The Hunted

by Matt De La Peña

  “Go on, young fella,” Shoeshine said. “Get ’em the rifles.”

  Shy couldn’t believe it. He shot Carmen a confused look, then reluctantly reached back into the Skylark for the rifle bag.

  The taller boy nodded, and motioned for Shy, Carmen and Shoeshine to follow him toward the boarded-up station.

  50

  Twinkies and Spoiled Milk

  There were three more kids inside the sour-smelling station, all of them putting on hospital masks and rubbing their eyes like they’d just woken up. No adults that Shy could see. The place was trashed, too. The food shelves were mostly picked clean and the refrigerator was full of empty cartons and wrappers and there were wrappers all over the cracked cement floor. In the dim candlelight, Shy spied five worn pieces of cardboard against the far wall. Their beds, he assumed. Folded Shammys for pillows.

  The DJ Dan show played quietly on a small clock radio near the cleaned-out cash register. Still just classical music which meant the DJ was asleep.

  The taller kid opened up the gun bag to inspect the rifles. He took them out one by one and held them up to a row of burning candles, looking into each muzzle and then peering through the sight. “I’ll give you a five-gallon can for all three of ’em,” he said.

  “Well, we need to hold on to at least one for protection,” Shoeshine answered. He shifted the duffel bag from one shoulder to the other. Having the duffel seemed careless to Shy. They should have left it in the Skylark.

  “What you need,” another kid said, “is some gas in your tank. Otherwise you’re stuck here with us.”

  “And you can’t be stuck with us,” the taller one said. “You know we could just take these for nothin’ and send you on your way, right? But I like to be fair. For karma reasons.”

  “Where you all trying to get, anyways?” the smallest kid, Paulie, said. He hopped up onto the table next to the cash register and pulled down his mask, revealing his dirt-covered face.

  The taller kid snapped his fingers, and Paulie quickly put his mask back on.

  “Come on, Paulie,” another kid scolded him. “Even if they got a cure now we still don’t wanna catch nothin’.”

  “Okay, okay,” Paulie said through his mask.

  “We’re on our way to Arizona,” Carmen told them.

  The kids gave each other strange looks. The tall kid even laughed a little, saying: “You know they built a fence out there, right?”

  “Don’t you listen to the radio?” another kid asked.

  “We know about the stupid border,” Carmen snapped.

  Shy noticed that the tall kid who’d ushered them inside the station had lowered his gun. He wondered if they could steal the gas somehow and keep the rifles. It was five against three, but they were just kids.

  One of them moved a sheet of plywood away from the front window and pointed outside. “What kind of car is that out there? It looks historical.”

  “It sure is,” Shoeshine said. “You’re looking at a 1953 Buick Skylark convertible. Mint condition. You ever seen a classic car like that?”

  The kid shook his head.

  “Little different than that pickup you got parked out front,” Shy said. He could tell Shoeshine was up to something, and he decided to try and play along.

  “My daddy left me that truck,” Paulie said.

  “Where’s your dad now?” Carmen asked him. “He stay here, too?”

  “My daddy’s dead,” the boy answered. “Just like everyone else is dead.”

  “Paulie!” the tall kid snapped, shooting him a dirty look.

  Paulie shrugged and glanced at the floor.

  Shy knew from this little back-and-forth that there weren’t any adults around. It was just these five kids. Alone. Living on Twinkies and spoiled milk. They’d probably made a pact to keep it to themselves.

  “We’re sorry for your loss,” Shy said in a sympathetic voice. He glanced at Shoeshine, who gave a subtle nod.

  “Nobody else is gonna die, though,” another kid said, “now that they got that medicine that cures you. We heard it on the radio.”

  “We heard that, too,” Shoeshine said. “Soon it’ll all be over, and you boys’ll be back in school.”

  “The school’s burned down,” one of the kids said.

  “Then they’ll build you all a brand-new one,” Shy said. “It’ll probably be mad nice, too.”

  It went quiet in the station for a few seconds. Carmen frowned at Shy, trying to figure out what he was doing. But Shy didn’t know, either. He was just following Shoeshine’s lead, assuming he had a plan.

  “You know what?” Shoeshine said, tapping his walking stick against the cement floor. “I just thought of a new offer I’d like to propose.” He cringed a little, like his leg was hurting, then he motioned toward the front window. “How would you all like to own that classic car out there?”

  “What are you talking about?” the tallest kid said.

  Now Shy understood.

  It was a way for them to keep the rifles.

  “Where we’re headed,” Shoeshine said, “we’re really gonna need all three of those rifles. I’d be willing to trade the Skylark for your pickup, though. Long as you fill it full of gas.”

  Paulie hopped down from the counter excitedly. “It’s already got a full tank, mister. And you got a deal.” He turned to the tall kid. “Right, Quinn?”

  Quinn went to the window and looked out at the Skylark. He wasn’t as quick to jump on Shoeshine’s offer, even though all the other kids were urging him to take the deal.

  It surprised Shy that Shoeshine was willing to give up Mario’s car so quickly. But at the end of the day, it didn’t matter how they got to Arizona, as long as they got there.

  “Lemme explain something to you guys,” Quinn said, turning back to his buddies. “Having a fancy car doesn’t do anything for us right now. It’s what you can do with it. And we stick all kinds of stuff in the bed of that truck.”

  “Yeah, but we got the Jeep for that,” one of the kids argued.

  “You heard him,” Paulie said. “Now that they got a cure, it’ll all be over soon. Anyways, it was my dad’s truck. I should have some say.”

  Quinn stood there a few seconds, staring back and forth between the Skylark and his boys. Shy could tell the kid liked being in charge, having everyone waiting on his answer.

  “You kept it in real nice condition,” Quinn finally said to Shoeshine. “Maybe it’ll be worth something when things got back to normal.”

  “Be worth a lot,” Shoeshine told him.

  After another short pause, Quinn said: “You know what? Screw it. We got a deal.”

  The other kids broke out in a cheer. It showed how young they really were. Shy had to hold back a smile.

  “Shoot, I’ll even throw in a five-gallon can of gas,” Quinn said. “That way you’ll for sure be able to get all the way to Arizona.” He turned to one of his boys. “Go put a can in the bed of the truck.”

  Shoeshine tossed Quinn the keys to the Skylark, and Quinn tossed him the keys to the truck. Shy was impressed with Shoeshine’s negotiating skills. Especially considering how he seemed to be in pain throughout the whole exchange. Now they’d be able to get back on the road and stop staring at the gas gauge. They still had a few more hours before the sun came up.

  One of the kids hustled into the back of the station for a can of gas. The other kids began pleading with Quinn to let them take the Skylark for a test-drive. “We gotta make sure it runs before we let ’em go, right?” one argued.

  Quinn reluctantly handed over the keys, saying: “You better not scratch it up, though.”

  “You’ll want to put a little gas in first,” Shoeshine said. “We brought her in here bone-dry.”

  Quinn pointed at Paulie. “You can put in the gas, but you’re not driving.”

  Paulie nodded and hurried out the front door with the two other kids. Quinn watched them go, a slight grin on his face. Even after everything they’d been through, Shy thought
, they were still just kids. He wondered if Shoeshine felt that about him and Carmen.

  “We barely just got that thing,” Carmen said, sidling up to Shy.

  “Least we still got the rifles,” he told her.

  “True.” She didn’t look too happy. “Why’s this trip even matter anymore, though? They already got a cure.”

  “Yeah, but they don’t have a letter that proves everything LasoTech did.” Shy could feel the anger begin to stir again. “If we just let shit ride, everyone will keep thinking those dickheads are heroes.”

  Shy watched through the window as the kids disappeared around the side of the building, then reappeared with a second gas can, which they carried down to the Skylark. They poured some gas into the tank, then climbed inside the old car and started up the engine. They sat there for a few minutes, turning on the headlights, rolling the windows up and down, honking the horn, opening and closing all the doors, then Shy heard the grinding sound of the driver stripping the gears as he backed out of the parking space.

  Quinn laughed at the sound. “Stupid kids.”

  Shoeshine joined Shy, Carmen and Quinn at the window, and they all watched the Skylark jerk out of the gas station and merge onto the dark, empty road.

  As the car rolled through the first stop sign, Shy suddenly spotted a large blur rapidly approaching from the opposite direction.

  A black Hummer.

  “Look out!” Carmen shouted through the window.

  But it was too late.

  51

  Sick and Alive

  The Hummer smashed right into the front grille of the Skylark, crunching the hood and shattering the windshield and sending the old car spinning across the dark and narrow road.

  An earsplitting scream filled the station. Shy turned and saw Quinn breaking free of Shoeshine’s grip, pushing through the front door of the station and racing toward the crash.

  “Oh my God!” Carmen kept repeating. She grabbed Shy by the arm, her face frozen in shock.

  Shy stared at the flames devouring the front half of the Skylark, illuminating the heads of the kids inside.

  “Get down!” Shoeshine shouted at him and Carmen.

  Shy spun around as Shoeshine whipped one of the rifles out of the gun bag and aimed it at the window, kicking the duffel toward Shy. Shy quickly scooped it up and slung it over his shoulder and ducked under the windowsill next to Carmen, both of them breathing hard and staring at each other wide-eyed.

  It was the same black Hummer they’d seen when they were burying Marcus near the freeway. Shy was sure of it. But how could LasoTech possibly have tracked them here in the dark?

  Shy peeked over the windowsill again. Carmen grabbed at his shirt to try and pull him back down, but he had to see. Three men dressed in black had jumped out of the Hummer. One turned and shot Quinn in the chest. Then the stomach. The boy’s body falling limp to the pavement. The other two raced up to the inflamed Skylark and raised their handguns and fired round after round through the side windows and the windshield, lighting up the desert night.

  “Jesus,” Shy whispered.

  The men didn’t stop shooting until all movement inside the car had stopped, then one of them circled the thing, opening each door and searching the bodies inside. The man shook his head and pointed at the station.

  All Shy’s blood rushed to his head and his breaths were coming way too fast. The men had just massacred four kids without hesitating a second. Massacred them in the hopes that they were Shy, Carmen and Shoeshine. And now they were marching toward the station, weapons drawn.

  Shoeshine took a few steps forward, aiming his rifle at the window. Shy pulled the duffel off, thinking he should hide it. He stashed it under the counter and hurried behind Shoeshine and grabbed a rifle and cocked it like Shoeshine had shown him back at the Bright House and turned toward the front window. Carmen staring at him.

  The three men in black cut through the gas pumps, toward the station, and glass suddenly exploded all around Shy. Shoeshine shoved Carmen away from the window and fired back, dropping one of the LasoTech guys with a single shot.

  Bullets whizzed through the window and Shy took cover behind one of the empty shelves, listening to shots pepper the wall behind him, sparking off the cement floor, shattering the glass cooler. Without thinking about anything at all, Shy found himself on the move, in a crouch, back toward the window. He settled the barrel of his rifle on the windowsill beside Shoeshine, who was reloading and took aim and fired two shots in quick succession.

  To his surprise, one of the two remaining men dropped to the pavement, not ten feet in front of the station door, grasping at his chest. Shy took aim again and finished the guy off with a shot to the midsection. Then he took aim at the other guy, realizing he’d just killed a man.

  His heart was in his throat.

  He felt sick and alive.

  It was so easy. A slight curl of his right pointer finger and a man’s life was gone forever.

  He fired again but missed.

  The man spun back around and took off at a sprint toward the Hummer, somehow avoiding another shot from Shy and one from Shoeshine. He swung open the door of the Hummer and scurried inside and soon the engine came roaring back to life.

  “I’m going after him!” Shoeshine shouted, limping toward the door and pushing through.

  Shy was still aiming his rifle out the window, even though he no longer had a target. Carmen had to grab him by the arm and yank him out of his trance. Shy grabbed the duffel from behind the counter and they both sprinted out of the station, racing around the building after Shoeshine, who had already started up the truck and was cranking it into reverse.

  Shy dove headfirst into the passenger side door with Carmen, their bodies momentarily tangled as the truck lurched forward.

  Two more shots rang out.

  But they didn’t come from inside the truck.

  Shy righted himself and peered cautiously through the windshield, expecting to see the man inside the Hummer shooting at them, but what he saw instead was the massive vehicle swerving.

  One of the back tires had blown out.

  Pure luck, Shy told himself.

  But then a third shot rang out, and one of the Hummer’s front tires exploded. This time the vehicle veered so sharply to the right it crashed through the guardrail and went hurtling over the side of the overpass.

  For half a second the world went deafeningly silent.

  Shy squeezing the duffel bag straps in his right hand.

  Then he heard the earthshaking crash of the Hummer hitting the freeway below, followed closely by a booming explosion. Smoke rose up over the side of the bridge and drifted toward their truck.

  Shy sucked in breaths, staring at the gap in the guardrail and trying to wrap his head around what had just happened. All three of them were still holding rifles, even Carmen, like they were some kind of mismatched posse in the Wild West.

  Then Shy spotted it through the smoke. A motorcycle speeding down the freeway on-ramp, heading east. The driver must have shot out the tires of the Hummer as he passed.

  None of them spoke as Shoeshine pulled the truck up to the lip of the bridge, and they jumped out and hurried to the guardrail to take a look.

  The Hummer was upside down on the freeway and lit up by high-arcing flames. There was no sign that anyone had climbed out alive. In the distance, Shy could no longer make out the shape of the mysterious motorcycle speeding away.

  Day 51

  52

  California Ghost Town

  Something moved in the bushes.

  Shy turned quickly enough to see what it was this time—a small Mexican boy spying on them. He stood up and called to the boy: “Hey! Nobody’s gonna hurt you!” But the kid was already hurrying away in a chorus of rustling leaves and snapping branches.

  For a second or two Shy was convinced it was his nephew, Miguel. But then he remembered. Miguel was dead. Same as the rest of his family.

  Shy sat back down on the l
og next to Carmen. “It’s just some kid.”

  “Yeah, ’cause kids never lead to anything fucked-up, right?” There was more than a little sarcasm in Carmen’s voice.

  “Good point.” Shy glanced over at the bushes again.

  Nothing.

  “Anyways, like I was telling you,” Carmen continued, “if it was just some random vato heading east on his motorcycle, why’d he shoot at the Hummer then? Wouldn’t he wanna slip by without calling attention to himself?”

  Shy picked up a small rock and tossed it into the lazy river in front of them. He studied the tiny splash it made.

  “Nah, he was going after them,” Carmen said. “Had to be. You saw the way he shot out those tires. I agree with what Shoe said.”

  “Maybe you guys are right,” Shy said, still staring at the water. Shoeshine believed the man who’d shot out the Hummer’s tires was a crusader from the other side. They’d heard on the radio about regular folks who had come to California to try and protect the unprotected. The fact that the guy had ridden off so quickly proved to Shoeshine that he wasn’t used to encounters like that. He was still getting his feet wet.

  “The point is,” Carmen said, “we don’t know. So it’s probably not even worth speculating about. All we can do is hurry up and get the damn duffel to Avondale.”

  Shy glanced over at Shoeshine, who’d settled in about twenty yards down the riverbank from them, where he was writing in his journal again. After the Hummer incident, Shy, Carmen and Shoeshine had scrambled back into the truck and driven east for miles and miles, talking very little about what had happened. When the first few rays of daylight spilled out onto the two lanes of freeway in front of them, Shoeshine pulled off in a town called Blythe, which he said was on the border of California and Arizona, less than a hundred and fifty miles from the Avondale border. He maneuvered the beat-up truck through back roads to the secluded stretch of river they were at now, fifteen miles north of town.