The Midnight Road Read online

  This all seemed to have been acted out many times before. Flynn could feel the wide turns coming up before they actually happened. He knew when they were going to take a left or a right, or when Danny would rip out on the straightaway.

  Another cruiser joined the chase. And another. Every time a new siren went off Danny let out a thick laugh from the center of his chest. The Charger was filled with flashing lights. The police tried to close in and bump them, until one of the drivers spotted Emma and Flynn in the backseat. Flynn let his gaze drift over the police officers’ faces and thought they all looked worried as hell but just angry enough to make drastic decisions. Danny let out more quiet laughter as Patricia begged him to slow down, to give up, to stop and think of the baby. Whenever she said the word baby the Charger would zag and the tires would squeal.

  Flynn wondered what the baby would look like. With almond eyes and a buried temper that would release itself in strange but memorable ways. Flynn tried to calm Patricia by reaching forward and rubbing the back of her neck. She lunged from his touch and let out a small scream. In the confines of the car the sound went on as if she was being slowly knifed.

  Flynn sat back and stared out the window again. They were near the ocean. He watched the saw grass and cyclone fencing go by, the sand sweeping across the road. There were four cruisers behind them now, the cops no longer bracing the Charger but staying no farther back than two car lengths. Everybody really hustling.

  He knew that Danny still had more to do. That his brother hadn’t, in fact, done anything yet.

  Emma stared at him as if to ask, What’s going on?

  “I don’t know,” Flynn answered, although he understood the wasted tension within his brother and inside the car. Deep in Flynn as well, and it had also lain within their father. The old man was still coughing. Flynn put his hands to his ears to drown out his father. The sirens couldn’t do it. Nothing could do it. He wanted to yell for his daddy. He wanted to dig up the coffin and relieve his grief. He hoped Danny would drive into the sea. He wanted to go into the water with him.

  There is a futility in having no enemy. Danny didn’t hate the cops, he wasn’t even angry with them. He had grown too lonely for fate. He could no longer bear the strain of their mother’s sighs. His own second-rate failures had surmounted his capacity for belief. His regrets were shallow but numerous. His mediocrity had driven him out of his head.

  He found an estate that had its sprinklers going. He let out a bark of real humor and jumped the curb, then downshifted to get enough traction to tear up the lawn and spit mud everywhere. The police followed across the grass. Danny didn’t even hate the rich, it was just something fun to do.

  They had the bullhorns blaring, shouting orders. They’d run his plates, and knew he was a speed demon and airport dragster. Everyone was shouting at the same time so that the sky filled with the rumbling, irritated voice of God.

  Danny let out a nasty snicker. It held more meaning than anything else that day. He’d come to a decision, and Flynn, somehow knowing the sound—that laugh being in his own blood—sensed what was coming next.

  Danny swung out behind some shrubs trimmed to look like lovers twined in each other’s arms and got the Charger back into the street. He hit seventy on a groomed road of million-dollar homes that ran a quarter mile toward the ocean.

  Flynn put his arm out across Emma Waltz, the way Danny always threw an arm across Flynn’s chest whenever he was about to hit the brake. Emma put her hand over Flynn’s and the sudden depth of feeling made his head swim. He shut his eyes and braced his feet, gritted his teeth against the abrupt lurching and halting of the car. Patricia screamed Danny’s name.

  A row of four cruisers were parked across the end of the street, backed by saw grass and sand. Twenty-foot-high wrought-iron fencing, stone lions, topiary hedges, clinging ivy, imported Italian-tiled retaining walls and huge sconce planters bordered the road. There were five police cars behind them now, all of them skidding and bashing bumpers. The tension was concentrated and insane. Rage wafted through the air, you could pluck at it with your fingers. It had happened so quickly, and all for nothing. There was no reason for it and never would be.

  The entire day seemed like a dream Flynn had declined to awaken from. He kept thinking it shouldn’t be so hard to change what was happening. The sirens and lights and shouting filled the interior of the car but nothing could drown out Danny’s snicker. It was still going. It would always be going. Danny was going to take it into the ocean with him.

  Tears filled Flynn’s eyes but refused to fall. In the years to come, this would be the moment of his greatest guilt. That he did not cry. The fact would torment him at the oddest moments: the afternoon he lost his virginity in the back of the Charger; on his wedding night as Marianne sat on the hotel bed, pulling off her shoes; the day his boy Noel wasn’t born; in the hospital the first time he visited his mother, carrying flowers, and she told him he shouldn’t have gone to such trouble. You can deny nearly everything, but you can’t dismiss your own failure to weep.

  Patricia had blood on her lips. Flynn saw that she was trying so desperately to love and save his brother that she actually believed she could do it. That it could be done. Perhaps it was a function of her fear. Perhaps in her own way she was as reckless as Danny was. They both struggled against the clichéd unimportance of their own lives. He could never be a bitter, unemployed ex-jock sitting in a recliner sucking down beers in front of daytime television. She would not exist without the romantic drama of an amour feu between strangers. Flynn felt a strange respect for the wild courage of their stupid convictions.

  Danny told her to get out and she wouldn’t. She mentioned the baby again. He shouted that there was no baby and she screamed that there was, there was. Danny reached back and undid Flynn’s seat belt with the barest brush of his finger and grabbed him under the arm. It hurt but Flynn didn’t make a sound. Painfully, Flynn slid across Danny’s lap until he was nearly behind the wheel. He took the steering wheel in his hands and Danny started to push him out the window. Flynn refused to let go. He struggled to hold on, biting his lip, clamping his eyes shut. Danny yanked and shoved and finally broke Flynn’s grip. Danny kissed him on the top of the head, said, “Good boy,” and threw him out the window.

  The wealthy filled their windows, eased out onto their lawns, and watched with eagerness. The cops drew a bead on Flynn like he might be a lit stick of dynamite. When they finally realized it was a ten-year-old boy, they made whining doggie sounds and gestured to him, holding their arms out like he was a baby taking his first steps. He heard wind chimes and ringing phones. He held his ground and took Emma from his brother’s arms, helping her to the ground. Together they walked away without another word. Flynn started up the street, with Emma Waltz close on his heels. She still appeared intensely calm.

  The police rushed toward them with their guns drawn and Flynn managed to wag his head. They kept coming closer and he turned and bolted back toward the Charger. It was a moment of weakness. It wouldn’t do Danny proud, seeing him like this, but Flynn couldn’t help it. He called his brother’s name and saw Patricia turn her head to peer back at him through the rear window. She smiled at him.

  Danny had outfoxed everyone. He knew these roads well all right. He’d probably made love to Patricia or other girls out on the beach in the setting sun, the moonlight. With the silhouettes of the mansions rising up to scratch against the silver sky.

  He hit the gas and swung the car out wide to the left, easing against a spear-rail fence. He knew that driving was more than just speed or power; it had to do with knowing the angles, understanding the vectors, describing the arcs. The police didn’t know the area as well as Danny. They were close to the end of the street but not quite there. Danny sort of tapped the huge gates in the middle of the fence with the front grille, doing maybe 20 mph, just hard enough for the lock to spring. He ramped up the tremendous semicircular driveway and sprang out the other side right past the police, skidding p
ast the sign that read: PRIVATE BEACH. NO ENTRY EXCEPT FOR RESIDENTS.

  Like he could get away anywhere. Like he might actually be trying to escape.

  That’s what ratcheted the cops up and got them even more crazed for blood. The idea that this ballsy kid wasn’t only making a run but really thought he might be gaining ground. Someone fired a shot. A gray puncture appeared in the trunk of the Charger. Flynn would fill and buff and repaint it himself six years later.

  So close.

  Danny would’ve made it to the water except the rear tires got hung up in some storm fencing set out in the nearest dunes. He tried to spin the wire off by yanking hard on the wheel, but the Charger bounced down the sandy slope fast and hit a deep wide hole dug by some kid. The tide had started to rise as if trying to reach the car. The left-front tire plunged and the shock absorber buckled. The Charger rocked hideously forward once, then jolted to an immediate stop and slowly angled to one side on the beach.

  If he had gotten to the water, it might’ve been enough. The cops would’ve leaped onto him and busted his ribs against the hood of the car, and Danny would’ve laughed hard and long and it might’ve been enough for him to feel like he’d done one solid, outrageous act of defiance in his life. He could’ve married Patricia and had the kid, and no matter how many beers he drank in front of the television, or how fat he got or how hard he coughed, it might’ve been enough to keep him going.

  Cops kept trying to grab Flynn. He dodged, and outran every one of them. He made it to the beach and an officer tackled him. Flynn let out a grunt of pain and it wasn’t until three days later that his mother discovered his left femur had been fractured. He struggled, but the cop lifted him easily and carried him back to the street.

  It didn’t matter, he’d seen enough.

  He’d seen Danny with his forehead resting propped against the steering wheel, lifelike but utterly lifeless. No charm, no hipness, no cool, no breath. There wasn’t a mark on him except for one small blemish on his chin. All because of the goddamn busted shock. His neck had been broken.

  Patricia’s head had gone through the passenger window. Jagged glass had sheared her right ear off. A small splash of blood trickled down the door in a thin line that thickly dripped into the sand.

  The tide crept up the beach, inch by inch, but Flynn never got a chance to see it reach the Charger.

  The cops offered soothing empty words like the crooning of pedophiles. They offered candy bars and juice and comic books. They threw a blanket over Emma’s shoulders and led her away. She glanced back at Flynn once and they never saw each other again.

  NINE

  The icy morning wind blew angel-wing patterns of frost against his windshield. Flynn saw Sierra walk the kids to the bus stop at the corner, then stomp back and get into her red ’91 Civic and drive to work. He watched Kelly interact with the other foster kids, talking animatedly as her breath bloomed around her face. She had a tendency to smile brightly, then close up her face as if embarrassed to have found something worth smiling about. It would be a while before her own grin didn’t shame her.

  He found himself wishing that Shepard would get the hell out of his coma already. He had a daughter who still needed him, no matter what his troubles. Flynn had the urge to rush to the hospital and smack the shit out of the guy until he woke up. Flynn needed answers.

  “Turn on the heater,” Zero said.

  “You’re dead,” Flynn told the dog. “How can you feel cold?”

  “You tell me,” the dog answered. “You’re dead too. Don’t you know that?”

  Flynn thought maybe he did, but he started the car and popped on the heater. He sat back and hit an oldies station while the school bus passed by. It slowed at the corner and the kids proceeded on. Kelly took a seat toward the back on the side closest to him and Flynn watched her hair gleam beneath the sheeted ice on the window. Emma Waltz got right the fuck up in his face again, so close he fell back in his seat.

  Zero said, “Who is she?”

  “Who’s who?”

  “The girl in your head.”

  “If you know about her, you know who she is.”

  “I don’t know about her, I know about you.”

  Flynn was starting to feel a little insulted. “Don’t you think it’s time to go on to doggie heaven?”

  “Whenever you’re ready to go, I will be too.”

  When the bus pulled away from the curb and disappeared down the road, Flynn shifted and glanced back at Sierra’s house.

  “The cops are going to pick you up, sitting around here all the time, acting suspicious,” Zero said, digging at the passenger seat, turning in circles, trying to get comfortable. “What are you looking for?”

  “I want to see Nuddin.”

  Flynn got out and slammed the door. He walked across the street, up onto Sierra’s front lawn, and peered into the living room window. The wind trilled through the trees and icicles rang above him. He moved around the yard until he got to the kitchen window. He saw the teenaged Trevor clearing away breakfast dishes, cereal boxes and a container of milk. Flynn got a good vibe from the kid. He seemed responsible, always cleaning up after his foster brothers and sisters. Nuddin sat staring off happily at nothing, humming. He was dressed in workman’s overalls and thick boots. He looked like he was getting ready to go work the docks. Sierra must’ve had some leftover clothing laid away by the exes.

  Nuddin’s misshapen, scarred head appeared much more normal now that Sierra had allowed Nuddin’s hair to grow out a little. He had a handkerchief that he used to wipe the drool from his chin. Trevor was saying something Flynn couldn’t hear, but Nuddin seemed to ignore the kid. His gentle brown eyes found Flynn in the window and filled with joy. He appeared healthy and happy. He smiled and started out of his seat, but Flynn was worried about Sierra hearing he’d visited. She might give him hell.

  He retreated fast over the lawn, got in the car and punched it to the Expressway. Zero was still sleeping in the passenger seat. He yawned once and rubbed his booted front paws across his nose.

  Flynn went to the office and discovered his desk piled with case folders. Every one of them a threat to a child. Seeing them stacked like that got his bad mood cooking. Sierra was out on a call. He read through files most of the morning, then went out and visited four families. He picked up a bad vibe on only one of them and faced down the rude roughhouse without throwing fists. Barely noon and the guy stunk of gin and cheap weed. The stereo was on loud, and so was the television. Flynn figured the complaint had more to do with noise pollution than anything. A seven-year-old girl with a broken leg was in bed laced up in traction. He asked her questions while her father glowered from the bedroom door. Her room was the cleanest in the house. She said she slipped in the kitchen on a slippery floor. Flynn found no suspicious bruises. He checked out the kitchen. The floor was wet with melting ice cubes. The father had been drinking gin and tonics. The daddy was stoned and had that look of strain, but he hadn’t hurt his kid. He just couldn’t keep his kitchen floor dry.

  Flynn got back to the office right after lunch. Sierra was at her desk on the phone reaming out a high-school nurse for sending a girl to the shower after she’d claimed she was raped in a stairwell. Failure to immediately garner a rape kit could ruin a criminal case. Who knew how much evidence had been washed away. Sierra’s naturally tight grin was notched a little higher than usual.

  He turned on his computer and stared at the screen for a minute. He was surprised that after three decades he’d never tried to find Emma Waltz. Despite her haunting him in her own way, he’d never given her much thought. But suddenly the urge to see her again was growing inside him.

  It was the kind of thing that would consume him if he couldn’t get it locked down. His hand drifted over the keyboard. He started to hunt for Emma through the agency’s database and affiliate intergov networks.

  Women were tougher to find. They got married, changed names, used hyphens that weren’t picked up by some directories. He gr
abbed the phone book and started checking under W. He stopped before he got to Waltz and tried to run it out. What he would say to her, and exactly why he would be saying it.

  He could see how the meeting between them might go. Each with the same immobile memory fixed in their childhoods, emanating outward to touch them every day since. His imagination fritzed when he tried to hear her voice. He’d never heard her speak. He ran through possible opening statements, comments, questions, but nothing held enough weight. It all sounded empty and silly. He saw himself trying to take her hand and Emma pulling away in anger or fear, overcome with emotion.

  His thoughts started getting dumber. She comes flying into his arms, presses her lips to his, because it was always meant for them to be together. Because no one else could understand. Because blood pulls kids together and keeps them bound through the years. Because you need to think things like this about someone you only knew for a couple of hours on the worst day of your life.

  Before the day you died, of course.

  A shadow crossed Flynn’s desk. He eased shut the telephone book.

  He’d really lost his edge. Sierra had on her three-inch heels and he hadn’t even heard her. Her new wig was a bright blonde with pageboy bangs. It hung a little too far to the left. He got the feeling she did it on purpose, just daring somebody to say something.

  She checked around the room and said, “You didn’t bring the cactus to brighten this place up.”

  “It’s at home.”

  “I’ll get you another.”

  “I’m not responsible enough to take care of two cacti.”

  “You could’ve said ‘cactuses,’ you know, it’s also considered proper English.”