His dad was already grinning. “Ready for work?”
“Can I at least put my bike away first?”
“Against the wall by the bathroom.”
“I know. I’ve done it a million times.”
“You’re going to have a fun afternoon!”
He did not have a fun afternoon. There were no customers, and after about an hour, he ran out of things to do, so he spent the rest of the day browsing shelves he knew by heart while his dad and Gary chatted by the front counter.
Even school was preferable to this. He didn’t understand how his dad could spend all day every day cooped up in here, and Nick vowed that as soon as he graduated he would put Montgomery in his rearview mirror and move somewhere cool. Los Angeles, New York or, heck, even Austin.
Of course, he would need to get a rearview mirror first.
He definitely needed that car. And then he’d need to win a scholarship to a decent college in a decent city, because unless they hit the lottery, the only thing his parents could afford to send him to was Montgomery JC. The problem was, he wouldn’t be able to get a scholarship without teacher recommendations. Which were going to be pretty tough to come by unless his situation at school started changing pretty quickly.
Life was getting complicated.
“You okay back there?” his dad called.
“Fine!” he called back.
He put the horror movie book he’d been perusing back on the shelf. Hearing an unexpected noise behind him, he turned, startled. There came a quiet knocking from the other side of the wall.
It was mid-afternoon, and his dad and Gary were ten feet away, but the sound still gave him goosebumps. He thought of that vague dark figure moving behind the window next door and imagined it positioned on the other side of the wall, tapping with a claw-like finger in an effort to get his attention.
“Hey, Dad!” he called. “Come here!”
He’d hailed his father out of panic, but it occurred to him even before his dad came over that since there was going to be a new bank on the other side of the wall, they were probably just starting construction.
Still, he found the noise unsettling, and when his dad heard it and wondered what was going on, the two of them and Gary walked outside and peered through the dirty windows of the nascent bank.
The space was empty, no one there.
“Rats?” Gary suggested.
“Too regular for rats,” his dad said. “It sounded like someone tapping on the wall, maybe looking for a stud or a beam.”
Nick popped back into the bookstore. The noise was still audible. He hurried outside to tell Gary and his father.
“It has to be something in the walls,” his dad acknowledged.
“Better hope it’s not termites,” Gary said as they walked back into the shop.
It wasn’t termites, Nick knew. He didn’t know what it was, but his dad was right. It sounded like builders. The fact that they could all hear the tapping while none of them could see anything did not sit well with him, and rather than stay by himself in one of the aisles, Nick hung out with his dad and Gary by the register.
Victor stopped by after school let out. His friend already had a car—a Jeep his dad had picked up for two hundred bucks at the county sheriff’s auction last year. The transmission could not be put into reverse—which made for some awkward and complicated parking arrangements—but other than that, the vehicle ran fine, and when Victor asked if Nick could cruise with him over to Sonic and hang out, his dad let him go.
“Punishment’s over,” he said. “Have fun.”
They didn’t actually go to Sonic. They went over to the high school, where Victor pulled around to the parking lot next to the field so they could watch the cheerleaders practice. He had a crush on Stacey Wilder, who wouldn’t give him the time of day at school but who had said hi to him during the summer when he’d seen her at the movie theater. He seemed to be laboring under the delusion that if he put himself in close proximity to her, she would somehow succumb to his charms.
Victor got out of the car and Nick followed suit, both of them leaning against the side of the Jeep, facing the field.
“Rumor has it,” Victor said, “that your mom’s getting boned by the gardener.”
Nick felt the heat rush to his face. “Who said that? We don’t even have a gardener.” But an image flashed in his mind of his mom’s car parked in front of the nursery.
Victor shrugged.
“You can’t just tell me something like that and then pussy out when I ask who said it. Who said it?”
“Mrs. Nelson.”
“Asshole.”
“I don’t know, dude. It’s a rumor going around. Who gives a shit? Just enjoy the view.”
They were silent for a moment, watching the cheerleaders perform a routine.
“You really think this is going to impress Stacey? Stalking her?”
“I’m not stalking her.”
“We’re spying on her cheerleader practice. It’s creepy. Chicks don’t like that.”
“Is there an ounce of testosterone in your body? You have no idea what chicks like.”
They’d been ranking on each other, half-joking, the way they usually did, but a touch of anger had entered Victor’s voice, and the look on his face was serious.
Nick backed off, backed down.
Montgomery?
He wouldn’t mind putting his friends in the rearview mirror.
Silently, he turned his attention to the cheerleaders.
4
V.J. killed the dog out in the open, and it felt glorious. Rather than dispatching it in the garage or storage shed, the way he usually did, he took the animal to the park and slaughtered it on the tennis court. There were little kids and their parents in the playground, and a few joggers on the paths, but the basketball and tennis courts were all empty, so he had this section of the park to himself.
There was something exciting about doing it where he could possibly get caught, and even as he entered the park with the stolen pet, leading it on a leash, there was a bounce in his step. The terrier barked at another dog—a setter being walked by a hot woman in tight exercise pants—and he and the woman nodded at each other and smiled, sharing the camaraderie of fellow dog walkers.
He passed a homeless old fuck digging through a garbage can by the side of the path and muttering to himself. V.J. ignored the shambling man and strode up to the tennis court, opening the chain-link gate and shepherding in the terrier. From the other side of the park, he heard the familiar sounds of children playing, and, from the street, the noise of passing cars. Tying the dog’s leash to one of the low poles that held up what was left of the net bisecting the center of the court, V.J. withdrew the sacrificial knife from the sheath attached to his belt. Before the animal could sense anything amiss, he knelt down, petted the dog’s head with his left hand and with his right hand shoved the knife deep into the terrier’s heart. There was a gush of blood, a single bark and then the dog was still.