Night Owls

by Jenn Bennett

  “I can’t.”

  Before I could ask him why, the table exploded.

  11

  PLATES AND DISHES SLID, HUMMUS SPLATTERED, AND Jack’s pot of Japanese green tea tipped over and splashed across my face and his shirt. It wasn’t hot anymore, but that didn’t stop me from crying out in shock as if I’d been scalded. With soccer-mom swiftness, Jack’s arm shot out in front of me like a shield, but the damage was already done.

  “Oh, God! I’m so sorry!”

  I wiped tea off my face and looked up to see a girl squatting beside me to help straighten the table. She was thin and small, but not as short as me, and she had asymmetrically cut hair that was black on the short side and streaked with purple and pink on the fringed, longer side.

  “My toe caught on the reed mat,” she explained in a tiny, high voice that didn’t match her wild hair. “I’m such a klutz.”

  “It’s okay,” Jack said in strained voice, using his shielding arm to push our plates back from the edge of the table before they dumped in our laps.

  “My cousin Trevor lives on the next block—you know, the one in college? Anyway, I saw your hair through the window when I was walking past. I couldn’t believe it was you, but it was and—excuse me.”

  She leaned over me to hug Jack’s neck.

  “Uh, Beatrix,” he said, clearing his throat. “This is my friend Sierra.”

  “Hi there,” she said to me, putting her hand on my shoulder to steady herself as she sat back on her heels. Was she drunk or something? She smelled funny. “He’s being modest. We’re more than friends.” She bit her bottom lip and grinned at Jack.

  A positively horrified look crossed his face. He moved his mouth as if he were going to say something but couldn’t force the words out.

  “Hey, it’s cool,” she said. “We’re not together or anything. Jackson doesn’t do the couple thing, as I’m sure you know. Do you go to his school or something?”

  “No.”

  Someone tapped on the window. A silhouette of a man.

  “Shoot, I’ve got to go. Hey, you guys wanna come hang with us? We’re going to a party in Rincon Hill.”

  “No, thanks,” Jack said testily.

  She shrugged and stood. “Give me a ring sometime. Maybe you and Andy and I can hang at his mom’s place. God! I almost tripped again—you guys need to do something about this mat,” she said to the waitress who had rushed up the stairs with kitchen towels to clean our table. “See ya, Jackson!”

  WE HELPED STAR CLEAN UP THE TABLE. JACK APOLOGIZED to her and later to me on the way back to the Inner Sunset. Our connecting bus was crazy full, and we had to stand. But once we’d gotten a seat together on the N train, we talked a little.

  “Thanks for being cool about Sierra,” he said quietly.

  “One freak-out a day is my limit, and I’d already used it up at the anatomy lab.”

  “Oh, good.”

  “But while we’re on the subject, are you and Sierra . . . ?”

  He looked me in the eyes and said very seriously, “Absolutely not. Sierra and I are just friends. That’s all we ever really were. Well . . .” He shook his head and glanced out the darkened window. “It’s complicated. Or it was. But now it’s simple, and we’re friends.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay?” he repeated, brows drawn together.

  I pulled a wet tea leaf out of his hair and smiled weakly. “Okay.”

  After I returned his wallet, we exchanged phone numbers and email addresses and work schedules. I thanked him for not making fun of me outside the anatomy lab. He thanked me again for not freaking out about getting splashed with tea. When we got to my stop, I wouldn’t let him walk me home. I can take care of myself, first of all. And second, no one had ever walked me home. Not even Howard Hooper. (And that’s not some veiled reference to sex, because Howard and I had plenty of that—well, maybe not plenty, exactly, but some. And anyway, it was 100 percent in his car . . . and 100 percent disappointing.)

  Besides all this, I wasn’t sure I wanted to chance running into my mom on another unplanned shift break at home, mainly because I’d have to lie when I explained that, no, Jack had nothing to do with graffiti in the museum, and gee, I’m not sure why I failed to mention that I’d met him on the Owl bus in the middle of the night when I was sneaking off to do something I was specifically warned not to do.

  I don’t like disappointing her, so I disappointed Jack instead. Not that I was conceited enough to assume he’d planned to throw me down on my front steps and kiss me like there was no tomorrow. But it was pretty obvious that I’d hurt his feelings when I wouldn’t let him walk me the measly block and a half from the Muni stop.

  “It’s not because I don’t trust you,” I told him before I left, but I don’t think he believed me. And that made me feel kind of rotten, especially when I turned around at the bottom of the street and saw his silhouette standing below the fog at the stop, watching me. I waved, but he didn’t wave back, and my rotten feeling slipped into a general all-purpose melancholy.

  When I made it back home, I discovered that Heath was out with Noah. Good thing I didn’t need him to utilize Jack’s driver’s license, because not only would it be hours before he even noticed I was gone, but the photo I texted him was so out of focus, I couldn’t read half the information on it. Still, I remembered Jack’s street name and searched for it online. It was on the western side of Buena Vista Park, and the houses there ranged in price from five hundred thousand to several million.

  I wondered which one was his.

  We used to live in a nicer place in Cole Valley, back before my dad took off. He was VP of academic affairs at the university hospital. That’s how my parents met. So, yeah, he made a crap-ton of money and couldn’t be bothered to pay child support. Heath and I pushed Mom to take him to court, but she went ballistic and screamed at us about how she didn’t need a handout from a cheater and a liar. Hey. No need to tell us twice. We never brought it up again, not even on the occasions when both Heath and I had to pitch in our own money to pay an extra-high electricity bill, or whatever. It wasn’t often—maybe a couple of times a year. And the three of us are all living here together, using the electricity, united in our stance against taking handouts from liars and cheats. So I didn’t complain.

  I just wasn’t quite ready to look at Minnie again, so after stashing my sketchpad, I stripped out of my clothes and dug out the artist’s mannequin. Dad might or might not be a bigwig VP anymore, but this thing wasn’t cheap. I turned it over in my hands and thought of everything Heath had told me about the card he found in the trash. Heath couldn’t remember the Berkeley address, but it was surreal to think that after not seeing my dad for years, he might be an hour away, just across the Bay.

  I flipped over the hanging tag. Telegraph Wood Studio. A quick Internet search pulled up the contact information, including an email address for inquiries. I doubted artist mannequins sold like hotcakes, and surely whoever carved it would remember the name of the client. The studio might even have an address on file. What harm could it do to ask?

  Before I lost my nerve, I sent a quick email.

  There. Either Dad had sent it, or he hadn’t. And if he had? Well, I’d cross that bridge later.

  IT WAS PAST MIDNIGHT WHEN I CLIMBED INTO BED, mulling over everything that had happened that day. My session in the anatomy lab. The aftermath. The calm and patient way Jack had coached me to breathe. How warm his leg had felt pressed next to mine . . .

  My phone buzzed with an incoming text message. Jack. Already? I halfway expected him to follow the usual pattern—that is, I wouldn’t hear back from him for days.

  Msg from Jack Vincent, received 12:33AM: *taps mic* Is this thing on?

  Me: Maybe.

  Jack: Just wanted to make sure you got home okay.

  Me: Safe and sound. You?

  Jack: Safe but not sound. Still sorry about earlier.

  Me: If you apologize again, I’m going to have to shiv you with
a pencil.

  Jack: Yes, ma’am. Hey, Bex?

  Me: Yeah?

  Jack: Despite the vomit and face full of tea, was still the best night I’ve had in a long, long time.

  I pressed a grin into my pillow before typing an answer:

  Me: I’ll be back at the anatomy lab on Thurs. Bring bottled water?

  Jack: Okay, but this time I get to keep YOUR wallet.

  Me: Deal. Good night, Jack.

  Jack: Good night, Bex.

  HE DIDN’T TEXT ME AGAIN THAT NIGHT, OR ON WEDNESDAY. By the time Thursday aFTernoon rolled around, my brain was once again conjuring crazy reasons why. Like, maybe when he said he couldn’t stop doing the Golden Apple graffiti, it was because he was being forced by the notorious local Westmob gang to spray-paint inspirational words around the city to antagonize their rivals, Big Block.

  Or maybe that Sierra chick really was the girl he was visiting in the hospital. And even though he said they were “just” friends, now I couldn’t stop thinking about her “more than” correction and what exactly that might mean. I had a vivid imagination, and the more vivid it got, the more jealous I became.

  On the train ride to the anatomy lab, I texted him the building number and the time of my drawing session. But he didn’t respond. Not then, and not after I got off the train and headed along the same pathway we’d walked two nights earlier. But halfway down the path, I spotted his lithe frame striding down a sidewalk that crossed mine.

  “Jack,” I called out to his back. When he didn’t stop, I jogged closer and called him again.

  He turned his head in both directions. He looked dazed.

  “Hey,” I said, stopping in front of him. “I texted you a little while ago.”

  “Bex.” His voice was shot to hell and back. Crap, his eyes were red, too. Either he’d developed a very un-Buddhist-like drug habit or he’d been up all night. “My phone died yesterday, and I haven’t been home to recharge it.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  He shook his head back and forth several times and scrubbed the crown of his head, mussing his hair worse than it already was. That’s when I noticed how wrinkled his clothes were, and that he had the faint shadow of unshaved whiskers darkening his jaw and chin.

  “Jesus, Jack. What’s going on?”

  “It’s going to be . . . I think the worst is . . . I don’t know. I haven’t slept, and I need a shower. I wanted to call you, but no one needs this level of heaviness in their life and—”

  “Why don’t you let me be the judge of that? Tell me what happened.”

  “I—”

  A deep voice bellowed behind me. “Jackson.”

  I swung around to see a middle-aged man in a slate overcoat approaching. He might’ve been handsome, but it was hard to be sure with the dark sunglasses and black baseball cap pulled low and tight. The only thing I knew for sure was that his clothes cost more than everything I had in my rickety wardrobe.

  “The car’s waiting,” the man said, giving me the briefest of glances. Brief enough to let me know that I was inconsequential.

  “Dad—”

  “Now.” He put a hand on Jack’s shoulder and urged him along.

  “Jack!” I said.

  “I’ll call you,” he answered over his shoulder, giving me a pained look. A few seconds later, they were yards away, heading toward the drop-off area near the parking garage.

  What in the world had happened?

  12

  SKETCHING MINNIE WAS A MILLION TIMES WORSE that night, partly because I knew what to expect, and partly because I was worried about Jack. But I didn’t try to hero-up this time: I excused myself halfway through the drawing session to walk around and breathe, using the same in-and-out pattern Jack had shown me. It helped. I managed not to get sick all over the bushes again.

  When I didn’t hear back from Jack that night, I told myself that whatever he was going through, it was clearly serious. And if he really hadn’t slept in that long, I hoped that’s what he was doing.

  The next day, I sent a text telling him to talk to me as soon as he could, no pressure. He texted back immediately:

  Msg from Jack Vincent, Received 1:30PM: I’m not ignoring you. Promise.

  Me: Are you okay?

  Jack: Better. But I have to go back to the hospital in a few minutes.

  Me: Is there anything I can do?

  Jack: No. I just wish things were different. I’d like to say this is unusual, but it’s just my screwed-up life.

  Me: I’m here if you need to talk. But I can’t help if you don’t tell me what’s going on.

  Jack: I have to go now. I’ll prob be out of commission for a while. Believe me, it’s better this way.

  I’M NOT SURE WHY I THOUGHT THAT MEANT HOURS, or even a day, but after a week passed, I couldn’t take it anymore. It’s not like I spent the entire time moping or anything. I dutifully sneaked off to my drawing sessions with Minnie. I worked four shifts at Alto Market. I checked my email to see if the wood-carving shop in Berkeley that made the artist’s mannequin had responded. And I did my best not to worry about Jack.

  Until ENDURE popped up.

  Maiden Lane is this alley in Union Square. It used to be filled with sleazy brothels before the 1906 earthquake leveled it—which is sort of funny, because now it’s a fancy-schmancy street filled with high-end boutiques and restaurants. It’s also a pedestrian-only deal in the daytime. There are these gates that close to block off traffic until 5:00 p.m., when they open up to allow cars through at night.

  However, somebody closed the gates late last night after the shops closed, and while the street was blocked off, that somebody painted the word ENDURE in fifteen-foot-tall gold letters down the middle of Maiden Lane. The letters were designed to look like an old-timey Western saloon sign.

  My heart squeezed when I saw the word glittering across our TV screen on the morning news. A reporter interviewed the owner of a café whose tables were set up around the gigantic E. Using it as a chance to advertise, he said he “rather liked” the graffiti and encouraged the public to come check it out in person and buy a latte.

  ENDURE. Did it mean anything? Was he expressing something about whatever he was going through? Was it a sign that he was ready to communicate again?

  Later that afternoon, while Mom was taking a shower and getting ready for her shift, I heard footsteps bounding down the basement stairwell, and I made the instant decision to get some unbiased advice. So I tugged on fluffy socks and headed downstairs to Laundry Lair.

  A door to the right led to the garage. The one on the left led to Heath, and it was closing as I called out, “Hey!”

  Heath’s head popped around the doorframe. “Yo.”

  “How was work?”

  “Umm, fine. What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Okay, then why are you asking about my day like some 1950s housewife?”

  “I need your advice about something before Mom gets out of the shower.”

  He held the door open and waved me inside. “That’ll be in thirty seconds, so you’d better talk fast.”

  I strolled into the room as he closed the door behind us. Huh. Laundry Lair was . . . surprisingly clean. His single bed was pushed up against a wall, and it was unmade, sure. But normally the floor was covered with clothes (which was ironic, since the washing machine and dryer were literally four steps away from his bed), and his curtained-off clothes rack was filled with empty hangers. Today, however, everything was put away, and the stuffed chair in the corner wasn’t piled with books and video-game cases. I curled up on it while he changed shirts.

  “What happened to the brimstone wall?” That’s what we called the painted cinderblock above the laundry-folding ledge, where a thousand metal slash punk slash indie band and bar stickers formed a giant collage of fiery, hellish logos. At least, they’d been there a few days earlier. Not anymore.

  “I gave it a funeral. Mom was right. Everything was peeling, and all the sticker resi
due was covered in dust. It was sort of disgusting.”

  “O-kay. Since when did you start caring about being neat?” Because he was the messiest guy I knew.

  “Are you here to give me a hard time? Because I thought you wanted my advice.”

  I sighed. “So, let’s just say I met this guy on the Owl bus one night when I was coming home from the hospital, and we hit it off, but I found out he was on his way to commit a crime.”

  “He sounds like a winner.”

  “Hush, it was a really minor crime.”

  “Minor like scoring an ounce of weed, or minor like illegal parking?”

  “Somewhere in between?”

  Heath pulled a T-shirt over his head and stared at me, mouth open. “Stealing a car?”

  “What?” I practically choked. “That’s ten times worse than buying drugs.”

  Heath snickered. “Okay, what, then? He was robbing a gas station, but it was because his grandmother needed the money for surgery? Or was it just something stupid, like egging someone’s house?” When I didn’t answer right away, his eyes widened. “Hold on. Not egging, but something like it? TPing? Oh, shit! No way. Are you kidding? The thing at the museum?”

  The blood drained from my face.

  “Holy freaking . . .” he murmured. “It really was for you?”

  “Heath—”

  He pointed an accusing finger. “That text you sent of the blurry driver’s license—that’s him? You’re seeing the Golden Apple street artist guy?”

  “That’s insane,” I said weakly. “It was the egging thing.”

  “You are the worst liar in the world.”

  “Oh, crap,” I whispered, covering my face with my hands. “You have to promise me not to tell Mom. Swear on your life, Heath.”