Candy Colored Sky, стр. 6

I step into the garage and let the door close behind me, feeling along the wall for the light switch. I smell oil in the dark, and when the fluorescents above finally kick on, my eyes fill in the rest of the picture. The yellow paint has held up. For the most part, there’s still a decent sheen on the doors and the hood. The seats are ripped to shreds from years of wear, though, and even through my novice eyes I know there are serious pieces missing from the dash. It’s as if my dad stopped halfway and left many things in limbo.

Needing fresh air, I hit the button to raise the garage door and lean in through the Bronco’s open driver’s side window. In my own selfish bubble, I’d forgotten about the chaos happening at the end of my driveway. A reporter and his camera man jet to their feet from the open back of a van. I hold up my hand in apology, sorry I disturbed them. But when they meander up my driveway, the nicely dressed one with a microphone in his hand, I regret being open and friendly. They took this as an invitation.

“Hey, there!” The guy’s wearing jeans and a sweater vest over a shirt and tie. In two words, I detect a slight accent—Texas, Oklahoma maybe. He’s not local, that’s for sure.

“Hi,” I stammer out, gripping my dad’s notebook while my arms rest along the open window. My eyes dart to the circus forming in our street. The last thing I want is for more people to see me, to approach me, to want to talk about the family across the street, a girl I barely know.

“Would you mind if we asked you a few—”

When the garage door begins to shut between us, I jerk my head back to see my Grandpa standing behind me, his thumb poised over the button on the remote. He waves at the two-man media crew, then switches to giving them the bird when the door blocks their view.

“Sorry. I forgot they were out there,” I say, my own words echoing in my head. How could I forget?

“I figured when I heard the door open.”

My grandpa has a bit of a limp. It’s at its worst in the evening and early morning. He ambles to the front of Dad’s Bronco and slides his hand along the crevices in the grill, feeling for the latch. He nods at me to join him as he lifts the heavy metal. I jump in, knowing enough to at least find the support bar to hold the hood in place.

“She’s a beauty under the hood,” Grandpa muses.

“Mmm.” I nod in agreement but honestly, I don’t have a clue what I’m looking at. The book in my hand may as well be written in Pig Latin and deciphered using a cereal box decoder ring.

“You can do this.” My grandfather’s heavy hand lands on the center of my back. He must sense my reservations. I’m sure they are vibrating off my skin.

I clutch my dad’s book to my chest, my thumbs nervously running along the corners of the pages that are no longer sharp. Maybe this is why Dad and I never really bonded. He could look under this hood and understand the workings of the engine so easily; all I see is a lot of dirty wires haphazardly taped together and strung around random filthy motor parts that do important jobs, I’m sure, but all look the same.

“Want a tour?” Grandpa leans his head under the hood and quirks a brow.

I shrug and set Dad’s book on the fender, leaning over for a better view. Holding on to the sides of the cavity, I breathe in deep. “Gotta start somewhere, I suppose.”

“Battery. You start here.” His hand hovers over the one thing in this mess that looks new. I’m guessing it is.

“Right.” I chuckle.

For the next twenty minutes, Grandpa walks me through the path that starts with a key in the ignition and ends up at a series of belts that run the motor. It’s one giant loop, and it’s overwhelming. I manage to sport a convincing smile by the time we close up and head inside. To truly pull this off, I’m going to have to obsess like my old man did. I know Mom and Grandpa have visions of me piling my friends in this thing and racing off for the weekend in the woods, but all I can see is the need for perfection, the frustration when things don’t work as they should, and the spiral until I basically live in this garage. All of this, of course, assuming I have any automotive inclination at all.

Mom is still curled up on the couch in front of the TV when Grandpa Hank and I come in. Having just been approached by the media zombies lurking on our sidewalk, I’m less drawn to watching them on screen. I kiss my mom on top of her head and lean over to hug her from behind the sofa.

“Happy early birthday, Jonah. I promise there will still be cake on the actual day.” A sleepy smile barely stretches between her cheeks. She’ll fall asleep down here, probably along with Grandpa.

I tell them both good night and drag my own tired legs up the stairs. I don’t know why I feel so listless. I haven’t done a thing all day except talk with officers and flip around local news channels. I don’t think my muscles have relaxed since we found out Addy is missing. My shoulders hunched up to my ears and have yet to fully drop.

In the shelter of my room, I close the door and toss Dad’s book next to my laptop where my essay still needs an ending. There’s no way my mind can focus on comparing protagonists in Lolita and Crime and Punishment. It’s hard to contemplate two fictional hero-villains while something possibly equally horrific to their deeds is