by Daniel Price
The cartoonist shrugged. “We can’t be country rubes forever. If this is what they do at gas stations, just imagine their theme parks.”
An electronic chirping sound emanated from Zack’s pocket. He retrieved his handphone and checked the screen. Amanda Calling.
He answered her with a grin. “Hey. You’ll never guess where we are.”
“I know where you are. I saw you in line. You’re both crazy.”
“You should try it. It’s amazing.”
“Yeah, no thanks. I’m just making sure you’re not holding each other and screaming.”
“Well, we’re not screaming.”
Amanda laughed. “Just try not to die, okay? I don’t like driving the van.”
“Where are you now?”
“At the base of the statue.”
He peered down at the thirty-foot sculpture of Power Boy—a chubby blond tyke with button eyes and an electric-blue superhero outfit. Two black-haired women stood at the feet of the eyesore. Even from a hundred feet up, Zack could see Hannah’s fidgety agitation. He was starting to share Amanda’s concerns about her.
“Yeah. I see you. Stay there. We’ll be down in a few minutes.”
Two days ago, Zack had purchased six handphones from an Arizona vendor, all bare-bones models that were prepaid for a generous amount of usage.
On Wednesday afternoon, shortly after the van crossed into New Mexico, Hannah’s screen lit up with a chain of malevolent texts. The sender was only identified as A. Sonnet.
Hey Hannah Banana, Always-Needs-a-Man-a. I guess you found Jury in your pants.
He would have entered your knickers a hell of a lot quicker if I hadn’t messed with events.
In previous times, he was the pearl in your clam. You were the honey on his plantain.
Wherever we stayed, it was always the same. We’d all hear your screwings. Your melodious oohings.
It was not meant to be, unfortunately. He adored you, I assure you, but he always died before you. :(
You’d cry at the dirt in your little black skirt and you’d swear to us you loved him.
And yet within a week, we’d hear the mattress squeak.
The bump-bump-bump of a brand-new chump.
If only these men knew the real and awful you.
Rest assured I do, oh Hannah Banana.
:)
Now the actress paced the feet of the Power Boy, anxiously scanning every man in the crowd. She barely knew a thing about Evan Rander and already she hated him more than anyone she’d ever known. She hated him for singling her out, for chipping away at an already broken psyche.
While Amanda talked on the phone with Zack, laughing her radiant laugh, Hannah swallowed a high scream. As if her stalker problems weren’t bad enough, this voyage was quickly becoming a couples cruise, a romantic slow dance across the floor of the nation. The disparity of fortune killed her. It tortured her for reasons that were vain and petty enough to make her ashamed.
Soon Zack and Theo returned to the ground and rejoined the sisters. On the way back to the generator lot, Hannah clasped fingers with Theo. Despite her smile, her grip was tight and desperate. She hated herself for the plan she was hatching. She hated Evan for knowing her.
—
To Mia and David, the only thing better than having the Royal Seeker was having it to themselves. The moment they finished lunch, they dashed back to the van like secret lovers. Classical music played from the radio as they propped their legs on empty seats and buried themselves in nonfiction. David read Temporis in a Nutshell, an ironic title for an 594-page tome. Mia pored through The Annotated History of America, Volume IX (1912–1940). The cover was graced with a haunting old photo of a broken doll in rubble, a shot of post-Cataclysm New York.
Mia sneaked a quick glance at David over the top of her book. She could only imagine that the teenagers of the world would roll their eyes at what these two did in the back of vans, and yet recent events had forced her to wonder. Ever since she spoke up for him on Tuesday, David’s smiles for her grew a few shades brighter and he touched her arm every time he brushed past her. She didn’t think it meant anything until Hannah slipped her a furtive whisper in the hotel garage. You might have just started something.
Over the next three days, his affections simmered down to old levels, enough to stop her stomach pains. She had no idea what was going on behind that beautiful face of his. Maddeningly, Future Mia was no help at all on the matter. She could have ended the conundrum with a single spoiler, but chose to let her younger self twist in the wind. Mia had received time-traveling intel about Hannah and Amanda and Theo and Zack, but nothing about David. For baffling reasons, her future had yet to mention him once.
An advertisement on the outdoor movie screen suddenly caught her eye. She watched through the windshield as a trio of cartoon handphones danced atop a forty-foot tagline. TRIPLE-8 IS ALL YOU NEED TO FIND ANYONE IN AMERICA, ANY TIME!
Mia’s mouth fell slack with revelation. It had been an irksome catch-22 that she didn’t know the phone number for Information. Now that she had it, she had a chance to shed some light on the other mystery man in her life.
David glanced up as she dialed her phone. “What are you doing?”
She shushed him with a finger. “Hi. Brooklyn, New York, please. Peter Pendergen.”
Mia spelled out his last name, then listened to the operator with faint surprise. “Oh. Okay. Is that near Brooklyn?”
David crinkled his brow at her. He didn’t know how any of these people could tolerate holding phones to their ears. The electronic squeals and crinkles were infuriating to him, like a whistling teakettle covered in firecrackers.
She scrawled a phone number into her journal. “Okay. I’ll try that. Thank you.”
“Success?” David asked.
“No listing in Brooklyn, but there’s a Peter Pendergen in Quarter Hill, just north of the city.”
“Could be an old number,” David speculated. “Or it could be where his handphone’s registered.”
Mia bit her thumb in dilemma. “Can you think of any reason why I shouldn’t try calling?”
“I can think of several, but you have me all curious now. I say do it.”
She stepped outside, restlessly pacing beside the van as she dialed the number. Her heart skipped when someone answered on the fifth ring.
“Hello?”
Mia was surprised to hear a high young voice, a boy caught in the wavering chords of puberty. She wasn’t sure if she’d laugh or scream if she learned that Peter was her age.
“Hi. Is this . . . this isn’t Peter Pendergen, is it?”
The boy fell into a suspicious pause. “Who is this?”
“I’m a friend.”
Another pause. The boy took a bite of something crunchy, then spoke through chews. “My dad’s not known for his maturity, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have any ten-year-old friends.”
Relieved, intrigued, and a little indignant, Mia stopped pacing. “I’m fourteen.”
“Okay. Fine. You’re fourteen. And you apparently have no idea what your friends sound like.”
“Well, I never actually talked to Peter. I’m sort of his pen pal.”
The boy choked on his snack. “Excuse me?”
“What?”
“If I heard you right, and if you’re not rubbing me, then I don’t think you meant to say ‘pen pal.’”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re implying you had homosexual relations with my father in prison. I don’t even know where to begin with that.”
Mia flushed hot red. “What? No! I didn’t . . . that’s not what it means where I come from!”
“Who are you?”
“I’m Mia Farisi, and I promise you that Peter really wants to talk to me! Is he there or not?”
The line fell silent again.
Mia could almost feel the air in the boy’s hanging mouth.
“Holy Christ. You’re one of them. You’re a breacher.”
Mia scoffed. “I’m pretty sure I don’t like that term.”
“Are you insane calling here? Do you have any idea what you’re doing?”
“Look—”
“If you value your life, hang up! Hang up right now and get rid of your phone!”
With a panicked yell, Mia hurled her phone. It sailed over a chain-link fence and disappeared into bramble.
Soon the other Silvers returned to find David and Mia embracing at the side of the van. Hannah was convinced the needle had finally swung all the way into romance until she saw the girl’s shattered expression. Mia fixed her frantic eyes on Zack.
“I think I told Rebel where we are.”
—
They fled the Power Boy with an 88 percent battery charge, and didn’t stop until they were halfway into Missouri. Mia was the last to unclench her fingers from the seat rests. The theoretical danger had theoretically passed. They were as safe from Rebel as they always weren’t.
The group ate dinner at a highway truck stop, their first experience in a bona fide speedery. Each booth and table was encased within a large glass cube. The place looked more like a human aquarium than a greasy spoon diner.
Theo was the first to spot the peculiar dial on the table, right above a sticker advising pregnant women and epileptics to avoid using it. After confirming that nobody in the booth suffered either condition, he turned the knob to 10. Suddenly the door to their enclosure locked, the glass lit up with a crosshatch of bright lines, and the outside world became ten times slower. Waitresses creaked their way between tables. Coffee poured like syrup from tilted pots.
As she casually perused her salad options, Hannah welcomed the others to her world.
Theo watched through the kitchen window in awe as a flipped burger rose and fell in slow motion.
“I just bent the fabric of time at a roadside grill. With a knob that sits next to the napkin holder.”
Amanda suffered a tense flashback to the fuel truck that dawdled over the Massachusetts Turnpike, seventeen years ago. She hid her bother behind a glib smirk.
“Great. A way to make the service even slower.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s not meant to be used until after you get your food,” David said.
“Yes, thank you. I’d worked that out already.”
“So this is what you see every time you shift?” Mia asked Hannah. “It goes all blue like this?”
“Yeah. The faster I go, the bluer it gets. And colder. Sometimes I see my own breath.”
And sometimes she saw more. Hannah thought back to the hallucination she’d suffered on Monday—the handsome Jury Curado, embracing a second Hannah from behind. He adored you, I assure you, but he always died before you. :(
Mia pressed a finger to the glass. “You think this would work if the walls weren’t here?”
“The enclosure’s just for safety,” David explained. “If you put your hand beyond the field, it would exist at a different speed than the rest of your body. According to the book I’m reading, that’s called rifting, and it’s not a pleasant experience.”
Amanda checked Zack’s stony expression, still fixed on his menu. He’d been morbidly quiet since they’d fled the chargery. This wasn’t the best time to learn the term for what he did to Rebel.
Hannah looked to David with sudden concern. “Wait. I don’t have glass around me when I shift. I don’t have a suit. Am I in danger of rifting myself every time I speed up?”
“I imagine if you were, it would have happened already,” he mused. “I’d guess you’re more a danger to others. I certainly wouldn’t suggest touching anyone in your accelerated state.”
Czerny had told Hannah the exact same thing, some weeks ago. She’d assumed he was just worried about high-speed bruising and breakage. Apparently there were worse dangers.
David turned to Zack. “Come to think of it, you also create an open temporic field. I imagine you’d be just as much of a risk as—”
“I know.”
“He knows,” said Amanda, at the same time.
Zack closed his menu and twisted the knob back to 1. Life outside the glass returned to normal.
“Let’s just pick what we want and order.”
—
That night, they rented three rooms at a quaint little inn on the outskirts of Jefferson City. Though the Silvers had forsaken fleabag motels in the wake of their new riches, Zack urged sensible restraint. “This isn’t just travel money,” he’d told them. “It’s build-a-life-in-Brooklyn money.”
All the same, Zack readily caved when David asked for his own room. The boy made a prickly bedfellow, and became downright surly when he didn’t get his personal space.
Amanda stepped out of the shower at ten o’clock to find she had the women’s suite to herself. She saw Hannah outside the window, lounging poolside with Theo. She could only guess that Mia was reading in David’s room, her new evening ritual.
Edgy in solitude, she texted Zack on her phone.
Two minutes later, he opened the door to Amanda. With her wet hair and white robe, her appearance was a throwback to his first recollection of her. She was a much more formidable presence than the high-strung redhead who’d slapped him seven weeks ago. Without a proper frame of reference, he couldn’t tell if she was changing into a whole new person or settling back into the person she was. Most of his thoughts were stuck on how good she looked with wet hair.
“I think I know what we need,” she said as she swept past him.
“So you’re skipping over the whole ‘What’s going on with you?’ part.”
“Shut up and listen.”
Zack fought a grin and returned to his sketchbook. He’d been on a cultural preservation kick since buying his new art supplies, dedicating his pencil to faithful re-creations of old-world icons. His current subjects were Calvin and Hobbes.
“We should take the weekend off,” Amanda declared. “Find a nice hotel with a sundeck and just relax. We’re all at wit’s end and we need to unwind. What do you think?”
Zack kept drawing, expressionless. “I think the others will love your idea.”
“What do you think?”
“I think what I think is moot, considering I’ll get outvoted.”
“Zack, you more than anyone else deserve a rest. You’ve done almost all the driving.”
“I’d drive all night if you guys would let me. I just want to get there already.”
“You think our problems will stop the minute we get to Brooklyn?”
On the contrary, Zack was terrified of what was waiting for them there. Ever since acquiring the van, he’d been plagued by nightmares that weren’t even his own. For three nights in a row, Theo had lurched awake from sleep with an anguished cry. Each time he apologized to Zack but never explained the specifics. He insisted he was only having bad dreams, not previews.
Earlier that day, as the two men floated high in the Kansas tea lift, Theo finally spoke of the future.
“I have this bad feeling about Peter. Not like he’s an enemy. More like a doctor with bad news. I have no idea what he’s going to tell us, Zack. I just know we need to hear it. I know it’s going to hurt.”
Zack chose to withhold that tidbit from Amanda. She didn’t need more reasons to fret.
“I don’t think our problems will stop in Brooklyn,” he told her. “But I do think we’ll get answers. And about goddamn time too. I’m sick of having this ‘in over my head’ feeling, like I’m trying to read Lord of the Rings in Farsi. I’m so desperate for information right now that I don�
��t even care if it’s bad news. I just want to know.”
Amanda crossed her arms. “You’re right. That is a minority opinion.”
“I’m not saying it’s right or wrong. I’m just telling you what’s going on with me.”
“Well, I’m really worried about Hannah. You’ve never seen her breakdowns. I have.”
Zack jerked a limp shrug. “Okay, then sell your idea to the others. I won’t fight it.”
“I was hoping to get more than martyred resignation from you.”
“And I was hoping to be in New York already. I guess we’ll both have to settle.”
Zack continued to sketch in full awareness of her harsh green glare, another throwback to their early days. Amanda wished him good night with all the warmth of a cadaver, then left him to his doodles.
Four hours later, bad dreams once again hit Zack by proxy. Theo shot up in bed with a yell, then stared at his trembling hands.
Zack rolled over to face him. “This isn’t good, man.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m not complaining. I’m just worried about you.”
“It’s all right. I’ll manage.”
“Is this one of those recurring dreams where you’re falling?”
“No.”
“Is it a recurring dream where I’m falling?”
Theo fought a smirk. “No. I swear to you, Zack, I’m not seeing the future in my sleep.”
“How do you know?”
“Because in my dream, I’m floating in front of a glowing white wall that stretches out to infinity. Does that sound realistic to you?”
Zack admitted that it didn’t, though he would have once said the same thing about floating teacups over Kansas.
“And what exactly are you doing in front of this wall?” he inquired.
“I’m looking for something. That’s the part that keeps getting me. In my dream, I’m desperately trying to find this tiny little object that means everything to everyone. And I just can’t find it. I don’t even know if it’s there.”
“What is it?”
Theo dropped his head to the pillow and blew a heavy breath at the ceiling.
“A string,” he replied. “That’s all I know. Just some stupid little string.”