The Brothers (26 page)

Crack. Crack. Crack
. My fist against his skull.

He turns, stumbling.

Boom. Boom. Boom.
Bullets zing through the warehouse, pinging off metal and smashing into plaster. A man cries out and falls off the stage.

Tommy grabs for the gun. Houghtson lets go of me and grapples with Tommy. Tommy’s wet fingers slip over the smooth sheen of the gun. Houghtson aims at his chest.

The gunshot feels like an earthquake. Like the whole world is vibrating apart. Houghtson’s arm recoils, jilting us both.

It’s so shocking I lose my grip and fall off his back and onto the stage. Someone else is falling, too. Both our bodies hit at the same time.

He’s the only thing I see as I struggle to catch the breath that was knocked away—Tommy. Tommy’s beautiful eyes staring into mine. Blue, blue, blue. Blue like the sky, like the veins that pump blood to my heart. The blue that keeps me breathing. I stare, entranced. It’s just him and me. His eyes are a conduit and I flow into them. He’s the one I chose, the one I know was meant for me. Formed and shaped by God or the universe to be my mate. My puzzle to solve over and over.

When the blood appears on his lips, it breaks the spell.

The gunshot. It happened. It happened to him.

My body comes unhinged as I reach for him. Prentice and his men storm up to the stage, but Tommy is the nucleus, the core. I scoot across the stage, littered with glass and blood.
His
blood.

I draw him into my arms.

But he doesn’t move. He doesn’t even blink as I bring my face close, my tears brimming and falling onto his skin. There’s no saving him. No last words. No chance to tell him I love him. I love him. I
love
him. It isn’t like in the movies where there’s always that last confession. That last moment that sums up all that has been and all that will never be.

I get nothing but empty eyes. Beautiful, empty eyes.

He’s dead.

He
can’t
be dead.

But he’s dead.

I press my face into his chest, trembling. Oh, God. How can this be happening?

A hand grabs my wrist and yanks. I look up. Bell stands over me.

“Run.” Her eyes flick to the commotion.

Where’s Houghtson? He must’ve taken cover somewhere. Prentice and his guards have taken refuge behind pillars and under the stairwell. The Breeders guards have better firepower, but no cover. Several bodies lay dead on both sides. Bullets are flying everywhere.

I wish to God they’d do the world a favor and kill each other.

Bell tugs again, but there’s no part of me that can heed her. I need to stay here with Tommy. And I need to see Houghtson ended. Houghtson was supposed to die and I know if I run now, he’ll follow me. He killed Tommy. Someone has to stop him.

I see him hiding in a far corner of the stage behind the shattered tank, getting ready to run like the coward he is.

I draw my arms away from Tommy and run at him.

Houghtson sees me. “Had enough of these savages?”

My body is vibrating as I take the last steps. “I want to pay you back for all you’ve done.”

He narrows his eyes.

I run at him.

He fumbles to raise his gun.

I hit him hard. The gun clatters to the ground. Houghtson reaches, but I’m quick. When I grab the gun, the metal feels so right in my hands. I turn and pull the trigger.

A gunshot cracks through the warehouse.

When I look, his expression is stunned. His eyes are wide, his mouth open. He looks at me like I’m an alien. He’s never seen anything like me before. And I think how right that is. There’s never been a thing like me before.

There’s blood everywhere. So much blood.

There’s no peace on Houghtson’s face as he bleeds out.

I can’t help but think of the differences between Tommy and Houghtson. Tommy’s death is still a knife in my sternum. Houghtson’s death is a balm to my wounds.

He coughs and lurches and is gone.

The remaining guards are still firing, but all that seems far away. Prentice is nowhere to be seen. Gabe, who seems to be coming out of his stupor, stumbles up the steps and falls to the ground beside Tommy’s body. He hefts his twin over his shoulder, tears streaming from his eyes.

“Can you run?” he shouts to me over the noise.

I nod.

We run.

I move as if in a dream.

My body floats on its own accord. It runs beside Bell and Gabe through the warehouse and out into the night. It climbs into a truck. It sits beside Tommy’s body,
my
Tommy, as we drive through the dark streets of Santa Fe.

Gabe has covered Tommy with black plastic, but I find his cold hand and hold it. Somewhere in my head, I know Tommy is gone. Tommy, whom I love. Tommy, who will never be mine. I have not yet found the bottom to the well of my despair, but now, sitting in the back of the truck with the New Mexico wind whipping my hair around, I know that well could be bottomless. I have an ocean of tears to shed for Tommy Meemick. And for myself.

I stare out at the dead buildings, the dead trees, and wonder if it wouldn’t have been better if the human race had snuffed out like a candle. What is the point of urging it on? Is it all just sorrow and sorrow and sorrow again? Is it all grit swirled up in a breeze?

We drive for hours. For days maybe. I doze in and out of sleep. I let Gabe drive without once asking how he is or how he feels about the death of his twin. I know I should offer comfort, but I can’t find any inside myself. When the world is dead, comfort is the first thing to go.

When the truck finally stops, I sit up and rub my eyes. It’s mid-morning. Gabe has pulled us into a large, open warehouse. I look around at the metal beams, flecked with bird nests, and shiver. It reminds me too much of Prentice.

Gabe climbs out of the truck and looks at me. His eyes are bloodshot and red-rimmed. He looks so,
so
tired.

Somehow, my voice comes out. “I’m sorry about your brother.”

He looks at me and then down at the tarp. “Me too.”

I stare at Tommy’s curled fingers, whitish blue at the tips. “I loved him.”

I don’t know why I confess it, but it feels right to say it out loud.

Gabe just looks at me sorrowfully. “I’m sorry.”

I nod. “Me too.”

Bell pulls herself out of the truck and looks us both over. “Best take care of him while it’s still daylight. Then we can mourn his passing.”

“I’ll do it,” Gabe says. His voice is as thin as the fabric on my knees, but he keeps his head up.

We gather around the truck bed and the shape in black. Gabe climbs in and draws down the plastic.

Tommy’s face is ashen. I stare, feeling a sob stick in my throat. I could gag on it, choke to death, and that would be a mercy. Gabe’s fingertips trace over the cheeks that will never again lift in joy or anger. He traces eyelids that will never flutter open. When he finds Tommy’s cap crumpled beneath him, he draws it out and stares at it. I watch his shoulders shake as he sobs.

My sobs come, too, a torrent of them. Bell walks over and puts her arm around my shoulder. Another comfort for another sorrow. If only I knew this would be our last.

I find Gabe up on the roof.

A few moments after we cremated Tommy’s body in the parking lot, Gabe limped off alone. I let him have his time, but the sun is setting and I worry about him. Bell volunteers to go looking, but I insist. I find the hatch to the roof flung open and his narrow shadow sitting at the roof’s ledge. The sky is smeared orange, but there’s no beauty in it. Not today.

He hears me and looks back. Swiping tears from his face, he sniffs. His brother’s bloodstained newsy cap is fitted over his hair.

“You need somethin’?” he asks.

I nod. “I need to see if you’re alright.”

He shakes his head. “I just can’t believe he did it.”

I sit beside him. “Believe that he did what?”

Gabe stares out into the sky where the pavement shimmers with the last heat of the day. “I can’t believe he sacrificed himself for me.”

I shake my head, tears welling up again. “What are you talking about? It was my fault.” I slap my hand over my chest. I want to keep slapping, but instead, I plunge my fists into my lap. “Houghtson—that man with the gun—Tommy jumped on him to save m—”

He grabs my arm and stares into my face, a shock I don’t understand registering on his. “What did you just say?”

“Tommy tried to protect me—”

His mouth falls open.

And all of a sudden, he’s kissing me. His mouth presses hard against mine with an urgency that wasn’t there when he kissed me in the van. His lips are hungry. His hands grip my hair. He kisses me more like…

I pull back and stare into his eyes.

“Tommy?” I breathe.

He nods.

Then he kisses me again.

“How?” I ask as I finally pull away. My lips are flushed from his kisses.

Tommy runs a hand through his hair and sighs. “When Prentice came for me, he brought me in to see Gabe. I guess Gabe talked Prentice into giving him a few moments alone with me. He and Prentice were…”

“Lovers?” I offer.

Tommy nods. “I never understood it. I mean, the liking guys thing, okay. But Prentice? He was a monster. But I guess there’s no reasoning with your heart.” He flicks a glance at me, smiles, and keeps going. “Gabe said he was so sorry for keeping us here all this time. He could see now how bad Prentice was. He apologized for all this being his fault. Then he told me he’d been faking his seizures.”

“What?” I say, pulling back.

Tommy nods sadly. “He said he’d been faking them since he was a little kid. At first, it was to get Dah off our backs and then, with Dah gone, it was to keep
me
off his back. I was mad and hurt, but I was going to die soon and he was my brother. I forgave him.” Tommy sucks in a stuttering breath.

“When he went to hug me, I felt a prick on my neck. He had a needle. Then everything got real fuzzy. Must’ve woke up, heard what we were about to do, and talked Harpy into getting him something to knock me out. Then, I guess he switched our clothes.” He holds up the newsy cap and sighs.

“I can’t believe I didn’t realize. It all happened so fast.”

“I think he planned to lose and then reveal himself to Prentice, thinking Prentice wouldn’t send him to the hallway. But then everything went so crazy.” He drops his head and shakes it. “And now he’s dead.” His face is twisted up with so much pain that it hurts just to look at him.

I take his hand. “He loved you.”

Tommy looks at my hand and then back at the sunset. “I know. And I was always so mean to him.”

What a burden to carry. What a weight slung around his neck.

I put my arm around his shoulder and draw him to me. He looks up.

“Why would you love me?” he asks, looking in my face. “When you said it in the truck, you thought I was dead, but now I’m right here. Gabe was the fun one, the easy one. I’m the hard one.”

I shake my head. “There was no easy or hard one. You both did what you thought was right. And the world takes the good, the bad, and the in-between.”

He takes my hand and kisses it.

My hand falls on my stomach. “I’m pregnant. Life with me will be one never-ending struggle. It’s going to be
so
hard. Hiding me. Hiding the baby.” I drop my head in my hands.

His arm slinks around me. “It’s amazing. A miracle. A baby.”

When I look up, his eyes are shining. “Are you sure?”

“There’s nothing in this world I want more.”

We hold each other as night falls, as the stars pierce the sky and wink down on the cracked pavement. The cracked world. No amount of puzzling will piece it back together. But there are tiny hopes tucked in deep drifts of sand. Together, Tommy and I will find them.

I sniff and look out my window. A hawk flies in high circles, dipping and floating on the wind. Somewhere, a coyote cries. And inside, my heart is breaking again, fresh and raw like the first time. I pinch my eyes together and try to mend it.

“So why did we call him Arn if he was known by Tommy?” I ask.

Auntie takes a big slug of water. “We never knew if Prentice or Bashees was still looking for us. Tommy was the only one who had to deal with other people, so he took on another name. His brother’s middle name. And he spent the rest of his life caring for your mama, me, and you.”

“I had an uncle.”

Auntie sighs. “Aye. And he also died saving you.”

So many men have died so that I could live.

She crosses her hand over her heart. “That’s the story. I ain’t lying. Scout’s honor.”

“I’m goin’ for a walk.” I sit up and open the door. It’s the first time I’ve been up since the scorpion sting. My head spins a little, but I feel about eighty percent. Doc watches me stand up outside the Jeep.

“Can I come with you?” he asks.

“Can you keep quiet?” I say. I’m snapping at him, but I feel prickly. It’s better he knows that now and not a mile into the brush.

He nods, gets up, and climbs out of the Jeep.

We walk into the twilight. I want to travel as far away from that Jeep and the story as I can. My thoughts feel clouded, and if anything, that story fogged my memories of my parents, not sharpened them.

We hike through brush that tears at our legs and up onto a ridge. You can see us from the road up here, but it’s empty and dark. And besides, part of me wants someone to come barreling down the hill. Shootin’ something might calm this pounding in my chest.

“It was a good story,” Doc says, eyeing me.

I narrow my eyes. “Thought you said you can be quiet.”

“I can,” he replies. “Your mom became her own woman,” he says, picking up a rock and chucking it across the landscape. “Just like you.”

I say nothing and let the breeze tug through my sweaty hair.

“Sometimes I think we’ll never understand our parents. I mean, take my father, my
adopted
father. How did he ever start working for the Breeders in the first place? Didn’t he know they were bad when he signed up? Were there any children he handed over before he chose me?” Doc turns wet eyes to the horizon.