We filled up most of the trunk with our supplies from the grocery store. Then we headed down the highway to a camping supply store. We brought two sleeping bags, two flashlights, a first-aid kit, and a tent.
The shopping took up the rest of the morning and started to eat into our afternoon. Still, I wanted to show you around before we left so that you could see the world I knew when I was still innocent. I wanted you to see the best of me. I parked the car at the end of a small cul-de-sac. We cut through the backyard of an old house and hiked through the woods for a bit. I checked to make sure that you were doing okay, but it quickly became clear that my leg was holding us back more than your condition. You were full of energy. We crossed a small stream and gradually started making our way uphill. Nothing had changed. It was like the forest had been frozen in time. I had changed. My world had changed. The forest hadn’t. As we headed deeper into the woods, the trees grew taller and farther apart. The woods opened up, only the random beam of sunlight finding its way through the forest canopy. “It’s beautiful,” you said as we hiked up the ever steepening slope.
“You haven’t seen anything yet,” I replied. My leg throbbed with each step but it was worth the pain. After covering in thirty minutes what used to take me fifteen, we reached the base of the rock. From its base, the rock shot straight up, nearly a hundred and fifty feet. You craned your neck and looked straight up to the top as it jutted just above the top of the tree line.
“Wow,” you said when we reached the rock, holding the word in your mouth. You walked up and touched the rock, feeling its texture. “This is amazing. How high is it?”
“Almost a hundred and fifty feet,” I replied. “We used to climb it growing up.”
“Really?” you asked, surprised you didn’t know this about me already.
“Yeah.” I remembered the first time I climbed it like it was yesterday. Jared had read all the books and had done all the prep work, so he volunteered to man the rope during the first climb. It fell to me and Michael to see who got to climb up first. I offered to shoot for it. Michael wouldn’t have it. “It’s your rock, Joe. You brought us here. You go first.” The first climb took over two hours. I made my way up slowly, dangling a hundred feet from the ground, holding on to tiny rock ledges. Jared and Michael yelled out the whole time, encouraging me upward. We were still more than a year away from our eighteenth birthdays. The world was still simple.
“So how do we get to the top?” you said. There was mischief in your eyes that I hadn’t seen since the first weekend we met.
“There’s a path around the side. It’s pretty steep. Do you think you’re up for it?”
“You think you can hold me back, Gimpy?”
We hiked on. My leg burned. A few times you had to turn around and reach your hand out to help me. I tried not to pull too hard on your hand, worried what it might do. Eventually, we made it to the top together. From the top, it felt like we could see half of New Jersey spread out beneath us. We walked up to the edge and sat down, dangling our legs over the hundred-and-fifty-foot drop, the tops of the trees barely reaching our feet. You leaned against me and rested your head on my shoulder.
“How long have you been coming up here?”
“Since I was seven. I’d come up here whenever I wanted to get away. After my father died, I came up here all the time. I’d ride my bike over from our new house. When me and Michael and Jared found out about the War, all of us came here. When we came here, it was just us. No War. No death.”
“Sounds nice.”
“It was.”
We spent another twenty minutes just gazing out over the world, watching the little matchbox cars move along the street, watching the miniature people move about their yards. We sat up there, your head resting on my shoulder, looking at the world we weren’t a part of anymore. As the afternoon wore on, it started to get cold and we decided that we had to head back.
We pulled up to the house in the early evening. When we walked inside, I went up and gave my mother a hug. She hugged me back, but her heart wasn’t in it. Something was wrong. I ignored it. I didn’t want to get into it with her. We walked into the living room. You sat down on the couch and I turned on the TV. I excused myself so that I could go to the upstairs bathroom and check on the hole in my leg. I went into the bathroom and pulled off my jeans. I stared at my leg in the full-length mirror in the wall. There was no blood and no pus. It seemed to be healing well.
I was in the bathroom for maybe five minutes when there was a knock at the door. “Who is it?” I asked.
“It’s your mother, Joseph. We need to talk.”
“Hold on a minute. Let me get my pants on.” I pulled my jeans back on and opened the door. My mother was standing there, not more than three inches from the door. Her eyes were full of tears and her upper lip was trembling. Everything was crashing down. Time froze.
“She’s seventeen, Joseph,” my mother said through trembling lips. The last time I saw her cry like that was when Jessica was killed.
“How do you know?” I responded, trying to stay calm.
“Her passport,” my mother responded coldly.
“You looked through her things?”
“I had to, Joseph. I knew something wasn’t right. I was just trying to look out for you. She’s seventeen years old, Joseph. You know what that means!”
“Keep your voice down, Mother. She’s downstairs.”
“She’s asleep. She’s asleep on our couch, Joseph. She’s seventeen, she’s pregnant, and she’s asleep on our couch!”
“I didn’t know until it was too late, Mom,” I said to her.
“You knew?” My mother’s face turned ugly. I’d never seen her that way before. “She’s a child, Joseph. You slept with that poor child and now you’re going to ruin both your lives.”
“She’s no more a child than I am.”
“Then you’re both children—spoiled children who are throwing away your lives!”
“Listen, Mother, I didn’t know,” I repeated.
“She can’t have that baby.” The words came out cold and bitter.
“She’s going to have it.”
“You’re going to let her have it?” She gasped.
“We’re going to have it together. It’s what we both want.” I meant it when I said it.
“And what do you plan on doing? You know the rules!”
I got quiet. I wanted her to calm down. I hoped that if I stayed calm she would calm down. “We’re going to run, Mother. That’s why we came here. I wanted to introduce you to the mother of your grandchild and then I wanted to say good-bye.” I wanted to cry but I promised myself that, if my mother didn’t cry, I wouldn’t either.
“Are you sure you know what you’re doing, Joseph? If you run . . .” She couldn’t finish the sentence. Her lips continued to tremble. “If you run, you’ll be giving up everything. You’ll be giving up on everything that your father fought for, everything that your grandfather fought for! You’ll be giving up your future. You’ll be giving up on everything that you’ve been fighting for!” Her voice got louder as she spoke.
“And what are we fighting for exactly, Mom?” I asked. “You tell me.”
She just stood there aghast. I looked into her eyes and didn’t recognize her.
“I’m sorry, Mother, but we’ve made our decision.” I stepped past her, into the hallway.
“I don’t think you’ve thought this through, young man,” my mother called out to my back as I walked away from her. I turned toward her and gave her a look that was meant to tell her that I had thought it through and that she couldn’t stop me. “Your father would be very disappointed in you,” she said to me as I stood there staring at her. It was like she had just slapped me the face.
I stayed calm. My voice was soft. “It was nice seeing you, Mom. Maria and I will spend one more night. I’ll let you sleep on all of this. If your opinions on the matter haven’t changed by tomorrow, we’ll leave in the morning.” Then I walked down the s
tairs. I wanted to be near you. I had a sudden urge to protect you.
When you woke up, I suggested that we go out for dinner. You thought it was strange but said okay. During dinner, I ate slowly. You ate a lot. As I’d hoped, my mother was already locked away in her bedroom by the time we got home. The lights in her bedroom were off. I knew she wasn’t asleep.
When we got upstairs, we kissed good night and you headed toward my sister’s old room to sleep. “Maria? Can you do me a favor?” I asked as you walked away from me.
“Sure, Joe. What do you want?” you asked, a little confused.
“Lock your door tonight.”
“Why?” you asked, confused.
“Just in case,” I replied. “Do you mind sleeping with the door locked tonight?”
“You’re scaring me, Joe. Is something wrong?”
“Maria, please. Just lock the door. I’m sure everything will be fine by morning.”
“Okay,” you said, afraid to ask any more questions.
I went to my room and lay down in bed. For the longest time, I simply lay there. Thoughts ran through my head but none of them were coherent. I just kept hearing voices. And what do you plan on doing? You know the rules, young man! Either they’re evil or we are. But what are you fighting for? I’m pregnant, Joe. Who the fuck do you think you are? You think you’re somebody? You’re nobody. They knew. She can’t have that baby. Good guys and bad guys. Cops and robbers. Cowboys and Indians. They’re all children’s games, Joe. I came here to kill you. They killed my daughter, Joe. They killed my wife and my daughter. Your father would be very disappointed in you. I haven’t been training to fight, Joe. I’ve been training to die. She’s seventeen, Joseph. I’m seventeen. Then, interrupting the voices, I heard someone crying. At first I thought it was just another sound trapped inside my head. Just another voice, only one that wasn’t even able to make out words. But as the crying persisted, I began to slip back into consciousness. Someone was actually crying. Not in my head, in real life.
I leapt out of bed, rushing toward the door. My immediate thoughts were that my mother had gotten to you, that she had done something to you. I couldn’t imagine what she would have done to you. I thought that maybe she woke you up. Maybe she woke you up to lecture you about how you were ruining my life. I regretted not telling you everything. I should have told you what my mother knew and how she reacted.
When I got outside my door, I saw that your door was still closed. The lights in your room were still off. The sounds of sobbing were coming from downstairs. I could tell by the sound that it was my mother. I hoped beyond hope that she had accepted my decision—that she was crying because she knew that she would never see me again.
All the lights in the living room were on. I walked down the stairs. My mother was sitting on the couch sobbing, the cordless phone in her lap.
“What’s the matter, Mom?” I asked. I would have assumed the worst if I could have imagined what the worst was.
My mother simply shook her head in response. She couldn’t get enough breath between sobs to speak.
“What happened, Mother?”
Finally, the sobbing slowed down and she was able to speak. “I’m sorry, Joseph,” was all she could get out before she broke into another series of deep sobs.
“Sorry for what, Ma?” My eyes moved from my mother’s crying face to the phone in her hand. “What did you do?”
She stopped crying. It was as if she was suddenly possessed by an entirely different person.
“I did what I had to do, Joseph,” she said, trying to keep her voice as strong as possible.
“What did you do, Ma?” I asked again, pleading this time.
“I told them, Joseph.” She held the phone up in her fist. “I did what you should have done already. I did what you were too weak to do. I told them. I did what I had to.”
“You realize what that means, Mom!” I screamed at her. She simply turned her head and looked away. “They’re going to come after me! They are going to come after me and Maria and our child!”
“I did what I had to, Joseph,” she said again, unwilling to turn to look at me.
“You did what you had to? That child is your grandchild!”
“Don’t you say those words!” she shouted back, lifting a finger toward me but still unwilling to make eye contact.
“That child is your grandchild!” I repeated, louder so that the words would ring in her ears long after we had gone. “Your grandchild!”
Finally, she turned toward me, her eyes large and red. “That child is no such thing. It is not my grandchild. THAT CHILD IS ONE OF THEM!” I looked into my mother’s eyes. The woman I knew was gone.
I had wasted enough time already. I turned and ran back upstairs and began banging on your door with my fist. “Maria! Maria! Wake up! Get your things together! We have to leave! We have to leave now!” It was the second fire drill I’d put you through in three days. It wouldn’t be the last. You opened up the door. “Get your things together. We have to leave now,” I said to you, lowering my voice. You simply nodded in response. You were ready to run. You were already growing accustomed to it. You started to pack. I ran into my bedroom and threw everything I owned back into my bag—everything but the gun. The gun I took out of the bag and tucked into the back of my pants.
When we got to the bottom of the stairs, my mother was still sitting on the couch, the phone still clutched in her hands. The tendons on her hands bulged out as if she would die if she let go of the phone. She looked up when we got to the bottom of the stairs. I looked into my mother’s eyes one last time. She was my mother again. Whatever creature had possessed her was gone. Too bad it was too late. People were coming for us. We had to go.
We headed for the door. You were about to turn to say something to my mother but I gave you a slight push on your shoulder to keep you moving toward the door. You took the hint and continued on. You never asked what had happened. I assumed that you had figured it out. As I was about to walk out the door, my mother finally stood up from the couch, tears flowing freely from her face.
“I love you, Mom. I always will,” I said before stepping out the kitchen door. She nodded in response. We threw our bags in the backseat of the car and leapt into the front. I turned the ignition and we skidded out of the driveway. As we left, I took one look back at the old house. My mother was standing at the window, crying, her one hand lifted above her shoulder. She was waving good-bye.
Thirteen
We made it out of town without incident. I took as many side roads as possible, changing direction frequently and watching every car we passed. I kept one eye on the road and one on the rearview mirror to make sure we weren’t being followed. Every time I saw the brake lights of a car that had just driven by us, I flinched, thinking it could be turning around. I had no idea how much information my mother had given them. I didn’t know what was compromised. I had to assume that they knew your name now. I had to assume they knew what car we were driving. I figured that we had, at most, an hour to put some distance between us and my old hometown. After that, I had no plan. Considering the situation, it wasn’t worth thinking more than an hour ahead.
You sat in silence for some time, watching me, watching me check the mirrors, watching me think. You didn’t interrupt until I began to calm down. “What happened?” you finally asked. After being pulled out of bed in a strange house, in the middle of the night, and told to pack up your things before being dragged into a car and driven to God knows where, you still waited over an hour to question me. You were getting good at the game. Knowing when to ask questions and knowing when to simply move was the first key to survival. Shortly before you asked your question we turned onto open highway. It was closing in on two in the morning. The road was mostly empty. It looked like we’d gotten away, for now.
“They’re onto us,” I replied. I looked out over the road in front of us. I didn’t tell you anything you didn’t already know.
“What does that mean?” you
asked after thinking for a few moments.
“It means they know. They know about you. They know about our kid. They know we’re on the run.”
“No, Joe. What does that mean?” you repeated. “For us?” I looked over at you. You didn’t look scared, just nervous. I put my hand on your leg and rubbed it gently.
“It doesn’t really change much. We were going to have to hide eventually. Now we just have to do it sooner.” You nodded. You looked strong. You looked much stronger than I felt. But here we were, on the open highway, no one telling us where to go; no more people lining up to die. We were on our own for as long as we didn’t get ourselves killed. “This is Route Eighty,” I told you as we drove, looking out across the highway. “It starts in New Jersey, right off the George Washington Bridge, which goes into New York,” I continued.
“I know about the George Washington Bridge. I’m Canadian, not retarded,” you replied.
“Okay. Point noted. Anyway, this road goes all the way from the George Washington Bridge to the Golden Gate Bridge. New York to San Francisco, straight across the country. And tonight it’s ours.” You placed your hand on top of the hand that I had yet to remove from your leg.
“So where are we going?”
“I was thinking Chicago.” If we drove straight through we could get to Chicago in about twelve hours. We could have been there by tomorrow afternoon. I didn’t think we should hit a city, any city, that quickly, though. My mother’s call would set the alarm bells off. For the first day after the alarm bells went off, things would be awfully thick. People would really be on the lookout for us. As time wore on, other things would come up and we’d be pushed to the back-burner, at least by those that didn’t have a personal interest in catching us.
“Why Chicago?”
“I don’t know.” I shrugged. “I’ve never been to Chicago.” That was true, but it was only half the reason why I chose Chicago. The real reason was because I had never done a job in Chicago.