Текст книги "Prodigal Blues"

Автор книги: Gary A. Braunbeck

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"Seriously?"

"Yes.  It actually feels strange on my tongue to use a contraction again."

Arnold nodded his head.  "Do it again."

"No.  You try it."

"I don't think so—whoa.  That does feel weird, man."

"Let me!  Let me!"  Thomas was actually bouncing in his chair.  "I want to try it."

Christopher laughed.  "Go ahead.  Bet you can't."

"Bet I can."

"Then do it."

Arnold knelt by the arm of the wheelchair.  "C'mon, Thomas—dude, that feels good!  I'm gonna say it again—c'mon!  Oh, wow!"

"Okay, okay," said Thomas.  "Let me see…"

Christopher sighed in mock irritation, then winked at Arnold.

"Okay, okay, I got," Thomas all but squealed.  "I can use contractions anytime I want!  There!"

"Didn't quite make, dude," said Arnold.

Thomas looked crestfallen.  "I didn't?"

"You did that time."

"I—?"  Then his face brightened as he replayed it.  "Oh, yeah…I did, didn't I?"

"My man is on a serious roll," laughed Arnold, slapping Thomas's shoulder with great affection.

Thomas wasn't stopping.  "Can't!  Won't!  Ain't!"

"Turning into a regular party animal, my man."

"Isn't.  Wasn't!  Couldn't!  Wouldn't!  Shouldn't!"

"Don't get carried away, now," said Rebecca.  Then, to me:  "I gave him a pain shot just before you woke up.  It takes a little while before it kicks in with him.  Then he just becomes goofy."

"Didn't…uh…aren't!  Yeah!  Uh…."

"I think that's most of them," said Arnold.  Then:  "Hold on a second.  'That's' a contraction."

"It's!" shouted Thomas  "What's!  Oh, boy!  Uh…uh…"

"Don't," said Christopher.

"Yeah—don't, that's another one.  Then there's—there's there's, and then—"

"No," said Christopher.  "I wasn't prompting you—"

"Wasn't!" squealed Thomas.

"Already said that," whispered Arnold.

"Knock it off!"  Christopher wasn't trying to dampen their fun—it was obvious they hadn't enjoyed anything in a long, long time—but he was trying to get things under control.  "What I meant was don't keep doing that, okay?  Thomas?"

"…okay…"

"Please don't pout."

"I'm not."

"Then what are you doing?"

"I'm…I'm thinking."

"About what?"

A shrug.  "Stuff."

"Care to let the rest of us in on it?"

"Nope.  It's secret stuff."

"Thomas?  We don't keep secrets from each other, remember?"

"Okay."

"So what were you thinking about?"

"Parking spaces."

Christopher blinked.  "Huh?"

"I was thinking about those special parking places with the wheelchair signs.  Mommy will be able to park there now.  It's a lot closer to the stores.  I think she'll like that."  He looked at me, snickered once, then burst out laughing.

As did the rest of them.

I almost joined in, but a quick look from Christopher—one that said, You've got a reprieve, Pretty Boy, but fuck-up and I'll kill you—kind of drained the humor from the moment for me.  So I just smiled and hoped that would suffice.

"Let's go," said Christopher.  "We need to get our game faces on."  He nodded toward me.  "He can help this time.  After he puts the others back in the duffel bag."

8. I Wish I Still Had Braces

It took several hours to re-apply everyone's makeup, as well as each individual prosthesis.  Rebecca and Arnold weren't terribly difficult, just time-consuming, but—just as Rebecca had predicted—Christopher's face took, it seemed, forever; most of it had been torn off so violently that it was beyond repair.  At least his nose and hairpiece had survived.  If we'd had to reconstruct the nose, God only knows how long it might have taken; as it was, making a new ear, cheek, and upper lip took the better part of four hours.

Their makeup kit was an extensive and expensive one.  Grendel had purchased it for them, and shown them how to apply the basics, as well as how to make and apply prosthetics.  "We had to wear our 'party faces' for the meetings," Rebecca explained.  "I don't think his friends ever really knew what he'd done to our faces; they just figured the makeup was all part of the fun."

They could only wear their false faces for four to five hours; after that, the latex and spirit gum started to really soak down into their tender flesh; it became incredibly painful after that, and potentially dangerous.  "It isn't as if we have skin to spare," said Christopher, an almost-apologetic tone in his voice.  I made no reply.  I couldn't figure him out; one minute he's a howling lunatic threatening to do a Dirty Harry all over my face, and the next he's this mild-mannered, sit-down-and-chat-for-a-spell-type who spoke to me as if I was one of the gang.

"You did a nice job with this," he said to me after I'd applied his new upper lip.  "I usually make it too thick and use too much spirit gum and it burns like hell."

"Don't talk," said Rebecca, applying the base and gently blending it.

Thomas did not get makeup of any kind; his burned skin was still far too sensitive to tolerate even so much as light powder.

"He's on an awful lot of pain killers," Rebecca whispered to me.  "Between his face and his legs having been cut off, he's always in a lot of pain.  Plus I have to rub a couple of different types of salves and ointments on his face three times a day."

"So you're the unofficial nurse of the group?"

"Yes.  I don't mind, not really.  But sometimes I get so busy with them I forget to take my own medicine, and that's not good."

"Do you still need pain killers, as well?"

She shook her head.  "Not so much anymore.  But I have to have my insulin shots."

"Do you have any with you?"

"Yes.  I keep it in a cooler with ice.  I got it in the mini-fridge over there."

"Where's the rest of the medicine?"

She nodded toward a large black square beside the closet; the thing was bigger than most suitcases, and easily twice as deep.  "It has a bunch of compartments that fold out.  Christopher said there's probably fifty or sixty thousand dollars' worth of drugs in that case alone."

"Are there others?"

"Uh-huh.  Two more just like that in the bus."  She finished blending the first layer of base, then decided that the corners of Christopher's mouth needed a bit more work.

I decided to use this opportunity to ask questions; Christopher wasn't in a position to open his mouth and protest.  I hoped.

"What's in the trailer?"

Christopher's hand shot up and grabbed her wrist; Rebecca gasped, almost dropping the applicator brush.  Christopher, not opening his mouth, stared at her and shook his head.  Back, then forth.  Once.

"I'm sorry," I said to both of them.  "I didn't mean to pry.  I don't want anyone getting into trouble.  It's not her fault, okay?  I was just curious."

Christopher gave a short, slow nod.

Rebecca made some last-minute touchups to the makeup around the prosthesis, added a little powder, then said, "Okay.  Go over by the air conditioner and kneel in front of it for a few minutes.  Make sure the air's right on your face and do not talk for at least five minutes or else that's all going to come loose."

Christopher gave her a look that only she could read; Rebecca smiled, then playfully slapped his arm.  "Go on, you.  Go dry your mug."

He went over to the air conditioner in the window and knelt.  After a moment, he reached over and turned the setting to high.  Cold air blasted into the room.

"Won't he catch a cold or something?" I asked.

"Probably, but it's the quickest way to make sure it dries.  How do I look?"  She sat back and cupped her hands around her face.  "Am I still supermodel material?"

I smiled.  "You look fine.  In fact, it looks a lot better than before.  It looks a lot more natural, I mean.  Did you…"  I leaned closer.  "…did you pinch some of the latex to make it look like wrinkles?"

"A little bit.  Did it work?"

I nodded my head.  "They look really good.  Hopefully no one will wonder why a fifteen-year-old girl has wrinkles around her eyes."

"I wanted to look more mature this time."

I sat back and examined the whole of her face.  "You know, you do.  You look older.  It works for you."

She smiled.  "You probably can't tell, but I'm blushing."

"Did I say something wrong?"

"No… it's just… I'm not used to having a nice guy look at me, that's all."

I glanced toward Christopher, who was still face-first in the arctic blast, then leaned closer to Rebecca.  "Can I ask you something personal?"

"In a minute.  Right now we need to get you fixed up."  She reached into her bag and pulled out a needle, thread, and several buttons.  "Your shirt.  Can't have you walking around with it torn up like that."  She leaned forward, found the first spot that was missing a button, and began sewing it back on.

"So you do seamstress duties, as well?"

She laughed.  "I've seen these guys try to sew.  They're really bad at it.  I mean, it's good for a laugh, but then I always have to fix up their thumbs and fingers because they jab themselves so much.  So"—she finished one button and began the next—"I decided it was easier for me if I did all the sewing.  What was it you wanted to ask me?"

"What happened to your voice?"

Another throaty laugh.  "You mean why do I sound like Lauren Bacall with a frog in her throat?"  She shrugged.  "They liked it when I screamed during the meetings.  The louder, the better.  Grendel liked to make me scream, too.  I feel like I've been screaming for two years.  I guess it messed up my throat, y'know?"

"Does it hurt to talk?"

"No.  Unless it does and I just got used to it.  Does that make sense?"

"Yeah, it does… and I'm sorry."  I sat in silence as she double-checked the button.  I wondered what sort of dreams she had, or if she dreamed at all.  I remembered some line from a novel I'd read a few years ago, wherein the novelist, remarking on the number of homeless girls the narrator saw on the streets, said:  They are all our daughters, and we are not caring for them very well.  There was a strength about Rebecca that I envied, yet at the same time it sickened me to think of how she'd come by it.  I wondered what the rest of her life was going to be like.  I wondered a lot of things about her, all of it tinged with sadness.  Finally, I said:  "Look, I don't mean for this to sound stupid or rude, but… you seem awfully okay.  You come off as a lot older than fifteen.  I mean, after all you've been through, you're pretty together.  Most people would be a mess."

She hesitated with the third and last button, one frozen hand pulled back, connected to me by a single thread, and in that moment, I saw it in her eye; in one blink the sparkle was there, and the next… nothing.  Dull and dead.

"I have to be okay," she whispered, her voice thin and quavering as she resumed sewing.  "The rest of them wouldn't know what to do if I ever"—her voice broke, her lower lip trembled, and for a moment the gleam of tears began forming—"…if I ever let them know how much it hurts, how much it scares me and makes me want to die, I just don't think they could handle it."  She took a deep breath.  "I used to have braces.  I really hated those things.  I wish I still had braces.  Now I have bad dreams.  Maybe my folks can send me to a doctor or something."  She released her breath, and the sparkle returned.  "We just don't let each other think about it or talk about it unless we have to, like with you today.  We had to tell you about it.  By the way—how are you doing?"

The question surprised me.  "All right, I guess."

She finished the last button, then patted the shirt, smiling at her work.  "You sure?"

I shrugged.

She reached out and squeezed my hand.  "How bad was it?  What you saw?"

I swallowed, then closed my eyes; the image of Grendel kneeling waited behind the lids.  I opened my eyes and ran my hand through my hair.  "I wouldn't know where to begin.  It was… it was the most horrible thing I've ever seen, Rebecca.  Don't ever ask Christopher about it.  Don't ever make him tell you.  Don't even wonder about it, okay?  Just know that it was… it was something that… diminishes you by looking at it.  I'll never forget it, and I wish I could.  God, how I wish…."

She leaned over and gave me a hug.  "You're a really nice guy, you know that?"

"Thank you."

She pulled back and stared at me.  "You don't believe that, do you?  That you're a nice guy?"

"No.  Maybe.  Sometimes—hell, I don't know."

"Well, take it from me, Mark Sieber, you are a nice guy.  I've known guys who weren't nice.  I'm pretty sure I can tell the difference.  Okay?"

I tried smiling at her, settled for nodding my head.  "Yeah."

A nod.  "Okay, then."

Arnold came out of the bathroom and sat next to her.  "Man, I'd forgotten what it was like to have the john all to yourself.  I miss anything?"

Rebecca pointed.  "Christopher's drying his face."

Arnold leaned toward her.  "Did you put wrinkles on this time?"

"Yes."

"Well, shit…if I'd've known that, I would have had you give me some."  He looked at me.  "I could get used to this cussing thing."  Then, to Rebecca:  "You'd better be careful about making yourself look too different.  Mess around with the look too much and your folks maybe won't know who you are."

"They'll know," she said.

"I hope so."  Arnold leaned toward me.  "See, what happened was, we got this one Michelle Pfeiffer movie… I don't remember what it was called…"

"The Deep End of the Ocean," said Rebecca, then:  "I think Michelle Pfeiffer's real pretty."  She brushed some of her phony hair away from her face, then—reconsidering—brushed it back down.

"Stupid title for a movie," said Arnold.  "Wasn't even an ocean in it.  See, in the movie, Michelle Pfeiffer's little boy, he gets stolen from her when he's real young—like two or three, right?  They look for him for a long time but then they give up, and one day, like, five years later, Michelle Pfeiffer sees him again, and even though he looks all different, she recognizes him right away.  He doesn't look a thing like he did when he was stolen, but she still knows who he is."

"We talked about that a lot," said Rebecca, "and Christopher said that the reason she recognized him, is because she was his mother and that any woman who had given birth to a child would… would… what was the word he used?"

"Instinctually," shouted Christopher.

"You're supposed to be not talking," said Rebecca.  "And thank you."  She turned back to me.  "Christopher said that any mother would instinctually know their own child, no matter how much they might have changed."

"So that got us to thinking," said Arnold.  "We all could mostly remember what we looked like when Grendel took us, so we got real good at using the makeup to make our faces look like they used to look—I mean, like we remember them looking.  Or something like that."

Rebecca patted his hand.  "Grendel did not allow us to have any mirrors, except once a month, before the meetings.  We got to use mirrors then."

"But you can forget an awful lot about your face in a month," added Arnold.  "I never thought about it much before, but, man, a lot of people sure do spend a lot of time looking at themselves in mirrors."

"Or windows, or shiny surfaces," said Rebecca.

"Or puddles," said Thomas from the corner.  "Don't forget about puddles."

"Or puddles," said Arnold.  "So we been working on getting our faces back the way we remember them looking.  We don't have pictures of ourselves, though, so we're just guessing.  I just hope that Christopher's right and that our moms will know us, anyway."

"How do you know where your families are?" I asked.

Arnold and Rebecca looked at one another, then over at the still-kneeling Christopher, who raised one of his hands, index finger and thumb curled into the "OK" symbol.

"Grendel kept track," said Arnold.  "He kept track of how long they looked for us, when they gave it up, if they moved, everything."  His eyes became suddenly sad.  "That's how I found out my grandma died."

"He always let us know when our families gave up looking for us," said Rebecca, gently rubbing Arnold's back.  "He really enjoyed that part.  'I told you they didn't care about you,' he always said.  'Only I love you.  Only I care what happens to you.'  Yeah… he really enjoyed that."

Arnold pulled over the other laptop and started typing with the keys.  "All of the information is in here—my family's still living in the same place, but Rebecca's family moved about a year ago.  Thomas's folks moved, too… about five blocks from his old house."  He showed me his own file, and all the information was there.  It was incredibly thorough; not just about him, but about all the members of his immediate family.  I wondered just how many city and police officials were parts of Grendel's inner circle.

"He's got files on here for the four of us, and all the other kids, too."  Arnold called up a section of map and showed it to me, explaining about the various color codes:  their "delivery" route was marked by a bright green line; an area highlighted in blue marked a place Grendel had already visited and acquired a child, places to which he did not want to go back because he didn't believe in tempting fate; an area highlighted in orange marked a potential grab point—rest stops, parks, busy restaurants, school playgrounds, etc., places where there were usually a lot of people and at least one child left unattended for a minute or less; and the red areas (this surprised me, because I wouldn't have thought Grendel so obvious) were hotspots—not for grabbing children (at least, not for him), no; these were hotspots for meeting other pederasts, known hangouts where he could, if the whim came on, meet out-of-towners with similar interests; most of these were rest stops and city parks, with a small gold star to mark the locations of the public rest-rooms.

"He once told me that you could find someone there any night of the week," said Arnold.  "These guys told each other where they went for… you know.  I guess there are kids who go there because they want to meet guys like this."  He shook his head.  "Man, I don't get that at all."

I couldn't help but notice one of the red-highlighted areas lay along their—our—route, and had been further delineated with a silver square.

"What's with the square?" I said, and began to point when the laptop's lid was suddenly pushed closed.

"I leave for five minutes," said Christopher, "and you two spill everything."

Rebecca protested.  "But you said—"

"—it was okay to tell him about Grendel keeping track of our families," snapped Christopher, pulling the computer from Arnold's lap.  "I did not say show him the route.  Now he knows where we are."

"No, I don't."

Christopher glared at me; his face had dried very nicely.  "Don't try to pull one over on me, Pretty Boy."

"I don't know where we are!  All I saw was the green line and the colored spots along the way.  Look, Christopher, I swear to you I didn't see anything else—no town names, interstate or exit numbers, nothing.  I just wanted to know about the silver square."

"You'll find out soon enough."  Then:  "All right, let's grab everything and get the hell out of Dodge."

"I want a pizza," said Arnold.

"What?"

"Don't 'what' me, man!  I'm hungry and I want a pizza and some pop.  There's a Hut right down the road, let's call one in.  Sign says they got a two-for-one going on."

"No."

"They got a drive-thru, Christopher.  We're not gonna have to walk inside or nothing."

"I said no."

"And I said I'm hungry."  Arnold was on his feet now, standing right in front of Christopher.  "It ain't like we can't afford it, not with all the money we took from him.  It's right on the way and I say we get one."

"I could go for a slice or three," said Rebecca.

"With extra cheese," said Thomas.  "I like extra cheese."

"What is this?" said Christopher.  "A democracy all of a sudden?  You guys put me in charge and I said no."

"If you don't let us get something to eat," said Arnold, stepping closer so that his nose was level to Christopher's upper lip, "then I'm gonna start munching on Mark's spare parts and we can all talk about the good old days."

After that, dead silence.

They stood glaring at each other.  I almost added that I was hungry, as well, but no one had asked.

Finally Christopher said, in a tight voice:  "So… you're getting some of that old nerve back, huh, Arnold?"

"You know it."

After that, more silence; this even deader than the first.

Christopher stepped back—I was sure he was going to haul off and hit Arnold—and reached for something in his back pocket.  "Good for you.  It's about time, my man."  He produced a cell phone, tossing it to Arnold.  "Get the number and phone us up an extra-large pie."

"With extra cheese," said Thomas.

"And green peppers," said Rebecca.

"I want shrooms," Arnold added.  "It's a two-for-one on extra large, so there's gonna be shrooms.  And sausage."

"Can we get pepperoni, too?" I asked.  Everyone looked at me.  "In case you guys have forgotten, it's been a while since I had anything substantial to eat."

"And pepperoni for the guest of honor," said Arnold, finding the number in the phone book and then calling in the order.

"Get the thin and crispy crust," Christopher said, "not that deep dish number.  There will be no argument on this point.  I never liked their deep dish."  Then:  "Hey, Pretty Boy."

"I really wish you'd stop calling me that."

He leaned down so that his eyes—so cold right now, so much like they were in the video—were staring right into mine.  "Swear to me on your wife's grave that you didn't see anything besides colors on that map."

I did not blink.  "I swear.  Nothing."  There was no doubt in my mind that he would not hesitate to kill Tanya—and probably right in front of me—if I lied to him.

"Pinkie-swear?"

So he'd heard that part, too.  "Pinkie-swear."

He stared at me for a few more moments, then stood up.  "I'll take your word for it, Pretty Boy.  Do I have to remind you…?"

"About the gun?  No, I think I might manage to retain that."

"Good.  By the way"—he slapped a set of keys into my hand—"you're driving for a while.  I'm tired."

"Hey," called Arnold.  "Do we want free cinnamon sticks or what?"

I was amazed at how quickly they were able to gather all the bags, cases, equipment, and other items they'd brought inside from the bus.  As soon as everyone was packed up and ready to go, Arnold peeked out the window; for the first time I saw that we were in a ground unit of a two-story motel with at least three separate buildings.  We were at the farthest possible end of the farthest possible building.

Arnold reached into his shoulder-bag and pulled out a set of binoculars.  "It looks good," he said.  "The dude behind the desk is talking on the phone and his back's to us."  He put the binoculars away.  "Good time to get."

Christopher reached into his pocket and pulled out a wad of cash half the size of my fist, peeled off six fifty-dollar bills, and put them on the nightstand along with a note that Rebecca had just finished writing.  "We pay our way," he said to me.  "It's up to the maids whether or not they give the management their share."

I wanted to ask how they'd gotten everyone in here without being spotted, but then Rebecca was wheeling Thomas through the door, Arnold was right behind them, and Christopher had me by the elbow, pushing me toward the bus and trailer.  It couldn't have taken ten seconds for us to clear that room.  I felt like we'd forgotten something, but I couldn't say what.