Ready to Roll

by Suzanne Brockmann

  The decor was Spiraling Alcoholic Shit-Hole, circa 1998. The furniture was cheap and used hard—worn and stained where there was fabric, scarred and sticky looking where there was wood or metal. An empty curtain rod hung over the front window, and the plastic mini-blinds were broken and bent. It reminded Ben of the living room in his mother’s shitty little rental house in Las Vegas.

  “When I told Cody that a tutor was coming over, he cleared out pretty fast,” Wade said, adding a rare and heartfelt “Thank you.”

  “So are you, like, Wade’s gay boyfriend or something?” Angel asked suddenly. Her tone was hostile, but her body language broadcast fear. Her arms were tight across her chest and her narrow shoulders were hunched nearly to her ears.

  “No, but I’m friends with Ryan—he’s Wade’s gay boyfriend,” Ben said, even as Wade gruffly said, “I don’t have a boyfriend. Ryan was just some stupid fuck-buddy that I don’t give a shit about. He was getting too clingy, so I dumped him.”

  Wade had his back to the door so he didn’t see that Ryan had finally arrived—or the way that his intentionally too-harsh words had wounded the other boy. Ryan didn’t come in. He just stood there, head down, defeated and in pain, on the other side of the screen.

  “Wade’s lying. He broke up with Ryan to protect him,” Ben explained, not just for Angel, but also for Ryan. “From Cody.”

  Angel, sadly, still felt a need to defend her asshole husband. “Cody wouldn’t,” she started to say, but she stopped because, come on. They all knew, absolutely, that Cody would.

  “Wade didn’t dump Ryan because he doesn’t give a shit about him,” Ben continued. “He dumped him because he does.”

  “Fuck you,” Wade said, but his tone was weary—the fight had gone out of him. “Are you inside my head? No.”

  “I don’t have to be,” Ben told him, and then started to sing. “Ryan, I’m crying…”

  “Ah, Christ,” Wade said.

  Out on the stoop, Ryan gaped at Ben through the screen, and Ben nodded to him in a silent, Yup. Your idiot of a boyfriend wrote a song for you.

  Angel gaped, too. “Oh, my God, Wade! You told me you wrote that song for some girl to sing. But you really wrote it for your gay boyfriend…?”

  Wade aimed his ire at her. “Will you stop calling him that? He’s my boyfriend. You don’t have to say gay. That’s given.”

  “So he is your boyfriend,” Ben said in his best William-Shatner-as-Denny-Crane, “not some stupid fuck-buddy.” He made giant air quotes.

  Ryan opened the door and finally came in, his full attention on Wade. “You wrote a song for me?”

  “Oh, Christ,” Wade said again, although it was hard to tell what he was reacting to—the fact that Ryan had obviously heard that entire conversation or the fact that this kid he loved so desperately was standing in his living room—and Cody could come home any second.

  “It’s a good song.” Angel lit another cigarette as she gave Ryan a once over. She was a curious mix of terrified and tough—as if she’d once been filled with light and life, back before she’d been beaten down too many times to rebound. Now she looked over at Wade. “He’s cute, if you’re into Harry Potter.”

  “In fact, I think it’s safe to say,” Ben concluded his defense, “that Wade doesn’t just love Ryan. No, Wade loves Ryan epically.”

  Wade was just shaking his head. This whole situation had gotten so completely out of his control, but then again, it never really had been something he could manipulate, try as he might. Right now, he was refusing to look at Ryan, as if avoiding eye contact would make the younger boy disappear.

  “Look-it, you both have to leave,” he told Ryan and Ben, before turning desperately to Angel. “Please, Ainge, pack your shit and take my car, and go. Do it, now, before Cody comes home.”

  Angel’s body language tightened. “He’ll just follow me to Phoenix.”

  “Not to Phoenix,” Wade said. “You need to go north, right now, like we talked about.”

  But she was already shaking her head, and Ben knew she hadn’t done the math. She didn’t truly understand what Wade was willing to do if she didn’t escape while she had the chance.

  “If you don’t leave,” Ben reminded Angel and told Ryan, too, since this was gonna be news to him, “then Wade’s gonna tell Cody that he’s gay.”

  “Oh, my God,” Ryan breathed.

  “Cody hears that, his head’ll explode—I think we can all agree that it will—and he’ll beat Wade into a senseless pulp. Maybe even kill him. Probably kill him, maybe not completely intentionally, but dead is dead. Murder, manslaughter, whatever, right, Wade?”

  “Oh, my God, Wade, no,” Ryan breathed again, but Wade was still just looking down at the floor, shaking his head.

  Ben asked Angel, “Do you really think Wade just, randomly, wants to die?”

  “I don’t know,” she whispered. “Sometimes I want to die.”

  Oh, crap. Pterodactyl. Ben pushed on. “Well, that’s terrible,” he told Angel. “But Wade really doesn’t. But he’s got this crazy idea that if he gets Cody pissed off enough, then Cody will kill him instead of you. Because if you won’t leave, if you refuse to go somewhere safe, either into the shelter or somewhere far away from Cody, well, Wade’s gonna keep his douche of a brother away from you however the hell he can. And he thinks he can do that, he thinks he can protect you, by sending Cody to jail for hurting or even killing him.”

  Wade stayed silent as Ryan let loose another Oh, my God. And Angel finally understood. Her eyes filled with both horror and tears.

  “He’s noble, but he’s also an idiot,” Ben continued. “He has no idea how long it can take for the police to lock up a white adult male for allegedly beating the shit out of a family member who’s gay. But maybe that’s okay. Maybe his plan will work on a delay, and you’ll finally leave when you see Wade in the hospital, hooked up to a respirator, in a coma with a massive brain injury that he can’t possibly survive. Maybe, when you have to be the one to unplug him, because his freaking mother still won’t come home, maybe then you’ll finally know for sure that yes, Cody would. He would, and he will. And Wade’s apparently not gonna just wait around hoping it’s not you Cody puts in that hospital bed. He’s not gonna let you be the one who dies after a man who is supposed to love you and cherish you loses his temper—” he made air quotes again “—one too many freaking times.”

  Ben turned back to Wade. “Your plan is gallant, but come on. There’s got to be another way.”

  “You can both leave. Together.” Ryan’s voice shook. “You can come and stay with us. My mother’ll be okay with it, I know she will.” He turned to Angel. “Although you won’t be able to smoke in the house.”

  “That’s stupid,” Wade sputtered. “And crazy. And… stupid.”

  “You love me!” Ryan shot back at him. “What’s stupid is that I knew that, and I don’t know why I let you convince me that you could suddenly just… stop loving me.”

  Wade finally looked over at Ryan, and just like that, it was as if they were standing in their own private bubble. And as Wade finally let himself gaze into the fierceness of Ryan’s eyes, he crumbled. Just a little. Just enough so that Ben wasn’t surprised when he didn’t fall back into his default mode of deny, deny, deny.

  “I need you to be safe, Rye,” Wade whispered with a raw honesty that was heartbreaking. “And let’s face it. Even if Cody’s in jail, my father is…” He made a sound that was part laughter but all pain. “He’s just as bad. You’ll never be safe with me.”

  “Are you kidding?” Ryan took a step toward Wade, who took a step back. So he stopped and said, “Never’s a long time. And okay, even if you’re right, which I don’t think you are… When I’m with you, when we’re together… I’m finally exactly who and what and, God, where I want to be. If I’m not willing to take some risks for that…” He shook his head. “Do you really expect me to live my life hiding beneath my bed?”

  “You don’t understand—”

/>   “No, you don’t understand. Because I love you epically, too. And I’m not going to just let you throw this away. I am not!” Ryan took a lurching step forward and then another, and suddenly Wade surrendered and moved toward him, too, and then they were in each others’ arms.

  Kissing as if the world were coming to an end.

  It felt too intimate, too private, and yes, even though Ben was glad for both of them, he was also so freaking envious. But as he turned away, he saw that Angel was watching them, wide-eyed in her shock.

  So yeah, maybe Ben let a little too much snark into his voice when he said, “That’s what love looks like.” Subtext: it makes sense that you wouldn’t recognize it.

  But when she met his gaze with such misery in her eyes, he admitted, “It’s okay, I’m jealous, too.”

  Wade was way too damaged or maybe spooked to let that definitely epic kiss go on for too long—God forbid his father return from whatever business trip he was on, or Cody come home earlier than expected.

  “I wish you’d told me the truth,” Ryan said as Wade pushed him away, “because I can—I will—help you figure this out.”

  “Staying at your place,” Wade said, shaking his head in a hard no. “Thank you, but… Angel needs to get farther away. A lot farther.” He turned to her. “But maybe Ryan’s onto something that’ll make it easier for you to leave. What if I went, too? With you.”

  “To Seattle?” she said.

  “Shhh,” Wade hushed her as if somehow Cody might hear them. “The fewer people who know—”

  Angel turned to tell Ben and Ryan. “Wade wants me to take his car and go to Seattle, but I don’t know anyone there. He says some girl he knows from Burgers Plus moved there last year and she can help me get a job—”

  “She can,” Wade said.

  “—and I can sleep on her couch, for a while, at least, but… What if I get there, and she didn’t mean it?” Angel asked. “Or… or… what if she hates me?”

  “She won’t,” Wade said. “But, it’s okay, Ainge, because I can go with you—”

  “I’m not going to make you do that!” she countered loudly. “What, are you just going to drop out of high school? What about the football scholarship? God, that’s all you ever talk about! I’m not going to make you give that up, and God, leave behind the… the—” as she gestured toward Ryan, she started to cry with big gulping sobs “—the freaking love of your life!”

  “Yes,” Wade said as he pulled her into his arms. “I am. Because you matter, too.” He looked at Ryan over the top of Angel’s head and his voice cracked as he asked, “You’ll wait for me, right?”

  Ryan nodded, even as he, too, started to cry. “I’ll help him get his GED,” he told Angel as he tried to smile. “And I’ll visit. On weekends and school vacations.”

  But she was shaking her head. “I’m not going to make you leave,” she told Wade as she fought to steady her breathing and stop her tears. “But I swear to God, when I get to Seattle, if this girl isn’t as nice as you say she is…”

  Wade didn’t hesitate. It was clear to Ben that he’d been waiting for a very long time for this. “Pack your things, you’re leaving now,” he told her. “I’ve already signed the title of my car over to you. It’s in the glove compartment. Here’s the key, give me your phone. You can’t take it with you. Don’t call, don’t text, don’t email, don’t write.”

  She handed her phone to him, and, as if on cue, it buzzed with an incoming text.

  Cody. Checking up on her with a surly seeming, ’Sup, bitch?

  “Doing laundry,” Wade answered for her, typing in the words. “Go,” he said again, and this time Angel went.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Still Thursday

  Petty Officer First Class

  Irving “Izzy” Zanella:

  On Thursday afternoon, it was time for our remaining tadpoles to write their letter home.

  Dear Mommy and Daddy, Camp Coronado isn’t as pretty as it looks in the brochure. We haven’t lit a fire and sung If I Had a Hammer even once, and the macramé class has been canceled.

  (Laughs) And yeah, no. They’re not really writing a letter, and no one’s gonna send it anywhere. That’s just this particular exercise’s nickname. Everything here in the Teams has a nickname—I think you’ve prolly noticed that.

  Nickname aside, this is a pretty standard assignment: Write a short essay on why you want to be a SEAL. Boom.

  In theory, it’s a simple classroom session, and on a normal, non-Hell Week day, for most candidates it’d be a piece of cake. These guys are here because they want this.

  Earlier in the week, we have ’em sitting at desks in their soggy, gritty unis, doing calculus, algebra, and geometry. We’re not just being dicks and throwing hard math problems in their faces while they’re under duress. (laughs) Okay, we’re also being dicks, but we have ’em calculating dive times and jump weights—the kind of math that keeps you alive out in the Real World under equally real duress and discomfort.

  We also throw things at ’em like: “In an urban warfare sitch, you’re barricaded and cornered in a small cafe with no additional exit doors or windows. Here’re the contents of the kitchen. Go.”

  Course we want them to give us a recipe for building a bomb, and then be specific as to how they’re gonna use it.

  Are you gonna make a Molotov cocktail type device, which can be used to distract or attack, or are you going to attempt to put a hole in the wall so you can adios your trap…?

  Most of the guys read the question and they take that you in the singular, like they’re James Bond.

  But our little Seagull interpreted it with the SEAL Team-appropriate plural you, and he wrote this nice little paragraph that put all of Boat Squad John to work. This was back before Jake rang out, and there were six of ’em still standing. So he’s got Schloss and Jake guarding the barricaded door, Timebomb making the distracts-and-attacks, while the two other Johns prep the escape-hole blast. The cherry on the top was that the Gull’s own job was to use the kitchen stove to boil tap water to resupply the team, and to grab food from the pantry to snack upon after they escaped. Because nothing makes you hungry like a good explosion or two. (laughs)

  (Gets serious, leans forward) I feel like I need to remind everyone that this kid—and he really is a kid—he’s barely an E-4. But he thinks like a seasoned Senior Chief.

  But, okay, earlier in the week, providing the correct answers to these classroom pop quizzes matters more, although we’re also looking for the guys who can get it right when everyone around them is doing the Chicken Dance at their invisible sister’s imaginary wedding. Ability to focus while others can’t is a useful skill for a SEAL to bring to the party.

  Still, as Semana del Infierno wears on and the hallucinations kick in, the questions get a tad easier, a la Why a SEAL. But we add to the challenge by turning up the heat. Literally.

  What we did that day was run ’em hard for about five hours non-stop. Then we froze their balls off with some surf torture, and then wet, chafing, and shivering, they staggered into the classroom.

  (As BUD/S Instructor:) “Okay, everyone, grab a seat, some paper, and a pen. Today we’re writing an essay. Why are you here? You have fifteen minutes, you may not leave your seat, and you must not fall asleep.” (laughs)

  These guys have slept maybe three hours out of the past ninety-six, President Lincoln is following some of ’em around—trying to get ’em to wear his stovepipe hat—so it’s a big challenge despite the easy topic. Especially when we crank the heat in the room to eighty-five degrees.

  The instructors take turns monitoring. With the heat up that high, it smells about as awesome as you can imagine. I was in there first, and I could see steam rising off of some of the bigger guys. Timebomb and Schlossman were doing a kickass imitation of a fog machine as their eyes rolled wildly in their heads.

  The guys from the other boat squads were scattered around the room—maybe they were thinking that giving themselves extra real e
state would keep them from overheating and falling unconscious. But Squad John’s in the corner, in this tight little cluster.

  And I realize that’s so the Gull can kick Timebomb’s boot, after which Timebomb kicks John Q who then kicks John Doe. Doe kicks Schloss who kicks Seagull, and then it goes around again.

  Meanwhile Gull’s muttering things like “honor to serve,” and “love of our country,” and “personal challenge.” Because you’ll note—as he did—that we did not say they could not talk. “Desire to excel” he mutters, along with “teamwork.”

  Kick, kick, kick, kick, kick.

  Across the room, Fark hits the floor with a splat, and all of Boat Squad John leap into action. Now, they can’t leave their seats, right? They’ve been told they can’t stand up. But they start shouting, Get up sir get up sir get up sir get up! as they scooch their desks over to the fallen officer, so that they can reach down and pull him up and get him back in his chair.

  And the rest of the guys in the room finally recognize that they need to work together to get through this one, so they schlump their desks over to BS John, and now they’re all in one big group, kicking each other and mumbling and doing whatever they have to—short of getting on their feet—to stay awake.

  (Smiles) You know what I wrote in my letter home? One sentence, barely legible. I want to be a SEAL because I want to be a SEAL.

  And then I transcribed the lyrics to a Beatles song. At the time it seemed appropriate and intensely profound. (recites as if Shakespeare, with sharp enunciation and rich, round tones) Shake it up, baby. Twist and shout.

  * * *

  Ben picked up on the first ring.

  “Thank God,” Eden said. “Where are you? What’s happening?”

  “I’m still at Wade’s,” her little brother reported. “Ryan’s here, too. He’s trying to talk Wade into at least going over to his house, but Wade wants to stay here, with Angel’s phone, because Cody tracks her with her GPS.”

  Where’s Angel? was a question that needed asking, but Eden had higher priority questions to ask first. She kept one eye on her tiny charges, and her other eye on the clock. She’d called Haley’s mom, Mary Lou, who was heading to the Troubleshooters Inc. office to relieve her. But just as Eden had suspected, it was going to take her at least another twenty minutes to get here. And then Eden had to drive to the O’Keefe’s, battling the traffic… “Is Adam there yet?”