The Leaving Part 16

"Not interested."

He ordered another vodka on the rocks. "Someone's going to do it. I'm just saying . . . why not you?"

"Yeah, why not you?" Tammy said, and Scarlett wondered whether Adam and Sarah had already inked book deals. "You were always reading, reading, reading. Couldn't get you to stop reading. If you love books so much-"

"When I was five?"

"Yes," Tammy said.

"I knew how to read before kindergarten," Scarlett said, but it was a question for Tammy. Now that she was thinking of her as that-Tammy-she couldn't un-think it.

"Yes, ma'am." Tammy's foundation wasn't quite the right match for her skin.

"In this book of mine," Scarlett said, "is it aliens who did it?"

"You wouldn't have to say for sure." Tammy gave Steve a look and said, "As I've said, no one can say for sure. But I bet it'd sell like hotcakes if it was aliens."

"Maybe you should write a book!" Scarlett said.

"Maybe I will!" Tammy took a pull off her drink with a slim red c.o.c.ktail straw, then looked out the window, like there was something really fascinating out there.

The silence felt tight around Scarlett's throat.

An invisible necktie of awkwardness and anger.

Steve said, "You do know how to tell a good story, Tammy. I remember those nights I'd just sit at the bar, when there was hardly anyone else there, and I'd be thinking, d.a.m.n, she sure can talk."

Looking at the ocean, Scarlett tried to hatch an escape plan.

She should run to the end of the pier, jump off, and hope to be rescued by the crew of some boat bound for a faraway land.

Or she could just walk toward the sh.o.r.e and into the water until it buried her. Maybe hope for some dolphin or manatee or mermaid to deliver her to some fantastical underwater city? Or maybe just to . . . wherever she'd been before?

Steve was still talking. "Then I got to wondering what else you might be good at," he said, and Scarlett's mother said, "Oh, stop."

Yes.

Please.

Stop.

"Seriously, though. A book," Steve said. "Promise us you'll think about it?"

Lucas

Lucas half expected a flock of birds or bats to fly out of the RV, but it was eerily quiet.

Dead still.

He followed his brother into the dim compartment, swatting at thick spiderwebs. Ryan turned on a lamp that flooded the room with golden light. There were Post-its and articles on every wall and cabinet door; even the windows were mostly covered.

A large whiteboard blocked one window, with crazy notes scrawled in black marker.

Lucas saw his own name-the first box of six, in the top left corner-and read, ONE WEEK BEFORE IT HAPPENED, LUCAS SAID THEY WERE BEING FOLLOWED BY A MAN CARRYING WRAPPING PAPER.

He turned to Ryan. "What is this man-with-wrapping-paper thing all about?"

Ryan came to his side and stared at the whiteboard while he spoke. "We were walking home from my baseball game. And you kept stopping and turning around and then walking and stopping and turning around, and it was driving me crazy because I just wanted to get home and tell Dad about my two hits, and I finally asked you why you were stopping, and I guess I was mean-sounding and you said, 'No reason.' But then a few minutes later, you said, 'It's just that there's a man following us.'"

Ryan paused then, took a breath, shook his head.

"I told you that you were being ridiculous. And you said that he was carrying something that looked like wrapping paper, and I said something like, 'Oooh, the scary man is going to wrap us and take us to a party,' and that was the end of it . . . until a week later, when you disappeared.

"I told the police about it, and they interviewed some of the guys on the team, and people said they remembered seeing this guy with wrapping paper hanging around the ball field. But of course they never found the guy. There were a few attempts at police sketches, but none of them looked anything alike and they started to think that the guys didn't really remember seeing the guy, just wanted to be a part of something and be helpful.

"Anyway." Ryan looked like he'd aged two years telling the story. "If I hadn't been in such a hurry, maybe I would have seen the guy and everything would have been different."

"Maybe." Lucas felt his whole body un-tense now that he knew. "Maybe he was just a guy. With wrapping paper."

"Something that looks like wrapping paper is what you said."

"What looks like wrapping paper?" Lucas asked.

"You're the one who saw it." Ryan shrugged. His phone buzzed and he pulled it out. "I'm supposed to meet Miranda."

"What's the situation with you two, anyway?" Lucas lifted a pile of newspaper clippings, started to sift.

"The situation?"

"How'd you meet? How long have you been together? Is it serious? Does she live here?"

"What are we, girlfriends now?"

"All right, whatever. Don't tell me." Lucas headed toward the bedroom section to see what was there.

"Hold up," Ryan said. "Sorry. I'm just not much of a, you know, talker. About stuff like that."

Ryan sat down at the small kitchen table. Lucas came back and sat across from him. Their knees. .h.i.t. The table was barely visible under piles of magazines and notes.

"She came into work one night about a month ago."

"You have a job?"

"Part-time valet at the Tiki Tower."

"That crazy-looking hotel?"

Ryan nodded. "I parked her car. We flirted. She was still at the bar with her friends when I got off, so we hung out and that was pretty much it. Dad was getting sick of her hanging around, I think. But she has roommates she can't stand, so we never go there."

Lucas tried to picture his brother wearing a lei, exchanging pleasantries with strangers. It was not an easy scene to imagine. "Shouldn't you be in college?"

"I am. Also part-time," Ryan said.

"Her, too?" It dawned on Lucas that he might actually have to go to . . . high school?

"She's taking a year off. She has this business that's actually doing okay. She sells these retro/vintage-type iron-on T-shirts on the Internet. Mr. Magoo and Betty Boop and all that stuff." He gestured to Lucas's shirt. "The Wonder Twins."

Lucas looked down. "Never heard of any of them."

Ryan shrugged and got up. "Anyway, I was thinking about seeing if she wanted to move in and start paying rent. Then hopefully you can start pulling your weight, too."

"How am I going to do that?" Lucas asked.

"I don't know. You can flip burgers, can't you? Mop floors? Whoever had you obviously taught you some basic skills. Or go on TV or something. Make some cash off your sad tale."

"Why are you so mad at me?" Lucas himself lit with anger, could almost hear the swoosh of it igniting. "Like one minute you're not, then the next second, bam. This rage of yours-directed at me-is just out of line."

Ryan started crying.

Full-body sob.

That was unexpected.

Lucas waited it out, didn't know what else to do.

Avery had looked like she was about to cry, too.

Then Ryan said, "I don't know, man. You're my brother and I want to believe you and be normal." Wiped his nose with his bare arm. "But how do I know? How do I know you didn't kill him? How do I know how to even act around you?"

"I'm as confused as you are." Lucas moved to a small sofa.

First her-Avery-not trusting him.

Now this.

"What do you want me to say, Ryan? That I'm sorry?" He looked up at his brother. "I'm sorry I came back?"

I'm sorry I don't remember your brother.

Ryan shook his head, the tears having gone as quickly as they'd come. "Everyone's like, 'What do they remember? Do they remember anything?' 'Oooh, it's so awful they don't remember anything.' Want to know what I remember?"

"I have a feeling you're going to tell me."

"I remember the day Billy Harrington spat in my face on the bus when I was in fourth grade. I remember Dad trying to read Harry Potter to me, and he was so drunk that pretty much every word sounded like 'Dumbledore.' I remember counting to like a thousand or singing 'Ninety-Nine Bottles of Beer on the Wall' in my head to survive bus rides with bullies in middle school, and then using those same strategies to deal with Dad and Opus 6 and his having me work with him on it for hours. I remember this guy John Deniro, who was always so mean to me and then one day I was a jerk back and then he ended up getting hit by a car and I felt awful about it for years, even though he'd been this awful, awful person. I remember being made to eat food I didn't like, and night after night of going to bed early just to get away from Dad, even though I wasn't tired, and I'd just lie there wondering when my life was, you know, going to get better. When things were going to change. I remember sirens and blood and dead bodies being dragged out of the school after the shooting. My friend Liam was dead. Everybody crying and screaming. That's what I remember. I remember being here."