Caught Between

Written for NYC Midnight’s #ShortStoryChallenge2020, January 2020

by Darcie T. Kelly

I hate this city. The air drips with childhood memories, blood, and bruises. I have no idea how they found me or why I let them drag me back. When the lawyer called last month, using a name I’d discarded nearly two decades ago, I panicked, hung up, effectively confirming my identity.

“Do you want a window or an aisle seat?” I holler over my shoulder.

“It doesn’t matter because I’m not going!” Channel’s abusive tone has lost its bite. It’s actually a welcome reprieve from the silent treatment. She fought me at every turn this past month – when I could find her. It’s amazing I was able to drag the kid to her mother’s funeral, the only day she didn’t dress in black from head to toe. Ripped jeans and a ‘porno’-graphic-t. At least she was there.

I hear the front door slam and grind my teeth. She spends most of her time roaming the streets doing god-knows-what. She always comes back to eat and doesn’t appear worse for the wear, so I stopped asking. She never answered anyway. Caught between what was and what will be. The mantra is supposed to give me patience. It doesn’t. I select three seats. We’ll take the whole row. The middle seat can act as buffer. The computer requests the name of the third traveller. I type ‘TEEN ANGST’ and pull the credit card from my bra to complete the purchase.

Yesterday, I found Channel thumbing through my wallet. She’d pocketed the measly thirty dollars cash and was discarding my OHIP and Smart Serve cards. “Give me my credit card,” she threatened.

“Why do you need a credit card?” I was dismissive, grabbing my purse. I didn’t even know what a credit card was, when I was thirteen.

“It’s my money!” She stormed out and I soon heard the familiar slam of the front door. Maybe I should choose seats on opposite sides of the plane.

I click COMPLETE PURCHASE, my mind already ticking down my to-do list. What to pack. What to store. How to secure this mansion until I can come back and deal with it properly.

My musings are interrupted when the computer bings, flashes red text. INVALID CC. I glance at the card. It came with a thick file of financial papers and access codes, given to me by the lawyer (what was his name?) ‘for unrestricted use to raise Channel Umbra until Joe Umbra is exonerated or she comes of age.’ No way Joe gets out this time. I smile, then remember: Five years. I close my eyes. Caught between what was and what will be. I can’t process it yet. Can’t think about being Channel’s legal guardian for five years. First, I need to get home. First, I need to buy these plane tickets.

I hunt-and-peck the digits, triple-check against the card, and click COMPLETE PURCHASE. The bing is instantaneous. DECLINED. The phone rings.

“Hello, Ms Umbra.” The voice is polite, clipped. The fucking lawyer.

“My name is Raine.” I’ve already told him at least twenty times.

“Ms Umbra,” (Fuck you too, I think.) “it’s come to our attention that there was an attempted hack on your brother’s accounts.”

My brow furrows. “What does that mean?”

“Someone tried to illegally access the accounts,” he patronizes. “All funds have been frozen.”

“For how long?” I don’t want Joe’s bloody money but without it I can’t get home, and if I don’t get back to work, I can’t pay my rent. I’ll be homeless. WE will be homeless. I have barely thought where Channel will fit in my bachelor apartment, but I never thought of us huddled together on the unforgiving Toronto streets.

“Undetermined, ma’am.” The line goes dead.

I stare at the receiver for a minute before returning it to the cradle. An antique, gilded device. Looks like it cost enough to feed me for a year. I glance around the study. Take in the extravagance. The unbridled consumption. Joe always did put on a good show. Always wanted people to admire him. The golden man with the golden phone. I chuckle darkly under my breath. He hid the truth in shadows. Bruises where my teachers wouldn’t see. I wonder how many bruises his wife’s closed casket concealed. For the first time, I wonder what bruises are fading on Channel’s body. That could explain her shitty attitude. The thought gives me pause. Oh my god.

I consider what her life must have been like. What this month must have been like. An abused girl. Whose mother just died. Whose father rots in jail, awaiting trial for beating that mother to death. Whose aunt (whom she had never met) swoops into town with plans to take her away. Away from her home. Her school. Her friends. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

I rush to the door, throw it open. Channel, of course, is long gone. Where would she go? Who is she with? I don’t know how I’ll set things right, how to apologize for my thoughtlessness, for Joe’s – existence, but I know I need to find her. Bring her home. Protect her. Get her away from this place, these memories. Let her start fresh. Like I did.

I return to Joe’s desk, search his drawers for a list of numbers. A rolodex. Anything that might have Channel’s cell number, a friend’s name, a hint. Instead, I find a family photo, the glass frame shattered. Shards missing.

I may have planned her funeral, but I hadn’t met Ardor, Joe’s wife. I escaped years before they met, running from a brother who owned the city but would no longer own me. I pick up the photo. Look closely at the glimmering adoration in Ardor’s eyes, her regal profile as she gazes at Joe. This is what Channel’s eyes would look like without the thick eyeliner and angry armor. Almond shaped, hazel, glowing with life, joy, love. In the photo, Channel’s discomfort can easily be mistaken for pre-teen petulance, but I see a shadowy truth in the way she tugs a sleeve lower over her wrist and twists slightly to distance herself from her father. I recognize that body language. It used to be mine. I look at Joe, an arm around each of ‘his girls’. Pride of ownership written across his face as he sneers directly into the camera. A shiver runs through me as I look at the family portrait. Joe’s golden family.

A folded paper in the drawer catches my attention, cream and textured with my former name scrawled in my brother’s rushed hand: Misty Umbra. I consider tearing it to shreds, burning it, calling Detective Lait who gave me my mantra (she’s also building the case against Joe), or walking away from this whole damned situation and never turning back. Then I think about Channel. I haven’t done right by her. I’m responsible for her, even if I didn’t want it, and this letter, from my brother to his sister, might hold a clue. Probably not, my inner voice cringes. But maybe, I retort. Setting my personal baggage aside, I unfold the page.

I’m a bastard, not a murderer.
Don’t trust Channel.

A growl builds in my chest. The sound of an animal, once wounded, now free, who will not be caught again. That manipulative, gaslighting bastard. I crush the page in a furious fist. Hurl it across the room. Drop heavily into the chair. Hands splayed on the desktop.

With a rumble, I answer a phone I don’t remember ringing. “What?”

“We have Channel.” The voice is distorted. I hear Channel’s familiar cursing in the background. “Bring five-million in unmarked cash to the docks in an hour if you want to see her again. No cops.” The line goes dead.

Fierce mama-bear instincts replace all thoughts of work and plane tickets. They have Channel. Who the fuck are ‘they’? And where the hell am I going to find five-million dollars with frozen accounts? There is no question that I’ll pay. Joe gave me access to his fortune ‘for unrestricted use to raise Channel Umbra … until she comes of age,’ and without using it now, there’s a good chance she won’t come of age.

I retrieve the lawyer’s crumpled business card from my jeans pocket. A black square of cardstock with white block numbers – no name. My shallow breath echoes through the phone as it rings and rings. Fuck you. Fuck you. And rings. Fuck you! When the lawyer finally answers (I still didn’t catch his name) I blurt, “I need five-million dollars!”

The line goes dead, again, and I wonder for the first time if there’s something wrong with the gilded phone. Or if someone tapped the line. Are ‘they’ monitoring my calls? Cutting me off? Isolating me?

I drop the phone, tug a sleeve lower over my wrist, heart pounding. “There’s no time for an anxiety attack.” I chide myself aloud, glancing at my watch, realizing I should have done that the moment ‘they’ set the time limit. Assuming I’ve wasted fifteen minutes with anxiety and the lawyer, (stop pretending he’s a lawyer, Raine,) I have forty-five minutes left.

My mind is racing. Stretching each minute. Making plans. I retrieve the handset from the floor, tap the cradle to get a dial-tone, and order a cab. It will take between eighteen and twenty-one minutes to drive to the pier, twenty-three with a buffer, so I have twenty-two minutes – twenty-one minutes now – to find five-million dollars. Or the equivalent.

With forced calm, I fetch my half-packed duffel from the spare room, dump the contents on the bed, and invade the master suite. I rifle through Ardor’s vanity, hunting for jewelry, surprised how little I find. I check Joe’s dresser, grab cufflinks, tiepins. I need more. Seventeen minutes.

I move from room to room filling the duffel. A fur coat. Diamond studs. Jewel encrusted trinkets. The silver cutlery set. Anything I can carry. Tick, tick, Raine. In the study I rip the gold-plated phone from the jack, add it and the laptop to the duffel. It’s not nearly enough! I check my watch. Two minutes. Don’t panic! At the front door I grab house keys from the side-table; they can take the whole house, contents and all. Damned traceable, but if needed ...

Where’s the fucking cab? I take another look around the foyer. Notice a drawer in the side-table, open it. Black metal glints at me. I’ve never seen a real gun before. As I start to close the drawer two words come to my mind, unbidden. If needed. Trying not to think, I grab the gun and shove it in my coat pocket as the cabbie honks.

The drive passes in a blur, my knuckles white on the awkward duffel. It pinches, sitting uncomfortably on my lap. I tug a sleeve, barely aware of the roads and alleys flipping past my window. Is this shock? This feeling of giving in? Of slipping away?

The cab stops abruptly, jolting me back to my body. “That’s forty-two, eighty, ma’am.”

Shit. Channel stole my cash yesterday and I maxed out my personal credit card on the flight from Toronto. I unzip the duffel and paw through the treasure, the gaudy carcass of a sinner’s masquerade.

“Sorry,” I apologize, passing the cabbie a ruby-studded tiepin. “It’s worth at least a hundred dollars.” As I climb out of the cab, he starts to object. Glancing at my watch, one minute, I interrupt. “You should leave.” The cabbie must see something in my eyes because he peels off, back to the safety of the city. I spare a moment, wistfully escaping with him, before turning. Now I understand why he fled.

I’ve never seen a gun from this angle before. People talk of ‘staring down the barrel of a gun’, but they never mention how the gun stares back. Or how it’s impossible to look away.

“Show me the cash!” The shout snaps my attention free. It’s Channel. Restrained. A human shield. “I said, show me the cash!”

I force my eyes to the shouting woman. Channel’s captor is somehow familiar. “Y-yes,” I stammer, crouch down with the duffel. Metal clinks on metal as the contents shift.

“Stop!” the woman yells. I lift my hands, cowering. “What’s in there? Where’s the money?”

“I couldn’t get money,” I sob. “Take this. You can have it all. You can have the house. Just let Channel go.”

She punctuates her words with the gun, shaking it at me. Please don’t let her finger slip.

“You have unrestricted access to the accounts. Get the money!”

How does she know that? Channel must have told her. Did she hurt you? I flick my eyes to Channel, searching for evidence. No bruises. Just a familiar eye roll.

Channel isn’t restrained anymore. The woman holds the gun with both hands. What the hell is going on?

“I can’t. The funds are frozen. Something about a hack …” I trail off as the familiar woman turns from me to Channel, revealing her regal profile. It’s Ardor. Alive.

“You?!” she shouts at Channel. “Your fucking hack?! You screwed us out of our money?!” She turns the gun on her daughter.

My mind is racing again. Stretching minutes. Fitting the pieces together.

“I didn’t mean to, Mom.” She looks down the barrel of Ardor’s gun, faces the fury of a madwoman, her own mother. Her eyes grow wide, she blanches, her voice quivers.

My inner mama-bear resurfaces.

I roll up my sleeve, reach into my pocket, wrap my hand around cold metal, and train the gun on Ardor. With strong, steady words, I claim my power.

“Let. Channel. Go.”

Tears glint on Channel’s cheeks. Ardor’s eyes go cold, dead. Her lip curls and she snarls. I squeeze the trigger. Feel the gun click. Hear an explosion. Watch Ardor take a bullet, her weapon thrown aside by the impact. She falls to her knees. I drop my gun. Run to Channel. Cling to her. Turn her away from her shattered mother. I watch Ardor clutch her shoulder as a bloom of red stains her sleeve.

“What have I done? What have I done?” I’m not sure if the words are mine or Channel’s. “What have I done?” I stroke her hair, blinking fast to clear my eyes.

The snap of metal draws my attention. Why is Detective Lait here? quickly becomes, Thank god Detective Lait is here! She holds two guns, points one at Ardor, then me. At me? I place my body between Channel and this new threat. Detective Lait flips the other gun open – the one I thought I fired – exposing an empty chamber. She nods to me, concentrating her loaded gun on Ardor.

I fold Channel in protective arms, whisper hollow comfort in her ear, a mantra. Between shuddering sobs, I hear the crackle of a radio. “This is Detective Lait. I need an ambulance at the docks…”