Charlie Huston - Already Dead

– Whatever she was shot up with is still making her dopey. She needs her sleep.

– Yeah. Got it.

She takes her finger out of my face and I go through the curtain. The bed is a huge futon on the floor, piled with more pillows. There's a little floor space rimming the edge of the mattress, which is fine because all that's in there besides the bed is a hookah and several wicker baskets that look like they stand in for closets.

Amanda is sitting up against a mound of pillows, wearing a tattered and massive Tears for Fears T-shirt that is probably left over from Sela's more conventional youth. However long ago that might have been. She rubs her eyes.

– Hey.

I squat down next to the bed.

– Hey.

She looks around for a clock that isn't there.

– What time is it?

– After two.

– Hn.

My leg starts to throb where the bullet went in. I ease myself down and sit on the edge of the futon.

– You OK?

– Yeah. But I feel tired all the time.

– Sela taking care of you?

– Yeah, she's fierce. Says she's gonna show me a great workout so I can get arms like hers.

– Huh.

She scratches at her tangled hair.

– So what happened?

– What's the last thing you remember?

She leans deeper into the pillows and looks up at the ceiling, at the glow-in-the-dark stars stuck up there in a swirl.

– We were getting ready to leave the school.

– That's it?

The air conditioner in the window gurgles and hums.

– Yeah. I think so. But I had all these dreams and it's hard to. What happened"?

I open my mouth. The truth sits inside it. And stays there.

– Some guys jumped us.

She sits up again.

– No way.

– Yeah.

– Sweet. That's so cool. Who were they?

– Some guys your dad had hired. They were following me.

– No way.

– Yeah.

– So what happened?

– You got your head bonked, went out. Concussion.

She feels her head.

– There's no bump.

– Happens that way sometimes.

– So what'd you do? Wait. There was a total fight. I. One of my dreams was like about a fight.

– Yeah.

– You kick ass?

– Not really.

– Lame.

– But one of the guys had a gun.

– No. Way.

– And I got it from him.

– Dope. That is so dope.

– Had to carry you out over my shoulder.

She buried her face in her hands.

– Uhhh. Was I heavy? Did I feel totally fat?

I watch her. She looks out from behind her hands.

– Don't be lame, kid.

She smiles.

– So what then?

Once upon a time.

– Then I figured, fuck this shit. Your folks want to send out dueling bounty hunters for you that's their business. But it's not mine. So fuck 'em.

– You didn't call?

– Fuck them.

– They don't know I'm here?

– Like I said. Fuck them.

She thrusts her arms up in the air.

– Phatl

She drops her arms and pushes herself deep into the pillow.

– That is just so phat.

I look up at the stars, and back down at her.

– So what ya gonna do?

She shakes her head.

– I. Well, I'm so broke. So I'm going to the bank and get some money. Then I want to take Sela shopping to say, like thank you. Then, I don't know. She said I can hang for as long as I want. But. I think I'll go home in a couple days. Like check in and everything. Get my folks off my case. Once they chill I can bail again. But I'll get some real cash together first. And if Sela says it's chill, I'll come hang with her some more. For like the rest of the summer. That would be so cool. She's hot. I just want to like work out with her all summer and get cut and hard before school starts.

– Good plan.

I stand up. She wriggles out of the pillow.

– So, you gonna be around? You hang with Sela much?

– Not really.

– OK.

She drops back into the pillows.

– Cool. Whatever.

– Yeah.

– Hey. Can I have that?

I look. She's pointing at the cuff bracelet still clipped to my wrist. I pull out my wallet and get out a couple picks. Cuff locks are easy, it pops right open. I squat back down.

– Hold out your arm.

She puts it out. I hold the open cuff.

– You have to do something for me.

She nods.

– When you get home. Leave me out. Whatever goes down, don't tell your folks or whoever that I found you.

– OK.

– That's a promise I'm asking for.

– OK.

– Don't break it.

– As if.

– Right.

I snap the cuff onto her wrist. She looks at it.

– Hot.

I leave.

Sela holds the front door open for me.

– How much longer do I get to keep her?

I point at the TV.

– Put the news on tomorrow. She'll go home after she sees it.

– Why?

– Because her parents are gonna be dead.

– You have anything to do with that?

I think about killing Marilee, and missing out on killing Horde.

– Not the way I would have liked to.

Sela tosses her head, throwing roped dreads back over her shoulder.

– There gonna be trouble?

– Not for you, she loves you.

She taps one of those ruby-tipped fingers against my chest.

– What about for you?

I walk out the door.

– Sister, she doesn't even know my name.

I stop by Nino's on the way home and get a pie. Large pepperoni, hold the garlic. Then I hit the grocery for a six and a few packs of Luckys. At home I lock myself in and make sure the alarm is on. Not that any of it will keep out Predo's boys if he sends them. Not that anything could keep out Daniel's Wraith. Not that I care much right now. I go downstairs.

I sit up in bed and watch CNN. I eat the whole pie and still I'm hungry so I raid the fridge upstairs and find some leftover Chinese and eat that. That fills my belly. The other hunger, the real hunger, is still there. But it's always gonna be there, and it can wait for another day. I watch more news and drink more beer. When I run out of beer I sit in the dark staring at the TV screen, and smoke.

The story breaks around six A.M. They show some stills of the crumpled, fire-blackened Jaguar sedan. It looks as horrific as Predo promised. They wiped out the car in the early A.M.s, on a lonely stretch of road just off the 27.

The anchor fills me in on how the highway was empty at that time of night and no houses were near enough to hear the crash or see the flames. By the time emergency vehicles arrived the fire had all but burned itself out. Fortunately, the license plate broke off the vehicle in the crash and was spared from the fire. The anchor tells me the car was owned by Dr. Dale Edward Horde and that it is believed that he and his wife were in the car, driving on a late whim to their Hamptons house.

By the time I wake, the Hordes' deaths have been confirmed. So has the fact that their daughter is missing. There's some hyper-ventilation after that. Some circling of carrion feeders as they sniff a too-good-to-be-true story. Then a report comes in that Amanda walked into a police station and told them she had run away a week ago and had just seen the news on TV. By the time the cameras are there to watch her leaving the police station, she is flanked by a double column of bodyguards and lawyers and the TV is already calling her the richest teenager in New York. I turn off the box and smoke.

The package arrives that evening. It's delivered by a private courier who doesn't ask me to sign for it. I take the box down to the basement room and slide the Styrofoam case out of its cardboard sheath. Inside are several refreezable cold packs surrounding ten pints of blood. A note on top.