He Started It

by Samantha Downing

  It is not in his bag. I have his lighter now, along with his cigarettes.

  I do this sometimes – imagine what he’s thinking. Usually it happens after we have an argument, and I try to picture what goes on his head.

  She’s wrong, she’s being stupid, she’s a bitch.

  Should I apologize?

  No, she should apologize. I’m not saying a word. Not this time.

  It’s been a while, though. She must be really mad.

  Okay, maybe I should apologize. Just this once, though. I’m not doing it again.

  More often than not, Felix apologized first.

  When he comes out of the motel bathroom, Felix gives me a half smile and walks over to his backpack. As he checks the front pocket, he says, ‘You’re not going to bed?’

  I point to the parking lot. ‘Someone has to watch. It’s Eddie’s shift.’

  ‘Oh. Right.’ He doesn’t find what he’s looking for in that pocket. Glances around the room.

  ‘Lose something?’ I say.

  ‘Phone charger.’ No hesitation.

  Liar.

  He goes to his suitcase and rummages through it. ‘Who’s got the next shift?’ he says.

  ‘Krista.’

  ‘You really think she’s going to watch?’

  ‘No. You can use my charger.’

  He stops looking. ‘Cool, thanks.’

  ‘It’s right there on the dresser.’

  Felix plugs in his phone and sits down on one of the beds. ‘I should take Krista’s shift,’ he says.

  Convenient. More time to look. More time to smoke. ‘If you want.’

  ‘Yeah. We should keep watching, at least for another day or two. Until we’re sure they’re gone.’

  ‘Okay.’ I look out the window, and I wonder if Eddie is in the same cell as Clemson. I wonder if the police are keeping an eye on them. When I turn back to Felix, he is eyeing the nightstand with the broken, crooked drawer.

  Good guess, but no.

  He doesn’t look inside. Instead, he goes back to the bathroom. Those missing cigarettes will drive him crazy because he won’t find them. Not until tomorrow.

  6 Days Left

  We have to go through a series of legal this, that, and the other to get Eddie back. They can’t release him from the jail until he appears before a judge, so we’re sent to the courtroom two blocks down. It’s another tiny building, nothing much to it. Hard to believe this is where justice prevails.

  Clemson’s friends also show up. They sit on the opposite side of the courtroom, which means they’re about five feet away.

  It all happens very fast. In a small town like this, there aren’t many cases. The only other one is a guy who got so drunk he slept on the hood of his car. Public drunkenness for him, and a fine.

  Clemson and Eddie aren’t so lucky. They get a lecture from the judge. A long-winded one, because it may be the only thing this judge has to do today. It all comes down to misdemeanors: criminal mischief, public drunkenness, disturbing the peace. The fine is $500 each.

  The whole escapade has been expensive, annoying, and time-consuming. The definition of Eddie most of the time.

  The only surprise comes after it’s all over.

  Eddie walks outside with Clemson. Together. They are smiling and laughing and at one point, Eddie smacks him on the arm like they’re teammates. Clemson’s friends look as surprised as we are.

  ‘What the hell?’ Krista says.

  When they reach us, Eddie turns to Clemson and offers his hand. ‘It’s been an honor going into battle with you.’

  ‘Wouldn’t have had it any other way,’ Clemson says.

  They shake hands, bump fists, then slap each other on the back and part ways. Eddie turns to us, arms out and smiling. ‘Hey, guys!’

  Krista glares at him. Arms crossed, back arched. ‘Are you kidding?’

  ‘Oh, don’t be mad. This will be a great story one day.’

  ‘Asshole.’ She turns around and walks back to the car.

  Eddie follows, saying, ‘Come on … I mean, you have to admit it’s a great story.’

  She admits nothing. Krista is starting to grow on me.

  The money came from us – Felix and me. We paid Eddie’s $500 fine because we had room on our credit card. Krista did not.

  Back into the car, Eddie is in the driver’s seat. ‘No car problems, I assume?’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘No problems other than you.’

  ‘And no truck sightings?’ he asks.

  ‘None,’ Felix says.

  ‘Didn’t think so.’

  Krista’s head swivels around to face him. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘You know, Derrick and I got to talking –’

  ‘Derrick?’ she says.

  ‘Derrick. From Clemson. Well, I mean that’s where all those guys graduated from. They aren’t as young as I thought.’

  ‘Who cares about their age?’ Krista says.

  ‘Anyway, we had a lot of time to talk – obviously – and Derrick explained to me what he meant about the truck thing. Why he thought the story sounded so weird. And yeah, he said it totally wrong and he didn’t have to call us assholes, but the fact is he made sense.’

  We’re on the road now, but not on the interstate. Eddie has pulled into a drive-thru fast-food place. He orders a mountain of food and asks us if we want anything.

  Today, this is breakfast.

  Soon the car smells like it’s been dipped in grease. Eddie parks so he can eat, stuffing food in his mouth while explaining Derrick’s theory to us.

  ‘I told him how it all started, about how you guys saw the truck, how the tire was flat again and the relay starter had been taken. It’s funny, you know, how a person who isn’t involved can see it all so clearly. How each thing that happened has a dozen explanations for why it had nothing to do with what happened in Alabama.’ He stops to take another bite of his breakfast sandwich. ‘Like the tire. Maybe we really did hit nails. Or the relay starter. There we are, in some rundown motel in the middle of nowhere, and maybe someone needed a relay starter for their own car. Or maybe someone sold it to make a couple dollars.’

  ‘We saw the truck,’ Krista says. ‘I saw the guy in the parking lot.’

  He shrugs. ‘You know how many black trucks there are in this country? And the guy you saw? It was late. Dark. Could’ve been any old guy who happened to be around, for God’s sake.’ He shakes his head, bites on a hash brown. ‘We took a bunch of things that had nothing to do with one another and we mashed them together into some kind of story.’

  That last sentence doesn’t sound like Eddie. He’s just echoing Derrick.

  Krista knows. ‘Bullshit.’

  ‘Wait a minute,’ Portia says. ‘Doesn’t this mean you broke the rules?’

  ‘What rules?’ Krista says.

  ‘Oh my God,’ I say, looking at Eddie in the mirror. ‘You went to jail. Grandpa said –’

  ‘We couldn’t go to jail. Yeah, I know,’ Eddie says. ‘But this isn’t what he meant. You know that. One night in jail isn’t prison.’

  Maybe, maybe not. But it’s something to consider.

  For the first time, I notice the car smells. Maybe it’s because our dirty clothes are piling up in our bags, maybe it’s because we spend so much time sitting in the same spots. I roll down the window. Portia gets most of the air. It hits her in the face and she moves to the other side of her back seat.

  ‘I hate Colorado,’ she says.

  ‘Same,’ I say.

  ‘Same!’ Krista yells.

  Felix shrugs, Eddie doesn’t say a word. Probably too busy thinking about his new bromance with Clemson.

  ‘Seriously,’ Portia says. ‘Nothing good has ever happened to us in this state. Nothing.’

  She is thinking of Grandpa, of Nikki, and I can’t disagree with her. I also don’t want anyone to ask.

  ‘What happened here before?’ Felix says.

  Too late.

  ‘Food poisoning,�
�� Portia says.

  I glance back at her, she doesn’t look at me.

  She continues. ‘We were all cooped up in the motel room like we were quarantined or something.’

  ‘For how long?’ Krista says. She also turns around in her seat, now facing the back. It’s the first time she has said anything since we picked up Eddie.

  ‘Days,’ Portia says. ‘It felt like weeks.’

  To a six-year-old, it probably did. She didn’t even understand what was happening. As far as she knew, Grandpa was sick, Nikki was in charge, and we were stuck in Colorado.

  And Grandpa was a bad, bad man.

  Now that I’m an adult, I understand how betrayed I felt. Between the kidnapping and the abuse, my grandfather wasn’t who I thought he was and never had been. Our grandfather was a man who hit his wife.

  At twelve, I couldn’t say all that, couldn’t put what I was feeling into those kinds of words. If I had to describe my feelings right then, I would’ve said my grandfather was a monster.

  I didn’t have to say that out loud because Nikki did.

  We were out of money and needed more, and the only way we could get it was with Grandpa’s debit card. All we needed was the pin number.

  Nikki asked for it, and he gave her the number 4-2-5-9. She ran down to the corner store to get some cash. Or so we thought. A few minutes later, she ran back in, all out of breath and puffing anger everywhere.

  ‘Wrong number,’ she said to Grandpa.

  He was lying on the bed and he looked pretty bad. Smelled, too. ‘No, it isn’t. The number is four, two, nine, five.’

  ‘That’s not what you said.’

  ‘Yes, it is. Four, two, nine, five.’

  Nikki ran out again. I have to admit, I thought he just mixed up the numbers. With all the pills he was drinking in the water, it seemed reasonable he would do that.

  A lot more time passed before Nikki showed up again. She wasn’t out of breath and didn’t yell. She sat down next to Grandpa on the bed and took his hand in hers.

  ‘I know what you’re doing,’ she said. ‘The third time I get that number wrong, the machine is going to take the card.’

  Grandpa said nothing.

  ‘So give me the real number or I’ll call our parents and tell them what you did,’ Nikki said. She stopped for a minute, gauging his reaction. There wasn’t much of one, and it always made me wonder how much Mom knew about her father. I hope she didn’t know about Grandma. Though if you knew our mother, you’d know she would never tolerate such a thing. Not for one second.

  But Grandpa hitting Grandma wasn’t what Nikki was talking about.

  Nikki turned to Portia, who was sitting on the other bed playing with her dolls. ‘I’ll tell Mom about how you touched her.’

  Grandpa looked horrified. Too horrified to speak.

  Eddie had been sitting at the desk but was now on his feet. ‘No way,’ he said to Nikki.

  ‘I swear,’ she said.

  ‘You’re lying,’ Eddie said.

  ‘No.’

  That was me.

  ‘He did touch her,’ I said. ‘I saw it.’

  Yes, Nikki was lying, and yes, I knew it. I lied with her. Maybe I was as angry as she was with Grandpa, or maybe I didn’t want her angry with me.

  We were in it together, allies in a secret mission. We were always playing Risk.

  Portia didn’t understand what we were saying; she wasn’t even paying attention. We didn’t tell her, either.

  She knows now, though.

  It feels like it takes forever, but we finally cross the border and get out of Colorado.

  ‘Wyoming barely has enough people to be called a state,’ Portia says. ‘But at least it isn’t Colorado.’

  She has talked more today than she has the entire trip because her soda cup has more than soda in it.

  ‘Remember last time we were here?’ she says. ‘We thought we were driving in circles.’

  She’s not wrong. Wyoming is a state of empty roads, beautiful mountain views, and – now – a ton of fracking equipment. It wasn’t here before.

  We make one stop for lunch at a deli, another in the afternoon for gas. The station and a variety of stores are all nestled within the hills, the only signs of modern life other than the road.

  We get out to use the restroom and stretch our legs. Portia and I go across the street to the package store, which is the only place to buy hard alcohol in Wyoming. She stocks up on vodka.

  ‘You all right?’ I say.

  Her eyes are remarkably alert given her daylong buzz. ‘Yeah. Why?’

  I shrug, and add in snack cakes, chips, packaged cinnamon rolls, and cigarettes.

  ‘Nice,’ Portia says.

  The man at the counter doesn’t glance my way, but Portia gets his attention. Could be the cutoff shorts, the long legs, or the fact that she’s carrying enough alcohol to kill a few people. Could be that she’s twenty-six.

  She sees him look and she smiles at him. ‘Don’t suppose you give bulk discounts?’

  ‘Depends. Am I invited to the party?’ His voice is deep, his smile a leer. I don’t know how Portia can do what she does.

  ‘I’d love to invite you,’ she says. ‘But we aren’t staying. Just passing through.’

  ‘Your loss,’ he says.

  ‘I bet it is.’

  He discounts our whole purchase by 20 percent. Now that, my friend, is power.

  Outside, it’s warm but not hot. Eddie stands around waiting, the gas already pumped, while Krista sits in the car and ignores him. Felix is ‘in the bathroom’ and I already know what that means. While Portia climbs into the car, I have a second alone with Eddie. He motions for me to come closer.

  ‘You don’t really think I broke the rule, do you?’ he says.

  So he is worried. ‘I don’t know. I didn’t make the rules.’

  ‘It was one night.’

  ‘You’re right. One night.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he says, nodding his head like he’s trying to convince himself he didn’t break the rule. ‘One night.’

  We move on, and the roads look the same, the landscape looks the same, the only difference is the vodka in my soda. Portia rambles on about a club in New Orleans that none of us have been to, but at least her voice fills the air. Otherwise we’d be sitting in Krista’s anger and the faint smell of cigarettes.

  The alcohol relaxes me a bit. I start to think – to hope – all the bad things are behind us. The guys in the truck are gone, Eddie is out of jail, and the car is working just fine. We’re still here, still driving, and everything is looking pretty good. Not that I want to jinx it, but I almost can’t help myself.

  We’re north of Casper when we stop for the night. Eddie pulls into the Western Sun Lodge and for the millionth time Felix remarks about how everything is the same all over.

  ‘Agreed,’ Krista says. ‘I’m not convinced Wyoming is any better than Colorado.’ Her first words since we left that state.

  Eddie doesn’t respond, doesn’t react. He goes to the back and starts unloading the suitcases. As I get out of the car, I hear Eddie say, ‘Guys?’

  His tone is off. I may be intoxicated, but I know off when I hear it. ‘What?’ I say, moving a little faster. As soon as I step around to the back, I see. All the suitcases are out of the car, on the ground, and the spare tire cover is up.

  The side compartment is empty. No wooden box, no anything at all. Grandpa’s ashes are gone.

  Wyoming

  State Motto: Equal rights

  If you’ve ever wondered what would get you kicked out of a place like the Western Sun Lodge, start by losing your grandfather’s ashes. Follow it with a brother who loses his mind over said ashes.

  ‘Are you fucking kidding me? You left Grandpa in the car last night?’ he screams.

  Portia. Slurring. ‘We were a little busy, given that you were in jail.’

  Eddie turns to Krista. ‘You saw me bring that box in every single night and you forgot?’

&n
bsp; ‘Stop yelling at me,’ she says. Krista walks away, throwing one last bomb over her shoulder. ‘You’re the one who got arrested!’

  ‘Nice, you dick,’ Portia says.

  ‘I mean, she has a point,’ I say.

  Eddie continues to yell. ‘What happened to watching the car?’

  ‘You missed your shift,’ I say. ‘You were in jail.’

  ‘So you just bailed?’

  I hold up my hands, trying to halt the conversation before it gets more ridiculous. ‘Felix and I tried, but you know, people get tired. I may have nodded off.’

  ‘You nodded off?’ Felix says. He sounds annoyed at this.

  ‘Yes, I am human. I do sleep,’ I say.

  ‘ASSHOLE!’ Krista yells from across the parking lot.

  Eddie punches the side of the car.

  ‘Stop,’ I say to him. ‘Listen to yourself. You think someone broke into the car and stole a box of ashes.’

  ‘That looks like exactly what happened.’

  ‘Have you looked in the suitcases?’

  Eddie sighs. ‘Why would –’

  ‘Have you looked?’

  He lays down the roller bags, opening each one in the quickest, roughest way possible, shoving aside the clothes in search of Grandpa’s ashes. I think about stopping him and doing it myself, but I’m too intoxicated and can’t be bothered. I was the one who suggested it, after all.

  ‘Nope … Nope … Nope …’ He says this over and over, like it’s a mantra.

  Felix leans in and whispers, ‘You have to admit it’s pretty weird.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Don’t touch mine!’ Portia says. She opens her own suitcase and shows Eddie that there are no ashes hiding inside.

  Eddie looks through the whole car, throwing out whatever gets in his way. Snacks, garbage, water bottles, sweaters. When he finds the vodka bottles, one empty and one half full, he looks at Portia. ‘Really?’

  ‘I didn’t drink it all by myself.’

  ‘What the hell?’

  The voice doesn’t come from any of us. It comes from a very large, very shirtless man storming across the parking lot. He is unkempt in that just-woken-up way and not happy about it.