Shelter

“I’ll stand over there. If I see her flap her wings, I’ll text you. By the way, what are you going to do if she is inside, waiting in the dark to pounce on you?”

I didn’t bother replying, though in truth I hadn’t thought of that. What if Bat Lady was waiting for me and… and what? What was she going to do, jump on my back? I’m a six-footfour-inch teenager. She’s a tiny old woman. Get a grip.

I stepped into the kitchen. I didn’t close the door behind me. I wanted a quick escape in case… well, whatever.

The kitchen was from another era. I remember once watching a rerun of a black-and-white TV show called The Honeymooners with my dad. I didn’t really think it was very funny. A lot of the humor seemed to come from Ralph threatening to physically abuse his wife, Alice. Ralph and Alice had a refrigerator-if that’s what this was-like this one. Bat Lady’s linoleum floor was the dirty yellow of a smoker’s teeth. A cuckoo clock was stopped on the wrong time, the bird out of his little brown house. The cuckoo looked cold.

“Hello?” I called out. “Anyone home?”

Not a sound.

I should just leave. Really. What was I looking for?

Your father isn’t dead. He is very much alive.

On the one hand, I knew better. I had been in that car with my father. I saw him die. On the other hand… you just don’t say a thing like that and not expect a son to demand an explanation.

I tiptoed across the peeling tiles. I passed a checkerboard tablecloth like something you’d see at a pizza joint. There were salt and pepper shakers stuck to it, the contents hardened. I stepped out of the kitchen and stopped in front of a spiral staircase leading up to the second floor.

Where, no doubt, Bat Lady’s bedroom was.

“Hello?”

No reply.

I put one foot on the first step. Then those images-the ones of Bat Lady maybe getting dressed or showering- filled my head. I put my foot back down on the first floor. Uh-uh. I wasn’t going up. At least, not right now.

I entered the living room. It was dark. The key color: brown. Very little illumination made it through the dirt and wood covering the windows. There was a tall grandfather clock, also not working. I spotted an old-fashioned cabinet stereo. A hi-fi, I think they called it. It had a turntable on top. Vinyl albums were stacked to the side. I spotted Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys, the Beatles walking across Abbey Road, and My Generation by the Who.

I tried picturing Bat Lady blasting classic rock in this dark room. The image was simply too weird.

I stopped and listened again. Nothing. Across the room I spotted a giant fireplace. The mantel was bare except for one photograph. I began to move toward it when something made me pull up.

There was a record on the turntable.

I took another look. I knew this particular record well. This record-the one Bat Lady had most recently played- was called Aspect of Juno by a group called HorsePower. My parents listened to it a lot. Years ago, when Mom and Dad first met, my mother was friends with Gabriel Wire and Lex Ryder, the two guys who made up HorsePower. Sometimes, when Dad was traveling, I would find Mom listening to the music alone and crying.

I swallowed. A coincidence?

Of course it was. HorsePower was still a popular group. Lots of people owned their music. So it happened to be sitting on Bat Lady’s turntable-big deal, right?

Except it was a big deal. I just didn’t see how yet.

Keep moving, I thought.

I started again toward the photograph on the mantel. The fireplace itself was filled with soot and burnt, yellowed newspaper. I lifted the picture gently from the mantel, afraid that it might fall apart with a mere touch of my hands. It didn’t. The glass on the frame was so thick with dust that I tried to blow it clean. Dumb move. The dust flew into my eyes and up my nose. I sneezed. My eyes watered. When they stopped, I blinked my eyes open and looked down at the photograph in my hand.

Hippies.

There were five of them in the picture: three women, two men, and they were standing girl-boy-girl-boy-girl. All of them had long hair and bell-bottom jeans and love beads. The women all had flowers in their hair. The men had scruffy facial hair. The picture was old-I would guess that it’d been taken in the 1960s-and the five were probably college students or around that age. The image reminded me of stuff I’d seen in a Woodstock documentary.

The colors in the photograph had faded over the years, but you could tell that at one time they’d been bright. The five stood in front of a brick building and all smiled widely. They all wore the same tie-dyed T-shirts with a bizarre emblem on the chest. At first I thought it was some sort of peace sign. But no, that wasn’t it. I looked closer, but I couldn’t figure out what it was. The emblem looked like, I don’t know, a messed-up butterfly maybe. I read once about Rorschach blots, where different people see different things in the same vague images. It was a little like that, except the blots were black while this design had a host of colors. I looked again. Yes, I could clearly make out a butterfly. Near the bottom tips of the wings, there were two round… eyes, I guess. Animal eyes maybe. They seemed to glow.

Seriously creepy.

My gaze kept being drawn back to the girl in the center of the picture. She stood a little forward, as though she were the leader. She had waist-length blond hair lassoed with a purple headband. Her T-shirt was, uh, snug, if you know what I mean, tight across a rather curvy figure. Just as I was thinking that this particular hippie chick was kind of hot, a horrible realization hit me:

It was Bat Lady.

Ugh!

When my phone vibrated, I jumped again. I quickly pulled it into view and looked at the message. It was from Ema. The text was all in screaming caps: CAR COMING! GET OUT!

I put the photograph on the mantel and headed back toward the kitchen. I kept low, nearly commando-crawling on the dirty linoleum. When I reached the wall, I rose slowly and peeked out the window into the backyard. In the woods, the cloud of dirt settled.

I could see the car now.

It was pure black with tinted windows. A limousine or town car or something. It had stopped in front of Bat Lady’s garage. I waited, not sure what to do. Then the passenger door opened.

For a moment, nothing happened. I glanced left, then right, looking for Ema. There she was, trying to hide behind a tree. Ema pointed to my right. Huh? I gave her a whatgives? shrug. She kept pointing, more insistent now. I looked in that direction.

The kitchen door was still open! I’d forgotten to close it.

I ducked low and stretched my leg toward it. Using my foot, I kicked the door closed, though it didn’t stick. It popped back open, creaking in the still air. I tried again, but the lock was broken. The door wouldn’t stay closed. I nudged it closed so that it was just ajar now.

I risked a glance back at the window. Ema glared at me and started working her cell phone. The message buzzed in: what part of CAR COMING! GET OUT! confused u?!? HURRY, DOPE!

I didn’t move. Not yet. First of all, I wasn’t sure which direction to go. I couldn’t go out the back-whoever was in the black car would spot me. I could run out the front, but that might draw their attention too. So for now, I stayed put. I kept my eye on the car. And I waited.

The front passenger door of the car opened a little more. I stayed low, keeping only my forehead and eyes above the window line. I saw one shoe hit the dirt, then another. Black shoes. Men’s. A moment later someone rose from the car. Yep, a man. His head was shaved clean. He wore a dark suit and aviator sunglasses and looked as if he were either coming from a funeral or an elite member of the Secret Service.

Who the heck was this?

The man kept his body ramrod straight while his head spun like a robot’s, scanning the area. He stopped on the tree where Ema was doing a pretty poor job of hiding. He took a step toward her. Ema squeezed her eyes shut, as though wishing herself away. The man with the shaved head took another step.