Tunnel Vision Read online

  “It’s fine,” she says. “Once the cameras and bugs are back in place it won’t happen again anyway.”

  We do a little standoff, her stone face to mine.

  She breaks first, for now. “The messenger service has dropped off a batch of objects, but one is an emergency. We can use my room.”

  An emergency. That’s why I agreed to keep doing this, for the emergencies. “Lead on.”

  Her room used to be the spare room, always ready in case we had an unexpected overnight guest. That’s one of Mom’s hospitality rules. Ana hasn’t changed a thing. The bed’s made perfectly, closet shut, nothing on the nightstand. It smells like her—some kind of clean, sharp soapy smell—but otherwise you’d never know anyone was living there. I wonder what’s in the drawers. Knives? Devices for tracking me? Underwear? I hesitate at the door.

  “You may sit on the bed.”

  I glance back at her, and sit. She closes the door, takes out a bag, no fanfare, and hands it to me.

  It’s dog tags.

  I twist them in my fingers, take a deep breath, and close my eyes.

  It’s a man. Not much older than me. Cropped pale hair, snub nose, desert fatigues. Location: Waziristan. Just west of the village of Tatai. He’s in a cave, dark but dry, sand whipping past his face in a wind from the entrance. He’s surrounded, held by a group of turbaned young men in white robes. They are furious, yelling, one of them pointing a gun at him. The others have machetes, knives. One of them spreads the soldier’s right hand on a flat rock before him, and holds it at the forearm, pinning it. He cries. Begs. Another raises his machete high. He brings it down across the soldier’s wrist.

  “Jake. Jake, stop!”

  I open my eyes. Ana’s beside me, hands on my shoulders. My face is wet. I spread my own hands, panicked, but they’re both still there. The dog tags slip from my fingers.

  “They cut off his hand,” I say, numb.

  “Yes.” She squeezes my shoulder. “But he is still alive. I must report it, this instant. But you will have to go and see Chris. You screamed. You will have to explain.”

  She dials, talks into the phone in a low voice. I stare at the dog tags, a puddle of metal beads on the floor, and grasp my wrist. I can still feel it, that shock of pain, the knife severing through muscle, bone. Worse than the headaches. Worse than anything I’ve ever experienced. Real.

  “You must go,” Ana says, hand over the phone. “You must protect your cover.”

  Cover. That’s what Chris is now, what home is. Cover.

  How can I explain? I can’t even think.

  I stand, open the door. I see Chris’s back at the end of the hall, by the kitchen. He’s calling my name. What can I say?

  I close Ana’s door loudly, and he spins.

  “Jake. Fuck. What happened? I heard you over the game. You all right?”

  “Me?” I laugh. It sounds hollow, but not bad. Not as bad as my fake laughs a few days ago. “That wasn’t me. That was a YouTube video Ana was showing me. Sorry, man. It was too loud.”

  He stops across from me, eyebrows pinched together. “A … video?”

  “Yeah. Sounded real, right?”

  The frown deepens, wavers, then clears, a cloud blowing away. “What the hell were you doing in her room, dude? She’s calling you into her room to show you videos?”

  I pull him into my room. “I know, right? How’d you do with the game?”

  I play—we play, for another hour or so—but my heart isn’t in it anymore.

  We do three more tunnels that night after he leaves, before Myka comes home. My heart isn’t in those either—I don’t know who I’m helping, hurting. Whose lives I’m affecting. But I do them anyway. I never know when I may be able to prevent something like that from happening again.

  Then Myk comes home, all bubbly from her afternoon, and dares me into a cutthroat game of Monopoly. Which she wins.

  I totally forget to call Rachel.

  16

  “Tension” by the Blue Man Group

  On Monday, I go early and wait for Rachel before her homeroom class. A little stalkery, maybe—but I need to clear this up with her. When I finally (finally) have a chance with an actual cool girl, I can’t let her think I’m a jerk just because DARPA wouldn’t let me leave.

  For any longer than she already has, anyway.

  She comes five minutes before the bell, charging through the crowded hall like a bull, head down. She doesn’t see me until she’s right there in front of the door, and I see her double take. First pleased, then … remembering … mad. Her cheeks go all red, instant.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, holding my hands up in innocence. “I had to take my little sister to the emergency room Saturday night. And they made me turn off my cell—I’m so sorry.”

  She looks at me steadily, tilts her head. “Is that bullshit? Or true?”

  For a second I’m sure she can tell I’m lying. Like of everyone, even Myka, she’s the only one who sees it. I wish so hard I could tell her the truth. It would be such a relief.

  “True,” I say, I hope convincingly.

  She’s still studying me. I don’t add any detail, because I read somewhere that’s how people can tell you’re lying, if you talk too much.

  She runs a hand over her ponytail, flicks it. “And yesterday? Chris said you were going to call me?”

  Ugh. “Yesterday was just a mess,” I say honestly. “All this stuff came up, and I couldn’t. I promise I won’t bail on you again.”

  I realize, too late, that was a dumb thing to say. How can I promise that?

  But she relaxes, and rewards me with one of those bright smiles. “Okay. It’s just … with my dad leaving and all, I’m … careful. You know? Cautious.”

  The bell rings, and she points into the classroom. “Gotta go. See you later?”

  I think of reaching out, touching her hand, her cheek, something—God, I want to—but I nod, and let her go.

  Then I sprint to the other end of the hall, where my homeroom is.

  The rest of the day is surreal. I listen to all the talk about the usual school stuff: classes, homework, tennis politics, Oklahoma politics, who’s doing who and who’s not. But after the incident with Dedushka, the doctor, the tunnel to the soldier yesterday … I feel like a water strider, my feet spread on the surface of the chatter. None of it touches me like it should. I can’t tell any of my friends a thing of what I’m thinking about, what I’m involved in.

  I guess it’s all part of Operation Massive Lies, and there’ll be plenty more lies and secrets where that came from. I’d better get used to it. But every time I lie to someone—Chris, Myka, Rachel, Mom—I feel a little more uncomfortable around them. I have to be more aware of what I say. I wonder if it will ever settle down and get less complicated, or if it’ll just keep piling up, lie after lie after lie, until I don’t know what I’m saying anymore.

  It’s almost a reprieve to head out to the cemetery with Eric. It’s simple. He knows who I am, what I do. And we have work that means something.

  We settle into the mausoleum, sitting on our packs so the stone floor doesn’t freeze our asses off. It’s cold—thirty degrees—and clear, the sun low on the horizon. Winter in Virginia. At least we’re not sitting in snow.

  He hands me the first object without comment. It’s a green plastic keychain with a picture of a beaker and three test tubes on it. I go, without comment. Simple.

  It’s a woman, young, black hair cut close to her head. She’s wearing a brown, bulky sweater and dark pants, but no coat—she shivers against the cold. Location: Indiana. Indianapolis. The campus of Indiana University—Purdue. She walks down a wide path lined with trees. The air is brisk, icy. A pair of students pass by her the other way—she watches them. They might be looking at her. She passes a School of Nursing sign, keeps going straight, and walks over a star set in the concrete, into the Department of Pathology. She’s jumpy. She doesn’t know if this will work, if it’s a good idea. Maybe she shouldn’t have l
istened.

  I open my eyes. “What was that? A college student going to class?”

  He lifts his shoulders slightly, lets them drop. “I can guarantee she’s not just a college student, if we’re asking you to find her. I can also bet that whatever she’s nervous about isn’t a good idea.”

  He finishes making notes and pushes some buttons on the camera while I put the keychain back in its bag.

  “I hear you pulled some bugs from your room and gave them to Ana.”

  “You guys talk about everything?” I say.

  “Yes.” He gives me a look, punches more buttons. “We talk about everything. Why did you do that?”

  “C’mon, Eric. I’m working with you, great. It’s working out fine. I don’t need to be spied on constantly. Ever heard of invasion of privacy?”

  “Ed, not Eric. And it’s for your protection. You know that.”

  Enough. I stand up. “That’s bullshit. You have them too, don’t you? Set up around school or something?” I point to the ceiling, the stone walls. “Here? Do you have a Jake-cam on your head?”

  He laughs. “Wouldn’t tell you if I did, mate. You’d just take them down and I’d have to put them up again.”

  “Put them—? Why would you put them up again? Christ.” I shake my head. “At least you’re honest.”

  He flicks the camera closed with his thumb. “You think so?”

  “What does that mean?”

  His jaw clenches twice. “Just don’t get too comfortable around any of us, Jake. Around anyone. Okay? It’s a complicated situation.”

  That’s the second time he’s said that. I frown. He closes his hands around the camera, snaps a look up at me, then away. Is he telling me he’s lying? That there’s something I don’t know?

  “Here’s your next one.”

  He slides across a box about the size of a baseball, instead of a Ziploc bag. I open the lid, see a small teacup resting inside. Fine white china, thinner than my fingernail, with a painted blue pattern of ladies dancing. I lift it into my hands, focus.

  Cold. Dark. Emptiness. Sucking darkness. It reaches for me, dragging me in …

  I drop the cup. It shatters on the stone floor into tiny slivers of white all around my feet.

  “They’re dead.” I clench my hands into fists. “Why do you do that?”

  “Because we need to know if they’re dead,” he says mildly. He writes a single line, then comes over to pick up the china. He piles bits in the box while I swallow, over and over, trying to keep my stomach down.

  He gives me a glance. “I think that’s good for today. You can go outside if you want. I’ll be out in a couple minutes.”

  I don’t need to be asked twice.

  The freezing air helps settle my stomach, calm me. It’s just an object, I tell myself. Just another dead object. You’re in a cemetery, for Christ’s sake. You’re surrounded by reminders of dead people. The darkness isn’t going to reach out and get you.

  I walk down the aisle, touching my fingers to the granite markers, people I know from my research. The Cliffords, a family of five who came here from England. The father died in World War I, and the rest struggled on until they were all here, together. The Beckers, a father and forty-five-year-old daughter. The Millers, who lost too many children young. I rest my hand on the foot of the Miller angel—tall, steady, watching over them all.

  And I see him.

  The man from that first week. He creeps through the gate of the graveyard, hand in the pocket of his black coat. Looking for me.

  I freeze, deer in the headlights, staring.

  But I can’t freeze. I have to move. I bolt back up the path to the mausoleum, the cold air stabbing at my lungs.

  “Eric!” I gasp, as soon as I see the gate. “Help!”

  He’s outside instantly, hand at his back. “What is it? Where?”

  I lean over my knees, panting. “The man. Who was following me before. Here. At the entrance.”

  He nods once. Draws his gun. “Get in the crypt, out of sight. Stay there until I come back for you. Don’t come out, no matter what you hear.”

  He moves in that sideways-crab walk, gun sweeping back and forth, that people do on TV.

  Part of me wants to stay and watch. But this is not TV. I do what I’m told, shut myself in the mausoleum, and sit down to wait.

  My hands clasp together with nothing to do. I wish I was the one out there facing the danger, like in Call of Duty. But much as I hate to admit it, probably not a good idea with real guns, a real bad guy.

  He’s back in about ten minutes. “No one there.”

  “He was. I didn’t imagine it, I swear.”

  “Oh, I believe you. I’ll check surveillance too, and we’ll get an ID from that.” He tucks his gun away, half-smiles. “Since I still have cameras up.”

  All right. I suppose the surveillance could actually be useful.

  “Now. Let’s get you back to school—you’ll be fine in the cafeteria with all those kids—and then I’ve got some phone calls to make.”

  To Liesel. She isn’t going to like this at all. And if she decides it’s too much of a threat, and I’m not safe out here … she could pull the plug.

  Jesus.

  Eric sets a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry. We’re not going to give up that easily. Yes, they were supposed to be long gone. We fed them misinformation, that your tests were useless, and supposedly they lost interest. I don’t know why he’s here now. But we’ll find out what we’re dealing with, and we’ll handle it.”

  God, I hope so. Just seeing that man’s face—I haven’t felt like that much of a bull’s-eye since that first day. We walk down the path and out the gate, down the street. Eric stays a step ahead of me, keeping an eye in all directions. I look over my shoulder, just in case he’s behind us, following. Watching. No one there.

  But he was. And it’s worse when I know why.

  17

  “Is it Over?” by Thievery Corporation

  I lunge for the ball, but it bounces past the end of my racket and slams into the wall behind me.

  “Lukin!” Coach Brammer bellows. “Get your head in the game.”

  “Yes, Coach,” I mumble. I pull another ball out of my pocket, serve it to Diego, and rock back and forth on my toes.

  Be ready. Be focused.

  Tryouts are sucking.

  It probably would help if I’d slept last night, instead of staring at the ceiling imagining (a) strange people abducting me or (b) Liesel’s people taking me in for my safety. About 3:00 a.m. I thought I heard someone outside my window. I jumped up, grabbed one of my rackets as a weapon, and stood there for twenty minutes, listening. My heart beating like a fucking rabbit’s. There was no sleep after that.

  Diego’s slice is easy, and I hit it back, aiming for the left corner. “Out!” Diego yells. Coach shakes his head and moves on to the next court. Damn it.

  Diego’s serve. We move to our places. I watch the ball fly toward me in a perfect curve. I return it neatly, making him run the other way. My body knows how to do this, where the ball will land, where I need to be. If I can just shut off my brain.

  “Well done, Ed,” Coach says, two courts down. “Impressive.”

  I sneak a look: Eric is flying all over the court like a streak, hitting balls back with ease. I hate him. How can he do that, with everything else going on?

  I miss another shot, and growl to myself.

  This is your real life, Jake. Focus.

  But is it? I’m not sure anymore.

  * * *

  When I get home Myk is setting the table, and Mom and Ana are talking in the kitchen. They sound like friends, laughing. The whole place smells like beef stew. It’s one of my favorites.

  I wonder if I can just skip it and go straight to bed, catch up on that sleep.

  Probably not. At the very least, I have to find out if there’s word from Liesel, any news, decisions. I drop my keys in the bowl.

  “Hey,” Mom says, poking her hea
d out of the kitchen. “How’d tryouts go?”

  I grunt. “I still have two days to do better.”

  “Oh.” She frowns. “You okay? You look … tired.”

  Ana appears behind Mom, antennae up. Mom and handler once-overs. I don’t know which is worse.

  I shrug at both of them. “Couldn’t sleep last night.”

  Mom gets the little line in her forehead. “Go wash your hands, please. Dinner in five.”

  Dinner. I can eat, after all. I stuff myself with stew and homemade bread, and stay quiet. Surprisingly, Ana starts in with the talking.

  “Tell me,” she says, her accent thicker than usual. “Where does the name Lukin come from?”

  I stop chewing. She knows perfectly well where Lukin comes from. She probably knows more about Dedushka than Mom does, after this past weekend.

  “Oh,” Mom says. “It’s Russian. My husband’s father and mother came here from the Soviet Union, before he was born.”

  “From Moscow,” Myk chips in shyly. “I’d like to go there sometime.”

  I imagine trying to protect Myk in Moscow.

  “Really,” Ana says. “Russian. So exotic! I thought it was hard to leave Russia then. Did they … what is the word. Defect?”

  What is the word? What is she doing?

  “You know, I’m not sure,” Mom says. “We never talked about it. Grigory’s a bit of an odd one, and Milena died before I met John.”

  There’s a silence. Everybody digs in again, and I unwind a little. I guess she’s pumping for more info about Dedushka. Can’t blame her too much. But it’s okay. Mom hasn’t said anything they don’t know. She probably doesn’t know anything they don’t know.

  “John,” Ana says. “I’m sorry, but that was your husband?”

  Mom swallows, then nods. “Yes. He died two years ago. But it’s okay to talk about him.” She glances at Myk and me tentatively, like she’s telling us instead of Ana. “It’s been a long time.”

  I pick up my spoon and keep my eyes down, focused on the stew.

  “That is good, yes. It helps to talk of the person, sometimes.” Ana pauses. “How did he die?”