by Peter Giglio
As she backed away from his revelation, her eyes went wide. What had he done this time? She wanted to know and she didn’t. Every warning bell in her brain screamed, Grab Hannah and run before the cops arrive. Tears sluiced down deepening worry lines on her flushed cheeks, and she struggled for words, but all she could say was “My God.”
“I know, right?” His voice was filled with pride. And, as if it had never left, his confident grin returned. “I wasn’t full of shit when I said I’d take care of us. I know you never believed me, but that’s okay. We can make things right, Tina. This money right here, this will make things right between us.”
“But…but…”
“Are you gonna question this?” His eyes narrowed. “Are you going to question me? Is anything ever good enough for you, darling?”
“Where did you get all this?”
“Does it matter?”
Her world grew cold, numbness enveloping her, but she managed a slight nod, because it did matter to her. It mattered a lot. “You promised after the last time…promised, no more of this.”
“Well, you had no problem spending the last score, and this is a helluva lot more.” He held up a stack of money and waved it at her. “We can finally get away from here, start over again.”
Much as she hated to agree with him, leaving Savannah sounded good. But not like this.
Armies of fear marched along her frayed nerves. Her body trembled. She felt herself grow light-headed as she imagined policemen storming their home, waking Hannah, scaring her, making her cry.
Chet dropped the money back in the box and snapped the lid shut. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Clean and easy, the only way I work. No one knows shit about any of this.” He then cast his attention away from Tina, toward Hannah’s bedroom. Grinning, he said, “Hi, sweetie.”
Tina spun to find Hannah leaning in the doorway. Her favorite blanket dangled from one hand, and she rubbed her eyes with the other.
“Stop fighting,” Hannah cried. “Please, just stop fighting.”
“We’re not fighting,” Chet lied. “Just a little misunderstanding between Mommy and Daddy.” That’s what he always called it when he was wrong, a “misunderstanding.” Putting a hand on Hannah’s shoulders, Chet led her back into her room.
“Don’t lie to me, Daddy. You and Mommy were fighting.”
“I’m not lying, sweetie. You know how your Mommy gets sometimes.”
Holding her head, Tina fell against a wall and let her body slide to the floor.
“Do you want Daddy to read you a story?” she heard him ask.
“I want Mommy. Where’s Mommy?”
“Your mommy has a headache right now. She’s not feeling well.”
Although she hated herself for it, Tina didn’t have the energy to get up and run to her daughter. And, as Chet read Harry Potter against Hannah’s frequent protests, Tina cried.
It was all she could do.
CHAPTER 4
Around a sharp bend, the front of Hannah’s go-cart noses ahead of Kevin’s. She squeals with delight as her short auburn hair billows like a lion’s mane in the summer breeze, then she straightens the wheel, keeping the cart on the inside of the track. This is where she holds the advantage.
With a glance over her shoulder, she spies Kevin falling back. Soon on her tail, he jockeys for position on her left, and although he’s laughing, she suspects he doesn’t want to lose to a twelve-year-old girl. It’s a competitive spirit that seems hardwired into all men’s DNA. She respects this in Kevin, because he’s not an asshole about it.
At track midpoint, a red light signals final lap, and Hannah’s mom blurs into view. She stands behind a chain-link fence and snaps pictures with her new iPhone, a gift from Kevin. He also gave her a diamond necklace and Hannah a new bicycle, a beautiful Cannondale. Nice gestures, but she hopes he’ll stop trying so hard. The gift-giving will undoubtedly lessen as the newness of the trio’s union fades, and that’s fine with Hannah. She just hopes he’ll keep treating her mom right. She deserves it.
As she steers through the final bend, Hannah’s tires lose the inside track. Finish line fast approaching, she bears down on the accelerator, and Kevin edges close, but it’s too late for him. Half a cart-length to spare, she crosses the checkered line. Slowing, she drives into the port while pumping a victory fist above her head.
Once her cart is secured at the front of the queue, she unfastens the seat belt and slinks onto the concrete landing. She turns toward Kevin and sees that separation isn’t coming as smoothly for him.
“Wanna go again?” he asks, struggling his gut free from the steering wheel.
His weight problem isn’t lost on Hannah, who hopes he’ll get in shape for his health, but she doesn’t hold the imperfection against him. Fat or not, Kevin Logan’s one of the good guys. Maybe the last of his kind.
“Nah,” she says. “It’d break my heart if I was forced to beat you again.”
He lumbers onto the landing with a heavy grunt, then his eyebrows rise and his mouth widens in a parody of surprise. “Beat me? You think you beat me?”
She points down at the cart that carried her to victory. “Looks that way, doesn’t it?”
“Hey, I just let you drive into the landing first. Shame on me for trying to be a gentleman.” He chuckles and puts an arm over her shoulder.
“You’re kidding, right?”
“Of course I am. This old man’s no match for you. Good race, champ.”
When they walk through the gate, Hannah’s mom meets them on the other side, anxious to share the photographs she has taken. “I’m just learning to use this thing,” she says, “but I’m shocked how good the camera is. I remember when a phone was just…well, just a phone.”
The three of them huddle around the screen, enjoying captured memories from only moments earlier. Hannah wonders what it used to be like in the old days, when people had to wait a long time to see their pictures. They probably looked at them a lot more often and cherished them, which is why, she figures, old people have photo albums in their homes, and families like hers don’t have any.
Her mom says, “Ah, look at you guys. You were having so much fun out there.”
“Yes, we did,” Hannah replies. “You should go out there, Mom. Kevin paid for your armband, least you can do is use it.”
“No, not my thing. I’ve never been much for thrill rides. In fact, when I went to Cedar Point in college, my friends always gave me a hard time for not riding the roller coasters.”
“Ah, come on, Tina,” Kevin goads. “Even your Corolla goes faster than those little cars. Tell you what, I’ll race you. Maybe I’ll finally even get to win one.”
Delivering a playful punch to his arm, Hannah’s mom smiles. “So you think I can’t kick your ass? Is that what you’re trying to say?”
Kevin shrugs. “Hey, there’s only one way to find out.”
This goes on for a while, but when the challenge is finally accepted, Hannah excuses herself to the game room. Although most girls her age don’t have time for childish games like skee ball and air hockey, Hannah loves the tickets they spit almost as much as the silly prizes they earn. Regardless of how tight the budget when they’d lived in Savannah, when Hannah brought home her report card, her mom always treated her to a day at the Fun Zone, a place just like this—go-carts and games and miniature golf and junk food. Her mom has always done her best to make her happy, and Hannah wants to return the favor.
Inspecting the prize counter, she digs in her pocket and fishes out two dollar bills, and it’s not long before she lands on the perfect object under glass: a bag containing three plastic rings, hideously purple, with yellow stickers that read BFF (Best Friends Forever).
She must have them. They’re the perfect symbol for how she feels.
Hannah’s also anxious to repay Kevin’s kindness, and she knows the message on the silly keepsakes will mean as much to him as they will to her mom.
But there’s a problem. The sign in front o
f the item reads 300 Tickets.
Hannah frowns, gazing up at the pimple-faced boy behind the counter. “Is that price right?” She points down at the desired prize, and Pimpleboy nods. “Doesn’t seem right,” she protests. “You can get that stuffed lion for two hundred. You can’t tell me those plastic rings are worth more than a plush Simba.”
He shakes his head, then looks away. “I don’t price ’em, kid. If you want those stupid rings for your little BFFs, I’m gonna need three hundred tickets. Besides, that Simba ain’t licensed by Disney.”
“Who are those little plastic rings licensed by?” Hannah asks.
“Give me three hundred tickets and you can find out.”
“Whatever,” she says, already halfway to the token dispensers. After fighting her crumpled bills into a thin metal slot, she grabs her tokens and rushes to the wall of skee ball machines. Not knowing the ticket-to-point ratio here, she doesn’t figure two dollars will easily win three hundred tickets. She can get more money from Kevin; that’d be easy, but it wouldn’t be right. The two dollars from her pocket is money she saved, and she has to do this on her own. More than that, she wants to do it the right way.
The first game garners a score of 290—better than average—with one of her balls landing in the coveted 100 hole. But her momentary excitement fades when the machine only spits fourteen tickets into her waiting hands. The next six attempts don’t fare much better—some worse—leaving her with one token and eighty-one tickets. Barely enough for a pencil-top eraser.
So much for the right way, she thinks.
Electronic dings and blips ring out. Parents with exasperated tones herd wild children. Laughter erupts from every corner of the arcade. But that’s all lost on Hannah. In her mind, she’s elsewhere—a dark void. The only thing present with her, the skee ball machine. She stares through wood and plastic, into the belly of the ticket mechanism, a network of wires and switches.
One ticket for every twenty points isn’t fair, she thinks, then she sends the machine a message: One for one.
Click—screep—click…
And she closes her eyes. For a moment, she feels weightless, as if detached from her body, but the sensation quickly fades.
When she opens her eyes, she’s back in the arcade, the one remaining token in her palm. She drops the coin in the slot and grabs her first ball, confident she can win. Sure, all nine balls might drop in 10, giving her the worst possible score of 90. But she’s better than that.
The first ball lands in 100, and she feels herself locked in a zone. Her luck holds out, and by game’s end, she’s looks up at a score of 450, her personal best.
Then the tickets start coming, and her smile fades. She crouches, wrapping her body around the dispenser like a shield, winding the long, seemingly endless strand into loops as tickets click, one at a time, from their slot.
She’s sure someone’s watching.
Her eyes dart.
No one’s paying attention, it appears, and yet she senses scrutiny at her back. She turns, and no one on the opposite side of the arcade looks in her direction, but that doesn’t erase the nagging fear she’s being watched, or that she’ll soon be discovered doing wrong.
Her body quakes.
She’s never used her power with so many around. What made me risk it? she asks herself. No logical answer is forthcoming.
After what seems like an entire afternoon, she moves to a short bench next to a Coke machine and counts off three hundred tickets, forcing herself not to look up, afraid that her nervous demeanor will only draw misgiving. She pushes the tickets she needs into her pocket and stands as a red-haired boy, no more than five or six, stumbles past. He looks like the kid from an old TV show her mom used to watch often, except the boy in the show always seemed happy. Opie, she remembers. That was his name. But this Opie looks depressed.
“Hey, kid,” she says.
The boy stops and looks up, but he doesn’t make eye contact with her. Maybe he can’t. Maybe he has a hard life. She feels sorry for the kid.
“Thought you might like these.” She hands him her spare tickets.
“Thanks,” he mutters. After taking Hannah’s offering, he scampers away, disappearing into the crowded den of electronic mayhem.
Her nerves calm, and her hands stop trembling. She glances around to make sure no one is casting suspicious eyes in her direction. The coast seems clear. Then she returns to the counter to claim her prize.
“See, that wasn’t so hard, was it?” Pimpleboy says.
“Actually, it was pretty freaking hard. Just give me my prize.”
“Okay, here you go, drama queen.” The boy flings the bag of rings onto the counter. “Enjoy.”
Hannah doesn’t take the bag right away. She just stands there, staring at the boy, wondering what she can do to get back at him for his callous attitude. She can easily untie all the stuffed animals above him with her mind, laughing as they rain down, making him look foolish. Or maybe she’ll break his cash register in such a way that he gets the blame for it.
No, she warns herself. Hell no!
She has already risked discovery once today. Besides, what will revenge accomplish? Will this douche bag miraculously transform into a nice guy? That hardly seems possible. So she snatches the prize from the counter, scowls at the boy, and then walks away.
Later that day, when she gives the gifts to her mother and Kevin, her hunch pays off. They do indeed love the offerings and promise to wear the rings every day. Hugs are shared. Tears even well in Kevin’s eyes, making Hannah afraid she’s hurt him—made him unhappy somehow—but when a grin brightens his face, she knows she did well, even if what she did comes with a high price.
Guilt.
She doesn’t sleep that night, thinking about her actions in the arcade. About the things her father did for money. Hannah hates thieves with every fiber of her being. Hates them.
And for the rest of the night, she hates herself.
CHAPTER 5
Not long after Chet’s invasion of Phillip Wise’s house, Hannah discovered her power.
It was a late August afternoon, the misery of summer’s peak fading. Cool ocean breezes wafted and palmettos swayed. Sitting in a lawn chair, Hannah’s mom wrote in a spiral notebook. And Hannah, pointing her arms in a V, kicked and glided in the YMCA swimming pool. She and her mom spent a lot of weekends here lately, which was great when the place wasn’t teeming with kids.
But there was a deeper reason they were spending less time at home. Her mom never wrote in the apartment. For whatever reason, she was keeping the whole thing secret from Hannah’s dad.
That was okay, Hannah figured. After all, Daddy had secrets, too, and she could tell his were worse, because they were hurting Mommy, whose writing was frantic—pressing the ballpoint hard into the paper, her mouth drawn in a pained scowl. The act didn’t seem to bring her much joy.
Just short of the shallow end’s edge, Hannah collided with someone crossing her path. Her face emerged from the water and she took a deep breath, and that’s when she realized the obstacle was a boy.
“I’m sowwy,” the boy said.
She recognized him from school—a stupid kid who frequently made loud and unfunny jokes during class, who more than once had farted proudly to disrupt Ms. Gelson’s lesson. But recognition didn’t register on his droopy face. No surprise there.
Ignoring the brat, she scanned the pool. Too crowded now. More beach towels and longue chairs, more mothers reading paperbacks, and way too many children splashing and making noise. Their high-pitched squeals set her nerves on edge, and a headache began blossoming.
“Hey,” the boy said, “you wanna pway?”
Hannah shook her head, then glanced in her mom’s direction. “I have to get back to my mom,” she said. “So, yeah, maybe later.”
“Okay,” the boy said, beaming.
Straightening her one-piece suit, Hannah climbed the pool steps. Without running—she didn’t want to break the rules and get yelled
at by the lifeguard—she moved fast toward her destination. Without looking up, her mom kept writing, and Hannah didn’t want to disrupt her straightaway. She snatched her SpongeBob Squarepants beach towel and wrapped it around her body, then sat in the chair beside her mom.
After a respectful silence, Hannah said, “What are you writing about anyway?”
“Huh?” She looked up from her notebook, as if coming out of a deep sleep. “I’m sorry, what’s that, sweetie?”
“I asked, what are you writing?”
“Oh, nothing. Just trying to put my English degree to work. Might as well, considering how much student loan debt I racked up getting it.”
Hannah didn’t understand but nodded anyway. “Is it a story?”
“Yes, sweetie, Mommy’s writing a story.”
“I love stories. Can I read it?”
Her mom smiled, resting the pen and notebook at her side, then grabbed a towel and started drying Hannah’s head. “You’re still soaking wet, honey. When are you going to learn how to dry yourself off?”
“The sun dries me, Mommy. It feels good. So, can I read your story now?”
“Someday,” she said, “but you’re too young to read what I’m writing now.”
“Are you writing bad stuff?”
“No, sweetie, nothing bad. Just…not the kind of things you should be reading at your age.”
Her head finally dry to her mom’s apparent satisfaction, Hannah stood and said, “I’m thirsty.”
“The water fountain’s right over there. Go get a drink.”
Disgusting, Hannah thought. She never drank from the fountains at school and doing it here seemed worse. She thought about all the snot-nosed brats, their faces pressed to the nozzle. And, even though something cool to drink would help her headache, she would rather take her chances with dehydration than germs.