The Boy Who Steals Houses

by C. G. Drews

  His gloved fingers find the screen edge and pry it back.

  After this, he gets Avery. He gets to hide. He gets to—

  never see the De Lainey family again

  The screen pops free and falls. It crashes to the floor inside. The sound is an explosion over the empty car park.

  Sam risks a glance over his shoulder, his body trembling with the effort to cling up here. He can’t see Vin.

  He grabs the window ledge, sucks in his breath, and pulls himself in.

  It’s tight.

  His shoulders only just wedge through. The buttons on his waistcoat catch and then one rips off, falling soundlessly to the cement below.

  Don’t think about falling.

  Sam wriggles in, his hands reaching out for the toilet and then resting flat on it. His legs slide the rest of the way and then he’s doing a handstand on the lid.

  He flips down, silent as death.

  Silent except for the pulse under his collar bones saying don’t do this don’t do this don’t you dare do this.

  He walks the halls. Avoids the cameras. Gets to the back door. His shoes give soft pats on the tiles and he breathes too loudly. He finds the small white box and uses the light of his phone to flip the lid and stare at the switches.

  Off.

  He shuts down the light, the camera, the alarms.

  Once he unlocks that door, this place is Vin’s. This isn’t spare change from a wallet and fistfuls of silver pieces. This is real and it’s big.

  Sam looks down at his shaking hands and slowly, carefully, he peels off the gloves. His fingers are red, a poisoned stain.

  Moxie screams ‘Sam’ in his ears. Not angry – frightened, desperate. A scream like someone holding on to a cliff that crumbles beneath their fingertips.

  He feels hot. Sick. He’s going to throw up.

  He slides down the wall, holding his face. Tears spill between his fingers.

  If he does this, it’s the beginning, not the end. Vin will find a way to trap him, because that’s the kind of person she is – and if she threatens Avery, Sam will be a broken puppet in her fist and she knows it.

  And he will never see Moxie again.

  No. He did that himself.

  Sam isn’t sure how long he sits like this, knees up to his chin, face buried, waiting for the silent sobs to stop racking his shoulders. The doorknob jiggles and then there’s an urgent hiss.

  ‘Sammy.’

  Sam hugs his legs tighter.

  ‘Sammy. Open it. Are you there? Did something go wrong?’

  Sam picks up his phone with trembling fingers.

  ‘Sammy.’

  He turns it on, his brain frozen over because if he stops to think, if he hesitates, he can’t do it. Won’t do it. Can’t can’t can’t—

  The doorknob rattles again and Vin swears. Feet scuffle and then Vin’s voice comes under the door, low and venomous. ‘Sammy, if you are in there and doing this on purpose, you can’t even imagine what I will do to you. Open – this – door.’

  Sam hits dial.

  Emergency picks up.

  ‘Please,’ Sam whispers, giving the address of the art gallery. ‘It’s being robbed. The thief is armed.’ He’s hit with a flurry of questions, but his eyes slither back to the door and the scratching of lock picks. He’s out of time. ‘She’s going to kill me.’ He ends the call.

  The lock picks break off their careful scratching and then feet scuffle. More than one set. Sam’s heart skips a beat.

  Voices sift under the door, low and then rising with agony.

  Vin’s is acid. ‘I told you to go back to the car.’

  ‘You told me where you were. I had to come! You have my little brother in there!’

  The voice is knives and panic.

  Avery.

  No. Avery can’t be here. Sam just called the goddamn police. He crawls forward, his mind blank on what to do next. He isn’t thinking. He’s just trying to stay upright when what he most wants is to curl into a ball and stop. Cease. Just let there have never been a Sammy Lou.

  He leans his cheek against the cold door. Which is how he hears the cracking slap and Avery’s cry.

  Then—

  sirens.

  He has to get Avery out of here.

  Nothing else matters.

  Shoes scrape the cement outside and their voices cut off as the sirens blare closer. Sam flips the lock.

  Avery’s voice is high and trembling. ‘Who would know—’

  ‘The kid,’ Vin snaps. ‘The kid has a phone. I’m going to kill him.’

  Sam throws the door open and explodes forward, all broken buttons and bruised knuckles and panic pulsing through his veins. Avery has a hand cupped to his lip, blood dripping down his chin, and his eyes meet Sam’s with shock.

  Sam doesn’t stop. He flies past him, feet eating up cement as he makes for the fence.

  Blue and red lights flash on the street.

  ‘Run!’ Vin gasps and pelts after Sam.

  There’s a brief hesitation and then Avery takes off too.

  Sam doesn’t slow for the fence, he just leaps and catches hold of the edge, toppling over like a boneless rag doll. He hits the ground on all fours and then he’s up again, streaking through a yard and then curving out on a parallel street.

  He runs.

  They pound after him.

  Chasing him or just getting away?

  His lungs scream.

  Avery pulls ahead of Vin and gasps Sam’s name, but the rest of his words are stolen by the crunch of gravel as they dive down an alley and climb over a gate wedged between a pub and a closed antique shop. Sam hits the ground and keeps running. But Avery trips.

  And then Vin is on top of him.

  Sam skids to a stop at the other end of the alley.

  Vin has Avery’s arm. She smashes her elbow into his face and then drags him towards Sam and the darker end of the alley. Dim streetlight illuminates them – Avery folding up to protect himself, Vin growing taller in the shadows, lips twisted with vengeance.

  ‘You dropped the bag of money, didn’t you?’ Vin says. ‘Our whole night’s work.’ She throws Avery on the ground.

  Sam takes a step forward. Another. Another. Vin’s lips peel back in a vicious smile.

  ‘Come over here, Sammy.’ She puts a boot on Avery’s back, pressing down. ‘Come here and let’s talk about what happens when you mess with me.’ And then before Sam can speak, can act, can think, Vin raises her boot and stomps down hard on the small of Avery’s back.

  Avery’s cry cuts the numb walls around Sam.

  Red heat pours into Sam’s eyes.

  ‘NO.’ He springs forward, fists curved to swing, but Vin is ready.

  She ducks and then catches Sam’s arm, twisting it so sharply Sam trips and chokes on a cry. Vin slams Sam into the wall and his head cracks against bricks. He sags to his knees, hands to his head.

  Vin picks something up from the piles of alley rubbish.

  A broken piece of plywood spiked with bent rusted nails.

  Sam tries to scream but the world tips sideways and his head throbs and he can’t even see straight.

  Avery scrabbles to get up. ‘Vin, wait. Please. I-I-I—’

  Vin cracks the pole across Avery’s stomach.

  He falls back down with a cry.

  Sam struggles to get up, grabbing at the wall for support. He needs it to stop spinning, please stop spinning. Vin sees him trying to move and flips the wood from hand to hand. ‘You’re next, Sammy. But I think it’ll hurt you more to watch this first.’

  She swings the wood again. It catches Avery across the shoulder blades with sickening thwack. Avery lets out a sob, curling into a ball and covering his head. He never runs. Never fights.

  No.

  No
.

  Fear fades from Sam’s chest and rage pours in, enough to level mountains and explode seas. Sam leaps forward.

  Avery’s sob is broken.

  Sam’s cry is blood.

  He throws himself at Vin, fists and teeth and torn lungs and murderous eyes. His punches are quick and aimed perfectly – kidney, nose, throat. And before Vin can grab him, Sam hooks his leg around hers and sends them both smashing into the alley wall. She lands a punch on Sam’s jaw. But they fall and he’s atop her now, knee in her throat. He raises his fist to her face. Twice in one night his soul spills red.

  But he can’t

  do

  this.

  Sam keeps his slashed knuckles raised, Vin pinned, her eyes on him like an ice storm. A sob ravages Sam’s chest. He doesn’t … he doesn’t … want …

  His arm shakes, frozen.

  He doesn’t want to do this any more.

  Vin’s fingers claw at Sam’s waistcoat.

  There’s a snick of metal slipping from a sheath and a smile curls her bloody lips.

  A sob racks Sam’s lungs and he slowly lowers his fist. He’s not going to hit any more. He’s not. ‘You’re never going to touch my brother again or I’ll—’

  His words snap off unfinished, because there’s a flash of silver and a punch to his stomach.

  His world shudders. He looks down.

  The knife slips out of his stomach, red as cherry syrup, black as a long kiss in the dark.

  He opens his mouth. Chokes.

  Pain.

  One bright spear of pain.

  Vin shoves Sam off and now he’s on his knees in the alley, his hand straying to his stomach. He tries to get up, but his shoelaces tangle and his legs buckle.

  Behind him, Avery wails. High-pitched and childish and terrified.

  Vin drops into a crouch in front of Sam. The world spins, a carousel of broken stars and blood-streaked knives. Vin’s face fills his whole vision.

  ‘And just think, when you’re dead, I’ll come back for your brother and I will carve my name in his skin before I kill him. That’s a promise, Sammy Lou.’

  She puts four fingers on to Sam’s forehead – and pushes.

  Sam falls.

  He falls for ever.

  He

  is

  going

  to

  die.

  Avery catches his head before he hits the cement. Avery’s arms surround him, pulling Sam to his chest and thrusting his hands over the blood gushing out of his stomach. It runs thick and red. So much of it. It doesn’t really hurt. Sam tries to tell Avery that.

  Nothing hurts.

  It’s OK. Don’t cry, Avery.

  ‘S-s-stop.’ Avery puts one hand to Sam’s face, holding him, holding him tighter than anyone ever has. ‘I n-n-need you. Sammy! You c-c-can’t …’ His voice breaks.

  ‘Avery.’ Sam’s fist curls in Avery’s shirt. The alley is quiet. Vin is gone. ‘It’s not bad.’

  ‘No, no, no, Sammy.’ Avery tucks his chin over Sam’s head, rocking violently now. His hands flap and spin and jerk, desperate to put pressure on Sam’s stomach, desperate to move. His stims get tangled when he’s upset.

  Sam is so very good at making people upset.

  ‘Stay awake, Sammy.’ Avery looks over his shoulder and screams for help down the alley.

  No one hears. No one comes.

  Sam tries to cough but it hurts too much. The pain is here, finally. He’s cold. He has turned to ice in Avery’s arms and he’s afraid if Avery holds him any tighter he’ll shatter. He wants to say this is nice, how Avery’s hugging him – but when he opens his mouth, he starts to cry.

  ‘I’ll buy you a house, Sammy.’ Avery pushes hair out of Sam’s eyes, smearing blood over Sam’s cheeks. ‘I’ll buy you a hundred houses. I swear, I’ll do a-a-a-anything. I’ll go – I’ll go get help.’

  Sam’s fingers claw Avery’s shirt. ‘Don’t leave.’

  But Avery’s already letting go. Curving Sam’s body into a ball as he lays him down.

  ‘I’ll be back in just a second.’ Avery’s voice is hoarse. ‘I’ll – I’ll be back.’

  His feet pound the alley, his screams for help already hitting the walls.

  Then it’s quiet.

  Sam tries to put the pieces of himself together. Tries, with cotton and screws and wishes. But doesn’t he deserve this?

  He pushes fingers to his stomach and his breath goes out in a wet, short gasp. His ribs folds inwards as everything inside him shudders.

  The boy turns invisible.

  As he should be.

  They try to pry his fingers open.

  He’s too weak to stop them.

  But if they take it away, the threads will snap and he won’t be able to get back up.

  ‘No, wait!’ Avery’s voice is panicked, words tripping over themselves. ‘Don’t take it. You’ll break him if you take it.’

  ‘OK, son, calm down. We’ve got this. We’re doing what’s best for your brother.’

  Avery’s words catch between a scream and a roar, ‘Then don’t take it off him. He needs it! Listen to me, listen, just—’

  They leave Sam’s fingers alone.

  ‘What’s he holding anyway?’

  ‘A key. Can you go see how the cop’s doing with the brother? We might have to sedate him.’

  Sam’s lips part, but he can’t dig words out of his pockets to arrange them in a pleasing display for people to understand.

  They need to understand the key.

  If lost, please return to the De Laineys.

  Sammy is fourteen and full of broken pieces.

  Rain slicks down his face, plasters his thin T-shirt to knobbly, shivering shoulders as he stands in front of Aunt Karen’s house in the dark. He’s been here for a long time.

  If he goes in, she’ll call the cops.

  After what he did to those boys at school.

  Her car is in the driveway and the TV flashes behind half-closed curtains. The thin smell of tuna bake curls out of the cracked windows and he thinks he hears crying.

  Or maybe that’s the wind.

  Or maybe that’s him.

  He knots frozen fingers around his shoulders and shuts his eyes tight tight tight. If he wishes hard enough, time will stop and fold backwards and he won’t run across the schoolyard to the group of jeering kids and throw them aside till he sees his brother. Being smashed to pieces.

  Blood and broken bone and hollowed-out eyes.

  And the screaming.

  Two seconds later and a teacher would have been there, would have saved them.

  But Sammy didn’t wait and he beat that boy unconscious because how could he how could he how could he let his brother get hurt?

  When they catch Sammy, they’ll take him away. Prison. He deserves it. He always goes too far.

  He’ll die in prison.

  He’ll die without Avery.

  He tells himself, a thousand times a day, that he exists for Avery, to keep him safe and hug him and calm him down and love him. Avery can’t exist without Sammy—

  or is it the other way

  around?

  Mud squelches under his shoes as he slowly crosses the yard. He ducks until he’s below the window of the bedroom they share. He taps on the glass, but the rain thunders so loud how could anyone hear?

  The curtain rips back and Avery’s there, eyes melting pools.

  ‘C-c-can you get my jumper?’ Sammy whispers.

  The curtain falls and there’s a brief scuffling. Sammy turns to the front door just as it crashes open and Avery tumbles out followed by a string of shouts from Aunt Karen.

  ‘If Sammy’s there, I’m calling the cops!’ she shouts. ‘Come back inside, Avery. Right now. You’ll get your cast wet. A
very? Avery!’

  Avery shoots across the lawn, Sammy’s favourite yellow jacket in his hands. He has an oversized jumper on to hide how lumpy one arm is – the cast on his broken arm. Sammy expects the jacket to be tossed at him while Avery spins into frantic tears.

  But Avery slams into him in a desperate hug and buries his face against his brother.

  ‘Sammy.’ It’s a sob.

  ‘Hey.’ Sam clutches him, a drowning boy. ‘Hey – h-hey, you’ll get your cast wet. You should go back inside.’ He feels the fever raging on Avery’s clammy skin and the bright, unfocused look in his eyes from the pain. He’s only just out of hospital.

  ‘Are you coming in?’ Rain sticks Avery’s fine hair to his cheeks.

  ‘I can’t.’ Sam glances desperately at the door. Has she called the cops already? ‘I don’t – I can’t go to jail, I just can’t. I’m going to … I’m running away.’

  ‘OK,’ Avery says. ‘OK. I’m coming too.’

  Sammy pulls away and grabs Avery’s face, not forcing eye contact because he knows Avery hates that, just holding him tight so he knows these next words are serious. ‘I won’t have anywhere to live. Or sleep. Or eat. I’ll … I’ll steal. I’ll steal houses. It’ll be different every day, and uncomfortable and – everything you hate, OK?’ He’s crying now. Tears and rain. ‘You can’t do this with me.’

  Avery gently slips out of Sammy’s grip and pulls the already sodden jumper over Sammy’s shivering shoulders. He zips it up for his little brother and then his fingers flutter for a minute in decision.

  ‘You. And me,’ he says. ‘We.’

  He’s too soft, they always said.

  He shifts on the pillows, his eyelids swollen and sticky. He’s too tired to make a proper effort anyway and if he moves too much, he feels the clenched tightness of his stomach where he’s been punched.

  Wait.

  Stabbed.

  A chair scrapes. Sheets rustle as elbows leans forward.

  His cold hand is caught up in a warm one and a small metal object is pressed into Sam’s palm.

  His fingers fold over it automatically.

  His key.

  ‘They took it off you during surgery. But you have it back now. It’s OK, Sammy.’

  Sam drags his eyes open. His face feels stung and swollen, his throat flayed raw. He pushes past the haze of pain, the cotton, the aching behind his eyes – and sees Avery.