by Wendy Wang
He startled and his eyes widened. “No ma'am,” he said. His cheeks turned pink, and he looked away quickly.
“I'm gonna sweep the store,” he announced.
“Fine,” Dave said. “You do that.”
The cash register dinged. “That will be $30.68.”
Charlie opened her wallet, pulled out two $20 bills and handed them to Dave.
After she left the store, she threw a glance over her shoulder before climbing into her car. The man stood at the window, holding his broom. His long thin face was unreadable and Aldus Talmadge was nowhere in sight.
Chapter 19
“Duct tape, plastic ties, even handcuffs. I’m just saying if it’s out there, I can escape from it.” Brian leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. Charlie gave her coworker a bemused smile.
“Why would you even have to escape from those things?” Charlie asked.
“You know, in case I’m kidnapped.” He answered her as if the question was stupid.
Charlie quirked an eyebrow.
“What? It could happen. People are crazy today. It’s good to be prepared.”
“Right,” she muttered and shrugged. It wouldn’t surprise her if Brian had a room in his house filled to the brim with freeze-dried rations, canned food, and weapons. Just in case there was a zombie apocalypse. She bit the inside of her lip to keep from showing her amusement. “So how would you do it then?”
Brian pushed his glasses up on his nose, his round face lighting up. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Ok. Just wait.” Brian pulled his black backpack from the floor and began to dig through it. A moment later he produced a half-used roll of duct tape.
Charlie folded her arms across her chest. “Do I even want to know why you have duct tape in your bag?”
“What? I always have some with me. You never know when you might have to fix something.” His condescending tone was getting on her nerves. Hopefully, she would get a call soon. He shoved the thick gray tape at her until she took it. He pressed his wrists together and held them out. “Wrap me up.”
“What?” Charlie scanned the call center floor for the closest supervisor. “No. You could get a call.”
“Come on, it’ll be fine.” He pushed his hands closer toward her. “Bind me up.”
Charlie sighed and ripped off a long piece of duct tape. She wrapped it tightly around his wrists.
“Great,” he said. “Now watch carefully. You may need to use this someday. You know, because women are kidnapped more than men.”
“Sure.” Her eyebrows raised, and she nodded. Brian wasn't the craziest coworker she had, but he was a close second. Better to humor him than to argue.
“Now watch carefully. I'm going to show you how to break these bindings.” He raised his hands above his head.
Charlie's phone vibrated against her keyboard tray and she flipped it over and glanced down. At the top it read Evan. They talked almost every day, so it was rare for him to text and her first thought was that he was in trouble.
Mom? Can you call me?
Her heart skipped a beat.
“Charlie, you’re not watching, seriously how are you going to learn this?” Brian said. Charlie held up one finger, shushing him. She glanced at the application running in the corner of her computer screen that told her when her breaks and lunch were and how long she’d been in certain phone codes. Her second break wasn't for another forty-five minutes. She picked up the phone and quickly texted him.
I can on my next break. Can you wait till then?
“The illegal cell phone,” Brian half whispered. His papery-thin voice creeped her out as he said, “Is it your boyfriend?”
Charlie scowled at him. “My son actually.” She glanced around the call center floor looking for a supervisor, maybe Laura or Kylie. They both tended to be more sympathetic when it came to child issues.
Two letters — OK — was his response. It was ridiculous to think that she could be so empathic as to feel his rejection and hurt through the text message, and yet that’s exactly what she felt. It must've been important for him to text her at one-thirty on a Wednesday afternoon. Why wasn't he in class? And why was he texting her instead of his father? She laid the phone back down on her keyboard tray out of sight.
“Okay. Ready? Watch.”
Charlie fought the urge to tell him where he could put his duct tape. She had more important things to worry about. But she’d worked with him a couple of years now, and knew if she didn’t just let him show her his trick, he would ask her about it until she finally gave in.
“Fine, go ahead.” She sat back in her chair.
He raised his hands above his head again, pressed his hands together like he was praying. In a quick swing downward that reminded her of a weird karate chop, he struck his stomach with his hands and the duct tape snapped, tearing apart.
“See?” He beamed. “That’s all there is to it.”
“Great,” she said. Kaylee passed by her row of cubes and Charlie placed her headset on the desk and put her phone into an unavailable queue to avoid any further calls.
“You want to try it?” Brian asked.
“Yeah, maybe some other time.” She turned away from him and called, “Kaylee!”
Kaylee wasn't much younger than she was. She had come to work at the call center when she was nineteen and had worked her way up to supervisor. Of all the supervisors, she was the most respected. Kaylee turned toward her name and Charlie waved.
“What's up?” Kaylee bent close so as not to distract the other call center reps.
“I need to take my break early. My son has an emergency.” It wasn't exactly a lie. She was assuming it was an emergency because he never contacted her at work.
“All right,” Kaylee said. She had two kids of her own and maybe it was wrong for Charlie to play on that sympathy but she certainly knew Dylan would've made her wait and would've scolded her or worse for even looking at her phone.
“Thanks.” She entered the correct break code into the phone, grabbed her purse and cell phone and walked out of the call center through the back door, avoiding Dylan. Quickly she accessed her son’s number and clicked Call. It rang once, twice, three times.
“Mom?” His ten-year-old voice sounded stressed.
“Hey baby,” she said softly heading outside the building for a little privacy. “What's going on?”
“I'm sorry to bother you at work.”
“It's all right. I'm sorry I can't respond as quickly as I'd like. Is everything okay?”
“I don't know. I just wanted to talk to you.”
“Okay—” Charlie said. “I'm all ears.”
“You know how you told me that if I had any dreams that upset me I should tell you?”
“Yeah, of course.”
“I had a dream.”
“Okay. Well tell me what happened in the dream so we can deal with it.”
“I dreamed that Jackson Grosse, and I were riding bikes and that he wouldn't wear his helmet. He said helmets were for babies. We were riding along and he hit a rock and ended up busting his head open on the pavement.”
“Oh sweetie,” she whispered. “It was just a dream. Everybody has dreams. I'm sorry that it was so disturbing for you.”
His voice began to shake. “Mom — it came true.”
“What do you mean it came true?” she said cautiously.
“We were riding bikes today because it's a teacher work day and I tried to tell him. I tried to warn him but he wouldn't listen. He just laughed at me, thought I was being a baby.”
“Sweetie where’s Miss Cora?”
“She's downstairs in the kitchen. Mom they had to take him away in an ambulance. There was blood,” he choked. “Just so much blood.”
“Okay, okay. Does daddy know?”
“No I didn't call him. He doesn't like it when I talk about dreams like this.”
“What do you mean sweetie? Have you had other dreams like this?” T
he line grew very quiet. “Evan, I need you to answer me. Have you had dreams like this before? Dreams that have come true?”
His voice sounded so small when he responded it made her heart ache. “Yes.”
“And what did your Dad say about them?”
“He told me they were just coincidences, and that no one can predict the future. Then he got mad and said, maybe I was dreaming about things I wanted to happen.” He choked back a sob. “Mom, I didn’t want Jackson to get hurt. Really, I didn’t. He’s my best friend.”
“Oh sweetie, of course you didn’t.” She wanted to cry right along with him. “It’s okay. I'm gonna come and see you in a little bit. All right? And we're gonna talk about this some more. Now, I want you to listen to me very carefully — okay? You did not make this happen. What happened to Jackson was an accident. Not your fault. Your dreams are not some sort of — wish.” She had to fight from spitting out the word. Damn Scott Carver. Damn him for making their son feel like this. She could not wait to get off work and give him a piece of her mind. “The things you dream may sometimes be scary and they may even sometimes come true and you know what? That is perfectly okay. You are perfectly okay just the way you are. Do you understand me?”
He sniffled. “Okay.”
“I love you buddy,” she said.
“Love you too, Mom.”
They hung up and Charlie gritted her teeth. Her break was almost up. Scott Carver was not going to do this to their son. He was not going to make him feel like a freak. The world would be happy to do that for him and she was determined to do everything in her power to make Evan strong enough to handle it.
Scott had gotten the house in the divorce. It probably could've been hers if she'd fought harder, but she couldn't have afforded to keep it even if she had. At least this way Evan could stay in his room and his school district near his friends. She walked up the steps to the idyllic two-story house on Daniel Island and rang the bell. After a minute, she saw Cora their housekeeper through the sidelight. Scott's housekeeper, she reminded herself. She waved and gave a perfunctory smile.
“Oh my goodness I wasn't expecting to see you today Ms. Carver,” Cora said.
“I know. And it’s Payne now. I dropped my married name when we—” Her voice trailed off.
“Oh I'm sorry. I didn't realize,” Cora said.
“Is Scott here?”
“Yes ma'am, he is. Come on in. Just wait right here and I'll go get him.” Cora relegated her to the foyer that opened to a beautiful double staircase.
It was a showpiece. Scott had insisted. He was from a family of old money where status still meant something. Of course she had never cared about any of it. The amenities were nice, but they were never the point to her. All she ever cared about was how much she loved him. Scott emerged through the formal living room — a room they barely ever touched when they were together — wearing a black apron. He had a red and white checked dishcloth slung over his shoulder. It struck her as an odd sight because Cora did all the cooking when they were married.
“Charlie?” He sounded surprised but not quite happy to see her. “What are you doing here? It's not your day.”
“I'm quite aware of our schedule Scott. I'm here because Evan called me. He was very upset.”
“Yeah, I heard about Jackson. Thankfully Evan’s got enough sense to wear his helmet. He called you about that?”
“Yes. He also called me to tell me that he had dreamed about it.”
Scott had the face of what her grandmother would have called a well-bred gentleman. The first time Charlie met him she thought he belonged in some other era, where men of a certain status dressed for dinner, drank brandy afterward, and talked about taking over the world. She always teased that he must have been a British aristocrat in a past life because of his refined features and squared jaw that never hinted at a five o’clock shadow, and his ability keep his feelings hidden. Stiff upper lip and all that. There was only one exception, and it almost always involved her abilities to see ghosts and predict things.
“He told you about that, did he?” Scott narrowed his pale blue eyes and wiped his hands on the towel. He blew out a breath through his nose, making his nostrils flare. A bull about to charge. It was always the beginning of a blow out with him and she couldn’t seem to stop herself.
“Of course he did. He knows that I’m not gonna think he's crazy or try to blame him when his dreams do come true.”
Scott laughed awkwardly. “Now just wait a minute. I've never told Evan he was crazy for having dreams.”
“It doesn’t matter what you said. That's how he's interpreted it. He's also interpreted it as the dreams he has that come true are some sort of sick wish fulfillment. Nice parenting Scott. Seriously. You should write a frickin' book on it.”
“Hey—” His voice rose. “I never said that his dreams were wish fulfillment.”
“You sure about that?” In her mind, she saw the scene unfold between father and son. The irritated, impatient tone. The words implying their son might be having bad thoughts about his friend. She took a deep breath and gritted her teeth. “Think very carefully about how you answer.”
Scott’s cheeks reddened. “You are not some freaking human lie detector — no matter what you believe.” His fingers tightened on his hips. “And I would never tell him his bad dreams were some sick wish.”
“You keep telling yourself that Scott. Tell yourself whatever you think is going to get you through the day. But do not ever try to make our son feel like he is crazy. Because he is not.”
“Well he's also not psychic. No matter what you think.”
“You would just hate that wouldn't you. If he was more like me than you.”
“Screw you, Charlie. I don’t have to stand here and take this crap from you anymore.”
“No, you don’t. But you do have to deal with the fact that Evan is upstairs right now feeling guilty for what happened to Jackson. He's blaming himself. And you know who I blame? You.”
“Well that's just ridiculous. What happened to Jackson was an accident.”
“Yes, it was. Have you told him that?”
“I figured I would talk to him at dinner.”
“Great. That’s just frickin’ great. You still don’t get it do you? Even after all these years. You are so thick sometimes. I swear to God—” She threw her hands into the air. “He adores you, you dumb ass, and he takes everything you say to heart. It won’t be that way forever. Why on earth would you push him away before he leaves on his own?”
Scott’s eyebrows rose, and he looked as if she’d slapped him. “You think I’m pushing him away?”
“He’s scared to tell you things. Scared of your judgment. Is that really the relationship you want to have with him?” She folded her arms across her chest and planted her feet. “And whether you like it or not, he may be like me. Which means dealing with it instead of living in denial. I didn't fight you on custody or on alimony or anything. But if you try to stop me from being his parent, you will have the fight of your life, Scott Carver. Do you understand me?”
He narrowed his eyes, and she thought he might come at her with both barrels blazing but his jaw unclenched and he gave her a look she hadn't seen in a long time. A look of acquiescence. “Damn you, Charlie.”
“Right back ‘atcha. Now are we going upstairs or what?”
“I don't want to encourage this thing. Whatever it is,” Scott said.
“He may outgrow it; a lot of people do. But you better realize he may not and whether you encourage it or not, it may not go away. Don't alienate him because you don't believe in it. Loving him means loving all of him.”
Scott's lips twisted into an angry grimace. If there was one thing she knew about her ex-husband, he hated losing. He gritted his teeth. “So just what do you suggest we do?”
“We go upstairs and we just talk to him. Remind him that we love and support him and that none of this is his fault.”
“What about the dreams? What am I
supposed to do about the dreams?”
“You can start by not calling them crazy. If you don’t want to deal with it encourage him to call me when he has a bad dream.”
“What? So you can tell him he’s psychic? And that it’s gonna come true?”
“Just because he has a dream doesn't mean it's going to come true. It means he needs to be comforted, especially if it scares him or worries him. Whether his dreams come true or not, it is our job to make sure he understands he can’t be afraid. He can’t let it stop him from living.”
“Won’t that feel like a lie? I mean, it almost stopped you.”
She would have preferred that he just punch her. It would’ve been less painful. The tears stung the back of her throat faster than she could've anticipated and her face filled with heat at the same time her chest filled with the sharp sensation that only Scott seemed to be able to inflict.
“That's a low blow.” She blinked fast, refusing to let the tears fall. “Even for you.”
“Charlie, I didn't mean…” he said, sounding confused.
“No. You never mean it, do you?” Swallowing back the tears, she took a step backwards. “Come on let's do this. I don't want to spend all night tearing each other apart. We got divorced specifically, so we didn't have to do that anymore.”
She turned and headed up the steps not waiting for him to follow.
Chapter 20
Exhaustion crept into her shoulders, making her limbs feel like they were filled with wet sand. She pulled into the parking space outside of her townhouse and put her silver Honda Civic into park. Her fingers fumbled with the key in the lock of her door.
After the encounter in her kitchen the other night, she had poured a straight line of the fine salt in front of all the thresholds and windows to keep Aldus Talmadge out of her house and out of her dreams. She’d been extra careful, making sure to step over it when coming and going. With her mind on nothing but what had happened with Evan and a hot shower, she opened the door, and stepped inside. She dropped her keys on the table by the door and stopped. Her shoes ground against something under her feet and she cursed under her breath. She’d forgotten about the salt. She flipped on the foyer light and stared down at salt spread out across the laminate flooring. Her eyes scanned the downstairs floor as her brain caught up with what she was seeing.