I walk up the ramp when I get there. I grab the handrail and whip myself around the turn. The library is full of people when I open the door. All four computers are full too. I’m definitely not the only one without internet at home around here.
I print my name nice and clear on the sign-up sheet so there’s no confusion, and then I kill time flipping through graphic novels. I’m too wired for anything else. I’m impatient and my knee is pumping up and down in a way that I know annoys people. I can’t help it.
When my turn finally arrives, I shoot over to the computers like a missile. I’m hovering over this guy’s shoulder as he’s collecting his stuff and I look down and see his résumé on top of the pile. For adults, a résumé is like the report card of their life. It says where they worked, where they went to school, if they graduated first in their class or got promoted at their last job—things like that. It’s what people use to get jobs.
It’s what my mom used to get her new job in the wrong Portland, not that she ever told us she was sending it out of state. But just one quick glance and I can tell that this guy’s résumé is more like my dad’s, where the “Education” section starts and stops at high school, and the “Employment” section is mostly some failing factory. My mom got “inspired” and started emailing her résumé all over the place. Sometimes my dad gets “fed up” and mails his like one town over.
Those are the words they use, anyway, but I honestly think they should reverse them. It was my mom who got fed up—with my dad, with this town, with me, maybe—and it’s my dad who gets inspired sometimes. His horizons just aren’t all that high, or that far.
The guy gets up and slides past me. He looks at my back and then at my face. I can see him trying to put it together—hundred-year-old back, twelve-year-old face—but he looks away quick and doesn’t say anything. He’s pretty old and smells like he hasn’t washed in a few days. No computer, no shower, no job … I wonder if he’s homeless. And then I wonder if I’ll have more in common with him soon than just sharing this computer. The thought gives me a sick, wobbly feeling, like the moment in between losing control of your bike and hitting the ground.
I slide into the chair and take his place.
When your computer access comes a half hour at a time, you get pretty good at finding things quickly. What I find, almost immediately, is that a Rd R-kit isn’t a kit at all.
I type it in and right away the search engine wants to know: “Did you mean Road Rokkit?”
Did I?
I click on that and I really hope it’s right, because this thing is SWEET. It’s one of those minibikes and, like, mini-er than most. Some of the entries call them “pocket bikes” because they’re so small. I am looking at pictures of dudes hunched over on Road Rokkits, their knees up to their chests and the bike barely visible between their legs. They look like monkeys riding tricycles in a circus, elbows out trying to balance over this tiny machine, but then I find some videos and they really are rocketing down the road.
The other thing I notice is that a lot of the videos are old, like noticeably low-def. It’s not hard to figure out why. Every page seems to say “Rare” or “Vintage” right at the top, almost like it’s part of the thing’s name: Rare Road Rokkit, Vintage Road Rokkit … There’s even a Road Rokkit Museum in California. I click on that and find out why. They stopped making these things almost a decade ago. The youngest Road Rokkit is almost as old as me!
But they’re still super popular. The museum page says they’ve got “a cult following.” So why did they stop making them?
After watching a video called “Epic Road Rokkit Wrekks” with these guys perched like parrots atop these tiny bikes going from zero to thirty in about three seconds and then going from thirty to zero in an instant, the answer is clear. They are ridiculously dangerous.
I type in my next search, “Road Rokkit for Sale,” and I just about fall out of my seat. People are paying four, five, six hundred bucks for these things! There’s even a mint-condition one from 1998 going for a thousand dollars!
I only have a few minutes of computer time left. I reach into my pocket and count how much change I have left. I find some good, info-dense pages and hit print. It’s ten cents a page here, so I only print five pages. I’ll look for cans again tonight.
The next guy is already waiting as my time runs out, so I get up, get my printouts, and pay at the front desk. It’s the younger librarian and she is friendly as usual and wearing a flowery dress like it’s already spring. “Doing some homework?” she says.
“Research,” I say. And then, I don’t know why, maybe because she’s pretty and has big green eyes, I add: “Business opportunity.” I pause dramatically, like I’m James Bond: “Can’t miss.”
She nods very seriously and says, “Don’t forget us when you’re rich.”
I want to say something smooth, like, How could I ever forget you? Instead, I grin like an idiot and sort of gurgle out a laugh. So smooth.
The wind hits me in the face and nearly tears the papers right out of my hand when I push my way out the library doors. I fold the papers into a lump and put them in the big inside pocket of my parka. But when I turn up the street, the wind is suddenly with me and it pushes me toward home. It feels like a sign. There is literally an invisible force pushing me forward. If I did something risky now, something big—it’s almost like it wouldn’t even be my fault. Almost like it might even work.
DAD STILL ISN’T HOME when I get back. Even though I’m inside now and I’ve left the wind behind, it still feels like I’m being pushed forward somehow. I dial the number from the ad before I can chicken out. We still have a landline because it comes free with the cable. I pace a little, waiting for someone to answer.
Just as I decide that this is nuts and start to pull the phone away from my ear to hang up, I hear a voice. “Yeah?”
I just look at the phone in my hand.
“Hello?” I hear, a tiny, tinny voice floating through the air.
I raise the phone back to my ear. “Yes,” I hear myself say. That first word sort of squeaks out, but after that I try to make my voice sound deeper, more adult. “I’m calling about the business opportunity?”
There’s a pause. I feel light-headed.
“The—? You mean the bike?”
“It’s a Road Rokkit, right?”
“Yeah.”
“How much?” I blurt.
“Well, it’s kind of old. They don’t even make ’em anymore, you know?”
“I know,” I whisper.
“But a friend of mine told me that some people are still into ’em.”
People are really into them, but I don’t say anything because I don’t want to give anything away. The man keeps talking. “I don’t know why. These things are really dangerous. It was okay when the kids were younger. They’re indestructible at that age, you know? But now?”
“How much?” I say again.
“It needs work.”
“I know.”
The man pauses. Part of me is afraid he’s reconsidering, and part of me is afraid he isn’t.
“I’ll tell you what,” he says at last. “Two hundred bucks and it’s yours.”
My head is still reeling, but having something to concentrate on helps. I do the math. It sounds like this thing is definitely not mint condition, so a thousand bucks is out. But if I fix it up nice, maybe six hundred? And it’s so small, how long could it take? I fixed my own bike once. Well, I helped Dad, but I’m the one who got the chain back on. So six minus two … I’d make four hundred bucks. Add in one more paycheck from Dad …
It would be enough to cover the rent we owe.
“You there?” he says. “You hear me?”
“Yes,” I say. “It’s a deal. What’s your address? How soon can I pick it up?”
He gives me the address. It’s close.
I leave the hundred-dollar bill on the outside of the stack. I even leave the first fifty, but I take the other two. The rest I take in twen
ties. Then I fold the bills over again, super careful, and put them back just the way I found them. The stack is definitely thinner now, but dad would have to pick it up to notice. He might even have to recount it.
I know it’s a risk. The thing is, sometimes, when you’ve got a business opportunity, you need a loan. A short-term loan, I tell myself. And hopefully it won’t attract too much interest.
I AM IN MY ROOM with the door closed because I don’t trust myself not to act guilty. Dad is in the living room. I couldn’t put the money back now even if I wanted to.
Instead, I go to my desk and find an envelope. My mom gave me a whole box of them so that I could write her letters. I still have most of my box of envelopes, and she definitely still has most of hers. I slip the money inside. With the two fifties on top, it looks like a bribe in a movie.
I go to the living room and try to sound casual as I ask Dad if I can go for another walk. He is half-asleep on the couch. I think maybe I woke him up when I came out of my room.
If he says no, that will be the end of it. I’ll go back to my room and sneak the money back into the rent box tomorrow. There are so many things wrong with this plan, things I’m just starting to think of now that I’ve had some more time. It would almost be a relief to give it up.
“Turn right,” he says.
It feels like fate, but it’s not. It’s a decision he made, a decision I’m making.
I walk out the door and when I reach the sidewalk, for the first time, I turn left.
I start walking, and here’s the thing: I don’t have to walk far. Things start to change fast. I guess I didn’t realize how close we lived to the edge of town. Maybe I was trying not to think about it? Maybe I’m an idiot? I’ve learned from experience that both of those can be true at the same time.
Sure, I knew we hit the edge of town right away in the car—but that’s a car. I’m walking now, and still: The houses get more broken-down with every block, and the yards get more cluttered. I don’t know if the edge of town has an official starting point, but I see a doorless refrigerator lying in the middle of a lawn with a stolen shopping cart sticking out, and that seems like a good candidate.
I look back over my good side and I can still see the lights from my neighborhood, just a normal neighborhood where kids go trick-or-treating and you don’t feel like you have to look both ways to walk down the sidewalk.
Mr. K said he’d kick us out if we didn’t pay what we owe, and now I’m starting to understand where we’d go. How close we already are.
The urge to retreat is strong. I pass a big, square house with boarded-up windows. It’s as dark as a black hole inside: No light escapes. There probably hasn’t been electricity in there for years. I wonder if people still live there, in the dark like moles living underground. Or with candles maybe, just daring the dirty old place to burn down. There are always fires in the news, and places like this are why.
I hear something move, a quick thump along the side of the house. I freeze defensively, possum up, and stare in that direction. I don’t see anything. Must’ve been the wind, I tell myself as I start walking again. But as I reach the end of the yard I hear it again: Thump!
I shift gears and turbo-boost down the block. The idea of getting attacked out here is scary. The thought of someone taking this money is terrifying. The next house is low and flat with a wire fence. There’s a battered snowmobile in the yard with no handlebars. An old car is parked along the street out front, alongside a rusty chain-link fence. The house has dirty white siding with dark smears running down, like it was wearing makeup and has been crying. No lights on here either, but at least this one has windows. I look into the dark black squares and wonder if anyone is looking out.
I walk along the curb and feel a crunch beneath my boots. I look down and see little bits of broken glass on the ground, glowing in the light from the moon and the nearest working streetlight. Someone broke into a car here.
I look at the house’s black windows again and see something shift in the darkness inside—a curtain? A person? I speed up. I make it two blocks, huffing and puffing the whole way, but then I see what I’m looking for: a sign that says Hornbeam Road. I take the folded paper from my coat pocket and check the address: 59 Hornbeam Road.
I follow the numbers from the corner. It’s a big old pile of a place three houses down. There’s only one streetlight working on this block, but it’s the one right in front of where I’m going. I stand underneath it, sizing the place up. I can’t decide if the light makes me safer or just an easier target.
The house has a few too many doors and windows for its size, and the roof is slanting too much to one side, like a barn out in the country. The whole place looks out of whack, like something out of Alice in Wonderland. But there are lights on and smoke is coming from the chimney. I take a deep breath and head up the walkway.
The welcome mat says “Get Lost,” but I feel like I already am. I can’t believe I came here with two hundred dollars! As I press the doorbell, I’m imagining myself tied up in the basement with duct tape over my mouth. There’s a harsh, electric buzz.
The door flies open almost instantly. There’s a big dude standing there. He must have been waiting. His beard and sweater are both brown and so ragged that it’s hard to tell where one stops and the other begins. Next stop, basement.
“You here about the bike?” he says.
“Yeah,” I squeak.
He looks at me closer, narrowing his eyes. With my parka on, he can’t see my back clearly, but he can tell something’s going on under there. Then I see the light come on in his eyes. “I know you,” he says. “I mean, I’ve seen you around.”
“Yep,” I say. “That’s me.”
Having any kind of visible, you know, thing going on in a small town is like a weird sort of celebrity. The man raises his head and looks out into the night behind me. “Well, I’m Wade,” he says. “Your, uh, parents out in the car or something?”
It doesn’t seem like a good idea to tell this mountain man–looking dude that I’m alone. “My dad’s circling the block,” I say. “I’ve got the money.”
“Right down to business, huh?” he says. His tone is friendlier than before, like he’s joking with me. But I’m serious.
“Yep,” I say.
“Well, I’ve got the bike.” He looks behind him, back into the hallway. I can see a small table near the door, some picture frames on the walls. It doesn’t look as much like a Murder House as I expected—and do murderers tell you their name? I guess they might—if they’re going to murder you anyway. “You want to come in?”
“No!” I say, maybe a little too fast. “I’ll just wait here.”
“Suit yourself,” says Wade. He closes the door most of the way and disappears back into the house. I look around the front of the house as I wait. I see a flicker of light from a second-floor window just above me, but by the time I turn to look all I see is a yellow curtain fluttering closed. Was someone watching me? The door swings open again, and I jump. The guy doesn’t notice because he’s doubled over holding on to the handlebars of this tiny little minibike.
I look down at it, horrified. The frame is beat up. The red paint is chipped in some places and gone in others. Worst of all, there’s a big hole in the middle.
“Uh, where’s the engine?” I say. This is a lot more work than I expected. I was picturing something more like my old bike, with a slipped chain and bent handlebars.
“Right!” he says, pushing the bike halfway out the door and disappearing back inside.
I take hold of the handlebars as he lets go. He returns with an old bag and holds it up for me to see. It looks like the sort of dark cloth sack that you’d find a severed head in. “I was going to reconnect it, but …”
I stare at it, dumbfounded. I mean, I knew the bike wasn’t mint condition, but the engine is literally in a dirty old sack. “I don’t know,” I say.
“Use your imagination,” says Wade, the mountain man. “Look at this fr
ame.”
I look down at the frame.
“What don’t you see?”
“An engine?” I venture.
“Ha! Good one,” he says. “The correct answer is rust.”
I look again. It’s true. There’s not much paint left, but there’s no rust either. I guess that’s important. “And the engine works?” I say, looking skeptically at the sack.
“Not right now,” he says, “but I don’t think it’s anything major. I was going to fix it myself. But who has time? Two kids in high school and one in eighth.”
Eighth grade—I wonder if I know him. I glance back up at the window.
“Had some vinyl,” he adds. “Fixed the seat. Nice, right?”
I look back down at the seat. The seat looks almost new, and the little fat-donut tires still have some tread too. I do like he says and try to imagine this thing racing down the road. I try to imagine this thing selling for six hundred bucks.
I unzip my parka enough to reach into the inside pocket. I pull out the envelope. What can I say? I have a powerful imagination.
Wade opens the envelope and counts it. I look away, guilty. “All there,” he says. He peers into the night behind me again. “You sure you’re okay getting home?” he says.
“My dad is just around the corner,” I lie.
He nods and hands me the bag. It’s heavy but manageable. From what I saw online, these things aren’t much different than a lawn mower engine. “Good luck,” he says, swinging the door shut. “Wear a helmet.”
I pull open the bag and look inside. Looks like machinery, anyway. I close it up and put it in my backpack. My back is already starting to ache, and the extra weight definitely doesn’t help.
“Just get home,” I tell myself. “Just get home.” It’s almost like a prayer.
And then I bend over and begin to wheel my brand-new broken minibike back toward the pre-apocalyptic part of town. My back aches and I’m sweating and breathing hard the whole way. Bent over and with my hood down, I can barely see where I’m going or who might be waiting. The wheels roll smoothly, but with no engine to connect to, the loose drive-chain rattles and clinks. The noise gives me away, and I’m sure something bad is going to happen.
On Thin Ice Page 5
