Nickel Plated Read online

  “Where’s the girl?”

  I answered him. “There’s no girl.”

  He nodded.

  Ricardo stood next to me and said, “I heard you can fight.”

  “That’s right. I’ve beaten up a few karetekas. You sure you want to do this?”

  He knew why we were there. I wasn’t surprised. Ricardo let him think his art was karate; it would make things happen even faster. Ricardo said, “I’m sure.”

  Jeff stripped off a sweatshirt and the T-shirt underneath it. He stepped into the sand pit. “Let’s go.”

  If Ricardo had any reservations about giving him a go in a pit outdoors, he didn’t show them. I could see Rhino’s truck behind them. He was probably in it with a pair of binoculars, ready to even things if it went bad, possibly on my end and Jeff’s, if I’d been wrong about honor. I watched the two square up less than ten feet away. I threw my matchstick on the ground and grabbed another new one. It was hard to keep from shaking.

  Jeff came in with his hands up and clenched into tight fists. There was no caution like there’d been with Dewayne; he went right for it. Ricardo was stiff in a karate stance, faking it for his opponent. When Jeff was close enough, Ricardo threw a teep, or push kick, into his solar plexus. It knocked the younger fighter back. He was surprised and came back swinging, big haymakers that would have ruined Ricardo, but Ricardo wasn’t there. As Jeff threw blows into the wind, Ricardo grabbed his legs and drove him into the dirt.

  He landed with his knees on Jeff’s left side, and then he quickly transferred, holding Jeff’s left wrist all the while, and tossed his legs over Jeff’s prone body. A shark on his feet, Jeff couldn’t even swim on the ground. Ricardo bent his arm in the way opposite of its intent, and Jeff screamed and smashed his fist rapidly on Ricardo’s hip. Ricardo let him go slowly and stood. Jeff came up next, slowly, unsure of what had just happened. Ricardo said, “Jiu-jitsu.”

  Jeff nodded. Put his hands up. Ricardo smiled and waved him in. Different submission that time, same result. Ricardo caught him in a wrist lock, or kimura. They stood, and this time they shook hands. Ricardo said, “Let me see your hands—let your hands go into the air.”

  Ricardo looked to the fields to be sure Rhino could see from the truck. Jeff punched a kata of strikes into the air, tight combinations of head-crushing trauma. He stopped, looked at Ricardo. They smiled. Behind them, I could see the truck moving. We watched it come in, slow but sure. Rhino stopped it near to us and got out, walking a heavy plodding pace that in no way showed how agile he could be. Ricardo walked to stand next to him, and Rhino said, “Now you fight against jiu-jitsu, is different fight for you.”

  “Yes.”

  “Who teach you strikes?”

  Jeff swallowed thickly. “I do.”

  Rhino and Ricardo shared a glance. Rhino said, “Show me two more combinations. Punch the wind, boy, let yourself go.”

  Jeff did it, hard strikes that were thrown from the hips and not the arms. Jab, cross, body. Jab, body, hook. Jab, jab, uppercut, body. Rhino held up his hand.

  “You good, boy, you could be real good—could be fighter. Who knows, right? What you need is ground fighting, you need kickboxing. Now you are this.”

  Rhino held up his fist.

  “But you could be like this.”

  He extended the same hand, palm open now.

  “If you can fight anywhere, no problems for you. A man he have kicks, you take him down, twist him. Man better at you on the ground, you stay up, punish him with what God give to you. You work hard, you could be something. You no work hard, you can be nothing…You watch UFC?”

  Jeff nodded, his eyes as big as dinner plates.

  “True warriors. I train UFC fighter sometimes; Nogueira brothers, they come sometimes, others too. To share and learn, to test each other. You keep up the street fighting, is no good for you. Someday you hurt somebody, go to jail. Or maybe you get hurt?” Rhino shrugged. “Doesn’t matter, right? Either hurt or caged like a dog. But you train in a gym, you fight in the ring or the cage, you not get hurt. Not real hurt. You no go to jail; you go in yourself, to see how much good you can pull out. There is only one problem. Street fight. I cannot train fighter who fights out of the ring. Then I get in trouble with you. You train with me, you learn.”

  Rhino tapped his temple twice and then swung his arm so fast I couldn’t even see it, clipping the matchstick from my teeth and lighting it across his shoe.

  “You don’t train, you gonna burn.”

  He threw the match on the ground and stomped it out. My hands were trembling next to my pockets, and air was heaving in and out of my chest. Jeff said, “When can I start?”

  “You want to start, we start now. Today.”

  “How much will it cost to train?”

  “To start, nothing. We see how you are, how quick you learn. If you do well, we sign contract for you to train to be a fighter. A real fighter. Real fighters teach classes, train with other real fighters, help run my gym. Real fighters fight someday, for my gym. If you’re not a real fighter, that’s okay, you still train, you work to be a real fighter. You’ll pay, but not much.”

  Jeff was smiling, both his eyes and his mouth.

  “I want to do it, no more fighting.”

  He turned to look at me.

  “Who’s he?”

  Rhino smiled broadly so I could see his teeth. “You’ll never know his name, but he do the best thing for you since your mother made you. Now, you get in your car; Ricardo can go with you, show the way.”

  Jeff picked up his shirts, and Ricardo clapped him across the back. I could see Jeff almost stumble from the blow, and then he wrapped his arm around Ricardo’s back as well. They already looked like brothers. I took a match and tossed it in my teeth; I don’t think my hands shook.

  Rhino said, “You call the boy’s mother, send her to the gym. She’ll have to sign him up.”

  “Okay.”

  “Thank you for letting me meet him, Nickel. You’ll see your money back—kid has power, real power. You come back to the gym; you’re not bad yourself, but you could be better.”

  “I will, Rhino, I just have to wrap some stuff up first.”

  He was already climbing into his truck, waving. I’d never see that money; guys like Rhino don’t call you to give back cash. That was okay, Veronica would give me the G plus some change. Walking to the bike, I almost felt like I’d been in a fight. Time to go home, relax for a minute. Call Arrow, have her over. Tell her about me. Tell her about her—maybe even tell her about some imaginary us.

  Yeah right, I needed to get groceries and get to work; I have a business to run. Sucks, and I still needed to get closer on Shelby. I was convinced she was dead, but either way she needed finding. The police weren’t doing anything, yet on the other hand, neither was I. It was a lot to think about—Four Oaks, Shelby, everything.

  Chapter 16

  I left the field and went straight to the gas station near Knapp and called Veronica.

  “Hello?”

  “This is Nickel. Can you talk?”

  “Yes! God, I was hoping you’d call! Last night Jeff came home with his eye about knocked out of his head! He had blood all over him and he was drunk, I could smell it. You said you were going to be watching him this weekend, and I have no idea where he is right now!”

  I let her get it all out; the phone was off of my ear by almost a foot. When she sputtered the last of it, I said, “Veronica, babe, he’s fine. Problem solved.”

  “Where is he? What happened?”

  I told her, let her know how it was done, let her know she was on the hook for seventeen hundred, and let her know where she needed to go to sign her kid up to learn to be a man. She thanked me, said she’d send the money, and I hung up the phone. I didn’t need two women in my life anyways.

  Chapter 17

  I thought about Arrow on my way home to get a backpack, on the way from my house to the store, and while I wrapped up my bike. I shook her out of my head a
nd went in to buy some food. She was hard to shake. The skirt last night hadn’t helped, and neither had the top or her taking my arm for a second as we walked to the party. I gave up, let Arrow have a quarter of my head and used the rest to get groceries.

  When you’re a kid like me, you really need to know how to grocery shop. It’s not as easy as you’d think—certainly not as easy as it is for a civilian.

  First off, you need a game plan. I have two. Either you need to be shopping for a meal, like a pack of pork chops, stuff for a marinade, stuff for a salad, things like that. The other way is to shop to fill holes, forget that you don’t have a mom and imagine she needs to make a cake and needs a couple of things. I usually top a trip like that with a bag of chicken nuggets or a pizza, like maybe the parent in question is busy and just wants a quick meal.

  Whichever plan it is that I pick, I always start the same way, in the magazines. I used to shop at a store really close to my house called D&W. When they closed, I had to shop at Meijer full time. The nice thing they had was comic books. Not all good ones—most were Archie and Jughead, and those suck—but the fact is, they had comics, Meijer doesn’t. In any case, the first rule of thumb is to hang out in the magazine aisle touching stuff. You don’t leave until you get noticed. A thirty-year-old guy could read Field and Stream once a month on his grocer’s shelf until he died; a kid couldn’t see two pages without getting the eye. Kids spill, make messes—we’re held to a higher standard. Always, magazines first, then get to shopping once the glares from employees start.

  After that, just do everything as fast as possible—you’ve got bigger fish to fry, you’re a kid! Rush around the store, but don’t make them think you could be shoplifting or make them ask you to stop running. You want to attract attention for doing kid things, but you don’t want to actually involve the real ire of an adult. It’s like being on safari in Africa. You want to see the lions, not get eaten by them. The goal is to buy groceries and get out, not make somebody wonder why that kid is always in here shopping, maybe call a cop to follow you home.

  The last thing I always do is spend a lot of time while I wait in line admiring the candy, finally picking out something for myself. For some reason, this lulls adults into dreaming about how wonderful being a kid is, makes them feel there with you. The reason is that they’re not a kid like me. I don’t want them to be concerned for my well-being; I want them to leave me alone. Nobody worries about a kid whose biggest problem is picking whether he wants almonds or not.

  Usually, you end up with either a rude cashier or one who wants to be cool and talk to you like you’re an adult. I’m not sure which kind is worse. What I do know is that the sooner you’re out of the store the better. Get outside, load your backpack as discreetly as possible, and bust out of there. If I could stand the idea of a basket, that would help, but vanity insists I avoid that route. I actually bought one of those bike trailers that little kids ride in to haul my stuff but never used it. I thought it would be a little too eye-catching. It’s a pain, honestly, the whole mess—I just want to get in and get my crap like anybody else.

  Today went off without a hitch. I read a Star Wars Insider magazine, seriously, got ocularly screamed at by a manager, and got to work. I bought milk, eggs, a pack of link sausages, and a sack of frozen chicken tenders. Ended up topping my stuff with a Snickers and endured a banal conversation with the cashier about how school was going and if I was excited for snow. It was going just fine, considering I wasn’t going, and who in their right minds liked snow? I lied on both counts, left the store, loaded the bike, and went home.

  It was late afternoon by the time I rolled into the driveway. I brought my stuff in and loaded it all up into the refrigerator and freezer. Took some chicken tenders out and threw them on a pan, preheated the oven. I plugged my pager into the charger and sat at my computer desk. Flexed my fingers out to crack my knuckles. Went fishing. Popped up like a cork when the oven beeped. Loaded my food in, went back to work. Missed a page, ignored it. Missed another one, the oven beeped, and I had a fish on. Fish left before I could get enough info to make his life change for him. Took my food out of the oven, plated it, added barbecue sauce. Checked the pager. Arrow. I ate and called her on line five.

  “Hello?”

  “Arrow.”

  “I thought you were going to call me.”

  “I had to move fast; I didn’t have time.”

  “Did it work?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can we meet tonight?”

  “How soon?”

  “Six. You know where.”

  She was getting good—too good.

  “I’ll be there.”

  She hung up. I stuck the pager in my pocket and went in the kitchen to wash the plate and baking sheet. I finished, got on the bike, and left. She was waiting when I got there, and so was Eyepatch. She wore purple jogging pants and a taut Adidas T-shirt under a just-zipped hoodie.

  “What’s going on?”

  “I want to ride through Four Oaks with you again.”

  “Sounds good; let’s go.”

  We waved at Eyepatch together and unhooked our bikes. She led, and I followed. She was angry, I could see it in her posture. I wasn’t surprised—if anything, I’d been waiting for it. I pedaled hard and caught up to her. I said, “Tell me.”

  She braked and her bike stopped violently, throwing down a black tire track, a bicycle’s fingerprint. Now that I was next to her, I could see that Arrow’s eyes were wet with tears. The storm had come. Shelby’s disappearance had nothing to do with it; I imagine the warning signs had been there for years. The girl leaving was just the last of it, the proverbial straw.

  “He left her. I knew he’d leave her. I could hear them yelling at each other. My mom was drunk, and my dad was worse than drunk. He was vicious. He hates her. He hates me.”

  “Did he hurt Shelby?”

  “No. Not like that. He used to paddle us when we were younger, but that was it. He told my mom that she got pregnant just to latch on, just to keep him around. He was talking about her having Shelby just to keep the family together, to hold onto him and his money. You know what she said? She told him it was true and that if she could, she’d do it the same way again. That it was all worth it now that she knew how miserable he’d been. He said she could see him in court.

  “I didn’t want to listen anymore because I knew what was coming, just like I think Shelby would have known if she’d been there. He was careful, but not careful enough, you know?”

  I nodded and let her finish. She was spitting out poison, and if she didn’t get it all out it would fester like venom from a snakebite.

  “My mom started talking quietly, not so I couldn’t hear but so that she knew he’d have to digest every word. She said that she couldn’t wait to see him in court, couldn’t wait to see his whore there either. Told him she’d known since the beginning and that she had pictures. She started laughing; it was the most horrible sound I’ve ever heard.”

  I hope I wasn’t the one who’d gotten her those pictures. Adults don’t usually hire me for that sort of thing, but I’d still done a good share of it over the last year or so because of that universal truth, people look through kids, they think we don’t see. I guess most of the time they’re right, but an observant kid who keeps his head down and his mouth shut, a kid like that can learn a lot. You can trust me on that.

  “She told him she didn’t care about the whore, that he could have a hundred whores if he wanted to, to her it was all the same. She told him if she brought him to court she would take everything. He left, saw me in the hallway. He had to have known I’d heard everything. He said he’d be back. He had a little bag with him, and I think he probably will be back, but I don’t even care. I wish I was dead like Shelby.”

  “You don’t know that Shelby’s dead.”

  “Nickel. She’s been gone ten days. She’s not coming back.”

  “Either way, we’re going to find her. I’m going to find her.”
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br />   “‘Either way’?” I’d only partway agreed with her—I’d just spoken as though it was a possibility that her sister might not be found alive—but she looked at me with a puzzled look on her face, and I wasn’t sure if she was going to hug me or hit me. She picked the latter.

  It’s not good luck to get punched off of your bike into somebody’s lawn, but it’s a sure sight better than landing in the road. My bike was twisted up in my legs, and I did a mental check of my extremities—everything seemed in proper working order and still attached. Arrow’s head moved over me and blotted out the sun.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I think so.”

  “I’m sorry I hit you.”

  Not sorry enough, I guarantee that. Arrow had really gotten off a good one at the expense of my already not-so-pretty face.

  “It’s alright.”

  She offered me a hand, and I took it. I let her start pulling me up, but halfway there I froze.

  “Quit fooling around. Let me help you up.”

  “Arrow.” My voice was cold. She stopped pulling, and I let go of her hand. “Arrow, are there telephone poles and lines all through Four Oaks?”

  “I think so. Why?”

  I thought hard, put the boot print by the hair band into my head. Turned it, twisted it. I could see the marks that hadn’t been on any of the boot pictures I’d seen on the Web, the deep marks of climbing equipment worn into the earth. Was Shelby a victim of opportunity, or had she been watched, maybe even talked to by her kidnapper? It didn’t matter. I knew. I didn’t need anyone to tell me I was right or wrong on this, I just knew.

  “We need to go to the bridge where she was taken.”

  I stood. She nodded at me and gave my face a sympathetic look. Crap, black eye. She leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. I’d take a bullet for this girl; all she’d have to do is ask. She said, “Let’s go.”