Infinity + One
Page 6
“Look, kid—”
“Clyde?” I immediately interrupted. “I’m not a kid. I’m twenty-one years old. I’m not jailbait or an escapee from prison or a mental institution. I’m not a member of the Klan, or even a Bible salesman, although I do believe in Jesus and am not ashamed to admit it, though I will keep my love for him to myself if you’ve got issues with that. I have some money to contribute to gas and food and whatever else we need. I just need a lift out . . . west.” I liked that he’d used “out west” first, because I was milking it for all it was worth now that I needed a destination.
Clyde actually smiled. It was just a quick twist of his lips, but I guessed that was saying something. He didn’t seem like the smiley type.
“You don’t have anything but the clothes on your back and that little purse, and your name isn’t Bonnie, so you’re obviously hiding or running, which means there’s trouble on your ass,” he objected. “And I sure as hell don’t want trouble.”
“I’ve got money. And I can pick up what I need along the way. I packed light.” I shrugged my shoulder. “I didn’t think I’d need a suitcase in heaven.”
Clyde choked and looked at me in disbelief. I didn’t blame him. I was joking, but I sounded crazy. I felt a little crazy. I continued talking.
“And, for your information, my name really is Bonnie. But you don’t look much like a Clyde.”
“Clyde’s my last name,” Clyde offered, somewhat hesitantly. “I’ve been called Clyde for so long now, I use it automatically.”
“So your friends call you Clyde?”
“Uh, yeah. My friends,” Clyde agreed with an edge to his voice that made me believe there was something there he didn’t want to discuss.
“Well, my friends and family call me Bonnie. So you can too. Even if it is kinda funny.”
“Bonnie and Clyde,” Clyde said under his breath.
“Yep. Let’s just hope this little adventure has a better ending then theirs did.”
Clyde didn’t respond. I didn’t know if he was going to let me ride along or not, but he hadn’t said no. The little voice in my head that sounded like Gran told me I had officially lost my marbles. When I stood on that bridge and let go, my mind obviously hadn’t been rescued with the rest of me. It must have tumbled down into the water below the bridge, leaving me a brainless zombie. So I leaned my forehead against the passenger side window, closed my eyes, and played dead.
Chapter Two
FINN CLYDE WASN’T a stupid man. In fact, he was brilliant. As a child he was fascinated by reoccurring themes in nature. Why do most flowers have five petals? Why are honeycombs shaped like hexagons? Why do numbers have corresponding colors? He was eight before he realized not everyone saw the colors.
Numbers also had weight. When he multiplied them, the numbers swirled in his head like a blizzard in a child’s snow globe, the answers settling in his mind softly, just like the snowflakes, as if gravity were responsible for the solution. As he got older, the fascination with the patterns nature presented grew into a fascination for probability, using mathematical formulas to predict outcomes. And his predictions became eerily accurate. So much so that he could handily beat anyone at chess, poker, or even games that seemed governed by chance. There was no such thing as chance to Finn. Chance could be analyzed, sliced, diced, and pegged using a little brain power.
But even Finn Clyde couldn’t predict that his brother, Fish, would get desperate, rob a convenience store with a stolen weapon, and drag Finn into the mess. Finn was brilliant, but he was also young. And he was loyal. And Finn had run toward his brother instead of driving away when Fish took a bullet in the stomach after demanding that the Vietnamese owner of the convenience store empty his cash drawer. Fisher Clyde died in the front seat of their mother’s car in his brother’s arms. And at barely eighteen, Finn Clyde’s fortunes took a definite turn for the worse. Life had not been kind since then, and at twenty-four, six and a half years after that fatal night, Finn Clyde was still brilliant, but he wasn’t nearly as young or loyal, and he wasn’t running toward trouble anymore. And Bonnie was trouble.
She was asleep, her head resting against the window, her arms wrapped around her middle as if she was physically holding herself together. She was slim, almost too slim. She said she was twenty-one, but she could pass for younger. When he had seen her perched on the railing, arms braced, her slim form appearing through a sudden and almost suspiciously providential parting of the fog, he had thought she was a kid. A boy, maybe fourteen or fifteen. And he’d driven past. You didn’t stop on Tobin Bridge. Hell, you didn’t walk or bike on Tobin Bridge. He didn’t know how the kid managed to be where he was. Where she was, Finn corrected himself.
He was heading northbound across the bridge into Chelsea. He had a stop to make—a goodbye—and then he was gone. The Blazer was packed with everything he owned in the world, and he was leaving Boston, leaving it all. New start, new people, new job. New life. But something about that figure in the fog, perched for flight, whispered to the old Finn Clyde, the Finn that didn’t know better, the Finn that ran toward trouble. And before he knew it, he was pulled off in a maintenance lane, trotting back toward the jumper.
When she’d spoken he recognized his mistake. The kid was a woman. Her voice was a smoky drawl, a voice so completely at odds with her enormous sweatshirt and her tear-stained face that he’d almost fallen off the bridge himself. Then she’d looked at him, and Finn saw something he’d seen on a thousand faces in the last six and a half years. Beat-down, hopeless, finished, blank. It was a look he had battled in his own reflection. It was defeat.
“Clyde?” I immediately interrupted. “I’m not a kid. I’m twenty-one years old. I’m not jailbait or an escapee from prison or a mental institution. I’m not a member of the Klan, or even a Bible salesman, although I do believe in Jesus and am not ashamed to admit it, though I will keep my love for him to myself if you’ve got issues with that. I have some money to contribute to gas and food and whatever else we need. I just need a lift out . . . west.” I liked that he’d used “out west” first, because I was milking it for all it was worth now that I needed a destination.
Clyde actually smiled. It was just a quick twist of his lips, but I guessed that was saying something. He didn’t seem like the smiley type.
“You don’t have anything but the clothes on your back and that little purse, and your name isn’t Bonnie, so you’re obviously hiding or running, which means there’s trouble on your ass,” he objected. “And I sure as hell don’t want trouble.”
“I’ve got money. And I can pick up what I need along the way. I packed light.” I shrugged my shoulder. “I didn’t think I’d need a suitcase in heaven.”
Clyde choked and looked at me in disbelief. I didn’t blame him. I was joking, but I sounded crazy. I felt a little crazy. I continued talking.
“And, for your information, my name really is Bonnie. But you don’t look much like a Clyde.”
“Clyde’s my last name,” Clyde offered, somewhat hesitantly. “I’ve been called Clyde for so long now, I use it automatically.”
“So your friends call you Clyde?”
“Uh, yeah. My friends,” Clyde agreed with an edge to his voice that made me believe there was something there he didn’t want to discuss.
“Well, my friends and family call me Bonnie. So you can too. Even if it is kinda funny.”
“Bonnie and Clyde,” Clyde said under his breath.
“Yep. Let’s just hope this little adventure has a better ending then theirs did.”
Clyde didn’t respond. I didn’t know if he was going to let me ride along or not, but he hadn’t said no. The little voice in my head that sounded like Gran told me I had officially lost my marbles. When I stood on that bridge and let go, my mind obviously hadn’t been rescued with the rest of me. It must have tumbled down into the water below the bridge, leaving me a brainless zombie. So I leaned my forehead against the passenger side window, closed my eyes, and played dead.
Chapter Two
FINN CLYDE WASN’T a stupid man. In fact, he was brilliant. As a child he was fascinated by reoccurring themes in nature. Why do most flowers have five petals? Why are honeycombs shaped like hexagons? Why do numbers have corresponding colors? He was eight before he realized not everyone saw the colors.
Numbers also had weight. When he multiplied them, the numbers swirled in his head like a blizzard in a child’s snow globe, the answers settling in his mind softly, just like the snowflakes, as if gravity were responsible for the solution. As he got older, the fascination with the patterns nature presented grew into a fascination for probability, using mathematical formulas to predict outcomes. And his predictions became eerily accurate. So much so that he could handily beat anyone at chess, poker, or even games that seemed governed by chance. There was no such thing as chance to Finn. Chance could be analyzed, sliced, diced, and pegged using a little brain power.
But even Finn Clyde couldn’t predict that his brother, Fish, would get desperate, rob a convenience store with a stolen weapon, and drag Finn into the mess. Finn was brilliant, but he was also young. And he was loyal. And Finn had run toward his brother instead of driving away when Fish took a bullet in the stomach after demanding that the Vietnamese owner of the convenience store empty his cash drawer. Fisher Clyde died in the front seat of their mother’s car in his brother’s arms. And at barely eighteen, Finn Clyde’s fortunes took a definite turn for the worse. Life had not been kind since then, and at twenty-four, six and a half years after that fatal night, Finn Clyde was still brilliant, but he wasn’t nearly as young or loyal, and he wasn’t running toward trouble anymore. And Bonnie was trouble.
She was asleep, her head resting against the window, her arms wrapped around her middle as if she was physically holding herself together. She was slim, almost too slim. She said she was twenty-one, but she could pass for younger. When he had seen her perched on the railing, arms braced, her slim form appearing through a sudden and almost suspiciously providential parting of the fog, he had thought she was a kid. A boy, maybe fourteen or fifteen. And he’d driven past. You didn’t stop on Tobin Bridge. Hell, you didn’t walk or bike on Tobin Bridge. He didn’t know how the kid managed to be where he was. Where she was, Finn corrected himself.
He was heading northbound across the bridge into Chelsea. He had a stop to make—a goodbye—and then he was gone. The Blazer was packed with everything he owned in the world, and he was leaving Boston, leaving it all. New start, new people, new job. New life. But something about that figure in the fog, perched for flight, whispered to the old Finn Clyde, the Finn that didn’t know better, the Finn that ran toward trouble. And before he knew it, he was pulled off in a maintenance lane, trotting back toward the jumper.
When she’d spoken he recognized his mistake. The kid was a woman. Her voice was a smoky drawl, a voice so completely at odds with her enormous sweatshirt and her tear-stained face that he’d almost fallen off the bridge himself. Then she’d looked at him, and Finn saw something he’d seen on a thousand faces in the last six and a half years. Beat-down, hopeless, finished, blank. It was a look he had battled in his own reflection. It was defeat.
