Mick snatched her by the hair and flung her against the wall. The loud thud was followed by shattering glass as a photo frame ricocheted from the wall. When Candace hit the floor, the containers on the coffee table jumped, splashing their contents. Trent squeezed his water bottle so hard the cap popped off.
“Would your son do that to you?” Mick asked Candace.
Candace looked up from the floor, eyes wounded.
“When we return to the living room,” Mick said, ignoring her, “we’ll pour this water for the Traders to drink.”
“What’ll happen to them?” Trent asked in a small voice.
Mick set a hand on Trent’s shoulder. “Save your concern for Jake. Once the Traders finish drinking, we’ll visit him at the creek.”
Trent wobbled as if his leg had been crushed all over again. He didn’t trust Mick—rather, Snare—but he was afraid to argue. Doing so could endanger Jake. Then again, Jake may have already drowned.
No, Trent thought. Gotta believe he’s okay and that I can save him. There has to be a way.
“First tell me what we’re doing,” Trent demanded. “Then I’ll help.”
Mick glared at him for an ugly, endless moment. Trent, standing a foot shorter than Mick, felt like a nail ready to be hammered through the floor. He considered apologizing but knew he had to hold his ground.
The moment passed. Mick leaned forward to whisper in his ear.
“I’m getting my parts back,” he said. “Be thankful that you and Jake can survive without what you traded.”
70
Ash could never have imagined the first task for her new hand would be draping a blanket over Cheeto’s disfigured body. This can’t be real. Any second now she expected to wake, preferably in a bed somewhere with Cheeto. Alive Cheeto. Grinning Cheeto. Her bandmate, her friend, her something more. She would take him in her arms and describe the wicked nightmare she’d had, one where some trippy fog swept in and mutilated him. Only a stupid nightmare. Nothing more.
Yet here she was, kneeling in the middle of a snowy highway and covering him with a cheap blanket. The same blanket they’d slept under last night. Once it was in place, she and Dad carried him over to the Subaru. They set him in the trunk beside Lauren. The stench was sickening, yet Ash couldn’t turn away.
She remembered the first time she saw Cheeto. Two years ago, she’d been barhopping after a Boston gig and somehow ended up in the North End. The door to a hole-in-the-wall pub was open, and she got an earful of the thrown-together screamo band playing inside. Musically, they were shit, but the moment she heard Cheeto’s voice, she knew. It was like McCartney finding Lennon.
Before the show ended, she fired her then-vocalist and had a whiskey sent over to Cheeto. When they met, he mistook her for a groupie, and she wanted to kick his nuts across the pub. She wisely kept her foot on the ground, however, and they talked till closing time. His voice sounded like success. Sounded like a future.
Now they had no future. She had her hand, but she didn’t have him. Never again would he call her Ashes or tell her to grow a heart or sneak up behind her for one of his surprise hugs.
Her throat stiffened. She fought back tears before she fell over him, sobbing.
“Sorry, darling,” Dad said. She’d forgotten he was there. She forgot the entire world existed, but it slowly, painfully returned as Dad rubbed gentle circles along her back.
Despite the stench, she kissed Cheeto’s forehead. A tear splashed his cheek and rolled along his nose, settling at the edge of his ruined eye. Using two fingers, she closed an eyelid. It resisted shutting, a cruel reminder that he could still be alive if she’d done things differently.
“Everything,” she said, sniffling. “Everything I did brought us to this…this disaster.”
“We all messed up,” Dad said.
“Nobody more than me.”
“Tell you something. Right before sunset I traded my skin. Didn’t need to, but I did. It’s something that’s been eating at me for ages. See, when I traded my knees way back when, the man I saw reflected in the water had lighter skin. I always… Well, the sight stuck with me for thirty years.”
“Dad…” She turned to him. “When I was younger, I kept a list of everything I hated about you. Being black wasn’t on it.”
“Yeah, well…” He cleared his throat. “What I’m saying is we all screwed up. Snare tricked us, made us act like fools. We all brought this monster to life, so we all shoulder the blame. Not just you.”
The wind howled.
With a grunt, he rubbed his wounded knee. “If you need another minute here, that’s fine, but we should get moving. Storm’s picking up, and this car doesn’t look built for blizzards. We gotta hurry back to the other Traders. Especially Trent and Jake.”
“Yeah.” She stared at Cheeto’s open eye. The damage matched Jake’s scars, which meant her nephew was still alive. “Jake got his eyes back. He shouldn’t have to see any of this.”
She reached up and shut the trunk.
71
“Listen up, everybody,” Mick said, setting two stacks of red Solo cups on the bar. “Snare’s coming after us, but there’s a way to protect ourselves.”
The Traders in the cramped, stuffy living room turned to face him. Devastated as they were, they perked at the nasal sound of his voice. It quieted their sobs and lifted their wrinkled chins. His tone exuded confidence, something nobody else possessed right now.
Trent wished he could muster some confidence. He didn’t know what to do. Staying the course would get most of them killed—or maybe worse. If the Traders drank the water, would it brainwash them? Torture them? Who knew? Trent wanted to stop this, but he was in no position to play rebel. According to Mick, Trent and Jake could survive as long as they agreed to surrender their traded parts. That wasn’t comforting, but it was enough.
Then again, no. It wasn’t enough. If they survived, Trent wanted more out of this deal. More than his son going blind all over again.
“For those of you who don’t know,” Mick said, glancing about the crowd, “I traded my brain to the creek the other day. In other words, I have Snare’s brain. Which is good news, because I can read her thoughts.”
The crowd gasped. Trent swallowed back bile as he listened.
“Mick!” Gina Narducci stood up in the back. “Can we bring back the dead? Please tell me we can. I’m afraid to go home. If I do and my kids are…are…” Narducci broke down, sobbing. Berke Toyama held her up, though the younger girl looked equally defeated. They all did.
“Everybody stay focused,” Mick said. “We can revive the dead, but first we got a bigger problem. Ash is coming after us. She’s working with Snare, like she has all week long. Snare gave her special powers to kill us, but we can protect ourselves. All we gotta do is drink creek water.”
“Creek water?” a Trader asked. “How’s that gonna help?”
“It’ll make us immune to Snare’s power.” Mick pulled Trent over to the bar. “My mom and Trent each have a gallon of creek water. Everyone grab a cup and drink some. A couple gulps should be enough.”