I gestured for something to write on, so I could give them the combination and they’d have this padlock back in service. They obviously had much bigger things in mind.
“What do you think?” Mr. Marsh said. “Can he use him?”
I didn’t know who they were talking about. I wasn’t sure I liked the sound of it, but Jerry Slade was already smiling and nodding his head.
“Damned straight. How could he not use him?”
“This could be it,” Mr. Marsh said. “This could be our ticket out of hell.”
It was just after midnight when I got back to Milford, but the liquor store was still open. Uncle Lito was behind the register, the phone to his ear. He slammed it down when I stuck my head in the door.
“Where in blazes have you been all night?”
I made a digging motion.
“Since noon? You worked for what, twelve hours?”
I gave him the thumbs-up and backed out the doorway. I heard him calling to me, but I kept walking. Back to the house. To my room. I sat down at my desk. I didn’t feel like sleeping. I didn’t feel like drawing. I just sat there and wondered what I’d gotten myself into.
I took out the leather case from my back pocket. I opened it and sorted through the tools. At least I’ve got these now, I thought. I’ll take care of these like fine jewels.
I didn’t know any better. I didn’t know that once you’ve proven yourself useful to the wrong people, you’ll never be free again.
The next day, my uncle was still pissed at me for leaving him hanging all night. Sitting at the kitchen table, eating his cereal. “That guy you work for,” he said, “you know he’s crazy. He could have killed you and buried you in his backyard for all I knew.”
I made a fist and rubbed it in a circle against my heart. He’d never been great with the sign language, but he knew that one. I’m sorry.
“You’re growing up. I know that. You’re at that age, you think you know everything.”
I nodded at him, wondering who he was even talking about. Certainly not me.
“I was seventeen myself once. I know that’s hard to imagine. Of course, I hadn’t dealt with half of what you’ve had to deal with.”
I couldn’t help wondering where he was going with this.
“You know, when I was seventeen, there was only one thing I wanted to do.”
Oh, please. Don’t go there.
“Okay, two things, but there’s one in particular I’m talking about here. Can you guess?”
I shook my head.
“Come on out to the store with me. I was going to give this to you yesterday.”
I followed him out of the house and around to the liquor store. He put a key in the back door and disappeared inside. When he came back out, he was pushing a motorcycle.
“It’s a Yahama 850 Special,” he said. “It’s used, but it’s in great shape.”
I stood there looking at it. The seat was black with a bronze trim. The chrome exhausts shone in the bright sunlight. If he had rolled out a spaceship, I wouldn’t have been any less surprised.
“One of my regulars couldn’t cover his tab. He offered me this bike if I would call it all square.”
That must have been one hell of a tab, I thought.
“Come on, saddle up. Hold on, I got you a helmet here.”
I took the handlebars from him while he went back inside. He came back out with a helmet and a black leather jacket.
“You need this, too,” he said. “I hope it’s the right size.”
I would have been speechless even if I could speak. I put the jacket on. Then he helped me put on the helmet. I sat on the bike and felt the whole thing bounce up and down under my weight.
“New shocks, he told me. New brakes. Tires are okay, not great. We’ll get you some new ones soon.”
I still couldn’t believe it was happening. I was actually supposed to ride this thing?
“Take it nice and easy at first, eh? Go ahead, give it a try.”
After he showed me how to start it, I tried putting it in gear and giving it a little gas. It just about took off from right underneath me. I tried again and made sure I was ready for it. After a couple of circles in the parking lot, I was on my way down the street. I took it slow at first, afraid I’d end up on the hood of somebody’s car. Then I started to get the hang of it. It was much easier to stay balanced than I would have imagined. And I had to say, the whole experience felt pretty damned good.
I took the bike back, but my uncle was already stationed behind his cash register, ringing up his first customer of the day. He gave me a wave, told me to go back out and get to know the bike. He gave me a few bucks to fill up the tank. Then I was off.
I spent the rest of the morning riding. You don’t realize just how much pickup one of those babies has. From an absolute dead stop, if you really crank it, it feels like you’re on a rocket. I headed west on the back roads, out into what was then still farmland. I found a new hatred for dirt roads that have been freshly oiled, nearly killing myself the first time I hit one. After that I stuck to pavement and didn’t have any other close calls. It was just me and the sound of the machine between my legs and the wind whipping against my helmet. I wanted to share this feeling with Amelia. To take her by the hand and sit her down on the back of the bike. I could already feel her hands wrapped around my waist.
I made one more stop to buy a pair of sunglasses. And another helmet for Amelia. Now I had everything I needed in life. I got back on that bike and headed straight for her house.
So I rode out to that big white castle of a house gleaming in the sun, feeling like I owned the whole world. Feeling like this could be the day that I start talking. I mean, why not? Maybe this is what it would take.
Today, though, I was going to get something a little bit different.
I saw Mr. Marsh’s car in the driveway, but when I knocked on the door, nobody answered. I knocked again. Nothing.
I wandered around the house to the backyard and looked under the tent. The plants Mr. Marsh had dragged back there were all starting to wilt, so I went looking for a watering can and spent the next few minutes walking back and forth between the tent and the faucet.
Then I knocked on the back door. When nobody answered, I pushed the door open and went inside. I walked through and peeked into Mr. Marsh’s office. Nobody there. I looked up the stairs and saw that Amelia’s door was closed. I went up and knocked.
“Who is it?” she said from inside.
I knocked again. What else could I do?
“Come on in.”
When I opened the door, I saw her sitting at her desk. Her back was to me. She didn’t say a word. I hesitated, finally came into the room and went over to where she was working. I wanted to touch her shoulders, but I didn’t.
She was drawing something. Buildings, an alleyway. Lots of shadows. There was a long figure in the foreground, but it was hard for me to see exactly what she was doing with it. I stood there for a long time, watching her work.
“If I don’t talk,” she said, “it’s going to be pretty quiet in here, huh?”
She turned around, finally, and looked me in the eyes for the first time that day.
“My mother killed herself. Did you know that?”
I nodded. I remembered Mr. Marsh telling me that, on that very first day, before I had even seen Amelia.
“Today’s the anniversary. Five years ago.”
She still had the pencil in her hand. She twirled it in her fingers like a miniature baton.
“Five years ago exactly, at one o’clock in the afternoon. Give or take a few minutes. I was in school when it happened.”
She got up and went over to her dresser. She went through a stack of papers and drawings and pulled out a portfolio. I wasn’t about to tell her so, but this was the same portfolio I had looked through the night we had all broken into this house. It was the first time I had seen her drawings, the first time I had seen her face. I remembered there were some other drawings in there, too. Of an older woman. These were the same drawings I was about to see again.