Asking for Trouble (9 page)

Yeah. That car. And then putting a hand in his pocket and handing
her the keys, seeing the look on her face. He’d love to have done that. He’d
love to have had the right to do that.

“Tomorrow’s the big day, huh?” he asked, deciding that he
should probably change the subject. “Nervous?”

“Yes.” She took a sip of her beer. “Especially since you
recommended me. I don’t want to let you down, or make you look bad to the
board.”

“You won’t let me down. And besides,” he added practically,
“nobody but Suzanne knows I recommended you. I asked her to keep it quiet. So
no pressure.”

“Well, except from her, of course. But I like her, and I
think I can learn a lot too. I’m sure going to try. I’m going to try
hard.”

He was reminded once again that it couldn’t be easy to be
Alyssa, to be the baby, never to be able to catch up.

“First days are never fun, though,” she admitted, setting
down the burger and wiping her hands. “Are they?”

“Hmm. It’s been a while,” he admitted.

“That’s true,” she said. “Because you’ve been working with
Alec for so long. You haven’t even had a boss, have you? Since . . . when?”

“Not really, not since Alec and I got that first idea,
senior year. That was it. We never looked back. I don’t even know how we
graduated.” He laughed a little, remembering. “We were breathing and eating DataQuest.”

“Can I ask—” She played with her fries, then abandoned
them, looked up at him again. “Was it that you really liked it so much, what
you were doing? Or was it more about being successful? I’ve always wondered
what was wrong with me, that I’ve never worked as hard as Alec,” she said in a
burst of confidence. “Or Gabe either, for that matter. I’m just not . . . I’m
not driven like that. Or maybe I’m just lazy, I don’t know. What makes a person
do that? What am I missing?”

He thought it over. He usually hated answering questions
about himself, but Alyssa was different. If it would help her, he wanted to
tell her. “I don’t think you’re missing anything,” he finally said. “I think
some people just get lucky, find something they care about early, and keep
caring. I wanted that diploma. I needed it. And I had no idea at the time that DataQuest
would do so well, that it’d do anything at all, really. As far as I knew, it
was just a cool idea, and we were making it happen, but it just . . .” He
gestured helplessly. “Sucked me in. Took me over. I had to hold myself in my
chair to get through the rest of what I was supposed to be doing. Especially
this class on Ethics in Computer Science. I had to write three papers for that
class, and that was a killer. I didn’t want to write about it, I wanted to do
it. And I still do. I get into it, and
I think it’s been a few minutes, and it’s been an hour. People say I work hard,
but I don’t feel like I work hard. I feel like I work . . . easy.”

“So it wasn’t just trying to be successful? Wanting to make
it?”

“Well, that too. That was part of it. I needed to get enough
so I knew that whatever happened, I’d be all right.” That he’d always have a
place to sleep, a place of his own. That he’d never be hungry.

“But you give away a lot, too,” she said. “I’m guessing.”

“Believing that I’d be all right, that happened quite a few
years ago. Time to, I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Give back.”

He could see the questions hovering on the tip of her
tongue, see her searching his face. And he could see the moment when she
decided not to ask them, because Alyssa’s own face was an open book. “I’d like
to enjoy what I do as much as you do,” she said instead. “I’ve had jobs that
were OK, but I’ve never had a job I loved.”

“It’ll happen. You just have to find something that matters
enough. You’ve got the passion, you just have to . . . match it,” he finished
lamely, wishing he were better at talking.

“Well, you know what they say,” she said more cheerfully. “Every
wrong job is one more thing that you know you weren’t meant to do. I have a
whole list of things I know I wasn’t meant to do, starting with McDonald’s and
moving right along.”

“That’s right. I remember that that was your first job.” His
second Kincaid Christmas, and Alyssa bicycling in to work almost every day,
because she’d turned sixteen. She was about the only person he’d ever seen who
looked good in that uniform. Especially the baseball cap. She’d sure looked
cute in that baseball cap.

“Yep. Not the worst one, but sure not the best. The worst,
actually,” she decided, twirling another French fry that Joe was pretty sure
she wasn’t going to eat, “was the latest one, even though it paid the best.
That was the only one where I’d wake up and
dread
going to work. How about you? What was your first job?”

“Stocking shelves at the Nellis Exchange. The Base Exchange.
The store.”

“Grocery store?”

“Everything store. A BX has everything.”

“Did you get that through your dad? He was in the Air Force,
right?”

“Sort of. Through a friend of his.”

It had been the year he’d turned sixteen, at the start of
the summer after his sophomore year. He’d been living with Mr. Wilson for a few
months, and his life had already got so much better, it was like a dream. No
more bunk beds in rooms shared with budding psychopaths. Packing a lunch every
day, a lunch that was
enough,
because
he was allowed to get in the cupboards and the fridge, even to do his own food
shopping. Having a ride to and from school instead of an hour-long trip on the
bus, doing his homework at a desk in the quiet, secure space of his own room
instead of trying to solve math equations on a jolting bus before he got back
to the house and there was no way. Being able to put his few possessions into
the drawers and start to believe that maybe, this time, they’d stay there a
while.

And then it got even better, because Conrad came back.

Conrad had been his dad’s buddy, but Joe hadn’t seen him for
a couple years, not since all the trouble had started. Conrad had been posted
to Kadena in Okinawa, about as far away as you could get, and Joe had only
found out he was back at Nellis when he’d run into him at the BX with Mr.
Wilson, when they were doing the grocery shopping on Joe’s military dependent
ID.

Catching up had taken more time than that, because it wasn’t
something you could explain easily, not in the ice cream aisle. Not anytime,
not if you were Joe.

Conrad had come by that evening and picked him up, taken him
for pizza. Had watched him eat a whole pie, and then had looked steadily at him,
not giving up until Joe had told him the truth. Just like his dad. Exactly like
his dad.

“Why didn’t you get in touch?” Conrad demanded. “Why didn’t
you let me know?”

Joe shrugged. “I didn’t know how.”

“Bullshit. You knew where I was. I told you to let me know
if you needed anything. You knew I’d be there for you.”

“It was just that . . .” Joe looked down, not sure how to
explain. “People say that.” Nobody else had meant it. Not his mom. Not any of
the social workers. Not even his sister, though he didn’t blame her. She’d had
to survive herself. She didn’t have anything left for him.

“Well, I’m here now,” Conrad said. “So let’s figure out what
you need. You’ve got a place to live. That working out?”

Another shrug. “Yeah.”

“Say again?”

Joe heard the warning tone, straightened up fast. “Yes,
sir.” He’d forgotten, and the shame of it was almost the worst.

“Look me in the eye and tell me,” Conrad said. “Tell me if
that’s working out. If it isn’t, I’ll fix it. I promise you that.”

“Yes, sir,” Joe said. “It’s working out.”

“OK, then.” The older man nodded his short-cropped head in
satisfaction. “Next things. Transportation, job. You don’t have either of
those, right?”

“No, sir. I just turned sixteen, but it’s hard, without a way
to get anywhere. I tried with the bus, but it was late, and I was late to the
interview, and . . .” He trailed off again. Excuses. “No excuse,” he muttered,
because that was the answer.

“What about your dad’s bike?” Conrad asked. “What happened
to that? He told me in Kuwait that when he got home, he was going to teach you
to ride it.”

Joe swallowed. “My mom has a boyfriend.” He’d managed to
avoid mentioning Dean so far, because even saying his name was like drinking something
corrosive.

Conrad’s face hardened. “He took your dad’s bike?”

“He wrecked it.” Joe felt his fists clenching, forced the
emotion down. “He totaled it.” When it had happened, he’d wished so hard that
Dean had died. He’d been young enough then to think that life worked that way.
Now he knew better. Only good people died. Bad people lived, and the things
they did never seemed to catch up with them.

 
Conrad nodded.
He didn’t get all sympathetic, but Joe knew he understood how it had felt to
see his dad’s Yamaha 800 that had been sitting in the garage, a memory and a
promise, under Dean’s skinny butt, then gone entirely, and the knot loosened a
little.

“OK, then,” Conrad said. “First step is, teach you to ride
my bike, get you your license. Second step is find a bike for you. Third step
is get you a job. You got anything going on the next few weeks, evenings and
weekends?”

“No, sir.” He could hardly believe it. The past couple
weeks, since summer vacation had started, all he’d had to do was help out Mr.
Wilson with the house and the yard, study for the PSAT, and play basketball at
the North Las Vegas Boys’ and Girls’ Club. It was all fine, but it wasn’t
getting him anywhere. And he needed to get somewhere. “But I don’t—” He
stopped.

“Don’t what?” Conrad prompted.

“I don’t have any money for a bike,” Joe admitted, feeling
the flush rise. “I don’t even have any money for gas.” He had his dad’s leather
jacket, because that had been in his closet, and Dean hadn’t been able to take
it. But that was about all he had. A jacket, a military ID, and some memories.
None of that would make the first payment on a bike.

“It’s going to be a loan,” Conrad said. “Believe me, you’ll
be paying me back.” He smiled, the first time that evening. “I know where you
live.”

And Conrad had come through. A month later, Joe had a bike,
a Honda 400cc bought cheap from an airman being posted overseas, fixed up in
the shop under Conrad’s guidance. And he had a job to ride to on it.

“Get your hair cut,” Conrad had instructed. “Short.
Military-short. Wear a clean shirt, one with a collar. Clean jeans. Not clean
enough.
Clean.
Take a shower. Be on
time. Get there half an hour early if you have to, to make sure. Talk like
you’d talk to me, like you’d have talked to your dad. Do all that and you’ll
get the job, because I know Gary Roswell, and I’ve told him about you, and he’s
ready to give you a chance. But keeping the job,” he warned, “that’s up to you.”

“Yes, sir,” Joe said, his feet itching to get out the door
right then. He’d have a
job.
He’d
have
money.

But Conrad wasn’t done. “I knew your dad a long time,” he
said. “He was a good man. I never knew him to do a cheap thing. I never saw him
give less than his best. He’s gone, but you’re still here.
 
You’ve got his name, and you can still
know that you’d have made him proud. That’s something nobody can take away from
you. But you make the wrong choices, you can throw that away. Don’t do it.
Don’t let him down.”

“No, sir,” Joe said over the lump in his throat. “I won’t.”

“Was that the worst job you had?” Alyssa asked now, bringing
him back. She was making circles around the rim of her empty glass with a
finger. “Stocking shelves? That doesn’t sound too fun.”

“No, that one was OK. I did that for a couple years, till I
went to college. That was fine. I never minded the physical ones that much,
washing dishes or whatever, as long as the boss wasn’t too bad. Just happy to
have the work.”

“Washing dishes? That was at more than our house, huh?”

“Yeah. I did lots of stuff, summers, during the school year
too. High school, first few years of college. Washing dishes, busing tables at
those Palo Alto restaurants. Working at 7-11. They like a big guy behind the
counter, just in case.”

“Mmm,” she said, looking sleepy, or maybe just like a woman who’d
had a couple beers after a tough day of used-car shopping. “They liked that you
looked so tough.”

“Well, you know the good thing about looking tough. You know
the secret of it.”

“No,” she said, and the sleepy look had changed to a dreamy
smile that was kicking his pulse rate up a notch, “what’s the secret of it?”

“You look tough enough, you know you got the stuff to back
it up, you almost never have to prove it.” He raised his beer in salute, then
drained it.

“Can I ask you a question?” she asked.

“Sure.”

“Why do you shave your head? I can tell you’re not bald. So
why?”

“How can you tell I’m not bald?”

“Bald guys have . . .” She gestured with a finger at her own
head. “That line, where they’re losing their hair. You don’t have it.”

 
“You’re right,
I’m not bald. It was always short, but you know that. Military-short. I started
cutting it that way when I started working on the base. I got one of those
electric clipper deals,” he said, running the imaginary shaver over his head.
“Cheaper than haircuts, you know? I got used to doing it that way. And I was
busy.”

“Too busy to get your hair cut?”

“Well . . .” He smiled. “Haircuts take time. I was busy. And
then one day, I thought, why not just shave it? Why not see if I had—” He
shrugged, looked at her, and laughed. “Any weird bumps on my head, or anything.
And I kind of liked how it looked.”

“Tough,” she said again.

“Yeah. I guess. So what do you think? Tough? Or just bald?
Better with hair?”