by Bryan Bliss
Luke didn’t say much, not then or the next morning when Toby woke up and Luke had somehow cobbled together enough money for some frozen waffles. Or maybe they were in the freezer—this was before the twins. Before Luke was a wrestling star, before he had every college with a team sniffing around their shitty town. Before he’d raised a fist at Toby. Now, as Toby sat on the ground shivering, it felt like he was stuck in a nightmare and there was no chance of waking up.
And he was more scared than he’d ever been in his life.
Toby shrank into the metal of the plane, trying to find a place the cold air couldn’t penetrate. Behind him, there was a rustle of leaves. Probably the wind or some squirrel. They always had a way of sounding bigger when they were hidden in the brush. But then it happened again. He turned around, expecting to see Luke.
Jimmy stepped out of the tree line.
His dad didn’t say anything, just twirled a tire wrench back and forth on his thumb like a gunslinger.
“At first Lily said she didn’t have any idea where you’d be,” Jimmy said. “But once we got to talking, it didn’t take long.”
Toby went to stand up, but Jimmy held a hand in the air, lowering Toby back down to the ground with just the movement. Jimmy looked around and nodded.
“So this is it? This is where you’ve been running to all these years?”
Toby couldn’t say a word. There had been moments when Jimmy had chased him and Luke before, but they went miles in a different direction to keep him from finding the plane. Jimmy staring at the plane now was a kick to the stomach. An abomination.
“Not to a bus. Or a car,” Jimmy said, swinging the tire iron. “No, you fuck up and you come . . . here. To some make-believe bullshit.”
When he said the last word, he slammed the tire iron down on what was left of the right wing. It shattered, splitting from the fuselage with a loud rip. Toby jumped. Jimmy had destroyed the plane with one swing.
“Every time you catch a whiff of a challenge, you go running. That’s your whole life story, right there. You didn’t learn a damn thing I taught you.”
Jimmy swung the tire iron again, cleaving off the nose in one swipe.
“Taught me?”
Toby stepped toward Jimmy. He didn’t care anymore. He was tired of hiding. He was tired of letting Luke stick up for him at every moment. He was just plain tired, and he wanted this shit to be over.
“That’s what you call getting my ass kicked for not picking up my socks? For leaving a glass of milk on the table? Teaching me? Fuck you.”
In one sudden movement, Jimmy slammed the tire iron down on the side of the plane with a metallic clunk. When it didn’t go through completely, he hit it again and again and again until finally the tire iron struck dirt. Jimmy kicked the body of the plane apart, opening it like a can of beans. When he looked at Toby, he was breathing hard.
“You lost me a lot of money tonight. What do you have to say for yourself?”
Toby didn’t answer. He was staring at the destroyed plane, his body numb. Jimmy grabbed Toby and threw him to the ground. As soon as he hit the dirt, Toby felt a surge of power go through him. He stood up and pushed Jimmy with every ounce of strength he had. Jimmy tripped, falling over the twisted plane’s carcass.
How many times had Toby been here before? How many times had he stood toe-to-toe with Jimmy, only to go running away so sleep could dilute the anger, the booze—all of it. Toby was going to end it forever, right now. He picked up a piece of metal from the wing and walked to his father.
Jimmy snickered.
“You think—”
Toby swung as hard as he could, the metal connecting with a dull thud. Jimmy groaned, dropping the tire iron. Toby reworked his grip. Ready to hit Jimmy until he couldn’t raise a beer or a hand or anything in his direction ever again.
He swung for the fences. Just before the metal crashed back into Jimmy’s head, ending it, his father ducked. Toby spun, the piece of wing skittering across the clearing. Jimmy stood up, rubbing the side of his head.
“Shit, boy. That was close.”
Jimmy took a step toward Toby, bending down to pick up the tire iron.
January 31
T—
It’s almost midnight.
That’s when they do it, which seems almost unreal, doesn’t it? Duels at high noon and executions at the stroke of midnight. I don’t think there’s a dude in this entire place who’s asleep right now. You can feel the vibrations, the way everybody can’t seem to figure out what to do with themselves.
Part of it is just knowing Eddie, I think. Putting yourself in his place, trying to imagine what it will be like in that room. When they bring you Whoppers and steak and shrimp—too much food to eat. And shit, how fucked up is it that you get to have a special meal right before they kill you?
The other part of it is knowing that it doesn’t take much imagination putting yourself next to Eddie. It might take twenty years, but soon enough we’ll all be on that gurney. We’ll all be holding hands with Sister, begging for any last-chance miracle we can get.
I don’t want to walk into that room like this.
I don’t want to have anything left unsaid, which I guess is the why I started writing these letters in the first place. But damn, T. We could’ve skipped all the bullshit about basketball and lawyers. Because we both know I’ve been ignoring the only words that really matter. What I should’ve said to you first thing.
I’m sorry, T.
It’s 12:07 right now.
I have no idea how long it takes for somebody to die.
Luke
31
LUKE was in front of Annie’s door, dazed. He raised his hand and delivered three sharp knocks. There was a slight scuffle of feet behind the door, followed by Annie’s clear voice saying, “I’m sorry! Please don’t!”
The door flew open, and David was standing in front of him. He had a Bible in his hand, a giant cross formed from nails hanging around his neck. And those were the man’s most memorable features. He was six inches shorter than Luke and at least seventy-five pounds heavier. One eye squinted as he spoke.
“You may want to join us in here,” he said, using the Bible to punctuate the sentence. Luke looked into the apartment. Annie was sitting on the couch and had obviously been crying. Luke ignored David.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
Annie nodded quickly, just before David started talking again.
“She’s not okay. Not at all. And my best guess is that you’re the one to blame for all this?”
As he spoke, David walked into the apartment and pulled out a wad of cash. It was a few hundred dollars, easy. When he lifted it up, turning to speak to her, Annie dropped her head.
“I thought we were past the stealing? The running away?” He threw the money back down on the table and took a few breaths before turning back to Luke. A tight smile appeared on his lips. “Like I said, maybe you should join us in here.”
Luke was trying to think, trying to determine if Annie was in any sort of danger. They didn’t have to leave together, not even tonight. Luke could find a place to hide until everything calmed down. Until she could use school as an excuse and slip away. The future for both of them was wide like an empty highway.
It hit him the way realizations never did—quick, like a shot of lightning.
“I don’t want to get you in trouble,” Luke said to Annie. And then he looked at David. “I didn’t ask her to do this. I’m sorry.”
Annie sat up, her face going from distraught to seriously pissed in a matter of seconds. She was giving Luke a stare that even Toby couldn’t have pulled from her in his worst moments. He didn’t want to say good-bye—to see another thing end tonight—so he spoke slow, hoping she understood what he was saying.
“I have a plane to catch,” he said, pausing for a second. Waiting to see a lightbulb, for that same lightning to strike twice. Annie’s face softened only slightly, her words sharp as a blade.
“Well, I
hope it gets delayed and you’re there all night. Asshole.”
David tsked at the cuss word, but when he turned around to face Luke one last time, Annie flashed him a smile so big, so alive with potential, that Luke knew it meant only one thing.
I’ll see you soon.
Luke ran into the dark night, a strange sense of peace filling his body for the first time in years. The stars were now out, bright enough to make it seem as if the entire world was highlighted in silver. When he came to the path that led to the grove of trees, he stopped running and walked toward the plane.
This was it. Something he and Toby had dreamed about. Talked about and talked about until their voices were hoarse—always imagining what it would feel like the moment they knew were getting away. It might not be on a plane, or even in a way they ever expected. But they both knew they would feel something.
And now Luke knew. It felt like waking up in the morning after a good night’s sleep. Like Christmas Day, or how his body would tense wonderfully when Annie appeared in front of him. Butterflies in the stomach. His hand being raised after a match.
It felt like hope.
A sudden pang of guilt stuck a knife between his ribs. This hope wasn’t supposed to be for him and Annie. Sure, there was enough to go around. But what he was feeling had always been so closely tied to Toby, it was odd that his friend wasn’t right behind him, talking about god knows what.
Luke flexed his hands, feeling the pain from the cuts. Toby’s face still lingered on each of his knuckles like a shadow. It wasn’t a feeling he expected to disappear, no matter how far he and Annie ran. As he started walking to the trees, he was already thinking of ways he could reach out to Toby once all the tempers had settled.
Luke stepped through the clearing with a smile on his face.
At first his mind couldn’t process what he was seeing. The plane, broken apart like a child’s toy. The wings had been hacked off and tossed aside in a heap. The nose was gone, the tail nothing but splinters. And the fuselage—the cockpit where he and Toby had spent countless afternoons, pretending to fly and then, when they got too old for make-believe, planning to leave—was curled in on itself. It looked like a tractor trailer had driven through the trees, leaving behind the twisted metal in its wake.
Luke’s stomach dropped.
This, of course, had always been the fear—that some drunk, some group of high-school or college kids would be bored and use the plane as a temporary distraction. Even as Luke stepped carefully around the pieces of metal littering the ground, he was surprised by the ferocity of the job.
He picked up a piece of the broken nose and studied it for a second and then sat down, holding it on his lap. They never even had a propeller. Luke had never thought about this until just now, and it made him laugh, a little too loudly, seeing as he was officially on the lam. But damn. All the talk of flying away in that plane. All the belief—more belief than any person ever had in a god, Luke was sure—and they didn’t have the one part necessary to get that plane up in the air.
Just then he saw what looked like the arm of a doll sticking out from under one of the wings. From a distance, it could’ve been anything. But the longer he looked at it, the more familiar it got. It had an unnatural, almost waxy appearance. Like a mannequin left out in the rain for too long.
He stood up, dropping the nose.
“No, no, no,” Luke said, running to his friend.
Everything was slick from the rain. The ground. The wing that covered most of Toby’s motionless body. Luke lifted the long sheet of metal and it slipped from his hands, crashing back down on top of Toby. He reached again and threw the rusted metal off his friend with every bit of strength he had. It crashed into a tree, the sound like a train driving through a house.
Toby lay with one arm outstretched like he was trying to fly. He was covered in blood, his body broken and bruised. Barely recognizable. Luke was frozen. He didn’t pick Toby up or reach down to check for the pulse. He knew. The way he knew how to wrestle that first time on the mat. It was instinct, a prophecy almost.
They’d never spent a single moment imagining a situation where they wouldn’t escape. It was preordained, a bulletproof future they’d tricked themselves into believing was guaranteed to them. But they’d been fooling themselves. They always had been.
Luke dropped to the ground, but he couldn’t cry. He reached out and pulled Toby toward him. Toby was stiff from the cold, and heavy. Luke knew he should feel something, but his entire body, his mind, had finally gone empty.
He stood up and carried Toby to the place where the cockpit had sat, now an oval of exposed dirt circled by overgrown grass and leaves. Luke laid him in the middle of the space and then started putting the plane back together. First he moved the fuselage. The metal groaned as he bent the two ends until they were touching once again. He picked up the pieces of each wing, putting the jigsaw back together on either side of the plane. The tail on top of the bent body. The pieces of the nose in front.
He worked until the plane was right again. Or as right as it could be.
Luke would give anything to go back to pretending to fly missions, when they crash-landed behind enemy lines. Given orders only heroes could carry out. “We’ll need our wits to survive this,” Toby had said, making Luke laugh. But no matter how much he willed his brain to remember the plane the way it used to be, he could only see it the way it was now—broken and incomplete.
Luke climbed in and sat next to Toby’s body. He needed to be close to Toby for as long as he could.
Around them, the world went quiet, matching the emptiness inside Luke. He wanted to feel anything but a cold, crawling sense of calm that was overtaking him. A sense of calculating purpose that snuffed out all the anger, dried up all his tears. Whenever he’d gotten on the mat, this was what he had always wanted. To have a singular purpose, a way of putting blinders on until nothing, not time, or the crowd, or even his own pain, would distract him from accomplishing his mission.
He had it now.
Every single step he’d take. Every movement. All of it collected into one perfect moment.
He was staring at Toby’s hand—open, like he was about to catch a ball—when Annie came running into the clearing. Her face lit up when she saw Luke. He knew he should stand up, stop her from seeing Toby—he’d already made that mistake once before.
Before.
The word took on new meaning for Luke. Everything in his life would now be separated into before and after this moment. Everything would force him to ask one question for the rest of his life: What did you do to save your friend?
Luke still couldn’t move when Annie got to the plane, when she started screaming.
“Luke! Oh my god!”
“I know where he’s at,” Luke said. For a moment, Annie paused, confused. “Jimmy. I know where he must be.”
“We need to call an ambulance,” Annie said, reaching for her phone. “The police. Are you okay?”
Luke stood up, and maybe Annie thought he was going to come to her, wrap her up in his arms the way he’d held Toby for the last hour, his arms cramping under the weight of his friend. She let the phone drop to her side as Luke walked by.
“Luke.”
He stopped and turned to face her. “Take care of Toby. Please. I need to go do something.”
And then he started walking to the trailer.
The door was locked, so he kicked it in. The cheap wood broke easily enough. Deep in the trailer park, a dog started barking. Luke stepped inside, barely taking notice of the beer cans littering the floor. The stacks and stacks of cigarettes Jimmy had in the kitchen. The only thing that made him pause were the rumpled clothes Toby had worn just a few days ago. He picked up the shirt and held it close to his face. It smelled like wine and sweat and, for a second that disappeared quicker than it came, Toby.
Luke walked to the bedroom. Straight to the closet. They had been eleven, maybe a little older, when Toby snuck Luke into the trailer and showed h
im the revolver. Luke could still feel the weight of it in his hand when they went running back into the woods, his entire body shaking with either fear or excitement. That night he made Toby promise he’d never pick it up again, no matter what happened with Jimmy. To come running to Luke instead. Because he would always save him.
Luke picked up the gun. It still felt heavy in his hands.
Every time a car would pass, Luke hid the wrapped-up gun at his hip. It could’ve been a present, or even a bottle. He had no plan if the police stopped him.
Walking seemed to loosen the cold fist that had grabbed his heart when he first saw Toby. As it thawed, it was replaced with a hot rage, the sort that Luke had never felt before. With every step, it boiled in his bones a little deeper until his heart was leather.
It wasn’t until he finally got to the Deuce’s parking lot that he started running.
He pushed through the doors in a sprint, skidding into the nearly empty bar. For a moment, the entire room froze. Jimmy stood up, his eyes going wide with fear when he saw what was in Luke’s hand.
One, two, three, four, five, six.
The revolver was still clicking when Bo tried to tackle him. He never got close. Luke swung the gun down onto the drunk man’s head so hard, the crack shook the whole room. Blood everywhere. Behind him, Val swung a bottle at his head. It connected in a brilliant flash, and Luke swung the gun one time, right at her temple. She fell too.
Luke dropped to his knees, blood coming out of his ear. A new gash over the other eye now. From under the table, he heard a squeak of fear that slowly turned into a scream. Luke dropped the gun and stared right at Lily, finally feeling the weight and the pain of Toby falling on top of him.
All he could say was, “He’s dead.”
February 2