Property of the State (21 page)

3.10: Smoke Alarm

Stillness surrounds me as I creep back to the basement. My ears strain for any sound of movement, but all I can hear is my own drumbeat pulse, my own gasping breath. The smell of gasoline is almost overpowering as I creep up the stairs, but at least it's not smoke. I wonder again, why hasn't she started the fire? Against the pressure of the silence, I edge one foot ahead of the other and force my way through the house.

Gasoline drenches the floors in the kitchen and butler's pantry, and up the first few risers of the south stairs. That tells me she's been here, which is good. I'm less likely to encounter her where she's already been. The gas also confirms who won the WWE SmackDown outside the vault. No telling where Bianca is now.

The air is clear of fumes and the carpet dry when I reach the second floor. I scurry down the dark corridor—expecting gunfire with each step—and dart into Philip's room.

Where I stall. I have no clue where he keeps the damn violin. Helpless, I stare into a degree of chaos that would make Mad Maddie stroke out. Scattered books, DVD cases, heaps of clothes, forgotten plates and bowls—and no sign of a violin.

There's no time for finesse. I tear through the room, spilling drawers, sweeping books off shelves, scattering clothes. Too loud, but I half imagine the smell of smoke already. I trip over Kristina's bag and kick it out of the way. She can damn well buy another bag. No such luck with the violin.

He needs to keep it secret, yet close enough to easily get any time he wants. In his place, I'd build a hide, but Philip never got a carpentry lesson from Mr. Rieske. The back of his closet is solid: old plaster years overdue for paint, oak floor intact, no unexpected seams. The room's baseboards aren't deep enough to hide a violin case.

Think, dumbass
.

But it's no good thinking like me. When Wayne found out about my tools, he made them his—probably to sell on craigslist so he could buy a Blu-ray player to go with his new TV. But there's no Wayne in Philip's life, no Anita, or Reid, or even Mrs. Petty. Just Philip and the woman he calls mom. He might be hiding the violin from the rest of the world, but in the house it's safe.

Then it hits me.

I turn to the bed.

The sheets and blankets are wadded up at the head, same as the day I came to scrounge some clothes.

What's the violin to Philip?

It's
Stravaganza del Talento
, it's the anti-chess. It's his power, what he's best at. It's his escape.

Even among neurotypicals
, Reid said,
there is no normal
. The violin is what he
loves
.

I grab a handful of the blankets and yank. As the covers untangle, the violin case tumbles out. Of course he sleeps with the damn thing.

Time to bail.

I listen at Philip's door, wishing I really did have the super hearing Trisha makes fun of. I hear nothing, but that's small comfort. I ease the door open to the stench of gasoline and a deeper silence. All I can do is make a break for it, but when I slip out of Philip's room, Mrs. Huntzel is waiting. A gas can rests on the floor at her feet, but my attention is all on the gun. The black hole in the end of the barrel freezes me.

For a moment, she looks at me like I'm a rat turd in her salad. I don't know who she was expecting as she waited outside the door, but I'm not it. Then the understanding seems to set in.

“You always were a resourceful boy.”

I have no response, but she's not looking for one.

“My husband warned against bringing you into our lives.” In the faint light, I can just make out the trace of a wistful smile. “I suppose I should have listened, but you know I always liked you, Joey.”

No one ever says
I always liked you
unless things are about to go sideways.

“You took care of my baby when he needed you, and I'm grateful for that.” She sounds resigned, but the gun in her hand tells a different story. I assume the only reason she hasn't pulled the trigger so far is fear of hitting Philip's precious instrument.

“I'll leave. We can all leave.”

Her response is a sad shake of her head. “Give me the violin.”

I take a step back and clutch the case to my chest. Kristina should be gone by now. I hope. “It belongs to Philip.” I only have to stall long enough to be sure.

“I'll take it to him.”

At that moment I hear approaching sirens.

“What have you done?” she snaps.

I can't help but smile.

She raises her arm and fires. I stumble back as the bullet shrieks…into me or past me? There's no time to think about the sudden pain along my jawline, because Mrs. Huntzel screams as flames erupt and engulf her arms and chest. Gas fumes and gunfire: not a good mix.

In horror, I crawl backward as she throws herself against the wall, howling like an animal. Her thrashing throws sparks in all directions. Then the gun goes off again. The gas can on the floor explodes and throws me down the hall. Everything goes dark.

Seconds or minutes later, the shriek of smoke detectors snaps me back to my senses. Around me, the walls are on fire, the carpet crackles, black smoke boils along the ceiling. I spot the smoldering lump of Mrs. Huntzel against the far wall and, for an awful instant, picture my sister's crib draped in flames. I shut my eyes, clench my teeth, but the piercing wail of the detectors alights every nerve, exhorting me to run.

Philip's violin is still in my arms. I roll over, crawl away from the flames, jump to my feet. Fire chases me down the hall, then leaps up to block my way through the library. It's too much. I head back the way I came. Flames climb the walls of the central staircase and leap across the treads. I start down anyway, four steps, five. Then lunge backward when something cracks overhead and shower of sparks and burning debris falls across my path. When I turn, the hallway is impassable. My only choice is down—or dead. I jump—

—and hit the top of elevator, one leg crashing through sheet metal. Fire pours down the lift cable. I throw myself backward, nearly twisting my foot off. A sharp pain knifes through my ankle as I fall. Something cushions my landing, but my breath whuffs out of me. At least I manage to hang onto the damned violin.

When I roll over and look up, Bianca stares back at me.

I yelp and crab backward. The violin case skids across the floor, but her eyes don't follow. She's propped against the bottom of the lift. Her flesh is the color of old concrete. Her designer outfit is in shreds, her shoes gone. She doesn't react when a cinder falls on her exposed forearm. Her body is what broke my fall.

I shudder and turn away. I find the violin and drag myself to the rec room door, test the wood before I reach for the doorknob. It's like touching a stove burner. The other direction, at the far end of the utility hall, the firelight is blinding. The smoke detector screams are less piercing now, or maybe my eardrums have burst.

Behind me, the central staircase collapses, burying Bianca in flames and debris. Every exit is cut off by fire. My ankle is a mess, my chin bleeding. I stand on one foot. The slate floor won't burn, even if everything else will. I hobble to the back wall near the bathroom. The plaster-coated concrete will probably be the last thing to go. Does concrete burn? Hot as it's getting, fucking steel will burn. I sag onto my ass and cradle the violin. Water floods my eyes. I can hardly breathe. “I'm sorry, Philip.” I don't know what I'm apologizing for. For failing to escape with his precious instrument? For letting his secret out into the world? For not understanding who he really is. An orphan, like me. Like all of us.

I squeeze my eyes shut. See Kristina…and Trisha. I'm sorry I'll never be able to make things right with her. My head swims. I can't stop the sounds burbling up from my throat. I don't want to die like this, like my sister died.
I'm sorry, Laura.
I'm sorry for a lot of things. All I can hope is that Trisha frees herself from Mr. Vogler, and that Kristina and Philip get away. Hell, I even hope the ugly old dog got clear of this disaster—

The dog
.

“Caliban.” The name is a revelation in my throat.

No one knows how he comes and goes. I remember him jumping into that hole up the hill from the house, the scrabbling sounds I heard rising from the shaft when I called out for Kristina from the vault.
A lot of water comes off Mount Tabor when it rains
, she said. The drains must not connect just to each other, but to a larger system.

Is it big enough? Caliban is half my size. Kristina is near enough to me, though, and she made it. But it's one thing to match her feat, crawling through the pipe from one room to the next. It's quite another to think I can wriggle my way up the hill to the hole the damn dog uses. But I'm dead for sure if I stay where I am.

Fuck it
—

Fire chases me down the utility corridor. I beat it through the first storage room door and claw at the grate covering the drain. The screws here are intact. Caliban must have another way out, a drain where the grate has rusted away. Maybe the spot where Kristina came up during the Great Vault Escape.

For half an overheated second, I wonder if I can get to it. But a
whumpf
and the crash of falling brick in the doorway cut me off from the basement maze. I look around for something to pry up the grate, but all I see are bare walls. Six months ago, I cleaned this space out and got rid of anything of possible use. The project earned me my first Huntzel hundred. Nice job, Joey!

Out of options, I thread my fingers through the bars of the grate and heave with everything I've got. I'm not sure what will give first, the screws or my shoulder sockets. A cinder lands on my neck and I scream, the sound punctuated by a sudden pop as the old screws break. Momentum throws the grate into my chin and I topple over backward. For a second I lay there, dazed. But the sight of flames boiling across the ceiling clears my head in the space of a single coughing gasp.

I kick the violin case into the hole, then drop down after it. I splash into knee-deep water, in some kind of catch basin. A pair of pipes run off in opposite directions. Pick a hand, white pawn or black. Either option is as likely as the other to end in checkmate. I grab the violin and go for the one which smells less of smoke.

The space isn't big enough for me to crawl on my hands and knees. I have to push the violin case ahead of me and wriggle on my belly, like a cork trying to squeeze back into the bottle.

Cracks in the pipe offer fingerholds I can use to pull myself along. Sharp edges tear at my arms and legs. The stench of rot threatens to bring up whatever's left of the conveyor belt sushi I ate a lifetime ago. If I get out of here, I'm going to have to soak in a vat of antibiotics for a week.

At the next catch basin, and the next, the drain shafts look up into the inferno. Falling cinders keep me moving through a tunnel that seems to go on forever. I only hear the roar of the fire and the sound of my own sobbing. As the world above burns, all I can do is thrust the violin case forward and follow what I hope is the hideous, beautiful dog's escape route. Not until I reach a basin with a third option, a pipe that slopes upward, do I dare allow myself a shred of hope. I choke on rushing water. Inhale mud. Roots and stones scrape my flesh. But somehow, I find my way through Caliban's hole in the hillside into free air.

Below me, Huntzel Manor burns. The night sky is filled with glowing ash. For a few minutes, all I can do is sit in the mud and draw exhausted breaths. But I can't afford to rest for long, not with emergency vehicles pouring into the area. I give myself another minute, then hobble down the hill to retrieve my suitcase with Trisha's laptop from the upper veranda.

Moments later, as the house collapses behind me, I limp off into the wet night.

Document Name: Dear Trisha.docx

I'm giving this to Denise to return to you. I understand why you don't want to see me, but at least you'll have your laptop back before Cooper ropes you into the corral for a powwow, or whatever he calls it.

I did make a print-out of your poem. I hope that's okay.

I want you to know I'm sorry. I'm sorry for not being there for you. I'm sorry for not trusting you.

If you ever decide you want to talk, I'm ready to listen to whatever you need me to hear.

—Joey

4.0: Thend

I find Mrs. Petty's car in the lot outside the Department of Human Services office on SE 122nd. I haven't been here in a while, but I don't imagine things have changed much. Her cubicle is on the far side of the building with no view of the parking lot. The near side has a few meeting rooms. The blinds are drawn in most, but through one wide window I see people sitting around a long table. Little kids and adults, some kind of group session. The kids are drawing or writing. I can see through the glass front doors as well, but the way the diffuse light hits the glass makes it hard for me to make out anything inside. If Mrs. Petty is standing there looking out at her car, I'm busted.

I pull the slim-jim out of my new backpack—bought with smelly cash. Kristina tried to give me a bundle of hundreds, but all I would accept were twenties. “They'll take it away if they catch me. Besides, it's easier to deal with smaller bills.” A teenage boy showing up at Home Depot with a stack of Benjamins is asking for trouble.

“You ever need any more, call me.”

“Sure.” We both know I never will.

I slide the metal strip of the slim-jim down between the window and the doorframe on the passenger side. I'm lucky Mrs. Petty's underpaid and overworked; the old Impala is held together by rust. I don't have to fight too much to pop the lock. I'm in and out in seconds, take nothing, leave only one item. I lock the door and turn.

She's behind me. Of course.

“Hello, Joey.”

I'm supposed to feel embarrassed or ashamed. She's supposed to be angry. Instead, she seems amused and a little sad, and I feel…I don't know what. “Hi, Mrs. Petty.”

“I've been worried about you.”

“No need.”

“Your chin looks—”

“I'm fine.” I don't want to talk about how close Mrs. Huntzel's bullet came to making me Orville's twin.

“Of that, I have no doubt.” Is she being sarcastic? I can't tell. “What does the note say?”

“How do you know it's a note?”

“I don't suppose it's a cookie recipe.”

I smile. A little. There's a copy of Trisha's poem, with her byline. But that's not what Mrs. Petty is asking about. “Among other things, it says I've decided to withdraw from state custody on my own initiative.”

“You know I can't allow you to do that.”

Here we go. “So…what then? Juvenile detention?” Or maybe Detectives Heat Vision and Man-Mountain would rather try me as an adult.

“You could always go back to the Bobbitts.”

“What about the cops?”

She breathes. “The investigation has advanced in a new direction. You are no longer a person of interest.”

My mouth opens and closes. “Well…Anita is a drug addict and Wayne can't get his fill of Internet porn.”

Now her breathing becomes a sigh. “Joey, tell me something I don't know.”

“If you know, why did you keep me there?”

“You're sixteen. You haven't finished high school. You need to be somewhere. We have a shortage of foster families.”

“So you stick me with the Boobies?”

“I stick you with them because I know you'll be all right. You can handle them, and if I put you there, another spot is freed up for one of my more fragile clients.”

“He changed the locks.”

“I've dealt with that, I promise you.” She stares off into the distance for a moment. “Listen. I know it's not the best situation. In a perfect world, the Boobies would be off the foster rolls. But in this world I need them. And they
will
provide a roof and clothes and creamed chipped beef. That gives you a chance to finish school and to grow up. You're a smart kid. I don't want to lose you.”

She's never called them the Boobies in front of me. “I don't need them.”

“If you agree to stay, you can continue at Katz. In January, you'll apply for early graduation. By summer, you could be getting ready for college. With your grades and background, grants and scholarships won't be a problem. But if you run, you'll never finish high school. Life on the streets sucks, Joey. Trust me.” She directs a flinty gaze my way. “You certainly can't live in the ruins of the Huntzel house.”

Christ. Does she know everything?

“Joey, please. If you go back to the Bobbitts, I'll support early graduation. I'll even help your bid for emancipation.”

“I could get my GED in a few years.”

“A year from now, you could be living in a dorm in Corvallis or Eugene.”

I'm not all that surprised she's guessed my Plan. A lot of case files have crossed Mrs. Petty's desk. She knows the classes I've taken, and she knows better than anyone how determined I am to make my own way. Still, it's pissing me off that she's making sense.

“I want something.”

She shakes her head, but then she laughs. “What?”

“I want you to help Trisha.”

Her face goes carefully blank. “Patricia Lee? Help her with what?”

She didn't ask to be rescued, but then neither did I. Sometimes we all need a little help. Reid would have a stroke if he heard me say that.

“Her foster father.”

One eyebrow rises slowly. “What are you saying?”

“What do you think?”

She's quiet for a long time, but I can see the calculation working in her eyes. “Based on what?”

“Based on her telling me, that's what.” I gesture toward the printout in the car. “It's all there.”

Enough of it, anyway. Mrs. Petty doesn't need to know about the Krugerrands. Trisha earned them, end of story. But she shouldn't have to keep fucking a fifty-year-old pervert.

“Thank you for telling me.”

“Thank me for
telling
you?
That's
what you have to say? Screw that. You need to get after that old perv. Go in hot. Use bad language. Make him crack.”

“Joey—”

“I'm serious. Don't let the fucker wiggle out.”

“You like her.”

“So what?” There's more snap in my voice than Mrs. Petty has ever heard from me.

“She likes you too.”

My face goes hot. For a long time, she stares at me—until I feel like I'm going to melt into the ground. Then she lets out a long, slow breath.

“Joey, the situation is already being addressed.”

“What?”

“The day after you ran away from the Bobbitts', she came forward about Mr. Vogler. The details of that are none of your business, but, as an aside, in her statement, she revealed where you were when Duncan got hit. Apparently she saw you sneaking into the chess room with the master key you kept hidden inside your laptop.”

Obviously I have
no
secrets. “Cooper won't let me stay at Katz if he knows about that.”

“Joey, we've both known about that key for months.”

For the first time in my life, I have nothing to say. She seems to enjoy it.

“You're going to have to pay for a replacement laptop battery.”

“Those batteries are crap.” But I'm thinking about Trisha, about sitting across from her at the coffee shop next to the fish tank. About her shimmering eyes, about spending the day just looking into them. Then the amber melts into emerald and I feel confused all over again.

“Joey.” Mrs. Petty puts a hand on my arm and I surprise myself by not flinching. “The Boobies. You'll go back?”

She's relentless. “Where is Trisha now?”

“She's safe.”

“What does that mean?”

Now it's her turn to snap. “It means her situation has been addressed and she's working through it, and we're helping her.” Then her voice softens. “I'm sure she'll be in touch when she's ready.”

If she's ever ready. And if she's not, so be it. Safe is what matters. I just hope she had time to pack her things—including the contents of her hide—neatly, in suitcases, without someone looking over her shoulder. Maybe she even took my advice and faked some tears, asked for a moment alone so she could grab her loot in peace.

“I think her next foster parents should be gay.”

She laughs. “You have this all figured out, don't you?”

Who the hell knows? It's obvious I've been wrong more than I've been right.

I stand there as she unlocks her crappy old car. “There's one more thing.”

“You're pushing your luck.”

I whistle. Caliban dashes out of the bushes at the edge of the parking lot and hip-checks me. “I have a dog now. I'm keeping him, no matter what Wayne says.”

Mrs. Petty offers us a wry smile. “Are you two coming or not?”

I climb into the car, settle back as Caliban jumps up on my lap.

If we survive the drive to the Boobies, I guess I'll give it a try.

Thend