Taking the Highway (19 page)

“He didn’t shield me.” Sofia’s voice was slow and sleepy. “Not from anything.”

“Yeah, all kids think that.”

“I chowed through a rare steak while Dad gave me every detail of a fatal stabbing. The blood didn’t bother me.”

“Jesus. How old were you?”

“I don’t know. About seven. It was just dinner conversation. The thing is, that was normal at my house. When I was nine, he taught me how to fight off a rapist.”

She didn’t say the rest. Didn’t have to. The way her body tensed told him she’d needed those skills, maybe not long after she’d learned them. Andre snuggled closer behind her, holding her until she relaxed.

He listened to her talk, trying to picture what it was like to be an only child of parents like hers. Sofia told him happier stories about her dad and her family and her childhood—Tigers games, sledding, Sleeping Bear Dunes—until she wore herself out and fell asleep.

He stayed awake long after, absently running his fingertips across her arm, thinking about family. What was it like to have parents who actually told you the truth about their jobs? All of it? What kind of family never hid things from the children? He hadn’t known his dad’s job was in danger until it was already gone. He hadn’t known Dad was an alcoholic until he’d drunk himself to death.

He watched Sofia sleep, content, wishing he could have some of that for himself. But if he couldn’t have her contentment, he could at least share it. He put his head on her pillow, matched her breath for breath, and tried not to think about his brother.

M
om couldn’t wait to
get out of Detroit. A week after Dad’s funeral, she accepted a job on a friend’s herb farm in Sedona. She’d put her house on the market, bought a condo in Sedona, hired brokers to sell the furniture and movers to pack the rest. Then Oliver stepped in. He bought her an airplane ticket and volunteered to drive the contents of her life to Arizona. Somehow, without ever raising a hand or saying a word, Andre had volunteered as well.

Even now, twelve years later, his memories of that trip kept coming back to the word
straight
. The endless straight highways of the Midwest, with farms on either side. Corn farm, wind farm, corn farm, wind farm. As they’d turned south, it had become wheat farm, solar farm, wheat farm, solar farm. The heartland of America grew food and energy in an unbroken pattern.

The rental truck’s sound system didn’t work properly and they were forced to listen to broadcast radio. As they drove through the Midwest, the all-news stations were full of controversy over Detroit’s new footprint. The shrinking of the city’s borders in a last-ditch effort to balance the budget and save the city was seen as foolhardy by half its populace and visionary by the other. Talk of riots on the horizon, 1967 all over again. Talk of greenbelts and federal grants and new prosperity on the other horizon, as the mayor and the city council tried to steer Detroit in the right direction.

The further they drove, the less news they heard, until somewhere in southern Indiana, every station filled the truck with twangy country guitars and exhortant preachers. Oliver snapped it off in disgust.

They neared cities and were surrounded by commuters alone in their cars. Unthinkable now, normal then. They left cities and saw fewer vehicles. An occasional truck. An occasional car.

Straight roads, straight driving, straight through. That’s what bothered Andre the most. His brother never stopped the damn truck.

He stared out the window, counting defunct oil wells. “I’m hungry.”

Oliver steered with one hand, the other drumming a rhythm on his leg. “You’re always hungry.”

“So let’s stop for food.”

Oliver picked up the bag of potato chips that sat on the seat between them and threw them into Andre’s lap. “Eat these.”

He put a handful of chips in his mouth. “Now I’m thirsty.”

“Water bottles in the back.”

Andre turned in his seat and snagged a nearly-empty bottle. He drained it. “Now I have to pee.”

Oliver pointed to the empty water bottle.

“Yeah. You first, bro.”

“You used the restroom at the last stop.”

“Three hours ago.” Andre made a fist and thumped the window. “Stop the truck.”

“No.”

“I’m carsick.”

“I’m not stopping.”

“I will give you ten thousand dollars if you get off at the next exit. It doesn’t have to be a sit-down restaurant. Fast food. A coffee shop. Something. I need a break.”

“We’ll be in Amarillo in two hours. We’ll stop then.”

“You mean, we’ll drive through.”

“We’ll stop.”

Andre stopped thumping the window. “For how long?”

Oliver put his signal on before changing lanes on the empty highway. “I can’t give you a number.”

“Of course not.” Andre transferred his fist’s energy to the potato chip bag. He held it closed with one hand and pummeled the bag flat with the other.

“I was going to eat those,” Oliver said.

Andre shook the bag in his face. “Go ahead.” Oliver swatted it away.

Andre snapped one corner of the bag open and tilted his head back, dumping the crumbs into his mouth. “We should have shipped Mom’s stuff.”

“And make her unload it? Nice, bro. Real nice.”

“We could have driven the Challenger to Sedona. That car was made for road trips. Take turns driving, go straight through, arrive in plenty of time to unload.”

“Do you know how much that would cost? The gas, the wear on the tires, the engine. We’d need several oil changes just to get there.”

“Why is it always money with you?”

“Says the kid who offered me ten thousand dollars to take a piss.”

“You’re an asshole, Oliver.”

“And you’re stupid. Do you have ten thousand dollars? No. Shut up right now or I swear to God you won’t ever
see
the Challenger again.”

The road-haze on the horizon seemed to swell until it obscured everything. Oliver always had some threat, something he could use. Now he would use the Challenger. “That car is mine just as much as yours,” Andre said.

“Yeah?” Oliver didn’t bother looking over, just kept his eyes on the road like there was something to see there. “Who’s paying the rent on that garage? Who pays for the upkeep and maintenance? It sure as hell isn’t you.”

Andre struggled with an anger so immense that it hurt to breathe. As quickly as his vision had blurred it now became dangerously clear, the tiny scrub bushes sharp and distinct before they flashed by, the roadside reflector posts tracing the line of the road into infinity. “Dad said—”

“‘Dad said. Dad said!’“ Oliver’s voice was high and cruel. “Dad said a lot of things, you fucking crybaby. Grow up! You don’t even have a place to keep it. Where would you park it, outside your dorm?”

“Stop the truck.” Andre cracked the door and the roar of wind filled the cab. “I swear I’m diving out right now, I don’t care how fast you’re going. I’m getting out.”

Oliver reached over and grabbed a handful of shirt. “Don’t even think about it.”

“Stop the fucking truck or you can explain it to some state trooper!”

Oliver slammed on the brakes, wrenched the wheel to the right, and crunched onto the shoulder. The truck skidded to a halt between the blacktop and a dry ditch, the inertia of the stop levering the door open and giving Andre momentum that he used. He started walking.

He heard the driver’s side door slam and the crunch of Gucci shoes on gravel. Strong fingers dug into his shoulder and whirled him around. Andre batted the hand away and stood in a fighter’s crouch.

“What is your problem?” Oliver didn’t look the least bit lawyerly in that moment. He looked like a football player who’d lost his helmet in a brawl.

“My problem?
You’re
my problem! You’re always
the
problem!”

The pissed-off jock disappeared and Oliver was back. “I’m doing my best, here.”

“You’re doing what’s best for Oliver LaCroix. Period.”

“I’m taking care of Mom, aren’t I? I’m taking care of you. Dad’s estate—” Oliver pursed his lips and looked over the horizon. A family van passed them—parents staring straight ahead, kids in the back seat pressing their faces to the windows.

“What about Dad’s estate?”

“It’s there, okay? I’m taking care of it. Your tuition is paid for, your books are paid for. You have a place to live. The Challenger . . . the Challenger you earn.”

“Yeah, yeah!” Andre laughed scornfully. “When I’m sixty you’ll let me polish the fenders up for Nikhil.” The suddenness of that thought was like a stone into cold water, the ripples spreading. He nodded. “That’s it, isn’t it? You want to hand the keys to your son and tell yourself that’s the way it’s done. Eldest son gets the legacy. Reinvent history the way you like it.”

“Nikhil is seven and a half.”

Andre felt small for even mentioning it, bringing Nikhil into this. He wanted back on solid ground. “Dad left the Challenger to both of us.”

“It’s in my name.”

“You know it’s meant for both of us. Just because you think I’m a stupid kid . . .”

Oliver was looking out at the horizon, back the way they’d come. “You aren’t stupid. You could succeed at any damn thing you try.”

Andre felt even more off balance at the sudden praise, felt the need to keep the argument going. “Maybe I should stay in school a few more years, huh? Change over to business finance instead of criminal justice.”

“I wouldn’t. You’re smart to get into something steady. People always need cops.”

“They always need prosecutors, too. That didn’t keep you from joining a big firm.”

Oliver bent and grabbed a handful of gravel. For a moment, Andre thought his brother would fling the largest stone at him, start a rock fight right here on Interstate 44, give kids in passing cars something more interesting to see than farms. But Oliver picked out some pebbles and threw them at the nearest fencepost, missing it. He dusted his hands together and reached into his pocket. He pulled out his bundle of keys—not the fob with the rental key, but the tangled bunch of responsibilities he’d carried as long as Andre could remember. He sorted through them and stripped off a single teardrop of plastic with a squared-off point. He held it up between his first and second fingers.

Andre knew the key, could have drawn it from memory. He plucked it from Oliver’s outstretched fingers before Oliver could change his mind. He held it in his palm and rubbed his thumb over the logo on the back.

“Don’t squirt your shorts. The Challenger is staying right where it is. For now.” Oliver lifted a hand, hesitated, then put it on Andre’s shoulder. “You’re holding a promise, there. The car is half yours. When you’re ready for it.” Andre didn’t move or look at him and Oliver dropped his hand, obviously uncomfortable. “Break’s over. Go piss behind that bush and get your ass in the truck.” He climbed back into the driver’s seat.

In the argument, he’d forgotten he had to go. He stood under the noon sun, not moving, arms folded, the Challenger key an ache in his palm as he clenched his hand around it. Now that he’d been reminded, he couldn’t keep his dignity much longer. Shoving the key into his pocket, he stalked across red clay soil behind a small outcropping of rock.

He could stick his thumb out and hitch a ride to Amarillo. No, better yet, get Oliver to take him that far, then ditch him at the restaurant and find a bus or train. But as he watered a bush, he knew that he wouldn’t go anywhere that Oliver didn’t take him. He got back into the truck and slammed the door. “I can help, you know. Let me look at Dad’s papers.”

“I don’t have the time it would take to walk you through them. The situation is complicated. That’s why Dad named me the executor.”

“Yeah, when you turned eighteen. I was
eight
.”

“Now you’re twenty and you still wouldn’t understand the first thing about it.”

“How am I supposed to learn if you won’t show me? If Dad had—”

“He didn’t. He never needed to.” Oliver checked his mirrors and pulled onto the empty road. “I’m taking care of things.”

He slumped against the doorframe and stared up at the punishing blue sky. Andre tapped the pocket with the key, as if sending a telegraph to his father. Dad must have had life-insurance policies, probably a long-ago pension and maybe even a retirement fund. Mom would be set for life. If Oliver wanted to skim a little off the top for his troubles, he guessed that would be acceptable. Oliver had politics on his mind, and politics weren’t cheap. Neither was college for that matter. Andre didn’t want the money. All he wanted was to be kept in the loop, treated like an equal. A little respect went a long way.

“Dinner in Amarillo,” Oliver said. “Sit down in a restaurant. A waitress calling both of us ‘hon.’“

Andre leaned forward to look in the sideview mirror. All that road behind them. Straight road. Ahead of them, more of the same. “You’re in the driver’s seat.”