A New Hope (Thunder Point #8)(83)

“I want to ask you something,” Lin Su said. “Would you like to go to Thunder Point High when school starts?”

He straightened instantly. “Could I?”

“Troy seems to think you could, based on my work location and schedule. But Charlie, I don’t know that it’ll be better. You could have issues there, as well.”

“I could, but I know people there. I wouldn’t be the nerdy strange kid who popped in from out of town. Troy and Spencer are friends. Iris and Seth are friends. Um, I mean Mr. Headly, Mr. Lawson, Mrs. Sileski and Deputy Sileski.” Then he grinned.

She laughed. He might not be big but he sure was good-looking. “So—you like that idea?”

“I love that idea. Can you do that? Does it cost anything?”

“It’s public school. And they have a chess club.”

“Cool. Yeah, I’d do that in a heartbeat. But what about...you know...Winnie?”

“She thinks she’s going to last a long time and I wouldn’t be surprised, but we know the reality—her disease doesn’t promise long-term survival. We could have to make another change.”

“I get that. But I’d do anything to live in Thunder Point!”

“I know it’s nice, Charlie. But there isn’t anything I can afford in that town.”

“But I could go to school there for a while.”

“You could, I guess. But you’d have to remember, it could be temporary.”

“Mom. Everything could be temporary.”

* * *

Grace was just about to close the doors to the deck when she noticed something. She went over to one of the chairs and lifted Charlie’s backpack. “Uh-oh,” she said. “Look what he forgot.”

“He might make his mother come back for it. I’m going to run over to Spencer’s. He’s hooking up the automatic garage door and I said I’d help,” Troy said.

“And you think you’re the man for that job?”

“Try not to damage my manhood. I do many manly things. I have my own tool belt.”

She laughed, but then she kissed him. “All right, then. I’m going to run this over to Lin Su’s. She said she lives about fifteen minutes away. I’ll get the address from Winnie and take the Jeep. By the time you’re done with Spencer I’ll be back.”

Grace put the address in her phone before leaving the garage and watched as the directions were calculated. It was calculated as farther than a fifteen-minute drive, but she dismissed that. She’d beat the GPS at its own game in the past with some clever shortcuts. In fact, she enjoyed that challenge. She wouldn’t try it tonight, however. She’d play it safe.

She drove through the south part of Bandon and then east toward Coquille. She passed a barbed-wire-encircled industrial lot where construction equipment seemed to be stored. Guard dogs patrolled inside the fence, an eerie sight. Nearby, there were storage lockers of the large, commercial capacity. A convenience store and bar were on the corner across the street from a run-down apartment complex. Customers were spilling out onto the street with their drinks in front of the bar. A bunch of teenagers were hanging out in the parking lot and a police car was parked nearby, an officer in the front seat. On the other side of the convenience store was a motel. The vacancy sign was flashing, missing the V. She passed through a sparse neighborhood comprised of old houses, crossed some railroad tracks, made a few turns and assumed she was leaving the populated area for the more rural area. Then the nice GPS lady informed her that her destination was on the right and she noticed the entrance to a trailer park. There was an outdoor lavatory attached to a small Laundromat. There were exactly two security lights shining down on maybe twenty trailers of various models. Among the mobile homes was an old Airstream, a few fifth wheels, a couple of abandoned trailers. The ground was dirt and a couple of trailers seemed to be well lit with outdoor lights for the purposes of beer-drinking gatherings or home auto and motorcycle mechanics. There was a police car at the far end of the one-street park. Two officers were cuffing a couple of men who wore jeans and leather jackets and looked dangerous to Grace.

She spotted Lin Su’s car sitting next to a very small fifth wheel with one dim light shining inside. It was more of a little camper. The car was parked very close to the single door. And in the yard between Lin Su’s trailer and a mobile home a man and woman who appeared to be drunk were having a very loud, very angry argument. The man—who, Grace noted the irony—wore a wife-beater T-shirt and was gesturing at the woman with his beer bottle. The woman wore a bathrobe. And the only vehicle at that residence was an old truck up on blocks.

The squad car was now moving toward Grace. There were two officers in the front and two passengers in the back. The driver pulled up next to her and rolled down his window. “You looking for someone, ma’am?”

“I guess I’m lost,” she said with a nervous giggle. “I’m going to turn around and reset my GPS.”

“Well, if you’re coming to buy something, the drug store is closed.”

Grace’s eyes grew round. She swallowed.

She drove to the next wide space in the road and maneuvered the Jeep into a U-turn. She drove out of the park, slowly. An elderly man was taking a bag of trash out to a silver garbage can that was chained to a post. She noticed that his mobile home had a screened porch and some patio stones forming a walkway to an ancient Oldsmobile.