“License and registration.” He was at the window now, peering in at them both. Loo leaned over and opened the glove compartment, hoping there would be something inside and there was, stained and torn and zipped inside a plastic baggie.
“I left my license at home,” she said and handed the papers over. The cop looked at them, then turned the flashlight into Loo’s eyes.
“You been drinking?”
“No, sir,” said Loo.
“We were just fooling around,” said Marshall.
“I wasn’t talking to you,” said the man.
Maybe I can cry, Loo thought. He might let us go if I cry.
The policeman told them to stay put and walked back to the squad car. Loo bit hard into the side of her cheek but instead of tears her mouth flooded with the taste of rust.
“Do you even have a license?” Marshall asked.
“No.”
“Maybe it won’t matter. Maybe he’ll just give us a warning.”
They sat together in silence, all the closeness that had wound between them seeping away. Marshall was no longer touching Loo. Instead he was pressed against the passenger side door, his fingers on the handle. Loo kept her eyes on the rearview mirror. After a few minutes she saw the cop come back along the car, stopping for a moment to double-check the license plate. He lifted his radio and said something into it. Then he took his gun out of the holster and pointed it at her.
“Step out of the vehicle.”
In all of her years—with all of the weapons Hawley carried and hid around the house, the derringers and .48’s and .35’s and rifles—Loo had never had a gun pointed at her before. Bile rose in her throat. It was as if she’d been locked down into place on an amusement park ride that wouldn’t stop spinning. The policeman’s Glock was loaded. She imagined the boom it would make when he squeezed the trigger. The velocity of the bullets. She opened the door and stepped out of the car.
“You,” the policeman said to Marshall. “Put your hands on the dashboard and keep them there. And you,” he said to Loo. “Put your hands on the hood.”
She turned her back and pressed her palms against the car. It was like watching a movie, like this was all happening to someone else, until the policeman put his gun back in its holster and began to run his hands along the length of her body, touching her back, the sides of her breasts, and each of her legs. Then he took hold of one of her arms and twisted it behind her and she felt the snap of the handcuff pulling tight around her wrist.
“I’m not drunk,” she said, her voice shaking.
“Maybe not,” the man said. “But this car is stolen.” He took hold of her other arm and there she was, a criminal, and he was leading her back to the squad car. He put Loo in the backseat and slammed the door. She watched through the metal grate as he took Marshall out of the Firebird and went through the same process, patting the boy down and handcuffing him. Marshall was pushed in the back beside her and the policeman got into the driver’s seat. He turned off the lights and then they were pulling away, leaving the Firebird behind on the side of the road.
“You’ve made a mistake,” said Loo. “That’s my grandmother’s car. She knows I’ve got it.”
“Then why’d she report it stolen?”
“I don’t know.”
“What’s your grandmother’s name?”
“Mabel Ridge.”
“The registration says the car belongs to Lily Ridge.”
Loo swallowed hard. “That’s my mother.”
“Then she can sort it out.”
“My mother’s dead.”
“Sure she is.” The policeman got on the radio and gave his location. When the reply came through it was loud and garbled with static, like someone moaning into a fan.
“It’ll be all right,” said Marshall. “I’ve been arrested before.”
“You have?” Loo asked.
“For protesting. With my mom. We snuck on board a commercial trawler and slashed the nets.”
The policeman rolled his eyes.
“My mother is dead,” said Loo.
The policeman turned up the radio.
—
AT THE STATION the lieutenant on desk duty tried calling Mabel Ridge, but the phone just rang and rang. In the meantime the officers separated the teenagers, made Loo take a Breathalyzer, then put her in a small, tight room with no windows that smelled of greasy Italian sandwiches, with a bench and a chipped plastic folding table and wire mesh over a slot in the door. The walls were covered with water stains, and there was a metal air vent in the ceiling with a wad of old chewing gum pressed into the corner. Loo knew the police were trying to scare her. She knew that, and yet the room was so depressing, and no matter how hard she tried, she found that she was scared, just like they wanted her to be.
When Hawley arrived he was out of breath, as if he’d run all the way from their house. She expected him to yell but he wouldn’t even look at her. He sat down on the bench and put some papers on the table. He asked for a pen, and the desk clerk who had brought him in handed over a ballpoint and Hawley thanked him. Then the clerk stepped into the hall for a moment and they were alone.
“Dad,” Loo said.
“Don’t say anything,” said Hawley.
The policeman who had arrested her came into the room and propped the door open with a wedge. He sat on the table, the polished leather of his holster creaking, the Glock he had pointed at Loo snug beneath its strap.
“I’m Officer Temple.” He shook Hawley’s hand. “Have we met before?”
“I don’t think so,” said Hawley.
“Her boyfriend says he didn’t know the car was stolen.”
“She doesn’t have a boyfriend,” said Hawley.
“Whatever you say,” said the man. “The boy’s got a record. But your daughter was the one driving. It might be time for you to get a lawyer down here.”
“All right,” said Hawley.
But it wasn’t right at all. It was never going to be all right.
Loo put her hand on her father’s arm.
“Could we have a minute?”
The officer nodded, then kicked the wedge so it was set firmly under the door. “This locks from the outside. Just knock if it slides shut.”
As soon as Officer Temple was down the hall, Hawley got up and snatched the wedge from the floor and put it in his pocket. The door closed slowly. The lock clicked. Hawley took the cap off of the pen. He was sweating, dark patches underneath both arms and a strip in the center of his T-shirt.
“After all I’ve taught you,” he said.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re supposed to think things through before you do them. You’re supposed to be smart.” He spread his fingers across the paper on the table and filled in their address, his phone, her name. “Maybe this is my fault. Maybe I’ve sheltered you too much,” he said. “The world is a rotten place and you’ve got to find a way to be rotten if you’re going to live in it. But you also have to be smart.”
“I didn’t steal that car,” she said.