the side of the road but I don’t. In the end I just crank up Katy Perry tunes and sing in a very loud off key voice, feeling perversely gleeful that someone is going to be forced to sit through the footage of my rotten performance.
It’s good to be out alone. The ever-present feeling of slow suffocation relaxes a little. Mercifully, Oscar was nowhere in sight when I pulled away from Atlantis. His truck, however, was just where he’d left it in the large clearing between the house and the brothel. So he isn’t gone, just hidden.
The Consequences Convenience Store is just as I remember it. Beside the door they have the same air freshener carousel with probably the exact same merchandise that was hanging there five years ago. An older man wearing a red smock and a tag that says ‘Kenny’ is dusting off a shelf of fishing gear, which doesn’t make any sense because there’s no fishable water within a hundred miles. He doesn’t look up when I enter.
The booze is still in the back, exactly where it’s always been. Monty used to make raiding the CCS, as we called the store, something of a hobby. He was always brazen and foolish about it so I don’t know how he managed to never get caught.
The pickings are rather slim here. I’d meant to bring back some wine but even I know a seven-dollar bottle probably isn’t go win over anyone. I grab a bottle of red anyway and snagged a six-pack of beer on my way to the cashier.
Once I’m done at the CCS, I drop the bags off in the car and take my time, dawdling around Consequences even though there’s little to see. It’s not that it’s the crappiest place on earth. It’s just kind of a dull void. One that’s been loosely sprinkled with people who seem half asleep.
There’s too many memories here though. That’s the whole damn problem with this godforsaken wrinkle in the state. It was hard enough to keep Oscar at bay and out of my head when he was somewhere unknown. But now he’s lurking back at Atlantis, waiting to assume whatever role in the Savage comedy he plans on playing. If there was ever a good reason for me to ditch this whole project and drive in the opposite direction until I can’t drive anymore, this is it. Gary couldn’t physically force me to return. Whatever kind of power Vogel Productions has, they still might run into some legal trouble if they try to drag me back to Atlantis by my hair.
My fingernails are digging into my palms. No, I won’t do it. I won’t run. There must be some feisty blood left in me somewhere. Maybe I can call on the spirit of Margaret O’Leary to spare some of what made her so hot-tempered and indomitable. If I’m weak enough to be chased away by a ghost of old heartbreak, then I’ll never really make much out of myself. I’ll be another sad drifter, perhaps like Aunt Mina, always confusedly searching and always coming up short.
Let Oscar Savage do his worst. Whatever scripted part he means to play can’t be any more painful than what we’ve already done to each other.
No. Lie. What I did to him.
Oscar walked away from me because I told him to. And as I watched him disappear, a boy alone cast out like garbage, I silently pleaded for the world to be kind to him. I begged him to forgive me, to forgive all of us for being too flawed and cowardly to stand up for anything. My own father had stood by with vague confusion and didn’t say a word because he was too drained to notice anyone else. And then Oscar was gone.
It’s too late now. I don’t even know who he is anymore. I don’t know what kind of revenge he has in mind. I just know that I’ll be taking at least a few cans of that six-pack to bed tonight. I need the edges to be numbed just a little. Hopefully it will be enough. I need it to be enough so that when I close my eyes I don’t dream of him, that I don’t dream at all.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
OZ
I’ve been here for a week now. A week in this surreal landscape of cameras and crew members and a cast who play-act their daily lives for a fucking paycheck. Ren avoids me and so far I’ve allowed her to.