Emancipated

by M. G. Reyes

  John-Michael knew Grace was right. The confession had been cathartic. And as he’d pointed out to her, without evidence or a written confession, what he’d told her couldn’t convict him. But it still wouldn’t be good if the information got out. Who knew where it could lead?

  He’d bound himself to Grace forever, had to trust that she could keep a secret. Otherwise he would drive himself crazy, worrying about it. It made him feel more secure to know she’d kept one of her own. But maybe he’d just lost all good sense a while back and now he was running on the heady vapor of hope.

  Without knowing what had really happened with his father, however, the other housemates couldn’t possibly begin to understand what he’d done on their way home.

  Even Grace was taken aback at first, but once she’d recovered from the shock of it, Grace had understood. He knew she would. She had a darker heart than any of the others might suspect.

  Prison had a way of contaminating everyone it touched. Now Grace was urging him to rein in the secrets he’d unleashed.

  “I’m done talking about what happened with my dad,” John-Michael said. “I mean it. But seriously, you don’t think Lucy has already guessed?”

  “Perhaps. But if Lucy did hook up with Paolo—I’m not so sure she’s a safe bet. Pillow talk—it’s notorious.”

  “So I’ll deny it.”

  “I mean it,” Grace insisted. “Don’t even get into a conversation about fathers. You never know where talk like that might lead.”

  “Oh, I get it. You’re worried that if I talk about fathers then people might start asking about your dad.”

  For a moment a look of sharp anxiety had appeared on her face. “John-Michael, this isn’t about me. Sure, I prefer it if people don’t start up about my dad. Candace doesn’t know about him—my mom wanted it that way. If she finds out I’ve been hiding it all these years, I don’t know if she’ll ever trust me again. But mainly, it’s about you. You committed a serious crime. That’s a secret you’ll have to keep—maybe for the rest of your life.”

  “Hey, hey, I know. You can trust me. On the subject of fathers, I’m all, like, zip-lipped. I’m an Easter Island statue.” His face wore an immobile frown until Grace reluctantly smiled.

  “Okay,” Grace said. But then, “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe you should talk to Lucy about what happened. Why we went to San Quentin, I mean.”

  “I should tell Lucy about your dad?”

  Grace nodded. “Lucy. But only her. And only about my dad. Not the stuff about your dad.”

  John-Michael still couldn’t figure why Grace thought Lucy was a safe bet with Grace’s secret about her father and not with John-Michael’s secret about his. Yet she insisted.

  “Lucy’s your best friend in the house. She’s going to expect some explanation for why you upped and decided to spend your holiday weekend taking me to visit some con. Being a total statue about it will only rouse her suspicions. Tell her about my dad. And nothing else.”

  His first chance to speak alone to Lucy came later that night.

  “Come up for a smoke.”

  “On the balcony—are you insane? The SoCal offenserati will be walking their dogs right about now. They’ll sue you for giving them cancer.”

  John-Michael tipped his head toward the rear of the house. “In the backyard then?”

  “Fine.” Lucy followed him outside.

  He reached into his jeans for a packet of cigarettes, snapped a lighter, and fired up. Wordlessly, Lucy plucked the cigarette from his fingers. She took two drags and handed it back.

  “I’m quitting,” she told him with an easy confidence. “First, I only bum smokes from other people. Next month I go cold turkey.”

  With an almost seductive swing of her hips, Lucy settled into one of the leather-backed easy chairs on the tiny lawn. She folded her arms. The skin of her shoulders, neck, and arms was glossy with a sheen of perspiration. John-Michael admired her poised sexuality.

  “What is it, JM? What really happened on the road today? I mean, dude, why’d you do it? C’mon now and talk to Lucy.”

  He ignored her question and went straight to what he’d agreed on with Grace. “Grace needed to see her father.”

  The mental processes were almost evident on Lucy’s face. After a moment she said, “What are you saying—you didn’t go to San Quentin after all?”

  He kept his eyes on hers. “Oh, we went to San Quentin all right.”

  Grace had instructed him very firmly against actually making the final connection for Lucy. With nothing but silence and his firm gaze between them, Lucy finally caved in and said it. Just as Grace had predicted she would.

  “Grace’s dad is Dead Man Walking . . . ?”

  Slowly, he nodded. “Grace’s mom made all the kids from her first marriage take her second husband’s name— Deering. But her real name is Grace Vesper. And her father is Alex Vesper. ‘Alan Vernon’ is just a name she made up. Vesper is who she’s been writing to, been seeing.”

  Lucy didn’t visibly react. “Is that supposed to mean something?”

  “It didn’t to me, either. But just take a look on the internet. He’s all over it. Around eight years ago.” He waited for Lucy to say something. She didn’t. “That Hollywood murder in the swimming pool? Tyson Drew, the movie star?”

  Finally, Lucy responded. “Grace’s dad killed Tyson Drew?”

  “No. He didn’t. Cops pinned it on him anyhow. Grace’s mom’s managed to get her family away from the stigma. They were separated at the time it happened anyway, so no love lost. Poor guy doesn’t have too many folks believing in him.”

  “But Gracie believes.”

  He knocked cigarette ash onto the nearby strip of lumpy, reddish-brown dirt. “Yeah.”

  “I see.” Lucy’s expression was grave, calm. Yet there was calculation behind those eyes. Her profound silence told him that.

  John-Michael continued. “Can you imagine the pain of something like that? I spent one night in jail, Lucy, and I’m not ashamed to admit it, I was fuckin’ terrified. The moment they lock that door. And you know for the next however many hours, that’s your world. The stink of piss, stale tobacco breath, sweat. I was lucky—I’m a minor, they couldn’t lock me up with any of the lousy scumbags they were bringing in. But I saw them when I was waiting. Drunks, junkies, guys from rough neighborhoods looking at me like I was something to slice up and lay on a sandwich. And I’m not a wuss, I’ve spent nights under freeways. That was sweet blessed freedom and perfumed sheets by comparison.”

  She said nothing. Lucy stared back at him with eyes that were only now beginning to register anguish.

  “Imagine all the soul and life sucked out of a building and replaced with fear and despair and rage that’s barely suppressed. That’s San Quentin. Last time, when I went with Paolo and Gracie, I stayed in the car and Grace went in with her cousin Angela. I didn’t go in. I couldn’t. This time, she made me go in with them. Said she wanted me to meet her old man. So I’d understand. And I did. I thought that night in jail had toughened me up. But no. The minute that security gate closed behind us, I felt the walls closing in. Throat all tight. Like all the air was used up. Like any minute someone would tap me on the shoulder and say, ‘Hey, pal, there’s been a mistake, it’s your time.’”

  Barely audible she whispered, “But they didn’t.”

  “How I didn’t just turn around and run screaming out of the place, I don’t know. Maybe I was afraid I’d look guilty. Anyway, I sat down with Gracie in front of some glass. Alex Vesper on the other side. Eight years on death row, you gotta figure that’s going to waste a man, right? Well, I never saw the dude before, so maybe he was a fat slob once, but I doubt it.”

  Her voice quavered. “How’d he look?”

  “A real tough guy. Not an ounce of fat on him. Face hard, like granite. But in his eyes, he’s all Grace. Glacier-blue. When he smiled at her, it was like a sledgehammer cracked open that ice. Smiled at me, too. Grateful to me for driving her up there. Two
visits in a month. That’s better than the last six. Gracie told him what was going on with me. And he told me: Don’t expect the truth to protect you. That’s a crock.”

  He paused then, waiting for Lucy to respond. But all she did was to take his cigarette, and return his gaze with a level stare. After a minute, she stood, paced over to the French doors, slid the door open, and stepped into the living room. She closed the door, didn’t look back even once.

  For a moment John-Michael just stood there, stunned. He’d poured his heart out to her, but nothing. Lucy was as inscrutable as she was evidently irresistible.

  He pitied any guy who got too close.

  GRACE

  PACIFIC COAST HIGHWAY, MEMORIAL DAY, AFTERNOON

  The ocean shimmered. It had a particular deep blue brilliance in the midafternoon that drew the eye, so long as you could bear its dazzle.

  From behind dark brown sunglasses, Grace watched John-Michael. He was driving with one arm resting lazily on the open window of the Benz. The car sped around the cliffs of the coastal road, its tires clinging to the tarmac as they took each bend.

  Grace marveled at the aerodynamic design of the convertible, so perfectly engineered that even with the top down, her hair barely moved. The car stereo was playing the Shins track “New Slang” from John-Michael’s indie music playlist. Not the kind of music that she would have picked for a road trip. Yet for a long, long time after that day, the tune would instantly evoke in Grace an exquisite ache of nostalgia; the memory of their drive back from San Quentin along the Pacific Coast Highway.

  And all that had begun and ended on that day.

  John-Michael had barely spoken a word in the last fifty minutes. It was the longest stretch they’d gone without conversation. Initially, she’d thought he was just enjoying the music. But when she’d asked him the name of the track that had been playing at the time, it was obvious that he wasn’t tuned in to the music. His eyes were on the road; his mind was somewhere else entirely.

  She watched him awhile. As she did, Grace became aware of John-Michael’s male physicality. His forearms weren’t as developed as Paolo’s, but they were covered with fine light hair, and the muscles beneath were strong, lithe. She’d always thought of John-Michael as skinny, but firm thighs filled his pale blue jeans. In fact, she realized, it was only his torso and hips that were slender. In the shoulders and arms were hints of a powerful, if underexercised body.

  Weirdly, she’d never really looked at him that way before. His face was angular and sallow, but without the usual touch of eyeliner and with a few days of dark stubble on his face and throat, his look was much tougher than she was used to. Normally, John-Michael had such a calm, gentle expression.

  Today, something deep was troubling him. He looked older. For a moment she thought she was catching a glimpse of how he’d look as a middle-aged man: saturnine and wary.

  Yet surprisingly attractive.

  She looked away, a little disturbed by the sudden stirrings he was causing within her. Falling for a gay friend? She imagined Candace’s response.

  Yeah, go there. Way to make Paolo look like a realistic prospect.

  What was wrong with Grace?

  Kind of obvious, sis, you need to get laid.

  Maybe that was it? Or was it because now Grace knew that John-Michael wasn’t just the sweet, amiable housemate she believed him to be? He had a darker edge. Was it possible she was only attracted to boys with a dark side?

  But she had to admit still another explanation. It ran like a current through her. Maybe it was because of the new, secret bond between her and John-Michael.

  Grace felt dizzy when she really thought about how much he’d trusted her. The power it gave her over him. She wondered if he had any idea how fiercely protective she felt toward him now.

  Her eyes strayed back to the road, carefully avoiding any part of John-Michael. On the stretch of road ahead, the green tent of a roadside booth billowed in the offshore breeze. She could just make out the writing on the sign: CARAMEL APPLES—FRESH.

  “Omigod, caramel apples,” Grace said. “We gotta get some. Pull over.”

  John-Michael eyed her, slow and curious. Silently, he did as she’d asked. The Benz rolled to a soft halt, crunching in the fine gravel of the hard shoulder. They were at the edge of the coastal road. Seven feet to the right, a scrub-covered rocky hillside rolled steeply down. At the bottom, rocks crumbled into the ocean. Waves crashed against a thin strip of pale golden beach.

  John-Michael didn’t make any move to get out of the car. He took a cigarette from the pocket of his checked shirt, lit it with a flick of his Zippo lighter.

  Grace undid her seat belt, opened the passenger door. She stretched her legs for a second before getting out.

  “You want one?”

  “I’ll take one to go.”

  “I’ll call Maya to see if the others want some. We’ll be home in two hours. They’d still be pretty fresh.”

  Plucking her cell phone from her back pocket, Grace strolled over to the stall, which was about fifty feet away. A single car was parked between the Benz and the caramel apple stall. Inside, a family of three was watching a Disney movie on the DVD screens, each eating a big, juicy apple coated in soft caramel. She could smell the buttery warm candy as she passed. Close to the stall it was almost overpowering. Under a clear plastic box, rows of identically sized, glossy caramel apples stood on their heads, wooden sticks in the air. Behind the counter, the vendor grinned.

  “I’ll take one,” she told him. The call connected. Maya picked up. “Hey, Maya,” Grace began. “What do you say to some caramel apples?” She tucked the phone between her chin and shoulder as the vendor handed her one apple.

  “I say ‘hey there, little fella,’” she heard Maya say warmly. “I say, ‘Now, you are one fine-lookin’ piece of fruit.’”

  Grace smiled. “That’s what I thought.” With the phone still under her chin, she nodded at the vendor. “And five more to go.” The vendor wrapped the take-out apples smartly in clear, red-tinted cellophane and put them in a candy-striped paper bag. Grace got her wallet, began to count out some dollars.

  Without warning, the vendor’s expression shifted, frozen in stark fear. She spun around, following his stare.

  John-Michael’s Mercedes-Benz convertible was rolling over the crest of the hill. A second later, it pitched toward the steep section. The car picked up speed.

  The vendor managed to gasp, “Is that your car . . . ?”

  And then there was nothing but the shattering sound of a car crunching into the rocky beach below. Three seconds later, an explosion. A fireball engulfed the entire Benz. The roar and boom pulsed through her body, a shock wave of raw energy.

  For a second, Grace was paralyzed. On autopilot, she slid her phone from between her chin and shoulder and back into her jeans pocket.

  She could tell the vendor was trying to say something else to her. But she didn’t hear it. She didn’t notice her caramel apple flying through the air, flung aside as she turned, racing toward the spot from where John-Michael’s car had plunged toward the ocean. Her voice was caught up in her throat, tight and stifled. She could feel her breath coming in gulps. Panic engulfed her.

  Then she saw him. Climbing slowly over the rise of the hill, framed with the ultramarine blue of the sea. John-Michael.

  As he came closer, she thought she could almost detect a lightness to his step. When he reached her, to her amazement, he smiled.

  “Hello, Grace.” He leaned in, planted a soft kiss on her cheek. “Thank you for being here.”

  She was too stunned to move. In the distance behind John-Michael, she watched the car with the family of three pull sharply into the road and speed away. Over in his stall, the caramel apple vendor simply stared in horror.

  “What . . . did you do?”

  John-Michael looked straight into her eyes. “The only thing I could.”

  “You . . . were you trying to kill yourself?”

  “
I jumped out, Gracie. It’s a convertible.”

  “Why?”

  “Why did I jump out?” He glanced over his shoulder to the blazing heap of crushed metal below. “I’d have thought that was kind of obvious.”

  “Why did you total your beautiful car?”

  Slowly, he shook his head. “Not my car. Chuck’s car. Chuck’s car where he shagged Judy. Chuck’s car that he loved more than he ever loved me. I thought it could be mine but how, Grace, how could it? Think about what I did to make it mine.”

  On the last sentence, his voice broke. A hand went up to his eyes. “You think I can ever forget what I did to get it?”

  She put both arms around him, pulled him against her shoulder. Behind his back, she watched thick black smoke twist into the air. The breeze changed for a second and she caught a scent of gasoline and burning rubber.

  John-Michael pushed back, wiped his eyes. He turned to face the ocean.

  “Good-bye, Dad,” he breathed softly.

  She sighed deeply; relief mixed with resignation. “I hope you have a plan for how you’re going to explain this.”

  “I’ll think of something.”

  “How about a plan for getting us back to LA?”

  He took out his cell phone. “Let’s call the house, ask someone to come get us.”

  “Candace won’t. She’s gonna think you’ve lost your mind.”

  “Paolo, then. He’s a good guy.”

  “Yeah, Paolo. Good ol’ reliable Paolo and his Chevy Malibu.”

  John-Michael slid an arm around her waist. He drew her gently against him. She responded by putting her own arm around him. They began to walk. In front of them, a narrow ribbon of smoke rose from the side of the road. It began to thread through the air toward them, smoldering tar and burned aluminum on the wind. Until they walked right through.

  For a second, Grace felt John-Michael’s grip tighten. But he didn’t look back.

  MAYA