No going back, p.18
No Going Back, page 18
I want to smack that smug face.
Rock climbs in last. He stands before us, reaches into his pocket, and pulls out a bunch of long zip ties. He hands them to Vaughn.
Vaughn approaches us, smiling, dimples popping. “What do you think of the Whaler, guys? Surprised?”
“Extremely,” Gary says.
“Because you two never believed in me.” He shakes a zip tie at Gary. “Wrists out.”
Gary Jr. does as he’s told. As Vaughn leans in and wraps the tie around his wrists, Gary whispers, “I know you’re doing this against your will.”
Vaughn grimaces at Gary as he threads the end of the zip tie through the loop. Holding the end of the tie, he stands tall. Lifts a foot and rests it on the bench. “Here we go!” Vaughn yanks the tie back with two hands, like he’s starting an old lawn mower.
“Jesus effing Christ! What the hell, Vaughn?”
Vaughn stares at him, stone-cold. “I am not on your side.”
Rock snickers at that.
Vaughn kneels and ties one around Gary’s ankles. He stands, saying, “I been waiting a long time for this.” He pulls an open-palmed hand way back.
“No!” Gary shouts as Vaughn’s arm shoots forward, slapping him in the face so hard, his head flies and knocks into mine, his body slamming into my shoulder.
Gary turns to his old buddy, tears streaming down his face. He rubs his cheek with zip-tied fists. “Are you serious, Vaughn?”
“Dead serious! You were never going to cut me in! When Lance called and promised me my share, I was like, Lemme get this straight. You’re asking me to trick idiot Gary and idiot Antonio into leading you to that crab pot where all the money is? Hell yes! Where do I sign up?”
“Crab pot?” Gary says. “Really?”
“Screw you both! You were jerks to me! You called me idiot Vaughn behind my back. Who’s the idiot now?” He slaps Gary again harder.
“Holy freaking freak, Vaughn!”
“Answer me, Gary!”
“I’m the idiot now! Okay?” Gary jerks his chin my way. “It was him who started that whole idiot Vaughn thing, FYI.”
Vaughn turns to me. “Wrists.” He wraps them. Threads the end through. A foot up on the bench.
I close my eyes.
I inhale dee—
Holy hell! It’s like he’s trying to pull my arms out of their sockets.
He steps back so he’s got enough space for a full swing, and…
My neck snaps back. Ears ringing. The world is a blur.
“Idiot Antonio!” he shouts at the top of his lungs.
I move my jaw from side to side, trying to line it up with the rest of my head. I press palms against my ears to stop the ringing.
Vaughn zip-ties my ankles, then jumps onto the ladder. He unspools the rope from the metal cleat at the top of the pier. Then he steps down onto the bench between me and Gary and hops to the cockpit in the center of the boat. He takes the wheel, fires up the engine, and pulls us away from the pier.
Gary and me share a glance as we watch the distance between land and us grow, not knowing when, or if, we’ll ever step foot on that pier again.
“Hey, idiot Gary!” Vaughn shouts over the engine noise. “I’m taking us to the north end of the island. If you do not direct us to that crab pot, Rock will direct you to Davy Jones’s locker.”
“Love the enthusiasm!” Rock shouts. “But Davy Jones’s locker? That’s too much.”
“Is it the killing that’s wrong?” Vaughn says. “Or the phrase?”
“The killing part is on point. Just nix the Davy Jones. That’s lame pirate cheese.”
“Good note,” Vaughn says, glaring at us. “I’ll just be like, Rock will shoot you and throw you overboard.”
“Getting warmer, kid. But keep in mind I only fire my gun as a last resort.”
“That’s a relief,” Gary says.
Rock calmly explains that if things were to go south, he would zip-tie our ankle zip ties to our wrist zip ties so we’re folded up good. Then he’d toss us over the side of the boat. “Quieter than firing rounds,” he says. “No cleanup. And I don’t have to watch death happen.”
“Got it,” Vaughn says. “If ever I must kill, I will kill in a way that is not loud or messy and I don’t have to watch the idiot’s life drain from his—”
“Jesus Christ!” Lance says. “No one is getting killed! All right?” He turns to me and Gary. “Just get us to that crab pot. We’ll pull it up, take the money out, and drop you off at the ferry. As long as you two stay quiet, Rock will stay out of your lives forever.”
Vaughn kicks the Whaler into high gear. He’s got the boat aimed at Dolphin Point, miles ahead. We skim the waves, bouncing, cold salt water spraying our faces.
My knees start shaking, my stomach turning. Not from motion sickness but from worry about what happens when Lance finds out the money is not in that crab pot.
Vaughn is leading us to something. He has to be. He has a plan.
Trust Vaughn.
I can’t trust Vaughn.
You have to trust him.
His plan can’t be good.
Trust him.
Because Vaughn is an idiot. Who screwed up the robbery. Who screwed me over in court. Who ruined my life.
I close my eyes.
And I consider the possibility that this might be the night I die, sinking into the murky, cold silence of Puget Sound.
I think about my mom’s house. Just her and Claudio and Olivia. I think about my mom never understanding what happened to me the weekend I came home from Zephyr Woods. Never understanding what I tried to do, how I tried to make amends to her.
I think about Olivia growing up without her brother. Always wondering about me. About the loser, the thief, who went to prison, was released, then immediately got himself messed up in another crime. And was murdered. She could grow up thinking her brother was a criminal. Or a victim. She might be sad about what happened to me. Or feel sorry for me. Or dismiss my existence because in the story of her life, I just didn’t matter.
My eyes pop open. There are tiny lights twinkling from inside waterfront homes on Maury Island to the southwest and Vashon to the north. I keep my eyes on those lights as I imagine surviving this night.
I’ll miss my meeting. I’ll get sent back to Zephyr Woods. The worst part is, it will be that much harder to fix things with my mom. Maybe I’ll even lose my shot at living with her when I get out again.
I imagine Olivia the moment she’s old enough to be told that her brother lives in prison.
I see Maya’s face when she finds out I’m back there. Grace’s too. And Mrs. Williams’s and Ms. Duncan’s. All so disappointed. I picture Mrs. Neville shaking her head as she watches me get hauled inside those doors in handcuffs again.
I would take all that disappointment. Because it would mean I made it through this night alive. With a chance to become something better.
MONDAY 3:10 AM
Vaughn takes the engine down a notch. “Hey, idiot Gary! Should I be looking for the crab pot south of Dolphin Point or north of Dolphin Point?”
Gary freezes at the question, then turns to me, wide-eyed. I elbow him in the ribs. He turns back to Vaughn and says, “Why would there be a crab pot on the north side?”
“I was groggy the night we sank the money. I don’t know where it is,” Vaughn says. “You do.”
“Yeah,” Gary says, “you were messed up, but we didn’t go anywhere near—”
I elbow Gary harder.
“Okay. Right. The currents are too strong on the north. Only commercial crabbers out there, so…”
“So we go south of the ferry dock?”
“Yes, Vaughn. South of the ferry dock.”
Vaughn turns the wheel and aims the Boston Whaler due south of the Vashon ferry dock. He gives it gas, and in seconds we’re flying again across relatively calm waters. We’re going to get there soon. Too soon.
Lance’s eyes are trained in the same direction as the boat—out where he thinks his money is waiting for him. For a second, Rock takes his eyes off us and looks out there too.
Gary leans into my shoulder and whispers, “What’s Vaughn doing?”
I purse my lips and shake my aching head to shut him up.
I scan the boat for a flare gun to alert another boat. Even if there was something, it wouldn’t matter, because Rock is watching us again.
I try to twist my wrists, to see if I can free them, but the zip ties dig in and cut my skin. My head aches and my ears ring from Vaughn’s slap.
Me and Gary Jr. got no options. There is no way. We’re zip-tied kids against men with guns—and Vaughn and this ridiculous game he’s playing.
Rock points the gun at my jersey. Gives me a thumbs-up. “Forlán!” he says, leaning forward and shouting to be heard. “I used to follow him at Atlético de Madrid. He had a cannon right foot and a cannon left. Not too many guys like that.”
I nod. Fake smile.
“Long gone now,” he says. “You know who I really like?”
“Luis Suárez?”
“Suárez? Ha! He’s an over-the-hill, undisciplined madman!” Rock gets an evil grin on his face and says, “Lionel Messi is where it’s at! He’s a damn god.”
I shake my head with a scowl. It’s not just that Argentina is our biggest rival, it’s that Messi is too obvious. He’s the most talented player in the world. From a country twelve times the size of Uruguay. There was a path to greatness and World Cup championships laid out for tiny Lionel the second a scout watched him slalom the ball from one end of a youth soccer pitch to the other.
Rock sees the look on my face and chants, “Messi! Messi!” pointing that gun right at me. “Messi! Messi!”
I close my eyes and breathe through the taunting and laughing.
“Messi! Messi!”
My jaw tightens, my abs tighten, my muscles clench.
Breathe, Antonio.
I do not care if the odds are against us.
Breathe, Antonio.
I shake off Mrs. Williams’s voice in my head as Lance flashes me that smarmy grin and Rock laughs and laughs.
Something in my gut rumbles. And it grows. And it takes me over. I chirp a whistle at Gary. I jut my chin at him again, just like he’d done to me.
Gary Jr. chirps a whistle back, winks at me, and juts his chin back one more time.
I don’t know how we’re gonna do it, but there is no way these assholes are gonna take us down. We will get past this night. We will survive. We will get off this boat. Because we have tenacity. We have instincts. We have grit forged in the fires of hunger, desperation, and teenage fuckuppery.
Me and Gary Jr… we are Luis Suárez.
“Idiot Gary!” Vaughn shouts, slowing the engine again to be heard. “That buoy, I remember it was either black or orange, am I right?”
“Orange,” Gary says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. Day or night, in these dark waters, a black buoy would be near impossible to see. Gary flashes his eyes toward Vaughn and nods. He finally gets what Vaughn’s doing. And he’s going to play the game.
“It had reflectors,” Vaughn says. “Am I right on that? A couple reflectors? Was it one or two?”
No reason to say a couple if there aren’t more than one. I send Gary the mental message.
“Definitely two reflectors,” he says. “No doubt about it.”
Vaughn turns to Gary. “Hey, idiot, did that buoy have three red stripes?”
“That’s right. It’s coming back to you now,” Gary says. “Orange buoy. Two reflectors. Three red stripes. You got it, Vaughn.”
Gary turns to me and shrugs. He played the game. But what happens next? Is there really a buoy? Is there really a crab pot? How can there be money in it?
Vaughn cuts the engine way back so we’re creeping toward land, near enough to make out the shapes of individual beach homes in the darkness.
There’s a layer of fog on the sound. Lance grabs a big flashlight and goes to the bow of the boat. He shines it in the water. Scanning. Searching. We see rowboats and small motorboats tied to buoys. There are diving rafts for swimmers closer to the shore.
And there are buoys with nothing attached to them. Some of those lonely buoys have nylon ropes tied to them. The other ends of those ropes are attached to cages, crab pots anchoring the buoys to the floor of the sound, baited and waiting to trap an unsuspecting crab.
Vaughn points to the north. “The buoy was that way—right, Gary?”
“Right,” Gary says.
“You check that way, then.” He turns to me. “Idiot Antonio, you check south of the boat just in case. Orange buoy, two reflectors, two red stripes.”
“Three stripes!” Gary says.
“Right,” Vaughn says. “Three stripes.”
Suddenly, Lance shines the light at a buoy and says, “There we go.”
Orange. Three red stripes. One reflector shining back at us.
“Nope,” Rock says.
Then the buoy rotates in the tide, revealing the second reflector.
And my heart.
Is.
Pounding in
my throat.
In
my head.
In
my fingers.
And I can’t catch my racing breath. Cuz this is it. The moment we pull up a crab pot with zero dollars in it.
Gary freaks. He starts butt-jumping in his seat.
I knock my shoulder against his. His hops just get more frantic.
Rock lifts the gun barrel. Points it at Gary. “Cool it, kid.”
We approach the buoy, just yards away now. There’s a black bird standing on it. A cormorant, wings extended, frozen, like a gargoyle sentry guarding a castle. It’s creepy.
But I take it as a good sign. Because me and Maya used to count them, and she’d record the number in her notepad. Almost always there’re twenty or thirty cormorants when you’re lucky enough to see them. I think about the day I can tell her me and Gary saw one solitary cormorant sitting on a buoy in the middle of the night.
Someday.
If we make it away from here alive.
Which we will.
Because we have fight in us.
We have tenacity.
We have grit.
Lance sets his flashlight down. He drops to his belly and slides his head and chest under the Whaler’s railing. He leans out over the bow, face in the layer of fog, ready to catch the buoy.
The cormorant flies silently off into the mist.
“I got it!” Lance says, steadying the beach ball–size buoy with one hand, reaching into the water to grab the rope with the other.
Gary is hopping again, freaking out, as Vaughn steps over to the bow, then grabs the flashlight and shines it so Lance can see the rope in the water. Lance pulls, hand over fist, as fast as he can, raising the pot toward the surface.
He’s still pulling when I hear the tiniest hum. It’s a boat coming toward us from Dolphin Point. All I can see is its one beam of light slowly getting closer and closer.
My breath and heartbeat race.
Gary jumps faster, higher.
Vaughn leans over, staring at the rope lit up in the murky water. “The pot’s almost up here,” he says. I catch him sneak a peek at that approaching boat.
A thump each time Gary’s butt lands on the bench. “It’s the wrong buoy!” he shouts. “The wrong crab pot! There were three reflectors! Three, Vaughn!”
“Shut up, idiot!” Vaughn says.
“Boat,” Rock says, motioning to Lance.
We’re all looking in its direction now.
“We’re just crabbers,” Vaughn says. “Nothing suspicious. Just keep pulling that rope.”
Gary gets up to his feet, wobbly, like he forgot his ankles were zip-tied.
“Sit down!” Rock commands, pushing Gary in the chest.
Gary’s butt and back both thud as they hit the bench. “Stop pulling! It’s the wrong pot! I was there! I should know!”
“Shut up!” Vaughn says.
“Stop pulling!” Gary shouts. “Stop pulling!”
Rock leans in, extending his gun hand and jabbing the barrel into Gary’s thigh. “I will blast a hole in your leg if you don’t shut—”
Gary hops to his feet again, daring Rock to shoot. “Stop this, Vaughn! Stop it!”
Rock pushes Gary in the chest to sit him down again. Gary thuds again.
My heart, my head, my breath. I can’t let Rock push Gary. I will not let him shoot Gary.
Gary bounces back up. “Stop!” he shouts, his mouth foaming, as the wire-cage pot comes into view. “It’s the wrong pot!”
I elbow Gary as hard as I can to shut him up.
As the pot comes into view, we make out a big metal box inside. It’s wrapped in a clear plastic bag.
Vaughn heaves the pot onto the bow of the Whaler. Instead of reaching into the little cage door like you do to get crabs out, he pops some springs and pulls the whole top off by the handle. The sides of the pot collapse and crash onto the floor of the boat, exposing the metal box.
“That’s not it!” Gary shouts. “It’s the wrong one!”
“I am shooting you in five!” Rock shouts, shaking the gun at Gary.
“I was wrong!” Gary shouts. “I was wrong! It’s all a lie!”
“I am shooting you in four,” Rock shouts.
“Throw it back, Vaughn! Please! Please!”
“I am shooting you in three.”
There’s a huge Dungeness crab on top of the metal box. Vaughn reaches for it. “Agh!” He grabs it, pissed. “Damn thing pinched me!” He stands up tall, hops up onto the bench, and makes a big show of throwing the crab into the water as he watches that oncoming boat pick up speed.
Gary pops up again. “Stop! I was wrong!” Rock pushes. Gary thuds. “It’s the wrong pot!” he shouts as Lance unwraps the plastic from the box.
“I swear to God, I am shooting you!” Rock shouts.
Lance pops latches on the box as the sound of the approaching boat crescendos.
I press my feet hard against the base of the bench.
“Wrong pot!” Gary shouts. “Wrong pot! Wrong pot!”
My heart, my head, my breath! I feel my feet push off the bottom of the boat.
“Shooting you in one!” Rock’s finger tightens as he presses the gun into Gary’s leg.
