by C. L. Stone
“I’ll never understand how you two picked up a pet skunk.” Gabriel turned toward a hand gun. “We don’t have to play at Kota’s or your house. We’ll play at Nathan’s. Maybe we should get the small handheld ones…wait.” He moved to a row of bows and arrows. The arrows were foam-tipped. “These are new.” He gazed at them and frowned. “But they’re all pink. Why are they all pink?”
“I want one anyway,” Luke said.
I sighed, feeling like they were forgetting why we were here. The bows did look cool, though. I picked one up, touching the handle. There was a button on one side. When I pressed it, the handle glowed.
The boys looked at mine, and then their eyes brightened.
“Fuck me,” Gabriel said. “The girls get all the cool shit.”
“Let’s get three.”
“Four. We’re forgetting Nathan.”
“Five. Kota might like these. He plays archer a lot in his games. Maybe he’ll like the real thing…the toy version at least.”
In the end, they did pick up the swords, the bows, a collection of science kits for Kota, a bubble gum machine for Dr. Green, and a Wiffle Ball bat with a bag of a hundred Wiffle balls and a stand, plus, for Silas, a net you set up in the yard to collect them.
“Do you guys get everyone toys?” I asked.
“We get stuff they get to play with in one of the yards or in the street or wherever,” Luke said.
“Yeah, Sang,” Gabriel said. “Every year, everyone gets other stuff that’s just boring. We get them the cool shit.”
I looked at the stuff we were buying and then at the stuff other shoppers were getting: game systems and games and some rare collectables. “Why did we come now for Nerf guns and bats? Is this a good sale?”
“Sang,” Luke said, hooking his arm over my neck. “It’s not about the sale. It’s the rush. Everyone’s buying now.”
I wasn’t sure I understood why they delighted in being out with everyone else. I guess it was a bit of a rush. Maybe it was like the football games they watched with the people earlier. Maybe they weren’t really into what was going on. They just liked participating.
We stood in the long line, looking at different displays and discussing what would be good to get everyone else. Some shoppers had moved on to other stores. Others were still looking at shelves that were starting to empty. I was amazed at how many people were buying carts full of things.
“Where should we go next?” Luke asked.
“I was thinking about Victor,” Gabriel said. “Maybe we should get him a little toy piano.”
“We got him that last year.”
“Some sort of really big puzzle thing?” Gabriel suggested.
Luke shook his head. “Hmm. Any ideas, Sang?”
I shrugged, dazing out at that point. Now that we weren’t moving, my eyes were drawn to the movement of other people. The boys continued to talk about options while I looked out the front window display of the shop.
A person in a white mask passed by.
I blinked, sure I was seeing things.
No one was there.
I checked the other window.
Nothing. No one passed by.
I turned toward the exit. Had I really just seen that? I was too tired. Maybe I was just delusional from the long day, lack of sleep and all the sugar.
Still, I didn’t want to ignore anything. My radar was up and I suddenly felt alert. There had been too many times when I’d ignored subtle signs and I’d been wrong to do so. I dropped what I was carrying, and headed for the door.
“Sang?” Luke asked. “Did you see something you wanted?”
I ignored him, stepping out into the hallway and looking at all the people. Was I sure of what I’d seen? Maybe it was a particularly pale person. I looked around but there wasn’t anyone wearing all black, like Volto usually did. It wasn’t that terribly crowded now that everyone was in the various stores, so I wouldn’t have missed him if he’d been there.
“Sang?” Luke said. He’d followed me out, looking up and down as I did. “What’s wrong? Did you see something?”
“I might be paranoid, but I thought I saw someone wearing a white mask,” I said. I still wasn’t sure, but I reached for his elbow. “We should stick together.”
He kept his head up, gazing around us. “I want to say you might be paranoid, but still…”
I searched the groups of people with him, scooting out of the way when people tried to get past us into the toy store.
I hung onto Luke’s arm tightly. “I’m probably wrong,” I said after a few minutes of fruitless searching.
Luke relaxed his shoulders and his brown eyes met with mine. “Don’t let him scare you, okay?”
I looked at him, suddenly thinking of the masks on the windows. I thought of what he’d said to me when he kissed me. I checked over my shoulder. I couldn’t see Gabriel directly, but the line hadn’t appeared to have moved much. “Luke?”
“It could have been anyone,” he said, although his eyes remained on the people around us. His expression was grim.
“I know,” I said, turning to him. “But…”
“Let’s get back to Gabriel,” he said, interrupting me as he pulled away and headed toward the store again. “And you’re right. You should stay close to me.”
THE THREE AMIGOS CAUGHT IN THE ACT
Gabriel was just paying for the toys when we got back. “Don’t leave me again,” he said. “Why did we get big items at the start? We may need to drop these bags off at the car and come back.”
“We may have to be careful,” Luke said. “Sang thought she saw someone wearing a white mask.”
Gabriel dropped his arms to his sides. “Fucking shit, can’t he leave us alone, ever?”
“I don’t know if it’s him,” I said. “I don’t even know if I saw anything. I might be just worked up and seeing things.”
“What can he do, really?” Luke asked. “We’re here together and it’s crowded.”
“Yeah, well, last time he showed up, we ended up knocked on our asses, and we were in the middle of the hospital.” He got the receipt from the cashier and took the bags, giving Luke and I each one as he lead us out of the store.
Luke and Gabriel got into a debate about whether they should put the bags in the car, or just carry them.
“What if we leave?” Gabriel said. “Let’s go to the other mall, just make sure.”
“Maybe we should try to find him,” Luke said.
Gabriel made a face, a russet eyebrow raised over his crystal eyes. “Are you shitting me?”
“We’re always avoiding him. Maybe we should call him out. He does stupid stuff sometimes, but is he really bad?”
“He kidnapped Sang!”
“He just talked to her,” Luke said.
I was going to intervene. Luke was making points I had made before. I’d wanted to believe Volto was just misguided.
Yet it was Luke saying it, someone that had used the masks to scare me. Not to mention all the odd coincidences that had happened lately.
“Look,” Gabriel said, shifting the weight of the bags in his hands. “We’re not going to find out tonight. Someone should just call Kota, tell him we think we might have spotted him down here. Or call Victor. Have him track us for the rest of the night. Make sure nothing funny happens to us.”
Luke sighed. “Maybe we are being paranoid.”
“We’re never paranoid,” Gabriel said. “We’re on top of things. Sang, give me your bags. You call Victor. He’s closer.”
I pulled my phone out, starting a text message.
Before I could finish and send it, Luke touched my elbow. I thought he was going to suggest something to add into the message but when I looked up, he was staring out.
I followed his gaze, searching for white. But then I caught another familiar face in the crowd.
Mr. Morris stood a few stores down the walkway, almost hidden among other shoppers. He wore slacks and a polo shirt, his tight, curly hair close to his h
ead. He was on a phone, but he was looking our way.
“Shit,” Gabriel said, catching on and looking in the same direction. “What’s he doing here? Isn’t someone following him?”
“We’d get notified if Mr. McCoy was with him, right?” I asked.
“Mr. McCoy couldn’t get this close to us,” Luke said. “Not now.”
I looked up the other side of the walkway, searching the faces, when I spotted another familiar one. “Mr. Hendricks is behind us,” I said.
They both spun around. Mr. Hendricks was the same distance away, also on his phone and watching us. His bald head shined under the Christmas lights overhead.
I turned, and in a store across from us, I caught another familiar pair of faces: Rocky and Jay. At first, I second guessed myself. It felt too dream like. Jay had his phone. Rocky was standing next to him, talking. Both were dressed casually, but clearly not interested in the shopping going on around them.
When I looked between Mr. Morris, Mr. Hendricks, and Rocky and Jay, they all had their eyes on us.
“What are they doing here?” Luke asked, looking at Rocky and Jay. “I know Hendricks calls some students in to help him out but…”
“What…the hell?” Gabriel said, his head darting from one person to another. “Is everyone from school here? We aren’t doing anything. Can’t they just let us shop?”
“What do we do?” I asked.
“Call Kota,” Gabriel said.
I picked up my phone, discarding the text message and finding Kota’s app to call him.
As it rang and I waited for him to pick up, I kept an eye on Mr. Hendricks behind us, who was pretending not to look at us now, instead facing a store window. Gabriel was watching behind me at Mr. Morris.
Luke switched from between all of the guys surrounding us and then settled on looking on toward Mr. Morris. “I’m going to talk to him,” Luke said, starting his way.
“No,” I said, grabbing his arm, still holding the phone to my face. “Don’t do that.”
“I’m just going to ask him directly what’s going on,” Luke said, pulling his arm from my grip and walking away.
I moaned.
“You should stay here,” Gabriel called out to him. “We can’t split up.”
Luke ignored him, filing past people on a path toward Mr. Morris.
Mr. Morris noted Luke coming toward him, and side-stepped into a store he was standing in front of.
Luke paused, looked back at us, and then signed to me, “I’ll be right back.”
“We should go after him,” I said, the phone was still ringing, not even going to voice mail. I pulled it from my face. “Kota’s not picking up.”
“I’ve got it,” Gabriel said, dropping the bags and pulling his phone out. “Wait here. Let Luke go in.” He turned his eyes to Mr. Hendricks.
Mr. Hendricks stood by, still on the phone, but wasn’t talking.
Jay kept his phone to his face. Rocky stood by, looking out at us, a serious expression on his face. Jay wasn’t pleased, either. Why were they all on the phone? Who was talking to them?
My heart was pounding a mile a minute. I was torn between going after Luke and listening to Gabriel. What could they do? We were in public. “Let’s take our stuff and get closer, so we can watch.”
Gabriel nodded, listening to his phone and then picking up what he could of the bags with his one free hand.
I carried the rest, heading toward the shop Luke had gone into, weaving around people. This was an unending nightmare. We were out of school, shopping and doing our own thing. Would we never see the end of this?
“They never followed us like this before,” I said.
“Something must be wrong.” Gabriel stopped in front of the store Luke had gone inside. He stood on his toes, looking over the heads of people. “Do you see him?”
The shop was one for electronics. Tablets, games and cell phones were posted as for sale. The crowd in this store was much larger than it was for the toy store. Some sale was going on during a specific time, and people were lined up awkwardly into the hallway, while others pushed on into the store to get at other items. I couldn’t find any blond hair. “Where’s Kota? Why isn’t he answering?”
Gabriel pulled the phone from his face, and pushed another icon, the one for Mr. Blackbourne and returned it to his ear. After a few minutes, he pulled it away again, frowning as he stared at the screen. “Nothing,” he said.
“Can’t we get through? Are there too many people with cell phones?”
Gabriel put his phone away, and then took some of the bags, pulling me toward the shop. “Let’s get Luke. We need to get out of here.”
I put my phone in my jacket pocket, following him. I wanted it close just in case someone called.
Entering the shop, it was much like the toy store, except the people were more frantic, fumbling for products, yelling at each other from across the aisles. There was a steep sale on some new phone and they all wanted it.
Gabriel and I stood close, elbow to elbow. We checked behind us for signs of Mr. Hendricks or one of the others closing in.
“I don’t want to get trapped in here,” Gabriel said. “If any of them come in…”
Someone bumped into me, I turned, apologizing, when another person ahead of us aimed right for between Gabriel and me, trying to get through.
Gabriel grabbed my waist, dragging me toward him, forcing the person to go around me, instead of through us. “Nope,” he said. “I’m not losing you right now.”
“We have to find Luke and get out of here,” I said, my breath hitching as I got even more nervous.
Gabriel scanned the space. “I don’t see him.”
I didn’t either, but there were tall shelves in the back that seemed not as busy.
We weaved our way through. Once we broke through a line, we were able to walk a bit more easily.
We did a circle of the aisle, excusing ourselves and our large bags while we walked.
By the last row, I was in a full-on panic. “He’s not here,” I squeaked out. “Gabriel…”
“Trouble, don’t freak out on me now,” he said.
“But what if they took him?”
“Then they’re in a shitload of trouble for kidnapping.”
Alarm seized me. Kidnapping? Would they dare? What would they do to him?
A hand gripped my shoulder. I whipped around, bags flying, assuming it was Mr. Hendricks.
Luke stood behind us. He held up his hands in surrender, looking perplexed and frazzled. “Hey, hang on.”
“Luke!” I cried out, trying to catch my breath.
“Shit,” Gabriel said, also obviously relieved. “I thought you were Hendricks.”
“I followed Mr. Morris in here, and then he disappeared,” Luke said. “I’ve been circling the shop. He either blended in and went out the front or…”
“We were just at the front,” Gabriel said. “I didn’t see him.”
“Then he slipped out the back, because he’s not here now,” Luke said.
“I vote we don’t follow him,” Gabriel said, and then scanned the busy store. “Our phones aren’t working. We need to leave.”
“Let’s go look and see if Mr. Hendricks is still there,” Luke said.
It took much longer to get out through the crowd that was flowing in. We barged out single file, ducking and maneuvering our shopping bags.
When we were out in the main walkway, we stood together. Shoppers walked with full bags around us.
We looked up and down, but no Mr. Hendricks. No Mr. Morris. No Jay or Rocky.
“They follow us, make it obvious, and then just disappear?” Gabriel asked. “What the hell?”
“I don’t get it either,” Luke said. “Should we leave?”
This didn’t make any sense at all. I agreed with them that the behavior was strange. Why would they follow us and then leave? I tugged at his arm. “I don’t like not being able to call Kota.”
“We could try from a pay phone,”
Gabriel said. “Or I could buy a new one here.”
Luke looked up the hall and then down. “Whatever we do, looks like our shopping is delayed.”
Gabriel rolled his eyes. “Damn it, why the hell would they fuck up Black Friday?”
OLD SCHOOL WAYS
We got back to the Jeep, loaded in and then Luke sped out of the parking lot.
We sat in silence, staring out the windows, seeking out anyone who could have been following us. Traffic wasn’t bad on the way back.
“Maybe we should have gone to the hospital,” Gabriel said.
“I don’t know,” Luke said. “Maybe they were shopping, too, and then saw us and got on the phone, and asked each other what to do and decided we weren’t doing anything.”
Gabriel rocked his head against the headrest. “Then why aren’t our phones working?”
“Try them now,” Luke said, pulling the Jeep onto the highway. “We’re away from all those crowds. It might have been a bad signal in the mall. Maybe we should switch carriers.”
“We’ve got the best in town,” Gabriel said. He felt his front pockets, stopped, and felt again, patting at his back pocket. He traced his hands to his front and then over his sides. “Fuck, did I drop it?”
Luke peered over at him. “Don’t tell me you did,” he said.
Gabriel looking for his phone startled me and I reached for my bra. My heart leapt into my throat when it wasn’t there, but then I reached down, pulling out my cell phone from the jacket pocket. “Wow, I thought I lost mine.”
“No, wait, here,” Gabriel said. He pulled his phone out of his back pocket. “I don’t remember putting it there. It’s usually on the other side.”
I turned my phone on, about to type in a message, when something felt off as I held the case in my hands.
It was smooth.
I flipped it over, looking at it.
The scratches that I’d had gotten the other day had disappeared.
Gabriel was pushing the button to call Kota when I reached forward, grabbing his arm and shaking him. “Wait!” I said in a hurry. “Don’t call.”
“What the fuck?” Gabriel asked. “Why not?”
