“Fuck you,” Byron said.
This car was a big What’s-Wrong-with-This scenario: Jimmy the Worrywart driving, Byron the Broke carrying the goods, and Cam serving as the brains of the operation. Cam, the star player for the Olmsted Architects, a football team every bit as pathetic as you’d expect from a high school where a 2099 SAT score put you in the bottom half of the class.
Cam pushed his seat back, jamming Byron’s legs. Byron responded by kneeing the back of Cam’s seat. “Mm, that felt kind of nice,” Cam said, “as I feel a little tingle in my groin, as we get closer to the party.”
“As Byron Durgin leans forward and says, once again, fuck you,” Byron said.
“Name the date, sweetie.”
Now Cam was scanning the radio stations. “This in from Metro-North—all trains in and out of Grand Central are canceled due to storm-related electrical failure. Express buses will be picking up outbound passengers at the following locations …”
“Dang. Glad we’re in a car,” Jimmy said.
“Too bad the Mets aren’t playing at home,” Cam grumbled. “A rainout’s better than a loss.”
He kept his finger on the SCAN button and stopped at a country station—“WMLT, Mullet Radio, Westchester’s country station!” the DJ bellowed. “With our country countdown—nnnnnnumber one!”
“No. Absolutely not,” Byron said. “Shoot that radio.”
“Yee-HAH!” Cam hooted as a twangy intro began. “I love this song—it’s about some hungover dude. He’s so shitfaced, he checks the obituaries for his own name….” He began singing along, loud and tunelessly. “Well, Ah’m drinkin’ down coffee but coughin’ up beer! Ah’m checkin’ t’see if Ah’m still here…”
Byron howled. “Aggh! Stop! You’ll break the windows!”
“Will you guys knock it off!” Jimmy shouted. “I can’t even see the goddamn road!”
The GPS device, which had been silent for a while, chimed in: “In point-six miles, turn right and go to the end of the road …”
That was the last thing Byron heard before he spotted the sudden movement on the side of the road, out of the woods and into the light.
14
9:09 P.M.
Byron had to blink a dozen times, each time hoping the dream would end. But the unreal was real. Jimmy was standing outside in the rain, the car was at a precarious slant, glass was strewn over the backseat, and a deer was lying across the front seat.
Kicking.
“Jesus,” Byron blurted out, “it’s still alive!”
“N-n-no shit …” came Jimmy’s voice.
The envelope.
Byron felt in his right pocket. He had fallen on that side of his body, so the envelope had been shielded from the rain that was pouring in sideways through the broken windshield. He fingered the opening and reached inside. The stuff was still wrapped in plastic. Intact.
Now what?
A crash meant cops.
Shit. This was Jimmy’s fault. How could Jimmy let this happen?
He was yelling shit at Jimmy. His mouth was going of its own will. Soon he was outside the car too, his hands grabbing the guy’s phone, preventing him from doing the stupidest possible thing: calling the cops. Byron’s mind was in warp mode, rearranging the reality into an impossibly fucked-up knot. The plan was shot to shit, he had possession, his own BlackBerry was dead, Jimmy was a useless mess, and …
Cam.
Holy shit. Cam was under the deer.
How could he have forgotten Cam? Why was Jimmy just standing there?
Leverage. He’d need a rope.
As he raced to the trunk, shouting instructions to Jimmy, the envelope felt like it weighed a hundred pounds. He glanced out to the woods.
Fling it away.
Great. The squirrels would be happy beyond their wildest dreams, but Byron would come home empty-handed, unable to pay Waits back, and next week they’d be pulling his ass out of a swamp in Red Hook.
Swallow it.
Um, no.
Stick it up—
Not even going there.
He flung open the trunk. Despite the damage, the light was working. Inside were the usual supplies—antifreeze, windshield fluid, paper towels, empty beer cans, flashlight, blanket, crowbar….
There.
The rope was perfect, a long, thick, braided cable. He grabbed it and the flashlight, and ran around the car. Jimmy was staring at him through the windshield, with a look that projected admiration, disbelief, and abject fear.
But Jimmy would obey. Jimmy yielded to the alpha dog. That was the good thing about Jimmy.
The deer now motionless, Byron went to work. He wrapped one end of the rope around the narrowest part of the deer’s legs, the other around the nearest tree.
Stepping back, he watched hopefully as Jimmy floored the gas pedal. After a few attempts, the thing finally slipped off—and Jimmy went skidding back, smacking into a guard rail.
Byron raced over to him. “Are you okay?”
“Fah—fah—” Jimmy stammered. He was shaken but intact.
Byron shone the flashlight into the passenger side. Cam, unfortunately, did not look so great. He was soaked in blood, his eyes shut and his arm hanging in a funny way. Byron tried to make out any movement in Cam’s chest, but his own hands were shaking. Was he dead? He couldn’t be dead.
The rain seemed to pick up, making hollow noises against the hood, tinkling against the piles of glass. And in the distance, a siren sounded.
Byron drew back, shutting the flashlight. “Shit! Did you call them?”
“No!” Jimmy said.
“Then how do they know?”
“Someone drove past us, just after the accident. Maybe they called.”
Byron’s stomach clenched. “Someone saw us?”
“This is a New York suburb. Occasionally people drive on the roads.”
Drug trafficking. Unlicensed driving. Manslaughter.
“Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, shit. Oh, God.”
Byron backpedaled. He reached into his pocket, grabbing the envelope.
Run.
No. He couldn’t leave Jimmy. And how suspicious would that be, anyway? Jimmy didn’t know anything, but cops could connect the dots.
He’d have to take Jimmy with him. But he’d have to hide the stuff first. If the cops found him and Jimmy, they would have to be clean. Later they could come back for it. He looked around frantically for a hiding place.
The bushes. Too wet and too obvious. A knot in a tree. Too hard to find. The car? Oh, sure, and leave an unexpected treat for the night-shift mechanics.
The siren was growing louder. They had to leave. Jimmy was in the car, sobbing, trying to revive Cam. Byron backed away, shaking. The siren was growing louder.
Byron’s leg hit against the deer, and he jumped away. The beast was distended and misshapen now, its back curved the wrong way and its head tilted upward. Its eyes were staring and its mouth, small and tight, was open wide as if it were ravenous for something to eat.
It wouldn’t be swallowing anything now.
Lightning cracked overhead, momentarily making the deer’s face an anguished rictus.
There.
It was the perfect place. And the thought of it made Byron’s stomach turn inside out.
He looked away for a moment, fishing the envelope out of his pocket.
Then, holding his breath, he inserted it into the deer’s mouth. The tongue was still warm. And bloody.
Leaning over a nearby bush, he retched.
15
10:22 P.M.
“If I … close my eyes …”
It felt good to hear music. It felt good to be indoors. It felt good to have found a bottle of single-malt Scotch hidden away in the kitchen cupboard. After the walk through the woods, he had been shivery and tense.
The living room was jumping to a dance tune everyone seemed to know. Byron had somehow lost Jimmy. He wandered up the stairs, dry clothes in hand, trying not to disturb the var
ious gropings along the stairway. Mouths jabbering, mouths kissing, mouths tonguing. Mouths, mouths, mouths, mouths …
He slipped on a step and rammed into one of the couples.
“Owww!” The guy spun around, revealing a mouthful of orthodonture and blood, an image that was far too close after tonight’s events.
“Sorry,” Byron drawled.
Coffee. He needed a cup of coffee. Drinking straight from the bottle of Lagavulin had not been a good idea on an empty stomach. At the time he thought it might ease the pain, stanch the flow of images. Cam … the deer … it was one or the other, wherever he looked—behind the sofa, out the kitchen window, behind the closet door left ajar, anywhere there was a patch of darkness.
The bloody-mouthed couple was glaring at him. Everyone was staring at him. Did they know what happened? Did they know that he had run from the scene of a crime? Had the accident been on the news? Byron Durgin, the Fallen Genius. His father, a retired New York City cop, urged his son to give himself up and join the family pantheon of losers.
No. He couldn’t lose it. He had to hang on. This was salvageable.
He would somehow return to the deer and find what he needed. And after that, come back to the party. His fifty percent was a hundred, now that Cam was—
Byron stopped at the top of the stairs, gripping the newel post. He felt ill. How could he be thinking about Cam’s percentage? He should donate it. To charity. To Cam’s family. For the funeral.
“Yo, um? Are you okay?” asked some girl, sitting on the stairs, who had a diagonal swath of dyed emo black hair. “’Cause if you’re about to yack, the bathroom’s on the left? I’ve had enough of guys yacking their brains out?”
“I’ll get back to you on that.” Byron marched to the top of the stairs and ducked into the first room he saw, directly in front of him.
It was a girl’s room, neat, decorated with stuffed things everywhere. He flicked on the light, hoping Jimmy would already be there, but the only occupants were a couple on the bed, writhing and giggling. They didn’t seem to care that Byron had entered.
Shielding himself behind an armchair, he let his wet clothes drop to the floor and changed into the dry outfit. The T-shirt was skintight, the sweatpants rose above his ankle. He’d need to take his wallet and dead BlackBerry, but the sweatpants had no pockets, nothing to carry them in. He looked around for another pair of pants, a jacket, a fanny pack, something he could use.
On the bed, the girl was peering out from under her boyfriend. “‘My parents went to the Minneapolis Skyway and all they brought me was this T-shirt’? Cute.”
Byron cringed, instinctively covering up the slogan on his shirt. He grabbed someone’s jacket off the floor and put it on, only to discover it wasn’t a jacket. It was a thick cotton robe.
Quickly gathering up his stuff, Byron bolted through the door—and ran smack into an older guy with a shaved head. “Whoa!” the guy shouted, looking at the bundled clothes in horror. “What’d you do, piss yourself?”
“Sorry, wardrobe malfunction,” Byron said. “It’s just water, dude.”
“Heyyyy, you’re the guy Angus told me about—came in from the rain—stalled car, right?”
“Angus?” Byron said.
“Give ’em to me. I’ll wash these babies for you.” The guy snatched the clothes from Byron’s arms and headed downstairs.
“Hey, wait, I need—”
“They’ll be dry in no time!”
“—I need the stuff from my pants pockets!”
The guy stopped on the stairs, surrounded by other kids who were staring at the commotion. He turned with a look of embarrassed contrition and gave Byron the BlackBerry and wallet. “Whoops. Sorry about that.”
“What are you, the houseboy?” Byron murmured as the guy bounded away. Washing clothes, in the middle of a party?
Instinctively he counted the money.
Emo Girl was still sitting at the top of the stairs. She looked at him with probing eyes. “You were smart. Your cell phone, your wallet—he already had them in his hand when you asked for them. He dug them out of your pocket.”
“Who is he?” Byron demanded.
“Who do you think?” the girl said as if even asking the question wearied her unnecessarily.
Byron ran downstairs and scanned the room. The guy was nowhere to be seen. His heart was racing. What kind of party was this?
Chill…. Think this through. Okay. Some lowlife thief. Big deal. The guy went away with nothing but some wet clothes. The worst had been averted. Byron had to get the fuck out of here, now. He had to find the deer, retrieve the stuff, and get back ASAP.
He ran toward the back of the house. Outside it looked as if the rain had let up. Halle-fucking-lujah. It shouldn’t be too hard to find the accident site if he used the road instead of the woods. The question was, how far away was it? He had no clue.
The back exit led onto a long, screened-in porch. The lights were out, but he could make out a door at the far end. His footsteps thumped dully on the plank floor.
As he reached for the latch, a voice called out to him:
“Cam?”
Byron spun around. A guy with slicked-back hair approached with a sly grin. He was holding an unlit cigarette. “Like the robe.”
“It’s not mine,” Byron said. “I borrowed it.”
“You don’t look the way I expected you to,” the guy said, his eyes flickering nervously past Byron into the house.
“Um, actually, that’s because I’m—,” Byron stammered.
“I’m Frazer,” the guy said. “I live here. Angus’s brother? You didn’t answer my last text message, Cam.”
“Well, I—that wasn’t … um, what was the message?”
Frazer pulled out a lighter and offered Byron a cigarette. “Basically, dude, I was saying that if you show up here, you’re a fucking dead man.”
16
10:37 P.M.
“Dead man?”
The guy was moving closer, eyeing him in a creepy way.
“I figured by now they’d be dragging you out the front door in chains,” Frazer said. “They’re crawling all over this place.”
“Uh, I’m kind of new to this, Frazer. Pretend you’re talking to someone who knows only Swedish. Define ‘they.’”
“You know, the dudes old enough to be my uncles?” Frazer whispered. “You did notice them. I mean, they’re like, My peeps! Rad! Far out!, with their balding heads and beer guts. They think we’re so fucking stupid we can’t tell.”
Byron nodded, his heart thrumming. “But why—?”
“Narcs, dude,” Frazer said. “What are you, like, home-schooled or something? Narcs. Someone tipped them off.”
Okay. This made perfect sense. “He—the cop—tried to take my cell phone.”
“They wanted your contact list. The dicks.”
“It’s broken anyway….”
“They can fix it.”
“Who could have tipped them off?”
Frazer cocked his head. “You got any enemies here in Westchester, Cam?”
Byron’s brain was spinning. You hold the stuff, Cam had said. You’re the one who needs the money.
Could Cam have been leading them into a trap?
“I have to get out of here,” Byron said.
“Duh,” Frazer replied.
“Listen, Frazer, my man. I am totally fucked with transportation. My car—it’s totaled. You saw the way I was, all soaked when I came in. A deer jumped out. I didn’t see it. Huge mother—”
DING-DONG!
The doorbell made them both turn. From inside the house, there was a scream. A sudden hush. Racing footsteps.
Frazer went pale. He grabbed Byron’s arm and shoved him out the back screen door.
“Who’s at the front door?” Byron said, stumbling down the steps and nearly falling on his face.
“Those douche bags have got undercover guys here already—why the fuck are they raiding the place?” Frazer replied, pulling Byron
across a wide, rain-soaked backyard. “We’re clean. It’s like a sixth-grade graduation party in there. Maybe one of the plainclothes guys planted something—”
“The cops are at the door? The real cops?”
Frazer frowned, his nostrils flaring. “Shit. You were drinking. I can smell it.”
“There was Scotch—”
“In the kitchen. Fuck. Dad’s single malt. Forgot about that.”
The house had fallen silent, and Byron could hear a deep voice calling out a name. Daniel or Emmanuel or something.
“Maybe just a noise complaint, who knows?” Frazer said. “But whatever it is, get your ass away from my house. Now.”
“I love you too. But it’s a long way back to the Upper West Side.”
Frazer dug into his pocket and tossed him a set of keys. “The middle car. Silver. It’s got satellite alarm systems that will track you to Mars, so don’t get any ideas. Bring it back tomorrow before my mom and dad get back from Gstaad. Like, two o’clock.”
“Thanks,” Byron said. As Frazer jogged back to the house, Byron stared at the keys in his hands and for the first time in his life cursed the fact that he had grown up in New York City.
He needed Jimmy to drive. Which meant Jimmy would have to take him to the deer, and sit there while he retrieved the envelope from its mouth. Which meant Jimmy would have to know.
He’d hoped to avoid this, but what the fuck. They were both in this up to their kishkes now.
He turned back toward the house. It was dark and silent. He had read in New York magazine about what happened when parties got busted in Westchester. It was like a venerated game—hide the booze, flush the dope, nuke the noise, and lay low until the cops lose interest. An arrangement made necessary by the idea that any busted head might belong to the son of a Fortune 500 macher with enough political clout to Roto-Root the entire local civil service structure.
As he got closer, though, lights began flickering on. A commotion had started inside the living room. Kids were clumping together in the kitchen and the porch to watch. He snuck inside and made his way through the muttering groups, scanning the faces for Jimmy.
In the kitchen doorway he took his place next to a girl and a guy gazing into the living room, clutching each other as if having just heard that the nukes had been launched at Westchester, or worse, John Mayer had died.