Tempestuous (18 page)

“No, Grady makes a good point,” Caleb said. “Whoever’s doing this is dangerous and unpredictable. Let’s just go back and hunker down.”

“Glad to see someone appreciates the seriousness of the situation,” Grady said. “You guys will all be just fine if you stick together in one place.”

“Come on, Miranda, let’s just get back to base camp.” Caleb’s tone sounded almost defeatist. “But where’s…? Aww, hell,” he said. “I left my wallet back on the Got Games counter.”

“No, you—” I started. He hadn’t touched his wallet all night.

“Yes, yes I
did
.” he said. “Grady, we’re just going to run right back—give us two seconds. I know exactly where I left it. Can you guys help Mike down the escalator?”

Grady hesitated. “I was on my way down to the other end of the mall to convince the kids there to relocate to the food court. Strength in numbers, you know.”

“I’ll get Mike back,” Seth said.

“Thanks, man,” said Caleb. “We’ll be back in a jiffy.”

“See that you are,” said Grady, turning on his heel to depart. With a backward glance, he added, “Don’t let Miranda coerce you into any more detours!”

“No way,” Caleb said. “She and I are through—with all that, I mean. Besides, I think Miranda has other priorities. We’ll meet you back downstairs.”

I waved at Mike as he disappeared down the escalator with Seth and then turned to Caleb, flummoxed.

“Why did you lie to him?”

“Because I’m not willing to be trapped in here like sitting ducks any more,” he said. “This isn’t just some petty crime. People are getting hurt, we haven’t seen your friend Colin in hours…. This just doesn’t smell right. We need the real police here—not McGruff the Crime Dog.”

“Agreed, but what’s your idea?”

“They stock ham radios at Radio Hut,” Caleb explained. “I think if we set one up and find the right frequency, we should be able to contact a dispatcher or an amateur CB buff who can put us in touch with the cops. Not that you’ve ever cared about what I think, but there you have it.”

He was clearly peeved with me, but given the latest development with the thief, I wasn’t of the mindset to react to his hostile tone of voice.

“Okay, fine by me. Let’s go.”

After that, Caleb maintained an uncomfortable silence as we made our way to Radio Hut. He finally said, “Don’t worry. I’ll have you back to your boyfriend before you even have time to miss him. And though he strikes me as good for nothing, maybe he’ll succeed at his mission to free you. God knows I want out of these cuffs as badly as you do.”

I briefly considered trying to justify my about-face with Brian, but I had too much pride to kowtow to Caleb’s open animosity. I would explain things when I felt good and ready, and not before.

“They’re back here,” Caleb said as we made our way through Radio Hut’s aisles to the shelves that carried ham radios.

“Does it need batteries or anything?” I randomly chose a box from the shelf and turned it over. He leaned over my shoulder to read the instructions. I could feel his breath on my ear.

“Wait,” he said in a whisper, holding a finger to his lips. “Did you hear that?”

I heard the distinctive slide-and-click of the cash register at the front of the store. Startled, I sent the radio box clattering to the floor. Oh crap. Caleb and I exchanged alarmed glances. If we were in here with the thief, he was between us and the exit. Rotating his cuffed hand to grab mine, Caleb pulled me toward the stock room. Opening the door stealthily, we slipped inside and softly shut it behind us. No sooner had we leaned against the door than we heard an audible click. Someone had entered the lockdown code into the security keypad reserved only for mall emergencies. We were trapped!

Little known fact about me: I’m not cut out for peril. I might have a knack for getting things done, and can grudgingly weather humiliation like a champ, but risking life and/or limb? Not my forte, thank you very much. I spent the summer before my sixth-grade year in a state of almost-constant anxiety after one too many Nancy Drew mysteries led me to obsess over the likelihood of being attacked by a lake-dwelling octopus or getting dumped in an abandoned mine shaft by some ex-con named “Grumper.” So needless to say, disbelief quickly gave way to unadulterated panic when I heard the retreating footsteps of whoever it was that had locked us in.

My natural inclination would have been to pace the room—a no-go with the maze of cardboard boxes stacked floor-to-ceiling in our midst, not to mention the impediment chained to my wrist. He and I stood glued in silence to the cement floor, giving my rapid-fire pulse an opportunity to ease up a degree. We each separately took stock (no pun intended) of our fluorescent-lit surroundings, which seemed eerily crypt-like. In addition to the aforementioned boxes, there was a beat-up black file cabinet with the initials W.S. scratched on its front, a “bend at the knees before lifting” safety poster, and a life-sized cardboard cutout of Tom Hanks holding a volleyball. Random. I made a mental note to check the mini fridge later, even though it was grimly affixed with a sticker that read “Abandon Hope, All Ye Who Enter.”

“Well,
that
happened,” Caleb said after a long silence. Apparently sensing my anxiety, he added, “If he were going to do anything to us, he would’ve done it already. I don’t think he’ll be back.”

“I hope you’re right. But after seeing what he did to Mike, I’m not so sure. What if he decides he wants to take me for his captive bride and ferrets me away to some dilapidated mountain compound far from the world’s watching eye?”

“Are you kidding me? Don’t flatter yourself.”

“Well, excuse me for having a perfectly natural freak-out response to all this. Unlike you, I do not have the emotional detachment of a cyborg. Anyway, what do we do now? No one has any clue we’re even here.”

He jiggled the door handle, to no avail. Oh brilliant.

“Really?” I said. “The doorknob? That’s all you got?” He turned to me looking fed up.

“As a matter of fact, yeah. So what do you suggest, your eminence? By all means, do enlighten me.”

Both his question and his sarcasm hung heavy in the stale stockroom air. I didn’t really have a plan either; no cunning quick fix, no brilliant tactical maneuver, no ingenious trick up my sleeve … other than to make like a girl and scream bloody murder.

“Someone helllllp!” I started wailing in desperation, pounding my unshackled fist against the metal door. “Let us out!!!”

It didn’t take long before Caleb joined forces with me, kicking at the door with his steel-toed boot while we both pounded our fists until our hands ached and our throats were raspy.

“This is pointless,” he finally said. “No one’s down at this end of the building. We might be locked in here until the mall opens back up and a new shift comes in.”

“And with ‘Arctic Doomsday’ out there, who knows when that’ll be!” As I succumbed to exhaustion, hunger, fear, and anger, tears started to well up in my eyes.

“Jeez, just calm down, alright?”

“Quit telling me what to do!!” I screamed. “We should have listened to Grady and gone back to the food court, but no—you just had to run off and play hero! Ineffectually, I might add!”

“Ohhhhh.” Caleb smacked his free palm to his forehead in an overexaggerated gesture of insight. “Now I get it. Worried he’ll think you’re ditching him, huh?”

“Who? Grady?”

“No, your scumbag boyfriend. ‘
My life hasn’t been the same without you!
!” he said, mimicking me. “I’ve witnessed some pathetic girls in my day, but that display took desperation to a whole new level. I mean, how many more ways will the dude play you before you have the sense god gave a hedgehog to see through his crap?”

“He has yet to get me trapped in a glorified broom closet by some hardened criminal, so you’ve got a leg up on him there!”

If I was ticked before, his words had now launched a perfect storm of anger. I’d had every intention of trying to explain to Caleb the circumstances with Brian so that he wouldn’t think ill of me, but what was the point? He’d already made up his mind about me, and it wasn’t a flattering depiction.

“I can’t believe I was actually starting to buy into your act.” As he said this, Caleb kicked the metal door once more for good measure.

“What ‘act?’”

“The one where you claim to give a damn about anyone other than yourself. The one where you pretend to be a normal human being—not the high-and-mighty prima donna we’re all supposed to suck up to.” So I was right! He
did
think I was a superficial bitch! This whole time I thought we might actually be forming an unorthodox sort of friendship, he’d really just been judging me, solidifying his opinion of me as some “popular girl” cliché. “You and Brian deserve each other,” he said with a sullen snarl.

“Go to hell.”

“By all means, ladies first.” He held up our fettered arms to make his point.

“Why are you being so hostile?”

“Look, I don’t have to waste my breath insulting your most beloved Brian, or turning him into some supervillain. He does a good enough job of that all on his own.”

“Yeah? You’re digging a pretty sizable hole for yourself right now, too.” Caleb switched from his default averted glances to look me squarely in the eyes. The only thing worse than having to listen to his aspersions was being physically unable to turn my back on him—or walk away completely.

“If you had any self-respect whatsoever, you’d never give him a second thought,” he continued. “Sadly, you can’t see that your own self-loathing is what keeps you so emotionally dependent on that deadweight reprobate.”

“I don’t know about all your psychobabble, but I definitely know dead weight, because I’m looking right at it. I may be stuck in here, and I may be stuck to you, but I’m not required to acknowledge your presence, no matter how long we’re trapped together. So consider this the last of our discourse.”

“Gladly. After all, I’m sure ignoring peons is what you do best.”

And with that, an uncomfortable silence reigned.

• • •

I’m not sure that people ever really change, but maybe the light in which we perceive them does. How else to explain what I was feeling thirty minutes after Caleb and I had unleashed what I knew would be our last torrent of insults at one another. It wasn’t as if that moment, shoving a bag of foam peanuts behind my back, suddenly made him the picture of gallantry. He was still as willful and hotheaded as I could be; a tempestuous soul who navigated his life with cynicism and a paucity of words. But I’d come to realize that when it really mattered he was even-keeled, steady, and solid to the core.

We were back on tentative speaking terms following the crisis-induced bonding moment that had prompted him to take my hand. I still gripped it tightly in mine, taking comfort in his warm grasp. Shifting on the makeshift Styrofoam beanbag chair he’d procured for me, I sighed deeply. My anger with him had subsided, supplanted by the panic and fear of our current conundrum. Caleb’s thoughts were clearly headed in the same direction, because he squeezed my hand reassuringly.

“My dad is probably freaking out right about now,” I sighed, breaking the silence.

“I’m sure he figures you’re safe and sound, just waiting it out here.”

“If I’m not home within an hour after my shift, well, let’s just say he has the chief of police on speed dial. Which for once would be helpful.”

“We’ll get out of this, don’t worry.” His forced optimism was only slightly encouraging. “But you’re exaggerating, right? Your old man’s not really that strict?”

“I wouldn’t call it strict,
per se
—just overprotective. But, to be fair, it’s not without good reason.”

“Are you referring to your brief but infamous ‘criminal’ career at Eastern Prep?”

Maybe it was just a delusion brought on by exhaustion and the fact that we’d been attached at the wrists for hours, but even if we never spoke again after tonight, it was somehow paramount that Caleb understood I wasn’t the conceited egomaniac he had made me out to be.

“No, actually he’s been like that for a long time. Since my mom died.”

Caleb was silent; he seemed to be taking it in before responding to my revelation.

“It’s like he feels this extra sense of responsibility toward me,” I said, “both for my well-being and, I suppose, my happiness. He’s constantly trying to make up for what we’ve both lost—as if an exorbitant allowance and unbridled credit could bring her back. I mean, I adore him, don’t get me wrong. But I’m not always sure his overcompensation is what I really need.”

“He wants you to have ‘all that money can buy’?”

I nodded.

“And I called you a spoiled princess.”

“It’s okay—I was one, but I’ve changed my ways, even if it wasn’t by choice.”

“I’m sorry about your mom,” he said. “And I’m sorry about what I said before. It’s absolutely none of my business if you want to get back together with your ex.”

“Oh my
god
. How could you have possibly thought I would take back that compulsive liar? Don’t you know me better than that after everything we’ve been through tonight?”