Freaks Like Us (20 page)
Authors: Susan Vaught
His words flash through my mind like Sunshine’s always do, when I’m not on such a whopping dose of fuzzy pills.
I wish I could find the locks in my brain, the buttons to push and the knobs and dials to turn to straighten out what
is
from what
was
and what
might have been
. Real and pretend and alphabet, it runs together like watercolors, and the knives and black clouds are always waiting.
I stare at Agent Mercer’s brand-new shiny briefcase sitting next to Mom’s green couch.
“Oh crap.” I dive toward it and grab it. How long has he been gone? Can I catch him? I’m halfway to the door before I stop.
Before I freeze.
Did he—
No.
But—
No. I’m crazy as hell. I’m crazier than ever.
I raise the briefcase. It is new. Like, just-bought-at-the-store new…
Maybe…
On his way over here?
The locks, two of them, are set on 1-1-1, 1-1-1.
Mouth dry, hands shaking, I carry the briefcase to my room in the house at the base, and I place it carefully on the bed and—
All you have to do is turn the locks to triple zeros and pop the lid and you’ll have what’s most important
—And
0-0-0, 0-0-0.
I slide the latches, and the locks pop open.
I lift the lid, heart beating so hard it’s making my heavy, thick head spin.
There’s a piece of paper, like a list, inside. Two envelopes, too, both small and padded.
I pick up the paper, and it’s definitely a list—names.
Mine’s on there, and Dad’s, and Drip’s. There’s Eli and Chief Smith and Roland and Linden and Drip’s brothers and more. The words
NO MATCH
are hand scrawled next to our names, and I get it. Yeah, now I get it. It’s the list of people who gave DNA samples.
I read it once. Then I read it again. Then the locks in my brain really do turn to triple zero, because I realize there’s a name missing. It’s scrawled on the back,
Karl Franks
, with “no compel at this time—Sunshine Patton likely a voluntary departure.”
Meaning… the FBI didn’t force the issue because they thought Sunshine probably left on her own, right?
I drop the list back inside, pick up the first envelope and open it. When I shake out the object inside, my eyes go wide and tears come right away because it’s a white candle. It’s the white candle from fifth-grade graduation.
My fingers close around it and—
I thought your freckles would taste like chocolate and then she laughs and I have to laugh and
—And I have a piece of her. One precious piece. Agent Mercer gave it back to me. He’s trying to give her back to me, even though I know this has got to be fifteen kinds of illegal. He didn’t care. He’s trying to do the right thing, and the right thing doesn’t always go by the rules, does it?
If he were here, I might cry harder. I might hug him. I might kiss him. I run to my dresser, take out a pair of socks, separate them, and tuck the candle deep in the toe. Then I run in circles, like a big giant idiot, looking for somewhere, for anywhere—and I stop at the bed, which has metal posts with these twisty things on top. I untwist one and tuck the sock inside the pole.
There.
One piece of Sunshine, at least, all mine and safe and I won’t tell a soul because Agent Mercer shouldn’t get fired because he’s the best person I know right now.
Back to the briefcase, breathing so hard it hurts where I had the chest tube and I cough and that hurts worse but I couldn’t care less because there’s another envelope and I’m hoping and I’m praying even though I know it can’t be, that it won’t be but I tear into it and I turn it upside down, careful, careful, with my hand out, and what falls into my palm is…
One tiny huge small giant perfect magic…
Golden locket.
What are you doing here Freak I mean Jason guess I should call you that ’cause if I call you Freak it would piss her off and I tell him I know you know something because your ears didn’t turn red and Eli says I don’t know what you’re talking about and I say I know he’s not on the list and the knives don’t come and the clouds stay away and I yell at Eli that I know he didn’t give his DNA and Eli says you better get out of here before Mom comes back because she still thinks you did it
“A road trip.” Dad’s voice crackles a little on my cell. “With Eli Patton.”
“Yeah.” I grip the phone too tight, but I can’t help it. I can’t help anything right now and I’m almost about to drool because I took an extra dose of fuzzy pills all on my
own, the day after Sunshine’s birthday, the day after she turned eighteen.
I’m not leaving, Eli, because back in the VFW your ears didn’t turn red and he gives me a look but I point to his ears and say they always turn red when you’re upset and mad so when Mr. Watson ran you weren’t really mad were you because you knew it wasn’t him and he says you’re crazy but I say I’m not going anywhere because I know and I know because she told me and I know because the knives try to kill me whenever I think about it and I know because his name wasn’t on the list and I know because she left me this locket and you know she wouldn’t have done that if she didn’t want me to remember
Eli’s ancient Ford rumbles and bucks and shakes and belches, and every few minutes it slows down, then speeds up all by itself. The air in the cabin smells like burned oil and dead gym bags and I’m probably getting carbon monoxide poisoning and I don’t care.
“Did your mother let you do stuff like that before she went back to the Middle East?” Dad asks, kind of nervous. He’s been tense around me, but I’m staying at his place again, for now.
“Yeah.” My breath curls out in a puff of chilled white air. No heat in Eli’s junker. Could have figured that one, right? And it’s November now, almost Thanksgiving, and cold as frozen snot. I’ve got on two coats and two pairs of gloves. “Mom let me be independent, Dad. Sort of.”
Dad hesitates. Takes a loud breath. “Let me talk to Eli.”
“No. I’m nearly grown. You can talk to me.”
Eli gives me a sideways stare from the driver’s seat, as slit-eyed as any Drip can fire at me. But he’s also kind of smiling.
“Oh,” Dad says. Then, “Okay.” And I sort of feel sorry for him, which is all right because Dad’s not really a bad guy. He didn’t ask for a kid with an alphabet, did he?
Eli says you’re not going to go away are you Freak and I say NO and he says you’re never going to give up on this NO you won’t let it go NO and he grabs my collar with fingers that read
PAIN
and
HOPE
and he shakes me but only once and then he says fine then come back the day after her birthday and don’t say a frigging word to anybody you got me or I’ll bash all your teeth down your throat you got me
YES
and
PAIN
and
HOPE
let me go and
“When will you be home?” Dad asks.
I glance at Eli, who mouths,
Tonight
, so I repeat that to Dad. Then I tell him it might be late so he won’t worry in case we really are late.
When I hang up, I’m pretty sure I’m getting frostbite on my nose. We’ve been driving two hours already. I don’t know how many more we have to drive and I don’t ask because it’s better if I don’t know.
Why didn’t you ever tell anybody why didn’t you get her help or get him arrested or something but Eli looks away from me and he
doesn’t have to answer because I already know what he’ll say I already understand he stayed quiet because nobody listens to alphabets and less than nobody listens to delinquents and if I really did want to die I’d hug him but I can’t hug him even though when he looks at me I can see Sunshine in his eyes and
And two hours later, Eli’s car slows down on its own and this time, it doesn’t speed back up again. Eli fights the wheel and limps the dead old car to the side of the freeway, where it clatters and rolls and lurches, then stops with a way-too-final-sounding
ker-thatter
.
Eli and I get out. He raises the hood and does some serious swearing.
Then it starts to snow.
Thank God for extra fuzzy pills or my head would be a mess right now. Okay, so my hands shake like hell and my tongue’s lead and huge and my eyes don’t really want to stay where I put them—crap like this, I can handle. I think slow, but I think well enough to find an option, because the stupid car and the stupid snow, none of this is stopping me because I won’t stop. I will not stop. Not happening.
Sunshine’s locket seems to burn against my chest, safe from the snow and the cold, under my shirt and all my coats.
Nothing’s stopping me today.
I pull out my cell again, and the card, and I call the number. It doesn’t go to any kind of voicemail system or
punch-this-or-that menu. It goes right to him and I’m so surprised I pull the phone away from my ear and gaze at it and Eli watches me, cold fog rising all around his head, mingling with the hissing steam frothing out of the car’s engine.
“Jason?” he asks through the phone, sounding worried. “Is that you?”
“You said you wouldn’t let me down again,” I tell him. “You said you’d help. Now’s the time.”
It takes so long for him to get here. Hours. Four, then five. I have to whiz on the side of the road twice and it takes so long but he doesn’t let me down and then he shows up driving a black car with government plates and we get in and the last hour is so quiet I’m not even sure I’m in my own head. There’s whispering. There’s muttering, but I can’t really hear it and I can’t really care because we’re almost there. I don’t know it, but I feel it. It’s spreading out like a warm blanket, covering my legs then my belly and my chest and my arms and shoulders and even my face. I’m thawing. I’m getting unfuzzy. I’m getting alive.
We’re almost there.
“Here,” Eli says, and Agent Mercer turns off at the exit Eli shows him.
We don’t talk. Not a word except for
here
and
there
and
left
and
right
.
Eli and I haven’t spoken since I told him Agent Mercer
was coming to help us, to drive us the last part of the way and make sure we get there and make sure to do whatever we’ll let him do and Eli started to throw a fit and—
He gave me back the locket
—And that’s all it took.
“There,” Eli says, pointing to a little charity-looking thrift shop and Agent Mercer turns in and I think I’m going to climb right out of my skin and I do climb right out of the car before it even stops moving and Agent Mercer hits the brakes and turns it off not even in a parking spot and he gets out saying, “Slow down, Jason.”
But I can’t slow down because this is it, this is where we’re stopping and I’m opening the door and going in and there are rows of clothes and aisles of dishes and fridges and microwaves and the sign over the cash register says PROCEEDS TO WOMEN AND CHILDREN IN PERIL.
There are two women behind the registers and the nearer one sees me and then she sees Eli coming in behind me and her eyes get slitty and her face goes a little pink and she says, “Wait, you agreed—”
But the other girl behind the other register sees me and I see her and it’s all done then and everything’s over and I don’t even try not to cry and she lets out a happy-surprised sound not a word because you know she doesn’t really do words in front of most people but I’m
not most people and here she comes here she comes here she comes and she’s here and she’s throwing her arms around my neck and I feel her through the numb and I feel her through the fuzzy and I know my alphabet will never block her out because no amount of crazy could ever keep me away from Sunshine.
She cries and she smells like honeysuckle and I hold her and she’s soft and I barely notice that other woman as she shuttles us out of the main store and tucks us into a little closet with clothes pitched all over the floor, and she closes the door and I sort of hear her jawing at Eli and Agent Mercer’s calm tones, maybe reassuring, maybe saying something stupid like, “FBI, ma’am, and I assure you, she’s of age, there’s no issue, all of this is completely confidential,” but I don’t care I don’t care I don’t care.