The Day of Small Things (33 page)

Pook nodded. “Okay, so far. Now, I want you to go over there where those kids are fooling around—put yourself near to them but not in amongst them. You got that thing plugged in your ear? Fine. Make you look natural. Now get out and be ready to cross behind me soon as I’ve got that roll of bills. Keep going to the pickup spot—Darrell’ll get you first. Let’s make this slick and quick—start the day with a little bankroll. Then we’ll be moving on and see how you do at something else.”

Something else?
Calven started to ask but a movement of Pook’s hand made him reconsider. As he climbed out of the van, adjusting the iPod bud in his ear—
just like ol’ Pook to give me an iPod without no music on it
—there was a tap on the back seat window and the tinted glass slid down a careful few inches.

“Like I said before, Good Boy, you get a notion to run off, it’ll be your mama takes your punishment, you hear what I’m saying?”

Calven could see nothing beyond the window, but along with the cold menace of Pook’s warning, he sensed his mother’s fear oozing like a bad smell through the narrow opening.

“I done
told
you,” he said to his reflection in the dark glass, “I know what I’m supposed to do and I ain’t going nowhere.”

The window slid shut and Calven, feigning a nonchalance he didn’t feel, slouched across the street toward the noisy group of teenage boys milling about in front of the bus stop. Two had laid aside their knapsacks and were engaged in mock-karate combat; some were talking on cellphones; some were busily texting or playing games, thumbs flying on the tiny keypads. Not one even glanced
over as Calven shambled to a spot near them, stopping to study the colorful posters affixed to a power pole at the edge of the sidewalk.

As Calven pretended to read the posters, he saw the van pull away and make a left at the next corner. Pook was on the sidewalk, hurrying in the opposite direction, a folded newspaper under his arm. He was dressed very much like the mark—pleated-front khaki slacks and a green knit shirt. A dark wig covered his shaved head and, except for the bad teeth, he looked like a hundred other guys.

Calven watched as Pook came to a corner, waited for the light, then crossed. Pook was heading his way and Calven moved around the power pole to see if the mark was still in place—yes!

In spite of his fear, Calven found himself excited by the prospect of what was to come. It was all working so far. Pook was slick—that was for sure. The mark stood there, looking at his watch. Then he moved away a few steps and Calven’s heart skipped a beat—would they lose him?

No, he was looking in the window of a bookstore—and now Princess made her appearance from around the corner where the van had turned. Her skirt was long but slit high on the side and the bright orange tank top she wore could have been spray-painted on. Calven saw several men turn and stare as she went by, her high heels tapping on the sidewalk, but she ignored them, advancing on the unsuspecting mark.

As soon as Pook had passed him, also heading for the mark, Calven made his move. Pretending to pull up his pants, he retrieved the dead cellphone from his briefs and palmed it as he moved closer to the two knapsacks lying
on the ground. Here he dropped to one knee and fumbled with his shoelace; when he was sure no one was looking, his hand shot out and swapped the phone in his hand for the one lying on top of the knapsack. Standing up again, Calven reached under his shirt to heist his low-riding, baggy shorts, then headed toward the mark.

He had to hustle to make the pickup. Just like Pook had said, right when his mama was next to the man in the pink shirt, she had stumbled, letting out a little
eek
of surprise and falling hard against the mark. Pink Shirt had been quick to catch her and slow to let loose of her, standing there with a foolish look on his face and asking her was she all right.

She played her part real good, holding on to the mark and jabbering a mile a minute while she held her foot up and twisted her head round to look at her shoe. The heel had broken off just like Darrell had fixed it to do. And while she was rubbing up against the mark and thanking him and all, Pink Shirt never noticed the dark-haired man next to him, the one who was reading the signs taped up on the window of the bookstore while his hand worked the lining of Pink Shirt’s pocket up and up.

At the last moment, Calven made his cross—just another typical thoughtless teenager, so busy listening to his music that he bumps into responsible adults. He ricocheted off Pook, mumbled an incoherent apology, and continued on down the sidewalk
don’t run, whatever you do, but keep moving
and around the corner to the waiting van. The roll of bills was riding safe at the back of his briefs—undetectable under the long, baggy shorts.

And at the front, snug against Mr. Johnson, was the little cellphone one of the karate kids had stupidly left on
top of his backpack, unaware of the apprentice pickpocket who was watching.

Calven smiled. He was learning fast.

“You did okay, Good Boy.”

They were back in the van, heading out of the city and north. Pook was in a good mood—which, Calven thought, was almost scarier than his usual low simmer of anger. Pink Shirt had evidently had some big plans—there was five hundred dollars in the roll of fifties. Pook had gotten Pink Shirt’s wallet too and there had been almost nine hundred in there, as well as the credit cards they had already used to lay in supplies before disposing of them and the wallet in a trash can at a fast-food place.

“Use the cards first thing—before an hour’s gone by—then toss ’em; that’s the safest way. It’ll take ol’ Pink Shirt back there a while to get over cussing about his missing cash, then, when he thinks to check for his wallet, he’ll spend some more time cussing and looking around for us and it’ll likely be a good bit before he thinks about calling to cancel his cards. And since I lifted his cell too …”

Pook held up a sleek blue and silver flip phone and grinned with an unpleasant display of brown teeth. “… well, you know how hard it is to find a pay phone anymore. Shit, he may not have called them cards in yet. But use ’em and lose ’em in the first hour—that’s my rule—and we’ll stick to it.”

Calven awoke from a dozing, after-lunch dream of Heather and her boobies to find that the van was parked
on a dirt road. Mama and Pook were outside, pulling on white coveralls, and just then Darrell appeared by the window. He was carrying one of those magnetic signs that stick on cars and trucks and he gave Calven a friendly wink as he clicked the sign onto the door panel.

Yawning and rubbing his eyes, Calven opened the door and climbed out. “I need to whiz,” he announced as Pook started to say something. Ignoring the activity around the van, Calven stepped behind a tree and reached for his zipper.

The cellphone was still there, warm and mute. At the last minute he’d remembered to turn it off before he reached the van. And he did need to pee.

“Zip it up, Good Boy; we got to get moving.” Pook’s voice seemed to be almost in his ear. Calven finished in a hurry and trotted back to the van.

“What’s the outfits for?” he asked, noting the logo now on the side of the van—
Hurley’s Cleaners—Bonded Care for Your Vacation Home
. At the rear, Darrell was unscrewing the license plate—a second one lay on the ground beside him. His mama, her face now scrubbed clean of makeup, was wrapping a scarf around her head, hiding the white-blonde hair. Pook still had the wig on but had added a yellow ball cap with the same logo as the magnetic sign. The embroidered name above his breast pocket said
Leonard
.

“We got another line of work I thought I’d see could we use you in, Good Boy. You just climb in the back of the van, and when I give the word, you get down low and throw that old blanket over you. I’ll explain the rest after we get there.”

Pook had taken the driver’s seat with Prin riding shotgun, while Darrell and Calven climbed in back. Once the
van returned to the main road, Calven had been able to pay attention to his surroundings, though aside from woods and farms, there wasn’t much to see—and nothing to tell him where they were. Then he caught sight of a big billboard with a picture of a man with a fishing rod standing in a branch and wearing those chest-high rubber boots. Behind him in the picture there was a great big fancy house, all made of logs, and some fancy-looking horses grazing in a pasture beside the house. The man was flashing a shiny white smile that let you know he had lots of money and that was
his
house and
his
horses. Over his head in big gold letters it said
Wildcat Reach ∼ 1.3 miles ∼ You’re Almost Home …

His mother roused herself and reached over to tug on the sleeve of Pook’s coveralls. “Pook, can we stop at the Hasty Mart up there? I need to pick up something.”

Pook shrugged off her hand and, without taking his eyes from the road, shook his head. “You don’t need nothing; didn’t we just buy a couple hundred dollars’ worth of groceries? What the hell you
need
so bad?”

“Lady stuff, Pook; I think my period’s starting.”

With a sigh of disgust, Pook slowed the van. “Get down and cover up now, Good Boy. And stay put till I say you can come out.”

The floor space was big enough that Calven could curl up and Darrell slipped him a jacket to stick under his head like a pillow before spreading the light cotton blanket over him. Calven felt the van stop, heard the door open and slam. A few silent minutes passed, then the van’s engine fired up again. Over the low rumble, he could hear Pook say, “What’s that ol’ boy think he’s looking at? I be damn if she don’t turn heads everywhere she goes, even in
them ugly-ass coveralls. Reckon it’s long of that rack she carries.”

And then the door opened and shut again and they were back on the road. There was a sharp right turn and they slowed, evidently now following a road winding up a steep incline. On and on and the hamburgers and fries he had eaten for lunch seemed to be expanding in his stomach. Cautiously, Calven lifted the blanket to let a little fresh air in with him, but when he felt the van stopping, he let it fall back and lay still as death.

Pook was talking to someone who was calling him Leonard and they were both laughing and then the van was moving again and Pook called back to him that he could sit up.

“Not many folks here now, early May. Some drive up from Atlanta or wherever for the weekend, now and again, and, come June, once school lets out, the place’ll be full of rich lawyers and doctors and such. But right now it’s nice and quiet, just the way we like it.”

“You work here? Like the sign on the van says?” Calven pulled himself up onto the seat beside Darrell—whose coveralls said
Ronny
—and looked out the window.

They were on a narrow, newly paved, one-lane road, running through heavy woods. The roadsides showed signs of being mown and now and then there would be a clump of flowering bushes or a newly planted tree with a few giant rocks at its base. Occasionally they passed a mailbox, usually with some weird name, like
The Aerie
or
Family Folly
, and a paved driveway snaking off into the woods or following the curves of an open meadow. Once, Calven thought he glimpsed the chimneys and roof of a very large building way back in one of those fields but he couldn’t be sure.

“Let’s just say we’re taking the place of some other folks who usually work here. Sit tight, Good Boy, and I’ll show you what you got to do.”

His mother had been staring silently out the window but as they turned into a drive by a big black mailbox set on a base made of a single tall stone, she roused herself. “Pook, don’t you think you’re maybe expecting too much? I don’t mean to tell you what to do but Calven ain’t never—”

“Sounds to me, Princess, like you
are
telling me what to do. You know, I believe you and me may have to have us another little talk tonight. Looks like you
still
don’t understand the rules.”

The even tones and low voice chilled Calven and silenced his mother, who slumped back into her seat and turned her head to gaze out the window once more.
I
got
to get us away from this feller
, Calven thought.
Mama’s so scared of him, she
—And then the van lurched around a final curve and pulled up in front of the biggest log house he had ever seen—three stories high and big windows and roof peaks everywhere.

“You uns gone clean this house? Is that what you want me to help with?”

They were all climbing out of the van now and Pook put one arm around Calven’s shoulders. He had to fight to keep from shuddering—it was like having a big old rattler across there. The threat of danger, even death, lay heavy on him.

Pook walked Calven around to the back of the house, the unwelcome arm still draped across the boy’s shoulders. Then, motioning Calven to follow him, he dropped to his knees, and began to crawl under the vast deck that stretched across the entire back of the house.

Sunlight filtered down through the spaces in the decking, making it easy to see as they moved slowly over the bare ground along the rock foundation, Pook muttering and complaining all the while. About a third of the way in, Pook stopped, pulled a small flashlight from his pocket, and shone it on a rectangular grate.

“Right there, Good Boy, is where your part comes in. First, though, you hold this light steady …”

Pook pulled a screwdriver from another pocket and Calven watched, apprehension building, as the grate fell away to show an opening.

“What d’ya mean? Whatcha want me to do?”

Pook bared his ugly teeth in a demon smile and began to explain.