wood door when I reach the end. A skinny shirtless man is sitting on the bed, arranging the contents of a large gray cooler at his feet. Plastic tubing. A bottle of starting fluid. And boxes upon boxes of what looks like cold medicine.
Clem looks up but isn’t surprised to see me standing there. Two bulldogs, like sentries, draw blood just below his collarbones, and something in old English is inked across his stomach. A silver cross hangs from his neck.
“Well?” He closes the cooler and looks at me.
“I’m looking for Jake Bennett.”
Clem doesn’t act like he knows Jake. He stands up, puts a foot on the cooler, and stares at me. “Am I supposed to know you?”
“I’m Thomas, his brother.”
“Okay, Thomas. But why are you here?”
Emotions collide. Why is Jake hanging with Clem? How does he even know this guy? I study the carpet, dotted with stains. “Just tell me where he is, and I’ll leave.”
Clem bends down but doesn’t answer. He grabs a small Thermos and sticks it in the cooler. “Why do you think I know where your brother is?”
“You were with him.”
“Correction,” Clem says. “He asked me for a ride, and I gave him one.”
When he stands up from the bed, I’m spinning the pieces of what’s happening in my head, trying to make them fit. Clem goes to his closet and pulls out a length of rope, wrapping it around his closed fist in big loops before setting it on top of the cooler.
“Well, did you bring him back here?”
Clem slams his hand down hard on the cooler. “Am I your brother’s fucking baby-sitter?”
When I don’t answer him, he picks up one side of the cooler and pulls it out of the room, leaving me there. I don’t immediately follow him, but when I hear a crash in the living room, followed by yelling, I stumble out of the room and up the hallway as quickly as I can. By the time I get outside, Wayne and Jerry Lee are on the ground, wrestling. Mallory and Sin are standing just outside the porch, both of them taking cautious steps toward the melee as if they want to break it up. Wayne spins and ends up on top of Jerry Lee, pushing his forearm into his brother’s throat. At the last second Jerry Lee pivots his hips and throws Wayne off. Before Wayne can get close again, Jerry Lee pulls a large knife from the back of his jeans and points it at Wayne like a gun.
“This is your fault,” Jerry Lee says, breathing hard. “What the fuck are you thinking, bringing all these people here? Soldier boy’s brother is bad enough, but I come out here and you’ve got two more sitting in this truck? Hell, no. You got to learn a lesson.”
“Good lesson, genius.” Mallory looks angrier than I’ve ever seen her. “Because now we’re all stuck here.”
“Y’all’s feet work just fine, I’m sure,” he says.
“You want us to walk?” Mallory says. “It’s ten miles back to town!”
“Walk?” I say. But as soon as the words come out of my mouth, I see the way my tires have sunk to the ground, four puddles of empty rubber. “What the hell?”
I take a step toward Jerry Lee, but Wayne moves between us, putting his hands against my chest. “Just tires, man. Just tires.”
And I know. But everything about tonight comes rushing into my body like a wild animal. It’s Jake’s not being here. My dad. The frustration of never being in control, ever. And now this. My body won’t stop shaking.
Wayne is in my ear. “Not worth it. All right? Just tires.”
Jerry Lee smiles as he wipes the blade on his shorts. “You should’ve had more sense than this, Wayne. Coming around here and expecting there wouldn’t be consequences. And now I’ve got myself a brand-new truck for the trouble. So maybe I should thank you?”
“New truck?” I repeat.
I fight through the pain, taking step after step until I’m right in Jerry Lee’s face. I wish I could take the knife from him, could twist it out of his hands, and put him on the ground the way I’ve seen it done in the movies. How many times? Instead, I push him. As hard as I can. He stumbles backward, smiles.
“Big balls on this kid,” he says to Wayne.
“You’ll see how big if you don’t fix my truck,” I say.
Before Jerry Lee can say anything, Clem strides from behind the trailer, his scarecrow chest still