Chapter One

 

It all happened because I had to pee.

I’m not kidding, and I’m not talking just any old call of nature. I’m talking leg-and-eye-crossing, I’m-going-to-piss-my-shorts pain.

And there I was, driving on Interstate 8, that stretch of freeway between Yuma and San Diego. You know, that section where the signs tell you to turn off your air conditioning because your car will overheat, and it’s so long it feels like it’ll never end, and there’s nowhere for a guy to pull to the side of the road and find a bush.

I was dying.

My mom’s purple truck rattled as I drove, making everything worse. It was the first day of June, less than three months before I was supposed to start my senior year at Yuma High. Mom and Dad had flown off to the East Coast with my kid brother, Todd, and I was headed to San Diego to stay a week with my best friend, who had just moved away from Yuma. His name’s Brandon, and mine’s Brenden, so we used to get a lot of mileage out of our names being so close. Friends just call me Bren.

It was amazing that Mom had convinced Dad to let me drive out to San Diego on my own. Dad said he thought I was too impulsive and irresponsible.

“Impulsive and irresponsible.” Dad’s total opinion of me. “Brenden, you’re too impulsive. Brenden, do you always have to be so irresponsible?”

Now Mom, she was great. A little nuts about grammar and not using foul language in front of people—especially girls—but overall, great. She had insisted I should be able to take this trip, told Dad I had to grow up some time, and insisted that he had to let me. She even let me take off without my ADHD meds.

Stupid pills. They made me feel so blah, but I guess they did help me concentrate in school. Well, enough to get by, anyway. School, books, homework…not my strong points. I never did well in class. Always one assignment behind, a paper lost, a book I couldn’t find. It was hard to keep it all in my head.

Now, I could concentrate on things that interested me a lot. In fact, I could concentrate too much on them sometimes.

“Get your head out of that video game.”

“Didn’t you notice the trash needed to be taken out, or were you too busy practicing your batting stance?”

That was Dad.

“Leave him alone. You know his ADHD makes him have a one-track mind.”

That was Mom. Usually trying to get Dad off my case, which was like scrubbing tar off chrome hubcaps in one-hundred-degree temperatures. And not getting burned in the process.

Dad always said Mom was too “New Age.” Mom always said there was a lot in the world my dad didn’t understand—or wouldn’t let himself see. Like my trip, and why I needed to try something on my own, for once. To show myself I could handle it, no matter what Mr. Straight-A Student, History-Professor Dad thought.

“If you don’t start to apply yourself, Brenden, you’ll always be average. Just plain average. Sports won’t last forever.”

Whatever.

I never could please him. Even when I was the varsity baseball team’s MVP my junior year—highest batting average of anyone in the past decade—Dad kept harping on how I struck out in the final game of the season.

“You didn’t use your head,” he said. “Think. Don’t let your team down like that again.”

“Okay, enough,” I muttered to myself. Driving one-handed, I pulled at a loose thread on my T-shirt and sighed. I had to get Dad out of my head and enjoy my vacation away from him.

A whole week. I couldn’t wait to head to the beach with Brandon to check out all the babes in neon orange bikinis. But first I had to take a piss.

Finally, an exit came up with one of those restroom signs, so I turned off the freeway and headed south. Giant trees lined the road, and I was tempted to pull over and hop the fence and just go, but there were homes around and cars whizzing by, and I figured it wouldn’t be much farther. Plus, there was this carload of girls behind me, so I was kind of embarrassed to stop.

I swear I had to drive another five miles before I finally made it to a little country convenience score. One of those buildings in the shape of an A. The truck skidded into the parking lot a little too fast, and I applied the brakes, hard. My mom’s sunglasses tumbled off the dashboard to my feet, and I stared at them.

Strange.

Why hadn’t I noticed them before? Mom never went anywhere without her shades. She’d lay an egg when she realized I took off with them.

Dust swirled around the truck as I hopped out. I rushed into the country store, pushed aside the basket of fruit on the counter. There was a nameplate next to the basket that said “Jasmina.”

“Listen, uh, Jazz,” I said to the girl. “Where’s the restroom?”

“Jasmina,” she snapped. She stared at me for a moment, looked me over as if she was checking me out, then pointed up a hill. “The only restroom is in the restaurant,” she added in a strange accent.

No kidding. Up a hill. Good thing I was too much of a gentleman to let it go right there in that store.

The girl’s yellow-brown eyes glittered like she was holding back a laugh. I felt sure she knew I was suffering.

“Thanks,” I managed to say before I bolted.

I jogged up the hill, the best a guy can do when dying to go to the bathroom. About a mile of concrete steps led to that restaurant, and I nearly tripped on my way up, which showed it was a good thing I didn’t run hurdles in track.

And then, after I tore inside the restaurant and reached the bathroom, the friggin’ door was locked. Locked! I was going to explode.

I raised my hand to pound on the wood, but the door opened. A weird guy came out. He was a real freak, with straggled blond hair, grungy clothes, and a stubbly face. His odor about knocked me over—alcohol and a woody, perfumy smell. And his eyes—a piercing blue. He pinned me with that electric gaze and grabbed my hand.

Before I could even yell at him to get his paws off me, he said in a husky, rumbly voice, “In the cellar. You will find the door in the cellar. Remember that, brother, or you will be sorry.”

Chills rolled over me and goose bumps popped out all over my body. The guy weirded me out with his eerie tone and freaky blue eyes. I was too far gone as it was. I almost wet my pants.

He let go of my hand, turned, and vanished out the door. And I mean vanished. The guy disappeared. Or at least I thought he did. For a moment I stood there, blinking, and then I realized the guy had left something in my hand. I couldn’t get into the bathroom and lock the door fast enough, so I shoved the thing into my pocket and got down to business.

I thought I’d piss forever. What a relief. Even in a grungy bathroom with toilet paper strewn all over the place, smelling of urine and that gross public-restroom disinfectant. I washed my hands and used the powder soap from the dispenser, but there were no towels and I had to wipe my hands on my jeans. Dad wouldn’t have approved. Just like he wouldn’t have approved of me stopping at a deserted-looking exit. Dad probably would have gone on to a place he had stopped before, even if it meant a bladder meltdown.

I shook my head, wishing I could get my father out of my brain. It was like he went everywhere with me, watching everything I did and passing judgment on it.

Never in my favor.

I hurried out of the bathroom and trotted into the restaurant, hoping the weirdo wasn’t around.

The restaurant was one of those small-town joints with red plastic tumblers and paper mats, and it looked like it had been someone’s house at one time. I considered eating there, but decided to grab some fast food once I got back on the freeway. It wasn’t that far to San Diego and civilization.

As I headed out the door, I thought about the girl in the store. She had sounded like she was from New England, or maybe even the real England. She was a babe, if you go for Goth. Not total Goth with layers of baggy black clothes; instead, she had on a snug, black sleeveless shirt and had black painted nails, dark lips, and long, shiny black hair. Her eyes were like an ancient Egyptian’s, only they were pale brown-goldish, really, like a cat’s. I couldn’t see much of her body because it was hidden behind the checkout counter, but I’d bet she’d look terrific on the beach in San Diego.

Now that I wasn’t dying to find a bathroom, I noticed everything around me was kind of interesting. Giant cottonwoods, oaks, and pines crowded around the store, and those bright yellow California poppies were scattered all over the place. Sprinklers chugged on the lawns, making the ch-ch-ch-ch-ch sound that always made it feel even more like summer. I smelled fresh-cut grass and a scent like my mom’s rose garden.

All in all, it seemed pretty boring. Except for the bathroom freak. What was he talking about—“the door’s in the cellar”? He must have thought I was someone else. That or the guy was wasted. It didn’t matter anyway, because I was out of there.

And then I remembered he had put something in my hand. What if it was weed or something? I could get busted for possession, and I’d be toast. I dug into my pocket, pulled the thing out and stopped on the steps to take a look. It was a small figurine, about three inches long and an inch thick. The statue was heavy and solid, and appeared to be carved out of wood. I thought it might be a relic of one of those ancient Aztec gods, because it had a headdress, a scepter, and a vicious sneer on its ugly face.

For a second, I swore it wriggled on my palm.

No, of course not. My imagination was running on overdrive.

A creepy feeling skittered over me, like spiders crawling over my skin. I wanted to pitch the thing as far as possible. I leaned back, my arm cocked, pretending I was throwing a baseball from right field to home plate for the last out of the game.

But somehow I couldn’t. I just couldn’t make myself get rid of it. It sort of stuck in my hand. Like it belonged there. I relaxed my stance and looked at the figurine again, then shoved it into my pocket and hurried down the stairs.

When I reached the grocery store, I stopped dead in my tracks. The parking lot was empty. As in, no cars anywhere.

My mom’s truck was gone.