Double Cross

by Carolyn Crane

  “You were only eleven.”

  “Don’t make excuses. Eleven is old enough not to fall for that.” Otto’s eyes darken. “I wanted to believe him.”

  “You were alone. He was all you had.”

  Otto raises a hand to forestall further utterances on my part. “That winter, the entry started cracking. I think all those bodies in that small space affected the integrity of the wall, and then you had trees growing into it, ice freezing and melting. I could’ve reinforced it with my touch, but Packard had us using a different entry by then. Switching it up, he said, and we weren’t supposed to go into the old entry ever again. Of course kids go everywhere, and one of the boys saw the hand and told everyone. Hearing it, something in me turned upside down. I threw up. Actually threw up, right when I heard. It connected with something deep in me, deep in that place where I knew what I’d done.”

  “Oh, Otto.” I touch a dark curl, push it off his face. “You were just a boy,” I whisper. “Scared. Doing the best you could.”

  He shakes his head, like that’s no excuse.

  “I can’t even imagine—to learn something like that.” I rest a hand on his arm.

  “You can’t imagine it. One minute you’re a boy, and the next you’re a killer, and you have poison in your heart. And everything inside you is wrong. I stumbled down there, through the scramble hole. Packard followed me. He tried to keep me from looking, but he couldn’t. I pulled every one of those corpses out. The shock, Justine.” He takes a ragged breath. “We fought, and cracks began crawling along the walls, and the entire stairwell started crumbling. I know what the rumors are, but I never meant to destroy that school. But pulling those corpses out, it was as if my rage and horror radiated through the whole building. The kids got out, but it collapsed around us while we fought. Then it was gone and still we fought.”

  “God, Otto.”

  “He was our savior, really. Savior to all of us kids, but he made me a murderer. I wanted to kill him, and I almost did—we almost killed each other. Somehow I picked myself up and stumbled off and just kept going. I needed to disappear—not from them, but from myself. Have you had that? That sense that you want to crawl out of your own skin, just slither away, leave yourself standing?”

  “I don’t know—”

  “If you don’t know, then you haven’t,” he snaps.

  There’s this long silence.

  “Did you ever find those missing kids? Fawna and the others?”

  “No.” Otto drains his Scotch. “You know the rest. I stowed away on the freighter. At first it was a geographical fix—try to shake the feeling by getting as far away as possible. But then I started wanting to make it up somehow. That’s how I ended up in Vindahar, why I sought out Master Basenji, and he helped me hone my skills as a crime fighter. Packard stayed and became a crime boss.” Otto turns to me. “I was just a boy, and think what he made me do!”

  I feel suddenly so angry on Otto’s behalf. “It’s horrible!” I begin, but I stop short. Packard was just a boy after all, doing the best he could. He was trying to save his little tribe—and save Otto from the awful truth by taking it all on himself. That seems quite clear when I stop to think about it.

  I realize, in a flash, that this is something Otto and I have in common—casting Packard as the bad guy. It’s so much easier to make Packard the victimizer than to see him as the very real and complicated man he is.

  He did lie to me—to all of us disillusionists—taking our freedom to buy his. But then again, he learned at a very young age that he couldn’t trust anyone else. And he was likely damaged every bit as much as Otto by what he did in that ruined school. Maybe more.

  Not that this all excuses him, but it changes something in how I view him, and I suddenly feel this overwhelming sense of unfinished business with him. I want to go and see him, have it out, ask him a million questions, tell him important things—what, I don’t know. I just know I haven’t been seeing who he is for a very long time.

  “And then we made a pact,” Otto says, startling me out of my reverie. “Lying there, after the fight, both so injured, it’s what we agreed—to never speak of it. As though silence would make it go away. Then we threw the bodies in the river. Who knows how Deena pieced it together. And then she and her boys got those glasses.”

  “How did they find you?”

  “Pure accident. They bribed a hospital official to get Covian’s name and address. They thought he could identify them, and wanted to finish him off. They figured out who I was when they saw how I sealed Covian up. I don’t know how—photos, rumors, other kids telling tales.” Otto stares out the window. Two freighters move across the dark water, lit in red and white.

  “You saved Covian’s life.”

  “Covian,” Otto says through a clenched jaw. The intensity I feel off him surprises me. It feels new. Exhaustion, I remind myself.

  “Have you slept much?”

  “Not much.”

  “Hey, the bandage. We were supposed to change it thirty minutes ago. What kind of nurse am I?”

  “You’re the best nurse in the world.”

  I put my hand on his stubbly cheek. Then I take away the trays and food and stick them outside the door and grab the stuff the hospital sent along with us.

  I think about Otto as a little boy. Nobody to care for him, nobody to help him make sense of the world.

  Carefully, I pull up the bandage. “You’re okay now,” I say. “I’ll help you.”

  “How does it look?” he asks.

  “The same. Maybe a little less red.” After I clean the gash, I dab it with ointment, updating him on whatever light, fun things I can think of. I’m deeply horrified by the story, though. And I left Packard alone, drugged. He tried to save those boys. I think of the guilt I felt when I was inside his dream.

  “It feels funny,” Otto says.

  “Of course it does. It’s an open wound.”

  I put on a new bandage, keenly aware of Otto’s gaze, deep brown eyes full of adoration and need. He wants me to look at him, to meet that gaze, but I don’t want to, because I feel like it would be a lie. So I fuss with the bandage and then I get him to lie down all the way, and he’s out almost immediately.

  I text Sophia to tell her not to bring the hat until morning, then I pull my bathrobe snug and tight and curl up next to Otto and try to fall asleep, but I can’t stop thinking about those children alone, and everything they went through. Packard having to make those decisions. The weight he carried. Otto’s own guilt. And what happened to little Fawna, and the others who were taken?

  In the morning, the sunrise wakes me. I look over at Otto, sleeping peacefully, jaw finally relaxed, dark hair burnished bright. Will he ever save and protect enough people to make up for his guilt?

  I tighten my bathrobe tie and pad across the room to close the curtains. It’s not even seven in the morning; he’ll need much more sleep than this. I sneak into the bathroom, more refreshed than I’ve felt in a long time. It’s not until after I wash up that I get it. Ez broke the link. I’m my own dreamer again.

  Quiet as a mouse, I put on my skirt and tennis shoes outfit from the hospital and head down to the lavish five-star lobby, where I’m served hot, delicious-smelling coffee in a real china cup with a little red flower pattern around its rim. I take a seat next to the grand fireplace and sip, unable to stop thinking about Otto’s story. All those lives, all that hate. The horror of Otto learning what he’d done. And Packard, bearing it alone.

  Has he realized we’re free of Ez yet? He’ll be so relieved! I feel eager to go over and point it out to him, and tell him firsthand what happened with the cannibals, and the Dorks, and that I know now what happened back at the school, and that I understand. Yes, there’s still the Jarvis thing. Why did he tell? I think about what Otto said: Packard’s motivations are only clear in hindsight. I certainly can’t imagine what possible advantage he got from revealing his ruse.

  I sip my coffee, wondering if I’m stupid to have thi
s little cockeyed speck of hope that he doesn’t have a game for once. I wander across the lobby window and look at the cars and the street out front. The press is probably still on the lookout for us, but they’ll be more focused on Otto than me.

  Quickly, I scribble a ‘back soon xoxo’ note, even though Otto hates those. I take the elevator back upstairs and slide the note under the door. Then I go down and buy a hat in the gift shop, sneak out alongside a group of tourists, and hop a bus north to Packard’s.

  As I ride, I fume at people who ask the driver stupid questions, get on without the correct change, or otherwise slow the bus down. At one point I get the idea that I could run there faster, and I actually consider it for a moment.

  Chapter

  Twenty-four

  FINALLY THE BUS LETS ME OFF at the stop near Packard’s. I round the corner and see Parsons, the head of the bodyguard team we hired, outside Packard’s building. It’s weird that he’s still guarding Packard, now that the Dorks threat is defunct. When he sees me, he says something into his wrist.

  I walk up. “Is Packard home?”

  He gazes past me, all around the street. “You alone?”

  “Yeah. Is he up there? I need to see him.”

  “I can’t let you do that.”

  “What do you mean? Mr. Parsons, I’m Justine Jones. We met once, remember? I work with Helmut—”

  “I know who you are,” Parsons says.

  “You need to let me see him,” I say, just as Carter bursts out the door.

  “Fuck that,” Carter says.

  I smile. “Carter!”

  “You better not have brought him.”

  I stare, dumbfounded. “What?”

  Carter’s wound tight for action. He pulls a gun from his belt. “Otto. Otto’s people.”

  “Carter!” I raise my hands. “What? I’m alone.”

  “You sure?”

  “What are you doing?”

  He kicks the door shut behind him. “What do you want?”

  “To see Packard.”

  “Yeah. Fat chance.” Carter jerks his head at Parsons, who wanders to a nearby car and leans in the window. Carter turns back to me. “Nice of you to leave him drugged for Otto like that.”

  “I didn’t leave him drugged for anyone. I was trying to get at that dream. We were dream invaded.”

  “You couldn’t have woken him up after? Given him a head start?”

  “Carter, what’s going on? Jarvis was an actor. We’re not minions,” I say. “Why are you being like this?”

  “Because you have screwed him over for the last time. Because unlike you, I’m not about to forget that he saved my life. I would’ve been dead by now. You would’ve spent half your days in an ER waiting room. Do you care?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  He shoves the gun back in his belt. “I’m talking about the fact that he threw it all out the window for you. Because you’re never happy. Because you care only about yourself. And how do you thank him? You drug him and leave him like an animal for Otto to come and get. Don’t worry, I snapped him out of it. Like only a half hour ago. We’re getting him out of here. He’s not going back to the Mongolian Delites.”

  I squint at him, bewildered.

  “Figure it out,” Carter sneers.

  I figure it out just as Carter says it. “The deal. If we aren’t disillusioning criminals, Packard goes back inside. And now that we’re free agents, you think we’re going to keep crashing Otto’s criminals? Packard scuttled the deal that keeps him free just to please you.”

  “He scuttled the deal …” I say.

  “For you.”

  This haze comes over me, seems to envelop me. “He traded his freedom for mine.…”

  “Well, hand the girl a stuffed monkey. She got it.”

  My eyes mist up. The little speck of hope expands like a flower inside me.

  Carter says, “We’re helping him clear out of here before Otto comes.”

  “Otto wouldn’t put him back in.”

  “You got that right. Because Packard’ll die before he goes back in there. And I’ll fucking die making sure he doesn’t.”

  “I have to see him.” I fling open the door and go in.

  “No!” Carter grabs my arm. I yank it away and start up the stairs. A man’s coming down with a box and I duck under. Carter crashes into him. I race up the rest of the five flights. Packard’s door is open and I burst in, with Carter behind me, rush through the foyer to the dining room, and freeze.

  There are boxes everywhere. Packard stands in front of the table, hurriedly sorting papers and IDs into piles, not looking up. Seeing him, something uncoils in me. It’s like I know him, recognize him. Like I’ve known him forever. “Packard,” I say, going to him.

  His angry gaze halts me cold. “This my official wake-up call?”

  “No … No, I …” I feel confused, panicky. What have I done?

  He waves Carter off. “It’s fine.” Carter stomps away, and Packard goes back to his sorting. “What?”

  “You’re leaving?” I ask.

  “I’m not going back into the restaurant business.” He stuffs a sheaf of papers into his briefcase. “Ideally, I would’ve gotten some head start here. It’s a goddamn miracle I’m not sealed in there right now.”

  “I didn’t think … I didn’t think it through.” I pause, hating myself. “Packard, I didn’t tell him,” I say. “He doesn’t know yet.”

  He locks up the case. “How do you know Sophia hasn’t heard, and that she’s not telling him right now? Or any one of his people. Really, you are so clever at putting things together, and you didn’t think this one thing through? I guess you have to care about a thing to think it through.”

  “Of course I care.”

  Packard continues packing. His hurt feels like a hot knife.

  I see what he sees now: I left him like a sacrifice to Otto. He set me free and I left him vulnerable. My pulse pounds. Frantically I look around. “We can fix this—”

  Packard gives me an incredulous glare. “Don’t be naïve.” He turns and runs a finger along the spines of the paperback books in his bookcase, extracts one, then another, starting a small stack on the table.

  I move nearer, feeling panicky. “You traded your freedom for ours.” For mine.

  “It had to stop,” he says casually.

  “You sacrificed your freedom—”

  “Only if he finds me. And he won’t.” He lifts a small carved wooden box from the bookshelf.

  I feel sick.

  He caresses the surface of the box, then sets it back in its place on the shelf. A man going on the run can only bring essential items. Packard’s going on the run.

  He’s leaving.

  “Packard,” I whisper frantically.

  “Stop it. It was overdue. My plan never went beyond using you all to get free of the restaurant. Then suddenly we had to keep doing it. It was getting old.” He picks up the little box again, walks across the room, and nestles it into a suitcase full of clothes. “Disillusioning people as a way of ameliorating Otto’s ridiculous head condition—”

  “What do you mean?”

  He stands. “Otto’s head condition.” He practically spits out the words. “There’s nothing wrong with Otto’s head except that he’s a hypochondriac. He can keep those people behind their force fields just fine without a problem. He doesn’t need us to disillusion them. He never did.”

  “What? But the cranial pressure, the headaches …”

  “Please. It’s imaginary. He needs a slap in the face, not the service of disillusionists. He’s a hypochondriac, Justine. You know how it works.” He tosses a baseball cap into the suitcase and walks off.

  Stunned, I follow him into the bathroom.

  He grabs an overnight bag from the closet, yanks open a drawer, and throws in deodorant.

  “It worked for me for a while. We just had to disillusion the people on the list, which meant I had to keep the Jarvis lie going. What’
s another despicable deed to me, right? You know how it is—I’ll do anything to stay free. To stay living in Midcity. But you started to sense how wrong disillusionment was.” He shuts a toothbrush into a plastic tube. “You were never able to articulate it, but you felt that it was wrong. For the record, I agree. It robs them.”

  “You felt that way the whole time?”

  “Just lately.” He twists a cap onto a tube of toothpaste. “Forcing people to turn robs them of the chance to change and grow. Which is one of the few things that set us apart from raccoons.” He unzips an inner pocket, puts in a razor. “Or to stay who they’ve become and suffer.” Helplessly I watch him pack. It’s like an out-of-body experience. “Basically, we’ve been robbing people of an essential part of the human journey. I guess I could’ve lived with it awhile longer,” he continues, “but I couldn’t live with you living with it.”

  “Packard,” I say.

  “It was monstrous. I didn’t see it before, but I do now. And you know what the worst thing is?” He stops, turns to me. “I did it to you.”

  Everything slows.

  “I took your choices away. I took your life away. It was unforgivable, and I’m sorry as hell. I know it’s too late, but I am sorry. I told myself that I was helping you, that it was for your own good, but it was never my right.”

  “You thought I’d be institutionalized. Or dead.”

  “Still wasn’t my choice to make. To force you to be a minion?” He goes back to packing. “Forcing you to attack others … I should know better. I do know better.”

  Otto. He’s talking about using Otto to destroy the Goyces. “You were just a child. You saved those children’s lives,” I say.

  He spins to face me, bright with shock.

  “He told me,” I say. “Everything.”

  Packard blinks, seemingly unable to comprehend this. “Well,” he says quietly, “now you know.”

  “You were a hero,” I say.

  He turns away with a derisive snort and folds a washcloth.

  I feel sick. “Where are you going?”

  “You know I can’t tell you that.”