Strong Coffee

It’s summer. Old Collins’ idea of an end-of-school-term party is a lame picnic out by the chain link fence. The eight-year-olds are over at the sprinkler, smearing ice cream on each other’s faces and washing it off in the rotating spray. The Almost Outs—five guys who are nearly 18—sit on the picnic tables, bare feet muddying up the bench seats.

The rest of us huddle in the shade of the biggest tree, finishing the bologna sandwiches before they start to grow botulism or maggots, whichever comes first. I wasn’t paying much attention in biology this semester. Steve and Jerry kept giving me grief over making A’s all the time. “Why should you?” Jerry said. “Who do you need to impress?” I told him, “Whoever will be reading my record when I get out of here.” Here, meaning East Wind School for Boys. It sounds like a reformatory, and it’s run like one, but it’s really what used to be called an orphanage. I’m Vinnie, and we’re all here because nobody wants us.

Jerry cusses, low so Collins can’t hear him, because foul language earns points that get you sent to D-hall. He’s 17, and was assigned to cut the grass when we go back to our dorm. “Water it to make it grow,” he mutters, “and then cut it when it does. That’s dumb.”

A siren screams far down the two-lane. We watch the sheriff’s car speeding toward us. It brakes about thirty feet away, and stops on our side of the road. The flashing light twirls. The sheriff and his deputy stay inside, hidden behind the sun glare on the windshield. A silent EMS ambulance pulls in behind sheriff’s car. Uniformed men get out and meet at a spot in the roadside weeds.

Everyone except the Almost Outs rushes to the chain link, and latch fingers into the mesh like they’re at the circus or something. Besides Collins, who’s picking up picnic trash—and me, because I’m downing the last bottle of spring water—Jerry is the last to saunter over, just bored with sitting still.

An unmarked car comes from the same direction, but slower, and pulls off the road to park behind the ambulance. The sheriff and his deputy cross the ditch, walk a few yards out into a field, and kneel. I join my friends at the fence and we watch the men tug at a round wooden lid and toss it aside. I know it’s the cover of an old well. When I came here seven years ago, Collins brought me out here and told me that’s where I’d end up if I wasn’t a good boy.

“Oh-my-god,” Steve breathes, his sweaty shoulder bumping mine. “Old Collie’s done put some kid in there and he’s been found out.”

“He told you that, too?” Steve’s fourteen, almost two years older than me, and ought to be kidding, trying to scare the Littles. I know from his tense look that he believed the dorm master then, and still does. And they call me Mouse.

Low excited chatter from the guys at the fence. Collins stops picking up ends of hot dog buns and comes over, just in time to see the sheriff take a grappling hook out of his trunk. He hands it to the deputy, who sends it down the well. Collins shoos the smaller boys away from the fence. Now the Almost Outs are coming to see what’s so fascinating. Collie puts the Littles into their care and orders them back toward the ivy-covered buildings.

Us Middles watch the deputy bring up a body.

They’re too far away for us to see much, but the unmarked car must belong to a private detective or a reporter. He’s got a tiny camera and shoots a bunch of pictures before the sheriff marches toward him, waving one arm like an angry drill sergeant. Reporter or whoever backpeddles and sits in his car, watching.

Collins yells at us to get the hell back to our rooms. By ones and twos, the others obey. I linger for a few moments, wondering who she was. Her skin is a streaky blue, but she’s not been down there long enough to rot. One foot still wears a red high heel.

EMS workers put her on a stretcher and load her into the ambulance. It leaves, slowly, and the police car follows. The reporter stares at me. I stare back. Then Collins’ shout, too close, burns my ears. “Vincent, get your ass in gear.”

I turn, thinking, That’s four demerits. D-hall for you, Collie. And I walk away from the fence.

At supper no one’s hungry, but we eat it anyway, mostly to keep Collins off our case but partly to cover the chatter over what we’d seen. What the older and younger inmates think doesn’t reach our table, but there’s enough nervous joking around me to paint a picture. Collie keeps a tight fist on the television and computer access, so most of what we know from the outside comes in with newbies or Jerry hacking into the Internet in the library. It’s the only use he has for my hangout, which is almost always deserted.

“She’s a floozy,” Jerry says. “Or, was. Who else would end up naked and dead in an abandoned well?”

“Lots of people,” Eric says, too mild to provoke Jerry’s legendary temper. “I’ve seen enough tv shows about killers and runaways and wife murderers to be an expert. Anybody can be a victim, not just floozies.”

A few other guys add their opinions, some with Jerry, some with Eric. I keep my mouth working on the overcooked green beans and greasy dinner roll.

The dining room is hot even with the windows open. According to Collie, his boss won’t let him turn on the air conditioning until summer officially starts—nearly two weeks from now. If it sounds like life here is all bad, it isn’t. The buildings are big and old with Masterpiece Theatre woodwork, especially the library. Many of the books are boring, and the encyclopedias are out of date, but there’s a pipe-tobacco smell lingering from when some old dude lived in that part of the campus, which was once his house.

There’s a swimming pool too, with the Almost Outs assigned lifeguard duty so the rest of us won’t drown each other. It opened two days ago, but my swim trunks are too tight so I’ll have to borrow Steve’s or wait until a busload of us gets a Day Pass to town. Jerry usually misses out on that, being in D-hall much of his life. He’s lucky to get a turn at the lame games in the lame game room. At least those don’t cost anything to play.

The Visitors’ Lobby is the least-used of any area here. Only the Littles get trotted out for potential adopters. It’s next to our own student lounge but Collie shuts the French doors connecting the rooms, whenever anybody is over there being interviewed. I remember sitting on a hard chair a few times, trying not to bite my nails or throw up, while young couples who dressed like they had good jobs and presentable relatives would look at me and then at each other. After about age 9, people quit picking my photo out of the Line Up. I guess people want the youngest kid they can find. There’s nothing wrong with me, except being shy. And maybe too dreamy.

My dreaming is interrupted by everyone pushing back chairs and taking their plates to the conveyor belt. Another meal is over, and there’s no homework. I look forward to finishing my latest library book, something that must have been smuggled in by an older inmate and has escaped notice. It’s a long involved tale about a boy in a European country, who finds a rare book, falls in love with the wrong girl, and has a mysterious stranger following him.

But it doesn’t work out that way. When I get back to the room I share with Steve, he’s cross-legged on his bunk, noodling on his clarinet. That wouldn’t bother me, but Jerry’s there, too, draped over my desk chair, and with a look in his eye that never bodes well.

“Shut the door. And be quiet.”

I shut the door. Jerry’s listening to a little transistor radio, the earpiece keeping his secret until he unplugs it and we hear the newscaster say, ” …no leads as to the identity of the woman whose body was found yesterday afternoon in an abandoned well near Hackett. Sheriff A.D. Goodwin says the F.B.I. has been called in to investigate. Turning to the baseball scores—”

“Shit.” Jerry clicks off the radio and tosses it aside.

“What did you expect?” Steve asks, dripping spit from the clarinet onto the bare wooden floor. “It’s not like she’d be anybody you know.”

“With Feds roaming all over the place, I can’t put my plan into action.”

“What plan is that?” Asking is against my better judgment, but I figure I can spare a few minutes to listen. Jerry has his faults, but boring isn’t one of them.

“Get out of this place. A little vacation.”

“We’re on vacation,” I point out.

“If you call mowing and mopping, chopping and dicing, washing and flushing—a vacation.”

Since there are no housekeepers, and only one old geezer who doubles as a watchman and groundskeeper, inmates do everything short of a major construction job. “You left out painting,” I say, remembering how satisfying it felt to roller on a fresh clean layer.

Steve puts his clarinet back into its case. “Why don’t you tell Vinnie about your plan? Maybe he’d be game for it, if you’re not.”

“The only thing I’m game for is finding out how this story ends.” I take the library book from beneath my pillow and adjust myself against the headboard. Before I can hit the lamp switch, Jerry snatches the book from me and peers at the title. Flips through the pages.

“This looks too old for you, Vinn.” He places the book under his thigh and lights up a forbidden cigarette.

Steve yells, “Don’t do that! Collie will smell it.”

“Collie’s nose atrophied long ago. He can’t smell—”

Steve leaps off his bed and opens the door.

Jerry snubs out the cigarette. Looks at me. “Vinnie, don’t you ever want to do something that’s fun?”

“If you want to leave, leave.” I don’t mention the likely consequences of going AWOL. Even Jerry hasn’t tried that, at least not publicly.

“Steve’s onto something here. You, my lad, are so far under the radar that you won’t be missed for weeks. You can be our front man, find a place for us to live, maybe line up a couple of jobs. We’ll make our break after the case goes cold and the Feds leave town.”

Steve cocks his head to one side, the way he does when he’s suspicious. “Our front man? We’ll make a break? You’re not expecting me to do this, are you?”

“We wouldn’t have to put up with Collie’s ugly mug and stormtrooper attitude. Not to mention all the work and lousy food and sheer boredom.”

Steve gives this some thought. He turns to me. “You are O’Leary’s pet. He wouldn’t punish you the way he would us, if you were caught.”

“I’m not getting caught because I’m not dumb enough to try it. I’m—” I catch myself before blurting out, I’m happy here. For a moment I’m no longer sure this is true. O’Leary is Collins’ boss and I’m not his pet. The few times our paths cross is when he’s giving out the yearly achievement medals. Mine’s always in English and O’Leary dishes up some compliments, that’s all. Until tonight I was just going with the flow, but after seeing that dead woman I’m thinking there’s a big world out there and I’m missing it. So I finish, “—going to take a shower.”

When I get back, Jerry’s so into his escape plan that he forgets to tease me about my striped pajamas. What he doesn’t know is that I take them off as soon as the light’s out. Steve might know, but he’ll never tell.

“I’ll give you bus fare to the big city of your choice, Mouse. And throw in some cash for eats along the way. And pay for the phone call to tell us where you are. We’ll be there ASAP. Won’t we, Steve?”

“If you say so.”

Steve yawns, but I know he’s as wide awake as I am. I decide to play along. “Where would I go? I like a warm climate.”

Jerry hunches forward, eager, cheering me on. “Now you’re talking. You can do odd jobs, and mail a little traveling money back for us. Since I’m giving you mine.”

“Whoa. The first time a letter comes to either of your boxes, Collins traces it back to me.”

“He won’t know it’s money, or from you if you don’t do something stupid like putting on a return address.”

“If I turn up gone, it would be pretty clear. Besides, who else would send you mail? You haven’t gotten anything in that box but junk from a porno publisher for two years.”

Into the heavy silence that falls, I add, “Of course, I never get any mail at all.”

Tight-throat answer as Jerry pushes past me toward the door. “You sure as hell don’t. Coward. Baby. Rot in here another six years.”

Over the next day or two, we sneak peeks at the news when Collins watches tv in the teachers’ lounge. Doesn’t look like the Feds will be leaving as soon as I’d hoped, and Jerry is onto me again about tasting adventure. The idea has caught root and is keeping me awake at night.

So on the fourth night after the picnic, with the Feds sending for reinforcements in the case, I find myself wearing a backpack and tennis shoes, a ball cap, and a jacket that’s too hot for the night even after a thunderstorm passes.

East Wind is out in the sticks, so the only street lights are the ones on campus, and the only road in either direction is that two lane blacktop that leads into town in one direction and God knows where in the other. Shadows under the ancient oaks move in the slight wind, sending raindrops down on my head, and Jerry casts a ghoulish shadow on the grass as he tries to lasso one of the iron gate points with a nylon rope.

I’m wondering why he chose to send me out by the front instead of down at the chain link, which I think I could climb even if it is higher than this old brick fortress guarding the front. But I shiver, remembering I’d have to pass that well on the road to Hackett, and I can’t remember whether the sheriff or his deputy put the cover back on, or not. If not, chances are I could fall into it in the moonless night. Maybe Jerry thought about that, too, and planned my escape with more concern than I’d given him credit for.

Steve interrupts my musing. “See that little tree? Maybe you could climb it, and go over the wall instead of the gate.”

“What if they’ve got broken glass on top? I read—”

“Quit complaining and get away from here before old Martin comes along.” Jerry coils the rope and hands it to me. “Tie the rope to a limb so you can let yourself down.”

I climb the tree, tie the rope to a limb, and let myself down onto the uncut grass on the far side of the wall. Behind me, I hear Jerry say, “Get the rope. Don’t want to leave any evidence.” And Steve answers, “Get it yourself.”

While I’m revving up the nerve to leave, Steve runs to the gate. “Hey, Vinnie, you got the money?” He grasps the bars, leans on them.

I walk over to him. Pat my belly. “Pinned to me skivvies.”

Jerry joins him, coiling the rope again. “That’s your stake, man, and you better not lose it.”

“I won’t lose it!”

Steve goes through his check list. “You got the phone number?”

“Pay phone in the dorm—right.”

“Remember: hitch to the bus station, and call us the minute you get to the city.”

Jerry pulls on his arm. “He knows all that. Come on, let’s get inside before somebody closes the damn door.”

Steve calls back, “Don’t get in the car with anybody you can’t beat up.”

“Right,” I answer, not loud because old Martin might be making his rounds early.

I watch my friends run up the walkway and into the mossy brick building where I’ve spent more than half my life. The sliver of light winks out as they close the door. Then I jog down the paved road, toward Hackett and away from East Wind.

I’ve covered half the five miles, grateful that track is one of my electives and I’m in pretty good shape, when I hear Eric’s voice saying, “tv shows about killers… runaways…wife murderers.” The chill inside deepens so even though I’m sweating, I keep the jacket on. Greater than the fear of becoming a victim on tv is the fear of going back to face Jerry. Coward. Crybaby. Mouse.

Nah. It’s my first adventure. And the Feds are out there, keeping a lid on things.

Leaving in the middle of the night wasn’t such a hot idea. Hackett has one motel, and it’s full. A note on the closed key return window says so. Now what?

TO BE CONTINUED!

RLB Hartmann is fascinated by Mexican history.

A snuffling. The backpack jiggles under my head and wakes me. I jerk up, slam against the locked door behind me. My neck is stiff and a damp night on the concrete stoop has lamed one leg. I remember it’s a pharmacy, and I see that the snuffler is a German Shepard.

“Hey, boy,” I say, hoping there isn’t a policeman attached anywhere. “You hungry? After my sandwich?”

There is Seeing Eye harness attached to him, but a quick look around doesn’t turn up the owner. It’s barely past dawn, Sunday morning in Hackett and too early for church. Or anything else.

Didn’t sleep much. The plan had been to hitchhike at least part of the way but that hadn’t happened. Not a single wild teen ager in his dad’s car, no salesman pulling a red-eye into Hackett. And for sure the little old ladies that I would have accepted a ride from were home snug in bed at 2 a.m. The road was dark and peaceful until it ended at my locked motel, full of out-of-towners covering the investigation.

I unbuckle the pack and unzip the sandwich bag Steve made me take. “You’ll be hungry, so here’s a midnight snack.” Speak for yourself, pal, I never eat after dark in the summer.

Mozart (first German name that popped into my head, courtesy of Steve and his music idol) wolfs down his part of the peanut butter sandwich. I feel sorry for all the allergic people who don’t dare enjoy it. I eat my share while working the tingles out of my foot and the kink out of my neck.

I have a vague idea where the bus station is. I wonder if the dog will follow me. Maybe on the way there’ll be a “Lost Dog” poster offering a reward. At least I haven’t spent any money on breakfast.

We start in the most likely direction. I’m checking the utility poles for something besides old yard sale signs when I hear a faint whistle and a worried voice calling, “Macho! Macho! Here, boy, where are you? Come back, Macho.”

A male voice, probably not searching for a lost kid with a name like that. I stop and the dog stops with me. “You going to answer him, or aren’t you, Macho?”

The voice is coming from the next alley. Macho-Mozart just looks up at me, pink tongue lolling out, hope in his eyes. “Want another sandwich? Sorry but I’m fresh out.”

“Is someone there?” A man about thirty, dressed in slacks and a polo shirt, feels his way into view with a cane. He’s wearing dark glasses, and old Mouse puts two and two together.

“I’m here,” I answer. “And I have Macho. I think.”

“Thank God!” He hunkers and holds out a hand. Macho goes to him. He hooks an old fashioned leather leash on the harness and stands up. “Thank you—?”

His voice asks for a name and I almost say it but catch myself. “No problem.” I start to walk away but the man keeps talking.

“I got a little turned around, I’m afraid. Can you take me to the bus station?”

Even with the dog he looks helpless, and since I’m going there and he won’t know if I make a few wrong turns, I say, “Sure.”

We walk along the deserted streets. I watch for a bus station sign, and he talks my ear off. “Macho’s young and still in training. The last dog I had would never run away and leave me, but he grew old and went into retirement. I miss him, but Macho learns quickly and will grow old with me.”

The man’s name is Al, and he’s meeting a friend at the Morningbird Hotel in Fairview.

I look for buses on the street or parked in a lot. Al says, “I’ve been to the hotel, but it’s been awhile. Do you suppose you could go there with me? I’ll be happy to pay your fare.”

A few things go through my head, but what comes out of my mouth is, “I have a fifteen minute stop over in Fairview.” Steve’s bus schedule has little red circles along a thin red line, all the way to Dentonville, where we’re to meet next week.

“What serendipity! A fellow traveler. How much farther to the station?”

At that moment I spot a bus rounding a corner up ahead, and follow it. “Not far,” I assure him, hoping it’s the truth.

Two more blocks and we’re entering a convenience store with a hand-lettered sign “bus” in the window. I smell coffee and my mouth starts to water, but what I really want is cold orange juice. My friend taps his way to the counter as if he’s done this before, and makes good on his promise to pay the part of my fare that takes me to his destination. I thank him, even if I am returning the favor.

“Bus for Fairview leaves in thirty minutes,” the clerk reminds us.

Al says, “If you want refreshments, machines are around the corner.” Macho guides him to an empty table near the rest rooms. “Bring me a coffee, will you? Black.”

The machines in the corridor dispense coffee, juice, and candy. I take a tray and load it with drinks and five candy bars. It’s brunch time at East Wind and right now my pals are feasting on omelets and pancakes and reading the comics. When I get to Fairview, I’m going to find a diner, so I stuff the candy into my pockets and return to our table. Macho lies at his master’s feet, rolling his eyes at me in that way dogs have. “Chocolate isn’t good for canines,” I tell him.

Al’s left handed. I watch him place and find his Styrofoam cup between gulps. I notice that he’s unhooked the leash and put it in his pocket. I want to ask if he’s been blind all his life, but it seems a nosy question.

A bus pulls in, hissing to a stop out front. The driver changes his sign from Hackett to Fairview. “That’s ours. Do you need any help?”

“Just guide me by the elbow.” Al fumbles and finds Macho’s harness handle, and we go outside with several other people who are leaving town. Nobody has gotten off, and only a handful remain seated for points farther along the route.

I let go of Al’s elbow so he can reach for the grab bar. On his other side, Macho leaps away as if he’s seen a squirrel or a cat and races down the sidewalk. I leap after him but someone grabs the backpack, jerking me to a stop. It’s Al, and I’m confused. I try to see where Macho went, and then I try to see through the man’s dark glasses. It’s hard to know what a person is thinking when you can’t see his eyes.

“The driver’ll wait until I can bring him back.”

“No, I don’t want to cause trouble. Get on. Macho will go home and my neighbor will see that he’s taken care of.”

“But what will you do—”

Al shows our tickets and steers me ahead of him into a seat near the middle. “I’ll be fine, once I’m in the lobby of the Morningbird.”

The bus is noisy and the driver seems to be making up for lost time. We speed around curves that throw Al and me together, first one way and then the other. He stares straight ahead, but the sunglasses are curved and his eyes are hidden. I’ve never known a blind person before, would the lids be open or closed?

His lips smile, as if his thoughts are pleasant. Mine are divided. I worry about Macho, then I worry that maybe Al’s friend won’t show up and I’ll be stuck doing my good deed for another hour before he can get a return bus. I promise myself I’ll stick to the plan and leave the Boy Scouting to the next twirp.

At least I’m clear of Hackett and the dead woman and anybody at East Wind that might realize I’m gone. I lean my head on the seat and doze.

The buzzer sounds, jarring me out of a dream about pancakes. I’m five and it’s my last Christmas with my family. Even then I knew nobody was happy, but I didn’t know why. I still don’t. The bus brakes in front of an old brick building that looks like an apartment complex that got left behind. Weeds grow in cracks in the parking lot, and dirty white paint curls in strips from the wood trim around windows and doors. There are posts but the sign no longer hangs between them.

I’m waiting to see who’s getting off here, when Al’s fingers clamp on my arm and he leads me into the aisle. I’m saying, “This can’t be right! Driver, we’re going to the Morningbird Hotel.”

“This is it, son.” The bus driver revs the engine, a signal to hurry up. Nobody else moves or answers, and Al forces me down the bus steps.

The bus pulls away while I’m trying to make sense of this. “We should have stayed on. It must be miles into town.”

“I know what I’m doing.” Al jerks me along the walkway and up a few steps into the building. “Just stay calm. I’m not going to hurt you.”

Calm? The peanut butter sandwich churns halfway up before it settles into an uneasy knot in my stomach. The lobby is worse than the outside. Dirt and trash everywhere, a dark and ugly place for a dark and ugly deed. I twist my arm to free it, but his grip bruises the flesh all the way to the bone. “You are hurting me.”

He pulls a cell phone from his pocket and speed dials somebody. Now I’m thinking, Damn, old Collie sicked the Feds on me before I can even have breakfast in that diner. I wonder how I could have been so stupid. Steve warned me against making any friends or being noticed by anybody who could give my description to a cop or reporter. I should have run from Al as soon as he came out of that alley. And I know I have to get away from him or go back and be laughed at for the rest of my life, at least the part of it I’ll have to spend at East Wind.

He lets go of my arm, certain that I can’t get help in this godforsaken place. I try to remember if the bus made any major turns between Hackett and here. It must be halfway to noon now. I figure here is closer to Fairview so I’ll have to keep going in the same direction and hope I don’t get lost. Then I start paying attention to what he’s saying.

He paces, the phone to his left ear. “I told you I’d get him and I did. Where the hell are you? I can’t hang around all day. Half an hour, buddy, if you want him. You’d better have the money.”

Half an hour. I can jog that long without being winded. Thankful that it’s not Al I need to worry about, I dash for the door he’s left open. He’s quick and his tackle knocks me to the floor. He’s picking me up by the backpack and I’m yelling, “Stop bruising the merchandise!”

The dark glasses sit crooked on his face, one earpiece bent. His free hand flips them off. He grins at me. “Good to know you have a sense of humor, kid. What’s your name?”

“Al,” I answer. His eyes are wide open, a fanatic pale blue. He laughs. Then he drags me up some stairs and puts me in the bedroom of a 2-room suite. Locks the door between us. The click activates the urge to throw up again but I concentrate on his muffled conversation, he’s losing patience.

“Yeah he’s just your type. You’d better hurry. My time will cost you extra.”

There used to be a slide latch on this side, the screw holes and different paint outline are all that’s left. I look around for possibilities. One window, old fashioned and breakable, but aside from a dresser that was old when O’Leary was a kid, there’s nothing to break it with other than my backpack. I cross to it. Part of an old wooden fire escape clings to the building. There’s a small weedy field with a line of trees beyond. Safe under that dense cover in less than five minutes. If I can get the window open.

Painted a few times, so tugging is useless. It’s gone quiet in the other room and my heart thuds and skips, my nerves shot. Sweat stings my eyes as I run the blade of my pocket knife around the edges, breaking loose the sickly yellow gunk. At last I push the frame up enough to crawl through, thankful there’s no wire screen to deal with, and praying it doesn’t fall on me and break a rib or worse. The fire escape landing outside has rotted away. Jumping to the ground is risky and might send me to the hospital with a broken foot.

I toss down the bulky backpack. It thumps and bounces out of sight. Thankful the builders of the Morningbird Hotel didn’t add a third story, I take off my leather belt with the steer head buckle that I won in the spring essay contest. Straddle the window ledge. Lean out and loop the belt on the lowest bit of railing I can reach. At least this way my hands won’t get infected from the splintery timbers.

In the room behind me I hear the door open. “Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Running footsteps.

I lean out and take hold of the belt and am one leg over the window ledge when Al grabs my ankle.

“Get back in here! You trying to kill yourself?”

He’s got me by my jeans leg. Hanging mostly upside down, I don’t dare let go of the belt because then he’ll pull me back inside. We struggle for a while and then rest. Time ticks away like the sweat dripping from my hair into my eyes. “Stand off,” I taunt. “Let me go and I won’t report you.”

He laughs again and gives a jerk that nearly tears me in two. I twist the other leg up over the ledge and kick at his hands, unable to reach his face. The sneaker on my captured foot feels like it’s going to slip over my heel. My jeans feel like they’re slipping too. Bracing my free foot against the building gives me leverage to slide Al forward under the window sash. Wishing the thing would fall on him doesn’t work.

Then the cell phone rings in his shirt pocket, startling him just enough that his grip fails and I break loose. Leaving my belt behind, I drop through the broken landing and sooner than I’m ready my feet hit the ground below. I snatch up my backpack and try to think which way to flee. He’ll see me in the field, or on the road, but going back inside I’d be trapped. Especially if the man coming to claim me arrives before I’m clear of this place.

Al has left the window. He has to be coming down the stairs, and the direct route to me is down a main hallway and out the door opening on the pool area. I take a chance and try the door right beside me under the fire escape. It leads down a short dark hallway to what was once a kitchen. The kitchen is next to a dining area, and the dining area ought to be near the lobby. I give Al time to clear the main hallway to the back, then I duck through the lobby, out the front door, and into thick woods across the road.

I fight through underbrush, through little trees close together, then bigger trees with high canopies, then little ones again. Pausing in the underbrush on the far side of the woods, my throat and lungs burn and my knees wobble. My sneaker has worked its way back into place, and I still have my pack. I sit down on it to catch my breath. The candy inside has probably melted all over my clothes. At this point, I’m not hungry and don’t want to find out if that’s the case. There’s another field, beyond a two-lane leading somewhere. Will it take me back to the Morningbird, or will the first car I see coming toward me be Al’s client? I have to keep traveling. Which way?

Then I spot a pickup truck moving along another road at the far edge of the field. I shoulder my backpack and am on the run again.

By the time I reach the other road, the pickup truck’s almost out of sight. Nothing in the other direction, so I trot after it. Half an hour later there it sits in the gravel parking lot of a cafe with a neon “open” sign and steam or smoke coming out of a chimney. Suddenly I’m starving.

It’s been at least 15 hours since I had any real food, and after what I’ve been through, I’d fight a trucker for a piece of fried chicken or anything Italian. Or a breakfast with three eggs, bacon, and lots of coffee even though I don’t usually get to drink it at East Wind.

Typical roadside cafe, with stools at a counter and a few square tables scattered between it and the windows. One middle-aged lady cook scraping down the grill, her single customer smoking on the last stool near the door. I plant myself at the other end and look at the poorly-typed menu. Little bits of paper with new prices are stuck over the old. I study the inked-in numbers, aware that the $185 that Jerry gave me for a stake is a limited resource. “You can get a weekly special at this Dentonville motel for $125,” he’d said, giving me a print-out from the Internet, “and do odd jobs until you parlay the rest into a couple hundred.”

I was only now beginning to see the fallacy in the plan. If I work for a week and make back $125, that would pay only for a place to sleep. Adding in meals, I’ll be left without enough to call home, let alone send cash to the two friends who’ve gotten me into this. What was I thinking?

Math has never been my strong point, but I’m fast learning about people. At East Wind there are all types, but nobody is dangerous, unless you count Jerry who does have a mean streak. He’s probably laughing his ass off right now, waiting for me to come slinking back and in his debt for whatever money I’ve spent.

“What’ll you have, son?” the cook asks.

“Coffee. And a plain burger. Burn it.” It’s the cheapest thing on the menu, and those chocolate bars, squashed and melted or not, are likely to be supper.

The clock on the wall startles me. Hands point to three-fifteen. “Is that clock right?” She glances at it and nods. I’m floored. Except for my late-night snooze on the pharmacy stoop, and a nap on the bus, I’ve been up for over thirteen hours, most of it running for my life, or at least my freedom. The coffee barely steadies my hand.
But I got away from Al, and I can do this. Jerry underestimated my ingenuity. My order arrives and I’m happily guzzling coffee when the driver of the pickup truck pays his bill and leaves with a wave to the lady behind the counter. She says, “See ya Clarence,” and then she stares into some long thoughts or memories. My eyes check the driver’s dessert dish but nothing’s left, not even crumbs.

As he passes through the door, another man comes in. This one is short and stocky, about thirty. He sits on the same stool. His dark hair is cut short behind but long on top, slicked straight back without a part. He’s wearing slacks and a black t-shirt with no logo. He looks like an actor.

I eat the plain burger slowly, making the most of each bite, remembering the picnic. Wishing myself back there, with it all to do over again. I’d probably help old Collie pick up the trash, give him a thrill. Smiling, I take the refill she offers.

She turns on a little tv hanging on the wall behind the cash register. No sound, just the video. After a minute a special news bulletin flashes and my heart starts pounding. But instead of a posse fanning out to search for a nobody runaway from the boys’ school, it’s the reporter’s stills of the sheriff’s deputy draped in a dead blonde body. He was closer to the scene of the action than we were, so her single red shoe hits me harder now than when I saw it for real. Worse, there’s a shot of her face. Her half-shut eyes seem to be looking around at the camera.

The actor makes a choking sound, loud enough that the cafe lady looks around, wide-eyed-fearful that she’ll have a dead customer on her hands because she never learned the Heimlich Maneuver. His attention is fixed on the tv and he’s motionless, not threshing around in agony, but his voice is gravelly when he says, “Turn that up.”

She does. The reporter is back in the news room. “If you know this woman, please call–” He gives the number, which appears over and over at the bottom of the screen, like a weather warning, and then regular programming resumes. Actor keeps watching with a dazed look on his face, replaying what he’s seen, unable to believe it. I almost tell him, “I was there,” but a new caution keeps my mouth closed. He knows her, I’d bet half my stake on it. I wait for him to go to the pay phone outside, but he finally breaks his trance and pushes food around on his plate. He has a refill.

When the cafe lady raises the nearly empty pot toward me, I shake my head. Too much coffee will make me need to pee an hour from now, when I’m on the way to Dentonville. It’s a farm road, like the rest that Jerry said would be safer to travel than an interstate. Finishing my meal, I’m more relaxed than I’ve been since Jerry routed me out of bed, with a theatrical whisper, “It’s time, Mouse.”

She puts the bill face down beside my plate. Telling Steve the money was “pinned to me skivvies” was a joke. I feel in my jeans pocket for the folded greenbacks. A chill engulfs me. I hear Jerry warn, “Don’t lose it!” and I hear my defensive answer, “I won’t lose it!” I feel in the other pocket, then open the backpack to check the jacket, even though I’m sure I never moved it. But it isn’t there, or in the jacket, or loose in the pack.

It’s on that broken landing. Jiggled out of my pocket when Al was dangling me upside down. If it had fallen through the broken landing, I’d've seen it on the ground below. Al wouldn’t have noticed it beneath the window, he was set on getting downstairs and heading me off.

I swallow against a dry throat. Take a drink of the lemon-flavored water. The Morningbird is miles behind me. The bill for lunch stares up at me. If I had the energy to flee, I would.

Stalling, I pretend drink the water. Try to think but my brain has turned to cotton candy, all fluff and too much sugar. Bad enough to run out on a poor woman who probably sunk her money into this place and is barely scraping by. Worse to realize that my cushion of comfort is lying in the ruins of a place I’d rather never see again. And worst of all, if I don’t get that money back I can’t even return to East Wind with my tail between my legs.

The harder I try not to cry, the harder it is to control my breathing, never mind the tears leaking out of my eyes. Not daring to blow my runny nose and draw attention, I wipe it on a sandpaper napkin. Then the devious part of my brain kicks in. I dig a pen from my pack and write “I will be back!” on the bill. Then I add, “With money.”

Hoping that will be the case, I drop off the stool and head for the rest room. In a rinkydink place like this, there ought to be a window that opens, one I can climb through.

There is, and I do. It’s high, but there’s a metal trash can that I can stand on, and I don’t need to use my knife to loosen old paint because there’s only one layer. Hanging onto window ledges is getting to be a habit, but this one is ground level and I take off like a jet through the weedy lot between here and the woods. Retracing my flight pattern isn’t hard. The broken brush and trail of footsteps in soft ground lead me to the Morningbird in little more than half the time it took to follow the pickup truck to the cafe.

Lurking in the fringe of underbrush, I feel like a juvenile detective from one of the series books in our library, casing the joint. No cars parked out front, nothing moving except the tree branches bending in a rising wind. Long minutes pass. Dark clouds move overhead. Finally I figure Al and his man have either left or killed each other, but what are the odds of my finding another dead body in the same week?

Dumping the pack so I can run fast, I dart across the two-lane and hunker behind an overgrown bush. Through its swaying branches I can see the parking lot, which is empty. There’s no other cover to shield my movements. I take a few deep breaths, shake my arms and legs to limber them for the effort, and race to the back of the building.

That was dumb. The fire escape landing is too high to reach, too flimsy to climb. My belt still hangs where I left it a few hours earlier. Hoping I was wrong about where the folded bills might have fallen, I search beneath the structure. Not here. I enter the dark hallway that leads to the kitchen. Eerily quiet. No angry voices, no groaning, no footsteps. I creep along, tense as a prey animal, half expecting Al to leap out and gnash me with vampire teeth. But I reach the stairs and ease myself upward from tread to tread, holding my breath after each creak and squeak. Along the dim hallway I find the door to the room Al locked me in, and on shaky knees tiptoe to the open window.

I look out, ready to scoop up my money and run.

It isn’t there, either.

Now what?

I step through the window and search the cracks in the boards that remain attached to the framework. Once, forgetting the hole behind me, I nearly fall through but catch the belt and save myself from a nasty injury. More careful, I unbuckle the belt and while I’m feeling it through the belt loops I wonder if I can sell or pawn it.

I wonder if Al did see the money and came back after it. I wonder how much his customer had been willing to pay him for a toy boy. I thank Jerry for adding that term to my education. I wonder if he knew it because something like this had happened to him before he was put in East Wind. Would I be better off if the cafe lady were my mother and I lived with her, just us two against the world, and went to a public school and watched tv whenever I wanted, and checked out public library books? And had friends that didn’t think it was funny to make a fool of me.

After one last look around, with no better results, I’m halfway downstairs when the storm hits. Safer inside than out, I find a second-floor room that still has a bed and mattress, and with lightning playing through the windows, I’m asleep in moments.

I wake to pitch dark. The rain and wind have stopped. At first I think I’ve dreamed everything, but that doesn’t wash because if I was in my bed, there’d be light under the door and Steve snoring in the opposite corner of our room. His honks and snorks didn’t wake me, so what did? I’m frozen by an unnamed fear. Listening for whatever went bump in the night, or cars passing in the road, I hear a distant wailing that starts in the yard and comes toward the Morningbird.

Downstairs a door slams and I shoot upright, my heart thumping so hard it hurts. Running footsteps vanish in the lobby, yet the wailing echoes up the stairwell. My first thought is to scoot under the bed, but since there’s a metal fire escape on this end of the motel, out the window I go. Clouds still cover the moon. Or maybe it’s already set, I’ve lost all sense of time.

In the back parking lot, there’s the bulk of a car that wasn’t here before. I can’t make out what kind it is, but the shape screams old. My sleeping mind must have heard it arrive and kicked me into consciousness. Through the open window that terrible wailing continues, from deep in the darkness of the motel. I don’t believe in ghosts, especially the kind that drive a car, but the sound cuts through me and I streak over the weedy yard and across the deserted road. Running ahead of the track team toward the finish line, the cheap trophy cup almost in my hand.

Not knowing where else to go, I head back through the rain-drenched woods toward the cafe. Staying at the Morningbird one more moment would be the stupidest thing I’ve done so far.

She’s closed the rest room window, and there’s no metal trash can outside to boost me up. There is a small utility building, with a lock on the door. Walking around the cafe, I peer through the glass and see the lighted clock. Two a.m. again. I’ve come full circle, with nothing to show for it except aches and bruises and an empty stomach. Tossing the pack down in the shelter of the doorway, I start to sit on it but before I do that I take out one of the squashed candy bars. It’s filled with coconut, my favorite. Leaves me thirsty. A bright beacon of a drink machine beckons, but lacking even coins for that, I settle down to wait for the nice lady to come open her cafe.

* * *

“Good Lord, you again!”

Struggling to a sitting position, I blink into a misty dawn. The tired, stern person standing before me causes a surge of guilt. “Yes, Ma’am. I’m sorry, I meant to pay you, but I lost my money.”

“Well you don’t look like a drinker or gambler. Were you robbed?”

She unlocks the door and I follow her inside. “In a manner of speaking,” I answer. She goes behind the counter and lights her stove burners. Puts on an apron. Washes her hands at a sink. Takes stuff out of a freezer and finds room for it in a cooler. It’s pretty certain she’s going to offer me breakfast instead of calling the police. I perch on the stool I occupied yesterday and wait to see what develops.

“Wasn’t it awful about that woman over in Hackett,” she remarks, getting the coffee started. She mixes up what I hope is pancake batter.

“Awful,” I agree. “I’d hate to fall in a well.”

“Oh, that poor soul never fell in. She was murdered. I don’t doubt, some man took out his rage on her. No rich-looking person like her would be walking in the weeds in hundred-dollar shoes.”

I remember now that the sheriff lifted an old cover from the well. Somebody had been careful to replace it. I wonder who tipped the cops off so they knew where she was, or if looking in old wells is just a part of searching for a missing person. I wonder why the Feds were called in so soon.

“Young to be out all by yourself,” the cafe owner says. “Never seen you around before.”

“I’m on my way to Dentonville. Hiking,” I add. “For my Scout badge.” That explanation comes out so easily I’m amazed, but figure it’s as good as anything to reinforce my image.

“You got a long way to go. Fifty miles at least.”

“Does a bus stop here?” She gives me a short stack and a bar of real butter. I reach for the plastic jar of honey. I need to get far away, where the news of Hackett can’t reach me. Or the police, who must be on my trail by now.

“Used to. The Interstate killed everything on this road and the next over. Just locals now. You might hitch a ride with Clarence as far as Parker City.”

Parker City wasn’t one of Steve’s red circles. I’d remember if it was. I take out the map, wipe off a smear of chocolate, and am shocked to see that I must have slept longer than I realized during the bus ride with Al. I’ve landed 5o miles beyond Dentonville.

But this is only the second day, and I’m getting the hang of taking care of myself. She keeps my coffee cup brimming and hot. The meal revives me, clears my thinking. “I’ll be happy to wash everything in here for a bit of cash.”

“How much?” Her voice takes on a suspicious edge.

“To pay for the food, and maybe a burger to go.” Asking for more seems cruel, considering her circumstances. Besides, hitching with Clarence will save me bus fare.

Two hours later, everything is sparkling clean when a couple of regulars take seats at a table and order the breakfast specials. Clarence hasn’t shown up. She calls his house but he doesn’t answer. “He might have gone to Fletcher,” she says. “With a load of produce.”

She clicks on the tv again and the news isn’t good. People are still being asked to call this number if they know the woman found dead near Hackett. The second clip is worse still, but it doesn’t involve me, so I turn in my mop and pail, and the lady gives me ten dollars.

“Don’t spend it all in one place,” she jokes, with a sad smile. When she hands me a bag containing a can drink and a burger all the way, I try to pay for yesterday’s lunch, but she refuses. “I had a kid like you once.”

My throat closes on the question. It’s none of my business what happened to him, or why. I leave the cafe behind, heading toward Dentonville. Other thoughts fly around in my head like bats. “Don’t get in the car with anybody you can’t beat up,” Steve had warned me. Good advice. Next time, I won’t be so trusting.

Four hours and approximately fifteen miles later, I come to a burg with a few houses, main street, and a large park. My feet are tired, it’s hot, and I’m ready for my lunch. Finding a shaded picnic table, I unpack and am chowing down when a sleek SUV pulls in and two passengers cross the grass toward me . The driver is dressed like a wannabe rock star in tattered jeans and sandals, and the girl riding shotgun could be an aspiring singer dressed in a flowing white dress. He looks to be in his twenty’s, she’s maybe sixteen.

“Hey, dude, I’m Hoodoo.” He holds out a hand for me to shake it and I notice that his clothes aren’t just recently dirty like mine, but old dirty like he hasn’t changed them in days. The girl is clean and she’s lazily brushing her long, shiny hair. “I’m Francine,” she says, “but you can call me Franny.” They sit down on the bench opposite me. She kicks off white leather sandals, puts her feet against Hoodoo’s thigh, nudges him playfully.

It’s only then that I see a third person emerging from the SUV. He slams the door like he’s pissed and walks to us carrying a medium-sized cooler. He’s better looking than Hoodoo, his age somewhere between the other two, who giggle and flirt as if nobody else is around. His shirt came from an upscale store, so did the running shoes. His short curly hair is the same brown shade as Franny’s. She says, “This old man is Ernie. He’s blood kin, can you tell?”

“You do look alike,” I say cautiously.

“Haul it out and let’s get this over,” Hoodoo tells her. “I’ve never seen people that eat as often as you do.”

“Only winos get by on as little as you eat,” Ernie shoots back at him.

Hoodoo flips Ernie the bird, and I watch her unpack the cooler. The ice has mostly melted and water drips from the plastic containers as she puts them on the table. Hoodoo opens one and sniffs the contents. Dumps it on the ground. Opens two more. Same fate. He grabs his head in both hands and shouts, “You trying to kill us?”

Francine picks up the containers and throws them into the nearest big rusty trash can.

“Hey!” Hoodoo rescues a can of beer from the bottom of the cooler. He pops the top and takes a long swig.

Ernie’s been sitting beside me, watching the show. “We have anything to drink besides beer?”

“A quart of grape juice. Under my seat in the SooV.”

Ernie goes back toward the SUV. “Bring those Styrofoam cups,” his sister calls after him. “I want some, too.” She washes her hands in the water fountain, dries them on her dress. Turns to me. “We’re a new gen,” she says. “Hipsies. You know what that means? Hippy gypsies. I made that up.”

“I made that up,” Hoodoo corrects her. He paces in a tight little circle, downing the beer like it’s a contest he intends to win. Turns to me. “You hoofin’ it?”

“What?” I’m watching Ernie examine the cups he’s brought back.

“You know–running away. On foot. Hoofin’ it.”

I know better than to trust a guy called Hoodoo with the truth, but this time the hiking Boy Scout lie gets stuck in my throat and I’m left with my mouth hanging open. One thing I’ve decided, though, is to ride as far as I can with them. So long as it’s toward Dentonville.

TO BE CONTINUED!

I try for a balance between eager and pathetic. “I’m meeting friends in Dentonville. Any chance you’re headed there?”

Hoodoo laughs. “I’m headed to Hollywood. Going to be in a movie.”

“Yeah,” Ernie says, “a horror movie.”

Franny grabs Hoodoo’s arm before he can land a blow. “Come on, babe, help me look for money.” Hoodoo slaps his thigh and does a little rain dance. “Now that’s a hoot!” They walk off down a path hugged up so tight they can hardly walk.

“Want some juice? One hundred per cent all natural.” Ernie offers the quart container. The glass is warm from being under the seat. “Watch those cups. Hoodoo likes to chew his.”

I examine the Styrofoam cups he brought from the SUV. “They’re all chewed.” I pick the one that has a clean side and Ernie fills it. The juice reminds me how hungry I still am, but if I break out those candy bars Hoodoo would probably take them away from me.

“You ought to go home.” Ernie stares after his sister. She and Hoodoo have turned a corner and we can’t see them for the bushes.

“Can’t.” I drink from the cup.

“Why not?’

“A matter of honor.”

He turns his head, smiling a little. “Really?”

“Are you guys going toward Dentonville?”

“With Hoodoo, you never know. Why, you got a deadline?”

“Actually, I have.”

He smiles at me again, like he’s thinking something pleasant for a change. I decide I like Ernie, but to be on the safe side, I add, “Those friends are expecting me.”

Franny and Hoodoo come back, hand in hand. He says, “Take a walk, you two.”

Ernie stands up from the picnic table seat. “Fran, don’t you think–”

Hoodoo thumbs us away and walks to the SUV. Franny says to us, “Go on. There’s a duck pond just around that curve. With ducks.” She follows him into the back and shuts the door. I notice there are curtains over every window, and they plaster a sun guard over the windshield.

Ernie’s pleasant mood has passed but he’s more sad than mad. “Come on, kid, let’s walk off some calories.”

“Call me Vinnie,” I tell him. I may be a kid but I don’t like being reminded of it. “Grape juice has calories?”

We follow the path to the curve before he stops and looks back at the SUV. He picks up a golf-ball-sized rock and flings it in a high arc. Of course it falls short, but the effort seems to make him feel better.

“You guys don’t get along very well, do you.”

“The day we start getting along, I’ll kill myself.”

We round the curve and can’t see the SUV or the picnic table. I realize I left my backpack there and my heart thumps a time or two before settling back into its pace.

“Guess we’ve gone far enough,” Ernie says.

“I don’t see any pond. Or ducks.”

He ruffles my hair the way he would do a little brother. “Don’t believe everything Fran says.”

We keep walking, though, round another curve and there’s the pond. Three brown ducks paddle about, scooping up something, probably insects or floating weeds.
I make a mental note to read up on ducks the first chance I get.

“Well, maybe half of what she says,” Ernie tells me with a wry grin.

We sit on the grass and watch the ducks. I worry again about the backpack. Then I laugh because there’s nothing in it but a change of clothes and a few battered chocolate bars. I wonder again what happened to Jerry’s money.

Ernie gives me that sideways look again. “Vinnie, are you a happy person?”

I ponder that. “I was.”

“What happened?”

Again I counter his question with one of my own. “Who is Hoodoo?”

Ernie stares out across the pond to the fringe of houses beyond. “He’s the bastard Fran thinks she’s in love with.”

The words didn’t tell me anything I hadn’t guessed, but the way he said it opened up all kinds of lines of inquiry. “You’re on a mission, too.”

“A matter of honor,” he says, and stands up. “We can go back now.”

The picnic table and SUV come into view. Hoodoo’s sitting on it and Fran’s stuffing more things into the trash can. I pick up my backpack, and remember that there is something valuable inside other than my jacket. At the last minute before leaving East Wind, I had packed my camera. An old-fashioned one, uses a cartridge, but it takes good pictures.

Hoodoo gets into the driver’s seat, Fran beside him. Ernie’s in the back, holding the door open. “You with us or not?”

I am.

Dentonville, here I come. What I’ll do when I get there, I haven’t a clue. Beg, I suppose. Beg for a job, beg for a room, beg for food. Pawn my camera? One thing I can’t do is use my real name or break down and cry and sob out the whole sordid story.

Trying to sort out a better lie than the one about being a hiking Boy Scout, I take the camera from the pack and hold it in my lap. I think about the worn photo in my cashless wallet. It’s my mother, taken before I was born. I don’t know anything about her family, or my dad or his family. Even my memories are featureless now, like the picture. I wonder if I was happy once, with them. Funny. I was happy at East Wind.

While my attention wandered, I missed seeing what road Hoodoo took in leaving the park, and watch unsuccessfully for any road sign that might tell me how far we are from where I’m going, or even where we are. Fields and woods take turns bordering the two-lane, with farm houses scattered along the route, most set in a grove of old trees, with dirt roads leading to them. “Wake me up when we get to Dentonville,” I tell Ernie, but he’s in his own little world.

Fran says something that almost pulls me out of my stupor, and I hear Hoodoo’s answer. “I’m waiting for rich boy to say he’ll treat us.”

Ernie’s voice carries a warning note. “I’m keeping track of all this freeloading.” And Hoodoo fires back, “Nobody asked you along, crudball.”

***

Don’t know how long I’ve been asleep, but I’m thrown against Fran’s seat as the SUV makes a sharp swerve and a sudden stop. Next time I’ll use the seat belt. Shadows are long but the sky is still light. Well, it would be, in June. Summer’s here. Steve and Jerry must be trying to out-do each other swimming laps in the pool at East Wind. My stomach thinks it’s close to suppertime.

Fran’s peevish voice finishes dragging me to full consciousness. “I didn’t mean for you to give us all whiplash.”

“You wanted to stop. I stopped. Quit bitching.”

Hoodoo’s at the end of some rope. That makes me uneasy. Ernie rouses up as if he’s been sleeping too. “What are we supposed to eat in a place like this?”

‘Like this’ turns out to be a gravel space in front of a long-abandoned service station. Three decades ago, at least. At a crossroads with no signs, and not a thing visible in any direction except fields bordered by woods, or woods close to the road.

Fran opens her door. “I didn’t want to eat, I want to pee.”

I do, too, but not here. The building is falling apart, unstable enough to collapse on unwary visitors. Watching Fran pick her way to the back, I ask, “What time is it?” Ernie doesn’t have to look at his watch to tell me, “After seven o’clock.”

Seven o’clock! We’ve been driving over five hours. Hoodoo distracts me from a confused panic with a weird comment: “I hate Daylight Savings Time.”

Ernie says in a tired voice, “You hate everything.”

“Mostly you.” Hoodoo opens his door, lights a cigarette, waits for Fran to come back.

“That sentiment is mutual, pal.”

Opening my door, I think about taking a picture of the place. Ernie continues in the same vein. “Close my eyes for one minute and you screw things up.”

“Fran is the navigator, I’m the driver. Can I help it if she reads the damn map upside down?”

Fran’s back, and leans into his chest, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Well, according to your map, we were going upside down.”

Hoodoo shrugs her off and snaps, “See? What kind of a fool statement is that?” He pushes past her and stomps off toward the back of the building. Fran sits in the driver’s seat, not looking at either of us. Ernie begins, “Fran, please–” but she snaps, “Don’t start.”

She walks away, makes aimless circles around the parking lot. Looking for money, maybe. After a minute Ernie climbs out past me and goes toward her. I climb out too, to stretch my legs and maybe take a pee after all. My camera’s hanging by its strap around my neck, and I figure I’ll try to get their picture. Make sure all this banging around and being dropped hasn’t broken the working parts of it.

Looking through the viewfinder, I step from side to side, then forward, searching for a shot that won’t pick up sun glare or plant a tree in the top of their heads. I’m maybe eight feet away when Hoodoo enters the picture. I watch him give Ernie a flat-handed push away from Fran. I see Fran grab Hoodoo’s arm.

Ernie’s hand shoots out, returning the chest-push. Hoodoo’s off balance for a moment. Fran grabs at Ernie’s arm. My finger jerks, tensing, and the shutter clicks–

–just as Hoodoo’s fist crashes into Ernie’s jaw. He can’t dodge because Fran’s holding him, but the force of the blow sends him backwards out of her grasp. He sprawls on the ground.

I drop the camera from my eye. Hoodoo grabs Fran’s wrist and runs to the SUV, dragging her with him. She stumbles, and Hoodoo picks her up and tosses her onto her seat and slams the door. Runs around to his open door and leaps in. Fires up the engine, and backs a swift half-circle around Ernie, still spread-eagled on his back. A lurch into forward gear and the SUV tears away, throwing gravel that hits my legs like little hailstones. I note which of the crossroads they take, then run to Ernie.

“Are you hurt?”

He’s moving around, groggy but able to sit up. Touches the back of his head. Winces. “Ow! Am I bleeding?” Looks at his fingers. “I am!”

I peer at his head where he’s holding a part in the hair. “Yeah, a little bit.”

He stands up, shaky. “Gravel took a chunk out.” Touches his jaw. “Nearly broke my jaw, too. Bastard.”

Now that I know he’s mobile, I look around us with fresh eyes and my heart nearly stops. “Where are we?”

Ernie looks around, too. “Damned if I know.”

“Weren’t you awake?”

“No,” he tells me, irritated. “I’ve been going on no sleep for three days.” He feels his head and wipes his fingers on his jeans.

“That’s how long you’ve been traveling with them?”

“Ever since Hoodoo brainwashed my brainless sister into taking Dad’s SUV on a ‘vacation.’”

“Must be the moon,” I mutter. In spite of the coming night, I feel safe with Ernie. I wonder whether Hoodoo was lost most of the time we’d been driving, which would mean we weren’t as far from civilization as we would be if he just drove non-stop for almost six hours. “Where were you guys really headed?”

“To hell, apparently.” Ernie heaves a long sigh, assessing each of our choices of route out. There are no signs to tell us where we’ve been or where we might end up. Even the service station sign is so weathered we can’t read the once-red letters.

“When it gets dark,” I suggest, “we can see house lights a long way off. Or a car will pass and pick us up.”

He turns to me, his lean face lit by spears of sun cutting through tree branches. “You little optimist.” His smile is fleeting. “Did you see which way they went?”

“Yeah.” I start out walking, Ernie beside me. It’s then that I realize I don’t need to pee any more. I hope he doesn’t notice the wet crotch or the smell.

He’s occupied with feeling in his pockets. “Damn!

“What?”

“One of them stole my credit card.”

“You have a bank account?”

“I did have.”

We have nothing but the clothes we’re in and my camera slung around my neck. Hoodoo–or Fran, more likely–will discover my chocolate bars and eat them. The thought of melting chocolate on my tongue makes me thirsty. I long for the machine in our dorm at East Wind, which dispenses pint bottles of real spring water. I consider going back to the service station before we get too far away, since maybe there’s a working faucet there. Then the memory of decay and desolation and the prospect of snakes and a clogged toilet spurs me after Ernie.

He’s in better shape than I would have expected, matching me step for step for maybe 5 miles before we see a farmhouse in the distance.

“We can work for our supper,” I say, starting to jog.

“What do you know about farming?” He jogs alongside me.

“More than I want to.” Tending the gardens at East Wind is one of the better chores, after clerical stuff like checking out library books and issuing hall passes.

“More than I do, then.”

At the house there’s newspapers spilling out of the rural mail box. No lights. No car. Only a garage, where we’ll be spending the night. A night without food, and after a brief inspection inside, one without even a dog bed or old mattress waiting for trash pick up.

“Well, at least I won’t have to listen to Hoodoo’s mouth.” Ernie finds a dusty tarp and shakes out any spiders or other crawlies. He spreads it on the dirt floor. “And this is softer than concrete.”

“Grass would be softer.”

“Inside is safer.”

I make a trip to the outside spigot and get a long drink of metalic-tasting water. “If it kills me,” I quip, “At least I’ll be out of my misery.”

“We’ll be okay,” Ernie says just before the twilight turns to night.

“Sure we will,” I answer, glad that dirt is softer than concrete. But not by much.

Sometime later, voices wake me. I can tell by Ernie’s tense arm against mine that he’s awake too. His fingers close on my wrist to keep me quiet. We listen. Two men are just outside, and I hear one of them say,

“What went wrong?”

The other asks, “Don’t you know? They’re after you.”

TO BE CONTINUED!

My fingers tense into a fist, and Ernie’s grip on my arm tightens. ‘They’re after you,’ hits close to home, reminds me I need to check my back trail more often. The voices in the dark outside the doorway continue and I listen.

First man. “I thought he’d miss a bundle like this.”

Second man. “Not him. The police. They think you did it.”

A silence. I can feel the stunning blow those words gave somebody, and I wonder who he is. Somehow his voice sounds familiar and I listen harder. But the second voice keeps talking.

“I already took my share. It’s the last you’ll see of me. You best clear out too.”

Wow, a bank robbery. A thrill of excitement and fear makes me shiver.

“How do you know? You didn’t happen to leave anything for them to find, did you?”

That has a threatening edge, but the voice is still familiar. I punch my brain in an effort to remember who I’ve heard in the last few days besides Ernie’s hipsie friends. A live person, not on tv. Not Al. Not the cafe lady. Not the bus driver. Who else?

Second man. “I never leave evidence. If I meant to hang you, would I be warning you?”

“Sorry. I’m just on edge. Helluva way to learn a thing like that.”

“You know they always suspect the husband, John.”

John goes on like he’s telling himself the story. “Jordan must have thought she took the money. He lost his temper and she ended up dead.” His anger spills over into the words. “He’s the bastard who ought to pay. And he will.”

Finally it hits me. In the cafe. Yesterday morning. The Actor. “Turn that up,” he’d said, glued to the tv report on the mystery woman pulled from the well in Hackett. I remember thinking he knew who she was and would call the number on the screen. I must have heard him order breakfast earlier, but paid no attention, my mind being on how to get to Dentonville. My only goal, until I discovered I’d lost my traveling money. Now I have no goal except to stay away from East Wind as long as I can.

The other man says, “You need a good alibi. What will you p–” The pop of a fist hitting flesh, just like when Hoodoo hit Ernie, and a scuffle on the ground outside. “Stop John I didn’t mean–” Another blow. John says, “Keep your damn mouth shut.”

Footsteps walk down the gravel drive. In a minute, a second set follows. A car engine sounds. Then another. Lights flash around as the cars depart, in different directions.

Ernie lets out a long breath, like he’s been holding it. “Inside was safer.” He lights up his watch dial. “Four o’clock.”

“I don’t think I can sleep any more,” I tell him. “Maybe we should walk while it’s cool.” Hunger drives me. I remember the ten dollars the cafe lady gave me and can hardly wait to find a diner or cafe or town.

By dawn we’ve come to the end of the farm road and to a small bit of civilization pretty much like the one we left behind. A neon sign promises breakfast 24 hours and cheap prices. Ernie’s eyes rove over a few cars parked under the streetlights. “Guess they’re long gone.”

“Franny and Hoodoo, or the bank robbers?”

“Those guys didn’t rob a bank. Unless Jordan robbed it first.”

We go inside, sit on stools at the counter. I have a moment of deja-vu before the waitress comes over. But there’s no Actor/John. The only other customers are some blue-collar types, and one single mother with two little kids.

Ernie looks at the menu like he’s never seen one before. He finally orders the ham and cheese omelette and hot tea. I’m surprised they have tea, and that he wants it. I leave off the bacon and coffee. Two fried eggs and a large orange juice, with a side of home fries. She brings enough for an army, so I’m looking at lunch too.

“Omigod,” Ernie says, half standing up.

“What?!” I look everywhere, not knowing who he sees or what to expect.

“We can’t pay for this.”

“Relax. I can.”

He gazes at me like I’ve grown another head.

“And have maybe a couple bucks left over.” I give him a smile, then gulp half the orange juice. He sits down slowly, doubtful, and eats everything on his plate without another comment.

While he’s thinking, so am I. Do I dare risk taking a ‘bird bath’ in the rest room, or should I just wash out my clothes? They’ll dry on me soon enough under the June sun. Losing my toothbrush, toothpaste, and comb in the backpack Hoodoo drove away with means we have to hit a drug store next.

“Let’s see if we can work off the breakfast,” I suggest. “That way, we can spend my money on other stuff.” I need sunglasses and a hat, too, but a couple bucks won’t stretch to cover those luxuries. At least I don’t need the jacket. I’m already sweating.

Ernie looks at me. “How much do you have?”

“Ten dollars.”

He smiles like an indulgent uncle. I can see why Franny called him an ‘old man.’

“What’s funny?”

“You,” he says. Drains his tea. Then, “Work,” he muses softly, like it’s an unusual idea.

The waitress gives us the same look before she says, “Sure. The guy who sweeps is out sick with pink eye, and the window washer quit last week.” She shows us where the cleaners and carpet sweeper are kept, and I hand a pail and squeegee to Ernie. He stands holding them, looking helpless. For a moment it’s like I’m seeing Al, blindly calling his dog, but the flash of fear and resentment comes and goes like summer lightning. “If you want to run the sweeper, I’ll tackle the windows.”

Ernie trades the tools and we work for almost an hour. The breakfast crowd has left and the lunch crowd hasn’t started yet. If you could call the morning customers a crowd. I’m swiping down the last plate glass corner when something outside catches my eye. “Omigod.” I sound like Ernie, only this time the stab of surprise has hit me.

He’s on the other side of the room, trying to pick up biscuit crumbs with a sweeper chock full of trash. I run to him and point to a stocky broad-shouldered man on the pavement. Reading the menu. Bound to come in. “It’s him!”

“Who?”

“John!”

He leans away, makes a skeptical face like he thinks I’m playing a joke on him. “You never saw him. What makes you so sure?”

“I did see him. Not last night. The morning before. In a cafe. The report on the tv shook him up. I heard his voice, and it’s him. What’ll we do?”

Ernie stares through the sparkling clean glass at the man I called Actor, whose voice belongs to John. “You’re right about one thing. He is coming in.”

The door opens and the waitress looks up. From her manner, all business-like, she’s never seen him before. He sits on the end stool, just like in the other eatery, and she offers him the day’s lunch special menu. He ignores it.

“Just coffee. Got any donuts?”

She lifts a dome lid off a pastry tray and sets the tray in front of him. He points to a couple and she uses tongs to lay them on a dessert plate. Goes to get the coffee.

“All done,” Ernie tells her on the way to the back, and she nods. We stow the cleaning stuff and he hurries me through the exit into the alley. Full of food, smelly from cleaners, and without a clue what comes next.

“Shouldn’t we call the police?” It’s all I can do not to dance around like a nervous girl.

“Why? From what we heard, Jordan is the guilty guy.”

“Husbands are almost always the killer.”

“You watch too much television.” Ernie follows the alley, not to the street but to the back parking lot.

Following Ernie, I’m about to mention my disappointment at not getting to wash myself or my clothes, when a parked car knocks me for a loop.

He lets out a low, long whistle of pure appreciation. It’s parked between two large ornamental bushes, off the pavement and on the scraggly grass, like it’s hiding.

Ernie trots over to a pale pink Cadillac that’s older than both of us put together. The bottom panel is black. Chrome so shiny it’s a good thing the sun doesn’t hit it or I’d be blinded without those sunglasses. “Let’s find a drug store,” I say. It’s the first time in my life my teeth haven’t been brushed for three days straight. “And then a thrift store.” If I can’t wash my clothes, I can buy clean second hand jeans and a couple of tee-shirts.

“Take my picture,” Ernie says, leaning against the car and smiling.

“What?”

“Take my picture. Or doesn’t your camera work?”

“It works.” Sliding the camera from my hip pocket, where it kept out of the way while I washed the windows, I hope it does. Ernie’s face is so eager and happy, I snap a couple.

He tries the door. Locked of course. The interior is show room clean. I can tell he yearns to sit behind the wheel. “That waitress can’t afford this antique.”

He shakes his head. “No. It belongs to John.”

Terror rips through me. The car is hiding, all right. Just like it was in the back lot of the Morningbird Hotel the night of the storm, when I woke and fled from that ghostly, inhuman wailing. Was it a grief so deep I’d never felt anything like it, or an anger so violent that I dreaded imagining its source?

Grabbing Ernie’s arm, I pull him along. We race over the curb and across the grass to the next street. He doesn’t ask me what’s wrong. I guess he can figure that out.

Luck on my side, there’s a drug store. We go in and I load a small plastic basket with the stuff I need. He stands with his hands braced on his hipbones, staring back towards the diner, seeing that Caddy only in his dreams.

When we’re back on the sidewalk, my disguise hat and dark glasses in place, I glance about for a secondhand shop that doesn’t have all dresses displayed in the window. Two blocks over, we find one. I buy a duffel bag for fifty cents, and pack two dollars’ worth of traveling clothes inside. Ernie’s content to travel in his expensive duds even if they are starting to smell. I pick up a used deodorant for a dime and toss it to him. “Thanks,” he says.

Using my last dollar, I pick out a nice striped shirt and a pair of jeans that I think will fit him. Stuff them into my duffel bag. He’ll be glad to wear them before long.

“What next, boss?” I ask, feeling light as air and ready for anything.

“You’re not tired of all this? Don’t want to go home?”

“Do you?” Wherever his home is, it’s probably a nice brick with a big yard and maybe a white fence to keep out neighbor dogs. But he’s on a mission, and I’m curious about how he plans to carry it out. Chasing Hoodoo and Franny is okay but catching them seems as unlikely as stealing John’s car and taking a joy ride.

He sits down on a shaded bench in front of the thrift store. “You forgot the take out carton with the leftover fries.”

Yeah, I did.

“We could go back, see if she’s thrown them out.”

“I’m not going back there.”

“He’s probably finished eating and is on his way to Canada.”

“Sure he is. If that’s where Jordan went. You heard him. He’s gonna make Jordan pay. Maybe he did kill her, and wants to pin the murder on Jordan.”

“And maybe he’s just out for revenge.” Ernie shifts restlessly on the bench. His teeth are too clean for him to be a smoker, but I bet he’d like to have a pack and lighter right now, something to distract his thoughts and calm his nerves.

“Root beer does it for me,” I say.

“What?”

“Distracts my thoughts and calms my nerves.”

Ernie laughs shortly. “You’re a funny kid.”

When we walk back to the parking lot, the Caddy is gone. Tire tracks lead into the grove of trees behind the diner and out on a side street. Ernie heaves a sigh. “At least I’ll have a picture.”

Ernie uses the cafe phone to cancel the credit card. I ask the waitress about the fries. She takes a little white bag out of a cooler. Tosses in a couple of cans of cola. I almost ask for root beer instead but thank her and carry my duffel bag out to where Ernie’s sitting on another bench, watching squirrels in the trees across the street. We share the fries, washing them down with the drinks. “You haven’t asked me a single question.”

“Yes I did. I asked if you wanted some grape juice. Then I asked why you can’t go home. If you have a deadline. And if you’re happy. You said you were. Past tense. And when I asked what happened, you didn’t answer. But I can see that you are. The rest doesn’t matter.”

“Phenomenal.” I’m impressed that he remembers all this. I hadn’t realized I was being questioned, or that I’d answered. “You’re one sharp dude.”

This time he laughs so hard he loses his breath. “Then what the hell am I doing out here?”

“You’re on a mission. You want to save Francine from Hoodoo. And I’m here to help you.”

“Some missions fail, no matter who helps.”

I gather up our trash and stuff it into a bin. Feel guilty that the aluminum cans should be recycled. I wonder where we’ll spend tonight, and what we’ll do with the hours in between, besides work for food and use public rest rooms. If I hadn’t spent all my money, we could find a Laundromat and have a clean change for later. If I were at East Wind, I’d be in the library, draped in my favorite wing chair, reading the end of that bookshop mystery. In warm weather, tall windows are open to let in cool breezes that carry whiffs from the cafeteria, hinting of lunch. If….

“They’re here!”

Ernie’s excitement startles me, but not as much as his hands roughly pushing me around the corner of the building. “Who?”

He flattens himself against the bricks, one arm shielding me beside him like a mama protecting her kid, and I freak. Collins has somehow managed to trail me and the cops are coming with billy sticks and handcuffs.

Some missions fail. The humiliation of being that failure propels me down the alley. Ernie races after and catches me by the wrist. “What’re you doing? I don’t want to lose them again.”

He drags me back toward the street, where the SUV has stopped for a red light.

TO BE CONTINUED!

Ernie charges toward the SUV like he thinks he’s going to catch it. I shoulder my duffel bag and chase after him, but the light changes and the SUV moves on into the next block. I stop. Ernie doesn’t.

If the next light turns in our favor, there’s a chance he might make it to the door in time to– Do what? Jump in? Haul Franny out? I take off running again, to be there when whatever’s going to happen, happens.

Morning traffic is heavier now, but it’s a small town, few people on the sidewalks. One of the storefronts I pass proves to be a Laundromat. At the end of the block the light is still green and the SUV skims through it and away down a long hill toward an Interstate ramp.

Catching up to Ernie, I want to say ‘Give it up, pal.’ Head back to Main Street and bum enough coins to do our laundry. Brush my teeth at the sink while the machines are churning. He has other ideas. “Come on!” He’s spotted a cab stand.

A middle-aged driver sits in his cab, reading a newspaper. Looks up when Ernie snatches open the back door and we pile in. His eyes in the rearview don’t come across as friendly. “Where to?”

“See that blue SUV going up the ramp? Follow it.”

The cab motor doesn’t start on the first try, and Ernie’s impatience shows in every tense line of his body. When we’re moving, he sags in relief. We’re two cars behind the SUV on the Interstate. I wonder where they’re going. What we’ll do when they get there. How we’ll pay the driver.

Ahead, Hoodoo pulls off only a few exits later, at a rest area.

“There is a God,” Ernie says softly.

Our cabbie signals a lane change and takes us to the edge of the parking lot, where cars go one way and trucks veer off to a larger space. Ernie’s door is open before the brakes finish, and the cab driver yells, “Hold on, bub! You gotta pay.”

“Wait–”

“Pay now or I call the cops.”

Ernie rips a silvery necklace over his head. “Here!” The clasp is one of those magnet types, and he slides off a small medallion before dropping the chain on the front seat. He’s gone, but the cabbie holds up the chain with a greedy surprised look that prompts me to grab it out of his hand. “Not that.” Fumbling in haste, I eject the cartridge from my camera and toss the camera over to him. “Three exits’ worth.” I slam the cab door. His tires screech angrily half way across the trucker’s lot.

It’s an old rest area and the untrimmed bushes lining the walk make good cover. As soon as I join Ernie behind one, he says, “Watch the doors and whistle when one of them comes out.”

About 5 spaces farther on, the SUV stands head and shoulders above lesser cars. Curtains are open and I glimpse Ernie inside. Either he has a key, or one of them left it unlocked. Then I concentrate on watching the rest room doors. Some traveler puts coins in a drink machine and the can clunks into the tray. A car pulls out. Birds twitter in a tree nearby.

The men’s side is nearer me. I wish Ernie would come back but since I don’t know if he’s coming back, my palms start to sweat and spit dries up in my mouth. Then Hoodoo steps into view in the lobby area and I try to whistle. Useless.

Dodging along the row of cars, I reach the back door of the SUV just as Ernie jumps out almost on top of me. He’s carrying a gray blanket wadded into a bundle and sweat has made spikes of hair stick to his forehead. Hunkered, we hurry away from the scene of the crime and crouch down on the far side of a silver Lexus. I pop up for an instant and see Hoodoo outside the lobby, kicking at an acorn on the walkway, smoking.

“What’d you find?” I nod toward the gray bundle.

Ernie doesn’t answer. He’s looking up at a sturdy white haired lady who’s come up to the car and stands motionless like she’s about to step on two snakes.

“Harold.”

Her voice holds a quiet but stricken warning.

From the driver’s side of the Lexus, Harold answers, “What?”

“Don’t unlock the car. There might be a b–”

His key clicks, he opens the door, there’s the clack of her door unlocking and the power window rolls down. His tone is peevish. “What’s the matter with you?”

At that moment something small escapes Ernie’s wadded blanket and hits the asphalt like a pigmy bomb. The woman leaps a foot into the air and squeals. Harold’s voice demands, “What the hell’s the matter? Get in.”

Ernie’s hand shoots out and retrieves a brown pill bottle. The woman cries, “Lock the door Harold!”

She can’t get in because we’re blocking her door. She’s still standing, barely, knees trembling. It’s too pathetic to be funny, yet laughter bubbles up and when I glance at Ernie he’s holding it in, too, like when Steve got the giggles in chapel and we all ended up in D-hall for three days. Snickering like fools, Ernie and I scoot away from her car and stagger across the road into the safety of another bush and collapse.

We’re heaving deep breaths when the Lexus rolls by us and down the slope toward the Interstate. The woman’s putting on her seat belt. I can almost hear Harold cussing. I feel sorry we gave her such a fright. Then the whole thing flashes like a double-time commercial and it’s funny again. The way she couldn’t move. The way he not only unlocked the door but put the key in the ignition and unlocked hers. And rolled down her window and yelled at her like everything was her fault.

Then it isn’t funny. She will forever believe we’re druggies. Car thieves. Terrorists. And clueless Harold who didn’t see us will never believe she did. I keep snickering. Nerves I guess.

“Shhh!” Ernie draws his legs in, backing into the bush, and I do the same.

Doors slam, and the SUV zooms past toward the Interstate.

They’ve been gone at least two minutes before Ernie crawls out of the bush with the bundle and squats on the grass. His hands are shaking when he unfolds part of the blanket. A plastic grocery bag full of prescription pill bottles spills over. “No wonder he’s crazy,” I say.

“Oh, he doesn’t take them all. Just maybe half.”

“And sells the rest.”

“You got it.”

“We won’t do that, will we?”

Ernie’s glance is sharp enough to cut. “Of course not.” He wrestles with the loose ends of the blanket, picks it up. We go toward the Men’s.

“Why didn’t we take the wheels? You have a key.”

“I have a duplicate door key. Hoodoo has the ignition.”

“Oh.” Too bad. Riding in luxury for a change would be nice.

In the rest room Ernie goes into a stall and I hear bottles rattling against each other and pills dropping into the commode. Flush. More pills. Flush. He comes out, the bag looks full but half are empty containers. Goes into another stall. Repeats. When he comes out this time with the gray blanket, it’s a neat sausage shape, a cowboy’s bedroll. There’s still something inside, bulging the middle like an egg in a snake. That makes me laugh again, imagining the woman in the parking lot telling her friends about the two drug dealers who almost stole their Lexus.

Ernie’s face stops me mid-chuckle. “Let me have your belt.”

I unbuckle it and he uses it to strap the ends of the bedroll so whatever’s in there won’t fall out. “What is that?”

“Hoodoo’s gun.”

“Hoodoo had a gun?” A mixture of fear and awe tips my stomach but doesn’t turn it over. I feel lucky he didn’t at some point shoot one of us, and pride in Ernie for stealing it out of the SUV without getting caught.

“You didn’t find your credit card?”

“No. I’d have to pick Hoodoo’s pocket.”

We’re too far away now to go back to that Laundromat, but I can hear old Collie’s voice prodding me, “Cleanliness is next to Godliness.” I’ve discovered that three days of sweat is my limit, not to mention that little accident when Hoodoo decked Ernie. And to keep the dentist away from my teeth, I’m determined to clean up while the means are available.

“Watch the door,” I say, and Ernie meanders to the entrance while I strip down and fill a sink with hand soap and hot water. In go the whites. I let them soak while the next sink fills with warm rinse water.

When I’m finished, jeans teeth hair and all, and wearing the thrift store outfit, I’m stuck with wet clothes and don’t know what to do with them. The hot air hand dryer would take all day, even if it worked.

“Your turn,” I tell Ernie. He gets up from the doorway like he’s a hundred years old. I take his place beside the bedroll, and wave away a twenty-something who looks like he needs to go right now. He moves on to another Men’s farther along. Ernie says behind me, “What are these?”

I know what he means but glance around to see his expression. He’s holding up the clothes I bought for him. “Yours. Think they’ll fit?”

“Yeah,” he answers and goes off to take his bath and change. I hear him filling sinks and sloshing his dirty clothes, and when he gets to the shampoo part he actually whistles a tuneless tune.

I envy him his expensive running shoes. My sneaker soles feel as thin as a mouse pad. “Mouse,” I say softly, missing the computer in the library, even if it does have a zillion kid controls imposed by old Collie.

“Mouse?”

Ernie’s wet hair is slicked back off his face, like he’s just climbed out of the East Wind swimming pool. Even in faded jeans and tee-shirt he still has the slumming executive look that I’ve come to know. I realize he’ll never be one of us. ‘Us’ meaning the under-dog waiting-for-a-break with a mandatory sentence of three-to-five ahead of him. I don’t know where I’m going from here, but it’s sure not back there.

“Ready to roll?” I stand up. “Man, I’m hungry!”

Ernie laughs. “You sound like Fran.”

Then he holds up his dripping upscale shirt. “I hate to throw this away, but the tag says ‘Dry Clean Only’ and wringing it out will finish ruining it.”

“You wrung out the pants. Go ahead. Make them match.”

A pained frown before he laughs again. “What the hell.” He twists the shirt tail and a pint of water flows out into a floor drain. Holding it by the shoulders, he snaps it a few times, then lays it over his arm on top of the pants.

I remember his chain and take it from my pocket. “Here. This might make you feel better.”

He picks the double-linked necklace off my palm as if it’s treasure from the Atocha. “How’d you get this?”

“Trade,” I answer, watching him replace the medallion and anchor the magnets around his neck. He picks up the bulky bedroll.

“Traded what?”

I pick up my backpack. “My camera.” His mouth flies open to protest but I show him the film cartridge and we step out into the summer sunshine as happy as if we had good sense. That’s what Steve claims his grandma used to say, before she died and his parents split up and put him in custodial care. I wonder if my parents are alive or dead, remarried with new families or pushing up daisies.

Collins had made it clear he couldn’t–or wouldn’t–answer questions like that. Clear too that I was NEVER to ask anybody in the couple of foster homes I’d been in when I was little. I try hard, not for the first time, to remember a grandma or other relatives, but the blurry faces I used to think I remembered have gone the way of the voices, which I can’t hear anymore.

I check the drink machines and find enough coins to buy one can. Ernie and I spread our wet clothes on a picnic table, then sit on the shaded bench and share the drink. We watch rest stop patrons come and go. After a while, the parking spaces are empty. Birds have gone deeper into the woods in the noon heat and travelers are sitting in air-conditioned cafes chowing down on salads and burgers. “What day is it?”

“Damned if I know. Thursday?”

No school, no tv, no schedule, no plan. What day it is no longer matters. I stretch my legs out in front of me and lean back against the picnic table. Aluminum snap crackle pops as Ernie squashes the empty can. He lobs it into the wire bin ten feet away.

Then a blonde girl about Ernie’s age drives up in a screaming red sports car.

TO BE CONTINUED!

Well, not a sports car, but a sporty one, a convertible. And the top’s down. Daddy’s girl with her first wheels, the kind Jerry’s always talking about. As if he’d ever been near either one.

Ernie doesn’t show a lot of interest until she finishes checking her hair and lipstick in the rear view mirror and swings long tanned legs out of the car. Her white dress is too small, not because she’s fat but because she bought it that way, and the heeled sandals make her teeter towards us.

“Hello.” She takes off oversized sun glasses. She’s speaking to him, acts like she doesn’t see me right beside him.

“Hello,” Ernie answers, and I can’t tell anything from his tone. He does sit up, though, crossing his ankles and resting his arms on his knees.

“Is this a private party, or can anybody play?”

“It’s a public place. Pull up a chair.”

“Cute kid,” she says, still watching him.

Ernie answers, “Not mine!”

She laughs and points at me. Then I remember that’s what my thrift store tee-shirt says on the chest. Cute kid. It should say Mouse.

A toss of her head flips her long hair back and forth. “I’ve never seen either of you cuties around here before. You guys brothers?”

Together we answer. I say “Yes” he says “No” and she gives us an amused look.

“Which one of you is clueless?”

We point at each other. “He is.”

She laughs again. “You could take this act on the road.” There’s about two seconds of silence before she adds, “Wanna ride?”

“Sure,” Ernie says and I nearly fall off the picnic table.

“Back in a sec.” She goes toward the Ladies’ side of the building.

Ernie starts folding our dry clothes. I help, and we pack our bags.

When we’re in her car–me in the back with the duffel and blanket–I want to ask where we’re going but she floors the gas pedal and I’m jerked breathless. Her hair flies in the wind, and she’s talking to Ernie and he’s answering but I can’t catch the words. His hand clenches the console as if he might be regretting this decision already.

We fly along the Interstate until we pass a speed limit sign and she slows down. I start to breathe again. By the time I’m relaxed enough to enjoy the ride, we’re many exits from the rest area and she signals a turn. At the top of the ramp there’s signs for everything, including food. I like her better now.

We end up at some little Italian restaurant that promises a meal anytime, day or night. I’m ready for spaghetti and garlic bread. The smells filling the place remind me of Friday nights when Collins would take a bus load of us to Nikky’s Ristorante in Hackett. It had to be somebody’s birthday, and Nikky would come to the table and sing a sappy song in Italian to the Happy Birthday tune.

She puts the car top up and we go inside. Fancier than anything I’m used to, with table cloths and a space for a dance floor. There are booths and we have our choice of seating. Nobody else is eating pasta at five in the afternoon, and the waiter must have gone home or is in the back washing dishes. We munch on breadsticks for what feels like an hour. The blonde is older than I first thought, twenty-five or more, and she’s sitting so close to Ernie, what she’s saying reaches his ears but not mine.

Her hand keeps straying to his necklace. Strokes it like a pet pooch. If she’s laying on the lovey-dovey talk, I don’t really care to listen. Can’t tell how Ernie’s taking it. She probably can’t, either.

Finally a waiter writes up our order. He brings a large green bottle of some pale wine. She studies the label, tips the guy with a smile, and he fills a glass each for her and Ernie. They sniff and sip like they know what they’re doing.

It’s another long time before the waiter brings a tray loaded with small salads and dishes of pasta. The meatballs are tender and tasty, so I leave off wondering what’s going on in my dorm, or what will happen later tonight. Somewhere soft music plays, and Ernie and his new friend leave stuff on their plates and go off to dance.

The salt and spices make me thirsty, so I finish my soft drink and fill the glass from the wine bottle. Steve used to have an uncle who got drunk every Friday night, to dull his pain. Right now, with a belly stuffed with spaghetti, garlic bread, and cola, I don’t have any pain, just curiosity. I sniff and sip, and it’s not bad. Grape juice with a bite.

Before the music stops and the dancing comes to a halt, I’ve drunk half a bottle and am feeling fine.

They come back to cold food. She sends Ernie to find the waiter, who takes the plates away, returns them steaming from a microwave. “Any dessert?” he asks me.

“Go ahead,” she urges. “They have a coconut pie to die for.”

Coconut pie, who can resist that? It’s one of my favorites, and she’s paying. At least, I hope she is.

The pie’s fresh and the slice is huge. The first few bites are delicious but I find myself forcing the rest on top of everything else in my stomach. Their quiet voices pick up where they left off, and her laughter tells me she’s enjoying Ernie’s company more than the warmed-over lasagne. An afternoon rainstorm blows in, darkening the place.

The waiter lights some candles and places them on the next table. The distant yearning music starts again, their desserts are on the way, and suddenly I’m so sleepy I can’t keep my eyes open.

I’m jostled awake just enough to realize Ernie’s picking me up off the booth seat. The woman says, “Your bro’s okay. It’s a quality wine.”

“He’s underage,” Ernie answers, sounding pissed.

“Shhhhhhh!” She giggles. “How was I to know he’d guzzle it down like a little wino?”

“Give me the keys. I’ll carry him out.”

“I can walk,” I say, the words leaving my mouth on little bird wings and flying ahead of me. I’m flying too, in the candlelit music, right out the door and into the storm.

Ernie lays me on the back seat and I think I’m asleep and dreaming. Like that night at the Morningbird. I wonder what a morning bird is. Does it cry and moan? Maybe it’s a mourning bird, and that’s the sound I heard. Not John at all. But birds don’t drive big bulky antique cars. Or sleek red sporty cars.

“Think he’ll tell your father?”

There’s a pause. “No. But he won’t feel too good when he wakes up.”

“That won’t be for a while.”

*****

Lightning flashes in the rain-dark sky. Or is it night? The car has stopped. The world keeps going around and I figure I’d better not try to sit up. I can see them in the front. She’s got Ernie scrunched against the passenger door, but he’s not making any moves.

“I bought the meal.” She sounds peevish.

“Thank you.” Ernie answers like he doesn’t know she’s mad, but I’m not fooled. He knows, doesn’t care.

“Did you think I wouldn’t want anything in return? I pay, you pay.”

“Not like that.”

“Why not? Afraid I’ll give you a disease?”

Mouse lies still, hoping they don’t realize I’m awake and listening. But when Ernie tells her, “I’ve made a rule not to have sex with anybody I haven’t known at least a month,” I snicker.

She thinks he’s joking, since she says in a sweeter tone, “I can’t wait that long. Can you?” She leans into him, and in a panicked voice he yells, “Vinnie! Unlock the door!”

Swaying like the drunken kid that I am, I leap up and pop the master door lock on the driver’s side. She screams, “Get out then! Get out of my car and take the little bastard with you!”

Ernie’s feet are on the ground before she finishes ranting. Opens my door, hauls me out. Shoves my duffel bag into my arms and snatches up the blanket bed roll. My head spins and my knees buckle but I manage not to collapse. She starts the engine, guns it, and the car leaps away so powerfully that the open doors slam shut.

We watch her tail lights disappear down a lonely back road. Summer lightning still plays about the evening sky. I’m standing in a rain-filled pot hole. “Where are we?”

Now Ernie sounds peevish. “About ten miles from the restaurant. At least twenty from that rest area. And a helluva long way from the last town.”

“Ten miles. Piece of cake.” I stagger toward the side of the road, and am grateful when Ernie steers me back onto the asphalt. Thunder in the distance. Lightning. Dark clouds roll across the moonlit sky towards us. Feels later than it could possibly be.

Far down the straightaway we see car lights coming back. “Think that’s her?”

He shoves me across the ditch and into waist-high weeds, where we crouch until the car zooms by. “Guess it was.”

“Sorry we didn’t let her pick us up again?”

We walk along the dark road for maybe a hundred yards before he answers. “No.”

Another hundred yards. “You heard me snicker, didn’t you.”

“I’m glad you were alert enough to pop that lock.”

Another hundred yards. “Um. If you didn’t want to bonk her, what did you two do for the last three hours?”

“Told each other lies.”

“Tell them to me.”

“Like a bedtime story?” Humor has crept back into his voice.

“Yeah, I –” Another pot hole. Except this one throws me. Knees and arms catch the impact, my face hits as an afterthought.

Ernie picks me up. “Are you all right?”

Now I do have a pain, like my brain’s two sizes too big and the world’s spinning again. I want to sit down but that would be wimpy. “Never felt better.”

“I bet.”

A mile or so ahead, a security light guards a construction site. Thunder’s closer now, and I smell rain coming. Near the chain link fence, sections of a huge drainage system wait to be installed. It reminds me of the fence at East Wind and right now I’d trade my comic book collection to be safe inside those familiar brick walls. Or at least inside one of these giant pipes, shelter from the storm. Ernie reads my mind, because he asks, “How good are you at climbing?”

“Drunk or sober?”

“How drunk are you?”

“Not enough to try climbing over that fence. I did that at East Wind, and see where it got me.”

“I thought you loved the life of the open road.”

“Sometimes I guess I do. Not when I’m about to be struck by lightning.”

Wind rolls in tree-shaking gusts over us, bringing the downpour. “We’re more likely to drown if we stand here.” Ernie starts running down a side road. With no other plan, I stumble along after him, dizzy, wet, cold, and queasy from undigested stuff like a rock in my gut.

We leave the construction site behind. Soon I don’t see its light anymore. We pass through a blind space, trusting the asphalt beneath our feet to keep us moving. Presently, little lights mark a utility outpost, a roadside stand locked up for the night, and a small used car lot. Ernie halts in front of me so suddenly that I bang into him.

“Sanctuary,” he tells me.

“You’ve found a church?” Shivering, my teeth chattering, I long for quiet, dry, candlelit. Peering into the darkness ahead of us and see a large old brick building. Tall windows glisten from a flickering flood light shines on a sign that reads ‘Haw Creek Elementary School.’

I groan. “Not another school.”

Ernie searches in the weeds, finds a bottle, draws back to throw. I grab his arm, screeching, “East Wind has a burglar–”

It’s the wrong arm and he completes the throw. The bottle crashes through a bottom window, breaking out several panes and the thin rotten wood strips that held them in place. “–alarm.” If I weren’t so sick and tired, I’d flee the scene before the cops arrive, but I am sick, and tired, and my head’s throbbing. My nose, knees, and arms burn from the fall on the asphalt earlier.

Nothing happens. No one comes. No sirens, twirling lights, uniforms or handcuffs.

Ernie takes Hoodoo’s gun from the bed roll and knocks off the shards of glass with the barrel. Half expecting the gun to fire and give us both a heart attack, I’m actually relieved when Ernie says, “Come on. I’ll boost you up.”

We land in a classroom dimly lit by a distant street lamp. Fourth grade artwork is taped around the walls. We move between rows of desks toward an open hall door. We’re nearly there when Ernie rushes me into a closet where we cower. I’m glad there are no wire hangers to clatter. Something squishy is underfoot but I’m more worried by the heavy footsteps coming into the room. A flashlight darts around but doesn’t spot us behind the louvers.

As the night watchman moves down the aisle toward the broken window, I hear him mutter, “Damn vandals.” He picks up the bottle and tosses it into a metal waste basket. The loud bang zings through my head like a bullet and almost makes me throw up.

He goes out and shuts the door. I listen hard to see if he locks it, but the drumming between my ears is too loud. We wait in the closet until I think I’ll smother. Then we wait in the classroom, standing ready to hide again in case he comes back.

I’m dozing against Ernie’s shoulder when he whispers, “Think he holes up in the infirmary?”

“Nah, it’s probably locked to keep the drugs from escaping.”

“You’re a witty dude, you know that?” Ernie cautiously opens the door and we wait some more. I’m not cold now, and the draft from the broken window feels good on my face.

“Then, if we break in there, he’s not likely to find us.”

“You looking for a fix?”

“Yeah, but not that kind. A cot and maybe another blanket.”

“I could go for that.”

The long hallway is backlit through a row of rain-patterned windows. I wonder if there’s a town nearby, and the prospect of breakfast without strings attached is appealing. I wonder what kept Ernie from having a fling with that blonde. Her age? The excuse he gave her? Me?

We pass a closed door that has a brass sign bolted on. TEACHERS LOUNGE. Light shows beneath it, and inside a radio plays low. Sounds like ‘A Prairie Home Companion’ and I’d like to stop and listen but Ernie keeps going until there’s another brass sign. INFIRMARY.

He lays down the bed roll, limp because he’s carrying Hoodoo’s gun in his waistband. Tries the door. Uses his pocket knife to jimmy the lock.

“You’re good at this, you know. Breaking and entering.”

“I’m good at a lot of things,” he tells me, and then we’re inside the windowless room. Before he closes the door behind us, I get a glimpse of shelves, cabinets, and a desk.

TO BE CONTINUED!

No sound, except our breathing. The space reeks of industrial strength disinfectant. Behind me, Ernie stuffs our blanket under the doorway and I imagine us suffocating in our sleep. A faint grayness fills a wide doorway, so there must be another room with a window. I start forward to open it. Stumbling into a desk, I bang my already bruised knee.

Then light shoots into my eyes and bounces around inside my head. “Ow! That’s bright.”

“Keep your voice down.” Ernie goes to the open shelves where boxes of bandages and other medical stuff sit alongside a clutter of lost and found items.

Limping, I pass a sink and a rest room stall in a cubbyhole between the dispensary and the infirmary. This room is like a barracks, three army cots with sheets and pillows without cases. The window opens easily, and I draw in long breaths of rain-cool air. There’s an old metal screen. No bars.

When I return to Ernie he’s prying at the lock on an upper cabinet. I tell him what I’ve found. He warns me, “If you use the toilet, don’t flush.” Sounds like he’s had a taste of community living, too, with plumbing that talks. I try to guess whether it’s boarding or military prep. He looks too young for college.

“If there’s any pain killer, I could use some of that.”

“I thought you never felt better.”

“I lied.” Almost every part of me aches or stings for one reason or another.

“You’ll feel worse in the morning.” The lock snaps and the cabinet doors swing open. He picks a small bottle of children’s aspirin and tosses it to me.

“This stuff is dangerous,” I say, and pop half a dozen into my mouth. The orange flavor brings memories of being sick and helpless. Chewing them would make me gag, so I head for the sink.

“Want a cup?” He holds up a plastic tumbler.

And risk every kiddy germ known to man? “Unnn-unnn.” When I lean over to catch the water in my mouth, it washes the tablets right down the drain. I stagger toward him, giggling.

Ernie’s reaching for something at the back of the second cabinet, which he’s just broken into. He gives me a one-sided smile. “You’re still drunk.”

“Yeah, I must be.” I wheel out the desk chair and make myself comfortable.

As he liberates a thin stack of comic books, a small white sandal falls on his foot. He bends, picks it up, turns it this way and that. It looks slightly familiar to me but I don’t have any reason to recognize a single shoe belonging to a fourth grade girl. That doesn’t stop my mouth. “I bet I know where that came from. A one-legged midget lost it on the playground when she was running to catch her bus, and a teacher found it and put it there in nineteen-forty-nine.” That’s the date carved into the front of this building. “The bus wrecked and everyone was killed and nobody thought about the shoe ever again.”

He lays it on the cabinet shelf. “Francine had a pair like this when she was nine. She used to carry around a story book called ‘Dependable Fran’ and try to make me read it to her.”

His voice breaks on the last few words, and I’m sorry for making a crummy joke. The shoe is familiar : Fran was wearing white sandals in that picnic park, when I first saw her. “Give me some more aspirin.”

“You’ve had enough.”

The giggles bubble up and I clamp my hand over my mouth, though I’m pretty sure these walls are thicker than those at East Wind and that night watchman’s halfway down the hall from here.

“What’s funny now?”

I don’t tell him, but empty out another half dozen tablets. Toss them one by one like popcorn, trying to catch them in my mouth. They’re heavier than popcorn, and my timing is way off. Ernie laughs and shakes his head as they roll across the floor like little live things. Then I catch one and chew it just enough to swallow. Somehow the aspirin bottle gets away from me and crashes into a tin wastebasket.

Ernie leaps a foot in the air. “Help me move the desk,” he says. We place it against the door. He’s carrying Hoodoo’s gun in his waistband again, since the bed roll is doing duty as a light blocker. He hits the switch anyway and we lean on the desk in the darkness, straining to hear footsteps. I don’t believe he’ll shoot even if the old man manages to push into the room. Nobody tries, so he turns the light on and we relax.

After changing into dry clothes, we sit around reading the boring assortment of comic books. “Prairie Home Companion” must have finished its time slot. What follows? Maybe the watchman has changed the station, or gone to bed. I feel like I’m back at East Wind, with a new roommate.

“Wish I had a library book.”

“Doesn’t take much to make you happy, does it?”

“And a million dollars.”

“I’ll settle for a good night’s sleep.”

We take turns at the sink to brush our teeth. In the dimly lit mirror I can see the skinned place on my chin, another on my elbow. Ernie peers at my reflection. He lifts my other arm and inspects it. “Both of them.”

He rummages in the dispensary cabinet and returns with a tin of pink ointment that smells sweet and old-fashioned. He smears it on the scrapes, and I can tell he’s had experience doing this for Fran before they grew up.

“You’re a great brother, Ernie,” I say. “Wish I could come live with you when you go home.”

He tenses. Hands me the salve tin. “Who says I’m ever going home?” Halfway into the barracks, he calls, “Switch off the light, will you?”

I drop my jeans and put ointment on my skinned knees. I can’t remember what day tomorrow will be, but I ought to call Jerry or Steve, even if that sends me to D-hall for the rest of my life. Not knowing what’s going on there is worse than not knowing where I’ll be tomorrow night after dark.

He’s lying on the farthest cot, arms over his face like a shield. I’m exhausted, too keyed-up to sleep. A strong cool breeze spatters light rain against the screen. Ernie’s restless, and I want to try to smooth over the stupid things I keep saying. “You’re like me.”

“Oh, yeah? How?” There’s interest in his voice, like if he was mad earlier, he’s not now.

“You always want to do the right thing.”

“Like running away and carrying a concealed weapon and breaking into a kiddy school,” he says, and I can feel him smiling.

“And letting that trashy girl get me drunk.”

He laughs, so I know he knows I’m teasing. Thunder in the distance grows fainter. The storm is passing, only an occasional lightning flash to remind us. That, and the lingering wet-dust smell that follows.

* * * * *

Ernie’s working the screen off the window when I wake. Summer heat’s coming in, promising a scorcher, and it’s barely June. Or is it August? I’ve lost all sense of time and reality’s rapidly leaving. The lumpy blanket and my duffel bag wait on his cot.

‘My bags are packed and I’m ready to go’ runs through my aching head, and the effort to come up with the next line threatens to s