Meet Me Here

by Bryan Bliss

  I don’t say anything, and she bumps me once with her hip.

  “I don’t think anybody’s going to come looking for it,” I say.

  “No, for when we come back,” she says. “Next time.”

  I have to look away, staring into the dark field as she searches for a rock. We didn’t come out here much at night. Fourth of July, the rare times when our parents left us alone with Jake as a baby-sitter. Even then we had to be sneaky. We had to move quickly and deliberately. Half the time the sneaking out was the best part.

  That’s how it comes to me.

  Mallory’s putting a large river rock—I have no idea how it got down here—on top of the recently overturned dirt. When she sees me, I must look insane because a flash of panic comes across her face quicker than I can get the word out.

  “Snap!”

  Mallory’s face transforms, her eyes wide and alive. “I know you just didn’t drop Snap! on me right now, Bennett. Jesus. Snap!”

  The game isn’t complicated. Run into the darkness and hide. Whoever can sneak up on the other one first and whisper, “Snap!” wins. The beauty of the game is that you can play with an entire neighborhood or just two or three. A lot of kids wanted to get Snapped! early so they could go back and sit on the porch with their friends. But forget that noise. Winning Snap! was better than money back then. Of course we played in the neighborhoods; who didn’t? But the field was ours, and we never invited anyone out here to play with us.

  “We should play Snap!” I say, looking out into the dark field. Like a broken ankle waiting to happen.

  Still.

  This is the card I can play for her. For both of us.

  “I don’t know,” Mallory says. “Your parents are going to be pissed at me.”

  “One round, and then I’ll take you home,” I say. “It shouldn’t take long, seeing as I’m undefeated.”

  “Okay, slow down. You may need to look up the definition of undefeated.”

  I feign surprise, offense. “I seem to remember you refusing to play and running home. Multiple times.”

  Her face twists into actual shock. “Are you kidding? That was you.”

  “No way. I never did that.” But then it comes back to me, and I pause just long enough that Mallory starts nodding enthusiastically.

  “Yeah, you know. Own your shame.”

  “Well, before that I was definitely undefeated.”

  “I feel like you’ve been doing a lot of drugs since we last hung out,” she says. “Even in the most backward of memories, how does that happen?”

  She’s laughing, looking out into the field, likely already planning a strategy. Despite my talk, Mallory was preternatural in her abilities. She makes no sound, and her body seems to fold into the shadows. I want to play so badly. I want to win.

  She sighs. “Fine. If we’re going to do this, we need to stretch first. We’re old now, and safety needs to come first.”

  She makes a show of touching her toes. As soon as I bend over, she laughs. Then she screams, “Go!” and takes off running into the darkness, laughing as she disappears.

  I move quickly, but carefully. Mallory always liked hiding just outside my vision, whispering “Snap!” when I passed and ending the game minutes after it began. But I can’t see anything now, so I move toward the road, away from Mallory’s initial line.

  I know exactly where I’m going, but I still move carefully through the darkness. There are two strategies in Snap! The first is to move, to glide across the play area like a shadow, snapping every person you come across. The second—the patient player’s tactic—is to find a spot, hunker down, and pick people off as they come by. And that’s what I plan to do: wait until she gets frustrated and starts hunting.

  My eyes slowly adjust to the night, and I begin to see Mallory everywhere. A bush looks like her hair on my right, and I swear her elbow is showing behind a tree twenty feet in front of me. But Snap! turns every branch breaking, every chirping insect into Mallory about to attack. I crouch down, looking across the field. Nothing is moving, so I go—probably too fast.

  I don’t see the dip in the grass and nearly fall right into it. I stagger into a crouch, breathing hard and scanning the field for any sign of Mallory. My entire body shakes with anticipation as I try not to move.

  When I was a kid, I’d hide behind trees and jump over streams. Running from, toward, invisible enemies, the kind my dad always talked about. I never thought about dying or how it would feel to be pinned down as bullets cut the air above me. Lately I haven’t been able to think about anything else. And as I crouch here, watching an ant crawl across a blade of grass, I work to slow my breathing.

  Footsteps like cannon fire come across the quiet field, and everything else disappears. To my right, a shadow moves, matching the footsteps. She sounds like a bull moving through the field, which surprises me enough that I almost stand up and ask her if everything’s okay. Instead, I wait until she’s standing ten feet in front of me and whisper, “Snap!”

  Will turns around and yells. I do, too, which makes me wonder where Mallory is—if she’ll come running.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Will asks. And then, almost immediately: “Where’s Mallory?”

  “Me? What are you doing out here?”

  “Where’s Mallory?”

  I scan the field as casually as I can. “She’s not here.”

  “But you know where she is.”

  “Man, c’mon. I dropped her off at her house and haven’t seen her since.”

  Will studies me, but the lies now fall easily from my mouth. He looks angry and hurt. “I know you were up at the quarry,” he says.

  I try to make my voice even. “We went up there with Wayne and Sinclair. We talked about you, actually. And then your friend Steve started acting like an asshole.”

  Will nods, looks around the field. “Well, that seems about right.”

  “If you want my opinion, give her some space. For tonight at least.” He starts to object, but I talk over him. “You can’t keep calling her. I mean, you know what she’s like.”

  He sighs and says, “She’s making me crazy. All I want to do is talk to her.”

  “So you thought you’d come search for her in an empty field?”

  He looks confused. “What?”

  “You’re in the middle of a field at midnight.”

  He thinks about this for a second and says, “So are you.”

  I hesitate, long enough to make it seem like I don’t know why I’m lying down in a field in the middle of the night. I go with the old standby.

  “I’m leaving for the army in the morning and wanted to be alone.”

  He eyes me and says, “I get that. Still, it’s kind of weird.”

  Something moves in the distance, and my entire body becomes a knot. I suddenly have visions of Mallory walking up, having it out with Will right in front of me. I don’t know if I want them to make up or not—at least right now. Because then it really would be over.

  I say, “So . . . why are you out here?”

  Will reaches toward his back pocket. “I lost my wallet when the car got stuck. I just realized.”

  He pauses, and I look at the ground, feeling bad for a moment. I kick at a rock and say, “Yeah, sorry. I didn’t think you guys would be stupid enough to follow me into the field.”

  “Jeremy is pissed. They had to tow the car out.”

  I can’t help it; I laugh. So does Will.

  “I don’t know what he was thinking.” And then something switches on his face, like he realizes we shouldn’t be having such a casual conversation. “If you point me in the right direction, I’ll see if I can find it. You can get back to your, uh, alone time.”

  I’m trying to mask my indecision: let him wander around by himself or go with him. Neither option is ideal, but I’m pretty sure I can’t convince him to leave without his wallet. So I tell him I’ll help him search for it, and he agrees after a moment of apprehension.

  It tak
es only a few minutes before I see where the car entered the mud, as well as the wide swath carved when it was pulled out. As we walk up, I am struck by how perfect a place this would be to hide in a game of Snap! And then I’m worried because maybe Mallory is here, hidden in the mud like a B movie commando. But as we pick our way through, both of us with our eyes down, her hand doesn’t come shooting up from the ground to grab our ankles. Still, I half expect to hear her voice in my ear, to win the game without Will’s ever knowing she was here.

  “It could be anywhere,” Will says, bending over to squint at the ground for a moment before standing up. “Perfect. Exactly how this night should end.”

  I walk softly, trying not to step on his wallet, at the same time making as much noise as possible just in case Mallory hasn’t figured out what’s happening yet. Saying his name whenever I address him and as loudly as I can without seeming even more weird. Every few seconds Will lets loose a shallow exhale. I can’t help myself.

  “What happened between you two?” He sighs again, this time long and emphatic. Even in the limited light he looks scattered. “I don’t know. I thought everything was great. If she’d pick up the phone and listen to me, I’m sure we could figure it out.”

  He pulls out his phone and gets ready to dial. I jump toward him and say, “Hey, good idea. Use that to find your wallet.”

  I reach in my pocket and power down Mallory’s phone at the same time. Too close. I walk over to him and say, “On second thought, you should probably do this in the morning. When you can see.”

  “I need my wallet,” he says, and it doesn’t look like he’s in any hurry to leave. He walks slowly, bending over to check the ground like he’s on the beach hunting for shells. I try to tell him I need to go home and pack. When that doesn’t work, I take a shot and say he’s probably making it worse by walking around.

  “You could step on it and grind it in. You’d never find it,” I say, hoping my logic penetrates his melancholy. Behind him, I think I see a shadow moving across the grass. When I look again, it’s gone.

  He nods but doesn’t move. Instead, he stares at me for a long time, finally saying, “You’d tell me if she was here, right?”

  “Yeah.” I’m unsure if the sick feeling in my gut is from the lie or the truth of her proximity. But he nods again and hesitates before offering his hand to me.

  “Good luck.” He says it sheepishly, like I haven’t heard it before. Still, I shake his hand.

  “She used to talk about you,” he says. “Not a lot, but every so often. She missed you, I think. Maybe you could give her a call when you get back. She’d like that.”

  Then he turns around and walks away. As he disappears into the night, I’m not sure if I’ve won something or not.

  I tear through the field once he’s gone. I check the ditch by the road, the tall grass near the tree line, but she isn’t in any of her old spots. When at last I come back to the bridge, she’s sitting on the tailgate of my truck, staring out into the field.

  “Hey,” I say, out of breath, “Will was here.”

  “I saw.” I expected anger, but her voice is soft. “Is he gone?”

  “Uh, yeah. He was looking for his wallet.”

  “What did you guys talk about?”

  “What else? World politics,” I say. When it doesn’t get a laugh, I add, “I had the best hiding spot ever, and he pretty much ruined it because he walked across the field and I thought it was you, so I Snapped! him. Let’s just say we were both surprised to see each other.”

  She smiles this time, rubbing her eyes.

  “So he thinks you’re out here playing Snap! by yourself. That’s . . . wonderful.”

  “I told him I wanted to be alone. In a field. In the middle of the night.”

  This cracks me up.

  “It happens,” she says, and this gets her laughing, too. “God, tonight is so messed up. I’m sorry about this.”

  “What else do I have to do? Join the army?”

  This time, though, she shuts down, staring at me the way Will did, a kind of hurting disbelief in her eyes. And for a moment we’re both quiet, looking at each other, waiting for the other one to say something that will give the conversation momentum again.

  Mallory shakes her head, like she’s trying to forget a bad dream, and says, “Do you ever worry that you’re going to miss out on something by leaving? Like, obviously the army’s a good decision—something you want to do. But do you ever wish maybe you had decided to go to college?”

  “I don’t know if I could get into college,” I say.

  “Even community college. Just anything other than what people expect.”

  A familiar tightness pulls at my lungs. If there was a time to tell anyone, this is it. It would be so easy—open my mouth and say the words.

  I’m not going to the army.

  “I went and visited my sister down at Chapel Hill last year,” she says. “And I know it sounds stupid, but that weekend was kind of a revelation. I didn’t want to come back.”

  Tell her. Right now. Tell her everything.

  “But I know Will wouldn’t be able to get in; he’s already got a job working at his dad’s church as the youth pastor. He might go to Bible college or something, but right now this is it for him. But sometimes I want to go away, pick up and leave. I can’t explain it.”

  She stops talking, kicking her heel against the tire of my truck until she looks up and says, “Do you think that makes me a bad person?”

  I think about what to say for a long time. “Sometimes you need to do what’s best for you, even if it’s going to make people upset.”

  She doesn’t agree or disagree with me, just kicks the tire until I swear her heel makes a dent in the rubber. I watch her, wondering if she really would leave, if she could cut her ties as easily as I’m about to cut mine. And for a second I imagine us with the sun at our backs, leaving North Carolina together.

  “Well, I’m going to let myself believe that—at least for tonight,” she says. “So where was it?”

  “What?” I ask.

  “Your spot. Where were you hiding?”

  “Oh. Well, I’m not sure I want to tell you, because it’s pretty much a guaranteed win if we ever decide to do this again.”

  She looks bored, almost offended. “The hollow tree.”

  “I’m not telling you.”

  “The tires?”

  “Seriously, it’s not going to happen.”

  “You are a man of limited options, Thomas. I’m going to figure it out eventually.”

  “Limited options? Jesus, that’s the worst thing anybody’s ever said to me.”

  She’s smiling as she says, “If you don’t tell me, I swear I’ll never play this game with you ever again.”

  It’s childish and stupid, and it totally works.

  “Fine. There’s this dip in the middle of the field—”

  “Oh.” She turns away unimpressed.

  “Hey, what does that mean?”

  “Nothing, I just thought you had something good.”

  “It’s perfect,” I say.

  “It’s in the middle of the field, not to mention completely indefensible. I could get at you from any direction. What happens if I came up behind you?”

  “I’d hear you.” She stares at me until I say, “It’s still a good spot. You can’t see me until you’re right on top of the dip.”

  “And you can’t see out of it! Seriously, I’m getting worried about your chances as a soldier.”

  For the first time I don’t feel a shock of panic or relief when somebody mentions being a soldier. Instead, I explain how I almost fell in.

  “So you wouldn’t have time for a sneak attack because you wouldn’t know it was there,” I say.

  She counters this and every other argument I make until the effect of Will’s appearance has disappeared, if only temporarily. She holds up her hand.

  “Stop. Please.” She shakes her head in disbelief. “If you’re not going to li
sten to reason, then—”

  Her smile is slanted to one side as she leans forward. And damn it, I know what she’s going to do a second too late. A second before she leans close to my face and says: “Snap! I win.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Neither of us moves when my phone goes off in my pocket, not the first or second time. Mom can wait. Tonight’s finally over, and we both know it. I keep hoping Mallory will break the silence, but she sits next to me, equally content and quiet, and I decide to take it for as long as I can.

  Tomorrow—or today, I guess—is finally here, and I’m only hours away from going. Where? For how long? I have no idea. Up until this point there was no need for planning. I had some money, and I could camp and eat on the cheap. Isn’t that how people start new lives? First they get up the gumption to leave, and then they do it. Let the chips fall where they may, that sort of thing.

  I can get a job working at a gas station or in fast food. Make enough money to last until August or however long it takes for Dad to cool down. Christmas at the latest. There’s no way Mom would let me miss the holidays.

  Mallory jumps off the gate so quickly I’m sure something’s bitten her. She pats at her pockets like her clothes are on fire.

  “Oh, God. Oh, God.” She looks at her hands and then goes back to searching her pockets. “No, no, no.”

  “What’s wrong? What’s happening?”

  “I’m so stupid.”

  I hop off the gate and grab her by the shoulders. Her face worries me.

  “I lost the ring. I took it off, and now it’s gone.”

  “The ring,” I say.

  I saw it just after Christmas, when she was checking out a book at the library. Her friends were standing around, cooing and carrying on. When she saw me looking, I could tell she was embarrassed, hiding her hand behind a book she was holding. It was small, the sort of thing you bought at a kiosk in the mall. A ruby maybe. But most likely red glass, cut and shaped to look better than it was. For the next few weeks I’d catch snippets of conversations, girls fawning over Will, maybe the only guy in high school with enough balls to buy a girl a ring.

  She crumples over and then drops into a squat, panicking. “I only took it off because I was pissed at him, but it was in my pocket. I put it in my pocket when I came to your house.”