The Space Between Us. Megan Hart

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ me until I dug a toe into the carpet.

      I stopped. The room kept moving. If I stood, I’d stumble, probably fall. It was not quite enough to make my stomach sick, though in retrospect the tuna hadn’t been the best idea. As I turned back to the computer, my eyes still trying hard to focus on one unspinning thing, I heard the front door open and the sound of little shoes on the tile entryway. Then voices. Simone, shrieking at her brother, who was giggling like a lunatic. Their mom, Elaine, admonishing them without much force. Then the diversion of the noise from the den, up the stairs and presumably toward the bathroom, where the kids would be bathed, toothbrushed and pottied before being put into their beds.

      I closed down my windows and cleared my history before logging out, and was just turning in the desk chair to face the doorway when he came in. “Hey, Vic,” I said.

      “Hey.” He looked tired. Kids could do that to you. Vic pressed the heel of his hand against his eye, then focused briefly on the computer. “Didn’t think you’d be home.”

      “Not everyone has a blooming social calendar like you,” I teased.

      His smile quirked faintly on one side. Just the one. “We took the kids over to Elaine’s mom’s house for Nancy’s birthday. If I’d known you were going to be home I’d’ve told you.”

      “It’s okay. I had stuff to do.” Elaine’s mom and sister had never been mean to me, but they’d never gone out of their way to be nice, either. We had a policy of neutral ground when it came to family events. If they came here or we met someplace else, we treated each other distantly but politely, never really delving too much into my place in their son-in-law’s life. I simply never went to their house.

      He nodded. “I’m going to help Elaine with the kids. You up for some Resident Evil 4 in a bit?”

      It was our favorite video game, especially played on Vic’s Wii with the special guns that attached to the controllers. “Hell, yeah. You guys need some help?”

      “Nah.” He shrugged and yawned. “We got it covered.”

      “How’s she feeling?” Elaine was pregnant with their third and didn’t have morning sickness. She had all-day sickness.

      “Like shit.” He shrugged again, a man bewildered by the complications of women’s bodies, though not unsympathetic.

      It was enough to make me determined never to get pregnant. Like, ever. Well … maybe if Christian Bale was donating, I could be persuaded. But other than that, probably not. “I’ll set up the game for when you’re ready.”

      There was no reason for me to have told Vic I’d been thinking about looking up Chase and Chance Murphy. It still felt like a lie, one that weighed heavily enough on me that I couldn’t quite keep my concentration on the game. Since it was single-player, Vic and I took turns at it, switching when one of us died. I died a lot.

      “What’s up with you, Tesla?” Vic took the gun controller from me as the red ooze dripped across the screen, showing I’d kicked it again.

      “Long day at work, I guess.” I got up. “I should go to bed. Early morning tomorrow.”

      “Yeah. Me, too.” But Vic didn’t get up. He leveled the gun at the screen again, starting the next level. “‘Night.”

      The rest of the house had gone quiet hours ago, Elaine and the kids in bed. It was just Vic and me, sitting in the dark, killing zombies. The flickering light from the TV made shadows move on his face, giving him expressions I knew he wasn’t making.

      He caught me looking and paused the game. “What?”

      “You should go to bed. You have to get up early, too.”

      “Thanks, Mom,” Vic said.

      I shrugged. “I’m just saying.”

      “Yeah, I know what you’re saying. I just want to finish this level, that’s all. You go to bed. I’m fine.”

      Since Vic often got up even earlier than I had to for the morning shift, I knew he wouldn’t be fine. “You look tired—”

      “I’m a grown-up, Tesla,” he interrupted through tight jaws, his eyes steady on the waves of zombies coming to kill Leon S. Kennedy, until he flicked a gaze at me. “I can decide for myself when to go to bed.”

      I stepped back, tossing up my hands. “Fine. You’re right. Good night.”

      “ ‘Night,” I heard him repeat as I left the den and headed for my bedroom.

      He was right, of course. I wasn’t his mom, perish the thought, and I wasn’t his wife. But that didn’t mean I didn’t have the right to worry about him, did it? Vic worked hard, long hours at the garage and used-car lot he owned. He had two kids and a pregnant wife. He had me living in his basement.

      Showered and in bed, I heard the faint sounds of zombie deaths through the door. Then, as I was drifting to sleep, silence. Then the comforting creak of the floor in the kitchen, the living and dining rooms. Vic was making his rounds. Checking the doors and windows, making sure everything was locked and we were all safe.

      His footsteps on the basement stairs sent me staring, wide-eyed, into the darkness. I heard him moving around the perimeter of the basement, doing what? Checking the windows down here, too? They were too small and awkward for anyone to get through. I heard the rattle of a toy being kicked, the mutter of a curse. Then the metallic squeak of my doorknob being turned slowly.

      A square of lighter darkness appeared as my door opened. I couldn’t make out his silhouette, but I could hear him breathing. I heard the soft scuff of his feet on the carpeting, and I closed my eyes tight. Stifled and slowed my breathing so there’d be no way he could think I was awake.

      I tensed when Vic leaned over me. But instead of touching me, all he did was press the lock on the high, narrow window above my bed. Then, assured all was well, he left the room, closing the door with a soft click behind him.

      I let out my breath in a whoosh and burrowed deeper into my pillows. Chill sweat had broken out all over me, and I was breathing hard. Warmth filled the cave I’d made, but it took me a long time to stop shivering.

      And when I did, when I slept, I dreamed.

      I don’t know what Vic does when he’s not at The Compound, but when he is here, he works on cars. Some people here, like my parents, for example, drive Volvos or BMWs the rest of the year, but during the summer they ride around in beater cars. Old Jeeps, dinged up and rusted muscle cars, stuff like that. Because The Compound’s not about money or status, it’s about getting along with people and raising vegetables and flowers or some shit like that, I don’t know. I’ve been coming here my whole life, and all I know is that this summer I’ve been bored out of my mind.

      There’s not much to do for me here. I could hang out in what they call the crèche, helping with the little kids, but the stench of cloth diapers gets to me after a while. I could help in the gardens, weeding and stuff, but it’s the hottest summer on record for like, twenty years, and it’s just brutal out in the fields. And for what? I don’t even like tomatoes.

      I’m like that girl in the song in that movie, the one about the family that sings while they escape from the Nazis. I’m sixteen, going on seventeen, and I don’t have a TV, СКАЧАТЬ