Wilder Boys

by Brandon Wallace

  “Chicago,” Jake answered.

  “Chicago! Oh, man! I’ve always wanted to come here. Wrigley Field’s here, Jake. Do you think we can go see a Cubs game?”

  “Taylor, we have to stay out of sight.”

  “Can’t we just look around a little bit?” his brother pleaded.

  “I don’t know. Maybe,” Jake said, shaking his head. “But before we do anything, I’ve got to get some real sleep. I feel like an elephant was kicking me in the butt all night.”

  As they drew closer to the city, the train slowed, and the air filled with the smells and sounds of the big city—diesel fumes, traffic on nearby roads, jet airplanes flying overhead, and the sour smells of garbage and trash. Finally the train slowed to a crawl, and the boys saw more than a dozen parked trains in the rail yard up ahead.

  “C’mon,” Jake told Taylor. “We’d better jump off here.”

  The boys put on their packs, then Jake sat on the edge of the doorframe and let his legs swing down toward the track. He literally hit the ground running, letting his back foot hit the gravel first, and just about managed to stay upright. He kept running alongside the car while Taylor handed Cody down to him. Then Taylor dropped to the ground too, gravel flying up from his sneakers.

  The boys hurried away from the rail yards along a canal, where homeless people had set up shacks of cardboard, corrugated iron, plywood, and even canvas. Some of the shacks were occupied, and a few of the grizzled faces nodded at the boys as they passed, but no one bothered them. That didn’t stop Taylor from feeling a shiver run up his back.

  “I don’t like this place, Jake,” he said, running a hand nervously through his hair. “We shouldn’t stick around here.”

  “We won’t be here for long,” Jake replied. “We just need rest. Otherwise, we’ll collapse before we even get started.”

  Down in the gulley between a railway track and the fence, the boys found a shelter that looked like it hadn’t been lived in for a while. It looked like it might be a half-decent place to get some sleep.

  “C’mon,” Jake said. “Let’s crash here for a couple of hours. Then we can figure out our next move.”

  The boys stretched out on the dirt floor, using their packs as pillows. A slight chill still clung to the air, but the day was warming up fast, and in no time Jake and Taylor drifted into sleep. Jake slept fitfully, at one moment dreaming of his mom, then the dad he barely knew, and then the nightmarish image of Bull floated in front of him, taunting him.

  But then, even worse, the nightmare spilled into reality. Sudden sharp pain erupted in Jake’s side. His eyes snapped open. A man with a scraggly salt-and-pepper beard and wild red eyes was standing over them. He held a thick branch over his head.

  “Get outta my house!” the man cried as he swung the stick at Jake’s head.

  8 Cody leaped to his feet, barking, but the man just kicked him away. Jake and Taylor scrambled out of the shack.

  “No-good trespassers!” the man bellowed.

  “Get your pack!” Jake yelled to Taylor as Cody again hurled himself at the man’s legs.

  Taylor ducked back inside the shack and seized his backpack.

  “Let’s get outta here!”

  The boys and Cody raced back the way they’d come, following the canal. Behind them, the crazy man yelled, “You’d better run! You come back, and I’ll kill you kids—and your ugly mutt, too!”

  As they approached the rail yards, the boys finally slowed down.

  Taylor looked up at Jake, terror still etched on his face. “Whew, was that guy insane?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe,” said Jake, panic making his voice waver. “We’ve got to be more careful from now on.” Jake couldn’t help but think that the encounter might have been much worse. They had barely started on their journey, and they’d already been chased and threatened twice.

  “Okay,” Taylor agreed, “but right now, I could really use a restroom. . . .”

  Jake glanced at Taylor and then at himself. Whatever Taylor’s bathroom needs, they both needed to wash up. Their clothes were already filthy from the train ride and from sleeping in the crazy man’s shack. Toward the rail yards, Jake and Taylor spotted a large building that looked like it belonged to a railroad company. The boys and Cody hid behind a large Dumpster and checked it out long enough to see three or four company employees in blue uniforms exit the building.

  “C’mon,” Jake whispered. “Now’s our chance.”

  Taylor picked up Cody, and the three of them rushed to the side door of the building. Inside, they found a long corridor, and from the far end they could hear the hum and shuffle of a copy machine, and the squawk of a radio.

  “In here,” Taylor said, pushing open a door with a sign that said EMPLOYEES ONLY.

  Inside the room, they found several little cul-de-sacs of lockers with benches next to them. Beyond that, they saw four shower stalls, toilet cubicles, and sinks.

  “This is what I’m talking about!” Taylor exclaimed, setting down Cody and his backpack and dashing into a toilet cubicle.

  While Taylor took care of business, Jake opened their packs and did a quick inventory of their belongings.

  “What are you doing?” Taylor asked from inside the toilet stall.

  “Just checking what we’ve got with us so we can decide what to do next.”

  “So what do we got?”

  “Let’s see . . . Some cans of beans, Swiss Army knife, extra socks, flashlight, Dad’s journal, the letters . . .”

  Jake heard the toilet flush, and a moment later the door opened.

  Taylor said, “Now we also have one more very important thing.”

  Jake looked up at him. “Yeah? What’s that?”

  Taylor grinned and held up a white roll. “Toilet paper!”

  Jake laughed and stuffed the toilet paper into Taylor’s pack. “Good thinking. C’mon, let’s get washed up.”

  “Let’s take showers,” said Taylor. “You stink, brother.”

  Jake gave him a sour expression. “Oh, look who’s talking, sewer breath.”

  “So c’mon,” Taylor said, starting toward one of the shower stalls.

  Jake reached out to stop him. “No, Taylor. It’s too risky. Let’s just wash up in the sinks and get out of here.”

  Taylor sighed. “Okay.”

  They went to the row of sinks and began washing. Jake pulled off his shirt and scrubbed under his armpits, and Taylor did the same. As they dried off with some paper towels, an overhead speaker suddenly burst to life. The boys stopped to listen.

  This is dispatch. Train 661 from Omaha now arriving on track fourteen. Would the replacement engineer please report to the main office? Also, all railroad employees, be on the lookout for two male runaways, early teens, traveling with a small brown-and-white dog. Boys are thought to have boarded at our Duquesne yard near Pittsburgh with unknown destination. They are not thought to be dangerous, but if you see them, report in immediately. Out.

  “They’re talking about us!” Taylor exclaimed.

  Jake yanked his shirt back over his head. “Man, that was fast. We need to get out of here—”

  Suddenly the boys heard the door open at the far end of the locker room.

  “Quick!” Jake cried. “Taylor! Cody! In here!”

  Jake and Taylor ducked into one of the shower stalls, and Cody scurried in after them. Jake pulled the curtain closed just as they heard footsteps approaching.

  Taylor looked at Jake in alarm and curled his hand around Cody’s muzzle.

  “Man, glad this shift’s over,” they heard a deep male voice mutter.

  “You got that right. I swear, some of these older freight cars are falling apart.”

  The footsteps stopped about ten feet away from the shower stalls, and Jake heard what sounded like the spinning dials of combination locks, followed by the sounds of lockers opening. He looked at Taylor and put his finger to his lips, scared to make a sound.

  “Hey,” said the first voice. “What d
o ya think about those two runaways?”

  “Man,” said the second voice. “I’m glad they ain’t my kids. If they don’t get their legs sliced off by the wheels of a freight car, they’ll be lucky not to get beaten up and robbed by some drifter.”

  “Yeah,” the first man agreed. “Hope the railroad police catch ’em before they get in over their heads.”

  Two metal doors slammed shut, and then the boys heard the men leave the locker room. Jake let out his breath and closed his eyes, relief flooding over him.

  “Jake!” Taylor said. “Did you hear what they said? We can’t hop another freight now, can we?”

  Jake shook his head. “No. And we can’t hang around here. Come on.”

  The boys sneaked out of the building and hurried toward a busy four-lane road that ran past the rail yard.

  “This way,” Jake said, crossing the road and heading west.

  “Where are we going?” Taylor asked.

  “I don’t know,” Jake said. “I was thinking maybe we could find a Greyhound bus station and buy tickets to Wyoming.”

  “But, Jake,” Taylor said. “If the train people know about us, don’t you think the Greyhound people would too?”

  Jake’s eyes darted nervously around him. “Maybe . . . But I don’t see what other choice we’ve got. We can’t walk the whole way there!”

  The boys continued walking as fast as they could, with Cody trotting swiftly behind them. Jake knew they couldn’t wander along the side of the road forever, and was glad when, about half a mile from the rail yards, he heard the deep rumble of an engine behind them. He spun around to see a city bus heading in their direction.

  “Quick! Run to that bus stop,” Jake said, and the three of them sprinted to a pole with a purple-and-red route marker on it. He checked the map and saw that the route would take them closer to a main station, where they could hopefully get a long-distance bus.

  Jake waved at the bus, and it pulled to a stop with a loud hiss. The door opened. The boys paid the fare with loose change and plunked down into some seats halfway through the bus.

  “Where are we going?” Taylor whispered.

  “Away from the rail yards—that’s all I know,” said Jake, still holding Cody.

  “But what are we going to do?”

  “I don’t know. Let me think.”

  However, as the bus rumbled through suburban Chicago, Jake was out of good ideas. We’ve got plenty of cash, he thought, but if the police are looking for us, our money might as well be more toilet paper. Jake carefully studied the blocks of warehouses, strip malls, and neighborhoods as they passed through various towns, hoping something would come to him. He felt very far from home, and even farther away from their dad—wherever he was.

  He sighed. Nothing.

  After a few miles, the bus crossed over a busy interstate highway with four lanes of traffic roaring in each direction. On the other side of the overpass, Jake spotted a truck stop. He reached over and yanked hard on the cord next to the seat. The rumble in his stomach had made the decision for him.

  Ping. The bell rang, and the driver downshifted, the bus lurching to a halt.

  “What are we doing?” Taylor asked.

  “C’mon,” Jake said, standing up, still holding Cody.

  He and Taylor hurried to the front of the bus. The driver said, “You boys want out here?”

  “Yeah,” Jake said. “We’re, uh, meeting someone.”

  The driver raised one eyebrow. “Okay, then. You take care, now.”

  “Thanks,” Jake said, hopping onto the sidewalk.

  Jake set Cody down and nodded toward the truck stop. “I don’t know where we’re headed, but I do know it’s time for lunch.”

  “Now you’re talkin’!” Taylor exclaimed, his stomach growling.

  They hurried over to the truck stop—a sprawling acre of pavement with more than two dozen gas pumps and a large central building. As the boys walked, they passed at least thirty parked trucks, many of them belching out diesel fumes as their drivers attended to business inside the central building.

  “You’d better wait outside here with Cody,” Jake told Taylor.

  “Get me some chips—oh, and some peanut butter cups.”

  Jake went into the store and quickly began cruising up and down the aisles, filling a plastic basket full of food that would have made a health worker cringe. He grabbed bags of chips and peanut butter cups for Taylor, two large Cokes, and a package of cookies. He returned to the refrigerator and picked out a chunk of cheddar cheese, some baloney, and a quart of milk, then threw in some beef jerky and a large bag of trail mix for good measure. Finally he grabbed two cans of dog food for Cody, along with some doggy treats, and carried the shopping basket to the counter.

  That should keep us going for a few days, Jake thought.

  A middle-aged woman rang up the food impatiently.

  “You want a bag?”

  “Yes, please.”

  With an annoyed grimace, the woman dumped the groceries into two plastic bags. “That’ll be $39.72.”

  Jake handed her a one-hundred-dollar bill from Bull’s stash.

  Seeing the large denomination, the woman looked at Jake, then back at the bill. She held it up to the light to look for the watermark and security strip, then picked up a special marker and made a dash across the bill. Jake started to get nervous. He tapped his hand on his thigh and looked out the store window with what he hoped was a casual expression.

  What’s taking her so long?

  The cashier hesitated, her hand hovering over the till. “What’s a kid like you doing walking around with one-hundred-dollar bills in his pocket?” she asked, fixing Jake with a glare.

  “It was, uh, a birthday present,” Jake answered, shifting slightly.

  The woman ran her eyes up and down Jake’s dirty shirt and messed-up hair. “Birthday present, huh? Stolen, more like. Maybe I should call the police, so you can confirm your story with them?”

  “What?” Jake blurted. If the police got involved, that was it for him and Taylor. They’d be on the first bus back to Pittsburgh . . . and to Bull. “Don’t—that’s all I have, I swear!”

  “And maybe we’ll soon know why,” the woman said, reaching for the phone.

  9 Acid surged in back of Jake’s throat. “Please . . .,” he said, but before he could continue, another voice spoke up behind him.

  “Aw, Pam. Cut the kid some slack, will ya?”

  Jake turned to see a middle-aged blond woman standing next him. She was dressed in jeans and a trucker’s cap. Her arm muscles bulged out of the sleeves of a T-shirt that read KEEP ON TRUCKIN’ and had a picture of a speeding truck with flames shooting out the back.

  “Oh, it’s you, Sharon. I’m just trying to make sure the kid isn’t in trouble,” the cashier—Pam—responded.

  “And if he isn’t, you’re going to try to make some trouble for him, right?” the truck driver—Sharon—answered. “I swear, since your divorce, you’ve been more ornery than a rabid possum.”

  Pam shot her a dirty look. “You stay out of this, Sharon. I got a duty to look out for trouble.”

  Sharon stepped past Jake. “And maybe I’ve got a duty to tell other truckers to pass up this choke-and-puke joint and gas up at Roady’s Truck Stop two exits back?”

  Pam scowled, the gears in her head clicking over. “Fine,” she finally said, stuffing the one-hundred-dollar bill into her cash register and slapping Jake’s change down on the counter. “But listen, kid, don’t let me see you around here again, you hear?”

  Jake didn’t answer, just scooped up his money and hurried out to where Taylor and Cody waited on a nearby bench.

  Taylor grabbed a plastic bag from Jake. “What’d you get?”

  “I bought the whole store, but we better not stay here.”

  “I gotta eat something first,” Taylor said, ripping open the bag of chips.

  Jake sighed. “All right, but hurry.”

  Jake popped open two cans of
dog food for Cody and set them on the ground. Then he joined Taylor in their junk food feast. Jake was even hungrier than he’d thought. After polishing off half the chunk of cheese, a half bag of chips, and half the carton of milk, he began gnawing on a slice of beef jerky.

  “I should have bought more,” Jake said.

  “So just go back and buy some,” Taylor said, his mouth full of cheese and chips.

  “Well, I would but—” Jake was about to explain about the nasty cashier when Sharon, the trucker, walked outside. Spotting the boys and Cody, she walked on over and grinned.

  “Every meal’s a banquet, huh?”

  Jake didn’t quite get the joke, but he and Taylor laughed guardedly. “Yeah. Thanks for helping me out in there.”

  “What do you mean?” Taylor asked. “What happened?”

  “Aw, just a little disagreement,” Sharon explained. “It was nothing. You boys look like you could use a friend.”

  Jake didn’t respond, so Sharon squatted down to pet Cody. “Cool dog. What’s his name?”

  “Cody,” Taylor answered. “He’s the best dog in the universe.”

  Sharon laughed. “I can see that. Hungry, too.”

  “We haven’t eaten in—” Taylor began, but Jake elbowed him in the ribs.

  “Ow! Why’d you—” but then Taylor figured it out.

  “Don’t worry, fellas,” Sharon said, standing back up. “Whatever you’ve gotten yourselves into, I’m not going to turn you in. I’ve been on the wrong side of the authorities, and I know that sometimes a person just needs a little help. Speaking of that, is there anything I can do for you kids before I head out?”

  Taylor and Jake exchanged glances. They both knew that their options were running low.

  “You’re a trucker?” Jake asked.

  “That I am,” Sharon answered. “Drive the finest rig this side of Wall, South Dakota.”

  “Well,” Jake said, “we could use a ride.”

  Sharon shifted her weight from one leg to the other. “Where you boys headin’?”

  Jake was going to make up a location, but Taylor blurted “Wyoming! To see our dad.”

  Surprise flickered across Sharon’s face. “Wyoming? That’s a fair piece of highway. Does your mom know where you are—and where you’re going?”