Last Chance (19 page)

When I set the book back into the backpack, I noticed something I hadn't seen the first time. A squarish envelope, the kind that might hold a greeting card. I hesitated. I'd already gone through everything else. Why not go all the way?

I pulled out the envelope and opened it. I was right. It held a greeting card—a funny birthday card. There were two photographs inside. One was old. It was a picture of Nick as I remembered him from junior high. There was another, older boy in the picture with him. They were both grinning at the camera. A sticky note on the back said, “Found this. Thought you'd like it.” The second photograph was more recent—Nick in the middle, his arms around the people on either side of him, Joey and a young woman in a waitress uniform who looked vaguely familiar. No wonder. The card was signed
Angie.

A
s soon as I settled down at my computer the next day, two things happened. First, I realized that I'd left Nick's backpack at my father's place. I had felt so guilty after snooping in it that I'd put it in the closet where I couldn't see it. I would have to pick it up before I could give it to my mother to return to Nick.

Second, I saw Mr. Schuster. He was out on the lawn with Orion, running the big dog through everything he had learned in the RAD program. When he finished, he turned him free for a run. By the time my morning break rolled around, Mr. Schuster was sitting at the picnic table and Orion was lying at his feet. I went outside to say hi. Orion jumped up when he saw me. That stopped me in my tracks. Mr. Schuster settled him. I approached more cautiously, giving Orion a wide berth.

Mr. Schuster looked healthy and rested.

“I'm glad you're feeling better,” I said.

“I guess I gave everyone a good scare,” he said. “Scared myself too. When you get to be my age and you black out like that, you can't help but think the worst.” He looked down at Orion. “Kathy really surprised me,” he said. “She asked me to work with him.”

That surprised me too, until I thought about it. Kathy must have felt sorry for Orion if she was breaking the RAD rules. Or maybe she was afraid that if she didn't entrust Orion to Mr. Schuster's care, she would have to have him put down.

“She said that kid who was training him isn't around anymore.You got any idea why that is?” Mr. Schuster said.

I filled him in on what had happened. I expected him to say something like, “I told you so.” But he didn't. Instead he said, “That boy sure is a puzzler.” I had no idea what he meant. I guess it showed on my face because he said, “He came to see me last week, after they released me from the hospital.”

“Nick?” That
was
a surprise.

“I had the same reaction when I opened my front door and saw him standing there with Ed Jarvis.”

I remembered seeing Nick with Mr. Jarvis in the shelter parking lot last Wednesday when my father had picked me up.They had been going somewhere together.

“At first I thought it was Ed's idea, but Ed told me, no, it was the boy who wanted to come. We sat in my living room, just me and the boy. I admit, I was suspicious. And he was uncomfortable. Boy, was he uncomfortable! For the first couple of minutes all he did was look at the floor. I told him, you want to look at a floor, you can do that anywhere, you don't need to be in my living room.”

I could imagine Nick's eyes blazing when he heard that. “What did he do?”

“You mean, what didn't he do?” Mr. Schuster said. “He didn't get mad. At first it looked like he was going to, but instead, he looked me right in the eye and told me he was sorry that he'd run into me and knocked me down and that he hadn't apologized properly. He said that he hoped slamming into me hadn't been what sent me to the hospital. Then do you know what he said?” Mr. Schuster was smiling now. “He said he knows he has an anger management problem, but that he's working on it.” He chuckled. “I like that. Young boy sitting there telling me he knows he has an anger management problem.”

“What did you do?” I said.

“What could I do? I accepted his apology. Then I made a pot of tea, and we talked about dogs for half an hour before Ed showed up to take him home.” He reached down and scratched Orion behind the ear. “I never thought I'd say this, but he didn't seem like a bad kid. I guess it's true what they say.”

I waited for him to tell me what
they
said this time.

“People aren't just one thing,” he said. “You can have good, bad, and just plain stupid all in the same person.” He shook his head.“I'm sorry to hear he got himself into trouble again. I think it took a lot for him to come and see me.”

 

. . .

By mid-afternoon, I had made a decision. I drew in a deep breath and started across the lawn to the picnic table, which the RAD guys had overtaken for their break. It was practically guaranteed that they would give me a hard time. A couple of them saw me coming and nudged the rest of them. Pretty soon everyone was watching me. They all looked suspicious. I went straight to Antoine, who was sitting between Dougie and another guy whose name I didn't know.

“Can I talk to you?” I said.

Antoine looked up at me, his face impassive, as if he hadn't heard me or hadn't wanted to. For a moment I thought I was going to have to ask again. But he stood up and walked with me away from the table.

“What do you want?” he said, not friendly, but not exactly unfriendly either.

“How well do you know Nick?”

“Why?”

“What's with him and Joey?”

The question seemed to catch him off guard. “Why do you want to know about Joey?” he said.

“Do you know him?”

“I know who he is.”

“He seems older than Nick.”

“He's twenty. So?”

“So how come Nick's not supposed to see him?”

Antoine shrugged. “He gets into trouble whenever Joey's around. At least, that's what I heard.”

“Then how come they're such good friends?”

“They're not. Joey is Nick's brother.”

“His brother?” It hadn't occurred to me that Nick had a brother. He and Joey didn't look remotely like each other.

“Well, stepbrother,” Antoine said. “But they were always tight, you know. Tighter than most real brothers. Nick told me one time that Joey saved his life.”

“He did? How? What happened?”

“He didn't give me the details. He just mentioned it, that's all. Nick doesn't like to talk about some stuff. And he doesn't like that he can't see Joey. But he goes along with it because he wants to get out of the group home. He only had a couple of months left.”

“Why do you think he did it, Antoine?”

He shrugged. “I don't know. Maybe he was bored. Or frustrated.”

“Yeah, but you said Nick is always telling you not to do stupid stuff. Why would he risk more trouble by doing something as stupid as joyriding, especially when he only had a couple of months left before he could leave the group home?”

“You're asking
me?
” Antoine said. “I don't even know why
I
do what I do half the time. Like that time I kicked Jackie—I knew he wasn't the real reason I was angry. But I kicked him anyway. It's the same with most of the guys here. That's the whole point of the program. It's one of the things we're supposed to be learning. Nick's an okay guy. But nobody's perfect, right?”

It was a good answer, but it wasn't the one I wanted.

“Hey,” Antoine said, after I'd started back inside. I turned to face him again. “You were right when you said you saw Nick go into that office.”

“What?”

“The office where that money was,” he said. “Nick went in it. But he went in to get me.” He shook his head. “All that money was just lying there. I didn't think they were going to miss fifty, maybe a hundred bucks, you know?”

I waited.

“Nick saw me go inside when all that commotion was going on with that old guy. He came in and made me put the money back. He dragged me outside. He told me taking money that's supposed to help animals is the lowest thing he could think of.”

I didn't say anything. But, man, did I ever wonder. A few years ago, that's exactly what Nick had done. Had he changed? Or had I been as wrong about him that time as I'd been this time?

 

. . .

When my father picked me up, he asked if I'd like to have supper at La Folie. It occupies the ground floor of the building my father owns.
La Folie
means “madness” in French. It was named that because the owner's wife, who is French, told him that it was
la folie
to think an upscale restaurant could succeed in what was then a mostly downscale neighborhood. She left him before the restaurant opened. My father gets to occupy the best table in the place because he bailed the owner, Fred Smith, out when Fred unexpectedly ran out of money. In exchange for “certain considerations,” my father made him an interest-free loan to pay for the furniture, which arrived a mere six hours before the scheduled grand opening. The way my father worked it, he gets the back booth whenever he wants it, which is usually to impress new, big clients or when he and Vern have just wrapped up a big contract or landed a new one and want to celebrate. It works well for Fred—it brings in new repeat customers. People who experience La Folie tend to come back—again and again.

“I want to shower and change first,” I said. “I'll meet you downstairs.”

When I finally went down to the restaurant, I found my father and Vern sitting in what my father likes to call his booth. An open bottle of champagne sat in a bucket of ice beside the table.

“Celebrating?” I said.

My father slid over to let me sit. Vern picked up his glass and swallowed the rest of his champagne.

“I'd better get going,” he said. “When I told Henri that this job involved a trip to Switzerland, well . . . ” He grinned and stood up.

“You're going to Switzerland?” I said to my father.

“Not me,” my father said.“Vern and Henri are going. Vern's going to set up a security system for a confidential client.” He leaned close and whispered a name into my ear—the name of a big but old-time rock star. Still, I was impressed.

“Henri's hoping to collect a few autographs while we're there,” Vern said. After he left, I slid into his place.

“How did you get that job?” I said.

My father shook his head as if it were no big deal. “A guy I knew in high school is the band's manager,” he said. “Back then, we all thought Hal was going to sit out his life in prison on account of all the rabble-rousing he did. Who knew, huh? And the guy who was actually voted most likely to succeed? Guess what he's up to?”

I couldn't, but I bet it was going to be good.

“He went to law school, specialized in corporate law. He's doing time for major fraud. Goes to show.”

Goes to show
was right up there with
ironic
on the list of things my father liked to say. But he hardly ever explained what it went to show. Unlike my mother, my father is big on letting people draw their own conclusions. If he was being philosophical, he could have meant, goes to show that you can't predict someone's future based on their past. If he was thinking about his own personal life experience, he might have meant, goes to show you can't trust lawyers.

My father signaled for the waiter. “What'll it be, Robbie?” he said.

“Coke,” I said. Then, because it was such a fancy restaurant, I said, “With a twist of lemon, please.”

“You know, if you didn't have this forced volunteering gig, I'd have taken the job myself. You'd have liked Switzerland.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better, Dad?”

“Sorry.”

The waiter set a glass of Coke in front of me. I took a sip. “You said you were going to talk to someone about Nick,” I said. “Remember?”

My father patted his jacket pocket and pulled out his smartphone. He scrolled down its screen.

“Are you still not interested in this boy, Robbie?”

“No,” I said. My father grinned at me. “I mean, yes,” I clarified, “I'm still
not
interested. What difference does it make?”

He looked at me for a moment.“Right,” he said.“Then I guess it won't upset you to learn that, according to my source, the police had a pretty good case against him when they arrested him the first time. I guess he's smart enough to know that by confessing once he was in custody—saving the police and the courts a lot of hassle—things might go a little easier for him. A little, but not much.”

I swallowed hard. This did not sound good. “What exactly did your source say?”

He set aside his champagne glass and looked back at the phone's screen. “The car was reported stolen on Saturday night at eleven. But the owner isn't sure exactly when it was taken. He was visiting his mother. He parked it in the alley behind her house out near Fifth and Main at 8:00 pm.”