The Thousand - Kevin Guilfoile [108]
“Jesus? In this heat? Where are you going?” Will asked.
“I’m from Chicago. But right now, I’ll go anywhere you’re going.”
“Not as far as that,” Will said. “But we can get you to Lincoln.”
“Lincoln would be good.” Wayne smiled his thanks. “They took my wallet. I got no money for gas. Or food.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“When I get home, I’ll send you some.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
They talked politics for a while, and tried to ask about other “monkey-wrench operations” Wayne might have been a part of. When appropriate, he substituted his old classmate’s biography for his, but Wayne soon fell asleep, his blazer folded into a pillow between his head and the window. He dreamed he was back at the Colossus, watching Nada play roulette, which she never did.
“Red or black?” Nada asked him.
“Green,” he said, and the wheel kept spinning and spinning and spinning.
When he woke up, they were stopped at a campground. Looking through the car window, he watched Cynthia and Will struggling with a tent. From the close orbits they made around each other, he could tell they were lovers. When Wayne was standing close to Nada, he longed to touch her casually, the way Will touched Cynthia, gently with a finger to her bony elbow or shoulder or sometimes the subtle curve of her ass, signifying nothing, just letting her know he was there.
“How long was I out?” Wayne asked as he approached.
“Long time.” Cynthia smiled. “We’re not so far from Denver.”
As the three of them fiddled with the tent, they gossiped, traded in rumors. Cynthia and Will had been stuck in Seattle after the plane crashes. It took them two weeks to get to their car, which was at her sister’s house in L.A. and that was why they stopped to help him. Wayne admired their comfort together, the small unspoken gestures of affection, the way Will did her some kindness every time he stood—fetching her water, or straightening her flip-flops, or just rubbing her shoulder.
They ate dinner on an unsteady picnic table—more sandwiches and water. Wayne felt good enough to drink half a beer. Will and Cynthia then retired to the tent and Will offered to let Wayne sleep in the Subaru. When Wayne was settled into the bucket passenger seat and had thanked them several times, Will locked it with a double beep, taking the keys with him.
Wayne pulled out his dark phone and wondered again if he should risk a call to Peter, or to his own brother, just to say “I didn’t do it.” Just to get that on the record. Just so the cop who finally did arrest him wouldn’t throw that in his face, wouldn’t put a finger in his eye and ask “How come you never denied that you did it?”
How long would it take them to track the GPS signal to his phone anyway? He had seen them track a cell phone on a TV show once. Triangulation was the word they used. Triangulation sounded like it might take a long time. This phone was more sophisticated than most and so maybe they wouldn’t have to triangulate to find it or whatever, but he could risk it, couldn’t he? Risk a few minutes on the phone just to tell his mom or Peter or at least Peter’s voice mail that he was innocent.
He was still debating with himself, phone in hand, thumb poised over the buttons, when he fell back asleep.
39
THE HOUSE was city narrow, with a front yard about the size of a badminton court and a narrow concrete walk where the net would be. Like all the other homes for blocks and blocks and miles in any direction, it was dark inside. Yellow police tape had been ripped down in quick pulls, but a few hopeless ribbons of it remained wrapped around tree trunks and light poles, the neighbors either too spooked by a murder on their block or too distracted by the blackout, now in its third day, to sensibly tidy up after the cops. Nada walked up the steps through a hard, hot rain and rang the bell, but it, like nearly everything else, had been silenced by the outage.
She pushed on the front door, which was locked, and then stepped back to the sidewalk to take the house in.
Three stories of new stone and brick.