Aislin makes a face that says Yep, true.
“Adam, take care of Aislin.” I head off.
It’s the first time I’ve run since the accident. I wasn’t sure I’d ever do it again. My muscles are out of practice, but to my surprise, my breathing is smooth and easy. I wish I were in shorts, not jeans, but it still feels good. More than good.
I reach Paradise Drive and leave the cross streets and houses behind me. There’s a bend in the road, with trees on one side and open hillside on the other.
Right, left, right, left. I’m in high gear now. The familiar rhythm lulls me.
Up ahead on my right is the shattered stump of a big pine tree. The small hairs on the back of my neck rise.
The stump is weathered and gray, mangled. The damage happened long ago.
Six years ago, in fact.
I know this place. I forced myself to come here once, when I was about thirteen. I touched the sharp edges of the wood. It was still clinging to life, but I knew it was dying.
Once was enough.
Now, on foot, it’s unavoidable. My throat closes up and my easy breathing is a memory.
This is the place where my father died. This tree is the one his car hit when he went off the road. That drop is the slope his car plunged down.
I want to keep running, but my legs aren’t having it. I slow to a walk. I stop altogether.
I bend over, hugging myself, and I sob.
No time. No time.
I gulp some air and start running again, faster than before, my legs pistoning.
* * *
From the road you can’t really see the main Spiker building, just the top floor. I can’t run down the steep driveway. I have to walk in giant going-downhill steps, fighting gravity.
I near the entrance to the underground garage. My mother’s gleaming white Mercedes convertible is in her designated space. She’s never put the top down.
I glance back, wondering how far behind me Adam and Aislin are. I’m scared. I’ve rushed in here like I have a plan.
For the first time in my life, I wish I had some kind of weapon.
I survey the garage for something weapony. My mind’s racing with made-up dialogue.
Hi, Mom, Solo and I sold you out and how are you? Nice blouse. By the way, I need some more cash.
So, Mom, while you’re in prison can I stay in the house alone? Please? I’m old enough!
Mom … what the hell?
There’s a fire extinguisher near the entrance. I take it from the hook. It’s surprisingly heavy. How do they expect people to use these things? But I find the size and weight and general metal-ness of the thing kind of reassuring.
Up the elevator. I have to punch in a code to get to my mother’s office. For some reason, my addled brain actually remembers it.
Even now, scared, tired, and a thousand times more confused than I’ve ever been before in my life, even now, with some disturbing montage of Solo and Adam and Aislin and the gangbanger and the scared Mr. Sullivan from accounting, even with the eerie images from the flash drive, even with all of it swirling like a tornado inside my brain, I have energy left over to feel nervous.
Why? Because I’m going to be interrupting my mother.
My mother does not like to be interrupted.