Authors: Christopher Pike
“Bardos Lane,” Free said.
“But isn’t that the name of the club you’re supposed to play?” Teresa asked. Free laughed hysterically.
“Yeah!” he said. “We were closer than we thought. What a break. We’re already here. Amazing.”
“But you said the club was in San Francisco?” Teresa said.
“I was wrong,” Free said, rubbing his hands fiendishly together. “We don’t have to go any further. We can satisfy all our shopping needs here.”
“Our shopping needs?” Teresa asked.
“Yes,” Free said. “We’re going to a mini-mart. I love mini-marts. And this one’s my favourite. Oh, there it is! Make a left up ahead, Teresa. Let’s just you and I go inside. We don’t want Poppy with us. She’s in a grumpy mood and she’ll just spoil our party.”
“You don’t want to come in, Poppy?” Teresa asked, as she pulled to a halt in front of the store. Free’s excitement bewildered her. The mini-mart was like a million others in the world. It appeared to have no special qualities. Yet she was relieved to see it. She figured she could buy some aspirin and maybe something to settle her stomach. She was through with Junior Mints for the night.
“No,” Poppy said.
“You should at least get out and stretch,” Teresa said, opening her car door. Free was already outside and standing in the rain, getting soaked. He was the craziest guy.
“I stretched my legs at the church,” Poppy said flatly.
“Have it your way,” Teresa said, climbing out.
Free hurried her to the door of the store, which was good given the amount of rain coming down. But just before they went inside, under the shelter of an overhang at the front of the place, he stopped and wanted to talk.
“Remember I asked if you could do me a favour and you said yes?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“You told me you would do anything for me?”
“I will. I like you a lot, Free.”
He leaned over and gave her a quick kiss. “And I love you, Baby. But I need a pretty big favour at this stop. I’m only asking this ’cause I know you and I are going to be together for at least a long while and I’ll need the money to take care of you and love you and you just got to help me out, you see, ’cause Poppy won't, she never would, and that's just the way she is and I can't change it. Do you understand?”
Teresa chuckled. “Hold on, you’re confusing me. What favour can I do for you? Just tell me and I’ll do it.”
“Do you have your knife?”
“My knife?”
“Your mother’s steak knife? Didn’t you say you had it in your back pocket?”
“No, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She smiled. “The only thing I have in my back pocket is that joker you put there when you pinched my butt.”
“Check it out,” Free ordered.
“What?”
“Check in your pocket and see if you’ve got your knife. I might need you to use it in a second.”
Teresa stuck her hand in her pocket, just to prove that she didn’t have a knife. Because it was a ridiculous assumption. She didn’t walk around with a knife, and besides, she couldn’t have sat in the car for the last how many hours with something as long and hard as a steak knife snugged up next to her.
Ouch!
A hot pain subbed at her left hand, the one she had thrust in her pocket. She quickly pulled it out to see that it had blood on it. Free was right. She poked more carefully into her pocket with her right hand and drew out the knife. It
was
the same knife she had taken to Bill’s house.
“I can’t believe it,” she gasped.
“Let’s get inside.”
“But I'm bleeding!”
“We’ll get you a Band-Aid.” He grabbed her arm. “Come on, we don’t have much time. The sun’s starting to come up.”
They entered the store. A tall man with chestnut brown skin, a white goatee, and a bald head stood behind the counter. He looked half-starved, like an Ethiopian who had seen one drought too many. He nodded in their direction but didn’t speak. Teresa thrust her knife back in her pocket, out of sight. Free quickly dragged her round the store collecting beer, doughnuts, a carton of milk and Junior Mints. She started to tell him that she didn’t want any candy, but before she could speak he was already piling the articles up on the check-out counter, and besides, he had just pulled out a gun and was pointing it at the tall African.
“Give me everything you’ve got,” Free said calmly, staring the man in the eye. “Or you won’t have to worry about renewing your health insurance policy.”
“Free!” Teresa screamed.
“Don’t tell him my name,” Free said impatiently. “We are robbing this store. If you identify me to him he’ll be able to identify me to the cops. I can’t let that happen. I’d have to kill him before I let that happen.”
“But why are you doing this?” she cried.
“Keep the bills coming,” Free said to the man, who was nervously emptying the register on the counter, beside the beer and the doughnuts. Free continued, speaking in her direction, “I am doing this because I need the money. I’m in love with you and I will have to support you for the next sixty years. Also, there’s some fine white powder I’ve grown very fond of and it costs more than you can imagine.” He paused and his head whirled in the direction of the door. “Take out your knife. We are about to have company. Do it!”
Teresa withdrew the knife from her pocket. Why, she didn’t know. She wasn’t going to hurt anyone with it. She had never hurt anyone in her life.
A young woman walked into the store. At first Teresa thought it was Poppy. They were about the same height and had the same long dark hair. But this woman was a few years older. She wore a nurse’s uniform. Her eyes grew big when she saw Free with a gun.
“Stay!” Free shouted to her. “Get your hands up. Move over to my partner. Slowly! Don't try anything funny or your boyfriend is going to be sleeping alone tonight. Cover her, Baby.”
Teresa stood helpless. “I can’t.”
Free shoved her in the direction of the young woman. “Don’t argue with me! Stick your knife at her throat and keep it there.”
Teresa slipped behind the woman and raised the tip of the blade to her neck. The woman shook with fear two inches in front of her and Teresa was grateful that she couldn't look into her eyes. Teresa felt as if reality had fractured into a million insane pieces. Free was such a great guy. She had slept with him for God's sake! But here he was, a common thief, like John. A heroin addict, too, maybe – no wonder the guys had been friends.
This cannot be happening.
Sirens sounded in the distance.
No, they weren't that far away.
“Jesus Christ!” Free swore. “Not again. Teresa, grab her by the hair and don’t let her go.” He started to scoop the money into the pockets of his black coat, his gun still levelled at the man. He shouted at the store employee. “You! You back up! You get your hands up and don’t look at me!”
“Jack,” Teresa pleaded. She had taken hold of the woman’s hair to pull her closer, even pressing the blade more firmly against her throat, but she was losing it. She was one inch from fainting. The store whirled around her like a merry-go-round. The sirens screamed. Everything was happening so fast. The cops were practically on the doorstep!
“We’re going to have to make a run for it,” Free yelled, dollar bills falling out of his pockets. He backed away from the tall man. “We can’t leave any eyewitnesses – we’re going to have to kill them, Baby.”
“No!” Teresa cried.
“Yes!” Free cackled. He was having a good time. “We’ll waste them and drive back to L.A. and spend all our money in all the wrong places.” Free shook his gun at the man. “Say goodbye to truth, justice, and the American way.”
“No!” Teresa screamed.
Free shot the man in the face. The bullet entered his nose and left behind a shattered mound of red dripping tissue. The man fell far and hit hard. Free threw his arms in the air and whirled in her direction.
“Slit her throat!” he ordered.
“No!” Teresa cried.
“The word is yes!” Free laughed. “Open her veins! Yes! Make her bleed! Yes! Do it! The police are coming!”
“Don’t ask me to...” Teresa began, but she didn't get to finish because the young woman suddenly tried to struggle free. Perhaps she figured her odds were poor just standing around, and Teresa would have privately agreed with her. But in the woman's struggle, she shook forward and the knife Teresa had at her neck
accidentally
cut her a little bit. It was definitely an accident, but it wasn’t exactly a tiny cut. Because the neck was chocked with big important veins and the blade was razor sharp and – well, Teresa cut her bad enough so that the blood began to flow. Bad enough so that the woman collapsed on the floor the moment she shook free of Teresa’s hold. Free laughed as he looked down at the nurse squirming at his feet, her hand raised to try to stop the bleeding.
“Teresa,” he said. “You did it to her faster and more efficiently than I could have.” He raised his gun and pointed it at the woman’s head. “But now that you’ve passed your test there’s no reason your second victim should have to suffer.”
“You can’t,” Teresa moaned.
Free shot the nurse in the back of the neck.
The blood and soft tissue splattered Teresa’s face.
Free stuck his gun back in his belt. “I can and so can you. Let’s quit this place, Babe. We can have beer and doughnuts back home. In L.A.”
Free grabbed her arm and dragged her out of the store.
Into the failing night, where they saw no police.
They climbed in the car. Free drove.
Teresa stared at the blood on her shirt. A nurse’s blood.
Poppy lit a cigarette and stared out the window.
Bored. Poppy was bored and they had just killed two people.
Teresa didn’t understand anything.
“This is a fast car,” Free said, getting on to the freeway.
Anything that had happened since she had left home.
“We’ll be there soon,” Free said, heading north.
Even the things she could remember.
“Where?” she whispered.
Nowhere, the priest had said.
“Your place,” Free said.
The road led nowhere.
“This isn't the right way,” Teresa mumbled.
Because she was in trouble.
“Yes, it is,” Free said.
Because she had done something wrong.
“I live the other way,” she insisted.
With her knife.
“We’ll be getting off the freeway in a second,” Free said.
The knife she had not left at Bill’s house.
“No,” she said. “No.”
The knife in her pocket.
“It’s the next exit,” Free said.
The knife she had used to cut into someone’s skin. “I live three hundred miles from here!” she cried. But whose skin? Who was really bleeding?
“Get real,” Free said.
Bardos Lane. Border Lane.
Teresa’s stomach lurched. “I feel sick.”
Border World. Bardos.
“We’re getting off here,” Free said, slowing.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
They drove into a residential area. The rain continued to fall, but lightly now, as if the growing daylight was capable of drying up the clouds that had plagued them all night. They turned into an apartment complex and parked in a carport. Free jumped out and Poppy and Teresa got out slowly. Actually, Poppy had to help Teresa up. She was so sick she had trouble staying on her feet.
“Where are we?” she mumbled.
“Same old Teresa,” Free said, striding into the complex. Poppy helped her as they followed him.
“I’m going to have to lie down soon,” Teresa said.
“Yes,” Poppy said, her voice gloomy as midnight.
Free led them into an apartment. He had the key. Teresa collapsed on a couch near the door and closed her eyes for an instant. To say she was in shock would have been like saying victims of serious burns were familiar with pain. Her pain, devastating as it was, could now hardly cut through the fog she had entered. They had killed two people. Blood was all over her clothes. Plus, she was bleeding. She had accidentally cut her left wrist with her knife. Like she had accidentally cut the nurse’s throat. Oh, God, Free had just aimed the gun at them and pulled the trigger. All for a few lousy bucks. The sin of it all. Having slept with him, she must now have disease growing inside her.
Teresa opened her eyes and looked around.
The apartment looked familiar. Very.
“Where are we?” she mumbled again.
Neither of them answered her right away. Free was in his glory, skipping around the living-room as if he had just found a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. He had his empty green garment bag in his hand and was unfolding it on the floor. Poppy sat smoking at a table in the adjacent kitchen. Teresa could hear water running. She turned her head with great effort and saw that the door to the bathroom was lying partway open and that someone had left the water running in the bathtub and that it was overflowing.
“Somebody should turn that water off,” she said weakly.
“Why don't you do it?” Free asked.
“I’m too sick to get up,” Teresa said.
“Always an excuse with you,” Free muttered.
She was offended. “You killed those people, you animal.”
Free laughed. He was smoothing the wrinkles out of his empty bag. What had he done with his other clothes? Just thrown them away? “It was fun,” he said. “Did you have fun? You killed one of them, too, remember?”
“That was an accident!” Teresa protested.
Free giggled. “What a memory!”
Teresa cried weakly. “Would somebody please turn off that water? The noise of it is hurting my head.”
Free paused in his task and approached. “You're the only one who can turn off the water, Babe. Poppy and I ain’t got no hands.” He stopped. “Do you want to watch TV?”
“Huh? No.”
“I have a video you might enjoy,” Free said, ignoring her. He pulled a tape from his coat pocket and walked over to the VCR. He thrust the tape into the machine and turned on the TV. “You keep asking where we are – and I've already told you. But you can think of this tape as a kind of a road map to the highways in these parts.”
“I can't watch anything right now,” Teresa whispered, her head falling to one side. She had to struggle to remain conscious and she had to ask herself why she was trying at all. Because if she just blacked out she could forget her pain. It was so tempting, just to escape. Yet something kept her eyes open.