“He could if it was coke.”
“Sorry,” Cory said, reaching for the pie. “This piece of flaky Costco goodness is all mine.”
Benny opened the door. “C’mon out! See what I got us. This is gonna blow your minds.”
Ty returned Cory’s smile. “Yeah. He’s flying.”
Cory put the pie on Ty’s plate. He said, “Save me some crust, okay?”
The twins stared in equal parts amazement and shock. Shining under the garage spotlight was the meanest, fastest, coolest, most expensive-looking motorcycle Cory had ever seen. Black as night except where the light reflected off the wheels and mirrors. On top of the seat was a helmet, black and sleek like the bike. Benny stood next to the boys, beaming ear to ear.
Ty said, “That’s…that’s a Ninja!”
“Yup. A ZX-14R. Special e-fuckin’-dition. Fastest production bike on the road.”
Cory’s head was spinning.
Ty said, “Is it new?”
“Cherry top ta bottom. I drove her here straight from the showroom floor.” Somehow he managed to smile a little wider. “Well, not exactly straight.”
Ty walked up to the bike, checked out the gauges. Squeezed the throttle. He looked at Benny. “Can I?”
“Go on. Feel what I felt.”
Ty put on the helmet, straddled the bike, stretched his toes to the pavement. He leaned down low, head tucked behind the small swept-back windshield. After a few moments he sat up, removed the helmet, climbed off the bike. He looked at Cory like It’s your turn now. Cory stayed where he was, afraid to get close and not sure why.
He asked Benny, “How much does one of these cost?”
“Not to worry. I got that covered.”
“Just tell me.”
“I said I got it covered.”
Cory turned to Ty. “Do you know?”
“Base? Sixteen-five. But this one’s tricked out.”
“Bet yer ass she is,” Benny said. “I had her up to one-thirty on the way home an’ she was just startin’ to spread ’er legs.”
Cory felt the gravy coming up. He said to Benny, “Why did you do this?”
“Wazzat’s s’posed to mean?” Cory noted the rapid flicker in Benny’s eyes. He was more than flying. He’d had a six-pack before dinner. Then who knows how many during the movie. Plus whatever he snorted or smoked or swallowed in the shed.
“What we need is a car. Something we can drive to school. Not a…not a…”
“Crotch rocket?” Ty said. Cory couldn’t tell if he was on his side, or Benny’s.
“But I’m gonna teach you how to ride ’er,” Benny said, his altitude still up there. “Have some father-son time up the coast. Camp out by the dunes, dig for clams, bonfires. All that bonding shit.” He picked up the helmet, looked at Cory. “Every boy needs to learn how to ride a bike. An’ there’s no finer way ta learn than on a beast like this.” He walked toward Cory, holding out the helmet.
All Cory could think about was the money. Sixteen thousand dollars! And Tirk spinning that hammer. He didn’t want to say it, tried not to. But he saw bad things heading Benny’s way.
“You need to take it back.”
Benny’s altitude dropped like a shot bird. “So there you go again. Talkin’ like your mother. Tellin’ me what I can and cannot do.”
Cory stepped back. Benny followed.
Benny shook the helmet at him and said, “Put this on.”
“No,” Cory said. “I don’t want to.”
“Just put it on.”
“No.” He stepped back again. Benny followed, closed the distance. He saw Ty move out from behind the motorcycle.
“Put it on, you dickless fat fuck!” He slammed the helmet into Cory’s chest.
Cory took the helmet, slid it over his head. He felt tears, hot and wet, forming in his eyes. The world went dark. He could barely see the bike.
Benny said, “Now sit on ’er. Feel what it’s like to have somethin’ under your ass other than a damn couch.”
Cory couldn’t move. He could barely breathe. He felt a seed of anger rising up from below the fear. He hated his father for planting it there.
Benny stepped behind Cory. Three seconds passed. Then something hard slammed into his back. He stumbled forward, almost fell, stood up. Benny pushed him again. He roared, “I said sit on the bike, you fuckin’ faggot!”
“Don’t call me that!”
“Why not? It’s what you are. I know it.” His eyes flicked to Ty. “He knows it.” Benny moved a step closer, dropped his voice to a low hiss. “No wonder your mother ran. She could smell it in your—”
Cory saw the shadow of Ty pass him, moving fast.
“You keep outta this,” Benny said.
Ty said, “Don’t you ever call him that again.”
“This is ’tween me an’ him. You know I’m right.”
“So what if you are? I mean seriously, who gives a shit? And a motorcycle? What were you thinking?”
“Why’re you takin’ his side?”
Cory turned, pulled off the helmet. His hands were slick with sweat. He accidentally dropped it. It crashed on the driveway, bounced, and spun.
Benny said, “Thass a hundred-dollar helmet!”
“I’m sorry. It slip—”
Benny lunged past Ty. He swung at Cory, sank a punch deep in his gut. Cory doubled over, gasping for breath. The gravy came up, plus the cranberries and turkey. He heard a grunt, a crunch. Looked up in time to see Ty’s sneaker plant a sweeping kick in Benny’s face. Benny sank to the ground, his nose and lips a mush of blood.
Ty stood over him saying, “If you touch him again—ever—I’m not gonna stop till you’re dead. That’s a promise. And unlike you, I know how to keep a promise.” He walked over to the black Kawasaki Ninja ZX-14R motorcycle and kicked it. The bike fell, snapping a side mirror when it hit the pavement. Ty helped Cory walk into the house. Just before they went inside, Cory took a look back. Benny was still on his knees, bent over, shoulders heaving, blood staining the concrete under his face.
Cory was in his bedroom, sleeping on his side because it hurt too much to sleep on his back, when he felt hands grip his arm, pull him out of his bed. A voice, Ty’s voice, screamed, “Get up! Get up! The shed’s on fire!” A shuddering BOOM shattered his window, blew glass and flames into the room.
Then smoke. Thick black smoke that smelled like ammonia. He coughed, couldn’t stop. The fire alarm downstairs started wailing. Ty pulled him out into the hall. They ran down the stairs. Cory fell the last three. Ty picked him up. He felt searing heat. Saw flames in the kitchen blackening that new linoleum. So much smoke. They stumbled past Benny’s bedroom. The door was closed.
Cory said, “Get Benny!”
Ty said, “He’s not there!” and pushed him toward the front door.
There was another explosion, this one bigger than the first.
They ran barefoot out the door, crossed the street, and finally stopped to stare at their home, Ty in sweats and a T-shirt, Cory shirtless in his boxers. The sky above them was an angry mix of red and orange, rising up into the black.
Ty said, “Holy shit! Dude, that was close!”
Cory suddenly remembered what Ty had said: The shed’s on fire! He said, “What about Benny?”
Tongues of orange shot out from the upstairs windows.
A car screeched to a stop in the street. A man got out, ran toward them, cell phone pressed to his ear.
Cory said, “Ty? Where is he? Where’s Dad?”
Ty turned from Cory and stared across the street. His eyes flickered with the light of a raging inferno.
TANUM CREEK
NOW
14
The fire behind us fades as the sound of flowing water builds from a whisper to a rush. We come to a short steep section with very loose dirt. At the base of it, Ty sweeps his headlamp across the water. We skid down the remaining sixty feet. The girl slips twice on the way, leaving deep gouges in the dirt, but we finally reach bottom and stop at the edge
of Tanum Creek.
The creek is narrower than I remember, about twenty feet bank to bank, and a lot faster. The opposite bank is just as steep and intimidating as it was sixteen months ago. I scan the creek upstream and down, hoping to see something familiar. It all looks foreign to me, except for the narrow path we’re standing on that Benny showed us when we followed the blood trail. The girl is a few feet away from me, focused on the slope behind us.
I ask Ty, “Which way do we go?”
“The water is way faster than I remember. Benny said it turned into a death canyon downstream.”
“So you think we’re below Anvil Rock?”
“Yeah.”
“Me too.”
The girl grabs my arm, points. I follow her finger with my eyes. All I see are the gouges in the dirt where she fell, and above that fog and trees. “What am I looking at?”
She puts a finger to her lips, signaling to be quiet. The terror in her eyes is a visceral thing. She points again.
A weak beam of light sweeps across the trees. It doesn’t belong to any of us.
“Shit,” Ty hisses. He kills his headlamp. I do the same.
Darkness closes in.
He whispers, “We should split up.” I barely hear him over the creek.
“No way!” I whisper back.
“Dude, he has the ice ax, and probably a gun. We’re leaving tracks everywhere. She smells like gas. I’ll head downstream with my light on. You guys go upstream for a ways with your light off. He’ll follow me. I’ll take care of him in the canyon.”
“What does ‘take care of him’ mean?” It’s a stupid question. We both know the answer.
Ty slips something into my hand. It feels like an envelope. “What’s this?”
“A letter. Take her to Stumptown. Give me two days.”
“Then what?”
“Read the damn letter.”
“This is crazy. There’s two of us. With your skills, we can take him. Let’s do it here. We’re not splitting up.” He doesn’t respond. I wait a few more seconds, then get a feeling that something isn’t right. I reach out to touch him. He isn’t there. “Ty?” I’m tempted to turn on my light but it’s not worth the risk. The girl tugs my arm. I look up. The driver’s light flashes again. The beam is bigger and brighter. He’s almost at the final steep section.
Then Ty’s light switches on. He’s fifty feet downstream, working his way around a rock. I hear his voice—he’s talking as if in a conversation. The girl tugs my arm again, hard. I have to make a decision. Now.
“Okay,” I whisper. “Let’s go.”
We feel our way through bushes and around boulders. It’s hard work for both of us since I’m dealing with a huge pack that makes a cracking sound every time it snags on a branch, and she has the bad arm. Since I have no clue how far downstream we are, I’m constantly afraid of passing Anvil Rock, plus there’s the very real danger of taking a wrong step and falling into the creek. After struggling over a blowdown, I whisper, “Let’s stop here.”
She stops. I look and listen for signs of the driver. After a minute of nothing but the creek and our heavy breathing, I decide the risk of passing Anvil Rock is greater than the risk of being spotted. I switch on my headlamp.
She points to it, then to her head.
“You want to wear it?” I ask.
She nods.
This makes me wonder if she thinks that I’ll leave her—or if she’s going to leave me. Since she has yet to say one single word and I can’t exactly read minds, I have no idea what is going on inside her head, other than the obvious plan of putting as much distance as possible between her and the driver. I have lots of questions, but now isn’t the time.
As for me, my concerns are simple. It’s an endless loop of hating the fact that Ty could be in trouble and I just walked away, that Anvil Rock will be easy to miss even in broad daylight, and that maybe, just maybe, this plan to hide out at Stumptown is, as Benny would say, born to be stupid from the start. But if she has the headlamp, that might help her move faster and trust me more. I give it to her and say, “Keep it focused on the water. We’re looking for a big rock shaped like—” She takes off. “An anvil,” I mutter into empty air, pretty sure that I just made another mistake.
After a few minutes of steady climbing, the steepness eases considerably and the current slows to a whispering crawl. This fits with what I remember. The trail rounds a bend and the creek widens by ten feet with a pool of nearly still water in the center. She does a quick sweep but keeps walking. I ask her to stop and do it again, only slower. I don’t see what I’m looking for, but the been-here-done-that feeling won’t quit. I ask her to give me the light. She hesitates, but we make the switch. I do a slow pass, linger just long for a distinctively shaped boulder to emerge from the fog.
I say, “That’s Anvil Rock. This is where we cross,” and light up the rocks we need to cross to get there.
She stares at me. Her unblinking eyes say I’m full of shit.
“I did this before. It’s not as hard as it looks.” I leave out the part that there aren’t as many rocks as I remember, that they’re smaller and farther apart and the water is significantly higher, maybe waist deep instead of up to my ankles. Still I’m reasonably sure it’s doable, even with my pack and her bad arm. And if we do fall in, worst case it’s a short walk to the other side. I have spare clothes in my pack—as long as I keep it out of the water. I say, “Staying on this side isn’t an option. If your friend didn’t follow—”
She slams my chest with the heel of her hand. The impact sends me stumbling backward. It takes me two steps to recover my balance. One more and I’d be on my back in the creek. Her eyes are flaming. “Why’d you do that?” I say.
All I get is stone-faced silence.
I do a rewind of the past thirty seconds. “Is it because I called the driver your friend?”
She nods. Once.
A quick glance at her wrists reminds me that less than an hour ago she was trapped in the trunk of a car, zip-tied, duct-taped, blindfolded, and soaked in gasoline. “I’m sorry,” I say. “He’s definitely not your friend. But we can’t wait here. Our tracks will lead him right to us.” She looks past me, into the darkness on the other side. But I sense a softening in her resolve. I say, “How about if I cross first, dump my pack, then come back halfway and help you?”
After a beat, she gives me a slow nod.
“There are these things called words. They’re very handy. Next time I say something stupid, try using them instead of hitting me.” I add a smile to show that I’m just kidding, although actually I’m not. Her eyes narrow, but at least her hand doesn’t move.
I readjust her sling, making sure it’s snug against her body; then I cross, drop my pack, and return to help her. She groans with every hop, and for a moment I’m afraid she’s going to faint and fall in. But she recovers, clamps down on my hand, and a minute later we’re standing in the same spot Ty and I stood while Benny leaned back against the rock and told us about camping at a lake with Mom. I show her the three dots Benny scratched in the face of Anvil Rock and tell her my father drew these markers about fifteen years ago, that our destination is less than a mile from here. I think I see the flicker of what could be a smile.
What I don’t tell her is that the next marker is a bald spot on the side of Gooseneck Mountain, and we won’t be able to see it with just the headlamp. We’ll have to do that when it gets light enough to make a sighting. I don’t tell her that my brother and I have only been to this place once and that was more than a year ago. That it’s hard to find even if you know exactly where to look. The odds are very high that we’ll just be wandering around in the woods like two deer on the opening day of hunting season. A quick glance at my phone confirms there is still no service, and that sunup is about three, maybe four, hours away. We’re on zero hours of sleep. But it looks like the fog is lifting. Thank God for that. Hopefully it stays that way because if we can’t see Gooseneck Mountain, then we’ll b
e in it up to our necks. Plus, there’s the X factor, her arm. I don’t know what kind of pain she’s dealing with; maybe she won’t even be able to handle the hike. Fuck. I wish I knew what happened to Ty.
What I tell her is, “You’ll be safe where we’re going. I guarantee it.”
I shoulder my pack, shine the headlamp on the steep side of the creek, and say, “Let’s do this.” She doesn’t move. It could be the prospect of climbing that slope, but I sense it’s something else. “C’mon,” I say and reach for her hand to help her across a rock. Two quick steps and we’ll be there.
She yanks it away.
“What’s your problem now?” I ask.
She looks at me, her expression still clouded with doubt. Maybe it’s information she needs. I decide to waste a few precious seconds to explain the plan. “I can’t find where we need to go in the dark. So we’ll climb that hillside a little ways, then hide out a couple hours till the sun comes up. Then we’ll climb to the top of a ridge, make a sighting, and head to Stumptown—that’s what we call our secret spot. But I need you to trust me. Can you do that?” Her expression goes from doubt to an icy glare. What the hell? I’m thinking this whole thing is a big fuckup. I have to remind myself that she’s been through hell and has a good reason not to trust some random guy. I say, “Look, if you’re worried about me making a move on you, don’t even go there. Ty and I are twins, and, well, he’s…he’s not the one that’s gay.” I’m stunned. It’s the first time I’ve ever said the g-word out loud. I couldn’t even say it to Stellah. All it took was a voiceless girl and a psycho killer to pull it out of me. Yet she still looks unconvinced. I smile, hoping that it masks the fear in my voice. “You have no clue how hard it was for me to say that.” After a long beat she gives a faint nod. I say, “Perfect,” and shine my light on the steep hillside. “Can you handle that with your arm?”
She looks at her sling, adjusts the angle a little, and winces. Takes a breath, points to the headlamp.
I give her the lamp, reach for her hand to help her across the rocks. She pulls it away. Yup, there is definitely something different about her. She does three quick hops to the other side. Her balance is perfect. I’m afraid that she’s going to start climbing without me and I’ll have to cross in the dark. But she shines the light back at me. On the last jump my muddy boot slips and down I go. Luckily the water isn’t deep. My right leg gets soaked up to the calf.
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