The Impossible Knife of Memory(9)

Home. I had to get home.

“No one is coming,” I pointed out.

“What?”

“There’s no traffic.”

“So?”

“So you can go.”

“The light’s red.”

“It’s stuck. Malfunctioning. You can go because the coast is clear.”

“We’ve only been here two seconds.”

“More like two minutes. Go.”

“I get it.” He turned to look at me. “There’s a warrant out for your arrest. You’ve got the FBI, CIA, and Interpol tracking you. What was it—jewel heist? Smuggling pandas?”

“I’m not in the mood to joke around. Even if I were, you are not a funny person.”

The light changed to green.

He accelerated slowly. “Are you sure you feel okay?”

“I’m fine.”

We drove in silence. I dug my fingernails into my palms as we were passed by three cars and a wrinkled old lady riding a pink moped. A block after he turned right (turn signal activated way too early, every mirror checked and checked twice more—for a right hand turn, for crying out loud, a right hand turn made from the far right lane) he eased to another slow stop at a yellow light and nodded to himself as it turned red, as if he were some kind of genius for having predicted that occurrence.

“See?” he asked.

“See what?”

“See what a good idea it was to slow down instead of blowing through that light, the way you wanted me to?”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You were thinking it loudly. The words Just go! appeared above your head in neon-blue smoke.”

“Whatever.”

“No, really. Aha! Look! Cop car just rolled out of the gas station back there and pulled up behind us.”

I looked in the side mirror. The cop’s sunglasses stared at us. His mouth was moving.

Threat

“He’s getting ready to pull you over,” I said. “Are your taillights out? Have you ever been arrested? You don’t have any weed in here, do you? I don’t want to get busted. I can’t get busted. I have to go home.”

“Don’t freak out. You’re not going to get busted.”

My mouth went dry. “Could we be arrested for leaving school?”

He laughed. “Are you kidding?”

I didn’t answer. The light changed. Finn drove with both hands on the wheel, his speedometer slowly crawling up to twenty-nine miles per hour.

“Speed limit is thirty-five here.”

Assess

I turned around and looked over my shoulder. The police car was six feet behind us. “He can pull you over for driving too slow, you know.”

“Not going to happen. We didn’t run any lights nor are we speeding. There just happens to be a police officer driving behind us. He’s probably on his way to a diner.”

I watched in the side mirror, waiting for the cop to hit his lights and siren. “Don’t say ‘nor.’ Makes you sound like a dweeb.”

“Makes me sound like a smart dweeb.”

“Really smart people don’t flaunt it. Besides, ‘nor’ is arcane.”

“‘Arcane’ is arcane.”

Finn stopped at another light. The cop pulled up so close I could see the grill that separated the front seat of his car from the back, where they stick the suspects. My heart started hammering against my ribs.

“I’ll get out here.” I tried to swallow the bitter taste flooding my mouth. “It’s close enough.”

“No, it’s not.”

“I came up to you in the parking lot.” I unfastened my seat belt.

“What are you talking about?”

“If that cop pulls you over, you don’t know me. I don’t go to your school. I bummed a ride from you in the Byrne Dairy parking lot. You were taking me to the bus station, but then I changed my mind. Understand?”

“I don’t understand. What’s wrong?”

“Thanks for the ride. I’ll write that article for you. I just . . .” I opened the door. “I have to go.”

Action





_*_ 13 _*_

My father’s legs stuck out from under the front end of his pickup. The toes of his right boot pointed to the sky. The other boot pointed so far to the left it was lying on the ground, like he was asleep, or . . .

My heart skipped a beat, two beats.

He started to whistle. Badly. “Hotel California” by the Eagles.

I was so relieved I almost barfed.

Spock woofed and Dad rolled out to see why. He sat up and shaded his eyes, his greasy hands marking his forehead and the gray buzz cut above it.

“That you, princess?”

I bent down to scratch Spock’s ears. “Hey, Daddy.”

The dark blue smudges under his eyes were from lack of sleep, not a fight. He’d woken up screaming three times the night before. He stood up and pulled a rag out of his back pocket to wipe his hands. “Aren’t you supposed to be in school?”

“Aren’t you supposed to be at work?”

“I asked first.”

“Teacher in-service,” I said. “Your turn.”

“Water pump is going.”