Compulsion Read online

The light from the streetlamp hasn’t had problems before.

  It bothers me.

  I stare at it while holding my breath. Thirty-seven seconds. It’s cheating, holding out longer on thirty-seven, but I’ll make up for it.

  My eyes are heavy and I rub them to wake up. I can’t mess around this morning, can’t be late.

  Frost frames the window in perfect symmetry.

  I pull on the blue sweats with parallel stripes down the sides. Then my left sock, right sock, left shoe, right shoe. My shirt slips over my arms at the same time, perched on top of my head. I tug the shirt over my face, the soft fabric easing down and settling on my shoulders.

  The glowing numbers on the clock change to 5:10, then 5:11. Magic. Digital clocks—no ticks but they still know when to pass from one minute to the next. They were invented in 1956. Good number. Good year. One plus nine is ten minus five is five plus six is eleven. OK. Good year.

  I take one PowerBar Gel with a few sips of water. Vanilla. Ack. Dad got a pack at Costco, and I’ve been ingesting vanilla-flavored gel for the past month and a half.

  5:13

  Fuck.

  I missed when the time changed. Totally zoned out. I don’t know how many seconds have passed. I’ll wait. I watch as it changes from 5:13 to 5:14 and rush downstairs, skipping steps eight and four—creaky. Unlucky. Then I tap the grandfather clock three times with each hand and use both hands to open the front door, stepping out into the morning.

  Jesus. It’s the freaking arctic. I look at the thermometer but can’t see through the frosted glass. When I inhale, it feels like a film of ice enters and covers my lungs, moving on to freeze every organ in my body.

  I can see the streetlight start to sputter again, so I turn away from it, pretending I don’t notice the erratic blinking. Fuck. I stop for a second and consider waiting, holding my breath, counting the seconds, but I look at my wristwatch. Five seventeen already.

  I can’t be late.

  Coach will kill me.

  5:17

  Good number, though. Five minus one is four plus seven is eleven. I’m tempted to wait until 5:23. 5:23. Three primes that make one big prime. Absolutely perfect. I pause. But I don’t have time and I’d be way late. Luc is cool about shit, but I don’t think anybody, no matter how cool he is, would get that I have to hold out for primes. Hard to explain that kind of stuff, even to the guy who used to tie string to his mom’s wooden fork, pretending it was Aquaman’s harpoon left hand, while wearing colorful tights.

  Maybe he would get it.

  Nah. That was kid stuff, the stuff that’s easy to blow off. This is different. It’s weird that the people we spend the most time with know the least about us. Maybe Luc has some fucked-up shit he hides.

  Nah. Too weird.

  It’s okay. Another time. I force my feet to move down the steps, keeping my back to the streetlight.

  One, two, three.

  One, two, three.

  My shoes slap against the damp concrete as I jog to practice, the pungent smell of damp sagebrush tickling my nose. The parking lot is dotted with cars, a clump of them at the gate of the field. I fall into step behind the guys while we work our way to the track.

  When we get to the field, the blades of grass are frosty damp—like miniature ice sculptures that crunch underfoot. I pull off my running shoes and put on my cleats. Then we begin conditioning, breaking the glassy silence with pounding feet and heavy breathing—all moving together in a Gregorian chant–like trance.

  We’re all on the same time, a synchronized tick-tock, tick-tock. We watch Coach and follow his signals, keeping an easy pace. Too much is riding on Saturday for any of us to get hurt.

  We begin drills. The ball soars across the field in a blur. Its grooved surface molds to my cleats, and the field opens up before me, everything else murky and gray. Crisp, focused, I become the creator on the field—finding the hole, the open man. Everything comes together; no webs; no spiders; no numbers; just me and the ball. The ball curves past Diaz into the goal. We begin another half-field scrimmage. I scoop it over Kalleres; Grundy back-passes to Keller, who drills it, Diaz skidding across the wet grass, grasping it in his gloved hands.

  We play. I score. We win.

  Because of the magic.

  “Jesus, man,” Diaz says after our last drill, “I swear we all just get in your way out there. Fuck, what you got in those shoes, gabacho locochón?” He wipes sweat from his brow; white puffs of breath come out and dissolve in the cold morning air.

  I laugh and take off my cleats, the grass now wet from melted frost—no more crystal palaces. The guys grab their stuff and head back to their cars.

  It’s a perfect morning.

  “Guevón, you gonna run home or do you want a ride?” Luc says, and heads to his car.

  “A ride.” I follow Luc out to the lot and open the passenger door of his cathedral—the 1972 Dodge Dart—and respectfully click it shut. Even though Luc’s stuck going to mass every weekend with his family, this is his religion. Unfortunately, he expects all of us to pay our tithes and passes around this old hat for gas money every time he fills up. It sucks because he has to fill up the guzzler like ten times more than guys with more fuel-efficient vehicles.

  But showing up in the Dart is worth it. Luc’s worth it.

  Mornings like this are worth it, sanctuaries in the chaos.

  Luc slides into the driver’s seat and cranks Locos por Juana up. I bump the volume up one more to seventeen notches. He nods approvingly. We leave the parking lot, the gravel crunching under the Dart’s tires.

  I lean my head back and close my eyes, listening to the rhythmic beat, sorry the ride has to end, because I’m in that spot between awake and asleep when everything feels dreamlike and safe.

  Eleven Time Trial

  Thursday, 6:19 a.m.

  Six nineteen. Nine minus one is eight minus six is two. OK.

  It’s that in-between time before the sun has risen but after the curtain of night has been lifted. The streetlight is off. I walk in the front door, tapping the pink flamingo’s beak on the way in, the tip faded from years of taps. It’s a tacky prize Mom got at some raffle a long time ago. Dad hates it. Mom says she’s not going to give away the only thing she’s ever won. Kasey’s pretty indifferent. “Giant pink birds really aren’t my thing. But I’m not going to go all antiwaterfowl on you either.” And I need to rub the fucking beak or my hands get all itchy.

  The flamingo stays.

  The house smells like burned coffee. Mom bangs around the kitchen, faded flower wallpaper and mud-yellow linoleum giving the kitchen that overcast-day look. Dad comes downstairs, goes into the kitchen, and dumps the brown sludge, rinsing out the caramel residue from the pot.

  “I like it strong,” she apologizes. And it bugs the shit out of me that Mom has to apologize for the way she likes to drink her own coffee. Let her spoon it out if she wants. It’s her coffee.

  The pot percolates and bubbles, but the new brew doesn’t cover up the burn smell.

  I look at the grandfather clock.

  6:22

  Six twenty-two. Six plus two is eight plus two is ten divided by two is five. OK.

  It works.

  But something about it bugs me, so I stare at the clock, counting the seconds to 6:23.

  “You’re going to be late, Jacob. Mr. Hartman is expecting you at half past six. You better hurry if you expect to get there and back here before school starts.”

  “Late,” I mutter, the numbers blurring. 6:23. Goddamnit. 6:23.

  “What do you want for breakfast?” Mom peeks around the kitchen corner, her cheeks sunken and pale, a stark contrast to the raccoon-black circles. The car keys are on the table beside a crinkled map of Carson City with red X marks all over it. Christ. She probably drove all over Carson, retracing her steps from yesterday all night long again. She does that—looking for accidents she might’ve caused, unreported hits and runs, retracing her steps to stores, carrying receipts to prove she hasn’t s
tolen anything.

  In a state that’s open twenty-four hours, retracing steps is hell. Sometimes I think we should move to Utah. Everything there probably closes at five thirty or something.

  Dad brushes past me and sits at the table, opening up the paper to the business section. His eyes are puffy and bloodshot too. He mutters about bailouts, IRAs, oil prices, and wars. He takes it all personally, like the economy went to shit just to piss him off.

  “Jacob,” he says through the paper. “Get moving. One more school tardy and you get in-house suspension. And that means no soccer. No Saturday game. No scouts. No future.” And that last word—future—lingers in the air. He tosses me the “last warning” notice the school sent out to my parents. “Jacob . . .”

  I look at the dates with big red marks on them. Principal Vaughn has signed the bottom of the notice in tiny, squiggly letters. Fucking tight ass. “I’ve been late seven times?”

  Dad sets the newspaper on the table and nods. He does it kind of like Godzilla—like somebody’s shoved a steel rod in his spine, making his neck unmovable. “Mr. Hartman is waiting.” The game begins. Dad sets a nearly impos-

  sible goal, and I run my ass off trying to make it. Today it’s called the Hartman Meats Time Trial, in which all opponents must get the family meat pack, turhamken included, put them in the deep freeze, and arrive at school on time. Your future depends on it.

  Seven tardies. Seven. OK.

  “Don’t mess this up.” Dad’s talking through the paper again. This means future. Mine or his, though, I’m not sure. “Mr. Hartman is waiting for you.”

  I stare at the clock, the minute hand slipping into place.

  6:25

  Six twenty-five. Six plus two is eight plus five is thirteen. OK.

  Mom looks from above the refrigerator door, her eyes pleading with me.

  I sometimes feel like this entire house is a wind-up toy just one turn away from exploding wires, levers, and coils all over the place.

  “Yeah,” I say. “I’ll get there.” I walk upstairs, skipping steps four and eight, and move toward the shower. I hesitate. I don’t have time.

  But I’ve got to have a shower.

  My palms sweat and I stand in front of the bathroom door, holding my breath, counting to seventeen, then starting over again. I do this three times.

  Fuck it.

  I don’t need to shower.

  Who gives a shit?

  But I need to shower.

  Fuck.

  It’s A schedule. I can be late—just a little bit.

  No big deal.

  Kasey stomps past me in the hallway, pinching her nose. “You know, in this country we shower every day and use a thing called deodorant.” She glares. She has to leave the house a good half hour earlier than I do. But it’s not like I can make Luc take her to school. Who knows who he’s gonna pick up? He’s King Carpool. Especially when he’s low on gas.

  “Kase, I took the bus when I was a freshman too.”

  One foot in the bathroom, one foot out. I almost burst out laughing because I am the hokey pokey incarnate. Fuck, I’m such a joke.

  She huffs. “Dad went Cracked Pepper and Olive Oil this morning when he saw the tardy notice. Lucky he didn’t see it last night, because that with the In-N-Out incident would’ve sent him totally Thin Crisps Quattro Formaggio.”

  We have a code for Dad going nuts—“crackers.” Saltines means he’s pretty sane. But when Kasey goes all out, trying to find the weirdest flavor on the shelves, I know Dad’s pretty flipped. “Yeah. I’ve gotta get going. Can’t be late. My future depends on it.” I smirk.

  “Butthead.”

  “Number three,” I say.

  “Yeah, yeah. Enchanted number three. Whoopee. This Saturday, yet again, I get to be crushed under the giant shadow of Magic Martin, M&M, while in his greatest, final act, he wins the championship, a full-ride scholarship paving his way to world fame and glory while leaving me to rot in what-nobody-knows-is-the-capital-of-Nevada.”

  “I’ll get Luc to take you to school the rest of the week.”

  “You will?” Kasey raises her eyebrows.

  “I’ll try.”

  She scowls.

  “That’s all I’ve got.”

  “Yeah. Yeah.” She looks at her watch. “Better hurry.” She skips downstairs. For being a popularity-hungry freshman, Kase is borderline cool.

  I take the quickest shower in history and end up with a film of soap on my left shin. I get dressed and run back into the bathroom to rinse off the soap. It just takes a second. Then I’m out and running down the stairs, grabbing Mom’s car keys from the entryway. “Be right back,” I say, rushing out the door, careful to tap the grandfather clock and open the door with both hands on the knob. I turn away from the flamingo. That’s only for going inside.

  6:43

  Six forty-three. Six plus four is ten plus three is thirteen. OK.

  It’s like everything is coming together so easy this morning.

  “Your breakfast!” Mom runs outside balancing a scrambled-egg burrito and cup of coffee, three tablespoons of cream, three sugars, in her hands. I touch her cheek—her skin dry, paper-thin. She looks older than she should.

  At least when she was working at the Do-It-Yourself Craft Emporium, she had something to do. At one point, everything in our house smelled like cinnamon sticks and hot glue. But Mom got canned a few weeks ago. She’s been unraveling ever since. “They’ll probably hire for Christmas season.”

  “Probably,” she says, shoving the food at me.

  I take a big bite of the breakfast burrito. “Really.”

  “Don’t talk with your mouth full. Drive carefully. Watch the school zones.”

  I swallow. “Sorry.” It’s nice when Mom’s a mom.

  6:45

  Six forty-five. Six plus four is ten plus five is fifteen minus four is eleven. OK.

  Good enough.

  I peel out of the driveway and head to Hartman Meats.

  Thirteen Memories Unearthed

  Thursday, 6:53 a.m.

  Six fifty-three. Six plus five is eleven minus three is eight minus five is three. OK.

  Mera Hartman is standing behind the counter looking like one of those hazmat guys who have to be covered head to toe so some freak bacteria won’t make them bleed out of their eyeballs.

  “You’re late!” she hollers at me through a paper mask, her eyes covered in plastic goggles. “They told me you’d be here at six thirty. It’s six”—she points to her watch with a thick-mitted hand—“six fifty-three. So I’m stuck on a Thursday morning in the slaughterhouse waiting for the least reliable human being on the planet. Thank you very much.” She makes a funny shuffling sound when she moves because of the layers of heavy-duty plastic aprons she’s piled on.

  I kind of think Mera takes complying with food-

  sanitary conditions a little far.

  “Hey,” I say lamely, and glance at my watch.

  6:54

  Six fifty-four. Six times five is thirty plus four is thirty-four minus five is twenty-nine. OK.

  “Here.” She shoves the Family Meat Pack Number Five at me over the counter.

  “Thanks,” I say. “Sorry for making you wait.”

  Her goggles are fogged up, so I don’t know if she even notices me half waving when I leave. I haul the meat out to Mom’s car, passing some old guy who looks like he’s in a big hurry rushing into the shop.

  I slump into the front seat and exhale, glad it’s over so I can go home and get on with the day.

  Any encounter with Mera is weird. We all used to be friends. She was always Black Orchid or Boodikka, depending on Mrs. Camacho’s tights supply.

  Then I just stopped calling.

  And so did she.

  So it was like we broke up. I remember the day we did: the day after Mera’s brothers had spray-painted CANNED LABOR FOUND HERE on the side of Luc’s house, littering the yard with empty Spic and Span spray bottles.

  Luc, Mera, and I
spent that whole morning scrubbing off the ugly words until they faded into nothing. We had to get them washed off before Luc’s dad came home. I had seen Luc’s bruises when we were little. Mera and I had. We just pretended not to.

  When we finished, Mera left and returned with a paper plate of salami and cheese, the salami grease seeping through the flimsy plate. She looked from me to Luc.

  “Another day, Mera,” Luc said, tossing the last of the Spic and Span bottles into the plastic recycling bin.

  But that other day never came.

  Mera looks at me through the shop window, and my stomach sinks. Familiar barbs of pain work their way up the base of my neck. Maybe because of the sputtering light.

  Just as I shift the car into gear, Mera comes running out to me, flapping her arms.

  Fuck. The money. I roll down the window and hand her what I’ve got, keeping Kasey’s loan for me. It’s total shit having to explain to somebody your family can’t afford meat. Maybe we should just stick to eating tuna fish, mercury poisoning and all. Then we could win a sweet lawsuit about how Tasty Tuna made us grow extra ears or something. I look over at the discount food mart. I don’t think they extend credit for their generic-brand sodas and cans of tuna, though. “I thought my dad talked to your dad. About paying”—I clear my throat—“about paying the rest at the end of the month.”

  Mera pulls up her mask. “Whatever. I don’t give a rat’s ass about when you pay for the murder of these animals. But I need your help. That man needs sausages.”

  I shrug. “So?”

  “So? Sausages.” She says it the way everybody in my family talked about my grandma having cancer—in that whispered, conspiratorial tone. Cancer. Mera’s heavy-mitted hand grasps my elbow. “The sausages are in the walk-in. In the back.” She shudders. “With all the other animal corpses. Help. Me.”

  I realize that the longer I wait for a logical explanation from a girl who grew up stuffing sausages in her garage, the longer it’ll take to leave, and I’ll never get anywhere on time. So I roll up the window and turn off the car, following Mera back into her dad’s shop.

  The man half smiles, half waves, and taps his foot impatiently. Mera says under her breath, “They’re in the back—in the boxes. Can you just get me some?”