Hide in Place Read online

  Yes.

  And then? What did Mr. Blue talk about?

  I don’t know. Mostly he just asked us about our lives. Pause. He kind of just listened.

  That’s it? How often did you go back?

  I don’t know. Like maybe ten times?

  Like maybe ten or definitely ten?

  I don’t know. I really don’t. We went like once a week. Sometimes twice.

  Once a week! Sometimes twice! Where had she been? In her memory Alfie was always home, quiet with homework in his room or helping her with dinner.

  And that’s all it was? Beer, joints, and oversharing?

  Yeah, he said.

  She gritted her teeth. Look, Jordan, do you have any idea why Mr. Blue took Alfie?

  Long pause. He started typing, then changed his mind.

  She typed, Do you think Alfie went with him on purpose? It was a question that needed asking, but asking it made the pizza turn sour in her stomach. She got up and filled her cup with water from the tap, drank it in huge, thirsty gulps.

  I don’t know, Jordan typed. Maybe. They talked a lot.

  What? Alfie talked a lot? With Owen fucking Hopper? Alfie could barely string a sentence together under the best of circumstances, the stutter twisting his face with frustration.

  Her fingers hovered with uncertainty over her phone. She had to ask.

  Was that all they did? Talk?

  Silence on the other end.

  Jordan? How about you? Did Mr. Blue ever touch you?

  More silence.

  Were you dealing for him?

  He left the conversation.

  She sat down and put her head in her hands. Dammit, dammit, dammit. An extreme weariness dragged at her and she slumped to the table, her forehead against the yellow-checked tablecloth.

  Hopper must have been staking her out for weeks before making his move. Watching her, watching her son. Had he stood outside her house and looked through the windows? Had he followed her on her bus route? She thought of all the times she had followed him during that blue-white September three years ago, bulky in her disguises. Had he done the same? He could have been the man waiting for a ride in the supermarket parking lot, the heavyset guy filling a car at a pump next to hers, the dude in the parka handing out flyers on Main Street or the one walking the poodle around the bend from her front porch. He could have been anyone. And then, when did he change his mind? When did he notice Alfie and decide to focus on him?

  “Oh, Alfie,” she murmured into the tablecloth. “What did you do?”

  After some time, her heart rate slowed, the blood receded from her cheeks. She sat up and texted Ed Boswell. Ask Jordan Rogers about the drugs he’s been selling for Hopper.

  Exposing Jordan’s secret wouldn’t help her cause, but that boy was almost as lost as her own. Perhaps a brush with the law at this young age would conclude his budding criminal career.

  CHAPTER

  27

  WHEN ALFIE WAS nine, his father took him to an arts festival in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Or rather he took him along, since he was trying to secure a meeting with a gallery owner and Alfie’s babysitter was out of town.

  The arts festival occupied a square mile of old warehouses and factory buildings long since converted to studios and office spaces. Jugglers, acrobats, and musicians claimed corners and performed to the cheers of children and adults, food carts steamed, and the sparkling spring sunlight made the world bright and sharp.

  Alfie followed his dad into a building, stumbled, and almost fell because he couldn’t keep his eyes from the roiling action on the street. In the gallery, while Theo waited for the owner to finish showing other artists’ works to a client, Alfie ran to the window and stuck his head out (no screens or guards on these windows, another wonder). From the sixth floor, the crowd below seemed even more vibrant, and his eyes didn’t know where to land, what to watch, all of it exciting.

  He stretched his body further into the air, and then someone grabbed him by his belt, was pulling him inside. Alfie looked up at the gray-haired man who held him. It was the gallery owner, the one his father had been waiting to see.

  “Mr. Bird,” the man said to Theo. “I think it’s best if you come back another time. We should talk when it’s quieter. Alone.” He smiled when he said this, and his voice was gentle, but he held Alfie in place with a stern, firm hand.

  Theo glared at Alfie, gripped his shoulder, and said to the other man, “Five minutes.”

  He led Alfie to the elevator, said nothing while they waited, then more nothing while they descended.

  “Dad,” Alfie sputtered. He wanted to ask what was wrong, but he couldn’t get beyond that one word, his mouth twisting, his palms sweating. Something was wrong, though; his father wouldn’t look at him, and his hand remained leaden and rough on his shoulder. Out on the street, Theo planted Alfie onto a curb next to a pretzel cart.

  “Wait here,” Theo said, meeting Alfie’s eyes at last. Alfie knew by the wrinkle between his father’s brows that he was unhappy. There was a coolness to his tone Alfie didn’t like, and he had to hold back tears, which he could never do. His eyesight blurred, and his nose grew snuffly.

  “Stop that,” Theo snapped, pointing an index finger at Alfie’s eyeball. Alfie fought with himself, swallowed, hard, and managed to prevent a full-on bawl. Theo watched him carefully for a minute to make sure Alfie wouldn’t move, then said, “Stay here. I’ll be back soon.” And with that he disappeared into the building, leaving Alfie perched on the curb’s edge.

  From that angle he mostly saw people’s pants, which were of all different colors and patterns. Eventually, he rose to his feet and walked two blocks to where a juggler was balancing on a unicycle, throwing multicolored pins, balls, and fruit into the air. Alfie edged his way through a crowd and sat on the ground next to a group of little kids, their parents a wall behind them.

  The miraculous thing happened as the light waned and the juggler stepped down, picked up three torches, lit them, climbed back onto his cycle, and began to throw them into the air. In the blue twilight, the torches danced and flared, black smoke fluttering around their bright centers like inky gauze. And then the juggler opened his mouth and placed the flaming tip of a torch inside. Alfie gasped, pressed his hands against his chest, as if in an attempt to stop the fire from descending into his own lungs. He watched, mesmerized, as the evening came and the juggler put all three torches one by one between his lips, then breathed streams of yellow fire into the darkening air.

  His father found him before the act ended and shook him, grabbed his wrist, dragged him toward their car, which was parked fifteen long blocks away from the festival.

  “I told you to wait,” Theo said through his teeth, his face so rigid Alfie forgot his disappointment in missing the rest of the fire eater’s performance. His father was angry with him. His father was often angry with him, and no matter how hard Alfie tried to be good, he kept failing.

  “I’m sorry,” Alfie said. He had to run to keep up with Theo’s long stride, and he was getting a stitch in his side but was afraid to complain.

  They drove home in silence, except for when Alfie remembered to ask his father how the conversation with the gallery owner went. Theo shrugged, his brows knitting and his mouth turning down. “I can’t very well get a deal with a gallery if I only have time to paint one painting every six months,” he said.

  “Can I help you paint?” Alfie asked.

  At this, something in Theo’s face softened, crumpled, and for a terrible second Alfie thought his father would start crying as well. Just when Alfie felt a sympathetic lump form in his throat, Theo reached out and ruffled his son’s hair.

  Some pressure lifted then, leaving Alfie tired and hungry but no longer close to tears. He spent the rest of the evening reliving the juggler’s amazing feats, and when Theo had cooked Alfie’s turkey burger (on a potato bun, with ketchup, one pickle slice, one tomato slice, the only way he could eat it; any other way felt impossible), he took his
bath, put on his pajamas, and asked for the iPad.

  Starting that evening, Alfie added the study of fire to his already beloved study of music.

  CHAPTER

  28

  A FEW WEEKS BEFORE Theo left, Alfie, who was ten and a half by then, was performing research in the backyard.

  Theo was painting, locked in the bedroom he’d turned into a studio, and had been for hours. Alfie knew better than to knock or call or disturb his father in any manner whatsoever.

  His mother had gone to work yesterday and still hadn’t come home, though she’d called a few times to wish Alfie good-night and ask him if things were okay. As always, he told her everything was fine. He couldn’t remember the last time she’d spent the weekend with them, but he didn’t mind. It gave him more time to experiment and nobody to question or stop him.

  Only the squirrels and the neighborhood cat paused to observe as he held a lighter to a spray of Aqua Net and measured how far the bright flame whooshed. He did the same with a can of WD-40. Then with black spray paint, aiming at the hedges, the sharp-leaved holly, the stone pathway laid through the grass. The WD-40 sprayed furthest and hottest, and he wrote this down in his notebook.

  He didn’t notice the smoke spiraling out of the studio window until he’d stuffed the Aqua Net, WD-40, and spray paint into a plastic bag along with his notepad. Only then did he realize the burning smell was not coming from the singed shrubbery or the lawn but from his house.

  He dropped the bag and ran inside, skidding along the wooden floor toward the locked studio door. He knocked, then kicked at the door, but heard nothing. Grayish tendrils furled out from under the paint-spattered wood, and Alfie panicked, his mouth so rigid he couldn’t have screamed his father’s name even if the entire house was engulfed.

  He stepped back, then ran full speed at the studio door. The wood cracked but bounced him away. He did this two more times, then a third, then again. The burning smell had turned into something oilier, more acrid by the time the frame splintered and he shoved his way in.

  His father slept, sprawled in the leather armchair that had been Alfie’s uncle’s, an empty bottle of wine at his feet, oblivious to the odoriferous smoke obscuring the corner where he kept his rags. His latest painting, inches away from the rags, was also beginning to smolder. The cloths, soaked with linseed oil and thrown to the floor carelessly, had begun to oxidize (Alfie learned later during another bout of research). With no air circulation inside the pile, heat had built up for days before finally combusting.

  The floorboards were already charred. Alfie gaped at the heap for a second, then ran to the bathroom, grabbed the bucket from under the sink, filled it with water, ran back to the studio, and dumped the entire bucket onto the rags. Then, for good measure, he seized the wool Mexican blanket that had always hung on the studio wall, threw that onto the steaming rags, and stomped on it. His father had owned the blanket since his own childhood (he said). Alfie’s studies taught him that wool was one of the most flame-resistant natural materials and was good for smothering flames; he had developed a habit of keeping a water-logged wool sweater with him when experimenting in his room.

  Theo woke with a jerk and turned an outraged, bleary eye at Alfie.

  “What the hell?” Theo rose from his chair, staring in horror at the black, oily mess on his floor, then at the broken lock. “What the hell are you doing?” he screamed, and grabbed Alfie by the arm, wrenching him off-balance so that Alfie tripped over his own feet and would have fallen if his father hadn’t lifted him.

  He tried saying something, tried to explain, but nothing came out of his mouth except saliva.

  The bottom of the new painting was ruined, blackened with smoke and smeared with soot. The painting itself was of a monstrous mouth, open, red on the outside and brownish black on the inside, and it scared Alfie the way fire never could.

  Theo dragged his son out of the studio and into the living room, then smacked him on the side of the head. “I told you to leave me alone!” he screamed. “I just asked for a few hours to myself, and you couldn’t give it to me! What’s wrong with you? Huh? What’s wrong with you? Why are you like this?” And all the while he shook Alfie so that his teeth clacked and his upper arms bruised.

  Alfie was beyond speaking, beyond trying to save himself. All he saw was hatred in his father’s eyes, and it was the coldest, hardest thing he’d ever seen. He didn’t even realize he’d started to cry until Theo yelled at him to stop.

  “Just grow up!” Theo screamed. “Why can’t you grow up! Stop bawling, for fuck sake, just stop it!”

  Theo let go of him and slumped to the couch, his head in his hands. When Alfie tried to touch his shoulder, his body was so stiff, so rejecting, that Alfie sank to the floor and put his own head in his hands in despair.

  By the time his mother came home, so tired she slurred her words when she told him she loved him and hugged him, Theo had thrown out the rags, washed the floor, and replaced the studio lock. Neither one of them mentioned what happened.

  Not in so many words, anyway. But when Theo made his announcement three weeks later, Alfie knew it was because of him. Because he hadn’t been able to explain. Because his father hated him.

  CHAPTER

  29

  IN RETROSPECT, ALTHOUGH the spreadsheet Alfie created to narrow down possible friend candidates guided him to Jordan—skinny, shifty, quick in all the ways Alfie wasn’t but also just enough geeky and philosophical for them to always have something to discuss—it was Alfie’s spectacular failure at the fall talent show and subsequent suspension that drew Jordan to him.

  Alfie had practiced repeatedly in the backyard, though to be honest, he made sure his mom was asleep or running errands when he did. He followed all the safety instructions listed in the videos he’d seen on the web. He even texted with an experienced fire breather, who gave him useful pointers. He never had a problem, not once. He never burned his fingers or his lips. He made sure to wipe his mouth and face after every time he swigged the tiny amount of kerosene needed to aspirate onto the lit torch.

  Yes, he knew his mother wouldn’t have allowed it, so he didn’t tell her. He figured she’d see him perform at the talent show and then she’d know how careful he’d been and she’d forgive him.

  But of course he didn’t count on the show taking place indoors. It wasn’t supposed to. It was supposed to be outside, at the park bandstand, on a Sunday, with food trucks and a DJ. But the weather turned nasty, and rather than postponing the event, the organizers moved it to the auditorium, the food vendors stinking up the hallways as they delivered paper plates heaped with sausage and peppers, gyros, and empanadas.

  He knew he should have withdrawn his name. But he had practiced for such a long time, and he was good, the flame whooshing from the torch as if he were a dragon—beautiful and strong. Onstage, he placed his saxophone case on the floor, opened it, and withdrew a torch, his little jar of kerosene, his cloth, his lighter. The principal, who had been standing to the side of the auditorium, was slow to react, his face first bemused, then alarmed, then downright panicked when Alfie lit his torch. He was still running down the aisle as Alfie tipped half a tablespoon of kerosene into his mouth and blew a fine mist with all his might, producing a gorgeous, ten-foot-long yellow flare. Which ignited the curtains.

  He was almost arrested. His mother was livid, took away his phone, iPad, and laptop privileges for two weeks, and he was suspended for three days. But it was worth it.

  Because there he was with a real, bona fide friend. Jordan made it seem easy—this being-friends thing. He talked all the time. He talked about the Snapchats he’d had that day or the night before, about the Marvel multiverse and how Loki was a more powerful god than Thor because Loki was smarter and could shapeshift, about how the whole Batman versus Superman thing was completely false because why would they ever fight each other, it was just a made-up war, not really real. He talked about Judy Bennett in Algebra II and how he saw that she had a red welt on
her thigh through the rips in her jeans and how he thought it was razor burn. All Alfie had to do was nod or shake his head and the conversation would continue.

  They were together a lot that fall and winter—during lunch, after school, at the football games, Alfie in his band uniform, Jordan in his trademark black sweatshirt and jeans, though they never visited each other’s houses. They were together when Mr. Blue approached them, and Alfie always thought it was Jordan who drew the man’s attention, what with his nonstop mouth and easygoing ways.

  He was wrong about that, as he’d been about so many things. Alfie wondered how it was possible to go through life being as wrong about so much as he always seemed to be.

  Alfie and Jordan were getting pizzas in the parlor on Main Street (Nuncio’s, Jordan’s favorite, though Alfie preferred Bella Theresa’s on Third), and this guy sitting behind them jumped into their conversation. They tried to ignore him, raised their eyebrows at each other and waited for him to shut up, but he knew the most interesting stories and they couldn’t help listening. He told them about Mr. Cooper at the high school who got fired for slamming a freshman boy into a locker early one morning. And about Dawn Pinelli who babysat for the football coach and then got caught on surveillance emptying his medicine cabinet and liquor cabinet and, most fun of all, his gun cabinet. Once the man had their attention, he asked them about themselves, what they liked. He fell into the rhythm of their dialogue effortlessly, theorizing perfectly sound opinions on the best Skrillex versus deadmau5 (Mr. Blue preferred deadmau5, and Alfie totally agreed). When he offered to drive them home—it was December, below freezing, raw and windy, and they were a good forty-minute walk from their respective houses—they said sure, great. And when he said he had to pick something up from his apartment and would they mind, they said no they wouldn’t, and once there, he handed them a couple of beers and dropped a needle—literally, the guy had a turntable—on Nosaj Thing, and that was that.