Nocturnal Meetings of the Misplaced Read online

  Polar Bear replied, “I was just wishing my boy a happy Fourth of July.” He wore a smile you might see on a crooked politician’s campaign poster.

  “That’s nice,” she smiled up at him suspiciously, “but rules are rules.”

  “I understand, Miss ...Remember our talk, Finn. See you soon. Real soon.” He made that clicking sound with his mouth and casually sauntered out of the room.

  The nurse plugged the stethoscope in her ears and placed it on my chest, telling me to relax.

  “Relax? Yeah, right.” I muttered. I knew I had to do something. I just didn’t know what.

  The next morning, the nurse’s aide came in with my breakfast tray, but I didn’t even take off the plastic lid. My stomach was tied in knots. I couldn’t eat and was already string-bean skinny. Even though I was worried about my mom, I fell into the slow routine of the hospital life. I got back from therapy and was sitting up in my bed when Silence and Annie poured into my room like light.

  “Hey y’all,” I said pretending things were normal. I felt anything but normal.

  Silence started saying how Annie had a supercool boyfriend now. I immediately returned to the here and now.

  “What boyfriend?” I felt protective and alarmed. There wasn’t any boy nice enough for Annie and that worry brought a pang of jealousy along with it. “Do you have a boyfriend too, Silence?”

  Silence’s eyes sliced into me. “If you don’t know, maybe I don’t.”

  I shut up, but she wasn’t going to let it go that easily. A whisper of a smile crossed her lips, and her eyebrows arched. “Really Finn?”

  “Who’s Annie’s boyfriend?” I asked. A picture of Tommy’s two friends came to my head. I didn’t really like either of those guys, at least not for Annie. “Not Tommy’s friends, I hope?”

  Annie became happily flushed. “Simon took my phone number.” Sounding deflated, she added, “But he lives in Chicago.”

  “Hell, he looks like he’s thirty. He’s way too old for you. You’re a kid.”

  “Finn, I’m the same age as you,” Annie reasoned, squinting at me.

  “Well, I wouldn’t date that old man,” I joked.

  The girls smiled. Silence whispered to Annie.

  I turned up my hearing aid, but it blared, and I still couldn’t hear a thing, so I dialed it back down.

  “I’m gonna leave you two alone for a few minutes. Silence has to ask you something,” Annie announced, elbowing Silence as if to nudge her along.

  “Obvious much?” Silence looked irritated telling her, “Just go, Annie. I got this.”

  Annie gave me a small, awkward smile right before leaving the room. I had a lot on my mind. I hadn’t expected this. It was a curveball. It seemed both girls woke up this morning and decided they wanted boyfriends.

  “Will you be my boyfriend already, dumb ass?” Silence asked.

  My words slipped out. “That isn’t very romantic.” I sounded like a girl.

  She tilted her head and allowed herself a small, amused smile. “You’re supposed to ask me out. I turned thirteen while you were sleeping.” She resumed her place, at the head of my hospital bed. It was the spot she always took.

  “Happy birthday, Si,” I said, reaching for the controls and elevating the bed a little more.

  Silence’s face dropped. “That’s all you’re going to say?” Her green eyes shimmered at me. Next, it sounded like she was spoon-feeding an idiot each word. Maybe she was. “Go on, ask me to be your girlfriend.”

  I paused. “Will you be my girlfriend?”

  Her lips fell to a hard frown and her eyes burned into me. “Why do you want me to be your girlfriend?”

  She had me sweating. “Because you told ...” Her eyes shot warning flares, and I slammed on the brakes, hoping to find just the right words, and then I had it. “Because you’re the coolest girl I know.” I felt mentally exhausted, like when the occupational therapist quizzed me with note cards.

  She leaned in and so did I. Her lips were cushiony and sweet. The kiss felt long overdue. She used tongue first. I went for it, regardless of the fact I had trouble moving my head and my body was a box of rocks. When we parted, I became conscious of my hospital gown and tried to straighten it. I didn’t feel like boyfriend material. After all, I was practically wearing an ugly dress.

  She pulled away, wanting to make it official. This seemed important to her. It was cute.

  “Kay. I’ll be your girlfriend.” She smiled, her fingertips skimming the line of my cheek, tickling my skin. “I moved in with Annie.”

  “That’s great!” I said. At least she would be safe from him. Polar Bear’s threat to kill my mother inhabited the air like a bad smell. I wondered if I should tell Silence. I couldn’t bring myself to and told her, “You’re pretty.” I always thought that when I looked at her.

  “You don’t need to go all hearts and flowers on me, Wilds.” She lightly smacked my arm, I smiled. I was all out of the sweet talk, anyway. “It’s hard to keep the poetry in,” I joked. I was getting sleepy.

  “I bet.” She smirked at me in a very Silence way.

  I could barely walk or even dress myself. How could I be her boyfriend? It was the first time I realized how truly bad off I was.

  Chapter 35

  Questions

  Tommy

  Holden and Reese were having a date night, and Izzy and I were going to spend the night at our grandparents’ house. Apparently, my aunt and uncle didn’t trust me to babysit, even though I always took care of Izzy before we came here to live. I mean, I practically raised her. That wasn’t the part that bugged me the most. What bugged me was how my mom always told me not to trust my grandparents, and now my little sister and I were going to have to spend the night with them.

  The bathroom door was partly open. I knocked.

  Holden called out, “I’ll be out in a minute. I’m just shaving.”

  I went in. “Hey.” I stalled, just standing around, before I put it out there. “Holden, when I talked to my mom, she told me not to trust my grandparents. Is there anything I should know? I have to look out for Izzy.”

  Holden had white shaving cream on his face, like a Santa Claus beard. He just brought the razor to his face, but stopped and said, “Of course not.” He started shaving and talking. “Your mom’s the one who wanted you and Izzy to come here. She had to know you would see your grandparents.”

  To my surprise, my instincts told me he meant what he said. I’m not sure why, but I couldn’t let it go. “What do you remember about Princess? My mom said she lived with your family and ran away?”

  He concentrated on shaving the area around his lip before answering. “Your mom brought this up to me on the phone today, too. There was a girl who stayed with us for a while and she would babysit, but I was young and don’t remember much. Your mother has more important things to worry about.” He looked at my reflection in the mirror.

  “How much younger are you than my mom?”

  “Ah... three years.” Every word he said was casual. I looked for a change in his pupils, a slight shift in posture, but nothing. He wasn’t hiding anything. It made me think maybe my mom should have been happy that Izzy and I had a house to live in and three meals a day.

  “We have a shovel maniac on the loose and Polar Bear going off the deep end. I don’t think you need to villainize your own grandparents.” Holden finished with a grin. He rinsed his face, and patted it dry, becoming more serious. “The shit is about to hit the fan next door. Jana wants Polar Bear out. I’m keeping my handgun on top of the fridge in case I need it.”

  Reese and I had talked about it earlier. I was nervous but happy about Polar Bear being gone.

  Holden grabbed Axe cologne from the medicine cabinet and splashed it on his cheeks.

  I relaxed a little. I wanted to ask him about Annie, but I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to ask. So, sort of thinking aloud, I said, “I should start shaving.”

  Holden turned to face me. His eyes examined my fac
e, giving me a short and leisurely once-over. He tapped my cheek and smirked. “For that, you just need a wash cloth. I think it’s Kool-Aid.” He messed up my hair and walked out of the bathroom.

  “Very funny!” I smiled and yelled after him.

  Chapter 36

  The Cold

  Finn

  I hadn’t told anyone what Polar Bear threatened to do. I had swallowed each word. They sat like rocks at the bottom of my stomach.

  My mom oozed out her loving greetings. I stared up at her, trying to think of what to say. She sat down on the chair next to my hospital bed and gave me a hesitant smile. “What’s wrong, baby?”

  “Maybe you should take Polar Bear back. I mean, I’m not home to protect you. You could take him back just for a little while.” It was the closest I could come to obeying my stepfather’s evil request.

  “How did you know I asked him to leave?”

  A brittle feeling occupied the moment. I had no idea what to say next. Yet, I wanted to tell her. My mom put her hand on the bed and we laced our fingers together. I wanted to walk out of the hospital with my mom and collect the little ones, get on a plane, and never come back. We could move to Iceland. Surely my mom’s parents, my grandparents, would take us in.

  Just then, a sudden cold blew in. I looked up to see a large figure in the doorway. It was Polar Bear in the flesh, huge and more unwanted than ever.

  My mom’s head jerked up. “What are ya doing here?”

  He sauntered closer, chewing on a toothpick. “I come in peace. I’m only checking on the boy.” His words were slick and treacherously friendly. “How ya doing there, buddy?” He brought the toothpick to the other side of his mouth.

  My mom looked down. “I don’t want ya visiting, Finn. I told ya that.”

  I tried to look strong. My eyes fixed on him. Polar Bear stared me down and told my mom, “Well, babe I don’t think Finn minds if I visit. We had a good talk and worked things out.” He flicked the toothpick to the floor.

  The stress moved through me.

  “We had a good talk. Didn’t we, Finn?” He pushed.

  “Yeah, we had a talk.” What could I do? I was a guy who needed help to walk to the bathroom to piss.

  My mom started to adjust my bed sheets, sensing I was cold, when Polar Bear told my mom, “I love you, babe.”

  The hypocrisy made me cringe. I confronted the idea of a man willing to hurt the mother of his children. I hated my stepdad so much in that moment that I thought he should drop dead on the spot. There he stood as smug and alive as ever.

  Chapter 37

  To Grandmother’s House

  Tommy

  We started driving down a narrow, tree-lined road. The branches of the tall trees swayed as the wind played through the treetops. It produced an oddly unsettling sound, composed of pain sculpted into notes. The sudden violent sound of thunder crashed down, followed by a flash of fluorescent lightning. Izzy looked at me with big eyes as Reese turned around to check on her. “It’s just a storm, honey.”

  “I know,” Izzy said, trying to sound brave. I knew she was scared of storms.

  “If someone gets struck by lightning, they become a superhero.” I don’t know why I said it. Maybe I was bored out of my mind from being grounded.

  Right away Izzy decided, “No, they don’t, Tommy.” She was barely five and had to know for sure, “Do they, Reese?”

  “Of course not, Izzy,” Reese replied. “People who get struck by lightning usually need a lot of therapy, you know, like Finn, to get better.”

  Izzy couldn’t let it go. “So, getting struck by lighting is like getting hit in the head with a shovel?”

  Reese paused. “Kind of, Izzy.”

  The rain blew in, hitting the car in diagonal patterns. The swish of the wiper blades battling dark raindrops played on. The headlights bounced giddily down a bumpy road before we pulled up in the drive. At night, my grandparents’ Victorian house in the storm seemed mysterious, and ominous. The mood in the car felt light. I didn’t want to leave it. I had only been here one other time during the day. The house appeared to be nicer than I had remembered. It was a little run-down, but you couldn’t tell as much in the dark. It had probably been a beautiful house back in the day. According to Holden, my grandmother had inherited her parents’ house, leaving her “crazy” brother Earl out of the will completely.

  Holden pulled up as close to the front door as possible. “I say we make a run for it.”

  I took a second before bracing myself to go out in the rain. I heard Holden telling Reese to, “You look beautiful. Stay inside the car and be perfect.”

  The three of us were inside in seconds but soaked. The easy-going feeling we’d had in the car evaporated as soon as we stepped foot in that house. Yet, our grandmother seemed glad enough to see us, hugging me, and Isabella before turning and barking at my grandfather, “Don’t just stand there, go get some towels,” and directed her gaze to Holden saying, “It’s about time you brought me my grandkids.” She almost seemed angry, but quickly composed herself.

  Izzy shivered as the wind rattled its way into the house. Her little face glistened, and her eyelashes were spiked with rain. Our grandfather reappeared, handing each of us a large bath towel. After we all dried off, our grandmother collected the wet towels. Holden promised he would pick us up bright and early and seemed to hesitate before our grandma practically pushed him out the door, cheerfully telling him, “Go already! Celebrate your anniversary!”

  Before I knew it, Isabella and I sat at the kitchen table. The walls were painted pea-soup green with an outdated border of sunflowers around the top of the walls that clashed with the paint. I noticed a giant wooden fork and spoon decorated the wall, as the rain continued to beat and batter the house.

  “That mother of yours couldn’t even give you the same father. There’s not a father to be found between you,” our grandmother said, shaking her head in disappointment. Usually, I didn’t dwell on it. Sometimes it bothered me, like now, when it was hurled at my face. My mom used to say that she always made her feel like crap. I was beginning to understand what she meant.

  My eyes searched Isabella’s face, to see if she was okay. She wore her thinking face and reasoned, “Tommy and Holden are kind of like dads because they’re boys.” She had never said that before. I sat up a little straighter, feeling kind of proud.

  “You poor, little things,” our grandmother said, her bright eyes flickering between us. She had a pair of big, silver hoop earrings that made her long earlobes hang.

  She served us both a plate of cookies and a large glass of milk.

  Izzy burst out with an excited, “Thank you,” and started eating. I guess Izzy was too young to notice our grandmother’s digs.

  I went to grab a cookie loaded with chocolate chips from Izzy’s plate. My grandmother playfully slapped me, letting her hand rest on top of mine for a few seconds. The blue veins on the back of her hand read like a strange map under her thin, wrinkled skin. “You don’t take something from someone else’s plate. That’s rude.”

  “Sorry,” I said and started eating the cookies on my plate. I’d eaten a couple cookies. They tasted sweet, with a bitter aftertaste, reminding me of my grandmother.

  A couple bites later, Izzy announced, “Tommy can have mine, Grandma. I’m not very hungry.” Izzy started gulping down her milk.

  “No. No. No. Eat up.”

  Izzy wiped away her milk mustache with her wrist. She had a funny look on her face but started eating again as instructed. When the phone rang, and our grandmother complained, “Why doesn’t that old man answer it,” and she jumped up and left the room.

  “Don’t the cookies taste good, Izzy?” I asked.

  “No, they taste a little funny.”

  Izzy liked everything sweet. My paranoia rose to the surface. Our grandmother hated our mom. Maybe she was planning on poisoning us?

  “Don’t eat them.” I bolted up, rushing over to the large wooden trash can and buried se
veral of Izzy’s cookies beneath some trash that was already there. Next, I threw a few of my cookies away too, carefully concealing them under some garbage.

  “We can pretend we ate them.” I sat back down next to Isabella, a little unnerved. “Do you feel okay?”

  “Uh-huh,” she replied as cute and calm as ever. “They just weren’t very good.”

  “Yeah. Everything’s fine. Let’s just not eat here.”

  Grandma came back in, circling, and hovering over us, for a moment her gaze lit on my face. “Why shouldn’t she eat here? Not used to home cooking?” She asked teasingly, but I knew she was really offended.

  The question awkwardly hung in the air. “Um, sorry, Grandma, Izzy already wolfed down her cookies and I don’t want her to get sick.” Sometimes I became overly polite when I was uncomfortable.

  “Stop calling her Easy!” Grandma said. “Call her Isabella.”

  “Grandma, Tommy said Izzy, not easy.” Isabella giggled.

  Our grandmother shot me an irritated look. She probably wasn’t trying to poison us. That seemed farfetched. I knew it sounded bad, but I didn’t really like her. The thunder exploded, sounding even closer.

  “God just moving his furniture around,” my grandmother said, collecting our plates buzzing around the kitchen, small and manic. The thunder cracked louder than ever, snapping me to attention. Within a second, the lights went out. It went pitch black. I heard my sister’s small voice say, “Tommy, I’m scared.”

  “I’m right here, Izzy.”

  Isabella and I fumbled, finding one another’s hand, underneath the table.

  Grandma banged around until she produced a flashlight. “Follow me, kids. I’ll get your grandpa to build a fire,” she said.

  I just didn’t trust these people. I vowed to sleep on the floor next to Isabella that night. No one could stop me.