Tangerine (38 page)

I don't suppose the police are interested in all of that. That's not their job. But it's a part of the truth. A big part. And as Antoine Thomas told me, "The truth shall set you free."

I went downstairs, handed the disk to Mom and Dad, and said, "Here. Here's the whole truth. Here's what really happened."

I went into the kitchen and poured myself a glass of orange juice. When I walked back through the great room, Mom and Dad had both pulled up chairs in the alcove. They were both staring hard at the computer screen.

The first day of school. Take three.

I got into my blue pants, white shirt, blue tie, black socks, and black shoes and went down to the kitchen. Neither Mom nor Dad mentioned my disk over breakfast. But I was surprised to hear Mom say, "Paul, we've talked about it, and we've decided that your father will drive you to St. Anthony's today."

At seven-thirty, Dad and I walked out into the cold Florida morning. A light wind was blowing to the west, carrying the muck fire away from us, toward the Gulf. To the east, the sun was rising behind a long row of gray clouds. I stopped to look at them, jagged and red peaked, looming there like a distant mountain range.

We pulled out of the development and headed north, past the gates and guardhouses, past the high-tension wires and the osprey nests, toward the Lake Windsor campus. When we stopped at the light at Route 89 and Seagull Way, Dad pointed over to the right. He said, "Do you see that? That's Mike Costello's tree."

I looked where Dad was pointing and saw it, the big laurel oak. It had been planted on the front lawn of the high school, between the road and the bus lanes. It looked healthy enough, strong enough. But it was bound in a crisscross of wires attached to white metal stakes. Dad added, "Those stakes are just temporary. Until it can stand on its own."

We drove on to the next light and turned right. We headed east, toward the glowing colors of the mountain range, and toward the glowing colors of the citrus groves. I thought to myself,
Mike Costello has his tree, and that's good. But Luis has his tree, too, and he will have many, many more.

Soon the road narrowed to two lanes and we were surrounded by the groves, surrounded by the beauty of it all. I stared through the window at the endless rows of trees—orange, tangerine, lemon—flying past us on either side. I rolled down the window and let it all in. The air was clear and cold. And the car immediately filled up with that scent, the scent of a golden dawn.