Built Like Brothers

Forrest

My dad's world taught me four rules to keep me from screwing up a job. Keep your face covered. Don't touch anything with bare hands. Don't look at security cameras. Don't trip alarms.

Last night, I broke three of those rules in less than ten seconds.

That's why I'm standing in the parking lot of a truck stop in the middle of a winter storm with seven dollars in my pocket, no coat, no idea what state I'm in, and no father.

The weather even feels like it's seeking it's revenge on me by pelting me sleet that stings everywhere I have exposed skin.

For a while, I stare at the empty space where Dad's rig had been parked. I tell myself he moved it. Maybe he pulled around back to the diesel pumps. Maybe he got tired of waiting. Maybe he's circling the lot because he does that sometimes when he's mad and wants me to feel it before he lets me back in. But the longer I stand there, holding the receipt from the diesel pump in one hand and the change in the other, the more I understand what he meant.

All you are is an eighteen-year-old liability.

He said it without looking at me. That should've been my first warning. Dad always looks at me when he wants to watch his words wound. But this time, he didn't care what they did to me.

He hadn't said a word to me in the nine hours and twenty-three minutes we drove after abandoning the job he swore was going to set us up for good. I counted the minutes because numbers make sense. Numbers are consistent. They're reliable and trustworthy.

Letters are different. Letters don't line up in my head the way numbers do. Numbers I get. They make sense. Letters just turn into squigles that know something I don't.

I can calculate miles, fuel, weight, drive time, and how long Dad can run two logbooks before DOT starts asking questions. I can tell you how many feet of copper will fit in a fifty-gallon barrel, and how much it'll sell for stripped clean.

When it comes to reading, though, I only know enough to fake my way through it when I have to.

Dad took me out of school when I was six and put me on the road. He taught me numbers because numbers made me useful to him. He taught me how to bypass locks, avoid cameras, strip copper, spot expensive tools, and disappear before sirens got close enough to catch me.

He didn't teach me how to read because reading didn't make him money.

Last night, Dad told me to cut the wire by the marked box. I cut the wrong one. The alarm screamed. Lights flooded the job site. Dad spun on me, and the look on his face said what his mouth didn't have to. I'd ruined everything.

Then I panicked. I looked up. Straight into the security camera. That was it. One alarm. One camera. One ruined twenty-thousand-dollar payload. My face turned into evidence. One son turned into a liability.

The wind slices through my hoodie and pushes wet snow against my clothes until the fabric clings to my skin. My coat's still in Dad's truck. So is my other pair of socks. So is the only blanket I've ever been allowed to call mine.

I stand there until my fingers start to ache around the coins in my hand. Then I force myself into motion. Losing it won't help me. Surviving might.

The truck stop is open twenty-four hours, so I go back inside and keep my head down. Warm air hits my face, and for one stupid independent thought, I almost believe I can breathe again.

I walk to the little café at the far end and buy a pack of crackers and a bottle of water. The woman at the counter says something friendly. I just smile politely and nod at her. My ears are still full of wind and alarm bells and Dad's voice telling me what I cost him.

Seven dollars can last three days if I'm careful. One meal a day, if I stick with crackers. Water from the bathroom sink. No extras. No mistakes. I'm good with numbers. I have to be.

I sit in the café for as long as I can without looking like I'm sitting there for as long as I can. People come in wearing coats and boots and lives that make sense. Truckers drink coffee. A family argues over breakfast sandwiches. A little kid drops a glove, and his dad picks it up before the kid can even cry about it.

I look away from that one, because I don't understand that kind of father.

After a few hours, the employees start noticing me. Their eyes pass over me too often. The lady at the counter glances at my wet hoodie. A man sweeping near the trash cans slows down when he gets close.

I know those looks. It means I'm becoming visible. Visible gets people questioned. Questioning gets cops called. Cops run names, and names find warrants.

And if they run mine, they'll find the one waiting in another state with my face attached to it. Maybe jail would be better than this. At least jail has a roof. Food. Heat. A place to sleep where snow can't crawl under my clothes.

But I'm not ready to be locked in a cage for mistakes I was raised to make. So I leave the comfort of the warmth and the safety of the building.

Outside, the cold slams into me harder than before. I pull my hood up and walk around back, past the diesel pumps and the line of idling rigs, until I find an old storage building near the edge of the lot. I sit on the curb beside it, where the wall blocks the worst of the wind, and wrap my arms around myself.

The sun sinks low. The air gets colder. Every few minutes, I look toward the driveway. Dad will come back. He has to. Fathers get mad. They yell. They leave you at gas stations long enough to make a point. They make you sleep in the cab without heat because you mouthed off or forgot a rule you should've remembered.

But they come back. Don't they?

I'm eighteen, so maybe I'm not exactly a kid anymore. But I don't know how to be an adult either. I don't know how to rent a room, get a job, fill out a form, or prove who I am. I don't have an ID. I never got a license, even though Dad made me drive sometimes when he was too tired to stay awake.

The only way I know how to make money is stealing from job sites. And that's the one thing I can't do anymore. Not with a warrant. Not with my face on camera. Not with Dad gone.

When I can't take the cold anymore, I go back inside. This time, I hide in the bathroom. I lock myself in the biggest stall and sit on the floor with my back against the wall. It smells like bleach and urine, but I don't care, it at least feels safe. It's warm enough that my body starts shaking harder once it realizes it's allowed to notice how cold it really was.

My stomach growls again, like it hates me for calling crackers dinner. I ignore it because I have to. Buying another pack now would be stupid, and stupid doesn't survive long.

I sleep in broken fragments throughout the night, my head tipped back against the wall, my arms folded tight across my chest. No one bothers me. No one notices. For once, being invisible works in my favor.

When I wake up, I splash water on my face and refill my bottle from the sink. The mirror gives me back someone I barely want to look at. Pale face. Cracked lips. Dark smudges under my eyes. My hair's shoved every direction beneath my hood.

I look exactly like someone who spent the night on a bathroom floor. Guess that's because I did. I wouldn't be surprised if someone called the cops on me. I look that shady.

I pull my hood lower and go outside. The storm has eased somewhat. Snow still falls, but the wind has calmed enough that it doesn't feel like it's trying to peel my skin off. The sky is gray and heavy over the pumps.

I count my money again. Two dollars and twenty-one cents.

That's only enough for one more pack of crackers, maybe not even that after tax. Somehow, I miscalculated. I never miscalculate. Numbers are the one thing I can trust, but the last two days have knocked something loose inside my head, and now even those feel slippery.

I lean against a pole near the regular gas pumps and try to think. I need cash. I need food. I need to get away from this truck stop before someone notices I have nowhere to go.

A blue SUV pulls up two pumps over. A man gets out first. Big guy. Nice coat. Clean boots. The kind of man who looks like he's never had to count crackers as a meal. He swipes his card at the pump, then leans against the driver's door while gas starts flowing.

A woman climbs out of the passenger side and heads toward the store. Halfway there, she stops and turns back. She opens the passenger door, grabs her purse, and pulls a white envelope from inside it.

When she opens it, I see the cash. A thick flash of bills.

My mouth goes dry. No.

I push the thought away before it can finish forming. No, absolutely not.

I'm not doing this. Not in daylight. Not here. Not after I almost got caught for the last job we tried to pull.

The woman takes out a few bills, tucks the envelope back into her purse, and closes the door. Then she walks inside. She leaves the purse sitting right there in the passenger seat, wide open. Like the whole world decided to test me while I'm already starving.

The man is on the other side of the SUV, watching the numbers climb on the pump. No one's looking at me.

My stomach growls again, louder this time. Not just hungry. Accusing me of failing to keep myself alive.

I tell myself I'll only take enough to eat. Two twenties. That's nothing to people like them. They probably won't even notice until later. Maybe they'll think they spent it somewhere else.

I hate myself before I move. But do it anyway. I crouch low and cross to the passenger side. My heart slams hard enough to hurt. I open the door slowly, just enough to reach inside. The purse is right there.

Easy. Way too easy. My fingers find the envelope. I slip it open, take two twenties, and shove it back. Then I step away.

Straight into someone's chest. My whole-body clamps down, like the bitter cold reached past my skin and froze me from the inside out.

The man from the SUV stands behind me, blocking the space between the open passenger door and the vehicle. His face is red, his jaw locked tight, his eyes already full of what he thinks I am.

"What do you think you're doing?" he snaps.

I flinch instinctively. "I'm sorry." The words fall out fast. "I'm sorry. I just needed something to eat. Here. I'll give it back."

I hold out the money with shaking fingers. His eyes drop to it. He snatches the bills from my hand.

"Please don't call the cops," I say. My voice trembles.

His expression hardens. "Don't plan on it." He grabs the front of my hoodie and yanks me close enough that I can smell his cologne. "I'll handle you myself."

My back hits the SUV. The rear passenger door digs into my side.

The woman comes out of the truck stop holding a paper bag and two coffees. She stops when she sees us.

"What happened?"

"This punk tried to steal forty dollars from us," the man says, but his eyes never leave mine.

"I'm sorry," I say again, because sorry is the only word I have that might keep him from killing me. "I really am. I'll leave. I won't bother you again."

I grab at his wrist, but his grip tightens. That's when I realize I need a new set of rules for this new life I'm stuck in. If I survive this.

New rule: Don't get caught.