Compulsion (20 page)

Just have to bring back the order.

Things were just wrong the last couple of days. Fucked up. Two days leaving before dawn, the other way after.

Leave at dawn.

Because of the sputtering streetlamp—too erratic. Can’t be controlled. Gotta call the city to get the light fixed. Then I can leave whenever.

But for now, wake at dawn and go outside.

That’s how it works.

I missed it three times in a row.

Wanting it to stop. That was wrong. It’s better this way—
my way
. Because it works; it keeps us safe.

I did the routine this morning. We won.

I didn’t do it tonight. Everything got fucked up.

It’s just a routine. It works.
My normal.

Five clocks. Two digital. Three analog. I line them up along the windowsill and set them one by one until they’re all ticking in unison.

But my favorite watch is the one I wear every day.

I look down at it and make sure it’s in time with the five clocks I just set.

Yep.

It was my great-grandpa’s. He fought in World War Two and left this vintage military watch to Dad. MIMO
SWISS
MADE
,
produced for the German army. When we won our first championship, Dad gave it to me.

I’ve worn it for three years now. Every day. And it works perfect.

When I remember to wind the fucking thing.

Shit.

Dad says, at least once a week, that the quality of the past can’t be matched by the technology of the present. He’s big on quality.

Quality.

And he’s proud of me.

I slip the watch off and put it on my nightstand, where it always is during the night.

I don’t wind it.

I wind on Thursdays and Tuesdays. I wound it on Friday morning, though, because I fucked up.

Tuesday. I’ll wind it Tuesday; get back on schedule.

The time is set. Now . . .

. . . call Kase.

Kase. Oh shit. Kase.

Fuck. If I hadn’t wanted it to stop, she wouldn’t be at the party. When I don’t do things the right way, everything spirals out of control.

“I’ll be right back, Jakey. Take care of Kasey.”

Take care of Kasey.

Fuck.

It’s too quiet. I cup my hands over my ears and hear the rumble in my brain, like the roar of the engines before the airplane hurtles down the runway. No screaming. My mind jumps to everything I did wrong since the game and scrambles to put the pieces back together.

So stupid. Stupidstupidstupid. I don’t know where to begin.

I was supposed to be normal.

This is normal.

Just. Stop.

Begin again. With the time.

3:27

Three twenty-seven. Good number. Three primes. Three. Two. Seven. Seven plus two is nine plus three is twelve minus seven is five. OK. Two times seven is fourteen plus three is seventeen. OK. Three times two is six plus seven is thirteen. OK.

Exhale. Everything’s under control now—now that I’m doing what I’m supposed to. Just as the second hand reaches twelve, I turn my back to the clocks, lying on my left side, facing the door.

I flick open my phone.

Dead.

Fuck.

Where’s the charger?

I close my eyes, then turn toward the clocks. I open my left eye, count to three, and watch as the blurry numbers take form. Then I open my right eye.

3:31

Three thirty-one. Three plus three is six plus one is seven. OK. Three minus one is two plus three is five. OK.

My head stops throbbing and the glow of light fades. Things are getting back to normal. Things are working and now everybody’s safe. I’m getting the magic.

Three times three is nine minus one is eight minus three is five. OK.

Five-oh-eight and fifty-five—

I slip my left foot out from under the covers and count. One, two, three.

Fifty-six, fifty-seven—

Right foot. One, two, three.

Charger. Need the charger.

I go downstairs and find the charger in the kitchen drawer.

Kaseykaseykaseykaseykasey. Fuck.

Genesis.

The phone beeps when I plug it in.

Seventeen missed calls.

Luc’s such an asshole. So I didn’t want to get laid. So I’m not like him.

Asshole.

The numbers on the call log are all from Kase.

All seventeen.

One message and one text message:

U @?

Right foot, then left foot, I slide under the covers and listen to the message.

“You told me you’d take me home!” Kase’s voice wavers. It’s eerily silent in the background and it sounds like she’s cupping the phone to her mouth. “You said, ‘Got your back.’” The line goes dead.

I call her right back, pressing the phone against my ear, trying to keep the spiders away. “Hello?” a soft voice answers. The reception is shit, crackly.

“Kase? Is that you? What’s going on?”

She chokes out a sob. Her words are static; they blur and run together because of the crap reception.

She’s drunk.

“Kase, where’s Luc? Where’re Kalleres and Grundy?”

What if Kalleres and Grundy ditch her?

What if somebody takes her to a closet?

What if she passes out and asphyxiates in her own vomit?

“Take care of Kasey.”

“Mom!” She’s not here. Make the numbers work to keep Kasey and me safe.

“Take care of Kasey.”

“I am. Fuck. What do you think I’ve been doing all these years with all the fucking numbers? I. Take. Care. Of. Her.”

And when I talk, I feel like my mouth is on fire. For an instant, I wonder if I’ll choke to death if I fall asleep; if my tongue will fill up my entire mouth and cut off my air.

The crackly line and silence bring me back. Focus. This is about Kasey right now.
She needs me
.

I only hear the sound of candy-wrapper static, then a soft hum of near silence.

“Kase!” I’m holding the phone so tight my knuckles ache. My back feels clammy and my ear doubles with the pressure of the phone.

“Kase!” I can feel the hysteria in my voice.
Keep it together
. “I’ll be right there,” I say. “Just talk. Let’s just talk until I—” The phone clicks off.

I dial again and it kicks me to voice mail right away.

Fuck.

No fucking way. She had to have charged the phone.

I hate batteries.

There should be a kind of windup cell phone. Fucking technology.

I wipe the palms of my hands on the comforter.
One, two, three, four, five. Five, four, three, two, one.

I’ll just get in the car and go to Mario’s and pick her up. Not a problem.

Just gotta start the day.

I look at the time and the obsidian sky. It’s not dawn. The moonless night falls down onto me, smothering me in blackness.

I try to lift my hand to touch my face, but it lies heavy at my side, as if sticky sap is creeping through my veins, coming to a halt, and my heart races to push the sludge blood through constricted veins. The frenetic beat pounds in my ears. Tingling electrical currents shoot through my body.

I can’t move.

Don’t leave. Don’t leave. Stay here until dawn. Then . . .

Stop. Just stop.

I try to place my hands over my ears—to smother out the frenzied hammering that bangs with every pulse. But I can’t move.

I can’t move.

I have no control over anything. Nothing.

The sun won’t be up until . . .

I force myself to turn to the clock, the digital numbers penetrating the curtain of darkness, giving me light—focus.

Focus
.

4:13

Four thirteen. Four plus one is five plus three is eight. Fuck. Four times one is four times three is twelve. Fuck.

Think. Think.

The numbers aren’t working.

One, two, three,
left.

One, two, three,
right.

Up.

I push myself out of bed, collapsing to the floor, and move to the door. I turn to the clocks and freeze.

It’s wrong.

One of the clocks on the windowsill has stopped.

Go back. Set the time. Get new batteries. Check the others. Just a backup clock, just to get things under control.
I go through the closet and pull out the best clocks, ones that won’t go dead. This will make it okay. If I do this, then I can go get Kasey.

Okay.

Stop the itching. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.
I cradle my head between my knees and knead at the back of my neck, pushing down the spiders.

One, two, three, four, five, six. Six clocks.

Six of them.

No.
Five and one.

I wince but leave them all on the floor, plugging them into the wall.

Batteries. Fucking batteries. Zinc-carbon, nickel-cadmium, alkaline addiction. Okay. Four AA batteries. Easy. Four batteries. Two clocks. Six. Six. Five and one. Four and two. Four divided by two is two. OK.

It’s okay. Technically it’s okay.

Two. OK.

I rifle through my desk drawer for batteries and set the clocks down in a line on the floor, working them one by one, until all eleven clocks tick in unison.

Eleven.

Good.

Great number.

It works
.

Gotta. Go. She needs help.

I look at my phone. Nothing. No beeps. No messages.

Nothing.

Maybe we can talk. Just talk. I’ll call Grundy. Or Kalleres. And we’ll talk. She’ll tell me about her day. We’ll wait for dawn together. It’s okay.

I ring Grundy.

No service. Out of range? Fuck. Did they go to Yosemite or something?

“Can you hear me now? Can your hear me now?”

Dressed. Get dressed.

But I have to start again. Do it right. I get back into bed and stare at the clocks.

4:40

Four forty. Four plus four is eight. Four minus four is zero.

The second hands look like they’re all stuck in time. The digital clocks blink, blink, and I concentrate so hard that now it looks like every line glows red or green.

Tick-tock, tick-tock
.

I can’t see the fucking time.

I squeeze my eyes shut to stop the spinning. My
mind feels like a mad merry-go-round whirring and spiraling, chipped paint on metal, hot to the touch, cheeks jiggling, stinging slaps of hair in the eyes, red mouths wide, laughing, laughing, a cyclone of images that shudder to a stop.

But the spinning doesn’t stop even when the merry-go-round does.

Everything spins.

Except the North Pole.

Zero miles per hour there.

No spinning. No moving. Nothing to throw me off. No time.

Just night.

Just day.

The North Pole.

The screen on my cell is blank.

One Hundred Thirty-One World Erased

Sunday, 4:47 a.m.

Four forty-seven. Four plus four is eight plus seven is fifteen minus four is eleven. OK.

One, two, three, four, five.
Elbow, elbow, knee, knee.

I make it to the top of the staircase but have to stop before I retch all over Mom’s carpet, before everything goes black.

Call Luc.

I dial him on his cell and am kicked to voice mail. “Hey. I’m not here.”
Beep
.

My battery bar is down to two blinking notches. I need to save it . . . just in case.

I get to the hall phone and lean against the wall, whispering in the receiver.
Pick up. Pick up. Fucking pick up the phone
.

“
Hallo
?” a sleepy voice answers. Luc’s mom.

I hang up and try to call his cell, but the phone goes
nah-nee-nah.
“We’re sorry, but this call cannot be completed as dialed. Please hang up and try again.”

Fuck.

Dad had all long-distance and cell phone calls blocked from our house phone unless we punch in a special code because two summers ago Kasey ran up a four hundred–plus–dollar phone bill calling Marcy at summer camp.

I cradle the phone in my hand until I hear the annoying beeps, counting them until I get to fifty-three, then replace the phone in its cradle. I feel better.

Fifty-three.

I crawl to Dad and Mom’s bedroom door and lift up my hand to knock. I need to get help. Kasey needs me.

Got your back.

Three words. OK.

“Take care of Kasey.”

My stomach churns. I move my ear to the door. Silence. My stomach lurches just thinking about going into that tomblike room.

It’s okay.

It’s okay. Kasey can wait. Drama queen of the freshman class can totally wait. I’m sure it’s nothing. She probably got in a fight with Marcy.

I block out the other thoughts that work their way through the sticky webs.

I put the phone back on the hook. Kase would find a way to call if she needed something. She’d borrow somebody’s phone. She’d really call if she needed me.

But when I search through my message box—now blank—the only thing I can do is curl up into a ball and wait for dawn.

Fifty-three.

I like the way the number forms in my brain and settles, clearing away room for thought.

It’s okay.

I can wait.

5:53

The curtain of darkness has receded. I open my left eye, count to three, and watch as the blurry numbers take form. Then I open my right eye.

Five fifty-three. Five plus five is ten plus three is thirteen. OK. Five minus three is two plus five is seven. OK. Five times three is fifteen divided by five is three. OK.