Sheltered(61)

“I guess you kind of like the rats, huh?”

He smiled, and this time it touched his eyes.

“I do. I love the rats. I love the bare floors, I love the elevator that barely works. I love all of this more than I ever loved tennis courts and swimming pools. This is the life I want—a life of hard work and being careful and planning for the future. Our future, if you want it to be.”

And for the first time she could see it there, in the distance. She could really see forever there, beyond his words.

“I do want it to be. I…yes. I want those things.”

He closed his eyes, just for a second. As though he needed to bask in it for a moment, or maybe take the time to pray. Before clapping his hands together, as loud as a gunshot.

“Okay,” he said. “So let’s go get your stuff.”





Things looked different, now that she’d had a taste of that other life. The colors were drabber, the surfaces of things less real, somehow. Everything seemed smaller, though rationally she knew it couldn’t be.

She’d just been living in a vast and plentiful space for the last twenty-four hours. This tight little corner of suburbia was bound to appear tiny and choking by comparison—and that was before she’d even gotten into the time limit. Because of course now that they were here, they had one again.

Her father would be back by five-thirty. They had two hours to grab things she wasn’t even sure she wanted, before he returned.

“You want this picture of your parents?” he asked, as she stuffed clothes into his backpack.

Yeah, that one was on the definitely-sure-she-didn’t-want-it list. But then there were other things, things she hadn’t even thought of that he suggested almost immediately.

“You’ll want your schoolbooks,” he said, just as she tossed them aside. “Whatever college you go to, they’re going to study the Brontes. Probably Charles Dickens too.”

She looked at the fan of books on her bedroom floor. Thought about what he’d said again, over and over. Ninety-three thousand dollars.

“You’re not paying for my education, Van,” she said, as she went for another woeful pair of shoes. She had no idea what the real world was going to make of her, dressed like this. Though really, how could she care about a thing like that anymore?

They had made plans together. There was a real and solid future ahead of them—one in which she could get a job, and buy new clothes, and just be normal. She had a chance at being normal, and by God she was going to take it.

“Yeah we’ll see. How about your music box?”

“Leave it. And the answer’s still no on the education thing, no matter how many we’ll sees you give me.”

“That’s right, baby. Be firm with me.”

“Stop it—I’m serious. I’m going to get a job as a street sweeper.”

“Again—Victorian England is not reality. No restaurants serve gruel, and you can’t make a living by lighting gas lamps.”

“I didn’t say gas lamps, you nerd. I said—”

He held up a hand, in a way that startled her for two diametrically opposed reasons. One being that she immediately knew what the hand meant, and warmed all over inside to think that she understood him that well. The other being a more stomach-dropping he’s telling me to be quiet because he just heard my father come home early.

Really, really early.

“There’s no way,” she told him, but of course the whispery tone of her voice gave her away. Apparently there was a way, if her vocal cords now wanted to believe him. “My father’s never home before five.”

“You sure? ’Cause I just heard someone come out of your parents’ bedroom.”

“What? That’s even…no. That’s…not possible,” she said, but even as she did so she could just make out footsteps on the stairs, going down. The faint buzz as the kitchen light snapped on.

“He would have heard us, if he’d been in the bedroom all this time. He would have—”

“Maybe it’s your mom.”

“She’ll never come back now. Never. And besides, it sounds like him.” She paused, listening for those heavy footsteps. “It’s just—I’ve never known him take a day off from work. I don’t even—”

“Take it easy, take it easy. We’re fine. We’re just going to pick up your stuff and get the fuck out of here, okay? You don’t have anything to be worried about.”

Which was all very well to say, but her legs still didn’t want to help her up. He had to put a hand on her arm—strong and good and reassuring—and make her look at him. Of course, once she did things felt different. He didn’t appear the least bit scared.