Figment (14 page)

Hey, babe, I’m okay. Sleeping on the beach. Can’t say much more. You know why. But I love you always.

Thank God. He was safe. I sagged back against the toilet tank in momentary relief.
Big problems here
, I wrote.
The guy found me. He wants a password. What should we do?

After a few seconds, the reply came.
Don’t say anything to anyone, Zo. Got to go. Will write later.

I love you
, I wrote back. Though I waited almost twenty minutes, no reply came. Finally, reluctantly, I stood up. I tried to shake the creeping feeling that I’d been blown off by the very person I’d hoped would save me.

*
* *

Two hours later, the big gallery space was almost empty. The drinks table was littered with discarded glasses and crumpled cocktail napkins, and Oliver’s mother was packing wine bottles into a big cardboard box. She closed the flaps on the last one and hefted the box. “I’ll just take this one out to the car, Ollie,” she called.

“Right, thanks, Mum!” Oliver was circulating around the gallery, stuffing scattered fliers into a trash can.

“Zoe, are you ready to go?” My mother slung her purse over her shoulder. “Is your wrist feeling better?”

I turned from a side table where I was collecting cups. “I’m fine. I think I’ll stay, if that’s okay, Mom. Help Oliver clean up.” I glanced at Oliver.

He nodded. “Yeah, that would be great.”

My father hesitated. “All right, then. Have Oliver see you home.”

“Of course.” I maintained my smile until they disappeared out the door and down the sidewalk.

Oliver and I were the only two left in the gallery now. I circulated slowly through the big room, straightening stacks of catalogs left scattered here and there.

Oliver was at the other end of the gallery, taking down his sketches and
stacking the frames at the back of the room.

“So, how do you think it went?” I called down to him. My voice sounded loud in the echoing space.

He looked up and smiled at me. “Not bad. I sold a bunch of the pieces. So that’ll help with school this fall.”

“That’s so awesome.” His steady, cheerful presence
suddenly felt very welcome, after Jeremiah in the alley and the brush-off from Davis on the phone. “Does it feel weird to think that your drawings are going to be in someone else’s home?” I stooped and swept a handful of stepped-on fliers from beneath one of the benches.

“Sort of. It’s kind of like selling one of your fingers or something.” Oliver was zipping up his portfolio very slowly. “I miss them when they’re gone.” He laughed a little. “Does that sound stupid?”

“No, not at all. I get it.” I needlessly arranged three stacks of catalogs into one and squared the edges.

Now he moved a few steps closer so we were facing each other over the long table. “I’m really sorry to cause more drama with you and your parents, by the way. I hope you don’t think I snitched on you or anything like that.”

“No, I don’t.” I knew the doubt was coming through in my voice. I fiddled with the top catalog in the stack, not meeting his eyes.

“They asked me how I thought you were doing, and I just said I thought you seemed stressed, and they started freaking out, asking me all sorts of questions, like, were you in touch with reality, and did you ever hallucinate
. . .” He trailed off tactfully, but I could see the questions in his eyes.

I knew I owed him some kind of explanation. I sighed. “Look, Oliver, I can’t go into details, but my parents and I had a gigantic misunderstanding not too long ago. It was pretty crazy, actually, and I was mad for a long time. We’re kind of okay now, but basically, they’re asking stuff like that because they don’t know everything I do. And I can’t tell them, or worse things could happen.” I paused. “I’m sorry, that’s really vague.” I smiled at him reassuringly. “I’m actually fine. Really.” I thought of Jeremiah, and the fear swamped me again, but I swallowed hard, stuffing it down.

Oliver nodded slowly. “I just worry about you sometimes, heading off into the city on your own and coming back so late at night.” His voice was gentle, and his eyes were clear as they held my gaze. He was so kind and sympathetic that I felt the whole, awful story bubbling up within me: my nightmares, Davis hiding out and blowing me off, the password I didn’t know, and especially Jeremiah and his threats.

“Oliver, there is something
. . .” Then Davis’s words echoed in my head:
Don’t say anything to anyone.
I forced myself to stop, but it was like using a cork to stem a flowing spigot. Oliver was watching me.

“What? What is it?” he asked.

I shook my head. “Trust me, if I ever need someone, you’ll be the first person I come to.”

He exhaled, nodding. “Okay. And if I ever need someone, say, to do some nude modeling, you’ll be the first person I come to.” He grinned, and, in spite of myself, I laughed—for the first time that night, I realized.

“Not very likely,” I said.

Oliver slung the portfolio over his shoulder, and we walked companionably toward the front, side by side. At the entrance, though, I hesitated. The darkness pressed in on us. Jeremiah could be out there, waiting just out of sight. I felt my heart pick up speed.

Oliver was watching me. “You ready?”

I nodded.
Thank you. Thank you for not asking why I’m suddenly afraid of the dark.
He had to be the most tactful guy in all of England.

We stepped out of the gallery, and I quickly cast my gaze left and right. No Jeremiah. I clutched Oliver’s hand tighter anyway as we walked down the empty sidewalk toward the Tube station. Our footsteps tapped on the concrete and echoed against the dark, shuttered shop fronts we passed. The streetlamps made pools of light on the pavement stretching ahead of us. I was afraid of the patches of darkness in between. That was where Jeremiah could hide.

“So, what are you doing tomorrow?” Oliver asked, clearly trying to make conversation. He could feel me trembling, I knew.

“Um, I don’t know.” I was trying to see down the alleys as we passed each one.
Hiding out.
But I didn’t say that.

“Have you been in here?” Oliver gestured to the massive gates of
Kensington Gardens as we passed them.

“
Yeah, once. My mom and I took a shortcut through there the other day.” With an effort, I kept my voice even.

Oliver took my hand again and squeezed it reassuringly. “Did you see the Peter Pan statue?”

“Um, no. Peter Pan?” I could see the Tube entrance now. The bright white lights of the station were like a mecca.

“Yeah, there’s a famous statue in the gardens. It was my favorite place when I was a kid. You want to maybe go see it tomorrow?”

“Sure.” I barely heard him. We were at the smeary glass entrance doors. Made it. I exhaled, then glanced at Oliver. His warm hand was still entwined with mine. I knew I should let it go, but in that moment, I realized, I didn’t want to. Reluctantly, I let his fingers slip from mine.

I woke up the next morning with a headache to match the dull light outdoors. For a moment, Jeremiah and the scene in the alley seemed like a dream. Then I stretched my arm out from under the covers. The red welt still encircled my wrist, faded now to a deep pink.

I pulled my phone out from under my pillow and thumbed the screen. No new messages. I sighed and tugged the pillow over my head. The password could be anything at all. Any word or number in the world. It wouldn’t be something like my name, or his dog’s name. Davis was too smart for that. And I wasn’t smart enough to guess it.

Two hours later, I found myself pacing back and forth outside the gates of Kensington Gardens. Oliver had asked me to meet him there—he was going to visit a buddy of his who was in the hospital up the road. It was foggy today, that famous white-gray London fog. The air hung about me, almost humid enough to touch. My camisole was wet with sweat already, and I’d only been waiting for Oliver for fifteen minutes. I ran my fingers up the back of my head, where I’d pinned my hair into a high bun to get it off my neck.

“Zoe!”

I looked down the street and saw Oliver walking toward me, waving. In spite of my anxiety, my spirits lifted as he came up to me. His eyes looked almost green this morning, and he smelled fresh, like soap and clean laundry. On impulse, I put my arms around him and hugged him—as a way of thanking him, I guess, for being there and so normal.

“Hey, good morning to you.” He hugged me back, smiling. “You want to go in?”

We passed through the big iron gates into the private, dripping green world within. Ahead of us, a wide, graveled path led deeper into the gardens. Big hydrangea bushes lined both sides, the pink and blue heads of the flowers wet and hanging over as if they hadn’t gotten much sleep either. Massive oaks and elms were scattered on the clipped green grass. The air was heavy with the musty, secret smell of the fog.

Our feet crunched on the gravel as we wandered down the main walkway. The gardens were deserted, probably because of the fog. I liked it, though. It reminded me of a forest where I used to walk with my mother when I was little. It was in a valley, and the early-morning fog would still be there when we got out of the car. I used to pretend I could hide in it. I wished I could now.

“Hey, check it out!” Oliver stopped, catching my arm, and pointed to a buck with massive antlers, standing half-hidden among the trees and staring out at us, cool-eyed.

“Oh, awesome,” I breathed. We watched him until he turned and bounded away through the brush. “I don’t know how people can hunt them,” I said as we started walking again.

“I know, right?” Oliver guided me to the right, onto a much smaller graveled path that wound its way through big clumps of bushes higher than my head. The trees were closer, too, hanging over the path, their upper branches still hidden by the fog. A mockingbird was singing on a nearby rhododendron. “My uncle likes to go on these shooting vacations in Scotland every year. We had a big philosophical argument about it last Christmas.” He held a tree branch up so I could walk underneath. “He threw a glass of wine at me.”

“Seriously?” I brushed away water droplets from my forehead. “What did you do?”

“Here, to the right. Took it like a man, of course. And asked him to pass me a napkin.”

I snorted laughter, just as I heard the crunch of footsteps behind us and whirled around, my heart suddenly thudding. But it was only a middle-aged woman in a running jacket, with a golden retriever at the end of a leash. She passed us, smiling. I relaxed.

“Yeah, my dad used to bring me here to play. We’d kick the football around and then sketch together.” Oliver laughed. “It was kind of a weird combination, now that I think about it, but it seemed totally normal then.”

The path was even smaller now and mostly dirt. Mud was clinging to the sides of my sneakers, and my legs were wet where the bushes had brushed them. “Where is this statue?” I asked Oliver. The fog was even heavier now, and all I could see ahead of us were the shadowy shapes of the trees, like giants looming out of the white mist. “It’s very
Lord of the Rings back in here.”

“Just ahead.” Oliver pulled me up and over a tree trunk fallen across the path. “This is the back way. I thought it’d be more fun than the main road.” He pushed past a couple of bushes, then stopped. “There.”

The statue stood in a little clearing, surrounded by trees on all sides. A little brick pavilion encircled it. Peter Pan, in dark bronze and with a flute in his hand, stood on top of a big bronze boulder, looking down as if he were about to hop off.

I couldn’t help smiling, the little figure was so delicate and charming. “It’s so cute.”

Oliver nodded. “It’s really famous. You see people from all over the world taking pictures here.”

We walked slowly around Peter Pan’s boulder, looking at the statue from all angles.

“What’s the attraction, do you think?” I asked. “Is it because everyone remembers the story from growing up?” I stooped to pick up a big sycamore leaf and twirled it between my fingers.

“I don’t know.” We stopped, and Oliver leaned back against the boulder. “Maybe it’s the allure of never growing up. I mean, wouldn’t you want to never get old, if you could?”

I shook my head. “And be seventeen forever? No. Definitely not.” I thought of the mess my life was in right now. I wanted to be done with all this.

I opened my mouth with the intention of telling Oliver so, when I caught a sudden movement out of the corner of my eye. Someone in gray was coming down the path toward us, walking swiftly and purposefully.
Jeremiah. My heart gave a great thud, and adrenaline shot into my system. I grabbed Oliver’s hand. “Run!” I gasped, dragging at him.

Jeremiah saw us, I could tell, and started picking up his pace. His hand was tucked inside his suit-coat pocket. For an instant, our eyes met, and he smiled broadly.

Without thinking, I turned and plunged into the nearby bushes, still holding Oliver’s hand.
Get away.
That was the only thought in my mind.

“Zoe! What’s going on?” Oliver stumbled behind me as we fought our way out of the thicket.