December 5, 2005, 7:35 a.m.
Cabel parks his new car next to Janie’s as she arrives at school.
It’s not a brand-new car. Just new to him.
But it is a Beemer.
People on the south side of Fieldridge do not drive Beemers. Well, maybe the 1976 variety. Definitely not the 2000 variety. Janie’s mouth opens, and then she presses her lips shut. Shakes her head and walks toward the building.
He’s right behind her. “It’s six years old, Janie. Come on.”
Janie’s eyebrow is permanently raised as he tries to keep up with her on the way in to school.
She loses him when he slips and flips on the icy sidewalk.
Janie finds Carrie by the doorway to English class. “What’s the scoop on the pimpster wheels out there?” Janie asks her.
“I don’t know, chica. He must be makin’ some big cake. I can’t believe he hasn’t been expelled yet.”
“Has he actually been arrested?”
“No. Shay’s daddy worked it out with the cops. Cabel was at all the parties this weekend with her.”
“And now he’s driving that.”
“It’s a friggin’ 323Ci convertible. Stu says seventeen grand at least for one of those, used.”
Janie’s blood boils. “This is just…just…” The anger swells, and she can’t come up with a word. Carrie is giving her the evil eye.
“Unbef*ckinglievable?” comes a voice from behind her.
She takes a quick breath, watching Carrie’s eyes grow wide. “Shit.” She turns around and there’s Cabel.
“S’cuse me, please,” he says politely, and squeezes past them into the classroom. Janie catches a whiff of the cologne he’s wearing. Her stomach flips against her will.
Carrie’s eyes sparkle. She giggles. “Oops.”
Janie rolls her eyes and laughs reluctantly. “Yeah.”
12:45 p.m.
For days, Janie’s been in other people’s dreams during study hall, with minimal success in helping them change the dreams. She is still puzzled by one thing.
Make that two things.
First, how did Miss Stubin get Mr. McVicker to ask her for help? And second, what was she saying to him to get him to change his dream?
Sorry. Make that three. Three things.
How the hell can Miss Stubin see in the dreams, when she’s blind? And how can she be there when she’s dead? Okay, that’s four. Janie knows. There are probably more than that, even.
This is so frustrating.
She knows she needs to work harder.
And she’s losing weight. Rapidly.
She was already thin enough.
Now her cheeks look caved in, like her mother’s. And she has dark circles under her eyes, from getting up so often in the night, working on her own dreams.
She finds Snickers bars in the strangest places.
(She knows they’re from him.)
(She wonders if they’re laced with pot.)
Cabel has been sitting in his old spot again the past few weeks. But he doesn’t sleep.
He reads.
Janie sort of wishes he would fall asleep. But she also worries what she might see.
Exams are coming. She opens her math book and studies it. Every now and then, she glances at Cabel, whose back is to her. From what Carrie said, he was at the Hill parties again all weekend. With Shay. And a lot of drugs. Janie sighs. Pulls herself out of the threatening misery and focuses on the math book again. Refuses to go there.
1:01 p.m.
Cabel’s head nods, and jerks back up. He shakes his head swiftly and glances over his shoulder at Janie. Janie looks down. Then he slouches in his chair and puts his chin in his hand. His hair falls softly around his shoulders and over his eyes. Janie reluctantly admires his profile as he turns a page in the book.
His head nods.
The book slips from his fingers.
It doesn’t wake him when it thumps on the table.
Janie feels his energy.
She concentrates, and slips into his dream slowly. Another positive step—she’s learning to control the speed of her arrivals and departures. It’s much easier than—
1:03 p.m.
He’s sitting in a dark jail cell. Alone. Above his head is a sign that says, “Drug Pusher.”
Janie watches from outside the cell.
His head is down.
The scene changes abruptly.
He’s in Janie’s room, sitting on the floor, writing something on a pad of paper. Alone. He looks up at her, beckoning her with his eyes. She takes a few steps forward.
He holds up the notepad.
It’s not what you think.
That’s what it says.
He tears off that sheet of paper. Below it is another sheet in his handwriting.
I think I’m in love with you.
Janie’s stomach lurches.
He looks at the tablet for a long moment. Then he turns to Janie and rips off one more sheet. He watches her face as she reads it.
How do you like my new trick?
He grins at her, and fades.
The scene changes again. Back in the jail cell. The sign above his head is gone.
He is alone. She watches from outside. His head is down. Then he looks up at her.
A ring of keys floats in front of her.
“Let me out,” he says. “Help me.”
Janie is startled. She moves automatically and unlocks the cell. He walks to her, takes her in his arms. He looks into her eyes. He sinks his fingers into her hair and kisses her.
Janie steps out of herself as she’s kissing Cabel. She walks away into a dark hallway and eases herself back to awareness in the library.
She blinks.
Sits up.
Looks at him.
He’s still asleep at his table.
She rubs her eyes and wonders:
How the hell did he do that?
And.
Now what?
1:30 p.m.
He slides into the seat across the table from Janie. His eyes are moist with sleep and mischief. “Well?”
“Well what,” she mutters.
“It worked, right?”
Janie squelches a grin. Poorly. “How the hell did you do that?” she demands.
His face sobers. “It’s the only way I could think of to get you to talk to me.”
“Okay, I get that. But how did you do it?”
He hesitates. Glances at the clock. Shrugs. “Doesn’t look like I have time to explain right now,” he says. “When would you like to go out with me so we can talk about it?” A grin flirts with his lips.
He’s got her cornered.
And he knows it.
Janie chuckles, defeated. “You are such a bastard.”
“When,” he demands. “I promise, all my heart, I’ll be your house elf for the rest of my life if I fail to meet you at the appointed date and time.” He leans forward. “Promise,” he says again. He holds up two fingers.
The bell rings.
They stand up.
She’s not answering.
He comes around the table toward her and pushes her gently against the wall. Sinks his lips into hers.
He tastes like spearmint.
She can’t stop the flipping in her stomach.
He pulls back and touches her cheek, her hair. “When,” he whispers. Urgently.
She clears her throat and blinks. “A-a-after school works for me,” she says.
They grab their backpacks and run. As they slip in the doorway of government class, he shoves a PowerBar in her hand.
She sits at her desk and looks at it. She raises her eyebrow at him, from across the room.
“Protein,” he mouths. He gestures like a weight lifter.
She laughs out loud.
Opens it.
Sneaks bites when the teacher isn’t looking.
It’s not as good as a Snickers.
But it’ll do.
In P.E., they’re playing badminton.
“I’m watching you,” he growls as they change sides. “Don’t you dare sneak out of here without me.”
She flashes him a wicked grin.
After school, Janie exits the locker room and looks around, then heads for the parking lot. He’s standing between their cars. His hair, dripping, has a few tiny icicles attached.
“Aha!” he says when he sees her, as if he’s foiled her escape plans.
She rolls her eyes. “Where to, dreamboy?”
Cabel hesitates.
Works his jaw.
“My house,” he says. “You lead the way.”
She freezes. Her stomach churns. “Is…is he…” She swallows hard.
He squints in the pale sunlight and reads the question in her voice. “Don’t worry, Janie. He’s dead.”
WHAT BECOMES THE LONGEST DAY
It’s still December 5, 2005
Three o’clock.
Janie pulls into Cabel’s driveway, tentatively. He pulls in behind her and jumps out of the car, grabbing his backpack and closing his car door gently. It clicks perfectly, solid. “I just love that sound,” he says wistfully. “Anyway. Follow me.”
He opens the rickety service door to the garage. It creaks and groans. He flips on the garage light and takes Janie by the hand. The garage is tidy. It smells pleasant, like old grass clippings and gasoline. Next to the door that leads into the house hangs Cabel’s skateboard. Janie smiles and touches it.
“Remember that?” she says. “That was a sweet thing for you to do. I hadn’t exactly planned on walking home that night.”
“How could I forget. You slammed the gymnasium door handle right into my gut.”
“That was you?”
He gives her a patronizing smile. “Indeed.”
They go inside.
The house is tiny. Clean. Threadbare.
She startles when she sees the kitchen. She’s seen this room before, in his dream. The table. And the chairs.
“Jesus,” she says under her breath. She looks up. The ceiling fan is there. “Oh, God.” She turns and looks where the front door would be, where the middle-aged man came in, and it beckons to her. She drops her backpack on the floor, shuts her eyes, and covers her face with her hands.
And he’s touching her shoulders.
Wrapping his arms around her.
Stroking her hair.
Whispering, his lips to her ear. “He’s not here. It’s just a dream. That never happened. Never happened.” And she’s soothed by the words. She breathes him in. Her hands leave her face and find his shoulders, his chest. She touches his chest lightly, wondering if scars lie beneath his shirt. Wonders if that dream really happened. And then he’s kissing her neck and she’s falling, turning her head to find his mouth with her lips, and she’s tracing his jaw with her fingertips and kissing him hard, their tongues tasting each other madly, and he’s pressing into her and she into him, bodies shivering, like they are two scared, lost children, starving, starving to be touched, to be held, by someone, anyone, the first one they can find who seems familiar enough, safe enough, strong enough to rescue them. They breathe, heavy. Hard. Their fingers strain at cotton.
And then they slow down.
Stop. Hold. Rest.
Before one of them, or both, begins to sob.
Before they break another piece that needs to be fixed.
They stand together for a moment, collecting.
And then he finds her fingers and strings them in his, and leads her to the living room.
On the coffee table rests a stack of books.
He looks at Janie. “This is how,” he says, his voice catching. “You know these books now, don’t you.”
“Yes,” she says. She kneels next to the table and lays the dream books out.
“I’ve been practicing,” he says. “Hoping.”
Dreaming, she adds silently. “Tell me.”
He sits beside her with two sodas and an apology. “I don’t have anything stronger,” he says. “Anyway. I read this book about lucid dreams and taught myself to dream what I wanted to dream about.”
She smiles. “Yup. I did it too.”
“Good.” He sounds businesslike. “What about the sleep clinic?”
“Ugh. Great idea, but not cool, as it turned out. I went in, got stuck in a dream when the lab tech opened the door to the sleep room. Walked out.” She pauses. “It was Mr. Abernethy’s dream. I just didn’t want to know what that country-fried rube was dreaming about.”
Cabel chokes on his Pepsi. “Good call.” He grows serious a moment, thinking. But then waves the thought away. “Yeah. Really good call.”
“Huh?”
“Nothing. Okay, so I first tried to dream me saying specific things to you. But I couldn’t get it to happen right. Too much”—he pauses, glancing sidelong at her—“too much came out of my mouth. More than I wanted to say. I couldn’t control it.” He shifts in his seat. “So I thought I was screwed. But then I thought of writing the words on the page. I practiced it a bunch of times, and the last few nights it worked.”
“But you didn’t dream me into the dream. At least, not until the end.”
“Right. Because I could control it better if I had myself alone, knowing that if—when—I dreamed it around you, you would be there.”
Janie closes her eyes, picturing it. “Clever,” she murmurs. She opens her eyes. “Really clever, Cabe.”
“So you could read the tablet?” he says. His face flushes a little.
“Yes.”
“All of it?”
She searches his face. “Yes.”
“And?”
She’s quiet. “I don’t know what to say. I’m really confused.”
He takes her hand and leans back on the couch. “I have a lot of explaining to do. Will you hear me out?”
She takes a breath, and lets it out slowly. All the reasons to hate him flood back into her brain. Her self-protective nature percolates. She does not want to ride this roller coaster again. “Well,” she says finally, “I can’t imagine I’ll believe a word of it. You’ve been lying to me from the beginning, Cabe. Since before, well, anything.” Her voice catches.
She looks away.
Withdraws her hand from his.
Stands up abruptly. “Bathroom?” she squeaks.
“F*ck,” he mutters. “Through the kitchen, first door on the right.”
She finds it, sobs silently over the sink for a moment, blows her nose, and sits on the edge of the tub until she gets it together again. Realizes she’s already on this roller coaster, and sitting in the front car.
When she gets to the living room, he’s ending a cell-phone call, saying “tomorrow” firmly, elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. He flips the phone off.
“Look,” he says in a dull voice, not looking at her.
“There’s some shit I can’t tell you. Not yet. Maybe not for a while. But I’ll answer any question—any question I can right now. If I can’t, and you don’t like that, you are free to hate me forever. I won’t bother you.”
She is confused. “Okay,” she says slowly. Decides to start with an easy one. “Who were you talking to, just now.”
He closes his eyes. Groans. “Shay.”
Janie stands in the doorway to the living room, tottering. Furious tears spring to her eyes. But when she speaks, her voice is deadly calm. “Jesus Christ, Cabe.” She turns and grabs her backpack and walks firmly out the same way they entered the house.
Gets in her car.
She can’t get out of the driveway.
She thinks about ramming his pimpmobile.
But that wouldn’t be nice for Ethel.
“Goddamnit!” she screams, and puts her head on the steering wheel. She can’t even drive through the yard without hurting Ethel, because of the stupid drainage ditch.
And then she hears the front door slam. He’s running to move his car. He starts it up and pulls it into the grass next to hers so she can back out.
She doesn’t know why she’s waiting.
He’s coming to her window.
She can still go now.
He taps.
She hesitates, and then rolls down the window an inch.
“I’m so sorry, Janie,” he says.
He’s bawling.
He goes back inside.
She sits in the driveway, freezing, for thirty-six minutes. Arguing with herself.
Because she thinks she’s in love with him too. And there are two ways she can be a fool in love right now.
She chooses the harder one.
And knocks on the door.
He’s on the phone again when he opens it. His eyes are rimmed in red. “I’ll try,” he says, and hangs up the phone. Stands there. Looking like shit.
“Let’s try this again,” Janie says, angry, hands on her hips. “Who were you talking to on the phone just now, Cabe?” Her words slice through the crisp air.
“My boss.”
She’s taken aback for a moment. “You mean your dealer? Your pimp?” The sarcasm rings in the dusky house.
He closes his eyes. “No.”
She stands there. Uncertain.
He opens his eyes. Takes off his glasses and wipes his face with his sleeve. His voice has lost all hope. “Is there any chance,” he says evenly, “that you’ll come for a ride with me? My boss is interested in talking to you.”
She blinks. She gets nervous. “Why?” she asks.
“I can’t tell you. You’ll have to trust me.”
Janie takes a step back. The words ring familiar in her ears. She asked the same of him once.
She deliberates.
“I’ll drive separately,” she says quietly.
4:45 p.m.
She follows his car to downtown Fieldridge. He turns into a large parking lot that serves the back entrances to the library, post office, police station, Frank’s Bar & Grille, the Fieldridge bakery, and a small fleet of high-rise apartments and condos. He drives into a parking space. She pulls in next to him.
He walks toward the line of buildings and, using a key, enters an unmarked door.
She follows him inside.
They go down a flight of stairs, and a room opens out in front of them, with a dozen partitioned offices and a separate office with a closed door.
Half a dozen people look up as they approach.
“Cabe.” They nod, one at a time. He nods in response, and knocks lightly on the door to the office.
On the window, in black lettering, it says, “Captain Fran Komisky.”
The door opens. A bronze-haired woman urges them to come in. Her hair is cropped short, and it frames her brown skin. She’s wearing a black tailored skirt and jacket with a crisp white blouse. “Sit,” she says.
They sit.
She sits behind her desk, which is littered with papers and has three phones and two computers resting on it.
The captain regards the two visitors for a moment. She rests her elbows on the desk, makes a tent with her fingers, and presses them against her mouth. Her eyes crinkle slightly with age.
She lowers her hands.
“So. Ms. Hannagan, is it? I’m Fran Komisky. Everybody calls me Captain.” She leans over the desk and reaches for Janie’s hand. Janie slips forward in her seat to shake it.
“Pleased to meet you, Captain,” Janie says mechanically. She glances at Cabel. He’s looking at his lap.
“Likewise,” Captain says to Janie. “Cabe, you look like hell. Shall we get this thing straightened out?”
“Yes, sir,” Cabel says.
Janie looks up, wondering if Cabe means to call her that. It doesn’t seem to bother the captain.
“Janie,” she says in a tough voice. “Cabe here tells me he’d rather quit his job than lose you. Quite a young man he is, I must say. Anyway,” she continues, “since that announcement affects me greatly, I’ve invited you here to discuss this little problem. And you need to know that I’d rather lose my left leg than lose Cabe at this stage of the game.”
Janie swallows. Wonders what the hell is going on.
The captain looks at Cabe. “Cabe says you can be trusted with a secret. Is that true?”
Janie starts. “Yes, ma’am…sir,” she says.
Captain smiles. Breaks the tension a bit.
“So. You’re here because this dear boy has been lying to you, and I made him do it, and he’s afraid you won’t believe a word he says ever again. Ms. Hannagan, do you think you can believe me?”
Janie nods. What else can she do?
“Good. Somewhere I have a list of things I’ve jotted down, things I’m supposed to tell you, and I’ll trust that if you have further questions, Cabel can answer them for you. And you’ll believe him.”
It sounds like an order.
Captain pages through the pile of papers and slips on half-glasses. Her phone rings, and she reaches automatically for a button, silencing it. “Here we are. First.” She glances at Cabe, and then back at the paper. “Cabe is not ‘involved’ with Shay Wilder.” She looks up, peering over her glasses. “I can’t really prove that, Ms. Hannagan, but I’ve seen him nearly hurl after spending a recent evening with her. You good with that one?”
Janie nods. She feels like she’s in somebody’s weird dream.
“I said, are you good with that one?” Captain’s voice booms.
“Yes, sir,” Janie says. She sits up straighter in the chair.
“Good. Second. Cabe is not a drug dealer, pusher, liaison, user, and/or other in real life. He just plays one on TV.” She pauses, but doesn’t wait for a response this time.
“Third.” She sits back, sets the paper on the desk, and taps a pen against her teeth. “We’re this close”—she holds up her thumb and forefinger an inch apart—“to closing a major drug bust in North Fieldridge, up on the Hill. If this gets messed up because you whisper one word to anybody, and I mean anybody, I will hold you personally responsible, Ms. Hannagan. Besides Cabel and Principal Abernethy, you are the only one who knows about this. Are we clear?”
Janie nods, eyes wide. “Sir, yes, sir.”
“Fine.” Captain turns to Cabe. Her face softens. Slightly.
“Cabel,” she says. “My dear boy. Are you with me or not? I need your head in the game. Now. Or this thing is shot to hell.”
Cabel glances at Janie, and waits. She startles. He’s leaving it up to her. She nods.
He sits up straight in his chair, looks Captain in the eye. “Yes, sir, I’m in the game.”
Captain nods, and flashes an approving grin at both of them. “Good. Are we through here?”
Janie shifts uncomfortably.
And then she gives Cabel a haunting look.
“F*ck,” she whispers, and digs her fingernails into the chair’s armrests.
5:14 p.m.
Janie tumbles into a bank vault, where a black-haired cop sits on the floor, tied up. He wrestles with the ropes around his wrists and the gag in his mouth—
5:15 p.m.
She’s back in the chair, next to Cabel, except Cabel is walking behind her, moving toward his chair again. The door is closed now. He sits down.
“Thanks,” she whispers, and clears her throat. “Didn’t see that one coming.”
Captain is staring at her, eyes narrow. She looks from Janie to Cabel, back to Janie. She clears her throat. Loudly. Waiting.
Janie’s face goes white.
Cabel’s eyes go wide.
“Do you need medical assistance, Ms. Hannagan?” the captain finally says.
“No, sir. I’m fine, thank you.”
“Cabe?”
“She’s fine, sir.”
Captain taps her pen on the desk, deliberating. She speaks slowly. “Is there anything else you two want to tell me about what just happened here?”
Cabel looks at Janie. “It’s your call,” he says quietly.
She hesitates.
Looks Captain in the eye.
“No, sir,” she says. “Just…that…one of your officers is asleep at his desk and he’s having a nasty dream. Looks like a bank robbery gone bad for the cops. He’s tied up in a vault. Sir.”
Captain’s face doesn’t change. She taps her lips with the pen now, and she’s holding the wrong end. Blue ink leaves a tiny dotted trail under her nose.
“Which officer, Janie?” the captain asks slowly.
“I…I don’t know his name. Short black hair. Early forties, maybe? Stocky. He was tied up with rope around his ankles and wrists, and had a white cloth gag around his mouth. Last I saw, anyway. Things change.”
“Rabinowitz,” Captain and Cabel say together.
“You want to double-check those facts for me, Cabe?”
“Sir, no offense, sir, but I don’t need to. I think you might like to go question him yourself.”
Captain tilts her head slightly, thinking. She pushes her chair back. “Don’t go anywhere, you two,” she says. She gives them both a strong, hard look before leaving. A look that says, “You better not f*ck with me.” When Captain opens the door and strides out, Janie grips the chair in anticipation. “Leave it open, Cabe,” she gasps as she goes blind.
And she’s back in the vault.