Crying Wolf (30 page)

“We have to search your house,” Nat said.

“How exciting,” said Helen. “But you won't find Leo.”

“We're looking for Freedy,” Nat said.

“You won't find him either.”

“What about Grace?”

“Grace?”

“My sister,” said Izzie.

“Ah,” said Helen, turning to her, “the beautiful twins. How Leo does go on and on. Which beautiful twin are you?”

“Izzie,” said Izzie.

“So many
z
's in my life. Well, Izzie, your beautiful twin isn't here either, except in the sense that you are.”

“I don't follow you,” Izzie said.

“What's so hard? Being identical, of course, you're always in both places. But no one's here today, not even the birds.”

Nat and Izzie searched the house. No sign of Grace, no sign of Freedy, no sign of Leo, except three plastic wrappers on his bed, the kind dry cleaners use for shirts.

They tried the garage last. It contained gardening supplies and an old Mercedes convertible under a drop cloth. The keys were in the ignition.

“We may need this,” Izzie said, getting behind the wheel. Nat opened the garage door. She drove out. Nat closed the door, hopped in the rolling car. Helen Uzig watched them from a front window.

 

T
hey couldn't figure out how to put the top up. Snow had been falling when Grace and Izzie drove Nat to New York for Christmas in the Rolls-Royce and the top had been down then, too. But it hadn't been snowing hard like this, and the feeling he'd had then, of being inside a protective bubble, was gone.

There were two banks on campus. They identified the one where Grace and Izzie had their account, entered just before closing, withdrew all the money in cash—$13,362. More money than Nat had ever had in his hands, ever seen, but still almost useless. They went back to Grace and Izzie's room to find some clever way of making it look like a million; their only idea. The message light was blinking. Izzie hit the button.

An intake of breath; Nat knew who it had to be before the voice spoke. “Little change of . . . can't think of it, starts with
v
. Call it a change of plan. What with the snow and all. Know the Glass Onion? Bring the package to the back door. Six o'clock. Sharp. Any questions?”

“Thank God,” Izzie said.

“What do you mean?” said Nat. It was 4:45.

“Because this will change everything, of course.” She was already calling her father to play him the message. Nat watched her face, said nothing.

An operator at some Zorn number said he would call back. Izzie tried again, every fifteen minutes, every ten, every five, using expressions like
life and death
. She tried her stepmother, Andy Ling, Albert, even Anton. She reached none of them. No one called back. The bone structure of her face grew more and more apparent.

At 5:50, Nat got to his feet. His heart started racing, lightly at first, then harder and harder but just as fast. Izzie raised her eyebrow, her left eyebrow. “Is it going to be all right?” she said. Or something like that; Nat was aware of little more than his heartbeat. She took his hand as they went out the door. Hers felt like ice.

Identify: “When you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.”

—Two-point bonus question, final exam, Philosophy 322

F
reedy felt pretty good. He kind of liked the way things were going down. Sure, the arm wasn't tip-top, his right arm, almost like another person, ready to go to war for him at the drop of a hat. And he was all out of andro, all out of crystal meth. But funny: he didn't even need them anymore. Had he ever felt stronger? No, not even close. He could knock down brick walls, lift cars right off the ground, smash things to smithereens, whatever smithereens were. Had to be momentum. Momentum was on his side at last. Everything was easy now. Take just walking down College Hill in the darkness, right in the middle of the deserted street, snow swirling around him and he didn't even feel it. Didn't feel the cold. Momentum: all he had to do was let it take him.

Soon, very soon, he would be a millionaire. A millionaire! Was that the most beautiful word in the language or what? A millionaire, and out of this goddamn town forever. Tomorrow—a matter of hours—he would be in Florida. The beach. The biggest cigar in the world. One of those drinks with an umbrella. Cool shades, the very best, like Revos, not ripped off somebody's towel, but store-bought, legitimate. He pictured it all, saw it as clear as life, or clearer. A picture in his mind tonight; tomorrow: reality. He was an entrepreneur, a risk-taker, one of the daring few, who, as they said on all the infomercials, made things happen. The kid from the flats makes good. At that moment, reaching the bottom of College Hill and trudging through knee-deep snow in the alley that led to the back of the Glass Onion, Freedy felt not just pretty good, but better than he'd ever felt in his life.

Only one problem. Not a problem, really, just something he hadn't made up his mind about. The girl. Would he ever find another girl like that, a girl so right for him? She was something: a girl who'd given him more trouble than Saul and his big boys. Remembering what had happened to Saul's nose, he smiled to himself in the darkness. He'd taken Saul down a peg or two, but good. I got you last—a game he'd played at recess as a kid. Freedy always won, had now won again. Florida tomorrow. He'd finished with Saul Medeiros forever, would never even think of him again, had got him last.

Much more fun to think about the girl. An amazing girl. She'd actually helped him—
if you're with the hostage, that makes you a hostage too.
She'd even suggested this place, in a way; a vacant lot, she'd said, or an empty building. The Glass Onion was perfect. Freedy saw just how perfect when he moved behind it.

The alley made an L-shaped turn back of the Glass Onion and ended there. On one side was the loading dock of the old hardware store, also boarded up; at the end of the alley, a Dumpster; before him, the service entrance of the Glass Onion, the door padlocked, the bulkhead buried in snow. He was happy about the snow, another sign of the momentum on his side. Supposing they
had
been stupid enough to call the cops, didn't it stand to reason that the cops would already have checked this place out? But they hadn't: he could see, dark as it was, that there were no footprints except his in the snow. He crouched under the loading dock, giving himself a good view back up the alley, all the way to the street. The alley was dark, but the entrance glowed orange from a street-light; the blowing snow came and went as black streaks. Freedy pulled an old pallet from the shadows under the loading dock, upended it in front of him, waited.

Out on the street the storm was making noise, but it was quiet in the closed-in space behind the Glass Onion. The Glass Onion had been boarded up for almost as long as Freedy could remember. He had to say almost because the truth was he'd been inside once. Must have been very young, but he had a clear memory of a guitar-playing singer with a long beard up on a stage, a yellow drink with a straw, a dish of noodles or some shit in a sauce the same color—ginger, was that the word?—as the singer's beard. The beard and the noodles and that yellow drink had got all mixed up in his mind and he'd ended up puking on his mother's lap. She'd been wearing one of those striped Arab robes. The stripes, the noodles, the beard, the puke—all the same ginger color. She'd never taken him to the Glass Onion again, so it worked out fine.

Something was bothering him about the girl. Oh, yeah. Even though she was amazing, he was a little pissed off with her. For one thing, there'd been that business with the broken glass. He admired it in a way, but she could have actually hurt him. Worse than that, though, was this tendency she had to maybe not respect him enough, maybe talk down her nose a little. Had she even laughed at him at one point? Of course, with the way things had been left between them, she might be reconsidering her attitude by now. She would come around. Human beings were animals, after all, not in a bad way, that was simply scientific fact. So what he'd thought before—breaking a horse—was right. If he decided to take her along with him, take her into this golden future—and the decision was his, not hers—she'd end up—what was the word?
Infatuated
. Like a broken horse. She'd end up infatuated with him. Could he picture her with her hands all over him, staring up at him with big horse eyes, going down on him by request? Yes, he could. He could have both: the money and the girl. But the decision would be his.

And first, the money. What time had he said? Six. Six sharp. Freedy was wondering what time it was now, the plan kind of depending on it, when he heard, very faint in the storm, the bell tolling up at the chapel on College Hill. That bell was part of his life, one of the bad parts, but this—the last time he'd have to listen to it!—was different. This time it was working for him. He counted: six bells.

Six o'clock. Sharp. But what if they didn't come? That would mean they thought he was bluffing. Freedy knew what had to be done in a case like that, no matter how perfect for him this girl was, no matter how infatuated she could become with his body and his mind. In a case like that, when you said if something doesn't happen then something else is goddamn well going to, in a case like that, you had to follow through. Every infomercial said that; it was like one of their Ten Commandments.

He'd been getting ahead of himself. There, down at the end of the alley, in that orange light with the black snow swirling around, someone stepped into view. Someone fairly tall, although not as tall as Freedy, but who did look a bit like a certain type of football player, the quarterback type specifically. Freedy had always hated quarterbacks. The wonderful Thanksgiving leg-breaking hit? That had been on a quarterback.

Whoever it was came closer, and just as he reached the point in the alley where the orange light ended and the shadows took over, he glanced back for some reason. And, in glancing back, revealed his profile. The college kid. Nat. He had a backpack—those college kids all went around with backpacks, like life was a camping trip—but he had it in his hand, not on his back. The college kid: born on top of the Hill. But then Freedy remembered:
He works in a mill. His old man's not around.
That made him even angrier.

Now the college kid was entering the quiet, closed-in space. How to handle this, exactly? The first idea that came to Freedy's mind was to take him out, take the money, take off. Break him in two, just like he'd wanted to do since the first time he'd seen him. Then-goddamn it, yes—then go back and get the girl. Why not? He couldn't think of one good reason. The first idea, the best, the only. He had momentum, he had the power, he had the element of surprise. Like the wolf or the tiger, he got ready to spring.

The college kid was looking around. Looking at the back of the Glass Onion, the Dumpster. What was this? He'd noticed the footprints, was following them with his eyes, like he was tracing Freedy's movements or something. Freedy didn't like that at all. The college kid's gaze came up, directly on the pallet propped up under the overhang of the old hardware loading dock.

The college kid, Nat, spoke. “Where is she?” he said. Didn't raise his voice; sounded almost steady, in fact, like he wasn't afraid or some bullshit. “I've brought the money.”

Freedy pushed the pallet over, came out from under the overhang in a crouch, a little awkward, rose to his full height, making up for it. Yes: taller than the college kid, and much, much stronger. A fuckin' animal of another species. “Let's have it,” he said.

 

I
t was Freedy. Nat made no move to hand the backpack over. Freedy, without question. Nat recognized him from the football picture; there wasn't much light, but enough for that. Freedy looked older, of course, but the expression on his face was the same. Enough light, too, to make out the scratches over his eye and on his chin: not good signs. Nat's heart still pounded, but slower now. “First I have to see her,” he said.

Freedy was silent. They stood there—if both had held out their arms at full length, their hands would not quite have met—stood there behind the Glass Onion, the snow drifting in corkscrew patterns down through the partly sheltered space between the rooftops. A smile appeared on Freedy's face; he had big white teeth, like a movie star.

“It's not that kind of kidnapping,” he said.

“Yes, it is,” Nat said. “There's no other kind.” He was aware of a strange assurance suddenly in his tone, as if some older self had stepped inside him when he most needed it.

Freedy's smile faded. “What's that supposed to mean?” he said.

“It's a trade. I bring the money. You bring her.” Nat looked beyond Freedy, tried to shape another person from the shadows under the loading dock, could not.

“Don't blame me,” Freedy said.

A remark that Nat didn't understand, but he asked for no explanation, just waited. He felt a certain rhythm coming from Freedy, sensed that it was important to break it, and that silence, waiting, might do that. In the silence, he watched Freedy's face, saw nothing of Professor Uzig, except around the mouth. Their mouths were similar—almost identical, in fact, if you allowed for the difference in age.

“What're you staring at?” said Freedy.

“I'm waiting.”

“What for?”

“For you to say where she is.”

“I already told you—don't blame me. It was her idea.”

Her? Was Freedy talking about his mother? Was she somehow involved, was that why they were meeting here, behind the Glass Onion? Had he misunderstood everything?

Freedy was smiling again. “Not so sharp, huh, for a college kid. She, me, and the money in the same place means I'm a hostage too. Get it now?
I
got it right away.”

Nat didn't get it. He realized that Freedy was talking about Grace, not his mother, but what did that mean? If Grace was giving Freedy ideas, were they in some sort of collaboration? Was it still a fake kidnapping? Would she take it that far? No: the scratches on his face, the phrase
hostage too,
the note—she'd never have worded it, or let him word it, like that—all told him no. It was real. Therefore the fact that Grace was giving Freedy ideas probably meant she'd been trying to trick him in some way, and almost certainly meant she was still alive.

“Is she in there?” Nat said, nodding toward the Glass Onion.

“I'm getting bored with this,” Freedy said. “Hand it over.”

“And then what?” Nat said.

“Hey,” said Freedy, “I'm not a prophet.”

“That's clear,” Nat said.

Could those eyes of Freedy's be said to harden, to become even harder than they were? They did. “You better explain that,” Freedy said.

“If you could see at all into the future,” Nat said, “you wouldn't be doing this.”

“Are you, like, threatening me?” Freedy said.

“I'm stating a fact.” Freedy seemed a little closer to him, although Nat wasn't aware of any movement; if they held out their arms now, their hands would be in contact.

“Shows how much you know,” Freedy said. “By tomorrow I'll be down in Flor—I'll be in fucking clover.”

“Only if there's been an exchange,” Nat said. “You don't get the money until we get her.”

Freedy was even closer now; Nat sensed his physical strength—like a magnetic field, except repellent. “This is starting to feel like negotiating,” Freedy said. “I don't like negotiating.”

“Then you shouldn't have done this,” Nat said. “It's not too late to undo it.”

“Shake hands,” Freedy said, “and go out for beers?”

“Just walking away with no more damage will be good enough.”

“Nope,” said Freedy. “Doesn't work that way, got to take risks if you're going anywhere in this life. Got to put it on the line. Everybody knows that, except you rich boys.”

“You can drop that one,” Nat said. “I grew up with no more money than you, maybe less.”

“What the hell do you know about how I grew up?”

“And you're putting another person, an innocent person, on the line, not yourself.” Nat was getting angry now—bad strategy, bad timing, bad self-control—but there it was.

“What're you getting at?” Freedy said.

“If you think you're some sort of daring risk-taker, you're full of shit,” Nat said. “That's what I'm getting at.”

 

H
ad he heard right? Freedy couldn't believe it, couldn't believe this college kid would say something like that to him, but he had to trust his hearing; his hearing, like all his senses was very sharp, the best. No one could talk to him like that without being punished. He'd handed out punishment for a lot less. But was this the time? Not quite. Instead, he thought of something amazing to do, something cool and amazing, while everything bottled up in him had a chance to get bottled up more. He reached across the space between them, not much of a space now, reached real slow, and laid his finger on the lips of the college kid. Shushing him, like. Was it the coolest thing he'd ever done? And at the most important moment in his life? What did that say about him?