“I don’t know how, he left a message on Dad’s cell,” Justin answered.
“When does Dad want to leave?” Travis asked as he got out of bed and began to dress for the undertaking.
“Dad doesn’t know,” Justin said as he involuntarily lowered his eyes in guilt.
Travis stopped mid-way through putting his three-way tactical sling on as comprehension dawned on his face. “I don’t know which will make Dad more pissed, the fact that you checked his phone or that you want to leave the complex,” Travis told his brother.
Justin sagged in resignation.
“So when do we leave?” Travis asked nonchalantly as he began to place spare shells in his multitude of pockets.
Justin whooped with glee, and then caught himself and lowered his voice. “I want to leave now, but I want to get Brendon in on this.”
“Can’t,” Travis said. “You wake Brendon, he wakes Nicole, Nicole gets Mom, we go nowhere.”
“Shit, I hate it when you’re right,” Justin said. “But I wanted Brendon to drive his truck. If we take Dad’s Jeep on top of everything else he’d probably just shoot us without ever asking questions.”
“He won’t shoot me,” Travis said beaming. “I won’t be driving.”
Justin let a sickly smile ghost across his lips. Taking the Jeep was by far the worst offense of the many offenses he was about to commit.
Tommy came in a minute later, a trail of Kit-Kat crumbs marking his passage. “Whatcha you guys doing?” he asked, spraying peanut buttery goodness everywhere.
“Kit-Kats?” Travis asked. “We have Kit-Kats?”
“Weef did,” Tommy said, spreading his chocolatey smile.
“Hey Tommy,” Justin said. Concern laced his thoughts. It would not be easy getting out of the house quietly with Tommy asking all sorts of questions. “Did you just get up to get a snack?” He was hoping that Tommy was merely getting a little bite before going back to sleep. Tommy was famous for sleeping in, so much so that all of his shifts at Wal-Mart started no earlier than 1:00 p.m. For him to be up before the sunrise was an anomaly.
“Well I was sleeping good, right?” Tommy started. “I was dreaming about working at Wal-Mart before the deadheads came. You remember the time, Justin, when they were moving that huge pallet of Halloween candy and it tipped over.”
Justin didn’t remember, that incident happened six months before he had started, but he nodded anyway. His being there wasn’t relevant to the story.
“I was happy no one was hurt but I was SO happy the candy got all smooshed. Joey the manager said I could have all that I could carry. Ended up I could carry a LOT.” Tommy was smiling at his remembrance.
“Didn’t Joe get in trouble for that? “Justin asked. “Something about having to return the damaged goods for inventory control.”
Tommy’s smile faded a bit at the memory of his friend getting in trouble, but slowly spread again as he said “Yeah but I sure could carry a lot!”
“That’s a good dream Tommy,” Justin said, trying to hurry Tommy along and hopefully back to bed.
Tommy wasn’t having any of it. Justin would be more likely able to push over a non-sleeping cow than Tommy. Tommy began anew. Justin sighed.
“Hey Travis, why do you have your gun on?” Tommy asked. Alarm increased in the boys and just like that Tommy moved on, not waiting for a response. “So what I was telling you was not a dream, ‘cause dreams are made up, and all of that stuff happened. I wish I had some more smashed mallow cups,” Tommy’s eyebrows furrowed. “But then Ryan Seacrest comes over while I’m carrying all my goodies away. He keeps following me saying I dropped a Kit-Kat. And I’m like, ‘thanks Ryan, but there weren’t any Kit-Kats on the pallet.’ He keeps following me, and telling me about the Kit-Kat. He starts pulling on my arm and I start to drop stuff, so I was kinda getting a little upset.” Tommy paused for dramatic effect. Justin’s attention was peaked now. He had heard the conversation Tommy and his father had regarding Tommy’s inner voice. Justin tore away from his inner dialogue as Tommy started up again.
“So now I have to pay attention because if I don’t he’ll make me drop everything. Joey said I can only have what I can carry and I don’t want to miss out. So I turn and Ryan tells me that there’s a Kit-Kat in the basement for me. Wait did he say that, or that I should go eat a Kit-Kat in the basement? Why would he tell me to eat a Kit-Kat in the basement? Wait, okay so I got the Kit-Kat upstairs, and then I came down here, but I started eating it upstairs, do you think that’ll make Ryan mad?” Tommy looked ultra-concerned that he might be irking his spirit guide aka the host of the now defunct American Idol.
“I don’t think he’ll be mad, Tommy,” Travis said earnestly.
“So I ate most of my Kit-Kat down in the basement!” Tommy said loudly, possibly trying to appease his spirit guide. “And then here were you guys, awake! Do you want to play Monopoly?” he asked hopefully.
“No Tommy, we can’t play Monopoly right now,” Justin answered.
“Oh, is it because you’re going to get Paul?” Tommy asked as he licked some errant chocolate off his candy wrapper.
Justin swallowed loudly, his mouth having gone instantly dry. Travis’ mouth hung slackly.
“Did you hear us talking?” Travis asked. Justin just shook his head; he knew better.
“Naw, that’s spying. My mom said that’s not polite. ‘Sides, I couldn’t hear you guys talking anyway, don’t you know how crunchedy sounding Kit-Kats are in your head?”
“Tommy, are you gonna go back to bed?” Justin asked hopefully, already aware of the response.
“Can’t,” said Tommy matter-of-factly. “Ryan says I have to go with you.”
Quarter inch goose bumps embossed up the entire length of Justin’s spine.
“Are you going to tell Mrs. T?” Justin asked.
Tommy looked up to the ceiling as if trying to remember some missing facts. “Oh no, Ryan didn’t say anything about her, but we should bring Oleyco’s boyfriend.” Tommy had become enamored with Nicole. He became flustered every time he thought of her. Because of this he could not remember her name. She was known as Oleyco most of the time, but sometimes she was Nickel, Coley, Colon, Coldstone and even once as Dime, no one was sure where that one originated from. Most likely Tommy had been thinking of ‘Nickel’ and Dime seemed like the next natural progression. Tommy never mentioned Brendon by name; everyone but Tommy noticed the slight.
Something or someone was intervening in the boys’ plans, whether it was divine was yet to be determined. Brendon was out of bed, making an early morning bathroom delivery. Justin crept up the stairs, doing his best to avoid all the spots on the stairs that creaked. This was not an easy task. Tracy had been goading Mike for years to repair some of the worst offenders. Some of the creaks were as loud as a pistol shot, especially in the middle of the night. But Mike had staunchly held his ground. He had always thought of the creaks as his own alarm system. He had argued intensely that no intruder would ever be able to sneak up into the bedroom unsuspectingly. Tracy couldn’t even begin to fathom the depths of Mike’s survivalism and paranoia. Although as he would tell you, it’s either one or the other, and he preferred to call it survivalism. Then he would add that if someone could get past the security bars, Henry and the ‘stair alarm system’ without garnering any attention, then they deserved to take some stuff. So, maybe using Henry in the equation wasn’t a great example, but still.
Justin crossed from one side of the steps to the other, at one point climbing over one step completely to avoid a particularly nasty groan. He appeared to be playing some advanced three-dimensional version of hopscotch. He stopped at the top landing, directly facing his parents’ bedroom.
There were four hot spots on the landing, the problem however was that not all were active at the same time. It was like playing Russian roulette with floorboards. There was no rhyme or reason to it. Justin had his suspicions that his dad somehow had the floor rigged. It wasn’t out of the realm of possibilities. Justin’s right foot came down tentatively. Nothing. He sighed in relief. Next he strategically placed his left foot as close to the banister as possible, more times than not this was a safe bet, but not today. CRAAACK – Justin froze, only the sweat on his forehead had the audacity to move. Nothing stirred, not even Henry. After a thirty-second pause in which Justin expected his mother to come bursting out of her bedroom, nothing happened. He took a quick left which marked his first successful completion down the gauntlet. The next part was going to be equally difficult. On the left of the hallway was his dad’s office which was now Brendon and Nicole’s room. Directly across from it was the bathroom. Justin noticed the light on underneath the bathroom door. If it was his sister, the jig was up before it ever got going. She would not be persuaded to not tell their mother. For the second time in two minutes, Justin found himself frozen. This time, however, it was with indecision. He needed to think of a valid reason for his being in the hallway at this time of the day if his sister came out of the bathroom. Somehow asking her if she wanted to play Monopoly at 6:30 in the morning didn’t seem like a viable option. He then had the idea of getting Brendon awake, convinced and out of the bedroom before his sister returned. Not an acceptable alternative, she would surely go looking for Brendon if she came back and he wasn’t in bed. They’d never get out in time unless of course she had fallen asleep on the john. Justin laughed a little at that picture, he couldn’t for the life of him imagine his prim and proper sister falling asleep on the toilet.
It was the smell that got Justin moving. For a fearful second he thought that a zombie had broken in. When he realized that it only smelled LIKE something had died, and had not actually died, he sprang into motion. Without even looking, Justin quietly shut the office/bedroom door. His sister was lactose intolerant, and even if she had downed a whole cheesecake she was incapable of producing the noxious gas that oozed from beneath the closed bathroom door. Justin was now dead smack in the center of the hallway, between the bathroom and the bedroom. He didn’t want to move for fear that Brendon would get back into the bedroom before Justin could intercept him. He was beginning to get woozy trying to hold his breath. Just when he began to lose his peripheral vision, Justin heard the toilet flush and the sink go on. He exhaled in bliss, only to be rewarded on the inhale with the full blast of pestiferous tang of Brendon’s refuse as the door was opened. Brendon was momentarily stunned by the appearance of Justin at the doorway but quickly recovered.
