John Gone (26 page)

“Okay,” his mother replied. “As long as
everyone’s trying.”

“I’m going to go take a shower and throw on
some fresh clothes, alright?”

“I’m surprised you didn’t go sooner.”

John stood from the couch and exited the
room, leaving his mother alone with Ronika on the couch.

“He seems more, I don’t know, confident,”
John’s mom said. Ronika nodded in agreement. “It’s like he’s the
one explaining everything to me, telling me that it’s all going to
be fine, even if it isn’t. Usually that would be reversed. I wonder
where that’s coming from.”

“He’s had a lot to deal with these--” Ronika
began.

John’s mother interrupted. “Are you
two--”

“No,” Ronika answered.

“I’m going to get more tea,” John’s mom said
quickly, standing from the couch. She picked up her empty mug and
plopped the used tea bag inside. “You want some?” she asked,
walking into the kitchen. “This blend is called Samurai Chai, and
it’s packed with caffeine.”

“Sure!” Ronika answered back, usually perking
at the mention of anything with “samurai” in its name.

“So what
is
going on with you two?”
John’s mom asked from the kitchen.

Ronika tried to answer her. “I don’t know.
Sometimes I think--”

“He’s been spending a lot of time there, at
your place, I mean. That’s got to count for something. He obviously
trusts you.”

“Yeah, he does.”

“How old are you?”

“I just turned nineteen.”

“Do you live by yourself?”

“Yes.” Ronika looked down at the scattered TV
Guides across the coffee table. Most were open with various
listings circled in a wide red marker.

“Were you one of those kids who couldn’t wait
to turn eighteen and move out of her parents’ house?” John’s mother
asked.

“It’s not like that,” Ronika said. “My father
died a few years ago. And my mother, well, I don’t know much about
her. I don’t think I’ve ever met her.”

John’s mother finished preparing the tea and
brought the two mugs back to the living room.

“I’m sorry. I should have remembered. John
had said that your--“

“That was fast,” Ronika interrupted,
motioning at the tea.

John’s mother looked down at the mugs as she
placed them on the table. “I use a little instant boiler instead of
a kettle. Boiling water is boiling water, you know? It’s not as
romantic as a chirping kettle, but hell, it makes a hot cup of tea
in about thirty seconds. Still needs about five minutes more to
steep, though.”

Ronika picked up the purple polka-dot mug
that had been brought to her and smelled the brew inside. “It
smells excellent,” she said. “Thank you.”

“John can be an odd kid sometimes,” his
mother said. “He can be completely oblivious to certain things. I
don’t want to say he’s self-involved. No, that’s not it. He’s just
the sort of person who convinces himself of what’s important and
zeros in on it. Usually he’s wrong.” She chuckled. “About what’s
important, I mean. But that’s just how he is. I find that usually
just talking to him about things helps, if he
is
missing
something, whatever that is. So, maybe what I’m saying is, just
talk to him about it. If there is an ‘it.’”

Ronika stared down into her tea and watched
it darken slowly. She stirred the bag around the mug by its
string.

“Thank you, for taking care of him,” John’s
mother said.

“I haven’t been, really,” Ronika answered
back, feeling more than a little uncomfortable.

“But you have,” she replied. “He used to talk
about you all of the time.”

“Used to,” she repeated.

“Tell me the truth,” John’s mother said. “How
dangerous is this? I know you guys didn’t tell me everything. What
are you two hiding?”

Ronika was taken aback by the suddenness of
the question. “There are two men,” she began to explain.

“Don’t tell me,” John’s mother said. “On
second thought, I don’t want to know. Just ... you’re keeping him
safe, right?”

“As best as I know how.”

John reentered the room in a towel as Ronika
finished her sentence. “You guys have no idea how great that was,”
he said, approaching the couch.

“John, would you get dressed? We have company
over,” his mother fumed.

“Jeez,” John replied. “Sorry.” He left as
quickly as he’d come.

“See?” his mother said. “Oblivious.”

“I guess,” Ronika replied.

“I’m sorry for the inquisition before.”

“There’s a lot to take in.”

John’s mother stirred her tea with the bag
still inside. “Hey, do you watch Starship Love Affair?”

“Oh!” Ronika exclaimed, lighting up. “I love
Starship Love Affair. Did you see the last one?”

“Not yet,” John’s mom replied. “So no
spoilers! I just haven’t had a lot of time. I’ve been out looking
for John, talking to the police, drinking tea--”

“Mom!” John said, appearing behind them
again, this time fully dressed. “I forgot about the cops! Are we
putting you at risk by being here?”

“Oh! No, I forgot to tell you,” she said,
turning her head back toward her son. “They’re not looking for you
anymore. Though, that’s not entirely true. They still have a
missing person report on you, but I can call that off.”

“Really?” John said excitedly, climbing over
the back of the couch.

“Yes, and I don’t know much, but Tom, the
officer in charge of the case, told me that they found an older
woman at America Offline who was apparently always hanging around
the warehouse playing with that board they have over there. They
heard her talking to someone about how she was constantly having to
reject Virgil’s ‘advances.’ When they questioned her about it, they
found some sort of high-powered taser in her purse that she claimed
she was carrying for self-defense.”

“I’m sure it was to protect her from all of
the muggers and murderers lurking around the island,” John added
flippantly.

“Anyway,” his mother continued, “Tom put it
together that perhaps Virgil had tried to hit on her, and that she
zapped him. When they confronted the woman about it, she became so
frazzled that she had a heart attack right then and there.”

“Oh, my goodness,” Ronika said. “Is she
okay?”

“No,” John’s mom replied. “She died from it.
The police are writing it off as an accident and blaming her for
Virgil’s death.”

“They’re wrong, though,” John said. “That’s
not fair. It was me.”

John’s mother placed her hand over the watch
on his wrist. “It wasn’t you,” she said. “It was this thing
attached to you. It’s not your fault.”

“I know,” John said sullenly, “but, still.
Now everyone thinks some poor grandma did it.”

“Not everyone,” his mother said, letting go
of his arm. “And it’s not like they’re drawing up posthumous
charges against her. They’re just closing the case.”

“John,” Ronika chimed in, “I should go.”

“Why?” he replied. “You don’t have to.”

“No,” she said, “I do. I have to get back to
my place and get Mouse ready so that it’s online as soon as you
jump. Plus, it will give you some time alone with your mom.”

“Alright,” John said. “I’ll walk you
out.”

They stood from the couch and walked outside
to where Ronika had parked the scooter.

“Thanks for bringing me,” she told him.

John looked up at her and gave her a
half-smile and a half-nod, seeming unsure of what to say.

She reached for him. As they hugged, she
whispered in his ear. “You know this is the fifth, right?”

“I know.”

“Okay,” she said, releasing him.

“What’s farther than France?” he asked
absently.

“A lot of places,” she answered. “But
whatever happens, we’ll get you back home again. We’re a great
team, right?

“We are.”

“Then I’ll see you at 3:14. The next
3:14.”

“Yeah,” John said, starting to move back
toward his house.

“John?”

He turned back to her.

“Do you think I’m selfish?” she asked.

“What? No. Why would you say that?”

“Sometimes I don’t think my priorities are,”
she looked down at the ground, “what they should be.”

“I don’t understand,” he said.

“Um,” Ronika muttered, raising her head.
“Forget it. I’ll be on Mouse by the time you jump, okay?”

“Yeah,” John said, looking puzzled.

Ronika mounted the scooter and turned the key
in its ignition. “See you on the other side!” she said through a
newfound smile. She revved the scooter and sped down the street,
quickly gaining enough distance from the house to disappear from
John’s view.

John walked back into his house where he was
greeted by another hug from his mother.

“I seem to be getting a lot of hugs lately,”
he said, his mouth again squished against her shoulder.

“Sorry,” she replied, letting go of him. “I’m
just so happy to see you okay.”

“Me, too,” John said. He walked with his
mother past the living room and through her bedroom to the porch
outside.

Two lawn chairs sat behind the sliding glass
door facing the sea. Both of them sat, he in the right, she in the
left. The breeze sailing in from the ocean was strong, and John
lifted his knees to his chest, balling himself to protect from its
chill.

The rhythmic crashes of the rolling waves
were something John had heard daily since his childhood. Their
sound was as natural to him as the air he breathed and John
realized that at some point he’d become accustomed to tuning them
out, accidentally not hearing them at all.

Tonight was different. He listened to each
with a sense of renewal, fearing secretly that he’d neither see nor
hear them again. He looked out across the water to the slowly
flashing buoys that floated at a distance from the shore, still
visible against the light from the half-risen sun behind them. He
counted six from where he sat, one less than he remembered counting
each day as a child. He wondered when the seventh had gone out.

John found himself calmed by the remnants of
his childhood that enveloped him. He wondered why he’d never taken
the time to appreciate them again as a teenager, as he knew he must
have when he was five or six.

He looked left to his mother and recognized
the expression on her face as the one he wore now: tranquil. He
realized then that she had learned this technique long ago. She
must have experienced this feeling daily, just sitting here,
looking out at the beyond. Maybe he finally understood how she
managed to smile each day, even while living in a place where her
neighbors didn’t respect her, where she worked sixty hours a week
serving them, and where she’d had to raise a kid by herself since
someone abandoned her. He thought about what he’d said to Kala,
that this house was the worst part of their lives. Perhaps that
wasn’t entirely fair.

A loud wave crashed in the sand, and John
remembered that Kala was underground. The doctor hadn’t had the
chance to see or hear the ocean in over three decades. John quickly
pulled the watch’s knob out one click and whispered, “Sorry,”
quietly into the face.

“I--” Kala started to stutter before
silencing. The doctor, John, and his mother sat together and looked
into the rolling ocean without anyone choosing to speak for over
half an hour. Eventually, John’s mother was the one to break the
silence.

“So, you’ve done it. You got out of here,”
she said. “I’m happy for you. I know it’s what you’ve always
wanted.”

“Not like this,” John said.

“We don’t always get to choose how things
happen,” she replied.

“I know.”

“Still, I’m proud of you. It seems like
you’ve grown up three years worth almost overnight.”

“Maybe.”

“And that’s all you needed, to get out there
and see the world. Anything other than what I could give you here.
Go figure.”

“Thanks for believing me. I know it’s a crazy
story. And thanks for not being angry that I didn’t come back
sooner.”

“I got your note,” his mother replied. “But,
I really had no idea what to make of it at the time.”

John looked up at the fast-moving clouds
above them and remembered scrawling the shortly worded note on a
tissue with his mother’s eyeliner. It seemed like ages ago.

“Will you come back here now?” his mother
asked. “Now that I know everything, and now that the police aren’t
hopping around after you?”

“Sure,” he said. “But what about Ronika?
We’ve sort of been running things from her place. I know she’s been
by herself for a few years already, but now that we’ve been
spending time together, I don’t want to leave her alone again.”

“She can come, too!” his mother exclaimed.
“Tell her to pack a bag and come stay with us until this whole
thing blows over.”

“Really?” John said. “Okay! I’ll tell
her.”

“Good,” his mother said.

“So, hey, Mom?”

“Yes?”

“I know I always talk about getting off the
island. And I’m not going to pretend like that’s not important to
me, but it’s never been to get away from this, our family, or
anything. You know that, right? We have a pretty good life here, I
think.”

“Yeah, we do.”

“Even if we are in the middle of Geriatric
Park,” he said. “Where dinosaurs still roam the Earth.” His mother
laughed along with him at the comment.

John looked down at his watch. They still had
a lot of time. His eyes weighed down and he fell unconscious,
calmly asleep in the lawn chair behind his house.

It was another few minutes before John’s
mother realized her son was sleeping, and she didn’t bother trying
to wake him once she did. Instead, she quietly stood and walked
back into her bedroom. Taking the red blanket from the foot of her
bed, she walked back to her son and laid it carefully across
him.

She looked down at her sleeping child, and
suddenly wondered if she’d lost him. Whether to girls, to the
watch, or to age, their relationship had changed. Losing him was
something she’d feared since his father had left them almost
seventeen years ago, and that fear had done nothing but grown as
John had.