Opposite of Always(86)

“How do you know what I’ve done?” he asks.

The truth is I don’t one hundred percent know. But it seemed like a safe bet.

“Jack, I did you a favor because you’re my kid’s friend, but that’s where our business begins and ends. Don’t think for a second you and me are friends now. That we’re gonna discuss how I deal with my son. Our relationship is none of your business.”

“Relationship? Are you kidding? What relationship?”

Franny’s dad jumps, his stool skittering behind him, his fist raised at me. “Don’t make this go sideways, kid.”

“Look, I’m sorry if—”

“You stay here another second, you’ll be more than sorry.”

“Fine.” I pull a twenty from my pocket, toss the money onto the bar.

“Drinks on me,” I say. “Bullshit on you.”

I call out to Mom and Dad but no one’s home.

I kick off my shoes, grab water from the kitchen. I collapse on my unmade bed and commence a lengthy Pointless Ceiling Stare session.

That’s when I remember:

The duffel.

I reach under my bed, grabbing for the strap. Nothing. I reach again, still nothing. I drop to my knees to get a better look, my stomach dropping.

Because I know without looking.

The bag is gone.

I freak the fuck out. Checking under my pillows, tossing my sheets, doing ridiculous things like pulling out all my desk drawers and checking under the rug—as if $200K could fit in an envelope-size drawer or somehow slip under a square of commercial-grade carpet.

I race around the house that way.

I check every nook, cranny, and then recheck. All while screaming wholly original curses. I just lost $200,000 type curses.

Nothing cool, mind you.

Mostly nonsensical. Definitely irrational.

Mother-squeezing-tiger-lily-having-crappy-poop-pants.

Stuff like that.

But in the end, for all my destroy-the-house efforts, all I have is shortness of breath and my crying, trembling face.

I call my mom’s phone. Voice mail. I nearly hurl my phone against the wall, but I stop myself. Try Dad’s.

“Dad, did you, uh, find . . . ,” I say, stammering, my voice an avalanche of panic and dread.

“Jack, are you okay, son? What’s wrong?”

“No, I’m not okay. I need to know if you found something.”

“Found what? What are you talking about?”

“A bag, Dad,” I blurt out, even though at this point I’m confident he has no idea what I’m talking about.

“What bag? Are you in some kind of trouble, Jack? Do you need—”

But I don’t hear the rest of his sentence because I take the phone away from my ear and glance at the screen.

A text pops up.

I have something that belongs to you.

Be at The Wood in 20.

I can’t tell you why we call it The Wood. I guess because it’s in the woods, except the exact location is in a large clearing in the least woodsy part of the woods.

Anyway—

When I stick my head up through the floor, Franny’s leaning against the wall, arms folded, the duffel bag at his feet.

“Hey,” I say.

“Why the hell do you have this money?”

“I robbed a bank?”

“The truth. Now, Jack.”

What is it with everyone demanding the truth?

The truth? The truth? You can’t handle the truth! No, really, you can’t. I know the truth and I can barely deal with it.

“I won a bet.”

Franny’s eyebrows rise. “You won a bet? That’s the best you’ve got?”

“It’s the truth.”

“You’re a real piece of work, King, you know that?”

“I bet that Mandrake would win the tourney.”

“You did what? Only a fool would make that bet.”

“I sold my car, used all of my savings, and I made the bet.”

“Even if that was true, you wouldn’t know how to place a bet this size.”

“I got someone else to do it for me.”

Franny laughs. “I know for damn sure Mama or Papa King didn’t place any wagers for you.”

I shake my head. “It wasn’t them.”

“Then who?”

“It doesn’t matter, Franny.”

“No, I think it does. It matters to me. I want to know.”

“What were you even doing at my house, anyway? You think you can just drop by anytime, unannounced? Just take a shower or grab a bite or steal someone’s money from under their bed?”

Franny shrugs. “I left some clothes at your house. And my phone charger. I knocked, but no one was home, which actually seemed better. I didn’t want to have to see . . . it was just better. I grabbed the spare key from the rock.”

Damn you, fake, spare-key-holding, save-Kate-plan-foiling rock!

“Just give me my money and I’ll—”

“You’ll what, Jack?”

“I’ll forget about the whole breaking and entering thing.”

“To be so smart, sometimes you’re so stupid. Where’d the money come from? Huh, Jack? Tell me so we can be done here.”