by R. J. Garcia
It seemed like we’d been driving a long time, over an hour. We had even lost the energy to swap nervous glances. My brain and body went numb. Silence scooted closer yet, and we were sweating on one another. That was about all we could do. We sat there, feeling miserable and trying not to make a sound. Then my entire system was jolted when the old man said, “I’m sorry, Laney. My beautiful, Laney.” His words echoed through the too-quiet van and woke us both up.
We shared a look in acknowledgment of that name, which faded into long, questioning glances.
He could be Laney’s husband. Maybe losing her had eaten away at him all these years and pushed him over the edge. It seemed more likely he was the kidnapper. On those police shows, don’t they say the criminal returns to the scene of the crime? Laney may have been buried somewhere in the woods like Sarah Evans had been. He could have been dancing on her very grave. Each thought tightened the knots in my stomach. But it wasn’t like we could discuss things.
The man kept driving. He had to run out of gas at some point, unless it was a strange, phantom van racing through the night, endless and eternal.
Silence’s head dropped on my shoulder. I counted the innocent bloom of headlights that glided by. My heavy eyelids began to close and soon I took the lightest of naps. I woke up within a minute, struck by the impression of us turning and the sound of the signal. The man parked the van at a gas pump.
Every nerve in my body urged me to get out of there. Silence and I waited, watching as the man went inside the filling station’s small store. I jerked forward and opened the back door. We jumped out of the back of the van to the parking lot. We ran as soon as our feet hit the pavement. A middle-aged couple, standing by a nearby gas pump, pointed at us. We kept on running. The cool night breeze felt especially good. We ran as fast as we could along the side of the highway, in the opposite direction that the van had been headed. I grabbed hold of her hand. It was an endless stretch of highway. Cars intermittently sped by. I thought of flagging one down but didn’t. I knew I had my phone.
At first, we didn’t talk. We had gotten used to being quiet. We slowed down, heaving in a lungful of fresh air. Silence admitted she had peed herself when we jumped out of the van.
“It’s okay,” I told her. “Everything’s okay.” But, hell I didn’t even know where we were. She was younger than me and a girl. I had to be the brave one. It seemed like the worst of it was over.
“Are you nuts? Nothing about this is fine!” she snapped.
We saw a small cluster of trees off to the side of the intersection. I suggested we hide there until he was gone. We climbed over the steel divider and into a shallow trench, tripping and running to those trees. She sprinted ahead of me and I pushed to catch up.
Winded, we slowed down to a trot. Silence’s started saying, “We’ve got to go back. He was the one who kidnapped Laney Serel and my mom, too. It was our one chance, and we didn’t even get his license plate number.”
It may have been our one chance. I shoved those thoughts out of my head. I kept my voice soft and low to sound like I had it under control. “Probably no one would believe us anyway. And we dunno for sure,” I said, playing devil’s advocate. I blinked in our surroundings and we circled around the trees. It became dark away from the street lights that lined the highway. We stopped, standing partly behind a giant pine and next to an old tire. “Listen, I’ll call my dad. He’ll pick us up. When I figure out where we are, that is.”
Tears trickled down her face. “No. He can’t. I pissed myself. I just want to disappear.”
The fight-or-flight thing had faded. I was worn-out. Silence was sad. I didn’t know how to deal with that emotional stuff. “My dad won’t notice.” Our eyes met for a second and a feeling burned through me. A feeling of wanting, needing to make things better.
“I smell like piss. Who wouldn’t notice someone smelling like piss?” She started crying more, but also sounded angry.
I liked her because she was this cool, tough girl. Seeing her cry made me care even more. I pulled my hand away from hers and put my arm around her shoulder to console her. “Si, look on the bright side. We’re still alive.”
It was weird because I knew things sucked, but I never stayed sad for long. The inner narrative in my head usually made me think things would be okay. It’s just how my brain worked.
She wiped tears away, starting to calm down. “You and your bright side. You sound like Annie. I hate you, Finn Wilds.” Silence turned and reached up and ran her fingertips over the side of my face, and a brief smile played on her lips.
Suddenly I heard something in the darkness. Silence’s eyes flitted around the trees and back to me, and her face became the lost, pale face of a ghost.
I turned my head. “Oh, hell no!” I said. The old man was standing there, looking bigger and more deranged than ever. Only now he was holding his shovel.
Chapter 23
At Night
Finn
I stared at the strange man as Silence stepped behind me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders.
The man’s face was marked and scarred up from acne and time. He looked about fifty.
“Why were you in my van?” he asked.
“It was an accident. We just wanted to look under the blanket. It was just a mannequin. So, everything’s cool.” If he didn’t think we knew about Laney, he might let us go, I reasoned. Then again, he could be a shovel killer. He moved closer. I tried to stay calm but was burning with adrenaline once more. “We’re sorry. My dad is going to be here any minute to pick us up.”
Silence peeked around me to get a look at the man. “How do you know Laney Serel?”
Why would she ask that? His eyes went wild and his face trembled. The guy was going to lose it at any second, but his face went slack. His mouth dropped open. “Laney?” he said like it was a question.
Silence surprised me more. “You kidnapped my mom and Laney. You killed Sarah Evans, you sick bastard.”
I hadn’t even processed what Silence said as she hid behind me again, sliding her arms around my waist, securing herself to me. The old man raised the shovel, looking right at me.
I turned to capture Silence’s hand in mine, and we started running until I experienced a hard, crushing feeling. Silence’s hand slipped away from me, I staggered back and halfway fell to the ground. Silence froze. A liquid poured from my head. I threw my hand up to the throbbing pain. “Run!” I yelled. Numbness traveled down my spinal column to the tips of my toes. There were no thoughts as a burst of colors went in and out, fading to black.
Chapter 24
Where R U?
Tommy
Annie tripped onto the bus in retro clogs and sat by me. Even though she looked sleepy, she managed to give me the little, happy smile that always made me glad to see her. Of course, we talked about Finn and Silence not showing up at the bus stop this morning and compared the strange text message we’d both received from Finn, asking us not to call them.
Once inside the school, I saw Hailee by our lockers, her posture rigid as she rolled her eyes at me. Yeah, I should have called, or at least texted her that I had a good time at the dance. What can I say? I’m an idiot. I could say it now.
“Hey, Hailee. You know I, ah, had a good time at the dance.”
She paused, and replied, “Whatever… One of my parents’ cabins was broken into yesterday. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you, Tommy?”
Her words hit me like a slap. “No.” I shook my head and looked down. “Um...That’s too bad.”
“Really? Because my little brother saw Finn, with a dark-haired boy around the cabin. He and his friends were riding the bike trails.”
As usual, the discomfort worked its way up my chest to my esophagus. I cleared my throat. Should I lie or tell the truth? I liked her a lot. Her parents’ cabin? What were the odds? “Um,” I replied.
The bell rang.
She slammed her locker shut. “That’s what I thought.”
; I emitted a helpless groan. When you are a guy on the outside looking in, the most you could do was pretend not to want a girl like that. It became more difficult to do once you held the girl, and even kissed her.
I wanted to talk to Finn more than ever. I figured he would have called me by now or showed up at school. I grabbed my phone and texted Finn, “Where the F R U?” Next, I texted Silence, “Where r u?!” with a worried face emoticon. Did they run away together? Were they that stupid? And if they did, how could Finn and Silence leave without saying goodbye? I was worried, yeah, but I was kind of mad at them, too.
As if my day couldn’t get worse, I had to go to class and give a speech. The point of the assignment was to show that we could clearly relay basic knowledge and information to others. It was a How-to-Speech, Mrs. Price said it could be a speech about anything like baking a cake, planting a garden, or downloading a song from the internet. Yet I had nothing. I could only hope they would run out of time, and I’d have a chance to plan something tonight.
Mrs. Price’s sing-song voice cheeped on. “The first student to give their speech will be.”
I slid down slightly in my chair and rubbed the spot between my eyebrows, trying to wipe away the tension and hide at the same time. There were twenty-five other students in this class and her pop-bottle eyeglasses stopped on me. “Tommy Walker,” she called. I knew the universe hated me, or maybe it was bigger than that, maybe God himself hated me.
There were collective murmurs.
Mrs. Price held out her hand and ordered “quiet.” Her voice boomed over the noisy class and everyone stopped talking. “This assignment isn’t optional, Mr. Walker. Come to the front of the room, now.”
The short, blond kid, Edgar, who knew Finn, slipped me a note scribbled in pen. It read: “Talk about how to make pasta.” A picture of a happy face was drawn after the handwritten note.
I got up and walked up to the podium. “Um. I’m going to talk about how to make spaghetti.”
Glancing around the class, I noticed fellow students glaring at me like they were jury members and I was on trial. I looked down briefly, trying to think it out. After all, I made spaghetti a lot for Isabella when my mom was gone.
I started. “Fill up a large saucepan with tap water.” I cleared my throat willing myself not to say, “Um.” I always said “Um” when I was nervous. “Add a little salt and bring the water to a boil.” I became woozy as my eyes scanned the room until I saw Edgar give me a nod and just like that, I relaxed. “Add the spaghetti and return it to a boil and cook for six minutes. Drain the pasta and pour your sauce over it.” Edgar and I both smiled. “And voila! You have spaghetti.”
“It’s a little short and you didn’t have a visual aid, but thank you, Mr. Walker. Nice eye contact and smile.”
I made it back to my seat and whispered, “Thanks, Edgar.”
He looked a little proud and smiled my way.
Mrs. Price handed me a written critique of my speech. I was relieved to see a “C” on the paper in red ink. After class, I made it to my locker hoping to find Finn. At least, I could complain about the stressed-out day I was having. He wasn’t there. Wherever Finn and Silence were, it had to be better than this. They were probably sharing a Happy Meal at some McDonald’s with my twenty bucks. They would come back, right? They had to.
Kids were talking and shouting across to other kids. Lockers were being opened and closed as Hailee briskly turned to face me. I moved in closer. She shifted, eliminating the risk of even an accidental touch. Her lips were tight as if she was thinking, and she looked right at me. “Why did you do it?” she asked. “If I tell my parents, you and Finn can get arrested. It’s called breaking and entering.” I hadn’t even thought of it, but Sheriff Bears could arrest us. He would love it. There was a long pause. “Do you want me to tell my parents?” Hailee asked.
My stomach flip-flopped. “Oh, God! Please don’t.”
“Explain to me why you did it? Were you going to steal something?”
“No. It wasn’t anything like that. Um.” I paused, trying to think of how to word things, but I couldn’t. “It’s a long story. I can mow lawns in the summer to pay for the window.” The last bell rang. We had less than five minutes to make it to the bus. A herd of teenagers made their mad dash for the doors.
Her face took on a tremor of disgust. “Whose blood was that?”
I ran my hands over my eyes, remembering how we left the place looking like a murder scene. “Finn cut his hand breaking the window.” I felt so embarrassed I could die on the spot.
Her repulsion seemed to mingle with concern. “Is he okay?”
“Yeah. He’s fine.”
Hailee stared at me fidgeting with the strap of her backpack.
The halls were quieting down. “I’m so sorry.” I had trouble looking at her.
She sounded like an adult disappointed in a child. “Just go before you miss your bus.”
I still wasn’t quite sure if she was going to tell her parents. I booked it to the bus. Annie had saved me a seat. We again talked more about Silence and Finn. Annie always said something positive and made it seem like it would be okay.
I texted “Where R U?” again to Finn and hit send.
Chapter 25
Bad News
Tommy
Reese hummed as she sliced cucumbers on the wooden cutting board in her cheerfully tidy kitchen. “Hey, Tommy! How was school?” she asked, like always.
I grumbled, “Hailee hates me now and Finn didn’t bother to show up to school today.” More sarcastically, I added, “I’m worried he might be dead or worse married.”
“Wow. That’s a lot to take in. Slow down.” She added the cucumbers to a salad bowl full of lettuce and turned to face me. “First, what happened with Hailee?”
“It’s a long story.”
“Which is your way of saying you don’t want to say,” Reese said, beginning to figure me out after three months of living together. “And what’s up with Finn?” she asked.
“I’ll let you know when I find out.”
She grinned, “You’re just a wealth of information.” She crossed the kitchen and picked up a black cell phone from the table. “Can you at least tell me whose phone this is?”
“Oh yeah, that’s Silence’s phone. She must have left it.” That explained why she wasn’t answering.
Izzy ran in, saying, “Look, Tommy!” She handed me a picture she’d drawn at school.
“Nice,” I said, and with Reese’s prompting, I hung it on the fridge with a butterfly magnet.
I felt like being alone and went downstairs to my room. I emptied the school crap from my backpack onto my bed, like I might do something with it. I looked around my basement bedroom. It wasn’t exactly what you would call decorated. Reese had hung up a couple drawings I did in art class. I guess Reese was into this kind of thing. Our mom never hung stuff up. I’d taped up the target I shot up when I went with Holden to the gun range. It was a poster of a man’s silhouette bearing bullet holes, next to the solar system that Annie had made from coffee filters. Other than that, there was just paneling and a few spiders. Now I was too restless to do homework, so again I checked my phone. There were no missed calls.
Banned by Polar Bear or not, I decided I would go to Finn’s house. He could be grounded and that would explain why he couldn’t answer his phone. If he’d run away his mom might have at least heard from him. Either way, I would be able to make sure he was okay. I heard the home phone ring, but no one really called me on that phone, so I headed straight for the front door. I yelled “goodbye” to Reese, telling her I would be right back.
She rushed toward me. “Wait, Tommy! Finn’s mom just called. He’s in the hospital.” I stopped dead in my tracks and turned around to face Reese. She pressed the phone to her chest and started to cry, and I knew it was serious. I couldn’t believe it when she said, “Someone beat Finn with a shovel.”
It was like I had been tasered. The blood left my face. “No,”
I halfway groaned. Finally, my brain cleared enough to ask, “Was it Polar Bear?”
“No, it was some crazy man. Your friend Silence got away and gave the police a full description of him.”
Reese hung up the phone. She rubbed tears from her eyes and tried to stay calm and collected. She called Izzy and turned to me. “Tommy, you go to the hospital with Finn’s mom. Izzy and I will watch the little ones.”
I nodded my head, trying to clear the fog. “Yeah,” I said. Although it hadn’t even registered yet, I still felt the panic in my gut.
Chapter 26
The Hospital
Tommy
Finn’s mother let me stay in the room when the doctor talked to her. It was a small room with a round table and a contemporary painting on each tan wall. The doctor talked about a small basal skull fracture and surgery to stop the excessive bleeding and leakage of the cerebrospinal fluid. I understood enough that my stomach turned. He also talked about an older head trauma and hematoma. Polar Bear, I thought.
She looked completely baffled like she was in total shock about things. “Will he be alright?”
“He’s in a medically induced coma to promote healing,” the doctor explained. “We are not sure if there will be brain damage, but he will live. He’s in recovery. The surgery went well.” The doctor looked at us as if to make sure we had no other questions. “You can see him in about an hour. But he won’t be conscious for days.” Just like that, he made his escape.
We left the tiny room, and sat down in a bigger waiting area, next to one another. For the briefest moment, she looked serene before she erupted in tears. It seemed like I was in a bad dream. All the terrible words the doctor said floated in my head. Finn had to be okay. What if he wasn’t? What if he wouldn’t be Finn anymore? My chest ached.