The Vow

The man and his son leave, and Reed and I start the cleanup process together in silence, except for the music. It’s an ABBA CD, one of seven CDs we have to rotate through. I’m so sick of this one already, I’m considering accidentally dropping it into the blender.

The rattle of my truck pushes through the music, followed by the three long blasts of the horn.

“Is that your dad?” Reed asks.

I shake my head, embarrassed. “Mo. Sorry. Sometimes he’s kind of like a five-year-old. I’ll go tell him to wait.”

“No, we’re done. I can do the cash and lock up.”

“You sure?”

“Of course.”

The horn blares again.

I give an apologetic shrug and untie my apron. “He knows my parents are strict about what time I get home.” I don’t add that he’d be doing the same thing if it was noon.

Reed eyes the clock. “Strict? Your application said you’re eighteen.”

“It’s complicated,” I stammer.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to criticize. I just—”

“No, it’s okay. I know it’s early.” I don’t attempt to explain that even though I can carry a gun and buy cigarettes and get married and die for my country, if I’m not home by 10:20, all hell will break loose.

“Are you on tomorrow?” he asks.

I nod, remembering the wave like cool water that flowed through me when he touched my arm. I can feel it now.

“Good,” he says.

“Why did you read my job application?”

He smirks. “Perk of being the boss’s brother-in-law. I was just making sure you looked good on paper too.”

I duck out before he can see that I’m smiling.

I can’t stop smiling.

I make it halfway down the steps before I see Mo. He’s staring at the Mr. Twister sign like he wants to rip its head off and set it on fire. His face is gray and crooked and hard. He looks like his dad.

Guilt rolls through me, flushing the smile and the warmth in my chest away. Head down, I make my way to the truck.

I forget that he deserves a charley horse for honking like a psycho and slide into the passenger seat. I can’t kick him out of the driver’s seat tonight either. He loves driving.

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey.”

“How was your day?”

He grunts.

Nothing else needs to be said, not with the anger rising off him like fumes. We just sit in silence, hurtling down the road I will never walk because I am not crazy.

It feels wrong, this silent mutual misery, but fighting with him would be worse. Besides, how many more times will we get to sit beside each other like this? The thought connects like a kick in the gut, and it takes all my willpower not to crumple beside him. Two weeks—no, less than two weeks now—and he’ll be gone. Have they bought plane tickets? Has Dr. Hussein come to his senses and started looking for a job here? What really happens if they just don’t leave?

I don’t ask a thing. It nearly kills me, but I let Mo be broken and silent because I know he wants it that way. It’s all I can do to let him have it.

Chapter 10

Mo

It’s all I can do not to let Annie have it, and it’s not even her fault. No, it is her fault. Her smile when she came out that door is a slap in the face. Last night she was sobbing because life without me was going to be unadulterated misery, but today she’s got a grin to rival the Mr. Twister Hitler mascot. That’s not supposed to sting?

No, that smile doesn’t sting. A bee stings. A slap stings. This burns. It’s betrayal.

I don’t know what I expected. If the roles were reversed, I probably wouldn’t be any better at sharing the grief. Acknowledging it doesn’t make me any less pissed at her, but I get that sympathy can only take you so far. She can feel sorry for me, but at the end of the day I’m the one who’s irreversibly screwed. Not her. She’ll recover. She’ll make new friends, or she’ll hook up with whoever it is in there who’s making her smile, and she’ll go on to art school, and she might even get the guts to walk away from her parents’ misery and step out from her sister’s shadow. She’ll be happy, like she deserves to be.

I won’t. I just have to keep reminding myself that it’s not her fault.

It almost works—I almost don’t feel so betrayed, but then she has to get in the car and put on that face, her tragedy face, like she’s trying to convince me she’s as miserable as she’s supposed to be, like that’s going to make me feel better, and I just want to drive the truck through the Mr. Twister sign. My parting gift to E-town. I’m sure at least a handful of people would thank me.

But I can’t yell at Annie, and I’m not going to wreck her truck by destroying public property either. Instead I bottle it. I drive too fast and ignore the way she’s gripping the seat belt because it feels manipulative—her fear— like it’s another emotional show she’s putting on for me. Maybe she thinks if I feel sorry for her I’ll stop feeling sorry for myself.

I glance at her. She’s doing that thing where she double blinks right as we pass each telephone pole. It’s some kind of counting mind game she plays. I asked her about it once and she totally denied it.

I should talk to her, ask her how her day went, let her ask me all the touchy-feely questions she’s been saving up. It’s what she wants, but she doesn’t understand that it won’t help. Nothing will help. There is no last- minute stay of execution coming my way, so it doesn’t matter if we talk, or if Annie is smiling or crying, or if I decapitate Mr. Twister.

“Slow down,” she says quietly.

I press the gas pedal down a little farther.

“I’m not kidding. Slow down.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean, why? Because it’s against the law to go fifteen over the speed limit, that’s why.”

“What are they going to do, deport me?”

“Fine, then, because it’s unsafe and I don’t want to die.”

I snort. “You know I’m a good driver.”

She swallows and stares out the windshield at the trees flying past on either side. “You can’t see around any of these bends. What if someone is weaving into your lane right around the next corner?”

“Then we’re dead whether I’m going fifty or sixty-five.”

“Then do it because it’s my car and I said so! Mo, you know I don’t like going this fast!”

I don’t hear the waver in her voice until it’s too late. I take my foot off the gas, guilt radiating through me. What am I doing? Why am I messing with her like this? “Sorry,” I mutter.

Normal Annie would now punch me in the arm and chew me out the rest of the way home, but this isn’t normal Annie. She’s silent, sitting beside me, still clutching the seat belt for dear life even though I’m going five miles below the speed limit like a good boy.

“Why do you want to waste time fighting?” she says, her voice barely above a whisper.

Waste time. Savor time. I’m not sure which will be more painful. Wait, yes I am. Getting sentimental will make the next two weeks sheer hell, and everything following even worse than it’s already going to be. If that’s my only alternative, please, let’s waste time.