Eight minutes until his appointment.
Darryl sat on the car edge, head hanging between his slumped shoulders. “What a fucking mess.”
Peter’s twitching became cataclysmic. He reached for Cai, drew back and gripped his own knees. “He made me. I swear to God, Cai, he made me.”
The hole in Cai’s jeans grew. “I know he did, Rabbit! That’s why you need to let it go.”
“It’s not that simple.” Peter rubbed his forehead raw.
I shifted in my seat in the ensuing uncomfortable silence. Peter’s mouth opened and closed randomly like he was searching for something to say. Darryl hadn’t moved a muscle. Four minutes until his appointment. Cai had stopped responding, but still hadn’t made a move to exit the car. My fingers drummed again while I decided whether to break this up or let them work it out. It was an unbelievably inappropriate time to hash out a really-needed-to-be-hashed-out problem.
Finally, Cai pulled himself out of the car and looked at me briefly before staring at the ground. “Let it go, or I’m leavin’, Rabbit,” he whispered. “You ‘n’ Dare gotta just let go. You gotta get your own lives, and you gotta let me have one, too.” Slapping away tears, he walked stiffly through the courtyard to the entrance of the building. Peter scooted out after him, stopping him just outside the doorway and pulling him into a hug. Cai’s hands hung at his sides for a few seconds and then scrunched into Peter’s shirt as he buried his face in his brother’s neck.
11:01. The kid was late. And I didn’t see this ending soon. If this took much longer, it would be called in to dispatch. Cai would be arrested. Someone had to light a fire under their asses. “You’re not going over there?” I asked while hunting through my virtual rolodex for Kate’s number and slipping the headset over my ear.
“Right now they need to work it out,” Darryl said, flopping in the front seat.
I was going to point out that that wasn’t exactly true, but my phone rang. I pushed the button on the steering wheel to answer. “Glass.”
“Oz—”
“I was going to call you this morning.”
“Shut up, and listen to me. Get the kid out of the building.”
“Cai?” I unbuckled my safety belt and leaned forward. I spotted Cai and Peter pushing through revolving doors.
“Yes. I couldn’t stop it. They’re waiting for him at the shrink’s office.”
“Who?”
“You want me to explain or you want to get that kid before they take him?”
“What’s going on?” Darryl asked. The string to his pink hoodie was wrapped tightly around his finger. He yanked at it.
“Stay in the car,” I said. After waiting for a car to pass, I threw open the door and tore out of the seat.
“Hey! What’s going on? Is it Peter?”
“Stay with the fucking car! In fact, get in the driver’s seat,” I yelled as I ran across the plaza, reaching into my back pocket for my phone. The Bluetooth was still streaming our call; I tore off the headset and hung up without a word to Dave. After nearly smacking my face into the revolving door, I stopped, scrolled to find Peter’s number and pressed ‘call’.
I spun to the right, toward the sound of the first ring. The second ring brought my hand to my right front pocket. By the third ring, I was holding Peter’s phone in my palm. “Borrowed your jeans. Took them off again when I saw your bare ass.”
“Fuck!” I raced to the elevators and machine-gun punched the up arrow until my thumb hurt. “I don’t give a damn how low my pants hang on you, Peter, this is the last time you borrow them!” And the phone was locked. I couldn’t even use it to call Cai. “Fuck me twice!”
I tossed Peter’s phone into my front pocket and used mine to redial Dave’s cell. Voice mail. I hung up and redialed, barely resisting slamming the phone against the wall when it clicked to voice mail again. The doors pinged open just as I dialed their home.
In the elevator, my finger rapidly pressed the button for the 18th floor. A business woman stepped in after me. As she reached to press a lower floor, I did the only rational thing. I panicked. Grabbing her briefcase, I tossed it out the door, ignoring her screech as she chased out after it. I squashed the ‘close door’ button like a dog with an itch. Marta answered the phone just as the woman directed me to the lowest depths of hell. The door closed out her escalating tirade.
Trust Is An Illusion
“Oz? Help. He is crazy!” Marta cried, hysterical with tears.
I quickly summoned an image of a lunatic there to kill her. “Have you called 911?!”