The Break-In

by Tish Cohen

  On the cup holder between them sat the spider’s Kleenex-box coffin. Neither Alex nor Marcus could so much as glance at it. The guilt was too much.

  Marcus kept his hand up, on Alex’s orders, to prevent more blood loss. Leaning to one side, forehead pressed to the window, he stared at a passing stop sign. “Rules, Alex. Follow them!” Alex stopped the car with a screech and glared at him. “W-w-want to live or want to d-d ... die?”

  “You said I couldn’t die!”

  “I’m el-el-eleven. What do I know?”

  For the first time, Marcus noticed the pattern on the tea towel: dancing mice. Even soaked in blood, they looked cheerful. Marcus wondered what the Morrisons would think when they returned. The bullet stuck in the fridge door. The blood on the counters, on the floor, the cupboards. Surely they would call the police. At least the gun wasn’t left behind. Alex had had the brains to put it back in the holster.

  “You still have Lisa’s ring, right?” asked Marcus.

  Alex nodded.

  The car sprang forward. Marcus felt a warm gush of blood on his palm. He wished, as he had so many times already, that it was the kid who’d been shot. Alex got the car rolling again.

  “Why were you after Morrison, anyway? What did he do to you?”

  The car slammed to a full stop and they both hit their seat belts hard. A group of three school kids walked past, staring and pointing at Alex behind the wheel.

  “Tell me.”

  Alex rubbed his eyes under the sunglasses. He pressed his lips together and looked around the neighbourhood for a moment. “K-k-k-k ... k ... k-k-ki ...” He waved the question away.

  “It’s okay. Slow down. The words will come.”

  “Ki ... k-k ...”

  “He kicked you?”

  Alex shook his head. “K ... killed my father.”

  Marcus stared at him.

  “H-h-hit and run,” said Alex.

  The oversized cop shirt. The holster. This was no Halloween costume.

  Marcus had heard the story while watching the news with his mother. It had happened late at night, just a few days ago. The cop pulled someone over, and the driver opened the door to climb out. Some idiot went speeding by and took off the driver’s door. The driver suffered nicks and scratches. The cop was killed instantly. Left behind a wife and a child. They’d just moved to a new part of town. Kid started a new school. “I don’t believe it,” he said. “That was your dad?”

  Alex didn’t react.

  “Is Morrison being charged?” Marcus asked.

  “Nob ... n-nobody believes me.” Alex stepped on the gas and sped up smoothly this time.

  They drove in silence for a while. Marcus sank lower in his seat. He should have been thinking of Alex, now nearly an orphan. He should have been thinking of his own life. He should have been getting his story straight, the story he would tell at the hospital. But they were too close to her place. Lisa’s. All he could think about was ... “Turn right on the next street.”

  Alex jabbed his finger left, toward the hospital.

  “Soon. We just have to make a stop first.”

  Chapter Ten

  Alex stopped the car in front of a dumpy grey apartment building. Marcus had been getting more and more nervous the closer they got. He had checked himself in the mirror and smoothed his hair with his good hand. Now he turned to face Alex. He had blood all over his T-shirt. His hand was a dripping mess inside its tea towel. “Give me the ring.”

  “D-d ... don’t.”

  “I want her back. I told you.”

  Alex stared at Marcus for a minute before fishing the ring out of his pocket. He pushed it into Marcus’s good hand.

  “Thanks, kid. You’re good people.” Marcus climbed out of the car and straightened his clothing with his bloody mitt. “How do I look?”

  “Like C-C-Clooney.” Alex turned off the car. He followed Marcus up a walkway, past dandelions and crabgrass, to a peeling metal door.

  “I can do this alone, kid. I don’t need a babysitter.”

  “T-t-tough.”

  Lisa opened the door like it was three in the morning. Her hair was a mess, as if she’d just climbed out of bed. She scratched her arms through her cotton nightie. Marcus found himself wishing she looked a little better in front of the kid. She glanced down at Marcus’s hand and gasped. “What did you do to yourself?”

  “Alex here was checking out his dad’s gun when I stopped by the old house. I thought, Whoa. Kid. Gun. I gotta do something about this.” Marcus gave her an embarrassed half-smile. “So I take the gun away. Make sure it’s not loaded and all that. Well, doesn’t the damn thing go off, shoot me in the hand.” Now he’d made himself sound like a total clumsy idiot. He added quickly, “Could have happened to anyone.”

  Lisa took Marcus’s arm and looked closely at the towel. “Are you serious? You better get to the hospital before you lose too much blood!”

  “We’re going.”

  “We should call 911,” Lisa said.

  Marcus motioned toward Alex. “He’s taking me.

  “What? He’s just a little kid!”

  “H-hey!” said Alex.

  “He’s a great driver. I just wanted to give you.” He opened his good hand and showed Lisa the ring. Maybe it had belonged to her grandma. Maybe the green stone was a real emerald. But it looked smaller and less important than he remembered.

  Lisa smiled. She pushed the ring onto her finger and held up her hand. Then she did just what he’d imagined fifty times that day. She wrapped her arms around him and held him tight. Kissed him all over his face. “Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you, baby! I knew you’d do it. I just knew it.”

  She admired the ring again, then paused. She looked down at her nightie. Blood from Marcus’s wounded hand had stained the cotton. She tried to wipe it away, frowning.

  Alex caught Marcus’s eye. Marcus looked away.

  Lisa waved toward her bedroom door. “I’d come with you, but I was right in the middle of. of something. But you could call me after, okay? Let me know what happens, and I’ll come right over and see you.”

  “What?” Marcus said to Alex when they were back in the car. “Lisa didn’t know I was going to show up half dead. She was in the middle of something.”

  Alex nodded.

  “Not everyone can just up and go to the Emergency Room, you know. Adults have things they have to do. Work and paying bills and other stuff.”

  Alex started the engine. Marcus turned on the radio. The hum of the motor mixed with the beat of Guns N’ Roses. “Sweet Child O’ Mine” had the happy effect of taking away the need to talk. Alex focused on driving; Marcus lay back in his seat.

  “She’s even prettier in real life, don’t you think?” Marcus asked.

  The kid sucked in a tired breath.

  “You should see her with her hair done. And when she’s dressed nice. Looks like a magazine cover model. The first time I saw her, I swear, I thought I’d seen her before on Cosmo.”

  Alex slowed, signalled, and turned right as smoothly as if he’d been driving all his life.

  “One time we were getting burgers,” Marcus said. “She was wearing this pink dress. Or maybe light purple.” His eyes searched the car ceiling for a clue. “Doesn’t matter which. The guy behind the counter gives her a free meal. Just because she’s so pretty. You ever heard of that happening to anyone? Ever?”

  Alex shrugged.

  “Mom never liked her,” Marcus went on. “But mothers and girlfriends get jealous of each other, I think.” He stared out the window. “Craziest thing.”

  Alex turned into the hospital parking lot. He parked the car sideways across three parking spaces.

  “I’ll call Lisa after,” Marcus said. “Once I get my hand fixed up. She’s real sweet. You can’t judge a person in three seconds like that.” He closed his eyes for a moment. “I don’t feel so good.”

  Alex cut the engine and went around to open Marcus’s door. He helped Marcus to his feet, and to
gether they started toward the Emergency Room doors. Marcus, from fear or blood loss or pain, couldn’t walk very straight. He leaned on Alex for support.

  “I’m going to marry that girl,” he said.

  They were almost at the door when Alex stopped. His face hardened, and he pointed at an old red Ford Taurus. Picked up a rock. Before Marcus could stop him, Alex threw it at the windshield. The rock flew off to the side and skipped across the hood of a brand new SUV

  Marcus grabbed Alex’s arm. “What are you doing?”

  “It’s h-h-his—that’s M-m ... Morrison’s car!”

  Marcus let the boy go and circled the car, looking closely at the passenger side. He bent over the bumpers and tires. He checked the head and tail lights. Finally, he checked out the chip Alex had just made in the windshield.

  Alex, collapsed on a bench, started to cry, his shoulders shaking with each sob. His dad’s sunglasses fell to his feet, and Marcus picked them up. He wrapped his arm around the boy and held him close. A woman with a handful of flowers stopped to ask if they needed help. Marcus waved her on.

  Five minutes later, maybe ten, Alex looked up. His face was puffy and wet, and tears stuck his eyelashes together in clumps. When he started to speak, his voice came out thin and high. “I-it’s my fault. I’m the reason Morrison went after my d-dad. I wrecked the stupid bushes. My d-dad would be at work right now ...” He looked down and touched the shirt. “He’d be wearing this if I hadn’t cut across Old Man Morrison’s lawn.”

  Marcus made Alex look him in the eye. “It’s not your fault, Alex.”

  “Is so.”

  “It was just an accident. A rotten, sucky, piece-of-shit accident. Just like the gun going off. Just like the spider.”

  “You weren’t there. D-dad went over to Morrison’s and—”

  “Alex. Morrison didn’t do it.”

  “You don’t know anything. He did so!”

  Marcus stood the boy up, led him to the front of the car, and walked him around it. “There’s no damage. Not even a dent. It isn’t possible for this car to have taken the door off another vehicle with no damage.”

  “That proves nothing. Morrison got it fixed. Repainted.” Alex wiped away his tears, leaving a faint smear of Marcus’s blood on his cheek.

  “The paint on his car isn’t fresh. The only damage on that car was caused by a rock to the windshield. Just now. The rock you threw.” He stared at Alex. “What happened to your dad was a terrible accident. A rotten, sucky, piece-of-shit accident that never should have happened. But it did. Life blows sometimes, and there’s not much you can do about it. You can’t possibly control all the good and bad that happens. I mean this in the nicest way possible: not everything is about you.”

  “Why don’t you shut up!” Alex dug his fingernails into his jeans. “What do you know, anyway? You’re just some goof-off with a crappy girlfriend. A girlfriend so crappy she can’t even stand that you bled on her nightgown. Why would I listen to you?”

  Marcus didn’t speak right away. He held his bad hand to his chest, and pain tore through the hand and into his wrist. “Okay. I’m going inside before I pass out here in the parking lot.”

  “Go. I never want to see you again. You killed my spider.”

  Marcus turned away, leaving Alex to study the rust and dead bugs on Morrison’s car. But first, he handed the kid a twenty. “Hide the gun and holster in my car. Go over there to the exit and wave at a cab. Get home before your mother starts to worry.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Marcus lay on his side in the hospital recovery room. On the pale green wall was a framed picture of a sailboat floating in water that sparkled in the sunlight. A happy image, but it didn’t take his mind off the machines beeping behind his bed. When the phone rang, he picked it up with his good hand. “Hello,” he said.

  “They told me they had to operate,” said Lisa. “Are you okay?”

  Marcus looked at his hand, bandaged properly now. No more tea towel. No more blood-soaked dancing mice. He felt drunk and swimmy, as if underwater. For a moment, he thought he could be dying. But no. He was all drugged up.

  Everything after he left Alex in the parking lot was a blur. He must have fainted after walking into the Emergency Room. All he could remember was telling the nurse he’d been cleaning a gun and it went off. Being happy no one questioned his story. Then the world went black. Now, here he was with wires snaked under his hospital gown. And here was Lisa on the phone. “Feeling okay now, all in all,” he told her.

  “I’m so sorry, Marcus. They said you’d be in the hospital all night. I’m packing a bag so I can come take care of you. The nurse said I can sleep in the comfy chair in your room. I called your mom. She’s going to pick me up. I really miss you, baby.”

  Marcus heard a squeak behind him and rolled onto his back. There, on the comfy chair, still in his father’s shirt, sat Alex. He waved shyly.

  “Lisa?” said Marcus. “I have to go. But don’t worry about coming. I’m fine.”

  “What do you mean? I’m all packed. I’m ready to leave.”

  “I’ll call when I get home.” Or maybe I won’t, he didn’t say.

  When Marcus hung up, Alex came to the bedside. Set the Kleenex box on the blanket. Ugh. He’d forgotten about killing Alex’s spider. But before he could tell Alex to take the coffin away, he noticed a fuzzy blond leg. It pawed at the inside of the box. “He made it.” Marcus sat up so fast the room spun. “Like a hairy little soldier.”

  “Like a hairy little soldier.”

  “I thought I killed him.”

  “You didn’t kill anyone.” Alex shoved his hands in his pockets. The gun and holster were gone. “It was a rotten, sucky, piece-of-shit accident. Not everything’s about you, you know.”

  Laughing softly, Marcus let himself fall back onto the pillows. “Is that so, Sergeant?”

  “As soon as you’re done lying around here, I’ve got a new plan.”

  Marcus groaned. “I’m afraid to ask.”

  “Ever been on a cricket hunt?”

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  Good Reads Series

  Coyote’s Song by Gail Anderson-Dargatz

  The Stalker by Gail Anderson-Dargatz

  The Break-In by Tish Cohen

  Tribb’s Troubles by Trevor Cole

  In From the Cold by Deborah Ellis

  New Year’s Eve by Marina Endicott

  Home Invasion by Joy Fielding

  The Day the Rebels Came to Town by Robert Hough

  Picture This by Anthony Hyde

  Listen! by Frances Itani

  Missing by Frances Itani

  Shipwreck by Maureen Jennings

  The Picture of Nobody by Rabindranath Maharaj

  The Hangman by Louise Penny

  Easy Money by Gail Vaz-Oxlade

  Coyote’s Song

  by Gail Anderson-Dargatz

  Sara used to be a back-up singer in a band. She left her singing career to raise a family. She is content with being a stay-at-home mom. Then, one Saturday, Sara’s world changes.

  Sara and her family go to an outdoor music festival. There, on stage, Sara sees Jim, the lead singer from her old band. He invites her to sing with him. Being on stage brings back forgotten feelings for Sara—and for Jim. And Sarah’s husband Rob sure doesn’t like what he sees.

  Sara also sees something else: a coyote. Learn how Coyote, the trickster spirit, turns Sara’s life upside down.

  About the Author

  As a child, Tish Cohen kne
w she wanted to write novels, but didn’t have the nerve. As an adult, Tish finally took the risk and began to write. Today, she is the bestselling author of six books. Tish also writes articles for The Globe and Mail and The National Post. She lives in Toronto with her two sons.

  Also by Tish Cohen:

  Novels for Adults

  The Truth About Delilah Blue

  Inside Out Girl

  Town House

  Novels for Younger Readers

  Switch

  The One and Only Zoë Lama

  The Invisible Rules of the Zoë Lama

  Little Black Lies (forthcoming)

  *

  You can visit Tish’s website at

  www.tishcohen.com