Radio Flyer
Chapter Four
By Unicode Smith
Billy opened his locker at school the next day and taped Jessica’s photo to the wall inside. She’d had it in her purse: one of those rolls of four you get from the photo booth at the mall. Each shot was exaggerated pose—a thoughtful look in one, a pout in another, a third where she’d bunched her hair over her head and kissed at the camera. In the last one she was smiling. Before leaving his bedroom she had grabbed a pen from his workbench and scrawled a note across all four: “I love you forever. XOXOXO.”
He stepped back to admire it—her—in his locker, safe and secure in all her aspects. The first girlfriend he’d ever put in there. His girlfriend, even if nobody could know it.
That, he thought, could become a problem. He’d heard Amy accost Jessica in the hall as she tried to head home—first accusing her of taking advantage of a naive little boy, then, paradoxically, scolding that Billy was exploiting her fragile post-breakup psyche for his own perverted needs. In the end, his sister just sounded confused.
But would she tell? That would open a can of worms that he wouldn’t be able to close with all the electronics in the world.
“Missing something?” came a girl’s voice from behind him, pulling him from his reverie. Billy slammed the locker door and spun around guiltily, to find himself looking into the most beautiful green eyes he’d ever seen.
“Uh, no,” he said. “I mean... What do you mean?”
The redhead laughed. “The way you were staring in your locker, I thought maybe you’d lost something.”
“No, no,” he stammered. “I was just thinking.”
“Hmmm,” she looked him up and down appraisingly. “Well,” she flashed a cocksure grin. “Don’t think too hard.”
She walked away, glancing back once to favor Billy with a flirty smile.
He watched her ass as she disappeared down the hall. What was that about? He didn’t know the girl’s name, but he was certain she was in that strata of high school social life that placed her beyond the aspirations of any guy who wasn’t at least a senior, an athlete and a male underwear model all at once.
He pondered for a moment, then decided it was the new confidence that came with getting laid. The other girls could sense it. He’d be more attractive to them now.
He strutted to his next class.
“Roger, you’re not going to believe this,” Kelly said, kicking the door closed behind her and dropping her books on the table with a thud.
“What is it?” Roger asked without enthusiasm. He was sprawled on their parents’ sofa, drinking a beer and leafing idly through a People magazine.
“I—wait, is that one of dad’s beers?” she said. “Are you crazy?”
He shrugged, flipped a page.
“Roger, you’ve got to snap out of this,” she said. “You haven’t left the house in twenty-four hours, and mom and dad are going to go ape shit if they see you drinking here.”
“I don’t care,” he said. “I loved her, sis. That’s what you don’t get. She was the one.”
She sat down next to him. He was a wreck, his hair a rat’s nest; deep shadows hung under his eyes. She felt bad for berating him. “Listen,” she said sympathetically, “this is really weird, and it might upset you, but I think you should know. There’s something not right here.”
“What?,” he asked, pulling himself up a little. “What is it?”
“Okay.” She inhaled, steeling herself. “I was walking to class, by the lockers, and I saw Amy Norton’s brother put a picture of Jessica up in his locker.”
“What?” He blinked. “That kid? Whatshisname?”
“Billy,” she said. “Billy Norton. I asked around.”
He shook his head. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would he have her picture?”
“I’ve been trying to figure that out,” she said. “Jessica is friends with Amy, right?”
“Yeah. And they’ve been studying together after school.”
“So, apparently he’s pretty smart,” she said. “He’s the biggest nerd since Urkle, but he might be helping Jessica with—I don’t know—differential calculus or something. Maybe writing term papers for her.”
“And?”
“He could have something on her. I know it’s crazy, but maybe he blackmailed her into breaking up with you.”
He shook his head. “No way,” he said. “She’d just tell me. This isn’t some UPN drama. She’s a philosophy major for christsake.”
Kelly sighed. When she said it out loud, it did sound pretty ridiculous. “You’re right,” she said. “I don’t know what to think. Did she ever mention Amy’s brother?”
“No. Never.”
They sat in silence for a minute. “Okay,” she said finally, rising to her feet. “I’m going over there.”
“What? Why?”
“I’m going to poke around a little. See if Jessica’s car is there.” She grinned crookedly. “Maybe look in a window.”
“You’re going to get arrested,” he said. “I appreciate it Kelly, but just let it go. I’ll get over this.” He swigged from the beer bottle. “She’s just a girl,” he added, his voice cracking a little.
“I’ll be fine.” She was already reaching for her purse, then fishing out her cell phone as she marched for the door. “I’ll bring Jason. He’ll take the rap for me,” she laughed, dialing as she left the house.
Roger took another drink from the bottle, and lolled his head back. He heard the car pull away. Kelly had always been headstrong and a little nosy; when they were kids, he teased her by calling her Harriet the Spy. She’d hated that, he recalled with a twinge of guilt.
Billy got home to find a package waiting for him. It was a set of protective contact lenses he’d ordered from a scientific instrument company, designed to shield technicians from harmful laser light. Billy had just about given up on them.
He tried them on in the bathroom. They fit perfectly, and as near as he could tell they didn’t change the color of his eyes one shade, though wearing them put a faint pink tint on the rest of the world.
Bam bam bam! Someone was banging on the bathroom door. “Billy?,” Amy yelled from the other side. “Get out here! We have to talk right now.”
He sighed and opened the door. Amy’s hands were on her hips, her dark eyes blazing with anger.
“Can we talk later?” Billy asked. “I really should call Jess.”
“What did you do to her?,” Amy demanded.
He pushed past her to his bedroom. “What are you talking about?” he said. “She likes me, I like her. Why aren’t you happy for us?”
She followed him in. “She is several years older and, like, a thousand times better looking than you,” said Amy. “And she suddenly dumps her boyfriend, who she’s practically engaged to, to hook up with a little geek like you? I don’t think so.”
“Did she say anything about me at school today?”
“She said you’re an immature nerd boy who can’t answer a simple question.”
Billy laughed. His sister’s barbs no longer carried the sting they did a couple of days ago. He picked up a comic book and pretended to read.
“Fine,” Amy said. “You don’t want to tell me what’s really going on? I’ll just have to let Roger know who exactly is screwing his girlfriend.”
“Who’s Roger?” Billy asked.
“I think you know who Roger is,” she said confidently. “And I think he’ll be as interested as I am in finding out what you’re up to.”
“Tell him whatever you want. I don’t care.”
“Mom and dad, too, when they get back. And maybe your school guidance counselor. Is that still Mr. Harrison?” She smiled sweetly.
Billy glared.
“Maybe,” she continued, “I’ll even tell Jessica’s parents. She still lives with them, you know. I bet they’d be concerned with her behavior. It isn’t exactly normal for a college girl to be going out with a high school boy.”
Billy cast a furtive glance at the wagon in the corner.
“This is crazy, Kelly,” her boyfriend grunted. “Let’s just go to my place.” They were outside the house, and Jason was lifting her by her legs, his arms coiled in a bear hug around her shapely calves as he tried to boost her high enough to win a view through an upstairs window.
“Be quiet,” she snapped in a loud whisper. “I hear fighting.”
“I can’t do this forever,” he said.
“You held me up like this for forty-five minutes at the Green Day concert,” she countered.
He grumbled something about the situation being different then, but made no further protest. A few drops of rain fell tentatively from the graying sky.
“Okay,” she said finally. “This isn’t working. Bring me down.”
He bent his knees and lowered her gently to the ground. She gave him an affectionate peck on his head as she lit, then picked her bag off the lawn.
“Let’s try the front door,” she said pluckily.
“I may even talk to your principal, too, and—what are you doing?” said Amy.
“Just a little tweaking.” He pulled the wagon away from the wall and crouched down. “A few modifications.”
She sneered at him. “Uh huh. Are you going to put some Spiderman stickers on it?”
He looked up at her and grinned. “I meant to you,” he said.
He flipped the switch.
Nothing happened.
“Shit!” He dove into the circuitry with both hands and began furiously testing the connections. “Fuck.”
She watched him, her puzzlement giving way to understanding. “You little fucking shit,” she said slowly. “It’s that machine, isn’t it? That’s what you did to Jessica. You sick little bastard!” She turned and ran for the bedroom door.
He jumped to his feet, slammed the door and twisted the lock. She shoved him and slapped at his arms, but he ignored her and went back to the device while she struggled with the lock, screaming in frustration.
The transformer? Fine. The phased-locked loops? They seemed to be connected. The power supply?
Amy wrenched the door open—just as a spark popped from the wagon and the room was bathed in flickering blue.
She stopped in her tracks, leaning against the door frame for support as she struggled to take another step.
She blinked hard, one, twice, then turned and faced the light.
“Fixed it,” said Billy.
“Did you hear that?” Kelly asked. “That was a scream. C’mon, we’re going in.”
Jason sighed. He couldn’t deny that a scream had indeed emanated from within, and the front door was unlocked. He didn’t want Kelly to think he was a pussy. He threw up his hands. “Let’s go.”
The pair crept into the dim warmth of the house and moved stealthily to the stairs.
Billy re-closed the door and sat on the edge of his bed, regarding Amy as she stared placidly into the blue light.
“God, Amy. You can be such a bitch sometimes.”
She frowned prettily.
“Look at me.”
Amy broke her gaze away from the flickering pyramid and locked on Billy’s eyes.
“You’re a bitch.”
“I’m a bitch,” she said softly.
“You know, you hurt me a little when you hit me just now. That really stung.”
She stared blankly.
“You feel very bad about that. You can’t live with the guilt. You crave my forgiveness desperately.”
“I—I’m sorry, Billy,” she whispered.
“That’s not good enough,” he said. “This is the worst thing you’ve ever done in your life. The guilt is torturing you, crushing you completely. You need my forgiveness. You won’t be able to eat or sleep until I’ve forgiven you.”
She blinked back tears. “Please forgive me, Billy. I didn’t mean it. I’m so sorry.”
“Beg me,” he said. “You need to beg me.”
The tears began flowing down her cheeks. She trembled as she descended to her knees, then crawled across the floor to where Billy sat at the edge of the bed. By the time she reached him she was sobbing openly. She looked up at him beseechingly, her makeup running and her eyes red.
“Please, please forgive me.” Her voice quivered. “I shouldn’t have hit you. I’ll do anything. Please. Just tell me what to do.” She collapsed at his feet, buried her head in her hands, her body shaking as gasping sobs escaped through her fingers.
Kelly crouched at the door, her ear pressed against it as she followed the conversation inside in fits and starts—her attention kept drifting to a pool of flickering blue light spilling over the doorjamb. Despite the distraction, she’d heard more than enough. She glanced up at Jason, who was eavesdropping above in the same manner. They exchanged a look. Oh. My. God, she mouthed.
He nodded grimly.
She stood carefully and whispered in his ear. “We have to call the police.”
Billy watched his sister’s groveling with an unexpected absence of satisfaction. He thought he’d take pleasure in making her feel regret for once; instead, the display made him feel petty and mean.
“That’s enough,” he mumbled. Then louder, “That’s enough. I forgive you.”
She looked up at him from the floor. Her black hair had fallen over her face; she pulled it away—a glimmer of hope sparkled in her moist, bloodshot eyes. “Really?”
“Really. I forgive you,” he said. “I—I’m sorry,” he added incongruously.
She broke into a joyful, radiant smile. “Oh, thank you, thank you,” she said. She grabbed his hands and began kissing them; he felt the wetness of her tears on his knuckles. “Thank you, thank you, Billy.”
“That’s okay,” he said half heartedly. “Stop that. Stand up.”
She rose to her feet, still facing him, still smiling, still painted in the blue light. She sniffled.
“Listen to me, Amy. Me and Jessica—you approve of us. You think it’s great that we’re together.”
She opened her mouth to agree, then cocked her head, remembering. Her smile faded. “But... you... that machine. You brainwashed her,” she said.
“No I didn’t. The machine doesn’t work. It’s never worked.”
“It—It’s never worked?”
“Never. It’s just a light show, and it doesn’t even work,” he said.
“It doesn’t work,” she agreed.
“You think Jessica and I are great together. You’d never do anything to cause us problems.”
“I think you and Jessica are great together,” she said. “I’d never cause you problems.”
“You won’t tell anyone about us, ever,” he said.
“I won’t tell anyone about you, ever,” she agreed solemnly.
“Okay,” Jason whispered. “I’ve heard enough. Let’s get out of here.”
“Out of here...” Kelly said distantly.
He tugged her hair lightly. She blinked and tore her gaze away from the blue light playing over the carpet. Jason inclined his chin to indicate the stairs at the end of the hall. She nodded.
Just then, the hall filled with music—a loud but tinny rendering of a Kelly Clarkston song.
“What the hell?,” Jason said.
“Shit! My cell phone.” She clutched her bag.
The bedroom door flew open, and the hall was flooded with flickering blue light.
The couple froze, caught like deer in headlights—mouths agape, eyes filled with dazzling blue.
Kelly’s grip slackened and her purse dropped to the ground, still playing music.