Banished

by Sophie Littlefield

  Instead, what I said was, “I can’t leave Chub.”

  Prairie didn’t look surprised. She dabbed at the corners of her mouth with her napkin and set down her fork.

  “Look,” she said, “I’ll admit I hadn’t planned on Chub. I was actually hoping to leave tonight. This complicates things a bit—but we’re still leaving. We’ll just go a little later than I planned, and we’ll take him with us.”

  She said that last part kind of fast as I started to protest.

  “But—but what about—”

  She held up a hand to stop me. “Try not to worry. I want you to let me handle the details. At least for now. Okay? Look, I know you probably aren’t sure about me yet, and you may not completely trust me, and that’s—that stands to reason. It does. I understand. But I just—I’m not doing this lightly, Hailey. After you get to know me a little more, you’ll understand that I don’t take anything lightly.”

  The way she said that, it sounded like a promise, but even more than a promise. Like something she’d worked hard to convince herself of and now she’d do anything to keep it true.

  “I can’t just—”

  “You can.” Prairie reached across the table and patted my hand, but I pulled away from her. “I have … resources that I’ll tell you more about later. I have some money. We can stay the night at the house and you can gather up a few things—not many, just one small suitcase. And we can’t let Alice see you packing. She doesn’t know. I told her that I was moving back to Gypsum so I could be closer to you. I told her I was going to look for a house here in town.”

  “You told her … ?” There was no way Gram would believe that. There was no way anyone would believe a person would come back here to live if they had a choice. “I don’t have a suitcase.”

  “A box, then. Whatever you and Chub need, we can buy.”

  “And then what? Where would we go?” I knew it was crazy. But it was so tempting to believe in Prairie, in what she said she could do.

  “I don’t want to say just yet,” she said. “I know I’m asking a lot from you, Hailey, but I promise you that soon I’ll tell you everything. Right now I just need to focus on getting us all out of here. And you need to help me make Alice believe what I told her. Do you think you can do that?”

  I didn’t say yes—but I didn’t say no, either.

  CHAPTER 10

  WHEN WE GOT HOME, I saw that Gram had made a few plans of her own. Dun Acey’s truck was pulled up in the yard, the back fender hanging a little lower since the last time I’d seen it, the result of some accident that had probably been worse for the other guy.

  Prairie pulled the Volvo into the yard about as far away from the truck as she could.

  “Whose truck is that?” she asked, voice neutral, but I could hear the tension underneath her words.

  “That’s Dun Acey.”

  “What a surprise,” she muttered, as if it was anything but.

  “You know him?”

  “I knew some Aceys.” She said the name like it was poison.

  She walked ahead of me. I let her, glad to have a buffer between me and whatever waited inside.

  In the kitchen, Dun was tilted back in a chair across from Gram at the table. Rattler Sikes was standing at the sink, a lit cigarette in one hand. He was pouring a glass of water down his throat.

  He gave me a tiny nod and then slowly lowered the glass to the sink. Leaning against the counter, he put the cigarette to his lips and drew in on it and smirked as the smoke streamed lazily out of his nostrils.

  There were eight beer cans on the table, and I knew without having to be told that six were empty and Dun and Gram were working on the others.

  “Hel-lo, Hailey,” Dun drawled, letting the chair legs slam down on the floor with a thud. “You’re lookin’ hotter’n August. And who’s this you got with you?”

  Behind him Rattler laughed, an abrupt, rasping sound accompanied by a ghost of a smile.

  Dun looked Prairie up and down the way he usually looked at me—lingering on her breasts and her legs. Dun and Rattler were both probably about Prairie’s age, but Dun had always looked old to me, with a couple of missing teeth and greasy hair falling all around his face. After he’d stared her up and down, he gave a low whistle.

  “Prair-ie Tar-bell,” he said, drawing out the syllables. “I’d know you anywhere. You look even better than the day you left.”

  I could feel Prairie tense up next to me. “Hello, Dunston,” she said, her voice steely. “Rattler.”

  “Damn—you recognize us after all, girl. Didn’t think you would, now you gone all uptown on us. But I guess you just couldn’t stay away from us local boys forever.” Dun laughed as though that was the funniest thing he’d heard in a long time. Gram laughed with him, lighting up a fresh cigarette and ending on a hacking cough.

  “I remember you.” Prairie practically chewed off the words.

  “Alice tells me you’re moving back here. Ain’t that nice. Course, if you come back to try an’ git in my pants, you’re a li’l late.” Dun’s words were slurred from the beer. “I got my eye on another girl.”

  Gram laughed again and they both looked at me.

  “Lucky her,” Prairie said icily. “Now, if you all will excuse us, Hailey and I are tired, and I’m meeting with a realtor first thing tomorrow to look at a house, so we’re heading to bed.”

  “ ‘Hailey and I are tired,’ ” Gram repeated in a high singsong voice. She did that sometimes when she was drinking, mimicking what I said.

  Something told me it was a mistake to do it to Prairie, though.

  I waited for her to snap back at Gram like she had earlier, but she said nothing. She put her hand on my arm and steered me toward the hall. “Come on,” she whispered.

  “Goin’ to bed, are you, Prairie?” Rattler’s voice came from behind us.

  I could sense Prairie tense even more, but she didn’t say anything, just practically dragged me down to my room. Once we were inside, she shut the door firmly and leaned back against it.

  I went to check on Chub. He was curled up in his crib, and I was grateful Gram at least had managed to get him put down. His little fist was pressed against his cheek. He always got hot when he slept, his face taking on a rosy color. I put my hand lightly on the back of his neck and felt his heartbeat—strong and regular.

  Only then did I turn back to Prairie. “If Dun and Rattler knew about you, and probably a whole lot more people knew too, how come nobody ever said anything to me?”

  “Keep your voice down, Hailey,” Prairie said softly. “A lot of people are scared of Alice. Or else Alice makes it worth their while to keep their mouths shut. Besides, other than Alice’s customers, not that many people in town would remember. Alice sent us to school in Tipton because she didn’t want us mixing with the local kids. And it’s not like we ever had friends over.”

  “What about Dun and Rattler? Seems like they knew you pretty well.”

  “There were a few families that Alice … socialized with. The Aceys and the Sikes, a few others.”

  “From Trashtown. Her customers.”

  “They weren’t always customers, but—yes. Alice knew they had a taste for illegal substances. And she figured out how to capitalize on it. She had to find a way to make money, after all.”

  Prairie sighed and smoothed down the fabric of her jacket, the memories clearly taking a toll on her.

  “But you got out,” I said. “And …”

  I almost didn’t say it. I bit my lower lip and considered staying quiet, letting the past rest. It was probably the right thing to do. But in the space of a few hours I had learned that I had lost more than I ever knew I had. So when I spoke again, my voice was bitter.

  “And you left my mom here to deal with Alice by herself.”

  Like me.

  Prairie recoiled as if I had slapped her. “Hailey! I—It wasn’t like that. You have to know that I loved your mother more than anything in the world. I would never have left, if—i
f—”

  “If what?”

  “The thing that happened. It would have been dangerous for both of us, if I stayed.”

  What could have been so bad that she had to leave town? “Did you kill someone or something?”

  Sharp anguish flashed across Prairie’s face, and for a second I regretted asking. If she was a murderer, maybe I didn’t want to know.

  “No,” she said quietly. “Nothing like that, but what I did made it impossible for me to stay here. You just have to believe me. And I was going to come for your mom.”

  “It’s easy to make promises,” I said. “You told her you’d come back for her, and you didn’t. Now you’re trying to come in here and, what, rescue me? Because you feel guilty about what happened to my mom?”

  I could feel my heart squeezing and hear my voice going high and thin. I knew I should stop. But it would be way too easy to give in to what Prairie promised—and way too dangerous. If I made the wrong decision, it wasn’t just me that would be hurt. It was Chub, too.

  Before Prairie could answer, I turned away from her. “Forget it. I don’t want to know. I’m going to bed.”

  “Hailey—”

  “If you’re still here tomorrow, not that I expect you to be …”

  I didn’t finish the sentence, because I didn’t know what to say. The truth was that I desperately wanted to believe in her. I wanted her to rescue me. But I was afraid that if I let myself trust her, she’d disappear like every other good thing I’d ever wished for.

  Suddenly I was tired. Very tired.

  “Hailey, we can go as soon as Rattler and Dun leave. Alice won’t wake up once she’s out. You know that.” Prairie sounded desperate.

  “What I know is that I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” I said, edging past her to the door. “I’m going to go brush my teeth.”

  When I came back, Prairie took a small toiletry kit from the bag she’d brought with her and went to the bathroom without saying a word. She looked exhausted. While she was gone, I fixed up a bed for her as well as I could. I put my sleeping bag down as a pad and added some old quilts and gave her my pillow. I made myself a pillow out of a sweatshirt.

  When Prairie came back into the room, she looked at the makeshift bed and gave me a little smile.

  There was one more thing I needed to do—I had to see what Gram and Dun and Rattler were up to before I could sleep. I slipped into the hall and peeked around the corner into the kitchen. The beer-can pile had grown, and Dun was slumped way down in his chair. Rattler was sitting at the table with an ashtray loaded high with butts, drinking another glass of water. Gram was saying something to him, low and serious, but his expression was stony. I wasn’t sure Dun was even awake.

  As I watched, something strange happened: Rattler suddenly raised his head and stared straight ahead, right toward where I was hiding. His eyes lost their focus and he squinted as though it hurt, and he held up a palm to Gram to make her stop talking.

  “Who knows I’m here?” he demanded.

  “Nobody,” Gram said, chugging her beer. Some dribbled down her chin.

  “No, there’s—there’s—You got that back door locked?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Something’s not right. A car …”

  “Nah, that’s just her car.” Gram yawned, not bothering to cover her mouth. “That damn foreign thing.”

  Rattler shook his head. “Men. It’s men in it.”

  Gram reached for a fresh beer, untangling it from the plastic rings that held the six-pack together. Even that effort was almost too much for her. I was always amazed that as frail as she was, she could drink so much.

  “You’re rusty,” Gram said. “Ain’t nothin’ happened around here in so long, you’re seeing things.”

  Rattler shook his head impatiently and scowled. I shrank back into the hall—I couldn’t believe Gram wasn’t scared of him.

  “I ain’t rusty, you damn woman.”

  “Okay, then you’re just plum wrong. It happens.”

  “It happens to the others, Alice—not me.”

  Gram cackled, a sound I knew well. When she was drunk she thought plenty of things were funny.

  I eased backward as quietly as I could, my heart pounding. In my room, Prairie was sitting on the floor, a quilt pulled up over her knees.

  “Prairie, Rattler was talking to Gram. He says—”

  But what had he said, exactly? Nothing specific, but I was thinking of the rumors, the women stumbling home barefoot in the chilly dawn.

  “He’s just so creepy,” I whispered.

  Prairie nodded. She didn’t seem surprised. “I don’t want you to worry about him. Let me worry about it. I’d lay odds that Dun’s passed out by now—is he?”

  I nodded, my heart thudding in my throat. “I think so.”

  “Okay, so one down, and Alice probably isn’t far behind. Rattler’s going to get bored sooner or later.”

  “I wish he’d just leave.”

  “I know,” she said. “Me too. But let me worry about them. You need to rest, if you can.”

  I couldn’t think of anything else to do. I lay down and Prairie turned the lights out, but there was enough moonlight coming in the window that I could still see her outline. She lay on her back and I could see her chest rise and fall steadily as she breathed.

  “Good night, Hailey,” she said. “I’m glad we’re together.”

  I didn’t answer at first. Her words had a strange effect on me—even though she’d brought even more chaos into my life, her voice was soothing, and there was a part of me that wanted very much to believe she’d come to help us. That I had some sort of family besides Gram—real family, the kind that cared about one another, like other people had.

  “Good night,” I finally mumbled.

  A little later, before I drifted off to sleep, I peeked at Prairie. She wasn’t lying on her back anymore. She was leaning on her side, up on her elbow, and staring at the doorknob. I closed my eyes again.

  The next thing I knew, a scream tore through my dreams.

  CHAPTER 11

  IT WAS COMING from the other side of my bedroom door, and it sounded like Gram.

  Prairie bolted to my side, clapping a hand over my mouth. Before I could protest she leaned in close and whispered, “Quiet. Take Chub in the closet and close the door and stay there. Don’t come out.”

  “But—”

  “Do it, Hailey. Please.”

  Chub was a heavy sleeper—once he was out, he could sleep through anything. I picked him up, which took some effort because he’d gotten so big, and he snuggled in next to my neck, his skin hot and damp.

  I glanced back, but Prairie was gone; the door to the room was open a few inches. My heart thudded as I went to the closet.

  I yanked a bunch of clothes off their hangers, put them on the floor and laid Chub on them, covering him with a long sweater that I tucked in like a blanket. I kissed his cheek and then left the closet, closing the door almost all the way.

  As I crossed my room, I heard a man yell, “Stop right there!” and a pair of sharp cracks and then Prairie’s voice, speaking softly, something I couldn’t make out. I had to find out what was happening. I wasn’t worried about Gram, exactly—but I had to know what kind of trouble Prairie had brought with her.

  I tiptoed down the hall, flattening my back against the wall, and peeked around the corner so I had a view into the kitchen and the living room.

  What I saw made me suck in my breath.

  A man stood a few feet from the door, pointing a gun at Gram and Prairie. It was one of the men from the car I’d seen at the drugstore—I recognized his gray jacket and his blond buzz cut. Gram was sitting in her chair and I could tell from the drool trail that still shone wet on her cheek that she’d passed out, like she sometimes did. She was blinking fast and patting at her hair nervously. Prairie stood behind her, hands held out at her sides.

  Dun was exactly where I’d last seen him, slumped over the table, except
there was a leaking pool of red coming from his mouth.

  Prairie looked furious. I wanted to signal to her somehow, but I knew I couldn’t do it without the guy with the gun seeing me.

  “You,” the man said in a clipped, calm voice. “Old lady. Get down on the floor. Lie on your stomach with your hands straight out to the sides.”

  “You ain’t supposed to—” Gram protested. I suddenly smelled urine sharp in the air and I knew she had peed her pants.

  A movement in the corner of the kitchen caught my eye. As it flashed past I realized that Rattler must have hidden behind the refrigerator—but why? Was he helping the man with the gun somehow? Before I could even finish the thought Rattler’s arm came up and there was a flash of metal as he buried Gram’s chef’s knife deep below the man’s shoulder.

  I screamed. I tried to scream, anyway, but what came out was more of a choked gasp.

  “Get back, Hailey!” Prairie screamed at me.

  Rattler let go of the knife handle. He didn’t wait for the man to fall but threw him onto the kitchen floor as he scrabbled at the knife sticking out of his shoulder. Then Rattler reached for Prairie.

  “Get Chub,” Prairie yelled. “Now. Run!”

  I turned and sprinted for my room. I got Chub from the closet—he didn’t even stir in his sleep. From the other room I heard a crash and glass breaking. I looked toward the window and considered jumping out with Chub—it was only a few feet to the ground, we’d be fine—but I realized that without Prairie, and the car, there was no chance we could get away. It was a long way across the yard to the woods, and we wouldn’t have any cover.

  And—I didn’t want to leave Prairie.

  As I ran down the hall there was another loud crack and then a man yelled, “Get back!” I skidded to a stop just before the corner and looked around it again, shielding Chub in my arms.

  Dun had slid out of his chair and onto the floor, leaving a smear of blood on the table. The guy with the knife in his shoulder sat next to him, making gasping sounds, his blood-covered hands around the knife handle. A second man stood in the doorway, pointing his gun at Rattler. It was the other man from the car, slightly shorter than his partner, with black hair and eyes and wearing a black track jacket. He stepped neatly over the pile of splintered wood and glass that had been our storm door, and placed himself squarely between Prairie and Rattler. For a second I had the crazy idea that he was protecting Prairie, that they had come here to save us from Dun and Rattler and Gram, but then the man spoke, never taking his eyes off Rattler, who slowly sank to his knees and raised his hands in the air, looking not so much afraid as amused.