Chapter 3

Clayton might’ve slept easy, but the same could definitely not be said for Jacob and me. It was pretty late by the time we turned in. But neither of us made a move to turn out the lights.

“It’s not like you’ll be gone forever.” I was whispering, I realized, even though there was slim likelihood of the kid hearing me from all the way downstairs. “A day and a half. Thirty-six hours. And eight of those, he’ll be asleep. Are you saying I can’t handle him for twenty-four hours?”

“Thirty-six minus eight isn’t—”

“Look, all I’m saying is, give me some credit. Your nephew, too.”

“He’s thirteen.”

“He’s in junior high.” I’d been held back a couple of grades—thanks a lot, math—so junior-high-me had been older than Clayton. But my friends at the time were all his age, so I had a pretty clear idea of what being a brand new teenager entailed. “And don’t tell her I said this, but maybe Barb is right. If the kid can’t handle being away from home, it’s better to find out now, where I can have him back on his own doorstep in three hours flat.”

My husband looked entirely unconvinced.

“Listen to me, mister.” I jostled Jacob under the covers. “All I need to do tomorrow morning is make a quick circuit of HQ to be sure the resident repeaters stay put, and then I’ll come right back home. The cannery is pretty solid. I’m sure it’ll still be standing by the time I get back.”

Of course, there was plenty more that could go wrong, and we both knew it. After all, we had been thirteen-year-old boys once ourselves—even if that was back in the Stone Age. I suspected I was a lot more street-smart than Clayton was. But he was a lot less rebellious than me, so I hoped it would all even out. And if he did end up getting into some porn…well, I’m sure that on the internet he’d already seen all that and worse.

Lights were out and I’d curled into my customary gangly fetal position. I was starting to nod off when Jacob said, “We should set some ground rules before we go.”

The thing about explicit rules is that they’re just begging to be circumvented. Whereas a grim warning, like Don’t do anything stupid, is a lot harder to weasel out of. But I was the responsible one, so I’d need to come up with something. “Fine. We’ll tell him to mind his Ps and Qs before we leave the house. Satisfied?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. What does that mean, exactly?”

Don’t do anything stupid.

I groaned and flipped onto my back. “Don’t use the weight bench without a spotter. Don’t start a fire. And for god’s sake, don’t open the door to a stranger. Remember, Jacob, I’ll be home again in just a couple of hours, probably less with Saturday traffic. Then I can sit here and twiddle my thumbs while he ignores me ’till you get back Sunday night. Does that about cover it?”

“It’s just…he’s so young. Younger than we were.”

While it was tempting to challenge Jacob’s math…I knew what he meant. At Clayton’s age, I’d spent my spare time dicking around on the train tracks and pretending to be interested in my friends’ titty mags. I was a city kid, born and bred. I’d been through three foster families and had already developed a decent sense of self-preservation. In comparison, Clayton was a sheltered, small-town kid. And nowadays, the world somehow felt a lot more risky.

Still…. “It’s only a couple of hours.”

Jacob slung an arm around me, ground his face into the pillow, and sighed. “I just hope he doesn’t do anything stupid.”

Yeah. You and me both.