“Our motivations. We need to know how to act,” he repeats.
“Oh. Did we eat all the bacon?” Ave Maria says, hooking her arms over the seat so her face is up by us in the front.
I hand her what’s left of the bacon. The whole car pretty much smells like pig oil.
Between swine chews Ave Maria says, “Well, I’m beside myself because my sister tried to gouge my eye out witha … with a… ” she looks up at the felted car ceiling. “With a spoon!” she says.
I have to admit, I like it. That girl has hidden talents. God knows I’ve always got a spoon with me. My mother’s.
“But you love your sister too, isn’t that right, distraught sister? You can’t bear for anything too terrible to happen to her?” Little Teena coaches.
“Uh huh!” Ave Maria agrees, chewing seriously.
“I’m the sole legal guardian, is what the paperwork says,” Ave Maria goes.
I smile. I am never going to meet anyone like her in my life again. I know it.
“I’m wanting outta this chickenshit assignment — bucking for a reassignment — homicide. I’m looking to make detective.” He fingers a mutton chop. He waves his finger at us collectively and says, “You two are an embarrassment to me. Beneath me. I’m just looking to unload you,” he points to me, “and bone you,” he points to Ave Maria, “before it’s all over.”
Ave Maria cracks up. I do too. The image of Little Teena A.K.A. the mutton-chopped caseworker boning little miss eye patch while the scary bald teen tries to gouge everyone’s eyes out with a spoon is worthy of an LSD dose.
“So then let’s go over the script again,” Little Teena prods.
“I know what to say,” Ave Maria bleats, nearly hitting her head on the car ceiling. “I’m supposed to make a big deal all distraught-y if we needa … what do you call it?”
“Diversion.” Little Teena shakes his head up and down.
“You say all the cop-ly stuff and give whoever is at the intake desk that whole cool pile of paperwork. Do you wanna practice your cop-y authority voice on us?” Ave Maria’s quite nearly in the front seat with us, her skinny arms and elbows poking everywhere.
Little Teena clears his throat. “We’ ve got a live one here, I’m afraid, emergency intake. They can’t take her up at Chelan so we had to come here. Full up at Chelan. Christ. Kids these days, huh?”
“Fuck that’s hot!” Ave Maria shouts. “Say it again!”
Little Teena complies. Then they go back and forth for a bit in mock bad cop television show lingo. It’s weirdly relaxing.
I look out of the car window again. I push the button and my window goes down. The night air hits my face. I close my eyes. So much like a dream, things are sometimes. Or a movie. If I was filming us driving I’d put a Nick Cave song in. I’d zoom in on ordinary objects in the car — Little Teena’s thick fingers on the steering wheel, the green glow of the speedometer and digital clock. Ave Maria’s Hot Tamales sticking out of the pocket of her jean jacket. And the pink plastic of my Dora purse — the safety pins for eyes — my black skinny jeans knees. It’s a claustrophobic little world the objects we own make for us.
But then I’d pan out to the view beyond the inside of the car, because you can do that with film — you can expand or contract space — you can trick time by going slow motion so that a few seconds of silence riding in a car lasts thirty minutes. You can speed up an entire day and night so it looks like a series of retinal flashes.
If I was filming this scene I’d go from the vastness of a night sky back to each of our faces there in the car — the way faces close up can look like their own universes. Ave Maria’s eyes are blue-green. Like the ocean. Little Teena has a cool little comma scar just under his right eye. It makes him look perpetually shy just under his badassery. My face is like a blank screen to me. I don’t know what there is about my face. Sometimes I’m scared it’s nothing.
My ass buzzes. I pull it out. It’s a text. Ida, please call me.
Mother.
“Let’s just go over the steps again,” Little Teena says.
“Yay!” Ave Maria goes.
I laugh but nothing sounds.
“Step one. Enter and distract intake person. Me at desk, Ave Maria hanging back with spooky sister.”
“Check!” Ave Maria sings.
“Step two. Engage script and hand over paperwork to move toward entrance.”
“Check!” An octave higher.
“Step three. Gain entrance, knock the intaker in the head from behind, get Obsidian.”
“Double check!” Ave Maria operatically sings, then says “can I hit the whoever it is with a Coke bottle? There’s an old-school Coke bottle back here — my mom loves this little Mexican market where they sell the old-school Coke bottles.” She hold it up. “Aren’t they cute? They’re little!”
I look over at Little Teena. Then back at Ave Maria. They continue their fake dialogue and their step rehearsals in their fake hair in Ave Maria’s mom’s Jag. Love isn’t what you were ever expecting. I open my mouth. Nothing comes out. No voice I mean. I smile. Little Teena interprets the silence correctly. Ave Maria pets my sketchy hair. I shove the last of the bacon in my mouth. It’s salty and rubbery yet crisp. What is bacon but fat and gristle and thin strips of ass meat?
Tastes like … family.
30
THE HALFWAY HOUSE LOOKS LIKE ONE OF THOSE GROUP homes for tards. You’ve seen them, usually a two-story dingy dark gray number with security bars on the windows and doors and dead grass for yard contained by a crappy-ass chain link fence.
This one has what looks like a tall surveillance mechanism posted sentry-like near the entrance, but on closer inspection? It’s just a goddamn bug zapper.
“Google Earth it,” Ave Maria says from the back seat of the Jag.
Little Teena does. We’re parked about two blocks away. We put our three heads together in the back of the Jag and study the halfway house on the laptop. Pretty much one way in and out. Through the front. Though fire code probably means there’s a back door. It’s the law. It’s bad to let teens burn up. Hard to get social services funding if you, you know, bar-b-que them. So there must be a back exit.
I delete my mother and text on my cell to Little Teena: Can you hack in? Surveillance?
Christ. It looks like somebody’s big huge crackhouse.
Little Teena taps away at the laptop keyboard. Bless the fingers of Little Teena. He chuckles. “All they’ve got going on is like a series of nanny cams. And electronic locks that are … lemme see … ha. Morons. The electronic locks are all controlled at the front desk. They’ve got a password tumbler from like the Starsky and Hutch years.” He continues typing code.
“Why, it’s just a dumbass little meanness hotel!” Ave Maria pipes.
“Oh my fucking god,” Little Teena says. “Their password? Get this. Their password is … PASSWORD. I can unlock everything from here and disable their idiotic “safety system” without them even knowing it. Fucking figures. Department of Juvenile Justice? I salute you!” Little Teena salutes the air. “Dumb douches.”
Before we leave the car, I text them both: Hatha Breathing. They know because I taught them. We all close our eyes and hold hands. We breathe in for seven seconds. We hold it for seven seconds. We breathe out for seven seconds. We picture the ocean. We do it seven times. When we open our eyes, we are our characters.
As we walk toward the entrance I can hear bugs die zap deaths in the bug zapper. My role is of course to look troubled, dejected, like I might lash out.
Tough gig, huh.
Little Teena carries his air of authority, his clipboard, his fake wad of papers.