This Side of Salvation

CHAPTER 17

NOWBailey knocks softly on John’s open door. I know it’s her, even though I’m sitting on the far side of the bed with my back to her. “You’ve kept it just the way he left it?” I’m not sure why she’s whispering. Maybe because it feels like a museum or a tomb.

“Mom dusts in here every once in a while. Other than that, no one really comes in anymore.”

“This is cute.” She taps her toe against a small metal trash can with a bug-eyed owl on it. “And this was his plane.” Bailey stops in front of a framed painting of an A-10. “It’s just like the model you showed me, the one in your room.”

I wrap my arms around my waist, probably looking ready to puke. Feeling that way too.

“Interesting,” she says. “Most jets are pictured way up in the sky. But this one’s in a valley.”

“A-10s don’t get a lot of wild-blue-yonder time, John used to say. They go in low.”

“Sounds dangerous.”

“It is. They can be shot down with a—what’s it called.” I make a weak gesture, miming a big weapon on my shoulder, a weapon whose name escapes me.

“Rocket launcher?”

“That’s it.” Duh. “A lot of the insurgents have them. You know, our government sold the Afghans those rocket launchers back in the eighties when they were fighting the Soviets.” I drop my hands into my lap. “Ironic, huh?”

She sits on the bed gingerly, as if the mattress could collapse. “I always assumed that was how he died. I’m sorry I never asked the real story.”

I didn’t want you to ask. “Did Mara tell you?”

“Kane did. Mara couldn’t.” Bailey’s face pinched like she was trying not to cry herself. “I saw you were antsy in your dad’s office. Kane explained why, and about the gun.”

I rub my ears. It’s quiet in here, quiet enough to hear the shouts, then the shots, then my brother’s screams.

I heave myself out of the papasan chair, go to John’s desk, and turn on his stereo. The screen lights up but no sound comes from the speaker. It’s set to receive satellite radio signals, a service we haven’t been able to afford for months. I touch the input button for regular radio. The first station I find is blaring a commercial for a new casino in Chester. It’s noise, so I leave it on, not caring what kind of music it’ll eventually play.

“This is a great picture of you guys.” Bailey’s standing at John’s dresser, holding a family photo taken at his high school graduation.

I notice that John was even shorter than my dad, who’s an inch shorter than me. When I was a little kid reaching up for his hand, John always seemed like a skyscraper.

“Look at you,” Bailey says, “holding on to everybody.”

The six-year-old David stands on John’s feet, one hand stretched out to each parent, chin propped on the shoulder of a scowling Mara.

Only two people in that photo live here now. I want to smash the glass against the corner of the dresser, yank out the photo, and rip my parents from the image.

Instead I just set the frame facedown and step away. My chest collapsing again, but not in a good way, like when I saw Bailey in the bikini last night.

There’s something new under John’s desk: a small plastic clothes basket full of what looks like shrapnel. I pull it out and set it on the bed.

“Isn’t that your model plane?” Bailey lays her hand on the edge of the basket. “What happened to it?”

“Dad happened to it.” I lift a shard of fuselage that once belonged to my original A-10 Thunderbolt II.

“He broke it? That’s horrible.”

“It was my fault. I knew how to make him snap. I could’ve shut up. I could’ve stopped.” I run my finger over the tail’s vertical stabilizer, where the rudder has come off. “But I wanted to break him.” My teeth grit with the need to crush the memory in my fist like glass. “I guess I finally did.”

Bailey touches my shoulder, her voice quavering. “What do you mean?”

“I wasn’t here for them last night. I knew they’d be hurt when they found out I was gone.” I clutch the plane’s tail in my palm until the pain radiates through my wrist and up my arm. “But I didn’t think they’d leave me because of it.”

“They left for their own reasons, David. We might not know what those reasons are yet, but—”

“I could’ve convinced them to stay, I could’ve begged them. But I—ow!” I drop the tail, biting back a curse. My hand is left with a purple-red streak, the skin unbroken but bruised.

I bend over to find the piece of A-10. It’s bounced under the bed, forcing me to kneel to retrieve it. When I reach under, my hand touches smooth leather, then laces.

I pull out one of John’s old combat boots, from when he was a Civil Air Patrol cadet in high school. The sole is worn smooth near the toe, and one of the laces is frayed from years of tramping through the woods on search-and-rescue exercises. I remember his giant backpack full of survival gear, and how badass he looked in his camouflage.

I want to put on these boots and kick everything in this room— the furniture, the windows, the stereo—until they shatter. I want glass in my skin and splinters in my veins.

Then Bailey kneels down next to me, and I know I won’t smash or crush or kick anything. If I lose control, I’ll lose her, maybe forever.

“David,” she whispers, “none of this is your f—”

I kiss her, harder than ever before. Instead of pulling away, Bailey utters a little moan and kisses me back. My hands bury themselves in the thick mane of her hair, burrowing to find skin.

I press forward until she lies beneath me on the rug. Her thighs hitch up around my hips and her hands slip under my shirt. Her heat penetrates through these agonizingly thin sweatpants. My body moves instinctively against hers, this time knowing what to do—no fear, no hesitation, only the need to lose myself inside her. To forget it all.

“We can’t do this here,” Bailey gasps.

“I know. My room.” I pin her wrists to the floor and keep kissing her, as if that will transport us to my bed.

“What about Kane and your sister?”

“I forgot they were here.”

“How is that possible?”

“How’s it possible you remembered they were here?” I put my mouth to her neck, dragging teeth over skin, while my right hand slides the straps of her shirt and bra down off her shoulder. “How’s your brain keep working while we’re doing this?”

She doesn’t answer, but the thought enters my mind, Maybe I’m doing something wrong, and just like that the fear is back. This time I shove it aside with the twin titanic forces of rage and lust.

I have to pull myself together long enough to get her to my room, preferably without dodging my sister or my best friend. Which reminds me, We were figuring out where Mom and Dad went, which in turn reminds me, Mom and Dad are gone, but that thought loops around to I can have Bailey in my room, with the door shut.

Down the hall, Mara shrieks. “Oh my God! You guys!” Her footsteps come closer, running.

I sit up fast, the blood rushing from my head, what little was there to begin with.

My sister opens John’s door. “You won’t believe this.” She lifts her phone to show us the screen. “I just got a text from Mom.”