Infinity + One (5 page)

Clyde swore long and low, making the one syllable word into several. “What in the hell happened in the space of twenty-four hours to make you want to take a plunge into the Mystic River?”

“Maybe I wouldn’t have jumped,” I said after a long silence, not knowing what else to say without spilling my whole life story.

“You did jump. But that wasn’t the question, Bonnie,” Clyde said softly.

“That’s the only answer I’ve got, Clyde.”

“Then you and I are gonna have to part ways.”

“Say that again.”

“You and I are gonna have to part ways,” Clyde repeated firmly, his gaze steely in the murky light.

“I like your accent. You don’t say part. You say pat. Say it again.”

“What the hell?” Clyde sighed, throwing his hands in the air.

“Now that, that didn’t sound very cool,” I said. “You say it just the way I say it. What the hell!” I yelled. “See? Exactly the same.”

“I don’t need this,” Clyde muttered under his breath and ran his big hand down his face. He wouldn’t look at me, and I knew I’d blown it. When would I learn to just shut up? I always tried to lighten things up and change the subject when things got uncomfortable or I was nervous. It was how I dealt. When Minnie got sick, I spent my days trying to make her laugh. Trying to make them all laugh. And when I couldn’t make them laugh anymore, I let Gran talk me into “helping out” in a different way, making money. Which reminded me. I held up Gran’s purse.

“I’ve got cash. I can pay you to take me to Vegas.” I pulled a wad of bills out of Gran’s wallet and waved it toward him, fanning his face, and his eyes widened.

“There’s no way you’re twenty-one,” he said, pushing my hand away. “What are you, twelve?”

“I was born on March 1, 1992,” I said, my voice rising with his. “There’s an answer for you. What other answers do you need?”

“Nobody who’s twenty-one years old would wave a stack of cash like that in front of a stranger’s face. You are completely vulnerable, you realize that, don’t you? I could take your money, push you out of my car, and drive away. And that isn’t the worst thing I could do! What you just did, there? Not smart, kid. Not smart!” He was flabbergasted, angry even. I knew he was right. I’d never been smart. Gran said so. That’s why I sang, because singers didn’t have to be smart.

“You’re right. I’m not smart. I’m as dumb as a fence post. And I need a ride.” My voice wobbled pathetically and that seemed to work much better than trying to distract him or make him laugh.

Clyde groaned and rubbed his hand down his face once more. “You have money—plenty of it from the looks of it. Why don’t you rent a car?”

“I don’t have my driver’s license with me or my credit cards.”

“So take a bus!”

“Someone might recognize me,” I answered immediately and then wished I hadn’t.

“Oh, that makes me feel better!” he shot back. “Look, you gotta give me somethin’ kid. Not money,” he cut me off with a look as I lifted my cash as an offering. “Information! I am not taking you any farther if you can’t convince me that it wouldn’t be a huge mistake.”

“I would really rather you didn’t know who I am.”

“Yeah. I got that when you told me your name was Bonnie.”

“It is Bonnie.”

“And your last name?”

“What’s your first name?” I countered.

“This is my car. I ask the questions.”

I bit my lip and turned away. I supposed I didn’t have much choice. “Shelby,” I said softly. “My last name is Shelby.”

“Bonnie Shelby,” Clyde repeated. “And how old are you, Bonnie Shelby?”

“Twenty-one!” I ground out. I was starting to reconsider my desire for a ride.

“Well, unfortunately for you, Bonnie Shelby, you can’t prove that.”

“Turn on the car.”

“We’re not going anywhere, kid.”

“Just turn it on. I can prove it. You just need to promise me you aren’t going to get all weird on me.”

“I’m not the one who jumps off bridges, smiles like a lunatic, talks a hundred miles a minute, and wants to drive to Vegas with a total stranger.” Clyde said, but he twisted the key, and the old Chevy roared to life. I flipped on the radio and spun the dial until I found a country music station. “Do you ever listen to country music?” I asked, hoping mightily that he didn’t.

“No.”

“I didn’t think so.” Hunter Hayes was singing about making a girl feel wanted, and I listened as the song ended. I’d met Hunter last year at the CMAs. He was cute and nice, and I thought maybe at the time he might be a good artist to open for me on the
Come Undone
tour. But Gran had other plans, so I never followed through on the idea.

Carrie Underwood immediately followed Hunter, and I sighed. It was too much to hope one of my songs would just conveniently be in the line-up when I needed one to be. I spun through the dial once more and then flipped it off.

“That’s not gonna work. I need your guitar. It’s got all its strings doesn’t it?”

Clyde looked at me blankly. “Yeah. But it hasn’t been played in ten years. And it wasn’t played well before that. It’s way out of tune.”

I scrambled over the seat to the back, tugging the guitar behind me as I crawled back to the front. I could have climbed out the passenger door and walked to the back of the Blazer more easily, but I was afraid Clyde would drive away as soon as my feet hit the pavement. He was looking more wary by the second.

I pulled opened the case on the backseat and lifted the guitar free, hoisting it into the front seat and positioning myself around it so I could play. I plucked and tightened for a minute. It was so out of tune the strings moaned and whined as I coaxed them back into place.

“You can do that by ear?”

“I may not be smart, but Jesus gave me perfect pitch to compensate,” I said matter-of-factly, and Clyde just raised his eyebrows. I didn’t know if he was doubtful about my perfect pitch or the fact that Jesus was my benefactor.

“There you go, old girl,” I crooned, as I strummed a series of chords, “not too bad for a girl that hasn’t been touched in a while.”

Clyde said a bad word under his breath.

I ignored him and picked my way through the intro of my most recent number one hit. Even if Clyde didn’t know country music, he had probably heard this song. It had been on the soundtrack of last summer’s big action blockbuster and had been my biggest crossover hit yet. It had been played so often even I was sick of it.

The movie was called
Machine
and so was the song. In the film, Earth had fallen to invaders—part machine, part human—from another planet, and one of these invaders falls in love with a human girl and has to choose which part of himself he’s going to embrace. The song is bittersweet and filled with longing, a perfect counter-balance to the high-paced action sequences that built to a fiery crescendo as the machine sacrifices himself for the girl who thinks he’s incapable of feeling, and she finds out too late that he was so much more than she had thought. America had eaten it up. I hoped Clyde would.

“Just a machine,” I sang, “Too cold to run, expired and numb, call it love. You don’t mind it, like I mind it, your hollow kindness. I should leave.”

Clyde was watching me, his body still, his hands resting on the steering wheel. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking so I kept singing, swinging into the bridge that launched the chorus.

“I’ll cover your feet and kiss your hands. By the morning you’ll forget who I am. Love is charity, but you’re not an orphan, so I’ll stay white noise that helps your sleeping. And if I’m useless, why do you use me, like a rusty machine, for your saving?”

“I’ve heard that song.” Clyde didn’t seem impressed.

“And do you know who sings it?”

Clyde shook his head.

“Bonnie Rae Shelby,” I said.

“And you’re telling me that’s who you are?” I could tell he didn’t believe me.

“That’s who I am, although my family just calls me Bonnie.”

“So what was Bonnie Rae Shelby doing on the Tobin Bridge last night?”

“I sang at the TD Garden last night. Last stop on my tour. I was finished.” I rushed on, realizing that whatever I said wouldn’t make much sense. “I took a cab. Told him to drive. I just needed some space, you know?”

“And the cab driver let you get out on the bridge?”

“He didn’t have much choice when I opened the door and told him to stop. He slammed on the brakes pretty quick, and was glad to see me go, I think.”

We sat in silence while Clyde seemed to mull it all over. The fingers of my left hand fingered the strings, finding chords and sliding up and down the frets. But I didn’t play. I just let Clyde be until he sighed and sat back in his seat.

“That doesn’t prove anything, Bonnie. I don’t know anything about Bonnie Rae Shelby. You could still be seventeen for all I know.”

I sighed. “You’ve got a phone, right? Look me up.” I really wished he didn’t have to. I just wanted to drive. Drive, drive, drive. And never look back. And odds were, as soon as Clyde figured out I was Bonnie Rae Shelby, he was going to see dollar signs just like everyone else did.

Clyde reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. It was a flip phone. Ancient. “I’m not going to be able to do that with this, am I?”

“Uh. No. Where did you get that phone? A museum?”

“My mom insisted I have a phone on this trip. So she hooked me up.”

“Does your mama hate you?”

Clyde shoved the phone back into his pocket, and his eyes met mine. I instantly felt bad. I was joking. I hated my big mouth. There was something about his expression that made me pause. He had sad eyes and a tired face. Too tired for a young man. I wondered if my eyes were as weary.

“How old are you?” I asked.

“Twenty-four,” he answered.

I nodded, as if I agreed. Which was stupid. I would have nodded if he’d said twenty-three or twenty-five.

“Are you going to hurt me, Clyde?”

His eyebrows shot up, and he drew back, as if I’d surprised him.

“Are you going to cut me up in little pieces or make me do disgusting things?”

Shock widened Clyde’s eyes, and then he laughed a little and ran that hand over his face. It must be what he did when he didn’t know what else to do.

“No?” I persisted.

“You are a very strange girl, Bonnie,” he muttered. “But no. I’m not going to hurt you, or cut you, or anything else.”

“I didn’t think so. Guys who do things like that don’t play the hero and talk strangers down from bridges. Although you didn’t really talk me down. You knocked me down. Thank you, by the way.” My throat closed, and I pushed through the sudden, surprising emotion. “I’m not going to hurt you either, Clyde. I just need a ride. I can help with costs and keep you company and even spell you when you need a break.”

It occurred to me suddenly that Gran’s phone might be in her purse. I pulled it open again, shoving the cash out of the way and looking into the big zipper pocket where Gran kept Tic Tacs and lipstick. I found her phone laying at the bottom of the bag. It had been on vibrate, and there were thirty missed calls and twice that many new text messages. She’d obviously figured out I had taken her purse. I didn’t look at any of them. Instead, I swiped across the screen and set to work googling my name. I found a couple of good shots, close-ups of my face, and handed the phone to Clyde.

“See?”

He took the phone and looked down at the images. Then he reached up and turned on the dome light, illuminating my face for his perusal. He looked from me to the screen for several long seconds and then reached out and pulled off my stocking cap.

“Why did you do that to your hair?”

“You don’t like it?”

A ghost of a grin flitted across his face. “No.”

I snatched the phone from his hand and clicked through a few links until I found a biography on Bonnie Rae Shelby. My date of birth was listed right at the top, March 1, 1992.

“And there’s everything you need to know about me, including my age. Totally reliable information off the internet. There might even be stuff there I don’t know.”

Clyde took the phone again and read through the information I’d offered him. He read and read. And read. It was awkward, and I turned from him, strumming the guitar and hoping that there wasn’t anything too far-fetched in the so-called biography—like romances that had never happened and bad acts I hadn’t been fortunate enough to actually commit.

“Clyde?”

He looked up from the little screen in his hand.

“You got enough dirt now? ’Cause I need food. And a shower. And I’m thinking I don’t like my hair much either.”