White Smoke

by Tiffany D. Jackson

  “Come. Come,” he insists, trying to usher me inside. “It’s this way.”

  “No!” I snap. “Where is Piper!”

  “I try to tell you,” he says, fumbling through his words. “Tell you to wait. Come. I’ll show you.”

  I peer inside, then point my chin at the entrance.

  “You go first.” No way am I going to let him have the upper hand on me.

  He nods real fast, hunches over, and enters. I grip the ax tighter and follow. The tunnel is narrower than the other, but somehow tidy and warm. A string of old Christmas lights dangling along the rock-bed wall lights our way. Still, I keep six feet of distance between us.

  Jon Jon looks back at me with a nervous smile as he shuffles forward. “This better, right? Better?”

  Is he really looking for approval right now? I have an ax aimed at his head.

  “Yeah,” I mumble. “Better.”

  “Daddy built the tunnels a long, long time ago.”

  “Why?” I blurt out, unable to control my curiosity.

  “Daddy hated the cold. Made these tunnels so we all had a way to move around in the wintertime. Took him almost two years.”

  He stops suddenly, spinning around with a frown. I flinch, backing up, tightening my grip on the ax.

  “Where they taking Mama?”

  Keep cool, Mari.

  Have to be strategic here. Any mention of his mother could send him into another Hulk Smash fit and there’s not enough room to fight him off.

  “Um . . . to a hospital.”

  “Oh. Is she coming back?”

  I swallow. “I . . . I don’t know.”

  Jon Jon rubs his hands together, thinking hard.

  “Mama . . . she ain’t what she used to be. I told her to leave that little girl be, but she couldn’t. She’s still mad. She didn’t mean it, though.”

  I narrow my eyes. “You were in my room.”

  Jon Jon blinks several times. “I was? Oh. Uhhh . . . Mama says I sleepwalk sometime. That . . . used to be my room, when I was young.”

  “Why were you trying to scare the shit out of us all this time? What the hell was that about?”

  Jon Jon stuffs his hands in his holey pockets, not meeting my eye.

  “The man said, if we run you off, we don’t gotta go away. We can stay.”

  “What man?”

  “I dunno. Mama just told me. Said he own lots of houses.”

  Mr. Sterling . . . it has to be. Maybe that’s why she tried to attack him.

  “But . . . how did he know you were still alive?”

  He shrugs. “Dunno. He just . . . knew. For a long time.”

  Still skeptical, I take another step back. “So why are you helping me now?”

  He squirms, shoulder twitching. “Mama just . . . went too far. Hurting that little boy. We don’t hurt children. But . . . she my mama.”

  Jon Jon’s eyes dart away, mouth trembling. In the light, I notice the little hair he has left is all gray. Then I remember the story about Jon Jon being accused of touching kids in the neighborhood. How they all turned on him only for it to be a lie. He was so young when it happened. I take a deep breath and lower my ax, reminding myself he isn’t the real monster here. The real monsters made him this way.

  “I know,” I murmur.

  Jon Jon bites his lip and quickly shuffles forward, the path inclining. I snug the ax under my arm. At the end of the tunnel, he pushes against a wall painted to look like the rocks. It creaks, swings open, and we step into darkness.

  “Be careful,” he warns. “Wood ain’t so good.”

  Eyes adjusting, I take in my surroundings. We’re in another house, different but with a similar blueprint, feels like we’re inside a giant brick chimney. The walls are blackened, furniture charred, and wood soggy. What little light there is shines through the cracks in the boarded-up windows, vines crawling inside.

  We’re in the house next door.

  I take a step and Jon Jon’s hand shoots out to stop me. He points to the ceiling, at the massive hole where the second floor, third floor, and roof have caved in, dumping the house’s contents into the foyer. The air, thick with mold, still has a hint of smoke in it, even after all these years.

  Staring up at the stars, I glance back down into the tunnel. So this is how they survived the fires. They escaped, never to be seen again.

  The boarded-up windows muffle the voices outside, but the mob is close, and this house would be next on their list. We need to hurry.

  “Where’s Piper?” I ask quickly.

  Jon Jon flusters, searching around the room. “Mama took her in here, but . . . I don’t know where she put her.”

  “Piper?” I shout, voice echoing.

  Thump. Thump.

  The noise makes both our heads snap up. I shrink away, my arms going numb.

  The same thumps from my dream.

  “Is someone . . . else . . . here?” I murmur, spine tensing.

  Jon Jon shakes his head. “No. It’s just me and Mama.”

  Right. His whole family is gone. All these years, they’ve been alone . . . until we moved onto Maple Street.

  Outside, the voices are louder now. “THIS IS WHERE IT ALL STARTED!”

  Jon Jon ducks as if they can see him through the walls.

  “No no no no,” he whimpers. He covers his ears, balling up on the floor.

  Maybe I should tell them we’re in here. Maybe they can help us find Piper. But then I take one look at Jon Jon and realize they won’t listen to a word I have to say. They’re operating in fear; they’re out for blood.

  Thump. Thump. Thump.

  I pace around Jon Jon. Despite the hole, the rest of the floor looks relatively stable, the wood solid. But the front staircase is a heaping pile in the middle of the foyer, so there must be another way up.

  “Jon Jon, how do I get upstairs?” I whisper.

  “No no no no,” he whimpers, rocking back and forth.

  A shrilling shriek then a boom echoes around us. Fireworks shoot off above and the room glows red. Jon Jon covers his head as if a bomb was set off. He’s babbling too loud. They are going to find us. And I need him in order to find Piper.

  The light of the mob’s torches bleed through the cracks in the boarded-up windows.

  “Jon Jon, please. We have to move.”

  He closes his eyes, shaking his head. The voices, the fire, the smoke . . . he’s terrified, reliving his worst nightmare all over again. I bend in front of him.

  “Jon Jon, I swear. I won’t let them hurt you. I’ll get you out of here. But we need to find Piper!”

  He shakes his head, hard. “No, no, no . . . I deserve it. I deserve it.”

  “You don’t deserve any of this. You don’t deserve to hurt yourself after they hurt you.”

  He cries. “No, no, no. We killed that little boy. We just wanted our house back. And we killed him.”

  “Who? Sammy? Sammy is alive! You didn’t kill him.”

  Jon Jon stops rocking long enough to look up at me.

  “He’s alive, I swear,” I say again. “You didn’t hurt anyone. But if we don’t get out of here, Piper could die. I could die. Is that what you want?”

  Jon Jon pauses to think it over. Finally, he stands, wiping his face, and points to the back.

  “O-o-o-over here,” he stutters, shuffling down the hall. Behind us, bricks come hurtling in. We run deeper into the house, hiding behind a wall.

  In the kitchen, a set of stairs leads to the second floor. We climb, keeping our steps light. I peer down the hole at the first floor. Two of the boards are ripped off in the living room. Glass shatters and the room erupts in flames.

  Oh no. . . .

  “We gotta go,” Jon Jon utters.

  “No! Not without Piper. Where would your mama put her?”

  Jon Jon looks around, overwhelmed.

  “Piper!” I call.

  Thump thump. Thump thump.

  She must hear us. We’re getting warmer.

&nb
sp; “What’s over there?” I ask, pointing to a door to the right of the hole.

  “That’s Daddy’s study.”

  We hug the wall, tightrope walking across the remaining floor, rising flames threatening to lick our heels.

  Another two Molotov cocktails are thrown in, the fire scorching. Black smoke fills the house. Jon Jon stares into the flames, weeping. He’s terrified. I shouldn’t have made him do this.

  “Jon Jon, you can go,” I offer. “I’ll find her. Don’t worry!”

  He shakes his head and keeps moving, sweat dripping down his face, the heat sweltering.

  “She’s in here!” Jon Jon says, and busts into the room. But the office is dark and empty. A window broken, bird feathers blanketing a large mahogany desk. I step back out into the hallway and listen.

  “Let’s split up!” I cry. “You look down there, I’ll check this room.”

  Jon Jon nods and makes his way around the hole. I open up the next door, ramming right into a four-poster queen-sized bed, soup cans on the dusty mattress. I glance at the ground. Footprints.

  “Piper?”

  THUMP THUMP

  “Wait! She’s in here!” I cry out into the hall.

  The sound . . . it’s coming from behind the bed, which is blocking a door behind it.

  “Piper, hang on! I’m . . .”

  And just as I grab the mattress, I see them. Bedbugs. Real ones this time, an entire family gathered on the corner, bloodstains a scattered black painting.

  “Ohh, ohhh God,” I whimper, dropping the mattress and slamming into a wall, clutching my wrist, hand frozen into a grip. I stare at my hand, the invisible eggs now on my skin, try to fix my mouth to call for help. Where’s Jon Jon? Is he gone? Did he run away? I don’t even blame him.

  THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP

  Run, run, run, get out of here, they’re on you now, you need bleach, blow-dryer, burn your clothes, can’t breathe, need air, no, need hot water, run, run, run . . .

  But Piper . . . I can’t leave her.

  With a babbling sob, I suck in a breath, grab the mattress, and push it off the frame. Then, using my whole body weight, I shoulder the bedframe aside, screaming, dying for this nightmare to be over. Wake up! Wake up!

  Jon Jon rushes in, stepping behind me, easily pushing the frame over, freeing a path to the door.

  “Piper, I’m here,” I gasp, coughing up smoke and wiggling the handle. Locked. “Piper, stand back!”

  I arch the ax up and bring it down on the handle with one swoop. Then another. The handle breaks off. Jon Jon jabs his fingers in, wiggles, and yanks the door open. And in the corner of the closet . . . is Piper. Wrists and ankles bound, mouth gagged. Her eyes bulge as she screams through the dirty rag. We work quick to free her, then she leaps into my arms, sobbing.

  “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she cries, then coughs, then we’re all coughing. The smoke is rising, filling the boarded-up house, suffocating us as we file into the hallway.

  We’re closer to the front of the house. I can look up into the night sky, fireworks sparkling blue above us, black smoke swirling.

  “This way,” Jon Jon says, opening another door down the hall, ushering us in and slamming it closed. The room is pitch-black. I can’t see my hand in front of me. Piper clings to my waist.

  “How are we going to get out of here?” she cries.

  I have no clue. The fire is too massive. We may burn up trying to make it back to the tunnel.

  BOOM!

  Piper yelps, gripping tighter. “What’s that?”

  Another BOOM and the sound of splintering wood.

  “Jon Jon?”

  BOOM! Jon Jon slams his shoulder into a boarded-up window. The board flies into the night and sweet air slips in.

  “Come on,” I say to Piper, holding her hand, and CRACK! The floorboard breaks under my foot, swallowing my leg, and I fall through before grabbing hold of the sides. Flames scorch my legs and I tread the air.

  “Ahhh!”

  “Mari!” Piper shrieks, clutching my arms. “Noooo! Help!”

  Jon Jon leaps over, one-handedly pulling me back up. Little flickers of fire sprinkle down my leggings. I kick furiously, patting them out, my ankle covered in blood where the wood sliced into me. Jon Jon tears a piece of his shirt and wraps it around the wound. The pain is blinding; I bite my arm as he ties it tight, trying to stop the bleeding. A crack splits down the room like we’re standing on a thin ice-covered lake. The fire sizzles below us. This whole floor is going to cave at any moment. I swat Jon Jon’s hands away.

  “No time! We have to get out of here!”

  Jon Jon nods and helps me up to my feet. I scream through gritted teeth, blood dripping into my sneaker, and hobble across the room. Piper coughs and I push her near the window. It’s a two-story drop, the back of the house a jungle of vines and trees.

  “Easy now, little one,” Jon Jon says to Piper with a prideful smile, lifting her onto the windowsill. He pulls a nearby branch. “Grab hold of this.”

  Following his thinking, I climb onto one of the lower branches, my ankle screaming as I scoot forward and hug the trunk of the tree mercifully. I can’t climb down, not like this. Piper makes her way to me and we sit side by side.

  “Hold on,” I pant, wrapping an arm around her. “Don’t let go.”

  Face covered in a thin sheen of sweat, Piper looks back up at the window.

  “Come on, Jon Jon,” Piper says, reaching for him.

  But Jon Jon shakes his head. Not in a petrified way; his face seems more resolved.

  “What are you doing? Come on!”

  He shakes his head again. And I know what he’s thinking.

  “No,” I snap. “You’re coming with us! They’ll understand. We’ll help you!”

  Suddenly, a bright white light flashes on Piper’s face and she flinches with a scream, nearly falling.

  “Hang on!” I shout, gripping her arm as the flashlight pings between us.

  “Hey!” a man’s voice yells from the ground. “Hey, y’all! There’s some kids back here!”

  Jon Jon backs away from the window, staying hidden. He won’t come. If we go out together, they’ll catch him, and the way the mob is riled up, they may not turn him over to the police.

  “Hide!” I whisper, clutching Piper. “You have to hide!”

  His eyes toggle between Piper and me, before running into the blaze, skirting around the edge of the giant hole, back down the stairs.

  “Jump, girls!” the man below shouts, the crowd now with him. “Jump! We’ll catch ya! Just jump!”

  I take one more look through the window, catching a glimpse of Jon Jon, running toward the tunnel . . . his clothes on fire.

  Twenty-Six

  POP-POP IS THE one who answers our desperate knocks at the door. He eyes us through his trifocals, unmoved. Piper scoots behind me, burying her face.

  We reek of smoke, our clothes covered in black ash. The bite on my shoulder is bleeding through and my ankle is a bloody mess. Down the street, a mob is setting fire to another house, cheering as it burns. I wrap an arm around a shivering Piper and raise my chin.

  “May we come in? Please.”

  Pop-Pop mutters and widens the door.

  Quickly, I shove Piper inside and limp straight to the bathroom. Yeah, our house wasn’t on fire (yet), but I definitely didn’t feel safe staying there alone. Pop-Pop shuffles into the living room, slippers scratching the floor, TV on the local news.

  “Shouldn’t be letting in strangers this time of night,” he grumbles, slumping into his chair. “It’s crazy out there right now. Bunch of hoodlums running the streets.”

  I take my sneaker and sock off, remove Jon Jon’s makeshift bandage, and dip my ankle into the tub, turning on the faucet. Air whistles through my teeth as bright blood swirls down the drain.

  Piper sits on the edge of the tub, watching me, her face pale, eyes glassy.

  “I thought she was my friend,” she sniffs.

  “Yeah,�
� I sigh, grabbing a wad of toilet paper to dab the cut. “I know.”

  She glances down at her hands before her voice breaks. “Why doesn’t anybody like me?”

  The sight of a bawling Piper crushes my heart.

  “Piper, I like you,” I say, sitting beside her.

  “No you don’t! You hate me,” she cries. “I should’ve died in that fire. Sammy and Buddy got hurt and it’s all my fault.”

  “It’s not your fault. She tricked you. Why should you hurt yourself because of a . . . mistake?”

  The words ring true. Even for myself.

  “But I don’t have any friends.” She hiccups a sob.

  “Well, I’m more than just your friend. I’m your sister. We’re sisters. Which means we gotta look out for each other. We both gotta do better now because it’s us against everybody. Okay?”

  She nods softly, drying her eyes, then points to my ankle. “Grandma says you need to clean boo-boos so they don’t get dirty or you’ll get sick.”

  I smile. “That’s very true. You want to help me?”

  We rummage through the sink cabinet and find some rubbing alcohol. I bite down on my fist as I clean the wound, then Piper wraps a towel around it, taping it. No sense in trying to make it to a hospital. I pop three Tylenols and pray my foot doesn’t fall off by the morning.

  Back in the living room, I sit Piper on the sofa with a blanket and grab two cups of water from the kitchen.

  Exhausted, my ankle throbbing, I fall into the sofa, vaguely aware of the bedbugs laying eggs on my arms but too weak to fight them.

  On the news, the Wood is like a war zone, houses engulfed in balls of fire. A helicopter circles overhead, zooming in on people throwing bricks and neighbors trying to put the fire on their roofs out with water hoses. Not a fire truck or police car in sight. The headline reads: “Riots in Maplewood.”

  A newscaster says, “Devil’s Night has come early to the Maplewood area of Cedarville. . . .”

  Exactly what the Foundation wanted.

  “Is Daddy okay?” Piper asks, staring at the screen, gripping the blanket.

  That’s a good question; no telling where Mom and Alec are in all this mess. I was supposed to call when . . . oh crap!