Me. She meant me.
We rocked. Mom kept her eyes closed, and I kept watching the sky, wondering if it would tell me something, too. Then I cleared my throat and said, “After you eat, I was wondering. Can we go buy supplies for next semester?”
“Yes, Delaney. Yes, we can.”
Ordinary teenager. That’s what I was today. Sleeping in. Lunch with Dad. School shopping with Mom. I could be salutatorian if I pulled up the math grade next semester. If not, I’d still probably finish in the top 5 percent of my class. No valedictorian, but I had great college essay material. I could still get into a good college, have a solid future.
Except when we left the office-supply store that feeling started, that pull at my body, the one that reminded me that I wasn’t an ordinary teenager. We were on the road, getting closer and closer. And while we were at a stoplight I looked over to my right, where the pull was leading me, and saw Troy’s car parked at the far end of the gas station lot. I bent over and pretended to look through my bags.
“We forgot batteries,” I said. “For my calculator.”
“We probably have some lying around at home.” And then she smiled at me, like she was glad I was worried about school, like she thought I was the old Delaney Maxwell. She didn’t know I was faking it.
“Let’s pick some up here, just in case.”
The pull was strong, tugging me toward the convenience store attached to the garage. It was strong, but there was no itch yet, no shaking fingers, no imminent death. To be fair, I didn’t know how imminent death was. It was faster than expected with Carson. Slower with the old woman in the assisted-living facility, who still wasn’t dead last I checked. My death took eleven minutes. Troy’s took three days. It was supposed to, anyway.
But someone here was sick. Definitely sick. Definitely dying.
Mom eased the car into the spot directly in front of the entrance. We entered the store and I headed toward the counter. The batteries were stacked behind the register, where the cigarettes should’ve been. I guess they were more valuable. I drummed my fingers on the countertop and left a clean handprint on the dirty surface.
Nobody was behind the counter. The clerk was probably in the single bathroom in the back corner of the store. Because that’s where I felt the pull. Someone sat on the single folding chair outside the restroom, coffee cup at his feet, newspaper in front of his face. “Hi, Troy,” I called from the front of the store.
Troy lowered the paper. He didn’t seem surprised to see me. He seemed curious. But then Mom walked up behind me and his eyes grew wide.
“Troy! I didn’t see you sitting there. What are you doing here?”
I smiled a smug smile at him, asking, Yes, what exactly are you doing here?
He shook the pages in front of him. “Reading the paper. Escaping the cold. My car doesn’t have heat.” Which caused Mom’s face to fold. Mine would’ve folded, too, except I’d been in his car, and it most assuredly had heat.
The bathroom door swung open and a heavyset man lumbered out. He had a plaid button-down shirt tucked into baggy jeans. His receding brown hair was tinged with gray. And his lower jaw was missing. I mean, his mouth wasn’t hanging open or anything, but the bone that used to be there was gone. He limped toward the front of the store, one hand on the thigh of the leg dragging behind. His lagging foot scraped against the floor, whining in objection with each step.
And as he walked toward the front, the pull of death spread out from him, like his dragging foot was leaving pieces of it behind. So that the whole store felt a little like death. It was suffocating. And disorienting. And I wanted to go, go, go, but I couldn’t leave Troy alone with him.
And on top of that, I knew him. Well, I didn’t actually, but I knew of him. One of the ice fishermen. Related to James McGovern, whose house was broken into to save me. Maybe his brother. Maybe his cousin. I wasn’t sure. Me to Carson to James McGovern to the man who was dying. Three degrees of separation.
“Leroy,” said Mom, who apparently knew him better than I did. “How’re you feeling?”
“Hanging in there,” he said, but it came out all garbled, tongue and palate, nothing else.
I looked at a spot right behind him, pretending to be braver than I was. “Leroy,” I said, like we knew each other. “Do you know Troy?” I gestured to where Troy sat in the back of the store. “This is Troy Varga. Troy, Leroy.”
Troy glared at me, then smiled at Leroy. Leroy raised a hand toward him in greeting. Then I sucked in a deep breath and continued. “Hey, that rhymes. Easy to remember those names together, don’t you think?” Mom laughed. Troy scowled. He knew exactly what I was doing, but he couldn’t stop me.
Troy wouldn’t hurt Leroy if he was connected to him. Not unless he wanted his name remembered along with Leroy’s. I remembered how he ran from the house fire. How he ran from me in my neighbor’s backyard and when sirens came for Carson. He was scared of any affiliation. It was why the woman at his work was still alive. He didn’t want to raise any suspicion.
Mom bought the batteries while I stood in the back near Troy.
“Do you two have plans tonight?” Mom asked.
“I was planning on spending New Year’s Eve with you and Dad. Like we always do. Maybe you can make fudge.”
“That’d be lovely, honey. Troy, you’re welcome to join us.”
Then he smiled a smug smile at me, and I was left wondering whether I had successfully saved Leroy from Troy, or whether I had put my family in immediate danger.
“I’ll be in the car, Delaney,” Mom said after she paid for the batteries.
Troy looked at me with a slightly sideways expression. He leaned forward and whispered, “You’re . . .” He clenched and unclenched his fists, and I knew what he was thinking. I was the girl who ran when she got spooked. I was the girl who hid in the back of the funeral home. I was the girl who had to be saved from the lake. He hadn’t gotten to know me, really. He didn’t know I wasn’t stupid. I was smart. I knew what I was doing.
“You’re not helping,” he said.
“I’m not killing him, either,” I whispered back.
I finally understood what I could not do. I could not save them from death. Life will end. For them, for me. But I also knew what I could do. Troy was wrong. Whatever I had—a damaged brain, a knowledge, a sense, or—like Troy thought—a purpose, I could help. Correction: I would help.
I waltzed up to the front of the store. “Leroy,” I said. “Troy and I were just having a discussion here. A debate, really. And we’d like your input. If you had one day left to live, what would you do?”
Troy turned green. Leroy grinned. “You mean like tell off my boss or buy that motorcycle I’ve had my eye on?”
“Whatever,” I said. “What would you do, if it was the one last thing you could?”
He slumped in the plastic seat behind the register and ran his hand through his thinning hair. “Well, I’d take the dog,” he said, pointing to the brown lump snoozing under his feet. “And me and him’d go down the coast. Watch the waves.”
“That’s it?” Troy said, standing up and walking toward us.
“Yeah, that’d do it,” he said, moving his tongue along the place where his jaw used to be.
Troy shook his head and walked out of the store. I leaned across the counter and watched as Leroy ran his hand along his dog’s head.
“Leroy,” I whispered. “Do it.”