“Coming right up,” said Joe, gently prying his mother’s fingers from around his arm. He went to the cupboard below the countertop where his mother kept her liquor. Since she’d been spending more time in a wheelchair, many of the items that once found a home in the upper cabinets had moved south.
He brought out a bottle of Ballantine’s and a tumbler and poured his mother a finger’s worth. She inhaled the aroma first, moved the amber liquid around in the glass, then downed it in one shot.
She looked at her son and asked, her voice serious, “You know there was someone under that car that was coming after me,” she said.
“I know,” Joe said.
“I think it was Daniella.”
Joe’s eyes closed briefly. “Oh, Jesus.”
“That poor, poor girl,” Lillian said. “This is so horrible.”
Joe nodded with shared grief.
“How many others?” Lillian asked her son. “How many others are dead?”
Joe hesitated before replying. “Reports are coming in from all over. I’m hoping it’s not as bad as it sounds, but it might be. We’re stretched too thin to be able to deal with this on our own. Help’s coming but I don’t know when it’s going to get here.”
“But what about until then?”
“I don’t see a way for those cars to get you here in the house, but to be safe, let’s get you up to the second floor. One of those things might find a way to break through the front door, but I don’t see them climbing a set of stairs.”
As Joe spoke, his voice faltered. When his chin began to quiver, he turned away from his mother so she wouldn’t see.
“Joe?” she said.
When he did not respond, she said his name a second time. He took a moment to compose himself before turning around. “We really should get you up to your room. We’ll take up everything you need.” He forced a smile. “I suppose that would include the scotch.”
“Don’t forget the ice,” she said, nodding her agreement.
Joe got his mother settled up on the second floor. He’d had a stairlift installed a few months ago, with a seat built into it, so he didn’t have to help her up. Once upstairs, he assisted her into the bathroom, discreetly slipping into the hall while she did her business. Then he helped her to her bedroom. She got comfortable in a faded, fraying lounge chair, and he made sure she had something to drink — bottled water, as well as her scotch and some ice — and her favorite snacks, including a cardboard tube of Pringles and some seedless grapes. He set her phone on the table next to her and connected it to a charger.
“Joe,” she said as he was starting to leave the room, “can you grab me the remote?”
It was resting on the bedside table, next to a well-thumbed, used paperback copy of a John Irving novel. Joe grabbed it, and the book, and set them in his mother’s lap.
“I really have to go, Mom,” he said, his face starting to crack again.
She nodded. “Go save the island,” she said. “And be careful.”
He tried to crack a smile. “Later, I’ll arrest myself for stealing a bicycle.”
Joe slipped out of the room. She heard him go down the stairs and out the door. She picked up the remote with her bony hands and hit the red button to turn on the oversized, boxy television that sat atop her dresser. She flipped through the channels until she landed on CNN. Where was Wolf? Wasn’t Wolf supposed to be on now? It was one of the women anchors. Lillian couldn’t keep them all straight. They all looked the same to her. All very young and very pretty. At least when it was Wolf, you knew it was Wolf.
The female anchor was saying, “Details of what, exactly, is happening on Garrett Island continue to come in. There are reports of multiple casualties as autonomous cars made by the Arrival corporation continue to go haywire. And it’s not just happening on the island. We’re hearing that across the country.”
She watched a few more minutes of the news and concluded that she knew more than the reporters did. She’d had some firsthand experience of what was going on here.
Lillian picked up the remote and started flipping through the channels.
“Oh,” she said when she landed on Dr. Phil.
He should do a show on her, she thought. Dr. Phil should do a show about sons who were thinking about putting their mothers in a home.
She couldn’t imagine that Joe would do that now. Not after what she had been through. She’d been traumatized.
Every cloud had a silver lining.
Joe hopped onto his stolen bike and pedaled toward the downtown. The headquarters of the Garrett Island Police Department was one block off the common, and that seemed like the most sensible place from which to get a handle on things.
The street out front of the house he shared with his mother was, at least right now, clear of Arrivals, so he was able to make good time. He was rounding a corner into another part of the neighborhood, the coast still clear, when his cell phone rang.
He took one hand off the handlebars and got the phone out of his pocket. On the screen were the words lisa carver.
So maybe she wasn’t the one who’d been injured at the event. When he’d talked to his dispatcher, he’d said something about the president of the company losing her leg. Maybe she wasn’t as badly hurt as he’d been led to believe. He tapped on the screen to take the call.
“Chief Bridgeman,” he said.
“Joe!”
Who the hell—
“Sandra?” he said.
“Yes!” she cried.
“Are you okay? And why are you using Lisa—”
“Where are you?” she said.
“I just left my house. One of those cars tried to get my mom and—”
“Oh God! Is she okay?”
“She’s fine, she’s fine.”
“Have you seen my kids?” she asked, her voice frantic. “Any chance you’ve seen Katie and Archie? They’re not answering.”
“No, no, I haven’t. I’m almost to headquart—”
“No!” Sandra said. “You need to come here! To the community center. Are you in an actual car?”
“I’ve got a bike. But what’s happening here? I heard about the fire engine and—”
“It’s bad here,” Sandra told him. She lowered her voice. “Lisa Carver’s dead. At least one person from the fire department. Maybe others.”
Joe said nothing.
“Joe, you there?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m here. I just can’t believe all this. I can’t — I just can’t be—”
“I need you here. I’m thinking, if we can get into Lisa Carver’s laptop, maybe we can find a way to stop these cars dead.”
“Okay,” Joe said slowly.
“And of all the people I know, you understand computers better than anyone.”
“I don’t know, Sandra. I mean, there was a time when I was a techie, but it was years ago. They’ve been upgraded like crazy since I worked with them.”
“You’re all I got, Joe.”
“But—”
“Just come by here and see if you can hack your way in. It’s a long shot, I know, but right now, I don’t know what else to do.”
“Okay, I can try. But don’t get your hopes up.”
“And on the way, can you go by my house? See if the kids are there?” Her voice dropped to a whisper and began to crack. “I’m scared to death, Joe. I’m scared to death something has happened to them.”
“Okay,” he said. “I’m on it. Hang tight. I’ll get there as fast as I can.”
Thirty
Running into Discount Bonanza was like entering the heart of a great metropolis. Archie glanced upward at the countless aisles of metal shelves that soared toward the ceiling like skeletal skyscrapers.
At ground level, huge wooden skids were piled high with everything the average American consumer could ever possibly want. Industrial-sized jars of pickles, enough to garnish the annual output of a dozen McDonald’s. Packages with enough rolls of toilet paper to wipe the asses of every single person on Garrett Island, with enough left over to clean up the bums of half of Boston. Nobody came into Discount Bonanza expecting to buy a single tin of tuna. You left with a case of tuna, which then meant you also had to head down to aisle four and buy a bag stuffed with a minimum of five loaves of bread, all squishy and white, so you could make enough tuna sandwiches to last a lifetime.