Highly Illogical Behavior(60)

“I’m not sure this’ll ever work,” she said, still staring.

“Maybe it doesn’t have to,” he said. “Gestures, you know.”

Lisa stayed for a while after that, eating takeout with Clark and watching some home renovation show that his sister put on. It was like old times, really, except for the wary looks she kept getting from Drew. Lisa knew she was pretty protective of her older brother, but this seemed more personal, like maybe Drew was upset that Lisa hadn’t been coming around as often as she used to. So, when Clark left the room to take a phone call, Lisa didn’t wait too long before quietly getting up to follow him.

“You there, buddy?” Clark said into the phone when she walked into his bedroom.

“What happened?” she whispered.

“I heard his dad’s voice and then he hung up.”

Clark took the phone away from his ear, looked at the screen, and then looked up at Lisa.

“Do you think everything’s okay?” she asked.

Then the phone rang and they both saw Solomon’s name on the screen. But as soon as he put it to his ear, Clark had to hold it away because Solomon was speaking so loudly on the other end.

“I need you to come over. Can you come over? I need you to come over right now,” Solomon said frantically.

“Lisa’s with me, okay?”

“Whatever. Just come over, please!” he said before hanging up.

“We’ll take the van,” Clark said, rushing out and down the hallway.

“It barely runs.”

“It runs,” he said, turning back to face her.

When they got there, all the lights were on and they could see Solomon standing in the front window. Once out of the car, Lisa hurried to the door and without even thinking about it, swung it right open to face him. He was ghost white, but she couldn’t have ignored the red hand marks on the right side of his face if she tried. Not knowing what else to do, she stood there waiting for him to say something, to explain what was going on. But he wouldn’t talk, not even when Clark walked up behind her and asked if he was okay. Instead, he took a couple of steps forward and collapsed into Lisa’s arms, burying his face in her shoulder.





TWENTY-NINE


    SOLOMON REED


“Sol?” Lisa said to him.

He let her go and stood up, trying to calm down and gather his thoughts so he’d actually make sense. Clark took charge and put his arm around Solomon’s shoulders, leading him over to the couch to sit down.

“My grandma,” he said finally, his voice cracking.

“Oh my God,” Lisa said. “Is she okay?”

“I don’t know,” he managed, closing his eyes tightly. “My dad ran in, said she was in a car wreck, and then ran back out. Then my mom called and said she was at Mountain View Medical.”

“What do we need to do?” Clark asked.

“I promised her,” Solomon said frantically. “I promised her I’d leave the house before she died.”

“Sol, you don’t . . .” Lisa began.

“I have to go,” he said, standing up. “I have to go, right? What if she’s dying? What if this is my only chance?”

He paced around the room, looking at both of them, his panic still too strong to let him deal with the other feelings that seeing them had brought on. But they were there. He knew that much, and they didn’t have to be.

“I can’t do it,” Solomon said. “I promised her and I can’t do it. There’s no way. I haven’t even been in the backyard since you guys left.”

“Holy shit,” Clark said suddenly, looking toward Lisa. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Probably not.”

“The van,” he said, his eyes growing bigger.

“The van?” Solomon asked.

“Oh my God, the van,” Lisa said.

“WHAT ABOUT THE VAN?” Solomon shouted, flinging his arms into the air.

“WE PUT A HOLODECK IN IT!” Lisa yelled back, scaring the shit out of both of them.

“You did?” Solomon asked.

“Yeah,” Clark said. “Like, today. I was going to surprise you.”

“Will it work?” Solomon asked, turning toward Lisa.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“Aren’t you going to be a shrink or something?” Solomon asked. “Say it’ll work.”

“It’ll work.”

Solomon and Lisa waited in the laundry room while Clark backed the van into the garage. A few seconds later, the clunky metal back doors opened and, from where they were standing, it was suddenly hard to tell where the interior of the van ended and the garage began. They’d painted it solid black and used yellow tape to block it off into big squares. There was even a black curtain or something separating the front of the van from the back so when Solomon looked in, all he could see was the same pattern that was surrounding him in the garage.

“I think it looks pretty good,” Clark said.

“You did all this for me?”

“Or maybe I just wanted one of my own,” Clark said with grin.

“You helped him?” he asked Lisa.

“Yeah. How’s it look?”