Break in Case of Emergency

by Brian Francis

  So, I’ve come to understand, in some terrible way, that I’m better off that my mom isn’t here. I love my mom more dead than if she were still alive.

  I think people would love me more if they lost me too.

  Chapter 18

  It seems like 1 a.m. will never come. That’s the time I’m going to meet Mike by the row of evergreens on the far side of the farm. He’s supposed to pull over to the side of the road and wait with his headlights on.

  I’m lying in bed, fully dressed. Grandma Kay and Grandpa Frank went to bed a couple of hours ago. I listened as they passed by my door, the floorboards snapping under their feet, Grandpa Frank farting as they made their way down the hall.

  “That wasn’t necessary,” Grandma Kay said.

  It was all so familiar, but it felt like the first time I was hearing their routines. The bathroom faucet turning on. The click of the light switches. The whining bed springs beneath their bodies. Then, a silence so loud I could almost feel it inside the house.

  Grandma Kay gets up shortly before midnight, just like I knew she would. She always does. I hear their bedroom door open, then the whish-whish of her slippers on the floor (she’s never barefoot, and thinks her feet look like blue cheese), and, as I listen to her, I feel something grab my heart. A tenderness, like what you’d feel when someone you cared for didn’t realize you were watching them. The toilet creaks as Grandma Kay settles down on it, and I imagine her, her nightgown with the periwinkle flowers on it, her pillow-flattened hair, her face frowning into the dark. She has no idea what’s in store for her. And thinking that almost makes me change my mind. What if I cause Grandma Kay to have a heart attack? And what about Grandpa Frank? I can see him sitting in his tractor, in the middle of the timothy fields, and thinking about me. How could I do that to them? What kind of person am I?

  And what will Arthur say when he finds out? Will I finally have his attention, after all these years? He’ll understand how much he hurt me. The damage he’s caused. But it’ll be too late. Time has run out. For everyone. There are no second chances.

  The toilet flushes. The seat bangs down on its base, making me jump. Then Grandma Kay shuffles back down the hallway and I think I hear a soft sigh and I wonder about all the things that might have caused that sigh and how I’ll never know any of my grandmother’s secrets.

  It will hurt at first. I know that. But, in time, they’ll understand they’re better off without me. I did what was best, what was needed. For everyone.

  Grandma Kay closes her bedroom door. The house is silent again except for the ticking of the living room clock.

  “Goodbye, Grandma Kay,” I whisper.

  * * *

  At 12:30 a.m., I consider getting out of bed, wondering why I’m waiting to head out. What does it matter? But I tell myself that if I get out of bed too soon, my plans will fall through. Everything will be ruined. This is the way my mind works sometimes.

  So I patiently wait until the glowing red numbers of my clock turn to 12:55. I pull the covers back, aware of every little noise I make, as though all of my movements, even my breathing, are being played over a sound system. I swing my feet around and step out of bed, wincing with every creak I make. I arrange both of my pillows into a long shape and pull the covers over, just like they do in the movies. Then I grab my shoes and hoodie and slowly inch my way down the hall.

  I tiptoe through the kitchen and to the stairs that will take me down to the basement. I’ll sneak out the window. In the laundry room, hidden under the stairs, beneath Grandma Kay’s jarred pickles and beets, there’s a knapsack with food and a suitcase. The pills are inside the suitcase. I don’t need food or clothing, since I’ll be taking the pills as soon as Mike leaves, but it would look suspicious if I didn’t bring anything. I grab the suitcase and knapsack and awkwardly make my way over to the window, thankful that Grandpa Frank took off the storm windows last month. I open the latch, prop the window open with my head and unhook the screen before sliding it over. Then I push my knapsack through the window, followed by my suitcase and, once that’s done, I pull myself out and let the window gently fall back into place.

  Now, I’m standing, surrounded by the night. Crickets are singing, and the moon overhead looks like a fingernail clipping. Stars are everywhere. The cows are here too, although I can’t see them. But I can feel them, giving me courage.

  When I first came to the farm, I was afraid of the country, especially at night. The silence bothered me. Not that I wanted to be around other people, but it was comforting to know that they were there, in the apartment next door or walking their dog along the sidewalk. I know I was supposed to be happier in the country. I’ve read books where girls skipped around fields, making friends with rosebushes and hollyhocks. But not me. Hollyhocks were only good for one-sided conversations. After a while, though, I got used to things. I even came to like the country a little more. But I still liked the city better, with all its noise. The strangers around me.

  Standing here, alone, in the darkness, brings back some of that fear. I imagine coyotes lurking behind tree trunks. A man with an axe slowly approaches me from behind. I hold my knapsack tighter against my chest and listen. But there’s no time for fear. Mike will be here any minute—if he isn’t already—and I need to get to the evergreens.

  Something nudges my leg and I almost scream. I look down and see that it’s Ladybug, our collie.

  “What are you doing out here?” I whisper, crouching down to pet her. “You’re supposed to be sleeping.”

  She rubs the side of her snout against my pant leg and I almost start crying because she’s just an old dog and one day she’ll die, even though she doesn’t know that.

  “I have to get going, Ladybug,” I say and give her a quick kiss on the top of her head. “I’ve got things to do. Be a good girl.”

  I walk away, knowing that she’s staring after me. But I try not to dwell on this. I can’t. So I make my way through the fields, my sneakers soaking up the dew, the cans inside my knapsack thumping against my back. Why wasn’t I smart enough to bring packages of soup, instead?

  In the distance, I see a pair of headlights, two giant owl eyes.

  “Please be Mike,” I whisper and head toward them.

  Chapter 19

  The week before she died, my mom and I went to a family reunion with Grandpa Frank and Grandma Kay. I didn’t want to go and told my mom that.

  “Toby, please don’t start with me,” she said in a tired voice. “This is something I promised your grandma. She wants us to go. As to how I feel, I’ll keep my mouth shut.”

  I watched her get ready. A few times, I heard her mumble it was all “crap,” and it seemed like she was nervous about something. It took my mom a long time to pick out her clothes and she put on mascara and blush, which she only did for special occasions.

  “The sooner this is over, the better,” she said.

  She’d been acting strange the past few days. Not strange enough to make me worry, but I could tell when something was off. My mom’s eyes would look at me, but I knew she wasn’t seeing me. It was like my mom was doing everything she was supposed to do, but she didn’t understand why she was doing it in the first place.

  We picked up Grandma Kay and Grandpa Frank at the farm. Grandpa Frank had on a thick, brown tie and Grandma Kay was in a pleated dress with daisies. Her fingernails were pink. It was the first time I’d ever seen a colour on my grandma’s nails and I couldn’t stop staring at them. Grandpa Frank told us he’d drive up north to the reunion because he didn’t trust anyone behind the wheel except himself.

  “Suits me fine,” Grandma Kay said. “I’d sooner be skinned alive than drive on the highway.”

  “You make it sound like going off to war,” my mom said.

  “That’s what it feels like when she’s behind the goddamned wheel,” Grandpa Frank said.

  “Watch your language,” Grandma Kay said. “There’s a child in the car.”

  I had heard the word goddamned
before. Worse words too.

  Grandpa Frank apologized. “Goldern, I meant to say.”

  “Goshdarn,” Grandma Kay said, and my mom pinched my leg, to show that we were in on a joke. That my grandparents were funny in a way they didn’t understand.

  The reunion was held in a hall in an arena. I remember the smell of the arena, like damp straw and old wood. My mom’s smile was fake as we made our way through the people. Other kids were there, running around what I guessed would be the rink in the wintertime. Grandma Kay told me to go and play with them.

  “These are your kin, after all,” she said, like I should be proud, and nudged me with the back of her hand.

  But I didn’t move from my mom’s side. I wasn’t comfortable around other kids. They made me nervous. They still do. It’s like they don’t care what they look like or what they say, and I can’t get out of my head to be like that. I don’t know if that makes sense. It’s like I feel both too old and too young.

  “Go on,” my mom said. “I’ll be right here.”

  I saw the look on her face. She wanted me to go and I didn’t want to upset her. I knew that being around other people could make her nervous.

  Be a good daughter, Toby, I told myself. Don’t make your mom mad. You know what will happen if you do.

  So I walked to the centre of the rink and stood there, trying to look friendly, whatever friendly was supposed to look like. My stomach felt like a stormy sea. Eventually, a boy came up to me. I didn’t hear his name. He seemed stupid in the way most boys were stupid. He had a twisted front tooth and eyebrows that were very close to one another.

  “Who are you?” he asked. He was panting, like he’d just run from somewhere.

  “Toby,” I said.

  “I’m related to you,” he said. “We’re probably cousins.” He looked over his shoulder. “I dare you to do something.”

  “What?” I hoped it wasn’t something like showing him my underpants. I’d seen stuff like that at recess.

  “Go up to your mom and say, ‘Mom! Mom!’ and then when she says ‘What?’ you say, ‘Oh, I forgot,’ and walk away.”

  I waited for the second part, but nothing came. He was stupider than I thought. But it gave me a reason to go back to my mom, so I said, “Okay.”

  He started to jump up and down as I walked away. “Make it seem like an emergency. Like you’re on fire or something. That’ll make it funnier.”

  I gave him a thumbs-up and walked back to the hall to find my mom.

  It was hard making my way through the crowd. By that time, the hall was full of people. The sound was a thousand buzzing bees; voices were bouncing off the walls and ceiling, like the hard rubber balls that were banned from school because a kid got hit in the face and came back to school with an eye like a purple doughnut.

  I couldn’t find my mom. All I could see were strangers.

  “Are you lost?” I heard a voice say, but I didn’t stop. I knew better than to talk to strangers, even if those strangers were related to me. All I wanted was to find my mom. If I didn’t keep moving, I’d lose her. I was sure of that.

  By the time I found Grandma Kay, hot tears were falling down my face. My nose was running too. I could taste it in my mouth. The salt. I worried it would leave a mark on my dress.

  “What’s the matter, Toby?” Grandma Kay asked. “What happened to you?”

  But I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t say anything except for “Mommy!” I could hear my own voice, so high and breathless, like the boy’s voice had been, only different.

  We found my mom. She was only a few feet away, sitting at a table with a couple of women, eating a brownie. I could smell the chocolate on her as I buried my face into her shoulder, her hair stiff from hairspray.

  “Toby, calm down,” she kept saying. And I knew I needed to; I didn’t want to make my mom upset. But I couldn’t calm down. I couldn’t get over the fear that I wouldn’t find her. Of her not being here. Of leaving me alone, in this arena, with these boys and their twisted teeth and stupid dares. Of leaving me with all these strangers.

  My mom excused herself from the other women and led me out to the parking lot.

  “What is the matter with you?” she asked.

  “I couldn’t find you,” I cried. “I thought you left me.”

  She crouched down so that she was looking into my eyes. “Why would you think that? I’d never leave you, Toby. Never.”

  And I believed her.

  Chapter 20

  Holy shit, Tobe-ster. I didn’t think you’d actually go through with it.”

  “Don’t joke with me,” I say. “This isn’t the time.”

  “I’m not joking. You’re the one who’s running away in the middle of the night. When was the last time you did something this crazy?”

  I try to think of something. Taking Mr. Whitlock’s pills? Not that I can tell Mike that. “I can’t remember,” I say. “You didn’t say anything to Trisha, did you?”

  “She knows nothing. She’s probably snoring away right now, sucking up her bedroom curtains into those huge, double-car-garage nostrils.”

  “Her nostrils aren’t that big.”

  In the silence that follows, I have a few minutes to catch up with my thoughts. I can’t believe it. My plan has become reality. I’m here, in Mike’s car, on the highway, heading for the Richardsons’ cabin, in the middle of the night. Have my grandparents discovered that I’m missing yet? Have the police been alerted? I keep checking the passenger-side mirror for flashing red and blue lights. What would I do? Tell Mike to pull over or tell him to press down on the gas pedal? Can I get arrested for running away? Could Mike for helping me? I shouldn’t have brought him into this. I shouldn’t have involved anyone else.

  But it’s nice having him here, next to me. He’s leaning back in the seat, his cigarette dangling from his lips, his thumbs loosely hooked onto the steering wheel. It’s hard not to notice how tight his jeans are across his thighs. My eyes travel up to his crotch, but I quickly look away before he catches me. Trisha told me last week she caught him blow-drying his pubes.

  “I’m scarred for the rest of my life,” she whined. “He was using a brush and everything. Oh, God. I think it was my brush.”

  I wanted more details. Why was he blow-drying his pubes? Did he have a date that night? With his baseball-loving girlfriend? Whoever she is.

  “Who knows and who cares?” Trisha said. “I’m trying to forget it. You, on the other hand, seem a little too interested. Please, Toby. I know you haven’t had a boyfriend yet, but let’s not start looking through the trash can.”

  Oh, Trisha. If you only knew, I thought.

  Mike says we’re almost there. I inhale, choking on the smoke filling up the car’s interior. The smell reminds me of my mom. Once, she made me a pair of tiny cups from the foil sleeve inside her cigarette pack.

  “This is how ladies drink,” she said, giggling as she poured a small amount of apple juice into each one. We tapped our glasses together and my mom told me to keep my pinkie raised.

  I loved those cups, and remembering this makes me sad. So many memories of my mom aren’t happy ones. When was the last time I felt truly happy? Maybe a couple of years ago. I was out walking in the fields. It was around the same time of the year, June. The fields were green velvet. In between the blades of grass, dewy spiderwebs dangled like rhinestone necklaces. The day made me happy, happier than I’d let myself feel for a long time. Generally, I talk myself out of happiness before I feel it. But this day was different. I let the happiness melt over me. It poured over my head and ran down my arms and legs. I let the grass and air and the cloudless sky above me take over. Summer was coming. And I was looking forward to returning to the house, to being with Grandma Kay and Grandpa Frank. I knew there would be a roast in the oven, surrounded by carrots and potatoes, and that by the time the roast was done the carrots would be sweet and mushy. And, for the first time, I knew that I loved my grandparents. Not in the way that I had loved my mom. But eno
ugh. Enough to make things worthwhile. But now, that memory—and that happiness—seems like it happened to someone else. A complete stranger.

  * * *

  It’s darker up north than I thought it would be. Not that we’re that far north. Or east or west for that matter. The Richardsons’ cabin is only forty-five minutes away, but it’s the way that the night seems to be swallowing the car. It just keeps rolling on and on, a bottomless sea, tipped on its side. Maybe, for the first time, I understand that I’ll be in that darkness too. The thought comforts me. No more Toby. No more dead mom. No more absent father. No more hurt. I can’t imagine myself stopping, fading to cool like an unplugged iron. I can’t imagine having no thoughts.

  “Almost there,” Mike says. “Miller’s Lane should be coming up on the right. Past the gas station.”

  Before long, the gas station comes into view, even though the lights are off and it’s closed. Seeing the unlit sign makes me realize how isolated we are.

  I want to ask him about his new girlfriend, but I can’t. Not that I care, anyway.

  Mike slows down the car and turns onto a gravel road, the windshield turning a deeper shade of black. I imagine the car’s tail lights behind us, evil, red eyes. But then I start to see the signs with family names on them. The Zantigs. The Donaldsons. The Fishers. It dawns on me that there are other people around. Strangers, but people just the same. Then I start to get nervous for Mike. He has to drive back himself. What if something happens to him? What if he falls asleep and crosses into the path of an oncoming truck? What if he goes to light a cigarette and loses control of the wheel? I’ll never forgive myself.