Itscomplicated, she mumbled, her face stiff with pain.
I dont see whats so complicated about it. You either do, or you dont.
Shed turned away, then. But she remembered Matts facetight-lipped, stubborn as only he could be. And his handstheir movements jerky and hurried as he packed his climbing gear.
Cory heard the ruckus before he saw it, as soon as he entered the foyer of the rec center. He was able to follow the sounds of mayhem to their source, the indoor basketball arena, where, from an open doorway, the noise pulsed and billowed like a heavy curtain in a high wind. He braced himself and paused there to assess the likelihood that carnage either had already ensued within or was about to. Hed been in battle zones, live ammo firefights less noisy and less violent.
What he saw inside that huge room confirmed it: people here were trying to kill each other.
What it reminded him of was an epic movie battle scene set in medieval times. War cries and shrieks of pain and rage echoing above the thunder of horses hooves and the clash of steel swords on armor plating and chain mail. Except these battle chargers were made of titanium, not flesh and bone, and carried their riders on wheels instead of hooves.
Out on the gleaming honey-gold hardwood floor, four wheelchairs were engaged in a no-holds-barred duel for possession of what appeared to be a regulation-size volleyball. Now the ball rose above the fray in a tall arc, to be plucked from the air by a long brown arm and tucked between drawn-up knees and leaning chest. The four chairs swiveled, drew apart amid cries of Here here here! and Get im, get the- and No you aint, mother- then smashed together again more violently than before.
Corys fascination carried him into the room, where he found a spot in the shadow of a bank of bleacher seats from which to watch the mayhem. Now that he could see it more clearly, the contest on the court seemed less like a battle between medieval knights and more like a grudge match being settled via amusement park bumper cars-though the canted wheels on the low-slung chairs did resemble warriors shields, even down to the dents and dings. The occupants of the wheelchairs-four young males of assorted ethnicities-all wore expressions of murderous intent, but the chairs moved clumsily, slowly, and their clashes produced more noise than effect.
Again the white ball arced into the air, to be retrieved by a lanky black kid wearing a Dodgers baseball cap-backward, of course. After tucking the ball into his lap, the kid hunched protectively over it and slapped at the wheels of his chair with hands wearing gloves with the fingers cut off, pumping as hard as he could for the far end of the court. The other three chairs massed in frantic pursuit. One, manned by a stocky boy of an indeterminate racial mix, seemed to be angling to cut off the possessor of the ball, before it was smashed viciously from the side by another pursuer. Over they went, toppling forward almost in slow motion, chair and occupant together, spilling the latter facedown onto the court. Above him, the chairs wheels spun ineffectively, like the futilely waving appendages of a half-squashed beetle.
Cory lunged forward and was about to dash onto the court to render assistance when his arm was caught and held in a grip of incredible strength.
Leave him be. They got him down there, theyll get him up.
The reflexive jerk of his head toward the speaker was off target by a couple of feet. Adjusting his gaze downward, he felt a jolt of recognition that made his breath catch, though the face was one hed seen only as a very small childs. It only reminded him of one hed last seen nearly thirty years before, and since then only in his dreams.
You have our mothers eyes.
He didnt say that aloud but smiled wryly at the broad-shouldered young man beside him and nodded toward the knot of wheelchairs now gathering around the fallen one out on the court. You sure they wont just kill him? They sure seemed to be trying to a minute ago.
Nah-hes safe. Hes not who theyre mad at. The young man reached across his body and the wire-rimmed wheel of his chair to offer his cropped-gloved hand. Hi, Im Matt.
Cory put his hand in the warm, hard grip and felt emotions expand and shiver inside his chest. He fought to keep them out of his voice as he replied, Im Cory. We spoke on the phone. Im your- He had to grab for a breath anyway.
So Matt finished it for him. My Guardian Angel. My bro. Yeah, I know.
Chapter 2
Hed seen him come in, of course he had.
Hed thought he was prepared for this. Should have been. Hell, hed talked to the guy on the phone two or three times since the day Wade had called him from the hospital to tell him the Angel hed always thought was a figment of his childhood imagination was real.
You look like Wade, he said, feeling like he needed to unclog his throat. A little bit-around the eyes.
Well, we both got the blue ones, I guess.
This brothers eyes were darker than Wades, Matt noticed. And looked like theyd seen a whole lot more of what was bad in the world. Which was saying something, considering Wade was a homicide cop.
This brothers eyes were darker than Wades, Matt noticed. And looked like theyd seen a whole lot more of what was bad in the world. Which was saying something, considering Wade was a homicide cop.
Yeah? Whose did I get?
Moms. You got Moms eyes.
About then, Matt realized he was still holding his brothers hand, and evidently it occurred to Cory about the same time. There was a mutual rush of breath, and he got his arms up about the same time Corys arms came around him.
Matt had gotten over being shy about showing emotions five years ago, so he shouldnt be ashamed to be tearing up now. And he wasnt.
He could hear some hoots and whistles coming from the court, though, so after some throat-clearings and coughs and a backslap or two, he and Cory let go of each other. Dee-Jon, Frankie and Ray had gotten Vincent picked up off the floor, and all four were churning across the floor toward them, along with Dog and Wayans in their regular chairs, moving in from the far sidelines.
Woo hoo, look at Teach, I think he got him a girlfriend!
Hey, Teach, I didnt know you was-
Yo, Teach, who the ugly bi-
At which point Matt held up his hand and put on his fierce-coach look and hollered, Whoa, guys-I wont have any of that trash talk about my brother.
By this time he and Cory were surrounded, and the exclamations came at him from all sides.
Brother!
He yo brothah?
Hey, you told us your bro was a cop. He dont look like no cop.
Yeah, he look like a wuss.
Matt glanced up at Cory to see how he was taking this, but Cory was grinning, so he did, too. Nah, this is my other brother. Hes a reporter.
You got a othah brothah? How come you never-
Reporter-like on CNN?
How come I never seen you on TV?
Yeah, Dee-Jon, like you watch the news.
Cory waited for the chorus to die down, then said, Im the other kind of reporter. A journalist-you know, a writer.
The kids didnt have too much to say about that. The chairs rocked and swiveled a little bit, and some heads nodded. Shoulders shrugged.
Huh. A writer
A writer-okay, thats cool.
Hes been in more war zones than you guys have, Matt said, which got the kids going again.
Dee-Jon shot his chin up. Yeah? You ever been shot?
I have, actually, Cory said.
Obviously thrown a little bit by that, Dee-Jon hesitated, then said, Yeah, well, I have, too. Thats what put me in this chair. I was just walkin down the street, doin ma thing, not botherin nobody, know what Im sayin? And this car comes cruisin, and this dude starts in shootin-like, eh-eh-eh-eh-an next thing I know Im down on the sidewalk lookin up at the sky, and I dont feel nothin. Still dont. But, hey, I can still satisfy my woman, dont think I cant.
That brought a whole barrage of hoots and comments, most of them in the kind of language Matt had pretty much gotten used to and given up trying to ban entirely. He wasnt sure about how his big brother was taking it, though.
But Cory hadnt batted an eye, just started asking questions, asking the kids how theyd gotten hurt, what had happened to them that put them in the chairs. In about ten seconds he had them all pulled in close around him, and was listening while each one told his story, sometimes yelling over the other eager voices, sometimes almost whispering in a respectful silence.
Ray, describing how his dad liked to beat up on him and throw him up against a wall when he was crazy drunk, and one day missed the wall and threw him through a third-floor apartment window instead.
And Dog, admitting how hed been living up to his nickname hotdogging it on his dirt bike out on the Mojave Desert, showing off for his friends the day hed flipped over and broken his neck. I was stupid, Dog said with a shrug. Now I gots to pay.
Wayans wasnt stupid, just unlucky, having been born with spina bifida. And Vincent hadnt had much to do with the automobile accident that had injured him, either, just happened to be in the wrong intersection at the exact time when a corporate lawyer on his way home from entertaining a client at a Beverly Hills nightclub failed to notice the light was red.
Frankie tried to get away with his favorite story about getting attacked by a shark, but the others shouted him down, so he had to admit hed gotten his injury skateboarding illegally in the Los Angeles Rivers concrete bed.
Matt hung back and watched his brother, the way the kids responded to him, the way he listened, not with sugary sympathy, but with his complete attention, interest that was focused and genuine, and that made people want to open up and spill things they wouldnt normally think about telling a stranger. He could see what had made his brother a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, although the whole war-correspondent thing was still hard for him to grasp. Hed been prepared to like this newfound long-lost brother-particularly since hed had those dreamlike memories of him protecting him from the bad scary stuff of his nightmares. What he hadnt expected to feel was respect. Maybe even awe.
Hey, guys, he said, breaking into the chorus of questions now being fired at Cory from all sides, you want to know about my brother, go home and do an Internet search on Cory Pearson. Thats P-E-A-R-S-O-N for you semiliterates. Now get out of here so he and I can spend some time together. Weve got a lot to catch up on. Go on, hit the showers.