He Started It

by Downing, Samantha

  I didn’t call the police, I called Eddie.

  ‘I saw it,’ I said. ‘That truck is definitely following us.’

  ‘Jesus Christ.’

  Back and forth, like a seesaw, this is what my mind feels like the next morning. The first thing I do is go outside and check the tires on the car. They’re fine. I stand and stare at them, not thinking about the tires but thinking about that woman in the back. Thinking about how easy it is to dye your hair.

  Felix comes up behind me. He slips one hand around my waist and offers me a cup of coffee with the other.

  ‘Is that from the vending machine?’ I say.

  ‘No. It’s from the check-in window. Only fifty cents.’

  I sniff it. Not bad.

  ‘Just drink it,’ Felix says.

  I do, and it’s not the worst.

  Krista joins us in the parking lot, though she didn’t stop for a fifty-cent coffee.

  ‘What’s happening? Is it flat?’ she says.

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘Tires are fine.’

  ‘Imagine that.’ Eddie. He’s right behind Krista, carrying their roller bags. He doesn’t like to ruin the wheels by pulling them across cement.

  Krista gives him a dirty look. He ignores it.

  Portia shows up last in her usual outfit: T-shirt, shorts, sunglasses, no makeup. ‘What’s everyone standing around for?’ she asks.

  ‘Waiting for you to tell us where we’re eating,’ I say.

  She waves her hand, dismissing all those healthy notions. ‘This is Texas.’

  No one answers that. We load up our things, I down the rest of that coffee, and we get in the car.

  It doesn’t start.

  Again Eddie tries, and again the car doesn’t start.

  Felix checks under the hood and figures out the problem in minutes. Not a dead battery, not out of gas – nothing normal has happened. The starter relay was removed. I can’t pretend to know what that is or how it works, but without it the car won’t start. And car parts don’t remove themselves, not even in Texas.

  ‘Sabotage! We’re being sabotaged!’ Krista yells. Repeatedly.

  Yes, it seems we are.

  ‘I saw the truck last night,’ I say.

  ‘I knew it!’ Krista yells.

  Eddie glares at me in the rearview mirror. No, he didn’t tell her because he obviously knew she would act just like she is. So did I, but the fact that the truck really has been following us makes me feel unsettled.

  And very curious about the woman in the back.

  Eddie talks a Lyft driver into picking up the starter relay and bringing it to us, then passes the phone to Felix to describe what we need. The Lyft fee will be more expensive than the part, but less than having the car pick us up to go get it ourselves.

  ‘We have to call the police,’ Krista says, taking out her phone. She has the oversized kind, like a small tablet. The cover is mint green.

  ‘The police?’ Portia says. ‘Jesus.’

  ‘The car’s been vandalized. More than once,’ Krista says.

  ‘We can’t prove anything,’ Felix says.

  ‘Yeah, they’ll probably throw us in jail,’ Portia says.

  Krista’s head whips around to face her. ‘For what?’

  ‘It’s Texas. I think they can arrest you for anything here. Probably just for annoying the police.’

  ‘But we have to –’

  ‘Wait, just wait.’ Eddie walks up, hands in the air like he’s stopping a boxing match. ‘I’m not getting stuck here waiting for the police. It’s not like they’ll do anything.’

  ‘We’re just going to let those Alabama assholes keep doing this? Are you serious?’ Krista says.

  ‘Let’s just get the car fixed. We’ll all go to breakfast and figure out what to do.’

  Eddie turns to me, nodding his head once.

  He remembers. So does Portia. We all remember what happened with the police in Texas.

  What is your greatest strength? Weakness?

  Wow, okay. These are some useless questions because no one would get them right about themselves. That’s pretty much impossible. But here goes …

  Other people would say my greatest weakness is not being able to keep my mouth shut. I say it’s my greatest strength, because who wants to be one of those people that keeps everything inside and then has a heart attack at 40? Not me.

  But it does get me in trouble, even if it’s not my fault. Example one, yesterday at the Cadillacs, when everyone blamed me for that asshole staring at me.

  Example two, today at the museum.

  Grandpa parked the van and we went in. It was another weirdo place just like all the other crappy, weirdo places Grandpa has brought us so far. This one was called the Devil’s Rope Museum. I mean, honestly.

  I saw them first. It was that couple from yesterday, the same asshole and his angry wife, so I went and stood right next to them and waited for one of them to see me. The wife did. She looked over and her eyes got huge and she nudged her husband.

  I admit I was a bitch, because who wouldn’t be? I said something like, ‘Oh looky here, it’s the asshole’ and yeah, I had that tone. That’s what Mom calls it. That tone.

  But damn if I was going to keep my mouth shut about that pervert. I just didn’t realize all hell would break loose the second I opened my mouth. The asshole said I needed to stop following him (as IF) and the wife said I was stalking them. I yelled back, their friends joined in with them, and the next thing I know the police show up.

  Apparently they’re always close by in Texas. Someone at the desk dialed 911 and the police just appeared.

  They blamed me for starting all the trouble. I MEAN ARE YOU SERIOUS, but yes, they were, and they kept saying ‘This is Texas’ like it meant something. They questioned me, they questioned Grandpa, they even questioned Eddie and Beth, but at least they left Portia alone. Paranoid much, Texas?

  After a billion questions and a bunch of calls to whoever was looking things up, yes I had to admit I’d run away several times. Yes, maybe I shoplifted some things and got caught, like 1% of the time, but no I wasn’t a stalker. I wasn’t dangerous. I pretended to be a dumb teenager because that’s what they already decided I was.

  They also searched the minivan, I guess to make sure we weren’t secretly drug mules or something, and that’s when they found the gun. I didn’t even know Grandpa had one. I mean, sure it was legal and registered and all that, so of course the police let him keep it. But still, it would’ve been nice to know it was there. What if Portia found it? This van is so not childproof.

  8 Days Left

  Our breakfast feels like a meeting of the Five Families, except we’re just one family with a lot of opinions.

  Krista: Call the police.

  Eddie: Keep going. Ignore them.

  Portia: Find the pickup, confront the people inside.

  Felix: Establish a schedule for watching the car throughout the night. We don’t know what these people want or why they’re following us, so we should be vigilant.

  They all turn to me and I keep eating my toast. It has the perfect amount of butter and raspberry jam – the first time that’s happened during this trip.

  Eddie taps his index finger on the table. ‘We just need to get this trip over with,’ he says. ‘Then we can all go on with our lives.’

  Yes. I agree with that. My life will be a million times better after this trip.

  ‘I’d rather not wake up dead one morning because of those psychos,’ Krista says.

  Neither would I, but yes, I get her point.

  ‘Screw it,’ Portia says. ‘We should put nails in their tire.’

  Yes. That, too.

  Felix shrugs. ‘I told you my idea. Make the schedule.’

  He really likes schedules. We have dozens of them on our refrigerator at home.

  ‘Well,’ I finally say, ‘Since we really are being followed and apparently sabotaged, then I guess we have to go with Felix’s idea. Let’s watch for them, and when
we see them we’ll decide what to do.’

  Felix nods.

  ‘Good,’ Krista says.

  ‘Fine with me,’ Portia says.

  Eddie rolls his eyes. ‘Whatever.’

  ‘As long as we do call the police,’ Krista says. ‘Like they say, we shouldn’t try to approach them on our own.’

  The more Krista speaks, the more I dislike her.

  ‘Fine. Perfect. Let’s just figure it out and get going,’ I say.

  Krista looks around at everyone, as if gauging the mood of the room. ‘Are we all good? Everyone okay?’

  I stare at her, realizing maybe I’ve been wrong. Maybe Eddie isn’t with her just because she’s so young and pretty. Maybe he’s also with her because she reminds him of our mother, because right then Krista sounded just like her.

  Mom always had to make sure everyone was okay, including at all our family meals. That’s how I remember her: walking around the table, checking on each one of us, making sure we had what we needed. She always wore the same kind of perfume, and I always smelled it when she leaned down beside me. Before she would settle down and eat, she would say ‘Are we all good?’ just like Krista did.

  Even when Mom had big news to share, she had to make sure we were okay. And for Nikki, Eddie, and me, Portia was the biggest news of our lives so far. Mom and Dad sat us down in the dining room – the formal one – and right away Mom let us know we weren’t in trouble. Nikki visibly relaxed.

  ‘We have great news,’ Mom said. ‘I’m pregnant.’

  That’s how she told us about Portia. I was six, Eddie was eight, and Nikki was almost twelve.

  Eddie and I stared at Mom, unsure of what this news meant for us.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Mom said.

  ‘Pregnant?’ Nikki said. ‘You won’t even let me get a dog.’

  ‘A baby is not a dog,’ Mom said.

  ‘But why? What’s wrong with just us?’ Nikki said.

  ‘Nothing’s wrong with anyone,’ Dad said.

  ‘It will be great,’ Mom said. Her voice was tight, like she was angry. Maybe at us, maybe because we didn’t give her the right reaction. ‘Everything will be great. I promise.’

  I didn’t know if it would be or not. I was the youngest, and sometimes it was horrible because there were so many things I couldn’t do. But being the youngest wasn’t the worst thing either, because I got a lot of attention. I knew that would change.

  Nikki narrowed her eyes, stuck out her chin. ‘I’m not changing diapers.’

  ‘No one asked you to do a thing,’ Mom snapped.

  Nikki smiled like she had won.

  ‘So are we good?’ Mom said. ‘Everyone good?’

  We all said we were, just like we all said it to Krista.

  Felix scribbles out a car-watch schedule on a napkin. Five-hour shifts, long enough to give the others time to rest but not long enough for the person on watch to fall asleep. So he says. I swear to God, Felix and his schedules. It can be maddening.

  I bet if he sees the truck he’ll take a picture of it and nothing else. The flat tire and missed starter relay didn’t faze him at all. He’s not even close to his breaking point. If he has one.

  ‘Felix,’ Krista says. ‘We can just put the schedule in our phones. You don’t have to write on a … napkin.’ Her nose turns up as she tries to stop him.

  ‘Let me just finish,’ he says.

  More scribbling. Sometimes the best thing to do is ignore Felix, which is exactly what I do until we leave.

  Next stop: Devil’s Rope.

  Yes, we’re still in Texas. Grandpa was right about it swallowing you up, because we are staying in this state for not one but two stops.

  Devil’s rope is what the Native Americans called barbed wire, and yes, there’s an entire museum devoted to it. That didn’t seem very exciting when I was twelve, but it turned out to be amazing. Barbed wire changed everything.

  We learned about how it was used in the nineteenth century, when people could just settle on a piece of land and call it their own. The barbed wire was how people marked their territory, and it also kept the cattle in, otherwise they would just roam around. That’s why cowboys hated it, along with the Native Americans. So many animals died when they walked into it, hence the name devil’s rope.

  I remember walking out of that museum in awe of how important barbed wire was to our history. Even more important than Bonnie and Clyde.

  But before I could voice this discovery, Grandpa ruined it.

  ‘There’s another reason why they call it devil’s rope.’ He turned to us, one eyebrow raised. ‘The harder you try to get out of it, the worse it gets.’

  Nikki snorted. ‘Kind of like this road trip.’

  Grandpa raised his hand. I thought he was going to hit her, but she ran off before anything could happen. That’s when she saw the couple from the Cadillac Ranch.

  Today we tell Krista about the museum before we get there. She’s already upset, and no one wants her to completely lose it. Whatever that would look like.

  ‘Devil’s Rope?’ Krista says. ‘Jesus, what a name.’

  ‘It’s not what you think,’ Eddie says.

  She rolls her eyes.

  I get a text from Felix. He is sitting right next to me.

  Seriously, what was the deal with your grandfather?

  My grandma died not long before the trip.

  He wasn’t thinking real clear.

  Felix nods as he reads it.

  That explains a lot.

  It does and it doesn’t. Since he doesn’t know anything about Nikki, I can’t tell him that she was Grandma’s favorite. I can’t tell him how she was the one who took care of Grandma while she was sick and dying and Grandpa couldn’t handle it. I can’t tell him how much Nikki hated him for what he did to her.

  So I don’t text him back.

  The museum is the same as I remember, only it’s bigger and has more displays. Just as we had been fascinated by it, so are Krista and Felix. Especially Felix. He insists on reading about every display, which keeps us here for quite a while.

  ‘I take it back,’ Felix says as we leave. ‘That’s a pretty awesome place.’

  ‘Not bad,’ Krista says. ‘Not what I thought.’

  Eddie puts his arm around her as we walk out the door. Portia waited outside, again, and she shakes her head at us. No truck.

  Eddie heads back to the interstate, the same one we’ve stayed near. And yes, he’s still the one driving. The only one ever, no matter what anyone else says. Because that’s who Eddie is.

  ‘North?’ Krista says. ‘Again?’

  ‘Yep,’ Eddie says.

  We all sit in the same place every day. Sometimes it feels like the same road, the same scenery, like we’re going around in circles. Our clothes change, though. No one wears makeup anymore except Krista, and she’s down to only lip gloss. Portia’s black nail polish is chipping and she hasn’t fixed it.

  I take out my laptop, decide maybe I should get some work done. Every night I download my e-mails to skim through them, because looking at my inbox puts me to sleep. Now, after multiple cups of coffee, it still makes me sleepy.

  Before this trip started, I looked at my e-mail first thing in the morning and read them before I was even at work. After one week on the road, I’m wondering how I do this every day.

  Maybe that’s what I’ll do with the inheritance. Forget the bills and the house and anything sensible. I’ll quit my job and do something that doesn’t involve staring at a computer.

  This idea gives me a lot to ponder during the drive, as I once again avoid reading all those unopened e-mails. Instead, I think about what else I could do. I could train dogs, trim trees, deliver packages, wrap presents, ride horses, or join one of those now-defunct circuses. Read about barbed wire.

  Nikki and I can do all of this together. Or we could just hang out on the beach. After I find her, we can do whatever we want.

  Last time we left the Devil’s Rope Museum, I wasn’t
daydreaming and the car wasn’t quiet. Everyone was mad, either yelling or huffing or pouting. Grandpa was furious at Nikki for getting detained by the police for making a scene. He thought it was her fault, just like the police did.

  We were back in the car and Nikki was in the passenger seat, practically tied down with the seatbelt. Arms crossed, mouth tight, face red. Nikki was angry about being blamed for everything again. Grandpa was angry the police almost called our parents.

  ‘Do you know what your mother would do to me?’ he yelled at her.

  He had a point. Mom was always mad about Nikki these days, and getting a call from the police wouldn’t help anything.

  ‘I told you,’ Grandpa said. ‘I explained that your parents are trying to work things out. Don’t you want them to stay together?’

  ‘I don’t care,’ Nikki said.

  ‘That’s not nice.’

  I couldn’t see Nikki roll her eyes, but I knew she did.

  In the back, Portia was crying. She had no idea what was going on, but all those policemen scared the hell out of her.

  Eddie had his head down and earphones on, the sound turned up to a thousand. NIN blasted loud enough for all of us to hear.

  ‘Turn that shit down!’ Nikki yelled.

  Eddie didn’t hear her, didn’t look up.

  ‘Language!’ Grandpa screamed, even though he swore all the time.

  ‘Who cares?’ Nikki said. ‘Nobody cares if they get divorced. Nobody!’

  Portia cried harder.

  ‘I care,’ Grandpa said.

  ‘No you don’t,’ I said. ‘You didn’t want the police to call them because we aren’t supposed to be here.’

  Nikki’s head whipped around to face me. ‘What?’

  ‘Beth,’ Grandpa said.

  ‘No, what did you say?’ Nikki asked – no, demanded.

  So I told her. I told everyone that Grandpa had taken us, and our parents never gave him permission.

  I said it for a lot of reasons. Because they were yelling and Portia was crying. Because Eddie wanted nothing to do with any of it. Because Nikki had been so upset ever since the Cadillac Ranch. Because I wanted attention. Because I wanted Nikki’s attention. Ever since she became a teenager it was impossible to get.