The Passenger (26 page)

R

I had so many things I wanted to write, so many things I wanted to tell him. Sadly, Ryan was still my best friend, even though he was the reason I was lost. I wanted to trust him, but I wasn't sure I could anymore. It seemed unwise to trust anyone. But I had to write back.

November 22, 2015

To: Ryan

From: Jo

I'm here. Sorry I was gone for so long, but it seemed best. I'll keep this brief.

No, I didn't kill Frank. He fell down the stairs, but I didn't know what would happen if the police started looking at me, really looking. And you know they would have. So I left. As for going to Mr. Oliver, it was a choice made from necessity. I didn't need just cash. I needed something only he could get me. Did he tell you he tried to kill me? He did. So I didn't bother him after that.

What do I need to know? Tell me more about this writer. Is she getting close to the truth? That would be bad for everyone, wouldn't it? Except me.

I need money.

Jo

I logged out of the e-mail account, erased my search history, put on my coat, and left the library. I took a walk under a light drizzle, trying to clear my head. Then I heard thunder rumbling and saw a flash of lightning. The rain battered the town. My wool coat was soaked through within minutes. I shuffled along the sidewalk, taking refuge under shop awnings and scaffolding until I found a tavern. I opened the door and walked into complete darkness.

I
T TOOK
two whiskeys to get my bearings. It wasn't until I'd downed the third that I started to think clearly again. My past lives would hold for the moment. It was the present I needed to sort out. My identity was weak, I was almost out of cash, and I needed to find a roof over my head sooner than later.

No one paid me any notice other than to suggest I hang my coat by the fireplace so it might dry off. My wool cap, cropped hair, hollow eyes, and menswear kept me mostly invisible to the opposite sex.

I ordered another whiskey and decided to stay. Maybe a customer would drop a line on a vacant home. The desultory conversations yielded no leads beyond football picks, some petty neighborhood crime, and a marriage on the verge of divorce. I already knew I wouldn't be able to drive that night, so I ordered one more drink and I left.

I slept in the back of my Jeep as a storm battered the roof. In the morning when I opened up the tailgate, the sky was still sulfurous, but the rain had cleared. The air was fresh and damp, and the blast of cold felt like an ice pack for my hangover. I strolled over to a café, used the restroom, brushed my teeth, splashed cold water on my face, and bought a cup of coffee for the road.

I got into my truck, put the keys in the ignition, and the engine sputtered and died. I turned the key again. The battery light blinked on the dashboard, but my Jeep was quiet as a mouse. I pumped the gas pedal and tried again, because that's what you do, you keep trying even when you know the effort is in vain.

As I prayed for my car to start, someone knocked on my window. He could have punched me in the face and I might have been less alarmed. I looked over. A man stood there, maybe fifty, sixty years old, with a full brown beard speckled with gray and a mop of unkempt salt-and-pepper hair. I rolled down the window.

“Sounds like your battery is dead,” he said.

That was what it sounded like.

“Think so,” I said.

“Pop the hood,” he said. “I got jumpers.”

I wasn't one to turn down the assistance of a Good Samaritan. His car was parked a few spots over in the lot. He drove a bright red Chevy truck twice the size of mine. Leaving the engine on, he attached the jumper cables and made a swirling motion with his finger, telling me to start the engine. My Wagoneer sputtered more heartily but never seemed to get any ground. The Good Samaritan told me to shut it down. He walked over to my window.

“It's toast. You need a new battery. There's an auto shop just a few miles up the road. I can give you a lift.”

I nodded, already thinking of excuses and explanations. He shut the hood of my Jeep, then his, and returned the cables to a toolbox in the bed of his Chevy. I got out of my vehicle as he opened the passenger door to his.

I thought maybe I could do it just that one time, ride two miles in the passenger seat without the paralyzing fear and nausea kicking in—but standing there, with the door open, I couldn't.

I looked at the Good Samaritan and smiled. “You mind if I hop in back? I got a wicked hangover this morning, and I wouldn't want to lose my lunch in your pretty new truck.”

The Good Samaritan looked like he was about to rescind his offer, not for my lack of gratitude, but because it occurred to him that my entire head might be a jangling mess of loose screws. He narrowed his eyes, as if a deeper focus on his subject might reveal whether my character had any dangerous faults. I jumped in the back of the truck and sat down, giving him the thumbs-up sign.

“It's very comfortable back here. Thank you so much for your kindness.”

The Good Samaritan shrugged and drove. When we reached the auto parts store, I jumped out of the truck. The Good Samaritan got out of his vehicle and continued to study my demeanor as if I were bouncing around in a padded room.

“I can take it from here. Thank you,” I said, shuffling off.

“You know what kind of battery to get?” he shouted after me.

I turned around and said, “I figured I'd just tell them the make and model, and go from there.”

He nodded his approval. “Do you know how to replace the battery?” he asked.

I hadn't thought that far ahead. When Frank and I were married, every time we heard an unusual squeak or rattle in the engine, we called Otis, who was such a regular at Dubois' we often didn't need to call him at all.

“I guess I don't know about that,” I said to the Good Samaritan.

He made an excellent point, but his generous spirit was making me uncomfortable. In my experience people don't go far out of their way for a complete stranger unless they want something.

“I can probably figure it out,” I said.

The Good Samaritan took a deep, cleansing breath and walked inside of the store ahead of me. He made a beeline for the aisle with the car batteries. I followed him. He pointed to the one I should get. I picked it up and took it to the register. We walked back to his truck. This time, he didn't even bother opening the passenger door. I dropped the battery on the truck bed and climbed in after it. We drove the two miles back to my car, the cold breeze continuing to tame my pounding skull.

Within fifteen minutes, the new battery was swapped for the old and I was sitting behind the wheel, my engine purring. I reached into my wallet, pulled out a twenty-dollar bill that I really couldn't spare, and extended my hand through the window.

“Thank you so much, sir. What do I owe you?”

I'd offended him. He approached the car, shoving his hands in his pockets to make it clear he wasn't accepting any gift of gratitude.

“Got a daughter about your age. She can change a tire and swap out a battery and she never goes anywhere without jumper cables. But say she didn't have a daddy who taught her these things. I would hope someone decent would do the same for her.”

I felt terrible for thinking the things I thought he might be. It had never occurred to me that he might be a pure soul, that there were any of them left. I nodded and said thank you again—a real thank you, not one with guardrails all around it.

He was about to leave and turned back. “I understand why you didn't want to get in the vehicle with a complete stranger, but it's not safe to ride in truck beds. Don't make a habit of it. And don't make a habit of driving around in an old car without jumpers, a spare, and a jack.”

W
HEN
I got back on the road, I headed north in the general direction of Canada, although I stayed off of any main highways. In a few hours, I was in Saranac Lake, stopping for fuel and provisions at a small grocery outlet. Inside was a Western Union office. I took fifty of the eighty dollars I had left and put it on a prepaid credit card. The clerk asked for my social security number and ID. I wrote down a random number that was a few digits off from my social as Debra Maze and left with instructions for making an online transfer to my card.

I went to the main library, sat down at the computer bank, and logged in to my old e-mail. Ryan hadn't written back yet, but it had only been twenty-four hours. I sent another message, marked “Urgent.” I gave Ryan the account number and told him that it would be deactivated in five days. I had no idea if or how he could track me, but I had to cover my bases.

I was just about out of cash and my back was aching something fierce. I didn't think I could spend another night sleeping in the Jeep, so I commenced a wholehearted attempt to find a new home.

I began driving around the foothills searching for overstuffed mailboxes along the roadside, figuring one of them might turn up a vacant vacation home. There were a few candidates that seemed promising, but one stuck out in particular. It was a one-bedroom A-frame cabin nestled on at least five private acres. The house had everything I required. It was hidden behind a stable of evergreens, and the closest neighbors were at least a mile down the road. It even had a generator, which seemed odd, considering the bare-bones nature of the property. When I checked the mailbox, it was swelling with fliers and junk mail, not a single bill, letter, or anything one might consider time-sensitive.

Despite the simple construction, the house was trickier to breach than I'd expected. There was no spare key tucked away, as far as I could discern. But one window was cracked just enough that I managed to wedge it open with my pocketknife. I took an old rocking chair from the porch and balanced precariously on it as I hoisted myself inside.

I had hit the squatter's jackpot. Every inch of that home was covered in dust. It's hard to describe the smell that had been trapped inside: a mixture of dirt, mildew, and stale air. The spare, unadorned furnishings told me it was a bachelor's very occasional retreat. According to his mailbox, his name was Reginald Lee.

I got to cleaning right away since the cloying combination of odors caused a sneezing fit that I recovered from only when I stepped outside again. I finished dusting in an hour. There was no washing machine, so I gathered the bedding and towels I found in the bathroom and drove to the closest Laundromat.

While the linens churned in the centrifuge, I worked out a story that might fly should Reginald Lee decide to take a holiday and find a strange woman sleeping in his bed. I chose to mix a bit of truth in with a hearty serving of fiction.

My husband died. He left me nothing. I had no source of income and couldn't pay the mortgage. My house was in foreclosure and I was evicted. I'd been living out of my car and the occasional motel room, but I had no money left and it was too cold for the car. I came upon your house, Reginald—Reggie? I saw that it was empty. The window was open and I was just looking for a warm place to stop for the night. Please find some charity in your heart during this holiday season.

I pictured Reggie as a soft-spoken, simple man not unfamiliar with the plight of the impoverished. I truly thought he would take pity on me. When I looked in the mirror, I had to own how pitiful I looked. There was no fixing this hair of mine, and I'd lost fifteen pounds in the last month. Reginald would show me some mercy. And I certainly doubted he would accuse me of fucking his wife.

R
EGGIE'S HOME
took some getting used to after the comforts of the Frazier cottage. He had no other form of heat besides a wood-burning stove. At least a cord of lumber was stored under a tarp on the back porch, but I still hadn't any notions about the vigilance or curiosity of his neighbors. If they saw a plume of smoke coming from Reggie's house, would they drop by to investigate?

That first night, I slept in a wool cap and thick socks under every blanket I could find. In the early hours of morning, when one would expect to hear only the whistling of wind and critters crawling across the roof, looking for trespass and shelter, I heard something else. It was a low humming sound. It could have been a furnace, but Reggie didn't have heat. It wasn't the refrigerator or any other household appliance. I shrugged off the mysterious noise and attempted sleep. I woke with my joints achy and my head still in a dreamy fog. I had bought basic provisions the first time I ventured out. I made coffee and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for breakfast. I prayed that Ryan would come through for me since I didn't have many more peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in my budget.

Reginald didn't have much in the form of entertainment. He had an old TV and a DVD player, but no movies, which surprised me. His bookcase was primarily dedicated to Clive Cussler and stacks of
Guns & Ammo
magazines. He also had a copy of
The Anarchist Cookbook
,
The Turner Diaries
,
I'm OK—You're OK
, and
Who Moved My Cheese?
Reggie was hard to figure from his bookshelf, but I had to guess he wasn't the laid-back soul I had imagined.

There were no other personal touches to the cabin—no photographs, no artwork, no decorative accents beyond a dusty old rug, a plaid La-Z-Boy chair, a boot rack, and some tea towels with daisies on them. He did, however, have a shockingly extensive supply of canned goods, freeze-dried meals, and bottled water, as if he were anticipating the end of days. Out of respect for my missing host, I tried to limit my use of his stash to one can of soup a day. That humming noise I heard came and went. I didn't pay it much mind at first. Every home I've ever stayed in had its own kind of chatter.