I checked my hand-drawn map. I was looking for a street called Division Street, where I was supposed to turn left. The buildings here were old and the streets set at odd angles to each other. The grass was scruffy.
I turned again, and then again, and looked for the number of Y. Coleman’s house on Chestnut Street—388. The street was nice enough, but not the kind of street I’d expected with a name like Chestnut Street. There were some cars parked at the edge of the road, and it was both newer and older than I was expecting. Some of the houses were very old, a hundred years old, maybe, or more, like on the other streets nearby, but others were not so old at all. Like, old, but not as old—boring-old instead of historic-old, including the boxy apartment building with the number 388 on the front—the number I was looking for. Y. Coleman’s house on Chestnut Street.
I stopped and looked up at the building.
“Chris.”
I froze. Who knew me? I whipped around to see an unfamiliar car, passenger door held open—by my father. I felt like I’d been stabbed with an icicle. It was my nightmare, alive.
“Come on, son, hop in.” His voice was gentle, warm, not angry like I was expecting.
I could hardly breathe, much less think. After a moment, I shook my head.
“Come on, we have to get going.”
Finally, I found my voice. “I’m not going anywhere.” Not sullen, just a statement of fact.
“What’s the problem, son?”
“You should have told me. You lied to me. You should have told me.”
My father sighed and looked like he made a little decision. “You found the picture, I noticed. I’m sorry, Chris. You were too young to understand. It was a grown-ups’ situation. You’ll be sixteen in August, and I was going to explain it to you then.” He gave me a sad smile. “Kids! You grow up so fast these days.” He shook his head. Idon’tknowIdon’tknowIdon’tknow. It all looked good, but I didn’t know if I trusted it.
“Look,” he went on. “I can explain, but it’s very complicated. Just hop in and we’ll go to the hotel, get room service, and I’ll lay it all out for you.”
It sounded okay, I wanted it to be all right but, still, I didn’t trust it. “Explain here, now.”
“Chris ...” It had a note of long-suffering patience that sounded more familiar to me.
“Explain here, now.” I swallowed. I couldn’t quite get my breath and I couldn’t quite connect to my own body. I couldn’t believe I was ordering my father.
“You don’t know your mother. She’s not whatever you’ve magically dreamed up in your imagination.”
A war was going on in my head. He could be right; he could be telling me the truth. I knew less about my mother than I did about him. But something in me didn’t trust him. Look where trusting got me on this strange journey, anyway—Cam, Moth. But I trusted Beatrice, I trusted Claire’s family, and those turned out well.
“I know you’re probably thinking of the court ruling.”
Yeah! That’s right, he’s right, a court ruling must have put me with her! I never thought of that!
“But there was a reason we split, and a reason you needed to be with me, in spite of the ruling.”
That’s true, too, there must have been a reason. Oh, God, what am I supposed to do?
He glanced at his watch. “Come on, Chris, let’s not do this out here in the street. We’ll go to the hotel, get a pizza.”
I was trying to get one thing to make sense in the chaos that was my brain. I felt like I was in a shipwreck in a storm at sea—everything I grabbed at was slippery and I just kept going under. My old self would just do what my father said, because I knew what would happen if I didn’t. And then I thought, Wait. I don’t know what will happen, because I always do what my father says. I didn’t know what the consequences of disobedience were in any way. But I was still trying to sort out who to trust. Everything my father said sounded reasonable. He wasn’t acting angry at all. And I didn’t know thing one about my mother.
Trust. Who to trust. Sometimes when I trusted people, it turned out well, sometimes badly. Though I should have known better than to trust Cam when I knew he was lying to me, and I should have known better with Moth, too, when I knew she was an orange thief. I know better than to steal rides, and I know better than to steal food from farmers. My dad is in the category with Cam and Moth. He stole me.
“Here,” I said. “Now.”
“You don’t know what you’re letting yourself in for.” My father glanced along the street. “Your mother is a very stubborn woman, very controlling, very rigid. Look how she still lives in the same apartment. Is that any way to move on?”
She stayed in the apartment because she was waiting for me. (At least I knew I had the right address!) She waited for me on TV. She looked for me. I wondered again why my father had really taken me, since he never seemed to want me for much of anything, just victory over her, maybe. Stubborn, controlling … rigid?
“You sound like you’re describing yourself.”
“Come on, Chris, Ramsay men stick together. I’ve told you enough; now let’s go and I’ll fill you in on the rest. You hungry? You must be hungry.” He glanced along the street again.
Why was he glancing along the street? Then it clicked—he was afraid of getting caught. My father was a wanted kidnapper. “No. Here. Now. I told you.”
“Chris, don’t you speak to me in that tone of voice.” He was stern, his jaw was rigid, and he checked his watch again. “Now, get in the car and let’s go!”
“I don’t believe you have anything else to say. It’s not ‘complicated’—you just want to win. If I’ve learned anything in the past few days, it’s to trust my instincts, and my instinct says ‘stay.’ She must be coming home from work soon, the way you keep looking at your watch, so I’m going to stay here and see for myself.”
My father looked incredibly angry. Now his whole body was rigid and he was turning a bit red, but he said nothing. I still didn’t know if I was making the right choice, and then I thought of what to do. “Stay with me. We’ll all three sort it out.”
“Get in that car immediately, if you know what’s good for you. You’re still a boy, and I’m still your father, so do as I say!”
“Oh, I know what’s good for me. What’s good for me is finding out the truth. What’s good for me is not being lied to my whole life. You stole me! You stole my mother, you even stole you, because I respected you once and now I don’t even know who you are!” I was shaking, but not from fear. It was the strangest feeling of ... power?
He went for the resigned shake of the head thing again, though he really couldn’t pull it off. “After all I’ve done for you! Protected you from that witch!” His anger was rising again. “Raised you on my own! Bought you what you needed, cooked your food, bandaged your skinned knees.” I felt a twinge for just a second but decided I wasn’t buying. I just stared at him.
“Fine, you stubborn little brat! You’re just like your mother!” He glanced down the street again. He was yelling a little now, his eyes wide. “Stay here, then, find out what she’s like. You’ll be crawling home before long. You’ll take your chances whether I’m still there! Last offer!” He stood for a moment by the open door.
I kept my voice quiet and spoke slowly. “And what’s so bad about cooking Minute Rice if I’m late? That’s why we have it in the house.”
My father slammed the passenger door. He crossed to the driver’s side and slumped into the driver’s seat and drove off in a tantrum of squealing rubber.
As I watched him disappear around the corner, I felt a surge of victory. But it didn’t last long. I turned and looked at number 388 again. This wasn’t quite finished yet. I felt good about standing up to my father. But what if I’d got it wrong? What was my mother like?