Still Waters

by Ash Parsons

  I ran more, fast as I could, an all-out sprint—against pursuers and more, against the sun.

  I doubled back to the road, heading in a giant arc toward the stop-signed intersection and the gas stations there.

  They weren’t open. I circled around back. I didn’t know what I was looking for. A car. A bicycle. A motorcycle. Something.

  Behind the row of gas stations was a clear-cut hill, dotted with rectangles.

  A trailer park.

  My legs trembled, but I forced them to sprint again, dashing for the trailers. The backpack full of money bounced against my back. The straps chafed my bare shoulders.

  My lungs burned, gasping in the chill air. I took deep breaths and slowed to a walk. Making my way up the row of angle-parked metal houses, looking for the most likely one. The last thing I needed was to set off a car alarm or invite more gunshots.

  Found one. The one. The only one worth trying.

  The faded Chevy Caprice looked defeated, faded Dead Head stickers studding the back window and bumper. The trailer behind it was equally beat up. There were paint cans, a stagnant dish for a dog, the wafting odor of dog crap from behind a little wooden fence, a torn ladybug banner that said Summer!, and rusted wind chimes. I bet the inside of the car would smell like pot.

  I felt under the wheel wells, letting my fingers sweep the mud spatter. Duckwalked across the front bumper, feeling under the edge again, legs trembling with the effort. Under the back bumper, tucked over the muffler, my fingers closed around the flat box. I pulled out the magnetic key-hide box. Unlocked the car and threw the backpack in. I fell into the seat. Didn’t smell pot but did smell rancid fast food. Grease-stained, brightly colored bags littered the car floor.

  I cranked the engine and backed out.

  No one made a peep. The dog didn’t even bark.

  I drove onto the street, trying to remember the route Michael had taken, searching for any familiar sign or road number. I kept driving and saw a sign for the major thruway that bisected the city.

  “Yes,” I hissed. Floored the accelerator and chugged onto the highway.

  Sunlight gleamed on the hood.

  Once over the bridge, I threaded through other cars, slowing only when I saw how fast I was going.

  I exited the Mercer High School ramp and wove onto Dean, racing past the building supply store and fast-food joints.

  “Come on. Come on.”

  I tried not to think about my dad’s threat. Tried not to think about his buddies. If he’d hurt Janie or let them hurt her.

  Tried not to think about what was going to happen when I got there.

  I had the backpack. It would be enough.

  The tires squealed as I took the last corner too fast. I laid tread, black marks weaving behind me as I yanked the wheel over. I cut the engine, grabbed the backpack, and bailed. Ran across the dirt yard and was at the top of the porch in one leap.

  The door opened before I touched it.

  My breath and heart competed with each other to see which could go faster.

  My father smiled from inside the door, welcoming me with a sweep of his hand. “Jason. Just in time.”

  A trickle of sweat stung my eyes. The backpack dangled by my leg. I hovered on the doorstep, unable to move, unable to make myself go inside.

  “Come in.” My father took a step closer, and I could smell the beer and cigarettes lifting from the pores of his skin. “We’ve been expecting you.”

  Janie.

  I stepped forward. Made myself take another step. Walked over the threshold and past my father and the door. My eyes searched for Janie.

  Fell on Cyndra and Michael instead, seated together at one end of the couch.

  Janie hugged herself at the other end.

  “I was just talking to your friends.” My father closed the door behind me.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  My lungs heaved. My father blocked the door, weight balanced between the balls of his feet, standing with his arms slightly out. Not a good sign. That stance can flow in any direction and the hands even faster.

  I glanced at his eyes. They had that look, that murderous, psychopathic glint. If anyone in Michael’s crew ever saw it, they’d never call me Ice again.

  “Michael?” I eased toward him and the sofa, legs weak from running and adrenaline. Cyndra’s eyes were red-rimmed, her face splotchy. The bandage on her arm was stained slightly. Her eyes darted around the room. Kept snagging on Michael, watching him like he was nitroglycerin.

  She was terrified of him. Of where she was and what was going to happen next.

  Michael glared at me. Half-smile in a pissed-off hover over his lips. Shaking his head like The nerve of you.

  Standing over Janie, almost looking protective, was a tattooed member of my father’s group. The only other person there.

  Janie didn’t look up.

  “What’s going on?” I asked Michael, stopping between him and my father.

  “Thought you’d be smarter than to come here, after what you pulled.” Michael’s voice was detached, musing like he was interested in the mental processes of an insect.

  “What?” I asked.

  I heard the creak of the floor. My father hit the back of my head with his open palm, hard enough to be both a warning and an omen.

  I cursed and slid back, rubbing my head. I tossed the backpack on the floor at his feet. “Here, you two fight over it.”

  My father had the backpack in his hand before Michael could even speak. He threw it to the tattooed man.

  “This all you got?” my dad asked. “’Cause Michael says you have a whole lot more.”

  “I should’ve done it without him,” Michael interrupted, gesturing to the backpack as he stood. “I had to leave a second one behind when your idiot son started shooting up the place.”

  What was he doing? My eyes ricocheted between them.

  This wasn’t about helping me with my father.

  Wasn’t even about the thrill of getting away with murder.

  This was something else.

  “Shut up,” my father said to Michael. “Whiny little shit. Your boy Dwight said you needed him.”

  “We’re square after this, though. Right? We’re square now.” Michael eased closer to my father.

  It bolt-shot through my mind.

  “Sure. We’ll be square.” Laughing to underscore the sarcasm.

  There was no Cesare.

  The realization shifted, a tangle of razor-edged hooks. Snarled and suddenly shaken free, scalpel barbs piercing into my mind and lungs.

  The knowledge stabbed, twisted, and lodged there.

  There was no Cesare.

  Because my father was Cesare.

  Everything Michael had said had been about my father. Michael’s day spent drinking and gambling with his stepbrother after dropping Cyndra and her mom off for their trip.

  My dad’s shift. The airport strip club.

  It had all started there.

  Drugs, debt, and Michael’s inflated opinion of himself had deepened it. Everything had happened like he’d said.

  It just hadn’t happened with the antagonist he’d painted.

  Same story, different villain.

  And now a different ending. Because it had never been about squaring with Cesare. Never been about getting free, or getting away, or wiping the slate clean.

  He wanted to blow the slate away.

  So he had hired me. Paid me money he owed to my dad, because while Michael may be a narcissistic sociopath, he could still see one clear thing about my father. The one clear thing even I always knew.

  Only one of us was getting out alive.

  My father or Michael.

  My father or me.

  Because with my father, it would never be over. He’d latch on and keep pa
ying it out, feeding Michael drugs, running him credit on races or fights—whatever it would take to keep the golden boy in his debt.

  Small-time, but not stupid.

  And Michael knew it.

  This whole elaborate setup, from hiring me to going on this insane strip-club robbery, all of it had been about one thing.

  Getting Michael in the right place.

  In exactly the right position to be able to do it.

  To kill my father and get away with it.

  Hell, he’d even tried to take a shortcut, by getting me to do it with him earlier. And I’d turned him down and forced him to continue building this scene.

  He’d bought my friendship, but it was really about setting up his alibi. It would go like he’d said it would that day in the school parking lot. That we were friends, that my father beat the hell out of me. And Michael had to kill my dad—to save me.

  He’d had Cyndra show up at my house before the party, knowing it would cause a fight with my dad when he saw her car. Then everyone else had seen my face at the party afterward. And the next morning, dropping me off at school, Michael had paid to see my back. He’d played me like a violin. I’d gone off, in a self-destructive haze, and had provoked the confrontation when I’d gotten home.

  Which had led to even better, undeniable proof. Absences and worse bruises.

  Mr. Stewart was worried about me. A friend had told him they were worried about me, too.

  Michael.

  All of it set up the believable backstory. Framed the justifiable homicide—in defense of another.

  Even tonight, the club and the bouncer and Dwight. It could all be explained away by saying my father had made us do it, while holding Janie captive. It showed how dangerous he was. And we didn’t know what else to do.

  Now all Michael had to do was cause my death. Get my dad to go for it.

  Would Michael stop it in time? Save my life at the last minute? Or did I have to die now, too? And Janie with me.

  What about Cyndra?

  She huddled on the sofa, tear-streaked face taut with fear.

  Something ripped in my chest. The space between my lungs tore and constricted.

  My father stepped closer, hand up, knuckle ridge bowing out as he showed me his fist. “Where’s the second bag?” he asked. “I know you didn’t leave it.”

  “He’s the one with money, not me.” I pointed at Michael.

  Why didn’t I say it? Say It’s a setup or He’s got a gun. He’s just waiting for the right moment to kill you.

  Can’t you smell the trap?

  I know what’s going to happen. It feels like a poorly rehearsed play that the high school admin makes the whole school attend so they can justify having drama class.

  And I have to play my part. Have to say the right lines. Only the right move will get Janie out alive, and Cyndra with her.

  I was wrong before. This is what it feels like to be trapped.

  My stomach roiled beneath my trip-hammering heart.

  Michael stood up, jabbing a finger at me. His eyes glimmered, an imitation of my dad’s psycho look.

  Maybe it wasn’t an imitation. He’d arranged it all. Even shooting Beast at the club tonight. Everything to get to this precise moment.

  “Wasn’t I your friend, Jason? Where’s the shit?” Michael asked.

  “You’re full of it,” I said.

  My father growled and seized my shoulders, yanking me up and shoving me against the wall. He shifted one hand to my throat, the other hand pointed to the backpack.

  “That all you got? Is that”—he pressed into my throat, cutting off the air—“all you got?”

  I brought up a knee. He blocked it, but the shift of attention loosened the hand on my throat. I jabbed stiff fingers at his eyes and tore his thumb off my neck, twisting away.

  He cursed, rubbing his eyes and blinking.

  The back door was behind me.

  Janie was on the sofa.

  “Janie—”

  A hand came down on her shoulder, tattoo of a squid wrapped around his wrist and hand, tentacles fat, green, and glistening.

  I stood, shaking, my body screaming at me to get out, to get away, to run and never come back this time.

  Looked at Michael. He shrugged. I couldn’t see any emotion in his eyes other than anticipation. No regret. No reassurance.

  No way out.

  I was bait on his hook. That was the use he had for me.

  The only thing I’d done right was keep Clay out of it.

  My stomach churned, an engine blade whipping sludge. The sour tang of acid rose in my mouth.

  Cyndra didn’t meet my eyes. Tears coursed down her face. She hugged herself like if she didn’t, she’d come apart.

  My shoulders slumped. This was it, then. Whatever Michael wanted it to be. Because if I said anything, it wouldn’t matter. My father would still come for me, wouldn’t believe anything I said, wouldn’t stop now.

  My father cursed, then laughed. It raised the hairs on my arms.

  “Run, little boy. Why don’t you run?”

  I glanced at Michael. Wondered if there was anything I could say that would change what was about to happen.

  Michael’s eyes were reptile flat.

  The only thing I could change was how I’d feel when it was over. If I lived.

  I threw myself across the room at the man with the tattooed hand. Punched him in the gut, brought my knee up in his groin. Grabbed the back of his head and slammed his face on my piston knee.

  He fell, groaning. I grabbed Janie, pushed her at the front door. “Run!”

  The tattooed hand grabbed my ankle, yanked hard enough to make me stumble. I kicked out.

  My father was there ahead of us, of course, the confined space and tattooed hand ruining our chance. My father caught Janie by the hair and yanked her backward. She fell, clutching at her scalp and screaming.

  “Let her go!” I grabbed the corpse-white hand snared in her hair, trying to ease the tearing.

  He shoved her away. Caught my wrist instead and whipped it to the side, pulling my arm straight and exposing my ribs. He punched, then kneed my ribs, the ones that were newly healed, and maybe not as well healed as I’d thought.

  I collapsed. He didn’t let go of my arm, but twisted it up behind my back, driving his weight on my shoulder until the joint screamed and so did I, scrabbling on the ground like a beetle having its legs torn off.

  My arm came out of the shoulder socket with a wet crack.

  I screamed, almost drowning Janie’s yell as she tried to tackle my father from behind.

  She was so slight, and he so big, that she barely swayed him. He let go of my ruined arm and flipped her off his back one-handed.

  I rolled onto my side, clutching my shoulder. Got my knees under me, then my feet. Stood swaying.

  Adrenaline sewage-dumped into my veins.

  The man with the tattooed hand lifted Janie off the floor, hands not taking care what parts of her they grabbed as he hauled her up.

  My father strolled toward me, calm as you imagine Death would be.

  “So, Jason,” he said, giving a sideways smile and a this-one’s-for-you nod to Michael, “where’s the bag?” He pulled a long face, a comedian going for a laugh. “Outside?” The fang-grooves over his canine teeth reappeared.

  My foot edged along the wall. I couldn’t stop myself from backing up. Couldn’t stop my eyes from darting to Janie, twisting in the tattooed hand’s grasp.

  I let go of my shrieking shoulder, cocking the fist of my good arm.

  “He’s a lying piece of shit who wants to watch you beat me to death,” I told him. “And then he’ll kill you.”

  My father started laughing, cutting too-round, ain’t-that-something eyes to his audience.

  Michael laugh
ed, too. If I saw a moment of appraisal in my father’s eyes, it didn’t last. He saw what everyone saw: prom king, golden boy, someone with a future assured, a future they wouldn’t risk.

  Right assessment, wrong conclusion.

  My father turned back to me, massive hands flexing like he was preparing to bench a weight.

  “He has the van.” I gestured to the backpack. “And that’s all there was.”

  My father smiled and nodded like he thought as much. Took a step closer.

  My foot wedged in the corner. No more room to back away. No way out.

  “Now, Jason. Time to give it up.” My father fired a huge hand out, batted my injured shoulder with a quick pop before I could dodge.

  I gasped, twisted, and realized too late that was what he wanted. He grabbed my shoulders and drove me to the ground. I tasted blood.

  And since he wasn’t thinking about the school, or the truant officer, or the social worker, or anything else, he punched me in the face.

  My nose snapped. Blood gushed out my nostrils, flowed over my lips and into my mouth. I brought my hands up, tried to jab or claw him, tried to remember myself.

  As someone who fought back.

  He punched me in the stomach, ramming his fist into my solar plexus again and again until I couldn’t tense around it.

  His thick fingers gripped my neck. Cut the blood off and put me out in seconds.

  I struggled awake, through pain, through layers of mental cotton that smothered my thudding heartbeats.

  My eyes opened.

  He smiled down at me. His fingers rested on my throat.

  “Where is it, Jason?” He lifted a knee, settled it on my dislocated shoulder. “Where?”

  Pain sparks flared behind my eyes.

  I strained against the weight on my shrieking shoulder, gagging on blood from my broken nose.

  His fingers clenched around my windpipe. Something in my throat broke with a wishbone snick. His grip eased off, letting me grab wisps of oxygen.

  “Talk.”

  I reached my good arm up. Scratched his hand. Gouged his arm and neck, straining for his eyes or his nose, just out of my grasp. I made his arm run with blood, but he didn’t move, didn’t flinch, just kept squeezing and easing off his grip, giving me a few sips of air. Squeezing and easing.