Too Close to Home

“No, no, really,” she said. “It’s probably something I ate.”

“For God’s sake,” Albert said, “we’ve planned this thing for weeks. We cancel now, we’re not going to get our deposit back on this place, you know that, don’t you?”

Donna Langley turned her back to him, saying, “Yeah, well, thanks for your concern.”

Albert Langley shook his head in disgust and left the kitchen.

“Listen,” Derek whispered to Adam, “I gotta take off, you know?” He suddenly realized this was going to take a bit of choreography. He needed Adam to go off with his father, head out the front of the house, so he could pretend to slip out the back.

Part of him felt like a real shit, not telling his own best friend what he was up to, but it wasn’t like it would be the first time he’d kept something from him. And it wasn’t like anyone was going to get hurt or anything was going to be damaged. No one would even have to know. Not counting Penny, of course. Sure, the Langleys would wonder, when they got back, whether one of them forgot to lock one of the doors, to set the alarm system, but when they looked around and found nothing taken, they’d eventually forget about it. Next time they went away, they’d double-check things, that’s all.

“I wish you could come with us,” Adam said. “I’m gonna die without someone to hang with.”

“I can’t,” Derek said. “My parents would freak if I ditched my summer job even for a week.” The thing was, even if he hadn’t already figured out how to make the Langleys’ time away the best week of his life, spending seven days with them, that just wouldn’t be cool.

They’d moved out of the kitchen, down the hall, around the midpoint of the house. All Derek had to do was keep heading to the back, go down half a flight of steps, and there was the door. Round the corner, take the other half flight, he’d be in the basement.

“I don’t know if there’ll be anybody there to hang out with,” Adam said, still moaning, Jesus.

“Don’t worry about it. It’s only a week. You know what? When you get back, we’ll read the rest of what’s on that computer.” He and Adam enjoyed collecting old, junked computers. Some of the stuff you found on them, man, you wouldn’t believe it. Everything from school projects to kiddie porn. Some people, the stuff that went on in their heads. Looking through discarded computers, it was better than searching through somebody’s medicine cabinet.

Adam looked down at the floor. “Yeah, well, there’s a bit of a shitstorm about that.”

That caught Derek by surprise. “What?”

“With my dad. He kind of found out what was on it. The thing we were reading.”

“So what’s it to him? He thinks you don’t know about porn? And it’s not like it’s pictures. It’s just written stuff. It’s not even really porn. Not good porn, anyway.”

“Look, I can’t get into it now,” Adam said quietly. “I’ll tell you about it when I get back, or maybe I can give you a call about it during the week.”

“Don’t sweat it. If I want to read it, I’ve got the copy I made.”

“Shit, don’t let him find out about that,” Adam said. “He seemed really pissed. I don’t know why he got such a hair up his ass about it.”

“What, you think I’m gonna go up to your dad, say ‘Hey, Mr. Langley, I kept a copy’?”

“No, it’s just-”

“Adam!” It was Mr. Langley, sounding pissed, calling for him from the front step.

“Listen, man, I gotta go,” Adam said. “He’s already mad about my mom feeling sick.”

“Okay, yeah, sure, see ya in a week,” Derek said. Adam turned one way, Derek the other. Derek forced himself to call out, “Have a nice trip, Mrs. Langley!”

Everyone had to think he was leaving.

From the kitchen, a subdued “Bye, Derek.”

He bounded down the stairs for effect, opened the back door, and closed it hard, making the usual racket he always did when he left and cut across the yard and headed into the woods that ran along the edge of the lane.

But this time he didn’t leave the house. Once he’d closed the door with enough force for Mrs. Langley to hear in the kitchen, he was down into the basement in a second, heading to the far side and kneeling next to the couch in front of the sliding panel that led into the crawlspace.

Derek slid it to the left, crawled in on his hands and knees, the concrete floor hard and cold. He turned himself around, slid the door closed as quietly as possible, and held his breath for a moment as he became enveloped in darkness.

All he could hear was his heart pounding in his ears. Slowly, he exhaled, tried to compose himself. He knew there was a bulb on a pull chain in here somewhere, but he was afraid to turn it on. What if Mr. Langley happened to come downstairs for something at the last minute, saw light showing around the edges of the panel? He’d just have to sit in the dark here for as long as it took.

At least he could see what time it was. He reached into his pocket for his cell phone, made sure the ringer was off, and checked the time, the tiny screen the only source of light. Nearly eight o’clock. The Langleys had to be going soon.