Mr. Hooper tucked the mace into my hand the day I started school, told me the first step to getting beyond my past was to take control of my present. I took it because having that small weapon made me feel less like a victim and more like a girl you didn’t want to mess with. Now the mace came with me everywhere.
Turning back, I scanned the street for Mike. He may have been the third wheel on this trip, but he was Luke’s brother, and at the end of the day, he was always good for a few laughs. That and he had our concert tickets in his wallet.
“You see Mike anywhere?” I asked.
Luke circled his hand in the direction of everything and nothing. “Yeah, he’s fine. He’s checking the place out, same as us.”
I sighed and searched the empty street once more. We had to stay together; it was stupid to be splitting up like this.
“Relax, Dee. There’s no on here,” Luke said. “They probably evacuated when the sirens went off. I’m sure it’s nothing more than a false alarm.”
I shrugged and kept going, wanting to get out of this place as soon as possible. This town, with its eerie silence and deserted streets, made me feel weak, like I was being watched … cornered. And I hated that feeling.
Sensing my unease, Luke tugged me to a stop and forced me to look at him. “I’m not gonna let anything happen to you.”
I smiled and tried to look reassured. I believed him, or at least most of me did. The rest was hanging onto seventeen years’ worth of crap.
He ran the pad of his thumb over my cheek, the familiar look of determination flickering in his eyes. “Dee, you believe me, right?”
“Yeah, but Mike … ” I trailed off. My throat was already getting sore. If I wasn’t careful, competing with the sirens would eventually make me both deaf and mute.
The darkened street stretched ahead of us and I exhaled, taking comfort in the sight of Mike’s figure in the window of the brightly lit gas station. The parking lot was full, several cars sitting side-by-side. Empty. Luke tapped on the open door of a standard-issue blue Ford, his mind no doubt traveling the same unsettling path as mine. He and I had lived in the same town for almost four years now, and we knew full-well that when there was an emergency, not everyone listened. There were always a few idiots who stayed behind, believing they were stronger and smarter and capable of outsmarting Mother Nature. Not here. Apparently, everybody is this town was a law-abiding citizen.
Luke placed his hand on my shoulder. He was probably just trying to get my attention, but it scared the crap out of me. I screamed out a four-lettered reaction and jerked away.
“Down, girl,” Luke said with a smirk.
He motioned toward the gas station’s windows, where Mike was waving us in. I laughed nervously as the bell above the doorway jingled, signaling our entrance. I half expected a grease-covered kid to come and see what we wanted. Instead, I was met by nothing but empty aisles.
“Oh thank God,” I moaned, uncovering my ears as
the door swung shut, dampening the high-pitched wail of the sirens.
“No phone, but I found a gas can,” Mike said as he proudly waved the shiny red container in the air. “It’s empty though.”
“No problem. We’ll fill it up,” Luke said. “I’ll leave a twenty on the counter to cover it.”
“It’s not that easy,” Mike muttered, banging on the tiny silver bell perched on the counter. Nobody answered his call, but he continued hammering away at the bell anyway. “Sure, there’s gas, but we can’t get to it without someone working here.”
Luke peered down the hall. “Hello? Ah, we need some gas. Anyone here?” Turning back, he shrugged and did another quick sweep of the counter. “No phone. No keys to the cars parked in the lot. No gas attendant. This place is completely empty. I say we take what we need and go.”
Mike lifted the empty can and shoved it in Luke’s face. “That’s the problem. There’s no way to take what we need. The pumps won’t work without someone here to turn them on.”
“Bullshit,” Luke said as he fished out his wallet and handed Mike his ATM card. “This place has automated pumps. Run my card through.”
“Already tried,” Mike said. “I swiped my card five times and nothing happened.”
I’d always assumed that when you swiped a card in one of those machines, it … well … it simply went through. Apparently not. Even in crappy little Podunk towns, people were still necessary.
“You used to work at a Seven Eleven,” Mike said, motioning me forward. “Come figure this out.”
“I think someone needs to authorize the card,” I said as I stepped behind the counter. “And I only worked there for two days. They hadn’t taught me how to run the pumps yet.”
I knew some of the buttons on the cash register from my brief stint last summer at the mini-mart. I’d clocked less than sixteen hours there before I realized it was a waste of time and left in search of something less boring. I was still looking.
“There’s a button or a key code or something. I’m pretty sure it has something to do with the cash register, but I’m not positive,” I said.
Luke stepped to my side, his fingers whispering across the buttons of the register. “Do you recognize any of these?”
I did. Problem was, without the four-digit security code, no one was accessing those pumps. I pressed the enter key to be sure, hoping that whoever owned this place had left in a hurry and neglected to secure the pumps. I got a blue screen and a flashing curser, confirming what I already knew. “You need a code to unlock the pumps.”
I felt the warmth of Luke’s arm around me, knew he was trying hard to be patient in a horrible situation. “Try one-two-three-four,” he suggested.
I pushed virtually every button, groaning loudly when I got nothing in return but a chorus of alarms sounding from the machine.
“Forget it,” Mike said as he moved toward the door. “Screw the machines; I’ll get us some gas.”
“Wait up.” Luke jogged over to his brother. I followed them to the doorway, wondering whether Mike planned on kicking the crap out of the pumps or sucking the gas out of the parked cars. Neither seemed promising.
Luke laid a palm on the glass, gave a quick shove, and pushed the door open a few inches. A blast of frigid air swept in, swirling a few crumpled pieces of paper out of the trash can and onto the floor. “Stay in here, Dee. Maybe get us some snacks for the road,” he said. “It’s freezing out, and from the looks of those clouds, the ice is going to turn to snow.”
“Yeah, no problem,” I said as I surveyed the mini-mart, taking special note of the chips aisle. “The least this town can do is feed us for our trouble.”
I ducked back behind the counter and grabbed a paper bag from underneath. A couple of turns down the aisles and I had it filled with favorites—a Diet Coke for me, more Twinkies for Mike, and a soda and some pretzels for Luke. I eyed the box of beef jerky on the counter, my mind wandering back home. There’d been a big hunk of meat defrosting in the refrigerator when I left. The crock-pot was already simmering, and Mrs. Hooper had a five-pound bag of apples ready to be cored. Apple pie. She was making an apple pie for dessert, and damn if I wasn’t a tad bit sorry for leaving now.
A stick of beef jerky couldn’t come close to satisfying my drooling imagination, so I tossed it back onto the rack and snagged an entire bag of M&Ms instead. I opened my wallet and did a quick tally before tossing down a five and scribbling out an IOU for the remaining ten. Once we got out of here, I’d mail them a check for the difference because I was never coming back here again.
The door whipped open and I dropped my bag, nearly lost it for a second before I realized it was only Luke. The look on his face was all the answer I needed, but I asked anyway. “You get the pumps working?”
“Nope.”
I craned my neck to see around him, expecting Mike to follow him in. Luke caught my gaze and laughe
d, kind of a half-snort that let me know whatever Mike was doing, he found it amusing. “He’s around the corner puking his guts out. I told him it was idiotic, but the dumbass insisted on sucking the gas out of a car anyway.”
I shook my head, gagging at the thought. The image of Mike vomiting up gasoline was too much for even my iron stomach. “That’s nasty. Why did you let him do that?”
Luke chuckled. “You know Mike.”
I did. I’d been watching Luke back Mike’s big mouth out of fights for the better part of two years. It had become a weekly Friday night activity.
“Don’t worry. The odds of him having swallowed enough to do any real harm are slim to none. The first taste had him heaving.”
“But what are we supposed to do now? It’s gonna be dark soon, and there’s no gas.”
“What do you want to do?” Luke asked, his tone slowly going from playful to serious. That had me worried.
“Why don’t we take a car? There have got to be at least a dozen sitting out there,” I suggested.
Luke nodded, his eyes scanning the road outside. “There are, but there aren’t any keys. I checked every car in the lot while Mike was working on the gas situation.”
“So?” I said, not seeing the problem. If anybody knew how to hotwire a car, it was Luke. He was insanely smart. He could probably tell you the chemical composition of each wire in that engine, never mind how to connect them to create a spark.
Luke laughed. “In theory, I suppose I could tell you how to splice the two ignition wires to generate an electrical spark that would ignite the air-fuel combustion necessary to get the engine started. But to do it in real life … yeah, no. Sorry, Dee, but I have no clue how to hotwire a car.”
I went to say something, but he cut me off with a wave of his hand. “And before you ask, Mike doesn’t either. If he did, he wouldn’t be puking right now.”
“So what, we stay here and wait until somebody comes back?”
“No, I say we head farther into town and see if we can find somebody home. Somebody with a phone.”
“Okay. I mean, it’s a tiny town, and people in small towns are nice, right?”
“Yep,” Luke said, a smile spreading across his face. “No matter what happens tonight, thank you. I have no idea what you planned for me, but I know it’s going to be amazing.” Dropping a kiss on my forehead, he banged on the window of the station, signaling Mike to hurry up. “Ready?”
“Yup,” I said, gathering up the contents of my spilled bag. I was having some serious doubts about wandering around this town at night, but we didn’t have much of a choice. The weather was getting worse and it’d be dark soon. At least here, inside the gas station, it was warm, full of my favorite foods, and a lot quieter than outside. Plus, there were plenty of places to hide. Counters to wedge myself under. Aisles to duck behind. Bathrooms with locks. If there was anything I could take away from my childhood, it was that finding ways to make yourself invisible didn’t make you a chicken, it made you smart.
“Maybe we should stay here and see if somebody comes back,” I said.
Luke saw the fear in my eyes and reached out for my hand. “I’ll tell you what, Dee. Give us a half-hour to take a look around. If we don’t find a house or another gas station, we’ll head back here.”
I nodded, fearing that if I spoke, my voice would crack and give away how scared I truly was. I had no idea what we were going to find, not a clue where these deserted side streets would take us, but it didn’t matter. It wasn’t like there was anybody useful, or harmful, around here to bother us.
Three
It started to snow the minute we turned the corner off the main street. The flakes were so big you could follow their twisted path to the ground, catching a glimpse of the lacy pattern before they melted into the pavement. I concentrated on each individual flake, carefully stepping around their fleeting outlines as we made our way out of town.
“You cold?” Luke asked.
I was beyond cold and it hurt to breathe, each breath burning its way through my lungs. “You think maybe we would’ve been better off heading back to the car?” I asked.
“Nope.” Luke took off his baseball hat and put it on my head. “No gas. No heat. Besides, there are some houses up ahead. There’s got to be somebody home.” He tucked the tire iron under his arm and took both of my freezing hands in his, massaging them, and I sighed as that little bit of warmth he offered transferred to me.
Following his eyes, I focused in on the faint lights up
ahead. The orange glow had a distinct pattern—linear and perfectly spaced. “Streetlights,” I said, thoughts of a warm house and a phone guiding my steps. “There has to be somebody home up there.”
“For sure. I can’t imagine everybody left when the sirens went off. That would be too orderly.” Mike paused briefly, the intensity in his voice fading away as he heaved into a nearby bush. “Holy crap, that gas is going to kill me.”
“How much did you swallow?” Luke asked, jumping back when another stream of vomit hit the ground near his feet. “That stuff will tear your insides up.”
I heard the concern in Luke’s voice. The way he watched his brother, his hands hovering over Mike’s shoulders in case he fell, was sweet. Even on their worst days, Luke still looked out for his younger brother. That protective instinct was in his blood.
Mike spit one last time and straightened up, swiping the sleeve of his sweatshirt across his mouth before he said, “Not much. Besides, I think the last of it is now covering your shoes.”
Luke looked down, groaning as he tried to use the snow-covered ground to clean his shoes. All it did was paste blades of dead grass to his already nasty sneakers.
“I’m gonna try my phone one more time.” I dug my phone out of my pocket and pressed the home button with my numb finger. There was still no signal, and the idea of knocking on some random stranger’s door seemed more appealing each freezing minute.
“I don’t understand how there’s no signal in this entire town. I mean, don’t they have cell phones around here?” I asked.
Luke rubbed my shoulder, no doubt a silent apology for our lousy luck. Less than an hour ago, I’d been on my way to what was probably going to be the best night of my life. The best night of our lives. Our two-year anniversary. I glanced at him, amazed he hadn’t given up on me long ago.
The plan had been for us to see his favorite band, then head to the hotel. One room for Mike, and a different room for Luke and me. I’d worked on it for months, even had to lie to both Luke’s parents and the Hoopers to get everything to come together.
Lying to Luke’s mom had been one thing, but lying to Mrs. Hooper was a whole other beast. It was like lying to your grandmother—your sweet old grandmother who made you cookies after school and baked pies at Christmas. Except Mrs. Hooper wasn’t my grandmother. She didn’t owe me anything. And that made it worse. She didn’t have to bake me cookies, take me in, wash my sheets, or go to my parent-teacher conferences, but she did anyway. And I’d gone and lied to her.
Now our seats would be empty and our hotel room … I didn’t even want to think about wasting that. Great way to start the weekend: cold, broke, and feeling extremely guilty.
I wiggled another frozen toe and grumbled under my breath as the wind lashed at my cheeks. We were getting dangerously close to the time opening acts were scheduled to go on stage. It wouldn’t be long before I had to give up and tell Luke about the super-fantastic night we weren’t going to have.
I stopped, and Mike nearly slammed into my back. We’d come to an intersection; a three-way stop. I swiveled my head, quickly glancing down each street. They were nearly identical, each yard perfectly maintained and insanely clean—no stray candy wrappers or cans blowing against the curb. Even the streetlights were lit, not a single one flickering.
Luke tilted his head, squinting his eyes to keep out the sno
w that was falling heavy on his lashes. “You guys hear anything?”
“No,” I said. The only sound I heard was the wind tearing through the trees. “Wait! The sirens! They’ve stopped.”
“Yup, so I guess this ringing in my ears is all me,” Luke said as he shoved a finger in his ear.
Now that the sirens had stopped, I expected people to start emerging from their houses, their basements, from whatever makeshift storm shelters they’d built in their yards. Mike and Luke were looking around too, each of them mumbling something under their breath.
This place was quiet. Too quiet.
That bank of clouds hovering in the distance was now here, bringing with it a squall that had me shivering. “Doesn’t look like anybody’s around,” I said, taking a step toward the street on the left, searching for the slightest of movements. “Which one do you want to try first?”
“Makes no difference,” Mike said, his head swinging from one house to the next. “They’ve all gotta have phones, right?”
I gestured to a dimly lit house on our right and said, “Sounds good to me. Let’s try that one.”
“Hang on a sec,” Luke said, putting up his hand to stop us. “Let’s try there first.”
I followed his gaze, my body cringing at the thought of having to snake my way through the dozens of crosses littering the ground. “Ah … that’s a cemetery, Luke.”
“I know,” he said, pausing long enough to point out a structure in the distance. “And that’s a utility shed. Ten bucks says they have a can of gas in there for mowers and diggers and stuff.”
“Diggers and stuff?” Mike smirked. “Wow, how very technical of you.”
I stifled a grin as Luke’s eyes narrowed into tiny slits. “Shut up, Mike. I never said I was a construction expert. But hey, since I’m the one with a free ride to college and you’re the one failing English, perhaps the construction industry is something you should seriously consider.”
Creed Page 2
