Breaker (18 page)

After her parents have gone to bed, Natalie stands at the front window of their apartment and stares out into the night. She thinks of her day, and her skin goes cold. She knows how prepared she is, how much she has trained, and yet she looks at the box in her hand, the one she found in her backpack, the tiny little ring box that none of her friends will admit to giving her, and feels powerless. She retraces her steps back and forth, her locker at school always closed and the combination that only she has. She goes over it all again, not willing to tell Ray unless she's certain what it means. He worries too much as it is.

She remembers walking behind the girls, saying good morning to a few of them, putting on her headphones and heading off to school. There was nothing out of the ordinary—the same girls, nobody missing or acting weird. A few boys approached the group—the same jerks from the hood that came up to them every day, none of them wearing blue, just kids from school, flirting and laughing, one boy putting his arm around a girl up front, her blushing and wrapping her arm around his waist, then pushing him away when he leaned in for a kiss.

She remembers the bright orange van that was heading southbound on Kedzie, the man behind the wheel flinging newspapers out of the passenger-side window, a ring of thin plastic covering the steering wheel, him rolling the papers, slapping them into plastic bags that hung off the dashboard, and tossing them out. She'd seen this van's driver for years—a man with olive skin and a goatee—nothing to worry about.

She remembers a white van, you never forget the white vans, delivering flowers, almost at the school yard, the door sliding open, her jumping and moving away from it, bumping into one of her girlfriends, the girl shoving her back, asking her what the hell her problem was, the man in red flannel and a puffy black coat turning and walking up a sidewalk without glancing at the girls once, tall and skinny, white skin, pretty normal-looking, her eyes on him as she kept walking north. Not once did he turn to look at them, buzzing the gate and pushing it open, into the yard and out of her sight. Nothing to worry about, she thought.

On the way home, though, what did she see? They all stayed later than usual, watching a basketball practice for a few hours, finishing up homework, hanging out—it happened now and then. As it got dark out, they headed home. Dinner would be on the table soon—for some of them, anyway.

On the side of the road were two boys with their hands on the trunk of a rusted black car, two cops in uniform patting them down, the boys yammering, bitching and moaning, turning out their pockets, the doors to the car open, then the trunk popped, one cop with a flashlight, rooting around, the other with his hand on his hip, on his gun, talking into his microphone, holding a driver's license, the boys now with their arms folded, scowling, nothing new in this neighborhood.

The traffic cop, Natalie remembers him now.

After watching the police, the cackling group of girls was now excited to head home. There were only a few weeks left of school before the Christmas break, Thanksgiving over now, a small turkey and some stuffing from a box the only indication at her house that a holiday had occurred. The man wore a blue shirt and an orange vest under his dark blue jacket, a white cap with a black visor. He had a notepad of tickets in his hand. As he turned toward them, the crowd of girls parted and he bumped into Natalie, apologizing as his hands were briefly on her. Distracted by the cops and the boys, she hadn't seen him until he said he was sorry and walked on, and he'd only touched her for a moment. She'd started to fall down, almost knocked down by him, his hands on her shoulders, the tickets stuffed in his back pocket, then pulled out again as he continued north. But Natalie's eyes stayed on him: tall and skinny, dark hair, not looking back once.

She remembers when she found the ring box in her backpack—no damage to her body, her coat, no tears, rips, or cuts—the zipper to her backpack open slightly, but nothing weird about that. She often found it open a bit, the zipper and fabric tugging at each other over the course of the day—or perhaps closed in a hurry, not zipped up all the way.

She looks at the gold band, nothing special really, no stones, but on the inside a simple message is engraved, one she keeps reading over and over again.

Forever yours.

The next day when she knocks on Ray's door, he doesn't answer.

After Ray doesn't answer the door for two days, she remembers he said something about heading out of town, but this feels different—something settling uneasily into her gut, a wave of panic crashing down upon her. He might never come back.

She rolls the ring over and over in her hand and feels slightly dizzy.

He's coming for me,
she thinks. The man in the van.

Natalie retreats to her bedroom and takes the shoe box out from under her bed, the gift from Ray, and tears it open. It's packed with money, and she smiles. This will help.

There are things she needs to do in order to secure her safety, and there is no time to waste. At the school library a few weeks ago, she Googled GPS devices and found a personal one for tracking down people at a website named AngelSense, a small portable GPS called The Guardian. She'll also need a cellphone, her parents too cheap to get her one, feeling she is still too young to need one. All of these devices can be bought at the Best Buy over on Belmont Avenue, so she doesn't waste any time.

It's a Saturday, but she prepares as if going to school, pulling on her coat, her gloves and hat, her backpack filled with all manner of self-defense, pepper spray in her left pocket, brass knuckles fitted on to her right hand, which is stuffed inside her right pocket, knife in her back right jeans pocket as well. It's a short walk to the 52 Kedzie/California bus that will take her north to the store. She has enough cash in her pocket to buy the items, a plan forming, a backup, a safety net, just in case. One for Ray for when he returns, another for her parents, forcing them to wake up and see the dangers around them, to see their little girl isn't a baby anymore.

At the store the salesgirl pauses, asking where her parents are, squinting at Natalie. Natalie lies and says she's sixteen, young-looking for her age, and that she can buy what she wants. If the girl won't help her, she'll take her business elsewhere. Tall and skinny, with long red hair, freckles dotting her nose, the salesgirl laughs and pulls the items from the shelf. Now she's Natalie's friend, an alliance perhaps, two girls in a store filled with boys and men. When Natalie counts out the money, she adds a hundred-dollar bill to the top of the pile and tells the redheaded girl that's for her troubles—something she heard in a movie one time. The girl laughs, as if Natalie is joking, blushing a little—and then she looks to her left and her right, and stuffs the cash deep into her jeans pocket.

Natalie hurries home to get the apps set up and test the device, which will eventually be sewn into the inside of her backpack. Lately, the sky has been nothing but gray and cloudy, threatening to rain or hail or snow—something violent coming.

At home, she gets it all running in no time, a smart girl of course, and then she places one phone for Ray where only he will find it, along with half of the money. If the police come, if the man with the ring comes, they'll take these items, they'll find them and destroy them, and that can't happen. She needs these items to survive.

She waits for her parents to come home, not from work, out someplace in the world, always running away from her, always disappearing into a bottle, a television set, work, the world outside the apartment, anywhere but here, with anyone but her. Deep down she knows she still loves them, but a contempt has grown and spread, maybe even hatred for them, expanding over time. She has thought of what life would be like without them—picturing a car accident, a man at the door, a policeman most likely, his hat in his hand, his face sad—as a great relief washes over her.

Hours pass by and Natalie loses her patience. She gets hungry and decides to walk to the McDonald's over on Milwaukee Avenue. Again, she brings her backpack, always the backpack, with her pepper spray and the brass knuckles and the knife, the new GPS device sewn into its lining.

In the end, none of it matters.

She sees the woman walking south on Milwaukee but doesn't pay her much attention, the baby in her arms wriggling, it seems, the mother cooing at it, a tall woman, with large hands. And if you looked close, you might see an Adam's apple peeking out from behind her black scarf, wrapped around her neck and over her head, her long, flowing coat a dark purple. Natalie is more focused on the white van sitting in the street up on her left, parked there with the engine running, not focused on the woman walking toward her. She is looking at the sliding door, only feet away from her, the passenger seat empty. Nobody is in the driver's seat either, as Natalie turns her head and stares, craning her neck, wondering where the driver is.

The woman trips, falling toward her, the baby falling out of her open hands, a tiny scream slipping from their mouths. Natalie pulls her hands out of her pockets, opens her arms to catch the child, and that is a crucial mistake.

Natalie looks up too late. The woman is muttering thank you as she plunges a syringe into Natalie's neck. The baby falls to the ground. It's a doll. The woman—really a man, it turns out—grabs Natalie and pulls her toward the van, sliding the door open and tossing her inside. The woman, really David Nelson, slams it shut and turns to look around. The sidewalk is empty, nobody noticing anything as he picks up the doll by one plastic foot and drops it into a nearby garbage can, a low chuckle slipping over his lips.

Chicago to Peoria, maybe two and a half hours, straight down I-55, very little along the way, industrial warehouses and manufacturing until you're out of Chicago and into the cornfields, flat land all the way south. The trunk of the Camry doesn't contain much—some clothes, a few trinkets, and a backpack full of cash. It feels premature, it feels selfish, but I don't know what else to do.

The road unfurls in front of me, a long gray snake undulating under a cloudy sky, the humming of the tires, the wind whooshing. I could be on an airplane, or in a submarine, the rest of the world slipping by, humanity a cold and distant reality. I am so separate from everything right now, no past I want to remember, no present to exist in, and a future that is highly uncertain. Just the metal wrapped around me, the cloth seats, the steering wheel in my hands, and I can't keep the panic quiet, the sense that the minute I clicked the apartment lock shut, the minute the car door thudded and the ignition turned over, right behind me was a cloud of locusts, a black plague descending on Logan Square.

Is my father a man of his word?

This is calling his bluff, seeing what he'll do as soon as I'm gone. Every time I pass an exit I think of turning around, heading back north, to sit as close to Natalie as I can, watching over her, listening for broken glass, a muffled cry, a gunshot in the night.

I feel feverish, and swallow back the bile.

I'll call Delmar when I get to Peoria. I've been checking the rearview mirror and I haven't seen any cars or vans trailing me. As I continue south, I slow down now and then, change lanes, pull to the right and then speed up again, sixty-five and then seventy-five, pushing the car up toward ninety miles per hour, just to see if anyone is back there. I get off at an exit somewhere around Dwight, sit in the car for a minute, and then run inside to take a piss, grabbing a huge Coke, and then back in the car, scanning the gas station for suspicious vehicles, familiar cars behind me as I merge back into traffic.

Nothing.

I suppose that's a good thing.

Then again, if he's staying in Chicago, as he said he was, what's next?

I think of calling now, looking down at my phone as it sits in the cup holder between the driver's seat and the passenger seat. But there have been no buzzing texts, no messages, the phone quiet, and I almost will it to ring.

I suppose I'd rather have some news than no news. But whatever news they'll have for me, it can really only be one of two things—they've caught him, or he's killed and raped again.

I push out into the universe a silent prayer, the first time I've spoken to God in as long as I can remember, asking him to watch over Natalie, picturing a blue translucent bubble as big as a whale wrapped around the feisty girl, hopeful that she has swallowed the essence of a warrior. Now and then I'd see that gleam in her eye, that dark blossom spreading out from within her. She has it in her, and I've tried to tease it out, to hypnotize that primal rage that lurks within us all.

I hope she never has to kill, to become tainted like me. But it may not be something she can avoid.

The highway is putting me to sleep. Only a few hours into the trip I decide to change my plans, in case anybody is looking for me. Instead of driving to Peoria, I stay close to I-55—Bloomington, a Comfort Suites just off the highway, one of many chain hotels in the area. They all look the same, the neutral color of the exterior, the lobby with carpet in dizzying patterns, the rooms the same light woods with horrible paintings on the walls—abstract art picked not for its imagination, but for how it matches the color scheme. It is a quick check-in, the only hesitation my lack of a credit card. I pull out a wad of bills and ask how much for the night, how much can I pay in advance—a week, an extra security deposit, perhaps? I keep slapping hundred-dollar bills on the counter until the skinny white college student with her hair tied up in a ponytail behind the counter, a gray vest over her sparkling white shirt, finally smiles and hands me a key. Wonder how much went in her pocket? Not that I care.

In the room, I click on the television set for background noise and collapse on the king-size bed. I'm exhausted, yet anxious—uncertain what I can do to change anything. It's like this for two days—nothing but fast food, bad daytime television, and restless sleep. Finally, I buy a pint of Jim Beam and sip on it as the third night washes over me, slipping off to an uncomfortable sleep in central Illinois, surrounded by cornfields and concrete highways in the middle of nowhere.

As my eyelids twitch, I dream of doors being kicked open, of blood on the carpet, a bathtub full of pink water, pale skin flayed open, and a swarm of bees crowding into the room.

On the desk next to me, the phone vibrates, but I don't hear it buzzing. The bees, that's how they got into my dreams.

First one text, then another, several from Delmar over the next few hours; I'm oblivious to it all, a false security in this hotel room hours away from home.

Ray, call us.

And then ten minutes later:

Ray, something happened.

Another fifteen minutes pass.

Ray, it's Eddy.

I sleep the sleep of the dead.

Ray, there's more.

The semis rumbling by on the highway, the elevator going up and down, the ice machine down the hall dropping cubes into a plastic bucket, the night spins out into the darkness.

It's Natalie, Ray. CALL US.

And in the background, the news plays on, WGN, the volume turned down.

We have breaking news of an elderly man found decapitated on the near northwest side, in a warehouse, police alerted to the building after a fire next door threatened to take out the entire block. Local officials stumbled across an underground boxing league, a “fight club” of sorts. The man, Edson James, was surrounded by suitcases, some stuffed with clothes, Hawaiian shirts and khaki shorts, the rest filled up with cash.

Going on a trip, it seems.

And in other news
, the television continues,
a young girl was abducted on the north side of Chicago, Natalie Morales. We take you live to Kedzie and Logan, where Robert Jordan is standing by. Robert?

Thanks, Jackie.

Two adults were found stabbed to death in their Logan Square apartment, the apartment ransacked, Natalie Morales reported missing. Neighbors mention a recent series of violent outbursts in the area, local gang members, Gangster Disciples, shot down on the sidewalk, as well as other trouble from a man in a white van, something local police will neither confirm nor deny. As you may remember, Jackie,
the television babbles on,
several years ago a similar crime occurred in the Logan Square area. A few girls were snatched up and abused in Humboldt Park. Police are on the lookout for this man, David Nelson, who was acquitted on all charges some twenty years ago. Nelson may have returned to the area.

Back to you, Jackie.

And as I slept, Eddy was taken to the morgue, unable to escape, the victim of his associates, or more likely my father. Natalie was now missing, her parents dead, only a few hours after I left town. I would awake to a phone full of text messages, a heat sliding over me, panic paired with nausea.

On the car ride back north, I would fluctuate between a violent rage that would overflow, my fists pounding on the steering wheel, driving over a hundred miles per hour, and a debilitating sorrow at what I feared Natalie could be enduring, if she wasn't dead already. Tears streamed down my face, and I couldn't get back to Chicago fast enough.

In and out of traffic, weaving onto the shoulder at reckless speeds, horns blaring at me, rocks flying up, waiting for the inevitable lights and sirens in my rearview mirror, but for some reason, they never come. The ride back is little more than a blur of the ride south. I'd called Delmar, telling him I was on my way back, cursing at the man, the cop on the other end of the phone, not caring about what might happen to me, worried only about the girl.

Delmar had told me a few things. The unmarked car at the apartment had been there all night, the officer in the morning coming to relieve the night shift finding a dead undercover agent with a tiny hole in his left temple, broken window glass sparkling in the street, an ice pick determined to be the cause of death shoved into the soft spot, scrambling the officer's brains.

Delmar had been angry, he had sounded worried, and there was little more he could share over the phone. Cops were out looking for a man they thought might be in disguise, for a white van in a sea of white vans, for a little girl who was probably already dead.

When I arrive at my apartment building I am blinded by rage.