Joe Read online

  Mr. Jackson began sifting through papers atop his desk. Eric rubbed his palms against his jeans.

  “Well, I’ve got the results of your last test,” Mr. Jackson said. He looked up at Eric and was silent for a moment. Always testing. When he didn’t continue, Eric smiled and nodded in response. Finally, Jackson said, “They came back clean.”

  This time Eric’s smile was less forced. “Knew they would, sir.”

  Jackson didn’t reply. He stared down at what Eric assumed was his most recent drug test results, scrutinizing them as if there had to be some mistake. Eric’s jaw clenched, and he directed his focus elsewhere, but the small office didn’t offer much for distraction. In fact, Eric hated the room itself as much as he hated the man who worked in it. The sparse posters on the off-white walls proclaiming things like, Friends don’t let friends drive drunk and Three strikes, you’re out! rubbed Eric the wrong way. The florescent lights, one of which flickered occasionally, gave him a headache, and the fat, sweaty aroma permeating the room that belonged to Mr. Jackson made his stomach hurt. Plus, there was so much riding on this. Eric couldn’t help but sweat.

  “You been getting your community service hours in?” Jackson pressed.

  “Yes, sir,” Eric said. “Thirty hours a week, every week.”

  Jackson shuffled some more papers. The previous question had been pointless. Eric had turned in all of his hours and Jackson knew it. Play the game, Eric. Just play his game.

  Finally, the P.O. looked up. “Well, then I’ll make the arrangements for Monday, as I can’t find any reason not to.”

  All of the anxiety seemed to melt out of Eric, and real happiness filled up his chest. He had waited so long for this and worked so hard. For the past six-and-a-half years he’d been paying for one mistake and now things were finally looking up. There had been times when Eric had been so depressed he felt like running from all of this. The time he had spent behind bars had been the worst three years of his life. He had been terrified, lonely and half-mad the whole time. It wasn’t a place where he belonged, and he had vowed to never end up back there.

  But if he was being honest, he hadn’t made just one mistake. He had made a lifetime of them. He’d just finally been caught for one of them. Looking back now, that part of his life, the pre-prison part, seemed to be a haze. The memories of it all had dream-like qualities to them, and yet he could still remember the details so precisely. Especially the night of the accident. The night he got put behind bars and was held there for the next three years. He remembered that night perfectly.

  Things were different now, though. Eric was a new man. He was older, wiser and determined. He had made decisions very young that he would be paying for until he was very old, and no more bad choices were needed. The time he’d lost when he had been locked up could never be gotten back, and people other than him had suffered for it.

  He was so humbled that he’d even considered the possibility that prison was exactly what he needed to get him to turn his life around. Maybe the only thing that could’ve gotten him to do so. His path had been all self-destruction. Now, not only had he been drug-free for six-and-a-half years, he had a job, a nearly-completed college education, and strong morals. But the race wasn’t over yet. That one night, the night of the accident, hadn’t been paid for in full. For that one night he’d paid three years in prison and three on parole, and he still had two years left to go.

  Things were finally looking up, though.

  “Thank you,” Eric told the P.O. “Thank you so much.”

  Jackson waved a hand. “See you next week,” he said.

  Eric left the office elated, got in his car and cranked up the radio. The tune playing was so appropriate, that he couldn’t help belting the words out along with Jimmy Buffet as he sang about the coming Monday.

  The words couldn’t ring truer, because come Monday, after his two morning classes at UMMS, Eric would get to see his daughter for the first time in five and half years, for the first time ever.

  Come Monday, it really would be all right. As far as he knew it.

  Chapter Ten

  Joe

  In case it’s not obvious, I’ll admit I was scared, but keep in mind that I’ve never claimed to be fearless, and I’ve never claimed to be brave. The trouble with this was that I did feel obligated. Though I surely had a choice in the matter, I would have to participate in what I considered foolish behavior. I would have to seek out the gunman, rather than running the opposite direction. Foolish.

  But even fools have to make plans.

  I checked the clock on the wall above the mirror. I had to be at work in two hours. That gave me enough time to brainstorm, but not much else.

  I didn’t end up making too many plans. I sat straight-backed on my bed for ninety of the one hundred-and-twenty minutes before my shift at the bar. My legs felt numb, and looking down at them revealed that they were shaking.

  I had found myself smack in the middle of a thick pickle, and biting through it was proving daunting. The logical thing to do would be to skip school for the next week. Stay out of harm’s way. Maybe call in a bomb threat on Monday and Tuesday, have the school evacuated. Yeah, there was a plan. A real pickle-puncher.

  I stood, crossed to the bathroom, and nodded once. Leaving the light switch down (there was a small window in my bathroom, heavily dressed, but letting in enough light to see by during the day) and spit into the toilet. My mouth had gone dry.

  I knew a bomb threat was only a plan that would delay the inevitable. I brushed my teeth, washed my face. No solution. I had no solution.

  I will tell you what was most terrifying at this moment as I stood corpse-stiff and silent in my tiny, dim bathroom. You may be surprised to know that it was not the obvious fact that people might die, or that I might die. No Sir-ee. It was the change.

  It is so that we are built over time, but this does not mean that change is slow. Sometimes it is, but that’s usually the good stuff. The bad stuff is something as swift as air.

  Here, I am also comforted by numbers. I think the bad stuff finds all of us before the man in the dark cloak does. Some of the bad stuff is training-wheeled. Like the first time you get physically hurt for doing something stupid. The change here is pennies. Chances are you learned that you never again would climb a tree at the top of the Grand Canyon just to get a better view of the hole. Hell, you might never again climb any tree. But if you do, you’re careful, cautious, and your heart races faster than it had on your last innocent venture up the bark. You’re training wheels have served their purpose, and thus been removed, but the six-inch-long scar on your left thigh reminds you to move with caution. You are slightly different. There is change here. Pennies.

  Other change is paper, a few bucks or so, but still training-wheeled, like the loss of your first love. You learn a lesson there, too, and it changes you, and usually for the better. But, this kind of change, the kind I was currently facing, held an indefinite value. No matter what, come Monday, I would be different. Whatever happened would change me forever. And, yes, that was scary, because who knew if it would be for the better or for the worse.

  On my way out of my apartment I found a letter tucked under my door. It was from Mr. Landry. He wanted to know if I would be available Sunday morning to help him unload a new shipment at his tobacco store. I tucked the note into my pocket and got in my car. I had never refused Mr. Landry’s requests before and I didn’t want to start now, but I only had so much time to find a solution to my current problem before the crap hit the fan. Not only that, but there was a strong possibility that Sunday would be my last day on this Earth.

  I started the car and headed to work, knowing I would be there Sunday morning to help Mr. Landry at his shop, end of my days or not. I couldn’t think of a better way to spend it, anyway, or anyone better to spend it with. As I’ve said, helping Mr. Landry has helped me in personally atoning myself, and I have a lot to atone for. The least I could do was not fail the old man, because there was also a v
ery strong possibility I would fail horribly on Monday, as I have in the past. I am certainly no hero.

  Chapter Eleven

  Sixteen years ago, Sunnyland Daycare

  The man whose face she’d drawn four days ago had been haunting her. The image of the stranger’s sharp black eyes—more so, the look behind them—had nailed itself to the forefront of her mind. Joe had forced herself to look at her sketch many times over the last four days, even though it quite literally scared her stiff. This was all still so new, and she was so young.

  After that first day, on the ride home with her mother, Joe had sat in her child seat and contemplated whether or not she would show her drawing to her parents. Although she was only five years old at the time, it still only took Joe a moment to know that it wasn’t an option. Her parents already thought her strange.

  Nancy Knowe was not a terrible parent, but she certainly wasn’t a good one. Or maybe she just wasn’t a good one for Joe. With light blue eyes and matching blond hair, both Nancy Knowe and her husband, Jim, had personal issues with their one-and-only child, Joe. The girl had been born with raven-black hair, silver-blue eyes, and snow-white skin. Needless to say, she didn’t quite fit the description of their ideal offspring.

  They had a DNA test performed at the hospital after she was born. Jim had insisted on it immediately, his face going bright red with anger. But, when the results came in, and it was undeniably certain the raven-haired babe belonged to them, there could be no denying it.

  It was not that the child was ugly. In fact, she had an odd allure about her. It was that Mr. and Mrs. Knowe had standards. They were as vain as two people can become, and not incredibly bright, either. Also, Joe really was a strange child.

  If Joe showed her parents her sketch of the stranger, they would both adopt that look she hated so much. Then they would insist on therapy or something similar. Joe knew all about therapy. She thought it was nonsense.

  “She’s just not…right,” her mother would tell the doctors, lowering her voice to a whisper. “I think she must have some sort of, you know…mental affliction.”

  Joe’s parents had her tested for autism, ADHD and every other thing under the sun. She tested brilliantly on every single one of them. The doctors told them that it was just a speech impediment, and that she would more than likely grow out of it. Joe even remembered one of the doctors telling them she was “gifted” for her age. These were not the results Mr. and Mrs. Knowe had been looking for. Something had to be wrong with her, because she just wasn’t…right.

  So little Joe kept the drawing of the stranger tucked away in her backpack, and didn’t remove it until she knew her parents were asleep for the night. Then, she grabbed her Winnie the Pooh flashlight, crawled under the covers of her bed, and unfolded the picture.

  Her little jaw snapped together with a click and the hair on her small arms stood up. The stranger’s face was so hard to look at. It made her shake.

  But it was important somehow. Joe knew that it was. She could feel it in her stomach. Looking at the drawing gave her the same feeling as when she “saw” things; the things that hadn’t happened yet. Only, the drawing was somehow worse. She was compelled to figure it out, but at just five years old, she didn’t have the tools to do so.

  For four nights she stared at the drawing, getting no closer to unmasking the mystery it promised. On July fifth, a Monday, all of her questions were answered. Joe was sitting at the same table, in the same blue plastic child’s chair when it happened. She would never forget a moment of it.

  Her stomach dropped to the floor at the same time as the chime went off in the play room. Joe knew the chime indicated someone entering the front lobby of the daycare, and the stranger’s face flashed through her head as a chill walked up her spine. Whatever her drawing had been predicting was happening now. Even at five years old, Joe just knew it. In reality, she wasn’t so much strange as…gifted.

  One of the caretakers, Miss Teresa, disappeared through the door that led to the lobby. Joe sat in her blue chair and watched the door intently. Something was about to happen. Something big, and something bad. She was too young to know just how very, very bad.

  When the door to the lobby swung open again, Joe was instantly frozen with terror. No air passed through her lips. The blood seemed to stop pumping through her veins. Nothing moved but her silver-blue eyes, as they followed the man who walked through the lobby door and into the daycare’s main play room. The stranger was here.

  “Emily,” Miss Teresa said. “Your uncle is here to pick you up, sweetheart.”

  Joe’s little heart lodged itself in her throat. She watched as the stranger squatted down and held his arms out for the little blond girl. She couldn’t take her eyes off his sharp, black ones. When the stranger turned his gaze to Joe, as though he could feel the child watching him, still she stared. She was an interesting one, the man thought, with her silver-blue eyes and raven hair. But he’d picked out his prize. Also, Joe was too smart to go along with his plan. You just wouldn’t know it.

  The little curly-haired blond girl looked up at the man, and no recognition played across her pretty face. Joe finally removed her eyes from the man and watched Emily, praying that the girl, her friend, would say she didn’t know the stranger. Joe knew the adults needed to hear that. She already knew that her stranger was a stranger to Emily as well.

  But the pretty little girl really did have the mental affliction Joe’s parents had Joe tested for. Emily was a sweet child, but simple, and very used to obeying orders from adults. When Emily stood from her spot in the corner, the same corner that she had waved from shyly to Joe four days ago, true horror flooded through Joe’s veins. The girl was going to go with the stranger. Unless Joe stopped her.

  As Emily passed by, Joe’s small, pale hand shot out and gripped the little girl’s forearm. Emily stopped and looked at Joe, who was still seated in her blue plastic chair. For what seemed like a very long moment, little Joe could not think of what to say.

  She stared into Emily’s big brown eyes, and would find out many years later that the memory of them would never vacate her mind. Joe would remember every detail about Emily that day, from her yellow-and-white flowered sundress to her crooked ponytails and frilly white socks.

  “Do you –” Joe began.

  “Joe, let go of Emily. She has to go now. You two can play tomorrow,” Miss Teresa said, cutting Joe off from asking the question that could have changed everything.

  Joe looked over at the stranger, who was now watching her again, and couldn’t find the words to continue. In fact, her mind seemed to escape her entirely and once more she was frozen with terror. The stranger’s eyes, or rather that look behind them, demanded she keep her mouth shut. He seemed to be silently challenging her, daring her to say something foolish. At this point in life, Joe had yet to become a fool.

  Poor Emily took the man’s hand and left through the rainbow painted door that led to the lobby of the daycare, her blond pigtails swaying innocently, her My Little Pony lunch bag dangling from her hand, and little Joe just watched.

  It took Joe ten minutes to come up with her best solution, but that was ten minutes too long. When she arose from her blue plastic chair and approached Miss Teresa she could barely get the words through her lips.

  “Muh-Muh-Mmm-Miss T-T-Teresa?” Joe said.

  Teresa, a college kid with a love for children said, “Yes, Joe?”

  Joe took a deep breath, trying to force the words out faster than they would come. “Eh-Eh-Emily told told told muh-me that that huh-her mmm-ma-mother was t-t-taking her to a mm-m-movie today. Sh-she said that that that they m-m-made sssspecial plans. That d-d-d-didn’t la-look like her ma-ma-mommy,” Joe said. She was sweating now.

  Miss Teresa looked down at the little raven-haired girl and gave her shoulder a pat. “I’m sure Emily’s mother just sent her uncle to pick her up because she was busy. Go play now, Joe.”

  Joe felt like bursting into tears. She didn’t know why, but
somehow, it felt like time was seriously running out. She grabbed Miss Teresa’s arm and locked her silver-blue gaze on the college kid. Joe said, “C-c-call Eh-Emily’s m-mah-mother. P-p-pleeease.”

  Later on, when the first policemen on the scene asked Teresa why she thought to call Emily’s mother and yet hadn’t thought to do so before releasing the child to a stranger, the college kid had glanced over at Joe, who was still sitting in the blue plastic child’s chair. Joe’s mother was the last to pick her up that day. For a moment, Joe thought Miss Teresa was going to tell on her and her parents would end up finding out about her sketch of the stranger, about everything. But the college girl didn’t tell on Joe. She just said it struck her as strange after the two had left, while sobbing and crying worse than Joe had ever seen. Over the next week, Joe would see that spectacle trumped tenfold.

  When Emily’s mother and father showed up, Joe was still sitting in the blue chair. She was already horrified. She was just too young to understand why. When the detectives took Joe aside to ask her questions, it all finally began to sink in. Emily had been kidnapped. Before that fateful Monday, Joe had never heard the word before in her five years of life, but it was one of those that you only had to hear once.

  During her brief interview with the detectives, little Joe Knowe sat listening to the screams and cries of Emily’s mother, who was in the front room of the daycare. The detective talking to Joe had been a kind woman, and she placed a hand on Joe’s shoulder when a particularly heart-wrenching wail from Emily’s mother came floating through the rainbow painted door to the lobby. Joe gripped the sides of her plastic chair and shut her eyes. Then she started crying, too.

  The detective wrapped little Joe in her arms, feeling sorry for the supposed simple girl she was holding, when she should have been feeling sorry for the simple girl who’d just been stolen. “Shh. It’s okay,” the detective said. “It’s okay. We just want to know if you can tell us anything you might remember about the man who came and picked up your friend Emily. Can you describe him to me?”