Panic

THURSDAY, AUGUST 18

dodge

DODGE KNEW IT WAS JUST A MATTER OF TIME before Bishop came to see him. He didn’t wait long. Just three days after Bishop had turned himself in to the police for the Graybill fire, Dodge came home from work and spotted Bishop’s car. He wasn’t outside, though; Dodge was surprised to see that Dayna had let him in. Bishop was sitting on the couch, hands on his knees, knees practically to his chin, he was so tall and the couch was so low. And Dayna was reading in the corner, like it was normal, like they were friends.

“Hey,” Dodge said. Bishop stood up, looking relieved. “Let’s go outside, okay?”

Dayna looked at Dodge suspiciously. He could tell she was waiting for a sign, an indication that everything was okay. But he refused to give it to her. She had betrayed him—by changing, by suddenly flipping the script. Panic had been their game, a plan they had made together, a shared desire for revenge.

He knew, obviously, that nothing could bring his sister back, and that hurting Ray, or even killing him, wouldn’t restore Dayna’s legs. But that was the whole point: Ray and Luke Hanrahan had stolen something Dodge could never get back. So Dodge was going to steal something from them.

Now that Dayna was shifting, turning into someone he didn’t know or recognize—telling him he was immature, criticizing him for playing, spending all her time with Ricky—he felt it even more strongly. It wasn’t fair. It was all their fault.

Someone had to pay.

Outside, he gestured for Bishop to follow him into Meth Row. For once, there were signs of life here. Several people were sitting out on their sagging porches, smoking, drinking beers. One woman had snaked a TV out into the front yard with her. Everyone was hoping to catch a glimpse of the tiger; in just a few days, it had become an obsession.

“I’m out, you know,” Bishop said abruptly. “I won’t get my cut or anything. It was all pointless.” His voice was bitter. Dodge felt almost bad for him. He wondered why Bishop had ever agreed to judge, to go along with it. Or why anyone else agreed to it, for that matter. Maybe all of them—the players, the judges, Diggin, even—had their own secrets. Maybe the money was only part of it, and the stakes were much higher for each of them.

Dodge said, “We’re almost at the end. Why back out now?”

“I don’t have a choice. I broke the rules. I talked.” Bishop took off his hat, ran a hand through his hair, then smashed his hat back on. “Besides, I hate it. I always have. Fucking Panic. It drives people crazy. It is crazy. I only did it because . . .” He looked down at his hands. “I wanted to give Heather my cut,” he said quietly. “When she started playing, I had to keep going. To help her. And keep her safe.”

Dodge said nothing. In a screwed-up way, they were both acting out of love. Dodge felt sad that he hadn’t gotten to know Bishop better. There was so much he regretted. Not spending more time with Heather, for example. They could have been real friends.

And Nat, of course. He’d royally screwed things up with her.

He wondered if all of life would be like this: regret piled on regret.

“Did you ever do something bad for a good reason?” Bishop blurted out suddenly.

Dodge almost laughed. Instead he simply answered, “Yes.”

“So what does that make us?” Bishop said. “Good, or bad?”

Dodge shrugged. “Both, I guess,” he said. “Like everybody else.” He felt a sudden pang of guilt. What he was doing—what he wanted to do to Ray—was really bad. Worse than anything he’d ever done.

But there was that old saying: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. That’s all he was doing. Getting even.

After all, he wasn’t the one who had started this.

Bishop turned to him and stopped walking. “I need to know what you’re going to do,” he said.

Bishop looked so lost, standing there with his big arms and legs as if he didn’t know how to work them.

“I’m going to keep playing,” Dodge said quietly. “We’re almost done. But not quite. Not yet.”

Bishop exhaled loudly, as though Dodge had just punched him in the stomach, even though he must have been expecting it. And Dodge suddenly knew how he could make Bishop feel better, how he could do something good for a change, and how he could make sure that Ray lost.

“I can keep Heather safe,” Dodge said. Bishop stared at him. “I can make sure she doesn’t go up against Ray. I’ll make sure she doesn’t get hurt. Deal?”

Bishop watched him for several long minutes. Dodge could tell he was struggling with something; he probably didn’t trust Dodge completely. Dodge couldn’t blame him.

“What do I have to do?” Bishop said.

Dodge felt a weight lift from his chest. One step closer. Everything was slotting into place.

“A car,” he said. “I need to borrow a car.”

Dodge had been worried Heather wouldn’t listen to him. After all, he was the one who’d told her all deals were off, no splits. But when he asked her to meet him at Dot’s, she agreed. It was ten p.m.—the only time the diner was ever empty, in between the dinner rush and the late-night crowd, when couples blasted from the bar next door came in for pancakes and coffee to sober them up.

He explained what he needed her to do. She’d ordered a coffee, made it light with cream. Now she stared at him mid-sip. She set her cup back down.

“You’re asking me to lose?” she said.

“Keep your voice down,” Dodge said. His mom had worked the early shift and was probably out with Bill Kelly—they were practically goddamn inseparable at this point—but he knew everyone else in Dot’s. Including Ricky, who he could see every time the kitchen door opened and closed, grinning and waving at him like an idiot. Dodge had to admit the kid was pretty nice. He’d already sent out a free grilled cheese and some mozzarella sticks.

“Look, you don’t want to go up against Ray, do you? The kid’s a beast.” Dodge felt a tightening in his throat. He thought about why he was doing this—thought about Dayna wheeled home for the first time, Dayna falling out of bed in the night and crying for help, unable to climb back into bed. Dayna wheeling around, hopped up on pain meds, practically comatose. And even though she’d seemed better and happier lately—hopeful, even—he, Dodge, would never forget. “He’ll knock you off the road, Heather. You’ll end up losing anyway.”

She made a face but said nothing. He could tell she was thinking about it.

“If we play it my way, you still win,” he said, leaning over the table, tacky from years of accumulated grease. “We split the money. And nobody gets hurt.” Except for Ray.

She was quiet for a minute. Her hair was swept back into a ponytail, and she was flushed from a summer outside. All her freckles had kind of merged into a tan. She looked pretty. He wished he could tell her that he thought she was great. That he was sorry they had never been closer.

That he had fallen for her best friend, and had messed it up.

But none of that mattered now.

“Why?” she asked finally, turning back to him. Her eyes were clear, gray-green, like an ocean reflecting the sky. “Why do you want it so bad? It’s not even the money, is it? It’s about the win. It’s about beating Ray.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Dodge said a little roughly. The kitchen doors swung open again and there was Ricky, his cook’s whites streaked with marinara sauce and grease, grinning and giving him the thumbs-up. Jesus. Did Ricky think he was on a date? He turned his attention back to Heather. “Listen. I promised Bishop I would—”

“What’s Bishop got to do with it?” she asked sharply, cutting him off.

“Everything,” Dodge said. He drained his Coke glass of ice, enjoying the burn on his tongue. “He wants you to be safe.”

Heather looked away again. “How do I know I can trust you?” she said finally.

“That’s the thing about trust.” He crunched an ice cube between his teeth. “You don’t know.”

She stared at him for a long second. “All right,” she said finally. “I’ll do it.”

Outside, at the edge of the parking lot, the trees were dancing in the wind. Some of the leaves had already begun to turn. Gold ate up their edges. Others were splotched with red, as though diseased. Less than three weeks until Labor Day and the official end of summer. And only a week until the final showdown. After saying good-bye to Heather, Dodge didn’t go home straightaway, but spent some time walking the streets.

He smoked two cigarettes, not because he wanted them, but because he was enjoying the dark and the quiet and the cool wind, the smells of autumn coming: a clean smell, a wood smell, like a house newly swept and sprayed down. He wondered whether the tiger was still loose. It must be; he hadn’t heard anything about its capture. He half hoped he would see it, and half feared he would.

All in all, the conversation with Heather had gone easier than he’d expected. He was so close.

Rigging the explosion, he knew, would be the hard part.