“I’m not leaving her, Ben.”
“Fine. Whatever. I have another job for you.”
I stand straighter. “Yeah?”
“There’s a detective in a different department who needs help investigating a potential credit card scam.” My cousin glances across the living room at my mom’s closed bedroom door, studying the wood veneer like it has some answer. “Computer thing—just your speed. Off the record, of course, but it’s good money.”
Now I’m the one to look away. “I appreciate the offer, but we’re doing okay.”
Such a lie. I’m out of jobs, out of money. I should pawn my computer or sell my bike and yet I can’t bring myself to do it. They’re all I have left. I’ll have to tap the buried emergency fund, and after that . . . I don’t know. I do know it’s kind of funny Ben wants to hire me for computer work when I might not be able to keep the electricity on long enough to finish the job.
“What will it take?” Ben asks, and my neck goes hot. I’m so tired of being his charity case.
I’m tired of being everyone’s charity case.
“It would take something I’d actually want,” I say, forcing myself to meet his eyes. He’s trying to help. I don’t need to be a jerk about it. “We’re doing fine. I like firewall stuff, but the kind of work you’d need for a credit card scam is beyond me. I don’t want to promise anything I can’t deliver on. My dad should call soon. Once he’s settled—”
“Yeah, we need to talk about that.” Ben’s tone rolls lower like he’s sharing a secret, and my stomach goes cold. It’s probably the same voice he uses when issuing tickets. It’s two parts authority, one part condescension. “Your dad’s not in California. He’s not looking for work. He’s hiding. From you two.”
No way. My dad wouldn’t do that. My dad would have told me. My dad would not have left us.
I don’t trust myself to say any of that though, so I say nothing and Ben stares me down, gaze crawling over my face.
“Prove it,” I say at last.
Ben nods, starts for the door, and after a beat, I follow.
2
We take Ben’s police cruiser to the east side of Atlanta, wind through older neighborhoods with leafy trees and cracked sidewalks. The houses look like something out of the seventies, but they’re well kept: nice lawns, recent paint jobs.
No trailers.
Ben takes a left and slows down as we reach a small, tan, ranch-style home. All the lights are on, and in the growing dark, the square picture window flickers blue from the television. Inside, a blond woman crosses the living room, hands someone a glass, and—
My shoulders hit the seat back. That’s my dad.
“How . . .” I swallow around the sudden, stupid lump in my throat. “How did you find him?”
“Little bit of luck actually.” Ben pushes lower in his seat, fingers tapping against the steering wheel. “One of the guys from my department recently transferred to the city and moved into a house a few streets over. He recognized your dad last week and called me.”
“I don’t understand.”
Ben exhales hard. “Yeah, you do. You just don’t want to.”
As we watch, the blond woman turns, greeting two small boys who hurtle in from another room. They run straight past her . . . to him. I lean forward, noticing how we have the same dark hair, the same wiry build. My stomach thumps into my feet.
“How old do you think they are?” Ben asks. “Two or three?”
“No idea,” I say, but I understand what Ben’s getting at: timeline. I don’t know squat about children. I do know these two look like him—nothing like me—and if they’re around two or three, that means my dad took up with their mom shortly after we moved here.
“You seen enough?” Ben keeps his eyes on the house, and as my dad hugs the two boys, my fingers wrap around the armrest and tighten.
“Yeah.”
Ben puts the car into drive, pulls away from the house and onto the main road. I can tell he’s waiting for me to say something. It’s certainly a moment that deserves it, but right now I’m shoving together pieces I didn’t understand—pieces I didn’t realize I didn’t understand—until now.
This is why he traveled so much.
This is why we never had enough money.
This is the real reason he left us.
Ben and I make it all the way back to my neighborhood without a word between us. He idles the car alongside our driveway and, as I start to get out, grabs my sleeve.
“You’re not going to do anything stupid, are you?” he asks.
“No. Nothing stupid.” There’s no need. I’ve already been stupid. I went with Ben and now I’m going to have to go back inside and look at my mom and pretend I don’t know so I never tell her.
All that is stupid enough.
I should tell my mom. She deserves the truth.
Except that’s what I thought I deserved, and now that I have it . . . I feel worse. Nothing’s changed. The truth didn’t set me free. Everything’s still the same: He’s still gone. She’s still in bed. I’m still . . . alone.
“You going to tell May?” Ben asks.
“Hell no.”
“You’re both better off without him.”
I stare straight ahead; focus on the seep of shadows at the bottom of our street. Ben and Charlotte are always saying things like that. They’re the Proper Side of the family, the side who remembers when my mom was a Good Girl. Then she married my dad. They think he’s trash. I’m not sure what that makes me.
“Tell me the truth,” Ben says. “How bad are you two doing?”
“We’ve been better.” Right now, we have $12.04 in the checking account and another hundred under two feet of dirt in the backyard. My mom knows all about the first and nothing about the second.
If she did, the hundred I earned from mowing lawns last month would be gone, and I’m not sure which scares me more right now: that we don’t even have two hundred bucks to our name, or that, if we did, I couldn’t trust my mom with it.
Ben shifts the car into park at my driveway, leaning one arm against the console to get a better look at me. “So. The job.”
“I could learn it as I go.” I think. I’m almost positive. “Whatever you need, I’m in.”
“Knew you’d come through for me.” Ben moves like he might slap my shoulder, but thinks better of it. “When can you start?”
“Depends.” There’s my mom to deal with, the research I’ll have to do. Credit card scams aren’t my thing. I’ll need some time to prepare. “I’ll call you, okay?”
“Yeah.”
I get out of the cruiser, shuffle up the trailer stairs, and unlock the door. I’m here, but I’m not here. My head’s still so wrapped around my dad, I don’t even notice my mom. She’s awake—in the kitchen—and for a long moment, we just stare at each other.
“Hey, honey.” Her smile is tremulous, almost a spasm.
“Hey. You’re up.” I sound positive, like my eyes aren’t snagging on the stained tee she’s been wearing for a week now and my nose can’t smell the sour sweat on her skin.
“I am up.” She doesn’t sound positive at all. Mom sounds like she knows what I’m thinking and it depresses her even more. I am an ass.
Mom nudges her chin toward the lasagna heating in the microwave. “Did Charlotte come by?”
“No, she sent Ben.”
“Good.” Mom rubs her eyes so hard I wince. I sit down at the table, brush my homework to the side so she’ll have a place to sit and eat. “I can’t deal with Char right now,” she continues.
Or ever. I deal with my aunt more than Mom does.
“She’s worried about you,” I say, and the words are lying between us before I realize I shouldn’t have said anything.
“Well, she doesn’t need to,” Mom snaps, her eyes going flat. “She doesn’t even know what’s going on unless you told her. Did you? Because people get tired, Griff. It happens especially when you work the kind of hours I do.”
“Then how would she know?”
“Because you haven’t shown up to work? She helped you get that job. You didn’t think someone would call her when they fired you?”
“I’m not fired!” Mom’s fist smacks into the Formica counter, making the dirty dishes rattle. “I’ll explain everything when I’m well enough to go in. It’ll be okay. I’m just tired. I’ll make them understand.”
This time, I’m smart enough to keep my mouth shut. We glare at each other until she sags, bottom lip poking low.
“You’re supposed to be my bright spot in the day,” Mom says. “Stop looking at me like that.”
“I’m not looking at you like anything.”
“Yes, you are. Christ, you’re so like him, you know that? You and your damn father. You’re just alike. You want that smiling mommy, don’t you? That’s the mommy you love not . . . not . . .”
Not the one I have. I focus on my sneakers, but it doesn’t stop me from hearing how she’s banging dishes around now, sniffling. She’s wrong . . . and she’s right.
I can’t take her when she’s like this. I used to be better, but then again, she used to be better too. Her episodes were further apart. Now that Dad’s left . . .
She wheels on me. “You know what? If you’re so worried about work maybe you should get a job.”
“I have a couple of jobs. You know that.”
“I mean a real job, not that part-time crap.”
“I’m not dropping out of school.”
“Then find some other way to pull your weight, because we’re behind again. They’re going to shut off the power.”
How—I shake my head. I don’t want to know what she did with the money, because I already know how I’ll fix it: Ben’s job. Forget the prepping. Forget the research. I’ll just force my way through.
Mom’s sniffling climbs into sobbing and I push away from the table, taking the cordless phone with me. Outside, I dial Ben’s cell and when he answers, I swallow hard, closing my eyes against the sound of glass shattering.
“Yeah?” my cousin answers.
“It’s me.” I put my back to the trailer door and watch the guy across my street settle into his lawn chair, twelve-pack next to him. He’ll be swinging at anyone who moves in two hours. The cops will be called in three.
I rub my temples, but the dull ache won’t go away. “Pick me up tomorrow. Let’s get this done.”
3
I spend lunch the next day sitting on someone’s truck tailgate, sketching how my Spanish teacher’s hand looked as she passed us homework assignments. Generally, I hate almost everything I draw, but this isn’t too bad. The shading’s pretty spot-on and the dips and bumps of her bones are my best yet. It might be worth keeping for my portfolio. I’m just about to start Mrs. Ramirez’s sleeve when I hear a scuff against the pavement.
I jerk, sliding off the tailgate, ready to run. If it’s Principal Matthews, I’m hosed. We’re not supposed to be out here between classes, and this will make the third time I’ve been caught. It’ll be in-school suspension for sure.
Four rows over, a head of sky-blue hair flashes between the cars.
I go still. It’s not Matthews. It’s Wick.
I’m not so lame that she slows down my world. This isn’t a shampoo commercial where Wick’s hair blows in the breeze and I trip over myself, but yeah, I’m totally straining for another look at her.
Where’s she going? I toss my pad and pencil into my bag. Now would be the time to hoof it inside the school but my feet are pasted to the pavement, which is, honestly, a bit of a habit when it comes to that girl.
That makes me sound pathetic and creepy, but I’m not a total loser. Wick and I have talked before. It was mostly about our classes, but I keep trying anyway. Now probably isn’t the best time to ask her about the weather though. Wick seems deep in thought. Her head swivels from side to side . . . she pauses . . . and then makes a hard right, heading straight for Matthew Bradford’s red Mustang.
Well, this is going to be interesting.
I lean against someone’s puke-green minivan, watching Wick through the tinted windows. She stands next to the Mustang for a few seconds and then, suddenly, drops out of sight.
What the— There’s a low pop and Wick jumps into view again, a soft hissing noise following her. I blink, unable to believe what I’m seeing. Wick just slashed Matthew Bradford’s tires.
I can barely cram down the laugh.
She glances around, double-checking that she’s still alone, and hightails it back through the parking lot. Not fast enough to look guilty. Not slow enough to get caught. Confident.
I pass one hand over my mouth. Man, there’s something about the way that girl shoves up her chin and tosses her hair that just . . . kills me.
I toss on my backpack and make my way slowly down the aisle, not stopping at Bradford’s car until Wick’s inside the school again.
Sure enough, the tire’s ruined. She made a quick puncture and tear. There’s no way Fix-A-Flat or whatever is going to plug it. The tire’ll have to be replaced.
I smile. Couldn’t happen to a nicer person too. Matthew Bradford is an asshole. There’s no better way to describe it. He loves Ed Hardy T-shirts, kicking around smaller people . . . and tossing Wick’s lunch into the school fountain.
My eyes flick to the double doors Wick disappeared through. I’d heard Bradford did it again this morning. That makes how many times now? I’ve lost count.
Guess she decided to get even. Interesting. I know a lot of girls, and none of them have ever been into payback. The realization that Wick is . . . well, it makes my chest go all warm.
I walk around the Mustang’s side, drop to one knee, and use the X-Acto knife I have for art class on the opposite tire.
There. I stand, examine my work. Now Wick and Bradford are even.
Ben picks me up after school. I usually don’t go down to the police station to get new work assignments, but my cousin says the guy wants to meet me in person. Technically Ben’s off duty, and he explains the drop-in to his coworkers by saying I want to join some community outreach program. It’s not a bad excuse until I have to follow Ben through the bull pen, all the officers slapping me on the back like I’m five years old.
If one of them asks me if I want to sit in his police cruiser while he turns on the siren, I’m out of here.
“His office is this way,” Ben says, motioning toward a narrow hallway, dotted with brown filing boxes. We’re nearly to the end when my cousin opens one of the doors, leans against the frame.
“Hey, Carson, you have a minute?” he asks.
There’s no response, but Ben walks in anyway, so I follow him. The office is almost as small as my bedroom. There’s a single filing cabinet, a desk, a computer that looks older than I am, and a thin, brown-haired guy sitting behind it.
“Carson,” Ben says, “this is my cousin Griff. Griff, this is Detective Carson.”
“Nice to meet you.” I push one hand forward and Carson shakes it, gripping harder than necessary. Tool.
“I’ve heard good things about you,” he says.
“They’re all true too.” Ben shuts the door behind us and hovers next to me. “Griff’s great with computers and he can talk his way into anything.”
I stiffen. Talk my way into “anything”? That’s not exactly a great character reference, but what should Ben say instead? “Here’s my cousin and thanks to his mom he really needs the cash”? That’s not exactly glowing either. Still, my brain keeps hanging on to Ben’s description. The only reason my cousin would bring that up is if the job isn’t strictly the “computer thing” like he billed it.
“So what do you need?” I ask.
Carson settles into his desk chair. “Someone to infiltrate a possible credit card scam. We’ve heard through a couple of sources that the group is looking for an additio
nal hacker. I want you to be that guy, make yourself useful to the leaders, and report everything to me.”
“Who’re the leaders?”
“Joe Bender and Michael Tate.”
Everything inside me sinks two inches. They don’t need my skills. They need my connections.
Joe Bender and Michael Tate are from my neighborhood. Everyone knows they’re thugs. Everyone’s afraid of them.
Including me.
I glance at Ben, but he won’t meet my eyes. I kind of hate him for it. It’s one thing to say you need my skill set. It’s another to need my background—especially when he bad-mouths that background whenever he can.
If Bender and Tate are looking for a hacker, there’s no way they’d trust an outsider. It makes me a great pick. I’m not here because I’m “good.” I’m here because I live minutes from Bender’s place.
“Can you get in with them?” Carson asks.
Probably. I pretend to be really fixated on the detective’s desk. No family pictures. No stupid figurines or knick-knacks. It’s nothing more than papers. Work. I get that.
Can I get in with Bender and Tate isn’t the question. The question is . . . do I want to? Yeah, I need the money, but these guys are seriously scary. I don’t want to be the kind of person they’d want.
“I think you could do it, Griff.” Ben clears his throat once, twice. His eyes keep cutting to Carson. “Your uncle’s been bragging about you.”
Ah, that means Paul. My dad’s brother. He followed us here shortly after we moved; set himself up in a trailer two doors down from ours. Paul’s not exactly an upstanding citizen. He deals weed for a living and sometimes does jobs with my dad.
“We’ve heard it through a couple sources,” Ben continues. “He says Bender’s interested.”
I study my cousin, spinning his tone around in my mind. Ben’s pushing this awfully hard. Is he trying to impress Carson? It feels like it. I know what he’s talking about though. I noticed the same thing. Bender showed up at my high school a few weeks ago. I had no idea why he was there. Paul was picking me up at the time, and the two of them started talking.
Lie for Me Page 2