Poked

by Naomi Niles

  So running from the police was a new experience. It was like being in a real adventure. I don’t know if Darren enjoyed it as much as I did. He looked scared. He held onto the grab-handle like he was afraid of being flung out if I slammed too hard on the brakes.

  But the car didn’t slow down, and we didn’t make any sudden stops. It helped that we weren’t the only ones in the chase; Adam and the other guys were zipping along beside us like we were in an actual race. I gave Adam a thumbs-up, and he winked at me just before he accelerated and took off.

  “They can’t catch all of us,” said Darren, who had finally caught his breath. “They’ll have to pick one.”

  “It’s like a race where the prize is not going to prison,” I said in excitement. “I love it!”

  Darren shook his head incredulously. I laughed; I couldn’t help it. Sometimes I thought maybe I was too much for him.

  Eventually, we did manage to escape from the police. I waited until they swarmed the driver behind us when they were too distracted to be paying much attention to where we were going. At that point, I made a sudden sharp turn to the left, down a couple of side streets, ultimately bringing the Mustang to a stop in the shade of a large bridge.

  Darren looked like he had gotten the wind knocked out of him. He kept breathing in and out like a man who had almost drowned. I could feel my adrenaline flowing. I felt giddy and light-headed, the way I had felt the one time I had ever been truly drunk, and I felt a crazed urge to reach over and throw my arms around him. But we were both sweaty and smelly and badly in need of showers.

  “I don’t know if I could’ve pulled that off,” said Darren.

  “I mean, you did just win forty thousand in a race.”

  “I feel like maybe you deserve that money more than me. It’s pretty impressive considering you can barely see over the steering wheel.”

  “Just because I’m short doesn’t mean I’m not fast.”

  We stayed there hidden under the bridge for another hour until we felt it was safe to come out. Once we were startled by a knock at the window, but it was just a homeless man begging for money. We laughed with relief, and I gave him what I could find in my purse.

  ***

  “So, did you sleep with him?”

  It was Monday morning, and there was no one else in the store but me and Nic. She’d been gone for most of the weekend, and this was the first time I had seen her since the race on Saturday. Lazy rays of golden sunlight drifted in through the front windows, bathing the store in a serene glow.

  “What? Of course I didn’t sleep with him,” I said in an offended tone. “Why would you think that?”

  “Because you had just escaped from the police. I bet your adrenaline was flowing. Those are the kind of moments when things happen.”

  “Well, nothing happened. He probably thinks I’m crazy because I outran the police and because I couldn’t stop laughing.”

  “That would terrify me if I didn’t know you better. On the other hand, if he’s still into you after that, you’ll know he’s not the sort of person who scares easily.”

  “I think I should do that with every boy I meet: take them on a terrifying adventure, and if they still want to be my friend when it’s over, then we can get married.”

  “Or you could just sleep with him. It’s not that big of a deal.”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond to this. Nic and I had drastically different views on the meaning and importance of sex. She thought it was the sort of thing you could do casually, like telling someone your middle name. I never understood that attitude. For me, sex wasn’t something you did with just anybody. I was still holding out for the right person. When I finally did it, I wanted it to be special.

  “I bet Darren would love to get nasty with you,” said Nic as she wound the clock that hung on the back wall.

  “See, when you phrase it like that, it doesn’t sound very appealing,” I pointed out. “I don’t want to ‘get nasty’ with someone—even someone I love. I don’t want to do nasty things.”

  Nic placed the back of her hand over my forehead as though checking my temperature. “Bless your innocent heart,” she said. “It makes the rest of us look terrible.”

  “If I wanted to get nasty, I would go to the zoo.”

  “Please don’t ever say that in public.”

  Just then, the front door opened, and Adam came walking into the store. He was wearing a shirt the exact color of his scruffy beard and a pair of cargo pants with a large grease stain across the front. He approached the counter slowly as though hesitant to talk to us.

  “What was that tune you were whistling just now?” asked Nic by way of greeting. “I could swear I had heard it before.”

  “It’s from The Lord of the Rings.”

  “That’s right! I had a boyfriend in high school who forced me to watch those movies.”

  “I don’t think you want to criticize ‘those movies’ in front of me,” said Adam, pointing to his shirt which displayed a cartoon portrait of Gimli the Dwarf. “There are three types of people I will never tolerate: fascists, white supremacists, and Tolkien-haters.”

  “Yikes,” Nic muttered under her breath. Aloud, she said, “You must be having a hard time lately. I can’t imagine losing forty thousand dollars was easy for you.”

  “Okay, I didn’t lose forty thousand dollars,” he said with a smirk. “I just didn’t win it; someone else did.”

  “Oh, well excuse me. It couldn’t have been easy not winning the forty thousand—especially knowing Darren won it.”

  Adam blinked rapidly and flashed his teeth repeatedly as though trying to think of a rebuttal, but none was forthcoming. “There are worse people it could’ve gone to. I won’t pretend Darren is my favorite person, but I know I can trust him to spend the money wisely. Frankly, I’m just relieved not to be in jail right now.”

  “Did they catch the other two guys?” I asked with wide eyes.

  “They caught one. Randy is sitting in jail at this moment. But I wouldn’t feel too bad for him. He’s been in and out of jail so often that I’m starting to think he likes it there. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out he had deliberately slowed down to let the rest of us get away. So you have him to thank for that.”

  “Darn. And all this time I thought I was just faster than the rest of you,” I said sadly. “Don’t tell Darren that.”

  Adam raised his arms in a gesture of innocence. “Anyway, the reason I came in here was to see if you could help me with something related to Darren. I know he came in here a few days ago and ordered a part. But he won’t tell me what he ordered, and I was hoping maybe you could tell me.”

  “If Darren wouldn’t tell you, what makes you think I’m going to?”

  Adam shrugged. “I figured you wouldn’t mind helping a good man out.”

  “Well,” I replied, and a smile played at the edges of my mouth, “maybe that’s what I’m doing.”

  Again, Adam threw up his hands in the air, but this time with a look of defiance. “Well, you’re being stubborn. I guess I can’t blame you. It was probably pretty thrilling riding in the front seat of his car on Saturday.”

  “It was okay,” I said with a shrug.

  “But if you don’t want to help me, I’ll just take my business elsewhere. I don’t want to give my money to a couple of lousy Lord of the Rings haters anyway.”

  He turned and stormed out of the building. “I actually like Lord of the Rings,” I said, about ten seconds too late.

  “Easily offended much?” said Nic, turning on the portable stereo. George Jones’ “The Race Is On” was playing. “At least he’s cute enough that I can sometimes overlook how obnoxious he is.”

  “You could find a guy who is both cute and not obnoxious.”

  “I’ll believe you when I meet him.” Taking a sip of her soda, she added, “Anyway, it’s not like we can give out personal information about customers. He would need a court order.”

  “I should probably warn Darren a
bout this.” Reaching into my purse, I pulled out my phone and sent him a short text. “Honestly, why are boys so competitive sometimes?”

  “Because they like to impress girls, and because they don’t know any better.”

  I shook my head in annoyance. “If a boy wanted to impress me, racing cars would not be the way to do it. He should write a book or something. Become an astronaut. Release all the penguins from the zoo.”

  “They would probably all die.”

  “Not if he took care of them. The problem with boys is that they think there are only three ways to impress us, and they’re wrong about all three.”

  “Hear, hear,” said Nic, raising her soda in the air as though making a toast. “Sometimes, I wish I didn’t like boys so much. Women like you are far more sensible.”

  “You’re making me blush,” I said, smiling. “I don’t recommend being single, but it’s not all bad. You can buy a whole bag of grapes and not have to share them with anyone, and if you want to spend the whole night writing, there’s no one to stop you.”

  “What about when you just want someone to cuddle? I cuddle with you sometimes, but it’s not the same.”

  “Sorry I’m not a boy,” I said sadly.

  “It’s okay; you’ll do. What have you got going on tonight?”

  I shrugged. “Probably just go home and write and feel sad about my life.”

  “What have you got to feel sad about?”

  “My dad is dying, and all the boys I know are dumb race-car drivers. I bought myself a jug of pomegranate juice at the whole foods market a couple nights ago, but I can’t get the lid off, and my dad’s hands are too weak to open it. I guess I could ask the nurse, but I keep forgetting. And it’s been a while since I’ve heard a song that I really liked.”

  “I’m sorry your life is so hard.”

  “It is, though. You don’t even know.”

  Nic went back to sweeping the back room, and I sat down at the counter feeling more miserable than before. I knew what I wanted to do when I got home—I wanted to make a quick dinner and then barricade myself in my room and work on my book until midnight.

  But I also knew what would actually happen because it had happened so many times before. I would come home to find Dad lying in bed reminiscing about the past. He would stroke my cheek and warn me to live every day to the fullest because I didn’t know when I was going to die. And I would nod along and pretend to be inspired even though I had heard all this before, and I’d hold in my tears until I returned to my room. And then I would cry into my pillow because not only was he dying, but his mind was dying, and I hated seeing him like this, and I hated that there was no one else to support me and look after me. And for the thousandth time, I would fall asleep with my arms wrapped around a stuffed penguin, wishing someone else’s arms were wrapped around me.

  Chapter Eleven

  Darren

  I awoke on Monday morning to a call from my mom.

  “Hey, Mom, what’s up?” Slowly, I got out of bed and went over to the window. Yellow-golden spring sunlight shone down on the evergreens and azaleas that lined the front yard. A middle-aged woman in yoga pants jogged briskly past, leading a pug on a leash. Across the street, a couple kids were playing in the stone fountain that stood in the center of the park.

  “I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” said Mama slowly. “And that you weren’t dead or in jail.”

  “Mama, you ought to know me better’n that,” I said with a smile. “How many times have I been to jail in my life?” I held up two fingers, although she couldn’t see them. “Twice. I have only been to jail twice!”

  “I know, but your dad explained to me what drag racing is, and I’ve been really worried about you all weekend. You weren’t answering your texts yesterday, and I thought maybe you had been hurt. Then this morning I saw on the news that there’d been a police chase and that they had apprehended one of the drivers.”

  “Not me, though. Me and my friend were smart enough to get away.”

  “Well, it sounds like it was a close thing. Sometimes I wish you’d find yourself a girl who could help you settle down. You’re almost twenty-two years old. It’s time you started thinking about raising a family and taking care of a woman. You can’t keep putting your life in danger once you’ve got kids to look after.”

  A man and woman in matching athletic shorts were jogging up the street together. The man turned to wave at me; I smiled back at him. “Mama, I promise I’ll quit racing once I’ve got kids of my own.”

  “You’d better,” she said. “I’m gonna hold you to that.”

  “You didn’t even ask me how much money I won.”

  “Did you win the race? I hadn’t heard anything about cash prizes.”

  “There was a very substantial cash prize. That’s the whole reason I was competing.”

  “Well, how much did you make?”

  “Forty thousand dollars,” I said proudly.

  “Well, that’s great—especially for one weekend. I just wish you wouldn’t have to risk your neck to make it.”

  “Mom, I was never in any danger. I know how to put on a seatbelt and helmet. And if it makes you feel any better, I’ll come over for breakfast tomorrow morning.”

  “Would you? That would be great.”

  By the time we got off the phone, I could tell Mom was proud of me, though she didn’t want to say so for fear of encouraging me in my bad habits. Throwing on my work uniform and heading into the kitchen, I poured myself a glass of orange juice and fried up the last of the hash browns from the bag in the fridge. Over those, I sprinkled shredded cheese and some Cajun seasoning from a spice rack she had given me for my last birthday.

  The hash browns were delicious but not particularly filling. On my way to work that morning, I picked up another box of donuts for me and Dickie. I found him in the garage hunched under the hood of the Mustang.

  “What’s wrong with the car?” I asked him, setting the box down on the counter.

  “Just making a few adjustments, is all.” He held up a small socket wrench that was covered in black tar. “It was making an odd rattling noise when I started it this morning, so I wanted to make sure it was still working properly.”

  “Penny was tearing up the road on our way through Dallas the other day, so I wouldn’t be surprised if there was some damage to the lining. I don’t understand why she refuses to race; I’ve never seen anybody drive that fast.”

  “Maybe she doesn’t want to get arrested,” Dickie suggested.

  “That is undoubtedly why she was running from the police. But at least we managed to get away before they caught us.”

  Dickie turned and flung the wrench onto the counter, where it landed with a loud clatter. He looked irritated, and I could tell he was barely paying attention. “Adam came in here this morning wanting to see you,” he said in an annoyed voice. “I told him I wasn’t expecting you in until later.”

  “Oh, yeah? What did he want?”

  “Nothing good, if you ask me. He’s still furious that you won the race and he’s determined to take you down a peg.”

  “Oh, yeah?” I swung my legs over the counter and sat down in the large swivel chair. “How’s he expectin’ to do that?”

  “He, for some reason, thinks it would be a good idea for you to wager your cars. Whoever wins the next race gets to keep their opponent’s car.”

  I was so surprised that for a moment I didn’t react. Then, once the initial shock had passed, I burst out laughing. “I mean, why not? I’ve beaten him before; I can do it again.”

  “I just don’t think it’s a good idea,” said Dickie, clutching at his stomach. “We’ve invested too much time and money and effort into that car for Adam to be parading around in it. If he won, he would never let you forget it.”

  “Anyway, I brought you some breakfast. It’s over there on the counter. I think I’m gonna run over to the auto parts store and look around for a bit.”

  Dickie jerked his head up a
nd studied me quizzically. “Any particular reason?”

  It should have been clear from the frozen expression on my face that I hadn’t thought of a reason. “I mean, I guess if you need me here…”

  “No, no, now I’m curious,” he said with a shrewd look. “Were you just going to stroll the aisles? No plan or agenda?”

  “Yeah. Like I said, I don’t need to go.” I tossed off my hat and threw it down on the counter, adding in a quiet voice, “I’ll just stay here.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Penny

  The air-conditioning went out that night, and when I called the repairman, he said he wouldn’t be able to come to the house until early the following day. I opened the window in Dad’s room and dragged the oscillating fan out of the closet. There were a few plastic bottles of ice-cold water in the fridge; I gave him half and took the other half to my room.

  I put on a pair of shorts and a green tank top and spent a few hours in bed with my laptop, working on my book. I had just reached the part where the handsome airplane pilot takes the plain but kindhearted young nurse out on their first date when I decided to stop for the night. I would probably spend the entire next day at work outlining their date in my head, trying to get every detail perfect. Of course, I had never been on an actual date myself, so I would have to ask Nic what they were like. I hoped her answer wouldn’t be too horribly inappropriate.

  I awoke the next morning to find my dad knocking at my door. Throwing a blanket around me, I ran to open it.

  “Dad, why are you up and running around?” I demanded. “You’re supposed to wait for me to come and help you.”

  “I’m actually not feeling too bad today.” He ran the back of his hand over his sweaty forehead. “In fact, I think I would like to get out of the house for a bit if you’ll come with me.”

  “Dad, this is a terrible idea. What would Margo say?”