted people to like her. She knew those weren’t exactly the same things.
“Are you here by yourself?” the guy asked.
“My mom’s around somewhere. We're supposed to meet in Waldenbooks in an hour. How about you?”
“I came by myself. Do you know what you’re getting for Christmas?”
It was an interesting question, she thought. “I know my parents are getting me a new guitar because I had to help them pick it out. My brother – he lives in San Diego – he’ll probably give me a gift certificate for clothes. He always does. My best friend will get me something totally off the wall. Something I’ll never be able to use or even show anybody.”
“How about your boyfriend?” the guy asked. The question was probing – the fact didn’t escape Teresa. But the guy asked it so easily that she didn’t know if he was interested in her. She didn't even know if she wanted him to be.
Lowering her head shyly, she muttered, “I don’t have a boyfriend.”
“Then I should buy you lunch.”
She raised her head quickly. “Pardon?”
“Can I buy you lunch?”
“Why? I mean, I don't even know your name.”
“I’m Bill Clark. Who are you?”
“Teresa.”
“May I buy you lunch, Teresa?”
She felt her cheeks redden. “Can I order anything I want?”
Bill smiled, showing his dimples. “Anything you desire.”
They both ordered chicken sandwiches when the time came – half an hour later. By then Teresa knew that Bill was a senior in high school like herself and that he was interested in astronomy and physics and that he wanted to journey to Mars before he was forty. By then she also knew she wanted to go out with him, and when he asked for her number after they’d eaten, she couldn’t find a pen quick enough.
He picked her up for their first date two days after Christmas, which was a Saturday. Her parents grilled him for thirty minutes before giving him full responsibility for their darling daughter’s very existence on the planet.
Bill took it all in his stride. When they were in the car he said his mother had died when he was a kid, and that he never saw his dad because the man worked all the time. Teresa felt a pang of sympathy for Bill, yet at the same time she couldn't imagine a more wonderful set-up.
They went to dinner, and Bill talked about the Big Bang Theory – the origin of the universe. He said that fifteen billion years earlier all matter in creation had been condensed into a single point of mass as tiny as the period at the end of a sentence. But that this point exploded, and generated trillions of degrees of heat and a great light that still glows faintly to this day. The background radiation of the universe, Bill called it, and it sounded so incredible because the light of the candles on their table was in his eyes and he had shaved and dressed up just for her. When he was through talking she asked him a question.
“Then what are we?” she asked.
“What do you mean?”
“If all matter in all the universe can be condensed into a period doesn't that mean that we’re like nothing? Just spirits floating around on a ghost planet?”
Bill nodded. “That’s true. All of matter is almost entirely space. Only an infinitesimal part of it is solid.”
“Then how come you can’t see right through me?” she asked.
He smiled. “Who says I can’t? Who says I can’t tell exactly what you’re thinking right now?”
“What am I thinking?” She didn’t even know herself, but it was something about him. Everything about him. He was wonderful, the way he talked about important things – big things. All she had ever thought about was the smallest of things – herself and what others thought of her.
Bill raised his water glass, indicating she was to do the same. They chimed the crystal together. “You’re thinking you want to go out with me again,” he said.
“I don’t know if I can.” She enjoyed watching his face fall. “I mean, there’s a lot of background radiation around you.”
He laughed. “There’s a lot of light around you, Teresa.”
Later, after a movie neither of them enjoyed, he took her to his place. His father was at work. The man must have made big bucks – the house was gorgeous. Teresa felt nervous. She had never been alone with a guy late at night. But she was excited, too, and she trusted Bill. She knew he wouldn’t try to take advantage of her. They sat in the living-room beside a huge aquarium of exotic fish. Bill remembered her comment at the mall about getting a new guitar. She hadn’t talked about her music over dinner. She’d been too busy forming galaxies and creating planets for alien beings to inhabit. His words had carried her to places she had never been before.
“So have you been using your new guitar?” he asked.
“Of course. I play all the time. I’ve played every day since I was nine.”
Bill was impressed. “You’re a real musician?”
She giggled. “I’m not real, remember? Neither are you. Just a bunch of empty space playing with empty space.”
“I have some empty space in the next room that looks like an old guitar my dad never learned to play. Would you play it for me?”
She was shocked. “Oh, I couldn’t do that. I’m not a performer.”
“Then who do you play for?” he asked.
She shrugged. “I just play. I only play for other people when I give lessons.”
Bill stood. “Then you can pretend that you're giving me a lesson. I want to hear you.”
“Why?”
“Because I know you’re going to be wonderful.”
He returned a minute later with a guitar that had seen better days. He sat on a chair across from her. The steel strings were rusty, and it took her several minutes to tune the instrument. Bill sat patiently while her heart
pounded against her chest. She knew she was good, but she didn’t know his tastes. He had said some nice things to her at dinner, but she had no real idea if he liked her the way she liked him.
“What would you like to hear?” she asked finally.
“I can just name any song and you’ll know it?”
“I don't know every song, but I know a few.”
“Play one of your favourites,” he said.
“I want to play one of your favourites.”
“Teresa.”
“What?”
“Play something that you’ve composed. And don’t tell me you haven’t written any music. You have, I can tell.”
She was amazed. “How can you tell?”
“Because you’re a creator. If you were there at the start of the Big Bang I’m sure you would have done a great job of organizing the universe. Maybe better than whoever did do it.”
His remark was ridiculous, of course. But maybe that was why it touched her so. She knew then what she was going to play him. It was a song she had written that morning, while she sat daydreaming about him. She just intended to play him the music, but hardly had she begun to strum the chords than her mouth opened and the words poured out.
There was a song in my room I wanted you to hear.
It had colours and rhythms and a story most dear.
But I kept it to myself out of sorrow and fear
That you would hear it too soon and never again come near.
But you heard it anyway and it made you laugh.
You saw me too soon and your eyes cut me in half.
But I laugh, too, and I don't want it to end.
This time together with the boy who gave me this painful yen.
You think I am an interesting stranger.
I have secrets you don't know that could be a danger.
I have lies that would hurt me to share.
But truths that could comfort me if you care.
So why don’t I stop now?
Why don’t I take my bow?
I can’t say with words in a song
Things that can’t be found in time no matter how long.
Road to Nowhere Page 2