Thunderland Page 3

  Blake and the others were nowhere in sight.

  But they had to be there. Somewhere.

  He licked his dry lips, looked around again. No sign of them.

  But it was nuts to think they had given up. Blake had a reputation for being as unrelenting as a pit bull. From what Jason had heard about him, the kid even relished a good chase before he kicked someone’s ass.

  Against Jason’s will, his imagination powered up; a river of vivid images flooded into his head. He imagined Blake, Bryan, and Travis having abandoned their bikes; he saw them slithering like serpents alongside, under, and behind cars, quick and stealthy, switchblades bared and gleaming in the sunlight, muscles tense with pent-up violence, minds boiling over with bloodlust, creeping ever closer, closer, closer ...

  Two arms wrapped around his chest.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Unable to stop thinking of his terrible fight with Linda, Thomas left the restaurant and drove to Green Meadows Nursing Home.

  He rode the elevator to the fourth level of the building, drumming a pocket notebook against his leg as the first three floors beeped past. He was nervous. Under the circumstances, visiting his father might only worsen what was already one of the worst days of his life. But he had been compelled to visit. He nursed a naive yet sincere hope that an earnest, man-to-man talk with his dad would help him solve his problems.

  He arrived on the fourth floor, walked slowly to the last room on the south wing. He paused at the threshold, exhaled deeply, then stepped inside and shut the door.

  At the thunk of the closing door, his father’s eyes opened. He spoke in a slightly slurred baritone voice: “What the hell do you want, boy?”

  “I came to visit, Dad.” He settled into the chair beside his father’s bed.

  Propped up by pillows, his dad leaned against the headboard, his legs swaddled under sheets. After a major stroke ten years ago, he had been admitted to the nursing home, and the years had been tough on him. He was seventy, yet he looked ninety.

  His six-feet-four frame was emaciated to scarecrow proportions, his ashen brown skin stretched so tautly over his bones that it seemed one sudden movement might split his flesh open. His long, bony fingers resembled gigantic spider legs. His lips were gray and chapped, and he had lost his teeth years ago. He had lost most of his hair, too. Only a few brittle white strands remained.

  His dad’s nickname was Big George, but these days, the only thing big about him was his mouth. Easily the most despised resident at Green Meadows in the eyes of both the tenants and the staff, Big George had a reputation for speaking his mind, regardless of the consequences. About two years ago, his penchant for cussing out doctors, making sexual overtures to nurses, and ridiculing fellow residents had got him banished to his room for a week. After the week had passed, he had apparently decided that he enjoyed his own company more than he enjoyed the company of others, because he rarely left his room anymore. But his mouth was as big as ever.

  Big George’s black eyes penetrated Thomas. “Why ain’t you at work? You slacking off, Tommy?”

  “No, sir, my assistant’s there. He can handle the place as well as I can. I came to see you because ... I have a problem.”

  “You have a problem, all right.” Big George straightened up in his bed. “After all this time, you still ain’t learned that you can’t trust another nigger with your job.”

  “Huh? That’s not what I was—”

  “That’s what I’m talking about, boy,” Big George said. “Did I work my ass to death so you could let some fool walk in and shit on everything I earned?”

  “No, sir, of course not.”

  “Did I work eighty hours a week, every week of the year, so you could skip out and let some so-called assistant ruin my place’s reputation?”

  “No, sir, you didn’t.”

  “Damn right, I didn’t.” He pointed a gnarled finger at Thomas. “I’ll tell you what: if I hear about you slacking off again, I’ll climb out of this bed and kick your black ass all over this nursing home. That’s my business putting food on your family’s table, and don’t you ever forget it. You hear me, Tommy?”

  Thomas clenched his fingers into fists. Why had he come here when the same sorry scenario always played out? Did he expect Big George to listen to his problems, to sympathize with the anguish and guilt he felt since he’d grabbed—even shook—his wife? Did he expect Big George to tell him how to apologize to Linda? Did he expect Big George to advise him on how to save his marriage, which suddenly might be on the brink of collapse?

  He turned back to the bed.

  Big George glared at him.

  No fatherly concern sparkled in those eyes. It had never been there. Why did he continue to hope that one day his father would care about him?

  “I said, did you hear me, Tommy?” Big George said.

  “I heard you, sir. You’re right. I should know better than to trust someone to run the restaurant as well as you or I could. It won’t happen again, I promise.”

  The tension seeped out of Big George’s face. Thomas had broken his vow numerous times, but his father never seemed to remember.

  “Long as you know who’s the boss,” Big George said, nodding, “we’ll be okay. Now open that notebook and tell me what’s going on at my place.”

  Lowering his head, Thomas opened his pocket notebook, found his page for that day, and began to read.

  Two fat arms squeezed around Jason’s chest.

  “Blake, come on. I got him, I got him!”

  It was Travis Young. Jason struggled to escape the kid’s bear hug. His bike dropped from under him and smacked the ground. They lurched over the bike and tottered between the cars, Jason thrusting his elbow backward, trying to strike Travis’s gut but missing. Travis panted and snorted in Jason’s ear, his fetid breath washing over him, making Jason want to faint.

  Three rows away, Blake and Bryan emerged from behind a truck.

  Fresh adrenaline galvanized Jason. He stabbed Travis’s gut with his elbow. Travis grunted, but he held tight. They stumbled over each other’s feet and collapsed to the hot blacktop.

  Travis flopped onto Jason, as if to pin him under his bulk. Holding Travis off with his forearm, Jason freed a leg-and slammed his knee into the boy’s groin.

  “Uhh!” Agony twisting his face, Travis rolled off Jason. He curled into a ball and hugged his stomach.

  “Brooks!” Blake said, only a few feet away.

  No time to get on his bike or run. So he scrambled under the nearest thing, a red sports car.

  In spite of the shade there, the heat was unbearable. The pavement scalded his palms and his bare legs, scorched his chest through his shirt. He rose up, minimizing his contact with the baking blacktop.

  Blake’s dirty combat boots pounded to the car beneath which Jason had crawled. Bryan Green’s battered high-tops followed. Travis lay on the ground, his curled back facing Jason.

  “Get that asshole!” Blake said.

  He couldn’t stay there, he had to keep moving, that was his only chance. Silently, Jason rolled into the blinding sunlight, hesitated, then wormed beneath a low-rider pickup in the next row, sucking his teeth as his skin scraped against the hot ground.

  Blake peered below the sports car.

  Jason’s heart galloped. Could Blake see him?

  “Shit, I don’t see him,” Blake said, probing the shadows with his single eye. He pounded his fist on the pavement. “Where the hell did he go?”

  Blake’s face disappeared as he rose.

  Jason chewed his lip. He squirmed underneath a van.

  Sweat streamed into his eyes, stinging them and blurring his vision. He wiped away the perspiration with the back of his hand.

  He saw the boys’ feet pacing around the area.

  “Asshole’s gotta be here somewhere,” Blake said.

  “If Trav hadn’t lost him, we’d have nailed his ass,” Bryan said.

  “If you lose him, I’ll nail your ass.”

  “
We’ll catch him, dude. Keep looking.”

  Jason scampered into the humid, oily darkness beneath another vehicle. He lost sight of their feet, but their voices sounded as though they were several yards away.

  He considered keeping up this strategy, scuttling from car to car, always staying just out of sight, until the boys got tired and left, but he nixed that plan. Blake could probably taste impending violence, and he would not give up until he had appeased his sick hunger. Plus, they had a crucial edge: they could check beneath the vehicles about a dozen times faster than he could scramble under them. Regardless of how quickly or frequently he moved, they would soon catch him.

  Now was the time to run.

  Cautiously, he crept into the daylight.

  The aisle in which he lay was empty.

  He rose to one knee. He looked across the car’s hood.

  As though equipped with a radar, Blake spotted him instantly. He was about four rows away, fists on his waist. Bryan and Travis milled around him.

  Blake pointed. “There. Get him!”

  Jason ducked out of view. He froze, unsure where to go. Then he noticed the tall chain-link fence that abutted the back of the lot, five rows behind him. He ran for it.

  The footfalls of the pursuing boys clapped like gunfire. Jason had a big head start, but he kept imagining a hand grabbing his shoulder.

  He leaped onto the fence, climbed.

  Halfway up, someone grabbed his ankle.

  “Got you now!” It was Blake.

  Jason’s fierce reaction startled even him. He jerked up his snagged leg, then rammed it down, smashing his heel into Blake’s nose.

  Blake howled and let go.

  Jason climbed to the top of the fence, jumped, and landed in the tall weeds on the other side.

  Blake cupped his nose, bright blood leaking from between his fingers. Bryan and Travis watched their wounded leader, Travis holding his groin gingerly, wincing as he breathed.

  Jason was simultaneously thrilled and sickened by the savagery of their battle.

  Blake’s busted nose had to hurt like hell. But the crazy kid ordered his friends to keep chasing Jason. Then he joined the hunt himself.

  Jason looked around. The weedy, tree-canopied terrain slanted steeply into a narrow ravine, and past the water, dense forest thrived. After a few hundred yards, the woods parted to accommodate a bike trail that Jason had explored often that summer.

  Somewhere in there, he needed to find a hiding place. He could not outrun them forever.

  He sprinted as fast as he dared down the slope. Hawthorns scratched his arms and legs, and sinewy vines threatened to trip him. Broken beer bottles bristled like fangs from the grass, snapping at his shoes as he flashed past.

  Panting, he glanced behind him. The boys tore down the incline at kamikaze speed.

  He vaulted the ravine and plunged into the woods.

  Thomas slowly read his business update on The House of Soul. He had carefully arranged his notes to elicit the maximum satisfaction from his father. Beginning the practice soon after Big George’s stroke, he had developed it into a highly refined skill. When he finally and dramatically told Big George that the net profit for last month was the largest in the restaurant’s history, Big George grinned. Thomas grinned, too, but something inside him was repulsed by his expression.

  “You doing good, but don’t get bigheaded,” Big George said. “Pride goes before that hard-assed fall.”

  “I have everything under control, Dad.”

  “You better.” Big George cocked his head quizzically. “So. How’s married life treating you?”

  Big George rarely asked about his marriage. “Uh, well ...”

  “Is Linda still so cute niggers get weak when she walks by?”

  “What?”

  Big George’s face grew dreamy. “When I was younger, I used to have women like her. So fine they make a nigger want to drop to his knees and worship! Those kinds of women can pussy-whip a man, but you can’t let any woman stop you from being true to your nature. You’re like me in a lot of ways, Tommy, so I know you got a girl or two on the side. Ain’t you?”

  Thomas erupted to his feet. “Don’t you ever accuse me of that. I love Linda too much to sleep around.”

  Big George laughed, a hard bark. “One way we’re different: You don’t lie as well as I do. Better pray Linda don’t pop that subject. She’d see through your shallow ass in a minute.”

  “But I don’t cheat on her.”

  “Liar.”

  “I’m not like you.”

  Big George chuckled.

  “I don’t treat her the way you treated Mama. Or any of those other women you were with.”

  Big George wrinkled his nose. “Do you smell bullshit, Tommy? I do.”

  “The only bullshit I smell is coming from you.”

  Big George smiled.

  Thomas wanted to knock out every one of those false teeth, smash them down his old man’s throat, and make him choke on them. Then he rebuked himself for sinking to his father’s level.

  “Like father, like son,” Big George said. “You might deny it, but that doesn’t change what’s in your blood. Like father, like son.”

  “I’m out.” Thomas stormed to the door. His hand trembled as he reached for the doorknob.

  “Hey, you get your ass back to my restaurant!” Big George said, pointing his long finger at Thomas. “I hear about you messing up, and I’ll come down there and mop the floor with you. Hear me?”

  “Sure, Dad. Good-bye.”

  Once inside his Buick, Thomas slammed the door hard enough to rock the car.

  Like father, like son.

  Lord, he hated that man. His father had an uncanny ability to find an exposed emotional nerve and twist it, and he did so with a sickening, perverse enjoyment. Hating his father was terrible, especially considering his pitiable health, but Thomas couldn’t help it. Why did he keep visiting him?

  He didn’t know. There were a lot of things he didn’t understand about his relationship with Big George.

  Striving to blot all thoughts of his dad out of his mind, he removed his cellular telephone from the glove compartment. He pressed the On button.

  He thought of calling Linda. They desperately needed to talk about what had happened in his office. But he wasn’t sure what to say, and she probably needed to cool off before she’d be ready for a conversation. He would speak to her later.

  Meanwhile, he would call someone else.

  He punched in a number. A female voice answered on the second ring.

  “It’s Thomas.”

  “I was thinking about you,” she said. “What’s up?”

  “Nothing much. Working hard. You know how it is.”

  “I heard that. Got to make that money, honey.”

  “Please. I need a vacation.”

  She laughed.

  They talked about inconsequential matters.

  “I’ll see you tonight?” Thomas said. “Around ten?”

  “Just like always, baby.”

  He clicked off the phone.

  He started the car. He looked up and found his father’s fourth-floor window. He realized there was only one person he hated more than his father.

  Like father, like son.

  Himself.

  Running through the woods, Jason soon realized that he was lost. The lush undergrowth, which loomed as high as walls in some places, as thick as canvas in others, prevented him from seeing more than a few feet ahead. Worse, all of the foliage looked identical, which made it difficult to distinguish his whereabouts from moment to moment.

  Deciding to keep moving forward, he bent down, hoping to conceal himself. He slipped under leaves, brushed away wildflowers and prickly shrubs. He kept his mouth closed, breathing through his nose, not only because it promoted silence, but also because a haze of insects buzzed around his head.

  He heard branches break far behind him. Alarmed crows fled their tree perches.

  Blake and his fri
ends must be nearby.

  He found a potential hideout: a dense ring of shrubs crowded together so that they appeared to be a single large, thorny bush. Red berrylike fruit dangled amid the green needles.

  He searched for a gap in the limbs. He located one barely wide enough to wriggle through.

  He looked behind him.

  He was still alone.

  He crept inside the copse. He squeezed into a ball.

  He waited, listening.

  He heard only the natural sounds of the forest.

  Then, the swish of legs marching through weeds.

  “Forget it, man. There’s too much shit in here to find him.”

  “I want to go home, Blake. It hurts, it still hurts.”

  “Shut up, dick-heads. We ain’t leaving until I get that bastard.”

  Jason’s clammy hands burned to form fists. Someone needed to give that punk a butt-kicking he’d never forget. But he didn’t move. He was pissed, but not stupid enough to fight three guys.

  The footsteps came closer. Stopped.

  He shut his eyes.

  “Man, I can feel that asshole around here,” Blake said. “Can’t you?”

  Another footstep. Closer.

  Leave. Turn around and leave.

  Silence.

  He imagined Blake examining the shrubs in which he hid.

  “I swear, I can feel him,” Blake said.

  Another footstep.

  Blake had to be right outside the bushes.

  “That dude could run, man,” Bryan said. “He might be out of this jungle already. Or maybe he’s cutting around us, going back to his bike. Or—”

  “Shut up,” Blake said. “I’m trying to listen.”

  Silence.

  Jason held his breath.

  More silence.

  His lungs felt as if they were going to explode.

  Blake sighed. “Yeah, you’re probably right. He ain’t here. Let’s go back to the lot. If we beat him to his bike, there’re a few things 1want to do to it.”

  “Like what?” Travis said.

  “Like shove it down your fat-assed mouth,” Blake said. He and Bryan laughed.

  The boys’ voices gradually faded.

  Gratefully Jason exhaled. When he was positive the kids were gone, he crawled out of the bushes.