Finders Keepers (4 page)

           
“Looks like I got the right girl!”
 
He hit the bird head-on.
 
The bird cartwheeled in the air before it crumpled to the ground.

           
During the attack she’d wriggled one arm partly free and with a last big tug she lashed out at his face.
 
Gouging eyes out is an unrealistic plan of attack.
 
Eyes don’t just pop out unless you are a fifteen pound shih-
tzu
.
 
Her dad’s words were crisp and clear in her head.
 
What you want is a corneal abrasion. Scratch right across the eye horizontally.
 
Hard as you can.
 
Ellie didn’t keep her nails long so she hoped that her dad’s
self defense
tutorial would still work.
 
She buried her fingers into his face and then raked her nails across.
 
He grabbed her right hand which barely grazed his cheek and twisted her fingers in his own.
 
She cried out but then he howled.
 
Her left hand had got him.
 
The sound of his yell grated across Ellie’s ears like broken glass.
 
With his hand patching his eye and a murderous look on his face, he looked like a pirate.
 
A real one, not the kind found at little kids’ birthday parties.
 

           
The darkness seemed to be getting inkier.
 
What she could see was starting to lose its definition.
 
She felt like she was blinking in slow motion.
 
He fell down to her side.
 
A dark shape jumped over her and the two shapes blurred into one.
 

           
Then, very gently, she was picked up and cradled against a solid, warm chest.
 
A white stripe of hair shone against black just above an ear.

           
“I want to go home, Pinstripe,” she said, or at least, thought she did.

3

               
“Don’t ever touch her again.”
 
The boy with the long black hair glared down at Ellie’s abductor.
 
His face and voice were as hard as steel.

           
The boy on the ground rolled to his side, spit blood, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
 
“I wouldn’t have really hurt her, you know.”
 
He cleaned his hand on the grass.

           
“You’re so full of crap.”
 
The black-haired boy clenched his fist, all too aware that his pinkie and ring finger were missing to the first joint.
 
“I told you I was out.”
 
He enunciated his next words.
 
“Leave me alone!”
 

           
The other boy jumped to his feet.
 
The movement was smooth and easy.
  
He was half a head taller than the black-haired boy, but they gave the appearance of being equally matched.

           
“There’s a mole in the group.
 
He sabotaged the project.
 
I thought you’d want to know who really blew your hand off.”

           
Shock flitted across the boy’s face but it quickly disappeared behind the steel mask once again.
 
“It doesn’t matter because that’s not why I left.
 
When I realized that something had gone wrong, I only had a few seconds.
 
Not enough time to do anything, just be aware that I was going to die.”
 
He shifted Ellie in his arms.
 
“I knew then I was out.
 
What if it hadn’t been me, Gibbs?
 
What if it’d gone off on someone else?”

           
The other boy shook his body out like a wet dog.
 
“Wasn’t that the point?”

           
The boy stepped away from Gibbs and held onto Ellie even more tightly.
 
“The girl is innocent, and now you’ve gone too far.
 
I won’t ever come back.
 
You are wasting your time with me and her.”

           
Like raindrops on glass some of the tension slipped from Gibbs’ body.
 
His posture relaxed.
 
“Sky, you know you have to come back.
 
You think I don’t know what you’re going through and what you’re rebelling against?
 
I’ve been
here
and done all this before.”
 
He rubbed his jaw where Sky socked him.
 
“I was worried when you disappeared off the grid.
 
No one could find you.
 
I
couldn’t find you.”
 
He shrugged his shoulders.
 
“But I figured you’d come back eventually.
 
I would have given you the time you needed, but then…”
 
He flicked a finger at Ellie.
 
“Zak was tipped off about her.”

A ringing started in Sky’s ears.
 
He clenched and unclenched his teeth.
 

“Maybe I got it wrong how she was involved, but considering your reaction, it’d be useless to try and convince me she’s not in this mess now.
 
You’re just lucky I got to her before they did.”

***

           
Sky took her back to the hospital.
 
Just before he reached the street he needed to turn down, he realized people would probably be looking for her and he couldn’t take her directly back.
 
He changed directions and ended up at the post office, which was juxtaposed to the hospital, but separated by fences.
 
He laid her down on the wide stone steps.
 
The emergency entrance was just around the back.
 
“I found her,” he said.
 
He waved his arms in the air and started shouting.
 

***

               
The buttery smell of pancakes caused Ellie’s stomach to rumble.
 
She shifted, groaned, and then reluctantly lifted heavy lids just enough to see through small slits.
 
Sunlight filled her bedroom with light, but her eyes were too bleary to make out the red numbers on the alarm clock.
 
She rolled onto her back.
 
The throbbing in her head was like her own personal jackhammer.
 

           
“Remind me to never let you get drunk.
 
You’d be a complete nightmare with a hangover.”

           
With some difficulty, Ellie picked up her head to see her best friend Taylor standing in the doorway.
 

           
“What is that supposed to mean?”
 
She smacked her tongue against the top of her mouth.
 
It felt like she’d fallen asleep with feathers in her mouth.
 
Nice.
 

           
Taylor strolled into Ellie’s room and crawled up onto the end of Ellie’s bed.
 
“It means you look terrible.”
 
She tossed her long blonde curls over her shoulder and giggled.
 
Ellie wasn’t jealous of Taylor very often, although she did think that Taylor’s combination Barbie doll perfection and athletic prowess (captain of both the soccer and softball team) was cosmically unfair.
 
Ellie, though slender, was on the smaller side, elf-like Manny said, but with completely ordinary, straight brown hair…well when it was brown anyway.
 

           
Ellie snorted.
 
“Is someone making pancakes?”

           
The arch of one of Taylor’s perfectly shaped blonde eyebrows and a purposefully unconvincing shrug of her shoulders was her only response.

           
When Ellie squirmed out from under her bedspread, her relief was so intense it was almost tangible.
  
In place of the wet, tattered shroud of a prom/wedding dress, she wore her favorite black yoga pants and a red Team Frodo shirt.
 
Everything was back to normal.
 

           
“Seriously,” she said.
 
“Is my dad home?
 
And…”
 
Ellie squinted at her clock again.
 
“…what in the world are you doing here so early?
 
You’re never out of bed before noon, unless it’s game day.
 
It’s only seven in the morning.”

           
Taylor stretched out her long legs and then stood up.
 
“You weren’t returning any of my texts or calls and then I remembered you said your battery was dead.
 
So I called your mom and she told me what happened.
 
I came right over and I’ve been here most of the night.”

           
Her outfit which included tight olive green pants and a loose, cream colored sweater didn’t even appear to be wrinkled.
 
Her mascara and
lipgloss
…not the least bit smudged.
 

           
“What exactly did happen?”
 
Ellie couldn’t help but wonder what part of last night was real.
 
Maybe she’d been locked in the store and frightened herself into all her injuries.
 
She noticed new bandages on her arms.
 
She could have been hallucinating.
 

           
The bright, goofy look Taylor wore earlier was replaced by smugness.
 
Ellie had seen this look before—it was Taylor’s favorite person to be—the “it” girl, otherwise known as the one with the freshest gossip.
 
“You mean you don’t remember?”
 
She licked her lips.
 
“Concussion and memory loss…interesting.”

           
Ellie stalked into the bathroom which connected to her room.
 
“I don’t have amnesia, you
goon
.
 
My head is still just a little woozy.
 
I remember everything…except the stuff after the hospital.
 
That’s kind of hazy.”

           
“What do you mean after the hospital?
 
Oh, like when you freaked out and dashed out the emergency exit?
 
Does that mean you don’t remember Sky?”
 

           
Ellie’s stomach rolled over.
 
Her hand trembled when she reached for her toothbrush.
 
The toothbrush holder tipped and her toothbrush nose-dived into the sink.
 

           
“Who…”
 

“Hey, that’s your mom calling.
 
Hurry up, I’m starving.
 
I’ll let them know you’re coming.”
 

           
Ellie took a lot longer in the bathroom than she needed.
 
Finally, after risking having her mother drag her out, she slunk out of the bathroom.
 
There was only partial relief when she strolled into the kitchen a few minutes later and saw her dad flipping pancakes on the skillet.
 
There was the other part of her, a significant part, which felt like it just jumped out of an airplane without a parachute, because the boy who sat at the kitchen table chatting with Taylor and her mom was the same one from the hospital.
 
Except for leaping over the nurse’s station and scaring her half out of her mind, he hadn’t actually harmed her.
 
Therefore, no need to panic
.
 
She wrapped her arms around her dad’s waist and squeezed hard, hoping it would also squeeze out the lumps inside of her stomach.
 

           
“Hey sweetheart,” he said and gave her an equally impressive hug back.
 
His voice wavered slightly when she looked up at him.
 
His eyes were on the purple bruise that spread from her eye all the way down her cheek.
 
“Putting chocolate chips in yours.”

           
“With whip cream on top?”

           
He smiled down at her.
 
He looked extremely ridiculous wearing the too small apron she’d sewed herself for him in the sixth grade.
 
Her dad was unique.
 
You’d know if you were raised as an air force brat.
 
You could pick out air force dads a mile away.
 
They’d ground you for calling fifteen minutes past when you said you’d check in.
 
Rules were strict, punishments tougher, and obedience mandatory.
 
As a child of an air force officer you could turn out in two ways; either a mini-clone of your parent, or a complete rebel.
 
Ellie was neither but maybe that’s because her parents had had her so late in life.
 
Her dad was always away on consulting business since he’d officially retired from active duty.

           
He scooped up three pancakes onto his spatula and then plopped them down onto a plate which he handed her.
 
“Already on the table.
 
The milk expired, but don’t worry, princess, your friend Sky ran out and picked up some orange juice.”

           
Your friend Sky.
 
Since when did everyone become so trusting?
 
She was attacked only yesterday and her parents were inviting strangers into their home.
 
This stranger, though pretty cute, was also a little bit creepy.
 
His eyes were not a natural color.
 
She didn’t even think contacts could make blue that vibrant.
 
And his nose and ears were a little too pointy.
 
And then there was his skin.
 
Under their cheap, incandescent bulbs, he still looked a little greenish.
 
Like olive, but not olive the skin tone.
 
Olive like pickled olive.
 
She didn’t realize she’d stopped her walk toward the table to stare at him until someone interrupted her thoughts.