David Wisehart - Blood Alley

With Trevor, she could finally relax, and be herself.

Whoever that is.

She didn’t know the answer. Maybe there wasn’t an answer. She supposed a lot of people felt like that, like outsiders, strangers to themselves, but Claire was an orphan and felt it to her core. She was making a conscious effort to change, to let herself be vulnerable, to open herself up to experiencing… what?

Love?

She didn’t know what that meant. The flim-fams said they loved her, but it wasn’t real, wasn’t true, wasn’t fair. Love was a game they played to control her.

Claire had run away from her current foster family. The Powells. It wasn’t something she had planned, not really, but when the moment came she grabbed it like a brass ring.

The Powell family reunion had been a large affair, full of cousins and conversation, mothers and memories. The morning of the reunion had been awkward, the afternoon unbearable. Claire excused herself at lunch and walked away. No one followed her out. No one even noticed. She called a cab and found a hotel. She had saved up some money from working at the restaurant, and had used it then to buy her freedom. It took eighteen hours before the first voicemail and text messages reached her.

She deleted them unheard, unread.

Finally Trevor came for her. He stayed with Claire three nights in that cheap hotel. Now she was never going back. Graduation was next week, UCLA was next year, and the summer was hers to do with as she pleased. The rent-a-folks wanted her to come home—for their own peace of mind, if nothing else—but their home wasn’t her home. The Powells didn’t love her like a real family. She wasn’t one of their own.

She belonged to no one but herself—

A voice broke her thoughts. Trevor said, “Take the wheel.”

He sounded weary, pushing on the open door frame. She could see the tightness in his muscles, the exhaustion in his eyes.

The sun was higher now. She was losing track of the hours. This desert made a mirage of time.

Trevor glanced back. “Claire! Take the wheel!”

That startled her. “Me?”

“Yes, you! Now! ”

“Trevor, you know I—”

He came back, took her by the elbow, and guided her to the open door. “Just steer it to the garage.”

“But—”

“Claire!”

Reluctantly she climbed into the driver’s seat. The leather seat was hot and sticky. The cab was warm, her clothes were damp. Beads of sweat formed like goose bumps on her skin. When she touched the black steering wheel it burned her fingers. Her hand recoiled.

Trevor closed the door, then went behind the car for the final push.

The vehicle rolled slowly.

He knows I can’t drive.

Mr. Powell, her foster father, had offered to teach her, but she didn’t like being in the car alone with him. Mr. Powell was always telling her what to do— Do this! Do that! Behave yourself! Instead, she wanted to learn things on her own, to live or die by her own mistakes.

Claire had planned to take lessons from a real driving teacher. Some day. She never got around to it. She didn’t have her own car, and besides, Trevor always drove her places, so what was the point?

I should have taken drivers ed.

Of course, she knew what you were supposed to do with the pedals and the gears and the steering wheel. She had watched lots of people drive. She had even played some of Trevor’s video games where you raced against another player. But it felt different actually sitting in the driver’s seat.

What the hell am I doing here?

“Just steer it to the garage,” Trevor had said.

Simple enough. So simple, even she could do it. Trevor trusted her with the wheel, and his trust meant everything. She wasn’t about to let him down.

Nervous, Claire put her hands back on the hot steering wheel.

Ouch.

But the heat was bearable. Her first reaction had been more shock than pain.

Just steer it to the garage.

She saw the gas station up ahead. It had a garage. That’s where they were going. To find a mechanic.

Then everything will be okay.

There was a cement curb and a shallow ramp descending to the level of the gas station. The pavement dipped towards the gas pumps, which were next to the garage.

All Claire had to do was make an easy right turn into the station, where they would find a mechanic and get the car fixed, then they’d be back on the road and in Cedarview by sunset.

Okay, she told herself, you can do this . Just turn the wheel in the direction you want to go.

To test the wheel, Claire turned it to the right, towards the gas station ramp. The turn didn’t feel like what she’d imagined. Much more resistance than Trevor’s Xbox steering wheel.

This is supposed to be easy—

Trevor screamed, “Not yet!”

She jerked the steering wheel back the other way. But now she was too close to the curb. She could feel it rubbing up against the side of the tires.

“Straighten out!” Trevor yelled.

She turned the steering wheel hard to the left.

The Hummer drifted toward the yellow median line, then crossed it.

Too far, she thought, then corrected back the other way, trying to keep the wheels in the lane.

Trevor pushed hard on the rear of his Hummer H3.

He barked to the others, “Push, damnit. Push!”

The metal was hot. His muscles were sore. The sweat kept dripping into his eyes. He tasted salt on his lips, felt his muscles bunch and tense.

Trevor was nearly spent, and the others were useless. Ethan and Dakota were just going through the motions, letting the all-star do the real work.

It was starting to piss him off.

“ Push! ” he screamed, more at Ethan now than Dakota.

His little sister was a waste of oxygen.

She gave him a look like it was all his fault, and tucked her cell phone in her jeans pocket. Ethan put his meager strength to the task. Dakota added a token effort.

It wasn’t much, but it helped. The Hummer picked up speed. They were going to make it.

Almost there. Almost there.

“Now!” Trevor yelled to Claire. “Turn the wheel now!”

“Okay,” she said, sounding nervous.

He saw the front left tire turn slowly to the right, and for a moment Trevor felt a surge of pride. He knew Claire was scared of driving, and the video games hadn’t helped much, but he also knew she could do whatever she set her mind to. Claire was a smart girl, but easily intimidated.

This was a big moment for her.

Claire’s first foster parents had died in a car accident when she was six. He knew the memory of that collision still haunted Claire, held her back. Trevor had always encouraged her to practice driving. She refused. Now here she was, behind the wheel of his beefy H3, taking the wheel in her own hands.

And she had Trevor to thank for it.

After his car was fixed, he might even let her drive on the—

He felt a hard jolt.

The right front tire was on the ramp, but left front tire had struck the curb. It rode up, almost got over the curb, then fell back into the gutter.

The car was stuck.

Shit.

He’d given her a perfect chance, he’d put his faith and trust in her—and she blew it.

Typical.

“Claire!” he screamed.

She poked her head out the window and turned back to him with a guilty look.

“Sorry.”

Joshua was behind schedule and low on gas. His back ached and his joints were stiff. As his big rig rolled down the desert highway—approaching Blood Alley—he could feel the old pain return to his left knee. It always acted up on this stretch of the road. Blood Alley brought memories, and memories brought pain.