Hitchers

CHAPTER 41

The ride home in the Maserati was awkward. Summer and Grandpa didn’t have much to talk about. Not that I could concentrate on what they were doing. It took all of my energy just to stay in my body, like trying to hold a long series of numbers in my head while clinging to a windowsill.

Mick had been half an hour behind Summer, who lived further south and hadn’t wanted to wait for Mick. He’d turned around when Summer called with the news, and now he was ahead of us.

We were nearly home when Lorena took over. Her hands made for a jerky ride, but she managed.

“This is so messed up,” she said. “I died and left you here alone. Now I’m coming back and you’re—”

Barely hanging on. It was becoming excruciating. If I could hang on long enough, surely I would eventually get flipped back into the driver’s seat.

“Are you even there?” Lorena asked. “I’m so afraid you’ve already left me.”

“Oh, he’s still there,” Grandpa said.

Lorena glanced over at him. “How would you know that?”

Grandpa opened the glove compartment and retrieved a pack of cigarettes he’d stashed there. He engaged the car lighter, took his time unwrapping the cellophane and peeling back the silver foil. Lorena kept glancing over at him, waiting for an answer.

“When all this is sorted out, you’re the one who’s going to be around for me to sue,” Grandpa finally said.

“How do you know——”

“Because you can feel it,” Grandpa interrupted. “I felt him go when we were in the water, and I felt him come back. I know just what it feels like because he did it once before, only then I didn’t realize what it was.” He lit the cigarette with palsied hands, then muttered, “If I’d known what it was I wouldn’t have gone back for a piss, and I’d be done with him.” He exhaled a plume of smoke through his nose, pointed through the windshield at the turn up ahead. “Drop me at my house.”

“The hell I will. I’m going to Mick’s. If you don’t want to be there you can walk home.”

Grandpa glared at her. “We’re in the same situation, you and me. From what I can see the little miss you’re crowding out doesn’t like it any better than Finn, and I don’t have any more choice than you.”

“I didn’t burn down her apartment. I didn’t try to bankrupt her.”

“She didn’t steal—” Grandpa paused, because the shift back to me had started. I cried out with relief as I came back into my body.

“Get me to Aunt Julia’s house,” I said to Lorena. “Fast. Like my life depends on it.”