Runner Boy | Book 2 | Rider Kid

by Mackey, Jay

  “I know that. I’m not stupid.”

  “I didn’t say you’re stupid. I said you need to use some judgment. Don’t get caught up in something you’ll regret later.”

  “I do. I . . . Look, Mom. Sometimes you have to stop thinking about things, and weighing the pros and cons and all that, and take action. Otherwise, it’ll be too late.”

  So yeah, she hugs me. But it doesn’t make me feel any better about anything.

  Flip comes by Jake’s one afternoon and tells us that the reporters have all backed off the story. Either they didn’t believe it, or they couldn’t get verification from anywhere, or Pounds’ people persuaded them it wasn’t true, but the big news splash that we hoped for is not going to happen, and the international condemnation isn’t either.

  “I know what I think we should do now, since our options seem pretty limited,” Flip says, giving me a strange look. “But I’m probably not the guy to do it. Some of Shanna’s folks down in Indy are working on ideas, I understand. But if I were you”—he looks at Jake now—“I’d be getting out my uniform and polishing my boots.”

  Later, after Flip has left, we talk privately about the situation, Jake, Rachel, Rob and me. That’s one thing about Jake—he treats us like adults. I figure it’s because he’s a professor and is used to being around college kids, even though Rachel and I are not quite college age yet. But then Jake starts the whole thing off by looking at me and saying, “So, Brady, you’ve been pretty silent whenever we’ve had these discussions. What do you think we should do? Is it time to start killing some of our government leaders, or should we just assume they know what they’re doing and ride it out? Or is there another alternative?”

  Before I can answer Rachel says, “Do you really think we’re the ones to answer that? We’re kids. What makes you think we know what to do?” She’s agitated, that is clear from the way she’s pulling at her hair and sitting on the edge of the chair, one leg bouncing like crazy. But I think she’s baiting Jake. She’s got an opinion. She just wants to make sure Jake doesn’t brush it off if she voices it.

  Jake pauses, looks at her, then at me. “Let me tell you,” he says, slowly. “You’re right. You should all be kids. But I’ve been with all three of you when we rescued some political prisoners from a pretty horrible prison camp. I may regret how that went down, but we did it, and we were justified, I think. And I know he”—he points at Rob, who lifts his head to look at Jake—“he lost someone very dear to him while fighting for what he, they, think is right.”

  He reaches across the couch where I’m sitting with him, grabs my arm and says, “And I’ve fought side by side with this man, in a vicious battle that we’re both lucky to have survived. I’ve seen him take a life. And I’ve seen how he reacted to that later on. It weighs on him. As it should.” He shakes my arm a couple times. “So yes, maybe you should be kids. But there are no kids in this room now.”

  He looks around at the three of us, and it’s clear that all of us appreciate what he’s said. He turns back to me and says, “So, let me repeat, what do you think we should do now?”

  I’m having a hard time forming words. My eyes are a little blurry and my lip is a bit unsteady, so I’m relieved when Rachel says, “We don’t have any good alternative. I’m never going to say it’s okay to kill anybody, no matter how bad they are. But I’m also not willing to just ride it out, either.”

  “So which is it?” I say. “If we don’t have an alternative, we have two choices. Sit still, or take action.”

  “We have to find an alternative,” she says.

  “But if we don’t?”

  Rob is the first to take a stand. “Pounds has to go,” he says. “He’s the one who set these ridiculous rules. It’s his people who are enforcing his laws. And now it’s us, the rest of us, who are going to pay for a war of his choosing, without a valid reason other than greed.”

  “As far as we know,” says Jake.

  “As far as we know,” repeats Rob.

  It’s pretty clear we all want a different solution, but what? We believe there’s a war coming, but we can’t get the word out; the president has denied everything and has killed the person who went to talk to him about it, the one person who might have been able to get something done, and has captured the guy, Len, who is the whistleblower. So, now what?

  The one good thing about this discussion is that we didn’t do it over a bottle of Jerry’s awful vodka.

  40

  8 days until the Pulse Anniversary

  Over the next few days we do what we can, or at least, what we can think to do, to get the word out about Pounds’ planned war. Jake gets some flyers printed up at the university with a big headline: WAR WITH USA? We include the details of the planned war, including the killing of Shanna, which merits its own headline: OPPOSITION LEADER KILLED TO KEEP HER QUIET! And then we have a thing at the bottom: STOP THE WAR! SPREAD THE WORD!

  We then put them up all over town. Flip takes a batch to Indianapolis, where we hope Shanna’s people will put them up. We know this is all pretty pointless; we can’t reach many people and even if they believe us, what are they going to do about it? But at least we’re doing something.

  I take some flyers out to Juniper, and I stop in to see everyone at the farm. It’s been a couple weeks since I’ve seen anyone in my family except Mom. The Mathewses are pretty nice to me when I walk into the house just before dinner time, saying hi and welcome and all that. My own family is a little more snarky. Like, my little brother Clark says, “Hey, did you shoot anybody since I’ve seen you last?” And my big sister Chrissie says, “Nice of you to drop in. The shovel’s next to the door, and the barn’s a mess. Hurry, dinner’s in a few minutes.”

  I laugh, like I think she’s kidding, but I go out to the barn anyway, feeling a little guilty about all the chores I haven’t been around to take care of.

  After dinner I get Dad and ask to talk to him privately. We go outside and walk down toward the river. This is why I came out here today. I need to talk to Dad.

  I start to tell him about what’s going on, but he says he’s heard about it. Mom keeps him informed. “She tells me what you’ve been up to. She’s pretty worried about you. Says you’ve been getting involved with more questionable activities. Now it’s something about a war with Bowers?”

  “I didn’t know you and Mom still talked,” I say. My discomfort with talking about their relationship is probably evident, as Dad gives me a fake smile.

  “We do. I see her whenever I go into Lafayette, usually once a week or so.” Another fake smile. “This is all temporary, Brady. In normal times, this wouldn’t even have come up. But she’s not happy being a farmer, and I don’t blame her. I wouldn’t be here either if it weren’t for the obligation I feel to the Mathewses.”

  “So Mom doesn’t feel obligated?”

  “I’m sure she does. But she wasn’t happy. I told her to go to town.”

  “You did? Why?”

  “Because if she’s not happy, nobody’s happy. You know how that goes.”

  I don’t, but I shrug like I do.

  Dad nods at me. “Enough about your mother. Tell me what’s going on with you. And about this so-called war.”

  I don’t know what Mom’s told him, so I give him the whole story about the war—Jerry Pospisil’s buddy Len, his sources, Shanna and her death, the media not picking up on the story. Dad listens while we continue to walk. I finish the story and say, “So, what do you think we should do?”

  “Who’s we?” he asks, not missing a beat.

  “Me and Jake and Rachel and Rob. And the rest of the resistance. There’s lots of us, like Jerry and Len, but we have no power, and no leader after they killed Shanna.”

  “So you consider yourself part of the resistance now?”

  “Well, yeah. You know that. Ever since the raid on the prison camp where they were holding Wilson.”

  “Well, I know Rachel and Rob, of course, and Jake. I’ve met Wilson, who seemed like a
really nice kid. But I don’t know Shanna, or Jerry or the others. I can’t judge whether these are people you should trust, or . . .”

  “I’m not asking you to approve anything, Dad, or to give me permission. I’ll decide that. I just want some advice. How do we stop a war?”

  He stops walking and looks at me. This time his smile doesn’t seem as fake, but it still pisses me off. This is not something to be smiling about. He says, “The first thing you have to ask yourself is this: Is this war real? That’s what I was getting at; I don’t know the people you’re relying on for the information you’re getting. Now, I’m no fan of Pounds, that’s for sure.” He starts walking again, waving his arms around as he’s talking. I’m not sure if he’s ever going to answer my question, but I walk with him, hoping he’ll get to the point.

  He says, “I know you’re upset with his civil liberties restrictions, and rightly so. But his fiscal policies are worse. And trade, Christ! You know what he’s doing?” He doesn’t wait for me to answer before continuing. “He’s restricting aid. He’s making those who send aid either prove there was an order for the goods being delivered, or they have to sign a waver saying there are no expectations of repayment.” Now he’s pissed. “That’s one reason we’ve been struggling. Nobody wants to put up with that shit. Ask your mother. She’s the one who told me about that one. And I could go on.”

  I hope he doesn’t. Trying to get back on track, I say, “But what if the war is real? What if he plans to attack the USA? What do we do?”

  “At least it isn’t Bowers and the GSA. He’d kick our ass, especially with all the Russian forces he’s got down there.”

  “Doesn’t matter, Dad. It’s still war. People die, remember.”

  “Don’t be a smart-ass. I know about war. I also know that if Pounds wants a war, there’s not a lot you can do about it.”

  Great. So, no big strategic plan is coming out of this conversation.

  Dad seems to think for a minute, and then says, “I have to question this war, though. There’s no reason, no advantage to be gained, that I can see. Why would he just attack a neighbor. For the ports on the coast? I don’t see it.”

  “Pounds hates President Vega, because she wouldn’t concede the election.”

  “That’s true, and I’ll admit that emotions play a bigger role in starting wars than logic, but Pounds hates Bowers too. And he’s the one who refused to allow Bowers to remain in power, so he’s playing both sides there, if that’s what this is about. Nobody is conceding anything. But I still don’t see a war.”

  We’ve now walked a big circle and are almost back at the house. It’s dark, so we head inside. But Dad stops before we get to the house. “One thing you could do, which might help you clear your head a bit, maybe even give you some sense of whether this war is real, is to go talk to your buddy, Colonel Williams.”

  “What? Just walk into his office and say, ‘Hey, is there a war planned for anytime soon? Just asking for a friend.’”

  Dad actually smiles. “Yes. Exactly.”

  “He might just arrest me for some of the things I’ve been involved in.”

  Dad raises his eyebrows, but doesn’t ask any questions he probably knows I won’t answer. He says, “If he wanted to arrest you, I think he could find you. Nobody has come looking for you here.”

  “Okay, but Dad, there’s no way he would tell me if the war was on. He’ll just deny everything.”

  “Maybe so, but maybe you’ll get a sense about whether he’s lying, or if he stumbles a bit. Who knows?”

  I shrug. “Maybe. Maybe I’ll give it a try.”

  Dad heads for the door, but then turns back to me and says, “Don’t do anything stupid.”

  It’s just like him to say that. Usually, I’d say something inane, like “I won’t,” but this time I keep my mouth shut. I’m pretty sure I can’t promise that right now.

  The next day I take a load of stuff from some of my regular customers into Lafayette. I hadn’t made a delivery for some time, and some weren’t too happy about it, but I told them things were not going well for me and my family. That’s pretty true, if you include my extended family. Anyway, I got enough sympathy to smooth out my relationships with my customers, at least for a while.

  As soon as I finish my deliveries, I ride over to City Hall. What Dad said last night has been churning around in my head all day. I can’t stop thinking that I’ll regret not turning over every possible way to uncover the truth, and asking Colonel Williams is almost as good as asking the president. Better, because I know Williams. If there’s a war in the works, as head of the militia, he will know. He probably won’t tell me anything, but I have to try.

  Of course he’s not in his office when I get there. But his receptionist, or assistant or whatever he is says he’ll be back “soon,” so I sit down and wait. For two hours. I keep telling myself I have nothing better, or more important to do, but still, I get pretty antsy by the time he strolls up the hall.

  “Hey, how’s my boy?” he says when he sees me sitting in the semi-darkness outside his office. He’s a completely different man that the one I last saw glaring at me on the steps to the capitol just after Shanna had been shot. His glare then had me convinced he was after me, and I was scared, really. But now? I stand, grin, and shake his hand. Maybe Dad was right, if Colonel Williams wanted to arrest me, he could have found me, even in this fucked up, no-internet, no-database, no-phone world.

  “I’m good,” I say, even though that isn’t even remotely true.

  “You’re looking a little better than the last time I saw you, down in Indy.” He’s smiling, I think. He continues walking into his office, motioning for me to follow. He sits at his big desk, and I sit in one of the chairs in front of him.

  “Yeah, that’s one of the reasons I came to see you today,” I say. I hadn’t intended to get into this, but when I opened my mouth, that’s what came out.

  “Oh?” He frowns.

  “What happened that day?” Forging full speed ahead. I’m feeling a little pissed now, to tell the truth.

  “I should ask you.”

  “What?”

  “No, seriously. I saw you there. What did you see? Because I still have no idea what really happened.”

  “Oh?” Now I’m really pissed. “Well, here’s how I saw it. Shoshanna Reynolds, who we call Shanna . . .”

  “I know Shanna. She’s one of the leaders of your—what is it, opposition group?”

  Crap. So he knows about the group. And that I’m in it. So it doesn’t matter, and answer, “RIP.”

  “Right. So what was RIP doing in Indy that day?” He leans forward across his desk, like he’s really interested in this.

  “Shanna was meeting with President Pounds to ask him about this.” I’ve got one of our flyers folded up in my back pocket. I pull it out, unfold it, a put it on his desk.

  He looks at it quickly, and says, “Shanna never talked to the president that day. I’m not sure who she talked to, probably the chief of staff or one of the others there.” He looks up from the flyer at me, and says, “This is all bullshit, by the way.”

  I shrug. It’s not like it’s surprising that he said that. “Anyway, after she talked to whoever she talked to . . .”

  “Who told her the same thing—that it’s bullshit.”

  “Whatever. She came out to tell the crowd what she’d learned, and your guys killed her.”

  “Weren’t my guys.”

  “They were wearing the uniform, complete with the red hats.”

  “So I understand. Still, not my guys. Did you notice that they wore masks?”

  “They shot her!”

  He nods. “They did. Then they marched off, and nobody stopped them.”

  “They took one of our guys with them, and drove off in government trucks.”

  “I don’t know about taking anybody. That’s the first time I’ve heard that.”

  I look at him. He stares back. I’m feeling a little doubt creep in. “If they
weren’t your guys, who were they?”

  “You tell me. We haven’t found them.”

  My heart is pounding so hard I’m sure he can hear it. “Tell me about the war.” I slap the flyer sitting on his desk.

  “There is no war.” He doesn’t blink.

  I stand. I can’t take more of this. “Of course you’re going to say that.”

  He leans back in his chair. “That’s true. I wouldn’t tell you if there was a war planned. But there isn’t. And whoever told you that there is, lied to you.”

  “So you say.”

  “So I say.”

  I stare down at him. He stares back. I’m breathing hard. He isn’t. I turn and stomp out. I’m pretty sure my face is lit up enough to give his assistant enough light to type whatever it is that he’s pecking away at as I walk by.

  I’m still pissed when I get to Rachel’s. She’s the only one home when I get there and I fill her in on my conversation with Colonel Williams. I’m cursing and pacing around, so I’m not sure how coherent I am, but I need to let off some steam. She suggests I take a run. I do, a short one, and it helps me calm down.

  Actually, things are starting to warm up a bit with Rachel. She’s not actively avoiding me now, and I mark that as progress. She actually sits down next to me on the couch at her place after I get back from my run, and we have a serious discussion. It’s not about us, unfortunately, but at least it’s not about fucking Colonel Williams, either.

  We’re talking about Rob. She’s really worried about her brother because he’s still so sad all the time.

  “He’s morose,” she says. “I don’t know what to do. Mom keeps telling him stuff like, things will be better tomorrow, but he’s not buying it.”

  “I know. I wish there was something I could do, but I think he’s going to have to find a way out of this by himself.”