The Nightworld - Jack Blaine [2]
He used to go to the lab in the city, but then he started some classified project, and overnight forty-two van loads of equipment got hauled down to the basement. For about a week, technicians scrambled around like ants, setting up a state-of-the-art lab where we used to have a saggy couch and a foosball table. There’s a generator down there, too, because Dad says the guys in charge are pushing for fast results and don’t want the project to go offline. He won’t say much more about the project besides that I’m not supposed to go around advertising it.
He’s always been a little absentminded and absorbed in his work, but lately it’s getting bad. He forgets to shave for days, and I can hear him mumbling stuff about the Higgs mechanism and other things I can’t even pronounce. It’s almost as bad as it was right after Mom died, when he was drinking. But it’s bad in a different way—there’s a worried look on his face that I’ve never seen before, like there’s something he can’t figure out how to solve. Dad always knows how to solve everything. I’ve asked him a couple of times if everything’s okay and he always says it’s fine, but I know it’s not. I know something is wrong.
Here’s another thing I know. My pacifist dad, the guy who constantly lectures me that turning the other cheek is the only appropriate response to violence, has a gun.
It’s hidden in the back of the china cabinet, where he keeps his bottle of single malt scotch. When Mom died, Dad lost it for a while. He tried to stay in control for me, I know he did, but he just couldn’t handle it. He started drinking, way too much. He stayed up late at night and slept through the mornings when I was supposed to be getting breakfast and going to school. Once I’d missed the bus a few times, the school called, and then my aunt Becky had to come out from California for two weeks. Once she came, it gave him the chance to pull it together, and he’s never done that again, but it scared me. I was only seven when Mom died, and I thought I was losing him too.
That’s how I found the gun. Like I said, he’s never acted that way again, but I still check the level of his latest scotch bottle every once in a while, just to see. I was checking last week and I found the gun, partway under a cloth place mat behind the scotch bottle. It’s heavy and cool to the touch and deadly looking. Finding it there was like walking into my bedroom and discovering a coiled, hissing viper in the middle of my down comforter.
I have to talk to him about it, and I was planning on doing it tonight. I had thrown the ingredients for a stew in the Crock-Pot before I left for school this morning, because I thought we’d be eating together, and I can smell it—spicy, tomato-y goodness. I put together a pretty good stew. It looks like I’ll be eating alone again, though.
I throw my backpack on the couch and go through to the kitchen. Sure enough, the lightbulb over the basement door is on, which means “Don’t come down here.” It’s the arrangement we made when his work got moved home—Dad says he can’t be disturbed when he’s in the middle of his research. I’m not sure why we need the lightbulb; it’s not like he’s ever allowed me down there since the equipment got moved in; the door stays locked if he’s not using the lab.
I rummage through the utensil drawer until I find a wooden spoon, and then I take the top off the Crock-Pot. Steam bathes my face and I inhale. It’s good stuff; too bad Dad will miss out. Another hour or so, and it will be ready to eat.
I kill the time online. Charlie has some new photos of his latest dorky T-shirt finds on his Facebook page. I leave comments on two of the worst ones. I notice a new friend request and when I click on it, my heart almost stops. It’s from Lara! I confirm it before I even take another breath.
Ahh. I have access to her wall and her photos