by Jill Cooper
“Don?” I stand up as he enters and then someone pushes him down from behind. The food and hot coffee splatter everywhere. I squeal and turn my head as the hot liquid splatters across my cheek.
Footsteps enter the room and I’m face to face with the thugs from the YMCA the other night. The large one with the flapping mustache grabs me by the shirt and pulls me close. “I ought to…”
“Enough!” Patricia screams and enters the room. “Let her go.”
My mouth falls open as she steps closer. I back up and gaze down at Donovan. He tries to lean up, but the thugs train guns on him. “Mom, whatever is going on—”
“—Stifle it, Donovan,” Patricia barks at him. “You’ve picked your alliance. We will deal with you later. First, you.” She crosses her arms and stares me down and it’s hard not to tremble in her presence.
Instead, I quiver and glance down at the duffle bag.
“Is this everything you have?” Patricia peers down and pulls the canvas apart to see inside. “Well, here are your phones and a gun. Just a girl you said,” Patricia says to her thugs; to me, she says, “Hmmpf. If we weren’t on the same side, I would have to congratulate you.”
“It’s not our fault. She stopped time or something. She was there and suddenly she just wasn’t.”
“Plus all our things were just gone.”
Donovan’s face rolls with disbelief, and when our eyes lock it’s clear he sees the truth of their words on my face. “Lara?” he whispers.
I glance down at the floor. “Let Donovan go. He doesn’t know anything.”
“About time travel? About what you can do?” Patricia crosses her arms. “I had my suspicions Rex was lying when he said he saw you ten years ago in that alley, that you were the one he shot and killed so Miranda could go on living, but after what’s happened in the last several days… I must tell you, Lara, I’m intrigued and I have to have you.”
I frown. “I’m not an object. You can’t just have me. That’s your problem. You view people as possessions. You’ll do anything you can to get what you want.”
Her eyebrow raises. “And you know me so well?”
My jaw clenches. “Better than you think.”
“Well, I will love to have this conversation with you”—Patricia wipes her hands on the back of her skirt—“but first you need to tell me where your family has gone. How I can find them.”
I open my mouth to give her a ‘hell no’ but before I do she raises her hand to stop me. “I promise you, no harm will come to you. Molly. You will be reunited with your family and you will be well paid for your time.”
I laugh. “Please. You expect me to believe that? I know you’ll never let me go. I hold the secrets to everything you want.”
Her eyes tick back and forth. “So… We’ve done this before.”
“I beat you before and I’ll do it again.” My lips snarl with anger.
Patricia stares at me. “So, you’ll just keep going back in time until everything is fixed? Until you win and I lose?”
“Pretty much.” I shrug my shoulders.
“Shoot her.” Patricia steps out of the way.
I back up and look for a place to escape. Donovan screams. “Mom, no!”
Patricia snaps her fingers as a thug steps up to me and my heart is pounding with rage. “With pleasure, ma’am.”
I scream, cover my face and drop to the ground. I hear the shot and then the bullet sludge through the air toward me, but before it hits it freezes. The extreme emotion in me has frozen time. I glance at Patricia’s angry face and then at Donovan’s look of rage, hurt and disbelief.
If I’m going to escape, he’s coming with me.
Grabbing my duffle bag, I jump over the bed and squat down low beside him. “Donovan!” I touch his shoulder and he snaps awake like he’s been in a deep sleep.
“Lara?” He glances around and when he realizes time is frozen except for us, he jumps. “Did you—”
“—There’s no time to explain.” I grab his wrist and pull him up. We dart through the bedroom and out the front door. “We need to get as far away from here as possible.”
“My sports car.” Donovan stops by the pool and stares down at the frozen ripple in the center. “Everything is just stopped? Everything?”
“Not for much longer.” I stroke his shoulder. “I can’t control how long it lasts. So we need to go.”
He accepts my answer and takes my hand. We run for the garage beside his house. There are two rows of cars and Donovan fishes out his keys. I get into the passenger seat and check the duffle bag for everything.
Evidence, invitation, flash drive.
Everything is there.
I breathe a sigh of relief as we peel away from the garage and behind us I hear the sound of a gunshot.
Screaming, I sink down low into my seat. “Donovan!” I scream as the car swerves around the bend of the road. The old masonry Boston buildings whiz by. Horns wail as we swerve into the other lane and people on their way to work jump out of the way.
I spin in my seat and peer behind my headrest.
The van that I was pulled into at Rick’s house is chasing behind us. Donovan’s face is frozen with concentration as he grips the wheel and gives it a hard yank to make a right hand turn down another street lined with mansions. Prestige.
And hidden secrets.
“Can you stop them?”
I shake my head that I can’t. “I can’t freeze time on purpose yet. It just happens.”
“You’re going to have to explain that to me. All of this, Lara.” Donovan shakes his head.
I promise I will. “If you can just get us away. If we can find somewhere to hide. I’ll tell you everything, but if I told you without you seeing it, you’d never believe me.”
He doesn’t argue. He yanks the wheel to the left and we go over the curb, barely missing someone who tosses his Dunkin Donuts coffee cup and dives against the wall. I cringe as the van banks behind us and is coming up close behind.
Donovan shifts the car and his jaw is tense. In front of us is a series of towering brick buildings and if we miss the turn we’ll be like sardines in a can. “Hold on.”
I grip the seat cushion and using the side mirror all I can see are headlights. The van is close to crashing into us. As the car turns I squeeze my eyes shut and rock toward Donovan as we take the turn hard. The wheels pop up onto the curve and our horn wails to warn people gathered on the sidewalk. We’re dangerously close to scrapping the brick wall with the side of our car.
We bank off the curb and in the rear view mirror the van fishtails as it chases us. I gasp for breath, my heart beating so fast I can barely control either. Air is caught in my throat; my vision splits, I don’t know if I’m about to jump back in time or freeze everything, but instead pain builds in my head.
I groan and grab it.
“Lara!” Donovan calls and the sedan comes to a sudden stop.
Lurching forward, I squeal as the seatbelt tightens against me. The pain in my head starts to dissipate and when I look up, I see the street is blocked by a giant semi-truck trying to back up into a small back alley to deliver his morning supplies.
I glance over my shoulder. The van’s approaching.
“Don?” The truck is never going to get out of the way in time.
He stops the car and pulls out the keys. He doesn’t need to say anything. We both unbuckle our seat restraints. I grab my duffle bag from the back and we bolt from the car. Donovan extends his hand to me. Taking it, my legs pump and threaten to take me past him, I was once a sprinter for high school, but I haven’t had to run like this in a long time.
We round the corner and behind us the men follow. “Catch up to them!”
Donovan and I bank across a car and turn down a side street. There’s no time to catch our breath or discuss where we’re going. We just have to keep running. Dumping into a back alley, we charge through a puddle, our feet pounding the pavement, and a gun fires.
I scream an
d we duck our heads. We spit out into a busy intersection and there are pedestrians waiting at a light to cross the street. I don’t think Patricia’s goons will care if people get hurt. We need to find a way out of there and fast.
We duck against a wall and my eyes gaze across the cityscape. Finally, I see a giant T hanging beside a building.
The subway.
I point at it as I’m still gulping for air. Donovan’s eyes train on it and he nods. “Let’s go,” he husks out, he re-takes my hand and we run for the subway steps. A flock of pigeons fly up as gunfire renews. Pedestrians scream and some dive for the ground as our feet meet the steps. We slide down the railing into the dark underbelly of the city. The smell of diesel engines surrounds us and I hear the familiar call.
“Hot popcorn. Peanuts.”
Donovan’s face is red with exertion and the sound of feet slamming the steps comes from behind us.
“Hey someone, stop those kids!”
There’s no time to buy a token or a Charlie card. Off in the distance I hear the rumble of a train. Donovan nods at me and we jump the turntable. Up ahead the train is pulling in and behind us the goons are closing in fast. The T-attendant screams at us. “Come back here, you need to pay!”
But we can’t stop. We can’t slow down.
The subway’s doors slide open and people behind shuffle off. Donovan and I push through the crowd and force our way onto the car. Hand in hand, we move deeper into the subway and have to pray the thugs won’t make it on.
The doors slide shut and the people who have just stepped on glare at us. They think we’re just a pair of punk kids, not realizing the danger we’re in. Through the glass I see the goons come to a running stop. They’re angry, their lips are drawn together tight, brows furrowed, and the blood lust in their eyes makes my knees quake.
Donovan holds on to the metal bar as the train lurches forward. I sigh with a deep breath and fall against his chest, the duffle bag is firm in my hand. We came close, real close to meeting our end. I came close to being under Patricia’s control and that was something I swore would never happen again. I was sloppy. It was a messy escape.
I have to be more careful.
My boyfriend’s arms go tight around me and he rests his head against mine. For now I am comforted and warm. Protected. But how long can that last?
“Where are we going to go?” Donovan asks.
I don’t answer because I don’t know. Where is there that’s safe? Where is there we can lay low for the night before we end up putting Patricia in a spotlight that she doesn’t want?
Chapter Eighteen
Turns out what is safe is a rundown dive of a hotel off of the redline in Quincy. It’s one of those places you can rent by the hour. We use the leftover cash in my duffle bag to secure a room until the next morning. I slip the sleazy attendant with the greasy comb-over hair a few extra twenty dollar bills to turn anyone away who might come looking for us.
He thinks I’m talking about our parents, but what I’m talking about is worse. Much worse. Trigger happy thugs?
No thanks.
We settle into the room and draw the mismatched curtains closed. The beige rugs have hints they might have once been white and have random stain circles. It’s not much better on the bed and I don’t want to think about what kind of fluids might be staining those bed sheets. In the corner is an old picture tube television that I’m surprised still turns on and on the nightstand is a bible.
We’re going to need all the help we can get.
I freshen up in the bathroom. The sink is cracked and the faucet squeaks. In the corner by the brown stained tub, a cockroach scurries by. This is low class and even makes me feel uncomfortable. I can’t imagine how it makes Donovan feel.
When I return to the room, he is fiddling with the television knob. “Doesn’t work.” The look on his face is meek and I guess I can understand why, but part of me is desperate to just be held by him. I don’t want to go through any of this and what is coming next.
So I stand in front of him and twist on my arches, I chew the inside of my lip because I’m not sure what I should do or say. Freezing time is hard for me to accept and now he’s been thrust into all of it. Chased by thugs that his mother sent. How I could ask him to keep going with me when I am on the verge of ruining everything he holds dear, everything he knows?
It’s crazy.
“So time travel, huh?” Donovan asks and the familiarity of what he says causes my skin to crawl. He said that once to me in the virtual world and here we are, going through it all again. Except now the stakes are higher.
“It’s a lot to accept, but yeah. I … went back to save my mom from being murdered. It works but it set off this whole other thing where she never left Rewind and now they’re power hungry.” My tone drops. “Your mother is power hungry. She wants to shape things and put herself at the top of the food chain.”
“She’s always been ambitious. I knew that.” Donovan raises his eyebrows. “But the mafia, hired guns? I have to admit that surprises me.”
“I’m sorry. I know what just happened…” I shake my head and Donovan reaches for me, he caresses my cheek and in an instant it’s like all isn’t lost.
“Why not wish it all away? Go back further and stop all of this before it even started?” His eyes are filled with curiosity and deep concern.
“Because”—I shrug—“then I might lose you. And I can’t lose you, Don. There wouldn’t be anything left of me.”
His face crumples and he pulls me in, kisses my forehead. We stand in that crummy, old, stained room. Only God knows what people have done here, but the warmness and the love that emanates from us is enough to cleanse it of its sorrow and pain. I love being with him. He’s worth everything I’ve gone through.
I think about the doubts I have that Donovan is with me until the bitter end. How I’ve been so scared I misjudged him, I almost didn’t trust him. Now his actions over the last several hours have strengthened what I feel for him and proven I didn’t just dream up he was a good, solid guy. He really is those things.
I’m so relieved I’ve been given this chance.
I have to seize it.
“Do you think my father knows?” Donovan asks and I can see pain forming in his eyes.
“I don’t think so. I’ve never seen proof he does or doesn’t. Maybe he suspects, but never asked any questions.”
His jaw bone tenses. “Not acceptable.” For a moment he turns away and gazes toward the window.
I touch his fingers lightly with my own. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you everything before. But I’m ready to tell you everything now.”
“If it’s painful for you, I don’t need to know,” Donovan says and I search his face and see he’s being completely honest. Sincere.
“Don—”
He puts a finger to my lips. “Montgomery, it doesn’t matter to me how many times you’ve time traveled or how many times we’ve tried to fix this. All that matters to me is that we do. We stick to the plan, we go through with it tonight. And when we are finally able to put all the pieces together maybe then we can talk about it.”
I close my eyes and nod. Part of me wants to tell him about the virtual world. About how close I came to giving up on the world, but another part of me is so ashamed. I think if I admit those words out loud, I might crumble into a million pieces.
And the king’s men may never put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
“Everything we’ve just been through, I might never finish processing.” Donovan sighs. “But I’m with you, Lara. And if my mother’s goal is to kill you, hurt you in any way, then we’ll do what we have to. No one messes with my girl.”
Tears fill my eyes but, for the first time in the last two years, they’re happy. Donovan kisses me and we reach for each other for comfort and solace. We cling to each other, we hold one another and I feel like everything is going to be fine.
It’s a dangerous feeling. One I haven’t had in a long time.
/> “Well, we can’t stand here forever. One of us might have to risk actually sitting down on this bed,” Donovan says.
I chuckle. “I know you’re used to much more than this.”
“And if it was built on lies and evil? I’d rather be here with you,” Donovan says.
His words warm me and it makes me smile. I glance at the clock.
Six hours left.
****
We spend the time sitting on the rug playing card games, thanks to the deck we found in the dresser drawer. He teaches me to play poker and when I clean his clock, he realizes I already knew.
“I’m sorry,” I laugh and cover my mouth. “I couldn’t help myself.”
Donovan pulls me close and I straddle his lap, my knees bent. “Where did you lean to play poker like that?”
“My dad taught me,” I admit and my breath calms. I think back to those days in our apartment, when his friends would come over for a late night game. Dad always called me his good-luck charm, but now none of that happened. For me it’s a distant memory, smoke and fog, for something that never occurred.
No one but me will ever know what a gentle giant he was. A big, burly man, raising a daughter on minimum wage jobs. How his big, tough fingers learned to braid hair because I cried when other girls came to school wearing them.
Mine were messy and never straight, but I was still happy to wear them.
Now he’s my dad, but in this time I barely know him. He barely knows me, but I hope soon, one day, that can all be different.
“Your dad … before you saved your mom?” Donovan asks.
I nod, but it’s slight.
He sighs. “That’s heavy stuff. And you changed everything and, suddenly, what, you wake up to Jax being your step-dad?”
“Actually”—I tuck my arms under his and cuddle against his waist—“I woke up to you. In a classroom. Remember? I had a headache and you took me home in your now abandoned sports car.”
Donovan thinks hard. “That was less than a week ago.”
“For you,” I admit. “For me … it’s been much longer.”
His eyes crinkle. “Do you remember any of it before that?” His face is so hopeful, I know he’s really asking if I remember falling in love with him.
