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I’ve heard Grandad’s war stories a thousand times. How they finally got Mo. How Mandy almost got away. How Charlie fell.
Birth to grave, we know it’ll be us one day. Our tragedy is that we forget it might be someone else first.
14
I AM SHAKING WHEN I walk out of Wharton’s office, trembling with such force that I’m afraid I’ll stumble as I make my way down the stairs. Sam’s blood is staining my skin, soaking through my pants. I force myself to walk across the quad, hunched over so that my coat hides the worst of it. Most students are gone on the weekends, and I am careful not to take any of the paths, and to veer away if I see anyone. I stick to the shadows of trees and darkness.
Once I make it to my dorm hall, I head straight for the communal bathroom. I see myself in the mirror. There is a smear of red across my jaw, and for a moment, as I try to wipe it and only smear it wider, I feel like I am looking at a stranger, someone older with hollow cheekbones and lips curled in a mean scowl. A madman fresh from a murder. A sicko. A killer.
I don’t think he likes me much.
Despite the scowl on his face, his eyes are black and wet, as if he’s about to start crying.
I don’t like him much either.
My stomach lurches. I have barely enough time to make it into one of the stalls before I start to retch. I haven’t eaten anything, so it’s mostly sour bile. On my knees on the cold tile, choking, the wave of anger and self-loathing that sweeps over me is so towering and vast, I cannot imagine how there will be anything of me that’s not carried away with it. I feel like there’s nothing left. No fight in me.
I have to focus. Yulikova will be here in a couple more hours, and there’s stuff I need to take care of, things that need to happen before I can go with her. Arrangements. Last details and instructions.
But I’m frozen with horror at everything that has happened and everything in front of me. All I can think of is blood and the guttural, raw sound of Sam moaning in agony.
I better get used to it.
* * *
I take a shower so hot that my skin feels sunburned when I get out. Then I dress for my date with the Feds—crappy T-shirt that got chewed up by one of the dryers, my leather jacket, and a new pair of gloves. The bloody clothes I run under the tap until they’re less foul, then wrap them in a plastic bag. Even though it’s a risk, I keep my phone, turning off the ringer and tucking it into my sock.
I shove a bunch of other things into my jacket—things I plan on transferring to the duffel I left in the car. Index cards and a pen. Styling gel and a comb. A few pictures of Patton that I print out with Sam’s crappy ink-jet and then fold. A beaten-up detective paperback.
Then I walk to the corner store, dumping the plastic bag of bloody clothes into the garbage can outside. Mr. Gazonas smiles at me, like he always does.
“How’s your little blond girlfriend?” he asks. “I hope you’re taking her someplace nice on a Saturday night.”
I grin and get myself a cup of coffee and a ham and cheese sandwich. “I’ll tell her it was your idea.”
“You do that,” he says as he gives me my change.
I hope I get to take Lila out some Saturday night. I hope I get a chance to see her again.
Trying not to think about that, I go back to the parking lot and force down my food, sitting in my parked car. Everything tastes like ashes and dust.
I listen to the radio, flipping through channels. I can’t concentrate on what I’m listening to, and after a while I can’t keep my eyes open either.
I wake to a tapping on the window. Agent Yulikova is standing beside the car, with Agent Jones and another woman I don’t recognize beside them.
For a moment I wonder what would happen if I refused to get out. I wonder if they’d have to leave eventually. I wonder if they’d get one of those jaws of life and pop the top off my Benz like it was a tin can.
I open the car door and grab for my duffel.
“Have a nice rest?” Yulikova asks me. She’s smiling sweetly, like she’s the den mother of my Boy Scout troop instead of the lady who wants to send me up the river. She looks healthier than she did in the hospital. The cold has made her cheeks rosy.
I force a yawn. “You know me,” I say. “Lazy as a bedbug.”
“Well, come on. You can sleep in our car if you want.”
“Sure,” I say, locking the Benz.
Their car is predictably black—one of those huge Lincolns that you can spread out in. I do. And while I’m getting comfortable, I lean down to put my key into my bag and surreptitiously lift out my cell. Then, leaning back, I palm my phone into the pocket of the car door.
