by Louise Voss
‘Right, Daddy?’ Jack raised the pitch of his voice a little higher to make sure he was heard over the violins. ‘’Cos you promised we could today. You said you’d teach me to do diving. You said so, on the way back yesterday.’
He pressed his ear against the door, and heard Shirley crying quietly. She’d been in bed with a really bad tummy-ache ever since they’d got home from the airport.
‘Daddy, you’re definitely in there, aren’t you?’ he persisted, hopping from foot to foot on the wooden landing floor. The door opened suddenly, and Jack looked up into his father’s face. Through the plastic lenses of his goggles, Vernon appeared slightly blurry and distorted. There was no mistaking the barely concealed irritation and stress on his face, though.
‘Jack,’ he began, leaning an arm against the doorframe as though the effort of even speaking was too much. With a sinking feeling, Jack knew what was coming. He ripped off his goggles and flung them down the landing, where they spun along the wooden boards and skidded into a vase full of pampas grass taller than Jack himself.
‘You’re gonna tell me we can’t go, aren’t you! It’s NOT FAIR!’
Vernon picked up his small son and hugged him, but Jack squirmed and kicked out in fury and disappointment.
‘I’m real sorry, Jackie, but Auntie Shirley is really sick. I can’t leave her. She’s in too much pain.’
Jack paused for a moment. ‘Are you sure she doesn’t
have the Indian flu?’ he asked quietly. ‘Are we all gonna get it?’
Vernon shook his head. ‘It’s definitely not flu. It’s her diverticulitis. It’s flared up again.’
Jack neither knew nor cared what divert-whatever was, as long as it wasn’t the deadly flu. ‘But you promised you’d take me swimming today.’
Vernon moved Jack’s chin so that he was forced to look at him. ‘Now, Jackie, I didn’t actually promise – I said I’d take you if I could. And I can’t, not today. You’re going to have to be real grown-up and try and understand.’
‘You did promise! And, I’m not a grown-up, I’m EIGHT,’ yelled Jack, and wriggled so hard that Vernon had to put him down.
‘Well, if you’re going to be this naughty, I couldn’t take you anyway,’ Vernon said, looking disapprovingly at him over his half-moon reading glasses.
‘Oh, so what? I’m going over to Bradley’s. I bet his mom will take us because she’s nice, not like you.’
Vernon snorted. ‘I doubt that Gina Morton’s been straight long enough to take her kids swimming since they were
born.’
Jack put his hands on his hips and glared at his father. ‘Gina Morton ALWAYS stands up straight, so THERE.’ And with this devastating parting shot, he marched straight down the stairs, out the back door and through the gap in the hedge into Bradley’s backyard.
‘Going swimming, honey?’ Gina said when Jack appeared in her kitchen, bright red with anger, still barefoot and in armbands.
He climbed up on his favourite bar stool and accepted the carton of chocolate milk that Gina automatically removed from the refrigerator and slid in front of him, taking a long slurp through the straw.
‘No. Daddy said he’d take me and now he’s not going to ’cos Auntie Shirley is ill. It’s not fair. I only got here yesterday!’
He put his elbows on the breakfast bar and sunk his chin in his hands.
Gina breezed around the counter and gave him a hug. She smelled funny, but not in a bad way. Her skirt was all floaty like the Dementors in Harry Potter, and on her ankle she had a bracelet thing with shells and little bells on it, so she tinkled when she walked. Her skin was very brown and wrinkly, and she always looked like she’d been crying, even though she didn’t sound like it.
‘So you have plenty of time left to go swimming with your dad. I know it’s tough, honey, but let’s look at the positive – if he wasn’t so busy taking care of Shirley then we wouldn’t be seeing so much of you, would we? And that would be real sad for Bradley, and for me. It was awesome that you came for pizza last night, and now you’re here today too! Besides, Bradley and Riley’s daddy works so hard making movies that he hardly EVER sees them. He lives in California, which is real far away?’
‘My mum’s gone to California,’ Jack said glumly. ‘She’s working too hard to see me too.’
‘Ah, you poor thing.’ Gina gave him another squeeze, and he noticed the faded tattoo on her wrist. The sharp edge of the deflated armband scratched the side of his chest. ‘But your mom is doing real important work, your daddy says, trying to find a cure for this horrible flu. And she’ll be back before you know it. Now, what are you boys going to do today? Seeing as you’re in your swimsuit, what do you say we get the water slide out? You go find Bradley – he’s in his room watching TV last I saw of him – and I’ll go hook up the hose, OK?’
Jack brightened. The water slide was awesome. ‘OK!’ he said, slipping off the stool and running upstairs calling his friend’s name.
When he and Bradley came back downstairs half an hour later, Bradley too dressed in his swimming trunks, they burst into the garden – to find Gina asleep on a sun lounger, with a small squashed homemade cigarette on the patio beneath her spread-out fingers.
‘Your mum sleeps a lot, doesn’t she?’ Jack said, squinting at Gina’s prone form. Her skirt had ridden up to reveal legs hairier than Vernon’s, and she was snoring gently.
‘Yeah,’ Bradley said. ‘And she’ll get mad at me if I wake her up. I’ll go get Riley, he knows how to fix the slide. Riley!’ he yelled, almost in Gina’s ear, in the direction of the battered old silver Airstream trailer parked at the back of the yard. Gina stirred and mumbled, but didn’t wake up.
Jack looked around him anxiously. He was slightly scared of Bradley’s older brother, who smoked the funny cigarettes too, and had a whole ton of dark swirly tattoos across his arms, back and chest. He had a moustache and slicked-back hair, and mostly talked in swearwords and grunts.
The side door of the Airstream slid open and Riley’s greasy dark head appeared. He looked as sleepy as Gina, even though it was almost lunchtime. ‘What is it, short-ass?’ he mumbled, as Bradley ran forward and grabbed his brother by the hand, pulling him down the three metal steps. Riley was wearing a grubby white vest and a pair of boxer shorts.
‘Come help us set up the water slide, please? Mom’s taking a nap. Pleeeeease?’
Riley scratched his head violently, but allowed himself to be dragged over to the garden hose and the rolled-up plastic slide that Gina had managed to remove from the garage before she fell asleep. With bad grace, he rammed the hose into the garden tap and set the water flowing down the long narrow plastic sheet. ‘There you go, now leave me the fuck alone, OK?’
‘Thanks Riley!’ chirped Bradley, hugging his brother round the waist. ‘Come play if you want, it’s so fun.’
The midday sun was blazing hot, and Jack could feel the burn already on his narrow shoulder blades. Even the heat of the rubber armbands was beginning to sting the delicate flesh of his inner arms, so he ripped them off. He noticed that neither Gina nor his daddy had been out brandishing the Factor 50 like his mum would have done, and he missed her with a pang so deep that tears filled his eyes. But then Bradley grabbed his hand. ‘Come on, let’s do the first one together!’
Holding hands, the two boys took a running jump at the slide, and skidded down its length, the cold water a shock to their hot bodies, colliding at the end in a heap of limbs, both giggling uncontrollably. Jack forgot about his mum, and his burning shoulders. ‘Again!’ he cried, running back to the start. ‘On our tummies this time!’
Some time later, when they were both soaked, scraped and exhausted, they decided to stop for a lemonade break. Bradley went into the kitchen to grab a couple of Snapples, and Jack lay down in the shade of the Airstream to wait for him, panting like a dog. Gina was still snoring on the deck.
Riley was talking on his mobile phone inside the Airstream, and Jack listened, awed by the language
he was hearing. ‘Yeah, dude. I’m fucking freakin’ out here. He’s not answering my calls. I mean, I know he’s a loser, but he’s my dad, right? And he’s a rich loser, too, har har. What would you do? That shit is getting outta hand … Dad ain’t got no one to take care of him out there. What if, man, I dunno, what if he’s like lying in his house, sick? Or worse?’
There was a pause. ‘I’d drive, of course. I’ll hook the trailer up to the Lincoln. Sweet.’
Another pause. ‘Nah, man, I never get the flu and shit like that. Strong as a horse and hung like one too, har har!’
Jack did not understand what that meant. But then he found it hard to understand quite a bit of what Riley said.
‘Why not? Boring as fuck around here. Besides, if I go see the old man, he’ll front me a few hundred bucks to get home again – he’ll freak ’cos of this flu epidemic, and want me to get home safe – and I’ll be in the money. We could drive up to Seattle or somewhere. Wanna come?’
There was an even longer silence, and then: ‘Well, screw you, I’ll go by myself.’ Jack heard the phone clatter down. ‘Fucking pussy,’ said Riley.
Jack stood up when he saw Bradley carefully carrying the two bottles of Snapple towards him. ‘Let’s go inside,’ he hissed. ‘I need to tell you something important!’
Once in Bradley’s room, they sat on the bed, leaving two soaking imprints of their wet trunks on his Transformers duvet cover. The air con was on full blast, and they both shivered.
‘Your brother’s going to hook up the trailer and drive to California to see your dad so he can give him some money,’ said Jack, feeling very important at being the bearer of such big news. ‘You won’t tell him I told you, will you?’ he added nervously.
To Jack’s surprise, Bradley’s eyes brimmed over with tears. Bradley scrubbed them away with the back of his hand, and climbed under his duvet. ‘I’m cold,’ he said in a muffled voice, but Jack could hear him sniffing under there.
‘Why are you crying?’ he ventured. He felt bad that his news had been taken that way – he hadn’t realised it would upset his friend.
‘’Cos that means Riley’s going away again, and the bad flu is in California, and Mom thinks that Dad’s probably got it ’cos I heard her talking to Riley about it, and if Riley goes, he might get it too and what if they both die?’
‘They won’t,’ Jack said with confidence. ‘Riley never gets the flu and shit, and besides my mummy is going to make an injection that cures it. I know she can, because she gave me one once when a bad man gave me a nasty sort of flu. It was in my bum – butt – and it hurt. But it stopped me getting sick.’
‘We should go find your mom, and get her to make sure my dad is OK,’ said Bradley, emerging red-faced from under his duvet. ‘She’s in California too, right?’
‘Right,’ said Jack, staring at his friend. He thought how much he already missed his mother, and how pleased she would be to see him. It had been great to visit his dad, but he was so busy looking after Shirley … ‘Will Riley let us come with him?’
Bradley looked doubtful. ‘I dunno. Would your dad let you go?’
Jack thought of Vernon, and the closed bedroom door. ‘I don’t think he’d mind. I could just leave him a note.’
‘Cool. Let’s go ask Riley!’
‘You must be fucking joking,’ said Riley, when the two boys appeared at the door of the Airstream. ‘How did you know that’s where I’m going?’ He glared at Jack, who quaked.
Bradley ignored the question. He reached out his skinny arm and leaned nonchalantly on the doorframe of the Airstream, and then jumped back like a scalded cat as
the hot metal pressed into his palm. ‘Does Mom know?’ he asked, slyly.
‘No, she doesn’t, and if you tell her, you are one dead boy. Got it?’ Riley narrowed his eyes and loomed menacingly into his brother’s face. Bradley was unperturbed.
‘I won’t tell her – if you let me come with you.’
He ducked out of reach as Riley tried to slap his head. ‘You little fucker! That’s blackmail.’
‘She’ll take the keys away if she knows. Or let your tires down like she did that one time before … Aw, come on, Riley, he’s my daddy too. I’m worried about him as well.’ Jack watched in admiration as Bradley changed tack and went for the sympathy vote. Fat tears dropped down his cheeks. ‘Pleeeeease, Riley? I’ll be good, I swear. I’ll sit in back and play my DS, I won’t bug you while you’re driving … And, remember, you did say you’d take me on a trip in the Airstream. You promised!’
Riley shook his head incredulously and scratched at the mass of black hair in his armpit. ‘Shit.’
‘Please?’ Bradley reached out and took his brother’s hand, sensing capitulation.
Riley wavered for a moment, then shook his head. ‘No way. If you wanna be a snitch, that’ll just show what a baby you are. Now get outta my way.’
He retreated into the Airstream, and Bradley looked crestfallen. But only for a few seconds. Bouncing back, he whispered in Jack’s ear. ‘Don’t worry, I’ve got a plan!’
16
It was mid-afternoon when the truck rumbled into Sagebrush and pulled to a halt. Paul hopped down from the cab into a cauldron of heat. Looking around him, at the cars and trucks spitting up dust on the freeway, at the desert landscape and the vast, forbidding sky, he felt a long, long way from home.
‘Downtown is that way,’ the driver said, pointing up the road. ‘Gonna be a long walk. Maybe the folks over at that gas station could call you a cab.’
‘That’s OK. I’ll walk. Thank you so much for the lift. Ride, I mean.’
The truck driver looked Paul up and down. He’d been quiet the whole journey. ‘Whatever you’re searching for, I hope you find it.’
The truck pulled away. Through force of habit, Paul took out his phone. He had sent Kate a couple of texts asking if her phone was still alive and, if it was, to call him. No response yet. Frustrating – but she must either be busy or her BlackBerry was dead and she had no way of charging it. He yawned so hard he thought it might dislocate his jaw. Part of him wanted to lie down here in the long, dry grass by the side of the road. But he needed to get into town.
Put one foot in front of the other and keep going, he told himself.
After leaving the motel early in the morning, he had walked into Bakersfield, found a small park and laid down in the shade of some trees, where, clutching his duffel bag, he had slept like a baby for several hours. He figured that Harley would assume he’d left town immediately, and if he was going to chase after him, would have done so first thing.
Later, waiting by the side of I-5, thumb uplifted, he had wondered if he was making a stupid mistake. But then he reminded himself that he was doing this for Stephen, and for Kate. And because he didn’t trust Harley and his government chums.
What would they do if they caught up with him? Lock him up? Deport him? Before that happened, he needed to find Mangold and figure out what to do with whatever information he unearthed. He had around four hundred dollars in cash and he knew that as soon as he used his Visa card to withdraw more he would be tracked down. That money wouldn’t stretch far, though. He couldn’t waste it on cabs.
After a long wait by the side of the road in Bakersfield a chain-smoking salesman had picked him up, dropping him an hour or so later in the middle of nowhere, a little place called Lebec. From there he’d endured another long wait before hitching a ride with the silent truck driver.
The road he was walking on seemed to go on for ever, and he began to wish he’d taken the truck driver’s advice and found a cab. There was no shade, and the only sound was the wheels on his duffel bag bumping along behind him. His bottle of water had long since run dry. Lurching with dizziness, sweat pouring into his eyes, he walked on, lizards skittering out of his path. He thought of his brother, and felt a sudden fierce longing to have him by his side. The next moment he was on his knees in the dust, throwing up the remains of the club sandwich he’d eaten that m
orning.
He waited for five minutes before hauling himself back on to his feet and pressing on. Eventually, just as he was about to collapse with fatigue and heat exhaustion, the city thickened, the spaces between the buildings contracting. He found a 7-Eleven and bought a bottle of water, some breath mints and a couple of energy bars. He also picked up a newspaper.
‘Wouldn’t wanna be in LA right now,’ the cashier said as he handed Paul his change. The cover of the paper showed a woman roller-skating while wearing a flu mask. Paul walked out of the shop with his nose buried in the news. The official death toll had ticked up since the previous day. On page 9, beyond the pictures of hospital corridors crowded with sick people, it was reported that the veteran actor Josh Sparks had died of Indian flu, his cleaner finding the body in his Hollywood mansion after he had taken to his bed with ‘a cold’ a couple of days before. The first famous casualty. Paul had no doubt that this news would help spread knowledge of the virus worldwide.
A little way up the road from the 7-Eleven, he came across a small business hotel. Hundred dollars a night, wi-fi in every room. That was a big chunk of his cash, but, right now, he didn’t care. He barely made it into his room and to the bed before he collapsed.
It was dark when he woke up, his mouth as dry as the desert he’d travelled through. He drank copiously from the tap in the bathroom and felt a little better. It was 9 p.m. – he’d been asleep again for hours – and more than anything he wanted to talk to Kate, but his iPhone was dead. After plugging it in and finding that she hadn’t texted or attempted to call him, he opened his laptop and checked his email in case she had sent him a message – nothing.
He spent a while running searches for ‘Charles Mangold Sagebrush address’ but again drew a blank. Next, he searched for the address of Medi-Lab, but it had shut down so long ago the location wasn’t showing up in current records.