Danny refused to open his eyes. He was sick of being Mr. Jones’s boy. “Yes, sir. Just enjoying the weather, that’s all.”
“Okay.” Mr. Jones’s laugh was grating. “Well, your camp is going to the cafeteria. I thought maybe you’d be with them.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You’re not sick, are you?” Mr. Jones’s took a knee and his old-smelling hand landed on his forehead. It was soft, untouched by manual labor. “Perhaps you should get some rest in your room so you don’t get sunburned.”
“Maybe I’ll do that.” It was best not to argue. “I’m waiting for Zin, though.”
“Isn’t he in his room?”
“He’s coming.” Danny lied.
“Are you boys going to the game room?”
“No, sir. I think we’ll do some exploring. Maybe hike over to the beach or something.”
“That’s a fine idea, Danny Boy. A little exercise is good for you. Maybe you could grab an apple before you head off. You know what they say, an apple a day…”
“Keeps the doctor away,” Danny finished.
And Mr. Jones laughed. He grunted as he stood up but kept on laughing. “At a boy,” he said. “You’re a good boy, Danny Boy. A good one.”
Mr. Jones smacked the grass off his hands. There was an awkward silence. Danny hadn’t opened his eyes. Mr. Jones finally said, “Well, I’m going to turn in for a nap and sleep for the both of us, my boy.” That was punctuated by a short laugh and Danny cringed. “If you need anything, ask one of the Investors and they’ll be in touch with me.”
“Yes, sir.”
And the shadow was gone.
Mr. Jones was halfway across the Yard before a cart picked him up. It looked like Zin’s Investor (Danny was getting accustomed to the subtle differences in gray hair). A few minutes later, another cart pulled up to the dormitory and the Investor (he didn’t recognize this one) went inside.
Zin’s curtains were closed. Only one other room had the curtains drawn: two to the left of Zin’s. Reed. He was sleeping, too. Or hiding.
Danny could get at least one of them to go on a hike.
Or a ride.
“What are you doing?” Zin stopped short of the golf cart.
Danny shoved him onto the seat. The Yard was mostly empty. He swung around to the driver’s seat and stomped on the accelerator. The cart jerked forward and Zin nearly fell off. He went around the dorm at full speed. Zin grabbed onto the roof.
“Hold on!” Danny shouted. “We’re out of control, Zin! We’re out of control!”
Zin’s eyes were wide open for the first time since they’d finished the last round. A smile had returned, too. Danny saw it. They made the next turn even faster and Zin held on to keep from sliding off. No one saw them hit a narrow path and disappear into the trees.
Danny was breaking the rules. He was doing something bad. It felt gooood.
The wooded turns were hard to manage at full speed. They sideswiped a couple branches, gouging the side of the cart. But the laughter never stopped. They drove past the Chimney where, luckily, no one was around and they got to the path on the other side without being seen. Several minutes later and a close call with a tree, Danny slammed the brakes. Zin nearly went over the dashboard.
“There it is.” Danny huffed.
The path ended a hundred yards away at steps leading to gigantic palms that framed doors at the top.
“Geezer Mansion?” Zin said.
Danny smiled wide. “Let’s storm it.”
“Reed’s rubbing off on you.”
“What are they going to do? Ground us? Stick a needle in our head?”
Zin thought about it, then was overcome with laughter. “Let’s ditch the cart and ambush these old bastards.”
Danny started up the cart again. They each hung a foot over the edge as they approached the end of the path. Just before they hit the opening, he gunned it and they leaped out, rolling into the scrubby palms. The boys crawled out in time to see the cart come to a stop at the bottom step.
Perfect landing.
“What are we doing?” Zin asked.
They were crouched just inside the tree line, watching the front doors. “We’re going to see what the old men got inside there.”
“No, I mean why are we hiding? It’s not against the rules to be here.”
“We hijacked a cart. There’s a really pissed-off Investor back at the dorm.”
They waited another five minutes.
When nothing happened, they stepped into the opening. The Mansion was more intimidating in the real than it was flying overhead when it was Foreverland. It was only one story tall. The walls were white and smooth with a wide soffit that would keep anyone from climbing on top. The trees were kept twenty feet away, preventing anyone from climbing up one and leaping to the roof. The infrequent windows were a hundred feet apart, interspersed with single garage doors for the golf carts.
But it was long.
In both directions, the building was a solid barrier that extended all the way to each coast, cutting off the southern tip from the rest of the island. That much he had seen in Foreverland, and it was dead-on.
“You believe this?” Danny said. “It looks like a prison wall to keep us out.”
“Or keep them in. You got any ideas besides bum-rushing the front door?”
They stared at the doors. There was nothing but the sounds of the jungle all around.
“If we time it right—”
“I’m kidding. That idea sucks,” Zin said. “They’ll jolt our trackers before we’re two steps inside.”
“How do you know?”
“You want to try it?” Zin stepped to the side and gestured.
Danny hadn’t given it much thought. He wasn’t serious about getting inside, but now that they were on the doorstep, it didn’t sound so bad. Danny looked in both directions. He started to his left.
“Where you going?” Zin asked.
“Looking for a mouse hole. What else?”
“You scared of getting smoked?” Danny asked.
They’d been walking for twenty minutes. Zin faded in and out, not like he was deep in thought but more like he was just absent, staring at the ground while his body was on autopilot. Then he’d come back and they’d be talking again. Danny wasn’t all that sure Zin even knew it was happening.
He didn’t snap his fingers or clap. That was something Sid would do. Danny just gave him space because Zin always came back and then they’d pick up where they left off. Most of the time, they just walked. The Mansion was nothing but a long wall with an occasional window and not one of them accidentally left open.
Danny was about to ask the question again when Zin answered.
“No,” he said. “I’m not. I just want it to be over.”
Danny gave that answer a good twenty steps. “You giving up hope?”
“Since when was there hope? Like it or not, Danny Boy, we all get sucked into the needle. You want to swim against the current, you’re just going to get tired. Just sit back and enjoy the ride, that’s all you can do, son. And hope you come out the other side.”
“Where’s that?”
“The Chimney, where else?”
They reached the end of the building. It dropped off a sheer cliff about thirty feet. The Mansion was built flush against it. And just in case someone figured out a way to get down, tangles of barbed wire extended down to the water.
“Figured as much,” Zin said.
“Man, they don’t want us in there. Think there’s any reason to go to the other side?”
“Not unless you want to see a mirror image of this.”
The breeze was nice. They stayed there until the sweat evaporated from their cheeks. Five minutes back down the trail, they were wiping sweat off their brows. Zin seemed present, although he wasn’t talking.
“What’d you think they’re doing in there?” Danny asked.
“Healing, I guess.”
“How, though?”
“That’s what I mean,” Danny said. “They tell us they’re healing, but we don’t see anyone after they’ve graduated.”
“Maybe we’re all infected with something, it’s a quarantine.”
“You believe that?”
“Hell, I don’t know, Danny Boy. You think salmon wonder why they’re swimming up stream?”
“They should. Bears eat them.”
Zin shrugged. A few seconds later, he glazed over. He’d been on the island much longer than Danny and asked all the same questions, made all the same arguments when he first woke up in the Chimney. But you bang your head with a hammer long enough, you come to realize it only hurts when you swing. He’d put the hammer down long before Danny arrived. Explanations only made his head hurt.
“What’s it like?” Danny asked.
Zin still seemed absent, but then coughed. “What?”
“Fading out like that, what’s it feel like? Where do you go?”
He thought about it. “It’s like… becoming hollow.”
“You mean like a log?”
“Kind of,” Zin said. “I’m tired, but not the regular tired. It’s more like I’m just not connected with my body like I’m supposed to be.” He swung his hands around like his identity was a ghost floating around him. “I am out there and I’m attached to this body by these invisible filaments, like a puppet.” He began to zone. “And they’re breaking, Danny Boy.”
“What happens when they all break?”
“I guess I go to Foreverland.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because that’s where I want to be. I don’t remember much of anything when I’m back here. When we go inside the needle, that’s when I feel like myself. I get my life back and it feels good. You know what I mean.”
“But that’s a computer program, you said so yourself.”
“So, what’s the difference?”
“It’s not real. And if you’re not real, you’re dead.”
“Like I said, Danny Boy, why fight it.”
Zin went into the zone and didn’t come back out, almost like the argument exhausted him. Danny could see the cart still parked at the steps, exactly where they left it. He couldn’t stand the look on Zin’s face, remembered how the joy ride brought him back. Maybe joy rides would reattach those filaments and Zin wouldn’t go away so much. Maybe he just needed to live life in the real world and make some new memories. He could reverse the tide.
He was about to ask Zin if he wanted to drive the cart this time when the front doors opened.
Danny yanked Zin into the trees.
Just as the garage door to the left of the steps began to open, someone came down the steps. He didn’t take them one at a time and he wasn’t hunched over a cane. The kid went three at a time, hit the ground with both feet and sprang into a somersault!
Danny didn’t recognize him because he’d never seen him with that much energy. He’d been a zombie from the day Danny woke up.
But Zin knew him.
“Parker?”
The kid was climbing onto the driver’s seat.
“Parker, dude.” Zin said. “Is that you?”
Parker stood, slowly. The boundless energy dissipated. He looked from Zin to Danny and back again. The knot in his throat bobbed up and down.
“Danny Boy, look. It’s Parker! He’s right here. Oh, man.” Zin grabbed Parker’s hand and shook. “Me and Danny Boy here were just talking about never seeing anyone that graduated and here you are… man, it’s good to see you!”
The handshake shook Parker’s whole body. The zombie look that Danny associated with Parker was gone. He was confused but completely focused. He looked exactly the same, except for the hair. The wild shag was gone, replaced by a proper haircut above the ears and combed to the side. The part was so sharp and neat that it looked like a white line on the side of his head.
“I almost didn’t recognize you, man.” Zin tried to muss up the hair but Parker jerked away. Zin didn’t notice the rage that flashed across his face. “Are you living inside the Mansion? Is that where the graduates go?” Zin turned to Danny. “Holy crap, you know what that means? They’re not lying, Danny Boy. They’re really healing us, I mean look at Parker. I never seen this kid so… alive.”
One thing Danny couldn’t argue with, he looked good. Half an hour ago, Danny thought there was a chance they might be chucking the graduates into an oven that smoked out the top of the Chimney. Now, there was proof they weren’t.
“Can you get us inside?” Danny looked inside the open garage. “We’ll hide in the garage until night, what do you say?”
“Oh, hell yeah,” Zin said. “How about it, Parker? Maybe you can give us a sneak preview?”
Parker’s eyes widened. The knob was bobbing non-stop. He started backing up the steps and tripped backwards.
“I don’t know, Zin.” Danny watched Parker crab-walk his way up the steps. “Something isn’t right.”
Zin was catching on. “You remember us, Parker?”
When Zin took a step towards him, he crawled faster.
“That’s enough.”
The deep authoritative voice sent shivers through Danny’s guts. A round old man was at the front doors. He stepped aside and two old men came out to help Parker inside. The round old man kept Danny and Zin frozen in place with a baggy-eyed stare.
“Danny Boy?” Mr. Jones came out. “What are you doing here, son?”
The gentle, grandfatherly look that distinguished Mr. Jones from all the other old men quickly darkened. Danny experienced another familiar feeling.
Getting caught.
24
Danny lifted the desk onto his bed and sat on top of it. It was mid-day and most people were in the game room or the cafeteria. Only three guys were in the Yard playing catch with a long-distance disc.
Danny hadn’t been outside in three days.
Mr. Jones put him on room-restriction for two days and threatened to send him to the Director if he got to misbehaving like that again. None of that bothered Danny. To prove it, he volunteered to stay in his room a third day. Who knows, maybe he’d stay there until they dragged him to the Haystack for the third round.
He spent the day staring at a spot on the ceiling and counting his breath, practicing his focus like Zin taught him. You’ll need it to control yourself when you’re inside the needle. Find your point of existence and breathe into it.
There were a dozen old men that were eventually lured out of the Mansion when they got caught. When Mr. Jones got the full story – how they hijacked the golf cart and conspired to break inside – his face turned dark red. A jagged vein throbbed on his right temple. Danny thought it might wriggle out and explode.
Zin’s Investor, Mr. Stevens, didn’t change color. He arrived ten minutes later and calmly took Zin aside while Mr. Jones ushered Danny down the steps with a stranglehold on his arm. Anger transformed his feeble task-master into a thundering disciplinarian. They went to the dormitory on the very same cart that Danny swiped.
“You love trouble, Danny Boy,” he said. “You have to have self-control. Chaos leads to anarchy, my boy. It’ll lead you down the wrong path. It led you here.”
Thought I was here for healing.
Mr. Jones strangled the steering wheel. “There are much worse places than here, I promise. You go back to trouble and you’ll find out.”
Mr. Jones was telling Danny more than he should’ve and Danny knew it. Most thirteen year old boys would’ve been reduced to a trembling mess under the glare of those father figures, but not Danny. It was thrilling. And the more Mr. Jones frowned – the more he shook his finger – the more fun Danny was having. He was forced to look away before he began laughing. Mr. Jones thought it was because he felt shame and, out of compassion, left the boy alone. He was hopeful Danny was punishing himself and that maybe, just maybe, he was mentoring this boy to a better life.
But authority doesn’t scare me, Mr. Jones.<
br />
And neither did Sid.
Self-preservation should’ve instilled some fear in him since all the above could cause a great deal of pain. Maybe worse. Danny knew he was good with computers, that perhaps he’d been arrested for hacking a federal agency, and that he loved trouble. It was a start.
He also knew something else: Parker was alive and healthy. Maybe a little confused but, besides the creepy haircut, he looked good. That ended speculation that the old men were using them for firewood. But Parker didn’t look excited to help them out.
Something had changed.
Danny had a future date with the Director, he was sure of it. And it might be sooner than later if he didn’t curb his behavior and he had no plans to do that. He was just starting to flex his muscles and he liked it.
The boys had stopped throwing the disc and headed inside. Someone else was crossing the Yard.
Reed finally left his room.
Danny’s self-imposed restriction came to an end.
25
Reed felt smaller, frailer. Vulnerable.
I’m breaking.
Reed stayed in the room because he didn’t trust himself. He craved the sun’s warmth but the ocean would be so near. If he went to the beach, all he’d have to do was step into the water and let the undertow sweep him out. It was moments like this – moments that revealed cracks in his will – that made him ask the question.
Why?
Why keep going?
Sleep came in short bursts. His body continuously ached. Dreams were fitful. He had delusions of falling, of shattering, of dying. He dreamed of drowning, over and over and over. Sometimes waking up gulping air. He didn’t find a restful night.
Until she came.
He was in a field of soybeans. The rows ran over the hills like a sea of green. He walked them and picked the heads off foxtail and stripped the seeds to chew on the bitter stalks. When the sun had peaked, someone appeared in the row ahead of him.
Her hair was below the shoulders, a halo of cherry red. She walked toward him in a fluttering white summer dress. She took his hand and led him to a lone elm tree in the middle of the field. Her smell was like a dewy morning. Her laughter, pure joy.
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