The Child Thief

“Right, Nick?” Leroy repeated, now with a noticeable edge to his voice.

No, Nick thought. I don’t have to play this part anymore. I’m done being dicked around, done with Peter and his games, and I’m most certainly done with Leroy.

Nick got up from the table and went over to the roots, leaving Danny and Cricket looking perplexed, and Leroy very unhappy.

NICK CLOSED HIS eyes and let the warmth from the porridge spread through his body. He was sure things weren’t over between Leroy and him, but he’d deal with that later. Right now his head hurt and he wanted some space to sort things out, but he only had a minute before Cricket and Danny came over and sat with him.

“Soooo?” Cricket asked.

Nick was silent.

“So what’s the deal with you and Leroy?”

“Nothing.”

“Yeah, right,” Cricket said. She looked like she might burst at any minute. “C’mon, you gotta tell me. What’d he do now? Huh, what?”

“Nothing,” Nick said curtly, and wondered why everyone seemed bent on driving him crazy tonight. “Just drop it, all right?”

“Man, what’s up with you?” Cricket said. “Leroy saved your life. Seems you could cut him some slack. Think about—”

“Do you guys miss home?” Nick cut in.

“No,” Cricket said, without hesitation. “Not a bit. Things were really fucked up at home. My dad—” She stopped, looked like she wanted to add something more, then shook her head. “Deviltree is my home now.”

Nick wondered how bad it could be that Cricket felt safer here, among these cretins, than with her own family.

“I miss Cocoa Puffs,” Danny said.

Both Nick and Cricket rolled their eyes.

“I’m not trying to be funny,” Danny said, as he tried to straighten his glasses. “Wouldn’t you kill for a bowl right now? Or maybe some microwave popcorn? What I really miss is freaking toilet paper. Never would’ve thought toilet paper was man’s greatest invention. Y’know what else? I miss my Gameboy. I also miss my stupid little dog. She’s a pug named Piglet. She had something wrong with her nose and made a snorting noise all the time. Just like a little piggy. Funniest damn thing. That little monkey-faced dog snored louder than my dad, too. We had to shut her in the downstairs laundry at night so that we could sleep. I sorta miss my friends at school. I miss my mom and dad, I guess. But,” he laughed, “most of all I miss my goddamn Gameboy.”

Nick and Cricket stared at him. Finally, Nick asked, “Danny, why’d you run away in the first place?”

“Huh? Oh, because I set the school on fire. After I saw all the fire trucks and police cars, I thought it might be a good idea to get out of town.”

“You did what?” Cricket and Nick asked at the same time.

“Well,” Danny said defensively, “I was pissed at that sour old tit Mrs. Kerry. She’s the one that took my Gameboy.”

“So you burned the school down?” Nick asked.

“Yes. No. Well sorta. I tried to. I only managed to burn up a bunch of bushes and part of the roof before —”

“That’s great, Danny,” Cricket interrupted. “How about you, Nick? Why’d you leave?”

“Because I had to.”

“Why?”

“It’s complicated. Some guys moved into my grandmother’s house. Turned into a bad scene.”

“How bad?” Cricket asked.

Nick rolled up his sleeve, showed them the burn on his arm.

Cricket looked at him. “That’s bad.”

“Well, I’ve got my mom to thank for that one.”

“Your mom did that?”

“No, but it was her fault, it was her idea to rent out the rooms in my granny’s house. Hell, it was her idea to move back to Brooklyn in the first place. We used to live at Fort Bragg, down in North Carolina, but after my dad died Mom decided we needed to move in with Granny. Said it was because money was tight. That was the same excuse she used to talk Granny into renting out the downstairs rooms. And that’s how Marko and his pals ended up in our house. Marko’s the one that burned me.”

Nick shook his head. “I mean I could see that those guys were shit the first time I met them. Right? But Mom, she was so glad to have some tenants, she just bent over backward for them. Turns out these guys are fucking street-level drug dealers and here’s my mom making them feel right at home. I mean, can you believe that?

“Soon we had these kids coming and going, running dope all over the place. A regular operation working out of our back porch. By then even my mom had caught on. I mean it wasn’t like these guys were going out of their way to be discreet. They pretty much acted like they owned the place.”

“Didn’t she call the police?” Cricket asked.

“No, that’s just it. She wouldn’t. We got in an argument about that. She said Marko had told her if she called the cops, he’d make sure it looked like she was in on it. If that happened the state would take me away from her, or seize Granny’s house. Bunch of crap like that. I think Marko had laid it on thick. Had scared her to death. Anyway, Marko must’ve got wind of our argument, because it was shortly after that him and his pals gave me this.” Nick tapped the burn mark.

“So you left?”

“You bet. I fucked up their setup and got out of there.”

Cricket looked at him, horrified. “You left your mom and grandmother behind…alone in that house with… them?”

“No…I mean, yeah. I left them, but don’t make it sound like I deserted them.”

“Nick, that’s terrible. Think about how scared your mom must be without you there.”

“She’s the one that brought them in!” Nick said angrily. “She’s the one that wouldn’t call the cops. What was I supposed to do? Stay there and put up with Marko’s crap? The guy was going to kill me.”

“Nick, think about it. They probably told her they’d hurt you and your grandmother if she did anything or told anyone. There’s no telling what-all they said to her.” Cricket shook her head. “That poor woman is in such an awful situation. What’s she going to do? I can’t believe you just up and left her there like that.”

“You don’t understand. You weren’t there. It’s not like you think. It’s—” He stopped. “Never mind. Just never fucking mind!” Nick got up and stomped away, crossed the chamber, and went into the privy. He pushed the door shut and dropped the latch. He pressed his back against the door, ignoring the clicking and rustling coming from the toilet. He stared at his reflection in the broken mirror and saw a dozen angry faces glaring back at him.

Fuck her, he thought. She doesn’t know what the fuck she’s talking about. I didn’t abandon my mother. I’d never do that. He tried to push away the thoughts of his mother alone with Marko, but could think of nothing else. He saw her face. Could see Marko and his pals: Marko’s bulging, bloodshot eyes, his beastly grin, could still hear the way they’d laughed when they’d burned him. If they didn’t mind burning him, what were they capable of doing to her, to Granny? With him gone, they could do anything. God, he thought, she must be so scared. And on top of all that, Granny could barely even get out of bed these days. Mom’s got nowhere to go. No other family, no one else to help her. What’ve I done? His face clenched up and an ugly sob escaped his throat. He pressed his face into his hands and began to cry.

“Mom,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry. I’m so damn sorry.”

ULFGER DREW HIS broadsword from its scabbard. His thick, muscled arms twitched,