MITCH AND DENNY left DC in the old white Suburban before the sun had even come up that morning, with Denny at the wheel as always. He’d handed Mitch some easily digestible bullshit the day before, all about reconnecting with his people now that he was a “real man,” and Mitch had gobbled it up, even taken it to heart.
In truth, the less Mitch knew about the reason for this little road trip, the better.
It was about five hours to Johnsonburg, PA, or, as Denny thought of it when they got there, Johnsonburg, PU. The paper mills here put up the same sour stench as the ones he’d grown up around, on the Androscoggin. It was an unexpected little reminder of his own white-trash roots, the ones he’d ripped out of the ground twenty years ago. He’d been around the world more than once since then, and this small town was as close to going home again as he ever cared to get.
“What if she don’t want to talk to me, Denny?” Mitch asked for about the eighty-fifth time that morning. The closer they got, the faster his knee jacked up and down, and he clutched at the stuffed yellow monkey on his lap like he wanted to strangle the damn thing. It already had a tear in its fur where Mitch had pulled off the security tag at a Target in Altoona, right before he’d stuck it under his jacket.
“Just try to relax, Mitchie. If she don’t want you here, it’s her loss. You’re an American hero, man. Don’t ever forget that. You are a bona fide hero.”
They came to a stop outside a bleak little brick duplex on a block of bleak little brick duplexes. The front lawn looked like the place where old toys went to die, and there was a rusty blue Escort heaped in the driveway.
“Seems pretty nice,” Denny said with a frown. “Let’s go see if someone’s home.”
Chapter 60
SOMEONE SURE WAS. You could hear the music coming right through the front door, some kind of Beyoncé shit or something like that. It took a couple of rounds of knocking before the volume finally went down.
A second later, the door opened.
Alicia Taylor was prettier than her surveillance photo, by far. Denny wondered for a second how Mitch had ever bagged her in the first place, but then Alicia saw who it was on her stoop, and her face got ugly and nasty real quick. She stayed behind the screen door.
“What the hell are you doing here?” she said by way of hello.
“Hey, Alicia.” Mitch’s voice was husky with fear. He seemed a little flustered, and he held up the stuffed monkey. “I, uh… brought a present.”
Behind Alicia, a little waist-high girl was giving them wide eyes from under her braided and beaded bangs. She smiled when she saw the toy, but those lights went out as soon as her mother spoke again.
“Destiny, go to your room.”
“Who is that, Momma?”
“No questions, baby. Just do as I say. Right now. Go ahead.”
Once the girl had disappeared back into the duplex, Denny figured it was time to insert himself into the mix. “How you doing?” he said, all friendly-like. “I’m Mitch’s buddy and expert driver, but you can call me Denny.”
Her eyes flitted his way just long enough to throw a few poison darts. “Mister, I don’t have to call you shit,” she said, and then turned back to Mitch. “And I asked you what the hell you’re doing here. I don’t want you around here. Neither does Destiny.”
“Go ahead, man,” Denny said, and nudged him in the shoulder.
Mitch pulled a small envelope out of his pocket. “It ain’t much, but here.” Inside was a twenty, two fives, and fifty rumpled singles. He tried to hand it to her right through the broken screen, but she shoved it back at him.
“Oh, hell no! You think that little envelope gon’ make you a daddy?” Her voice dropped. “You’re just an old mistake, Mitch, that’s all. Far as Destiny’s concerned, her daddy is dead, and that’s how we gon’ keep it. Now, are you two getting off my property — or am I calling the police?”
Mitch’s round face looked about as long as it could get.
“At least take this,” he said.
He opened the screen door, and when she stepped back fast, he dropped the stuffed monkey on the floor at her feet. It was pathetic to watch. Besides, Denny had seen all he needed to.
“Alrighty, then,” he said, “we got a long drive back to Cleveland, so we’ll just be on our way to O-hi-o. Sorry to bother you, ma’am. I guess this little visit wasn’t such a good idea after all.”
“You think?” she said, and slammed the door in both their faces.
On the way down the walk, Mitch looked like he wanted to cry.
“It sucks, Denny. She’d be proud if she knew what we were doing. I wanted to tell her so bad —”
“But you didn’t.” Denny threw an arm around his shoulder and spoke close. “You stuck to the mission, Mitchie, and that’s what counts. Now come on — let’s hit ourselves a Taco Bell on the way out of town.”