Me & Death (18 page)

“This is a stun gun. When these terminals touch your skin, you’ll feel seventy thousand volts running through you. Won’t kill you, but it will put you down, disgusting puke that you are. What’s your name?”

He sounds polite, like he’s telling an old lady the way to the post office.

My name. I’ve forgotten my name. If he gives me a second …

But he doesn’t. He reaches out, and the spark hits me like a hammer. I’m back on the floor of the garage, screaming, before I know it.

“I asked you a question, puke. What’s your name?”

See what I mean about being shocked? Not a yuck at all, really. My head is aching. My mouth tastes funny. There’s
something wrong with my eyes, because there are lines of bright light everywhere I look. It’s like I’m peering out at the world through the bars of a cage.

I can’t help thinking back to the times at school, when I’d tease Lloyd by rubbing my socks on the carpet and giving him shocks. He’d pee his pants and start to cry. And I’d laugh.

My turn now.

“His name is Jim,” says Lloyd.

“You
know
this puke?” Standing up, turning toward the trunk. “You know his name?”

The gentle voice makes me want to throw up.

“Jim goes to my school.”

“Oh, Lloyd.”

“What’s wrong, Dad?”

“Why are you answering your friend’s questions for him?”

“Trying to save you time, Dad. And he’s not my friend.”

“I think he is, Lloyd. You know his name. You answer his questions. I think this puke is your friend.”

“No!”

Feeling and strength return to my arms. My brain is running again. I know that I have to get away from this wacko. I’m on my back near the trunk of the car. I push with my palms and heels, sliding along the cement floor. I do it again. Push by push, I slide up the side of the car away from Lloyd’s dad. He doesn’t notice me – too busy threatening his son.

“Do you like sleeping in the trunk?”

“No, Dad.”

“Want to go back to your own bed?”

Lloyd says something I can’t hear.

“Sorry doesn’t buy groceries, son.”

Lloyd makes that noise again – the whimper that sounds like a cat mewing. Still creeps me out.

What to do? I can’t run. Can’t hide. Can’t fight. I need a place to rest. I’m under the driver-side door, and I remember that it’s unlocked. I raise myself onto one elbow and reach for the door handle. The door opens, and the dome light comes on. Oops. Forgot about that. Quickly I roll into a kneeling position and begin to pull myself into the car.

The trunk shuts with a solid
thunk
. Lloyd’s dad can see what is going on now, his view no longer blocked by the raised trunk.

“Hey!” he cries.

“
Watch out!”

CHAPTER 35

R
aoul’s voice, of course. He’s sitting in the passenger seat of the car. I glare at him as I try to lever my body inside.

“You
think
?” I say. “You think I might be in danger here?”

He holds out both palms like, I’m only doing my job.

“
Watch out!
” I mimic him. “Really helpful, Raoul. How about stopping the bad guy, huh?”

Raoul shrugs like, I wish I could, but I can’t.

Lloyd’s dad scrabbles around the car. I slam and lock the door just in time. He pounds on the glass. I’m panting from the exertion. I feel light-headed. The bars of light are dancing in front of my eyes.

“Get out of my car, you puke!” he shouts.

I give him the finger. Raoul does too. His beard moves. Raoul is actually smiling – for maybe the first time since his girlfriend fell off the roller coaster.

Lloyd’s dad bites his lip so hard that blood comes out. Nice guy. Nice scary guy. I’m safe for now, but not for long. Really, I’m not much better off than Lloyd. Maybe I should help him along with myself.

Help Lloyd. The idea swims into my brain like a sick fish in a pool of sludgy water. Help Lloyd. The idea of running away again – leaving Lloyd as I left Raf – is
beyond awful. I can’t let Lloyd spend any more of his life with this guy. I just can’t.

Help Lloyd. But how?

His dad runs around the back of the car. I crane my head and see his silhouette in the open doorway at the back of the garage. He disappears.

“Appreciate the company, Raoul,” I say. “But I wish you’d
do
something.”

He pats me on the shoulder. I can’t feel it.

My head is full up with headache, like a sink full of water. Bands of light are zigzagging in front of my eyes. I remember Dr. Driver said flashing lights were serious. Go to the hospital, she said.

Yeah, sure. But first I have to help Lloyd. My life has come down to that one thing. Help Lloyd. But how? Scrooge had it easy – all he had to do was buy Kermit a turkey. I have to slay Grendel here.

An idea works its way past my headache into my mind. Simple, effective, and well within my power. Illegal, but so what. I duck under the steering column of the big Lincoln and empty the tools out of my pocket. Lloyd’s dad is calling the cops or getting his car keys. Either way I’ve got about a minute. But a minute’s all it takes. Flashlight in my teeth, I isolate the wires I need, strip the insulation and twist them together, and feel the familiar jolt of electricity running through my hand as the engine catches.

I have to smile, despite my headache. Here I am trying to save Lloyd by stealing his car and running away with him. How reformed am I?

Of course, I don’t know how my plan will work out in the long run. I don’t know where Lloyd and I will be next week, or even tomorrow morning. I don’t know what we’ll do for food, or money, or anything. But Lloyd will be at least one tankful of gas away from here. And anywhere – anywhere on this planet – is better than here. I know I’m doing the right thing. It’s a strange comfort.

I shift into Drive.

“Watch out!” calls Raoul. Big eyes. Worried expression.

“
Now?
” I say. “Why should I watch out now? We’re safe in the car. What can happen
now
, Raoul?”

I don’t get it. I take my foot off the brake and the big car moves majestically out of the garage. For about a second, the trip is going well.

CHAPTER 36

T
hen there’s a sickening crash, and my side of the windshield goes all spiderwebby as the glass cracks and splinters. I put on the brakes. Another crash bends the windshield in toward me. I don’t know what to do. I can’t drive blind. A third crash, and most of my side of the windshield disappears in a rain of glass bits. I can see. Not that I like what I’m looking at. Lloyd’s dad is kneeling on the hood of the Lincoln in his tracksuit, holding a piece of pipe like a baseball bat. He must have run around the garage and grabbed the heaviest thing he could find.

I hit the accelerator and spin the steering wheel. The car jerks forward and to the left. Lloyd’s dad slides across the hood. I stomp on the brakes, which should send him flying off the side of the car, but he manages to hang on to the far doorpost as the car skids to a stop.

It’s weird to drive with a huge hole in your windshield. Like swimming with your mouth open.

Lloyd’s dad snarls at me, his teeth flashing white under the flickering streetlight. He lets go of the doorpost to reach for me. I straighten the wheel and put the car in reverse. This move catches him by surprise. He slides away from me, clutches at a windshield wiper, breaks it, and flings himself forward to land spread-eagled on the hood. One hand snakes toward me, grabbing first the dash and then the steering wheel. The other hand follows.

Yes, that’s right. Lloyd’s dad and I are holding the steering wheel from opposite sides. I’m sitting in the driver’s seat. He’s lying facedown on the hood.

“Don’t say it!” I tell Raoul, who is still beside me. “I know.”

If the wheel’s a clockface, my hands are at nine and three o’clock. Lloyd’s dad’s are inside mine, at about eleven and one. His fingernails are rimmed with dark blood. His knuckles are white with the strain of holding on. We reverse down the alley. I try to keep one eye over my shoulder, to steer, and the other on Lloyd’s dad. The speedometer creeps up.

If I stop, he’ll end up in my lap.

He wrenches the wheel to my left. The car veers drunkenly. I straighten us out. He does it again. There’s a hydro pole in the mirror. It looks real close, and the mirror says, OBJECTS ARE CLOSER THAN THEY APPEAR. We miss the pole by a finger. I straighten us out again.

I have no plan. All I’m doing is reacting. I’m aware of Lloyd in the trunk. I don’t want to smash into something and hurt him. I’m aware of my headache, sloshing around inside me.

We’re angled toward a garage with a yellow door. I yank the wheel around. Too far! I pull to straighten us out, but Lloyd’s dad is pulling
in the same direction I am
. Instinctively, I slam on the brakes, and we skid into a half-donut – what Raf calls a
croissant
. That’s when the car ends up turned around so that it’s facing away from where you
were going. It’s a stunt turn. I’ve pulled a few of them, fooling around in parking lots. This is my first one in reverse. I don’t know how I manage it in the narrow alley.

Lloyd’s dad is lying sideways across the hood, hanging on to the wheel with only one hand. His feet are dangling over the passenger side of the car. This is my chance. If I speed forward and then jam on the brakes, he’ll fly off like a stone from a slingshot. I shift into Drive. The big old engine roars. The way is straight. The speedo gets up to forty real fast. I have my foot on the brake pedal when Lloyd’s dad brings his free hand around. In it is the stun gun. He must have had it in the pocket of his track pants.

Raoul and I cry out together. The horrible old man lunges through the windshield, his arm at full stretch. The blue spark touches my hand.

I see things in vivid depth and in slow motion. A wooden fence on my left. Lloyd’s dad slipping sideways, his eyes wide and scared. Flashing lights in my mirror. I also see stuff I shouldn’t see – stuff I can’t be seeing. The pain bubble running up my arm, exploding in bright colors all over the inside of my skull. The hydraulic system transmitting force to the pistons and callipers on the disk brakes of the Lincoln. The muscles in my arms and shoulders working together to turn the steering wheel sharply to the left.

Now the action speeds up. The wooden fence buckles and folds, and we’re bumping across a backyard
with trees and bushes and a real fountain in the middle. Floodlights blind me and we crash. I close my eyes to turn off the world.

When I open them, Lloyd’s dad is lying in the wrecked fountain with his neck at a funny angle. I am slumped low in the seat, staring into the side mirror at a face that looks like mine. I press the trunk release button with my good hand. And close my eyes again. When I open them this time, Morgan the Slayer stands in front of the car, grinning in at me through the hole in the windshield. His filed teeth glisten in the bluish spotlights. Even at this distance I can feel the heat coming off him.

Oh crap, I think.

He is not here for me, though. He strides over to the fountain and picks up Lloyd’s dad by the scruff of the neck. He shakes him hard, twice, the way a dog kills a rat. Tucks him under his arm. And leaps into the air.

All right.

I stagger out of the Lincoln. Emergency vehicles choke the laneway. Lights flash, walkie-talkies echo. There are uniforms all over the lawn. One of them is helping Lloyd out of the trunk. I hope he’s okay. Two or three more check the body in the fountain. Two women stand on the back porch, hands to their faces, horrified. Mother and daughter, maybe. Look like they live here. A black-and-white dog races around, wagging its tail. The daughter calls the dog to her. Come, Scipio, she says.

The air smells wonderful. Dew-wet grass. Some kind of sweet flower. I take a deep breath and feel myself relaxing. I’m tired and I have a headache, but the bands in front of my eyes are gone. I feel – this sounds bizarre – pretty good.

A loud voice tells me to step away from the car, and I do. And then to raise my hands in the air, and I try to. I get one up, but the other arm won’t move from my side.