Prologue
Garin
Sixteen Years Ago
“Sorry I’m running late, guys.” I tossed my jacket on the bed before I sat on the floor between Kyle and Billy. “Show me what you all got tonight.”
“It wasn’t a good one for me,” Kyle said. She was still wearing her jacket, rubbing her arms like she couldn’t get warm.
I reached behind me, lifting my coat off the bed so that I could hand it to her. “Here, put this over you; it’ll keep you warm.”
She was always cold. I figured it had something to do with her being so skinny. And that was because her ma didn’t have the money for food. She sold her food stamps for cash.
Same as my ma.
Same as Billy’s.
Us kids who lived in The Heart—that was the name of our housing project—had to earn our own money and buy our own food. Four long streets with over two hundred apartments, and no one would even give up a box of mac and cheese. It may have been named after the muscle that kept us alive, but there wasn’t any life around here.
The Heart sucked the life right out of everyone.
“Thanks, Garin.” Kyle crossed her legs in front of her, tucking the jacket over her lap.
I smiled at her. “Tonight was real good for me,” I said, grabbing the cash and change from my pocket and dropping it all on the carpet. “Three hundred and forty-eight dollars.”
“Damn,” Billy said. “Look at all that drug money.” He pushed the coins together to make a pile. “Lots of panhandlers tonight, huh?”
Panhandlers used change to buy their dope. Most of the time, they’d hand me a full cup—the same one they’d collected it with. I’d keep the cups in the alley, stacked against the wall, and dump the change into my pockets when I left to re-up. Mario, my boss, owned a corner store. It was where he stashed all the dope. I’d go there and pay Mario back my advance, and then I’d refill my pockets with balloons and baggies.
Dope was way lighter than that heavy change. It didn’t make my jeans sag either.
“You should’ve seen all the junkies lined up tonight,” I said. “I thought for sure the cops were going to get called.”
“Any of the hookers try to give you head?”
I didn’t look at Kyle when I answered Billy’s question, “Not tonight.” I hated when he talked about that kind of shit in front of her. “I wouldn’t let those hookers touch me. Half of them don’t even have any teeth.”
“I hear that means they give better head, all gums and suction. Can you imagine?”
“Fuck no. I don’t want to imagine.”
I felt Kyle staring at me, but I kept looking at Billy. “How’d you do tonight?” I asked him.
“I couldn’t find nothing to pawn besides a CD player and some old drills. Cheap bastard at the pawnshop only gave me twelve bucks for it all ’cause the drills were so rusted. Fucking winter. People keep their shit locked up ’cause it’s so goddamn cold.”
“Twelve isn’t all that bad,” Kyle said.
Billy threw a wad of cash onto the floor, his grin telling me he wasn’t quite done. “Nah, but sixty-two is better. I got fifty bucks for the tires.”
“Tires?”
“You’re gonna lock your car up, so I can’t steal nothing. Then, I’m going to take your tires, so you can’t go nowhere.”
“Oh, man.” Kyle laughed.
I punched Billy’s shoulder. “That’s messed up. You know that, right? I’d beat your ass if you stole my tires.”
Billy would steal anything. It didn’t matter if it had sentimental value, if it was the cheapest thing you owned, or if it was the tires on your car. Family and friends were all he cared about. He had no fear.
None of us did in The Heart.
Except for Kyle.
“You mean, you’d beat my ass if I stole your ma’s tires since you ain’t even old enough to drive.”
“Neither are you,” I shot back. “Besides, Ma’s car got repo’d a long time ago, so she doesn’t have any tires you can steal.”
“You know I wouldn’t take nothing from either of you.” Billy looked at both of us. “But those fuckers I steal from, they can try to beat me all they want. They’ll never catch me. I’m too fast.”
“Garin!” Ma yelled from downstairs.
“What?” I shouted back.
“I’m going out. Make sure you get your ass to school in the morning. I’d better not get another call telling me you skipped again. You hear me?”
“Yeah, I hear you.”
I finally looked over at Kyle. She was smiling at me.
The last time I’d skipped school, we ditched together. We smoked a joint in my room and took a cab to Mario’s house, so we could go swimming in his indoor pool. That was after I’d taken her bathing suit shopping. The only suit she owned was a bikini with a giant hole in the bottom that showed her ass crack. She wasn’t comfortable wearing it, but God, I’d wanted her to, even if that meant holding my breath and going underwater and opening my eyes until they burned from the chlorine. I’d do that if it meant I could see more of her body. I didn’t tell Kyle that. Instead, I offered to buy her a new one. She couldn’t afford one, which meant she wouldn’t have gone swimming at all. And that meant she wouldn’t have gone to the beach that summer. I couldn’t let that happen. The beach was the best part about this hellhole town.
“How much did you make tonight?” I asked her.
Her hair had fallen into her face. As much as I wanted to tuck it behind her ear, I didn’t. Not now and especially not in front of Billy.
She held out her closed fist and slowly unfolded her fingers. There were a few crumpled up dollars in the middle of her palm. “It’s winter. There’s no beachgoers that I can sell bottles of water to and no tourists walking the boardwalk. And, when I try to panhandle outside the casinos, everyone has lost so much money in there, they won’t even give me their change. I’m not as good as you guys.”
“Then make ’em look at you, Kyle,” Billy said. “Stick out your tits, hike up your skirt, and make ’em want to open up their wallets.”
“Shut it, Billy!” The look I gave him told him I wasn’t messing around. Another word, and I’d rip his fucking face off. I didn’t care if he was my best friend. He would never give that kind of order to Kyle. “You want some dude to grab her off the street and rape her? Because that’s what’ll happen if she does that.”
“Damn, Garin, you’re right. I wasn’t even thinking. Course I don’t want nothing like that to happen to Kyle.”
Kyle dropped the cash onto her lap and buried her hands inside her jacket. “It’s okay. I know you didn’t mean it, Billy.”
“You’ve been trying real hard to earn money, and I know that,” Billy said to her.
She nodded. “I just don’t know what else to do until summer.” Her voice was so soft, and I knew she was trying not to cry. “Garin, you’re so good at dealing, and you make a ton doing it. And, Billy, you’re the best hustler in our whole school. You could steal a diamond ring off a woman’s finger, and she wouldn’t even know it. I can’t do that. I can’t do anything.”
“Bullshit,” Billy barked. “You’re smarter than me and Garin, and you got more talent than the both of us combined. Those things you make on the computer ain’t like nothing I’ve ever seen.”
“You mean my designs?”
“Yeah, those.”
“But they need so much detail, and I need so much more practice. The only time I get to work on them is during Mr. Gunther’s second period class…unless Mom plans on getting me a computer, but we all know that isn’t going to happen.”
“Well, whatever. They’re good,” he said. “Real fucking good.”
I waited until Billy was done redeeming himself. “He’s right,” I said. “You’re too good to be out there, hustling, and definitely too good to be dealing. You just figure out how to sell those designs and leave the street stuff up to us.”
She finally tucked her hair behind her ear. I was glad it was out of her face, but I wished my fingers had done it.
“You guys pay for everything, and that’s not fair,” she said. “I’ve got to help out somehow, and I’ve got to come up with a way to pay you back.”
We didn’t give her much—food, mostly, some clothes, taxi rides around the city since none of our mas had a car. I was happy to do it. I’d buy her food every day if she’d let me. But there was no way she was paying us back.
“You do help,” I said.
“How?”
“Yeah, how?” Billy asked.
I gave him another nasty look to shut him up. “Just trust me, Kyle. You do.”
Kyle was the reason I hadn’t dropped out of school to go live in one of Mario’s apartments and deal all the time. That would have been better than living in The Heart with Ma and my sister. But Kyle lived just a few apartments over, and she was in most of my classes, so I stayed.
I just wanted to be close to her.
“You can pay us back when you’re making the big bucks from selling those designs while me and Garin are still here, hustling,” Billy said.
“I won’t be here,” I said. “I’ve got four years left, and then I’m getting the hell out of Atlantic City.”
“Where you going?” Billy asked.
“Vegas. Mario’s been getting me ready to work at their hotel out there. Once I turn eighteen and get my diploma, I’m out.”
Kyle didn’t know it yet, but she was coming with me. So was Billy. There was no way I was leaving them here. Going to Vegas meant more money for all of us, and I could probably get them jobs at the casino.
“Well, I’m going to college,” Kyle said.
Our heads jerked toward her. The kids around here didn’t go to college. Most didn’t make it to their junior year of high school.
“That’s…”
“A big goal to have,” I said, finishing Billy’s sentence.
“I have to try to get a full academic scholarship. Going to college is all I’ve ever wanted. Somehow, I’m going to make it happen.”
I had to talk to Mario and see if he or any of his boys had connections at the colleges around Vegas. Maybe he could get her in. I’d pay for her schooling, and I could make it look like she’d gotten a scholarship. That was the only way she’d take my money and probably the only way I could make sure she came to Vegas.
“If that’s what you want,” I told her, “it’ll happen.”
“It won’t be happening for a while,” she said. “And since summer is still a ways away, maybe I could help you deal down at the boardwalk.” She looked over at Billy. “Or I could help you hustle—”
“Not gonna happen, Kyle,” I said. “I told you, leave the street stuff to us.” I grabbed my money off the floor and shoved it into my pocket. I usually took twenty bucks from whatever I earned each night and bought food with it, and then I saved the rest. But tonight, I was going to spend a little more. “Come on, guys.”
“Where we going?” Billy asked. “I’ve been running all night, and my feet hurt. You’d better not be taking us too far.”
Kyle handed me my jacket, and I slipped it on as I walked to the door.
“It’s not far,” I said.
“Should I grab a sweater or something?”
The worry in Kyle’s voice made me stop in the doorway and turn to face her. The shirt she was wearing underneath, I’d bought for her, and it wasn’t thick enough to keep her warm.
I grabbed a sweatshirt from my closet. “This is warmer than anything you have at home.”
She took off her jacket, put the sweatshirt on over her head, and zipped her jacket over it. She tucked her nose under the front of the sweatshirt. “It smells like you.”
“It’s my favorite. I wear it a lot.”
She pulled her face out and smiled. “I know.”
“Are we gonna talk about your stank ass all night, or are we gonna get going?” Billy barked.
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, come on.”
“Where are you taking us, Garin?” Kyle asked, walking a bit behind me.
We went down the stairs and out my front door, passing Kyle’s and Billy’s apartments on our way out of The Heart. “I’m taking you guys to the diner ’cause we all could use something to eat. Then, we’re going someplace where we can have some fun.”
I’d have to call Mario when we got to the diner. He let me use his indoor pool and hang out in his basement arcade whenever I wanted, but I needed permission to bring my friends. And then I’d have to have a talk with Billy. I’d never brought him to Mario’s before. I was afraid he’d steal something. I needed him to promise that he wouldn’t. Billy wouldn’t break a promise—not to me anyway.
“I’m down for some fun,” Billy said.
I waited for Kyle to say something. When she didn’t, I slowed down, so she could catch up to me.
“What about you?” I asked her.
Her smile was even bigger than it had been in my bedroom even though she was shivering now. “Of course I’m up for it.”
“Good.” I stopped walking, the three of us forming a tight circle.
Kyle’s teeth were chattering loud enough for Billy and me to hear. I had to get her out of this cold.
“You sure you can’t run, Billy?”
“Ahh, fuck. I can always run if I have to.”
I grabbed Kyle’s hand, and we took off.
“Then, start running!” I yelled at him from over my shoulder.
Once Kyle was sipping some hot chocolate at the diner, she finally stopped shaking. The three of us wolfed down bacon cheeseburgers with extra orders of fries and onion rings and headed over to Mario’s.
I knew Kyle had a good time at his place; she didn’t stop smiling or laughing the whole night. Mario even let us make eggs for breakfast and gave us a ride to school. Kyle fell asleep on my shoulder before Mario was even out of his neighborhood. I didn’t want to wake her when we pulled up in front of the school. She needed the sleep. But, when I did, I liked the way her eyes looked when she opened them real slow and rubbed the corners with her small fingers.
Shit, I liked it a lot.
But there weren’t many more nights like that one—the three of us together, sober, earning on the streets and celebrating with our shares. The nights that followed weren’t fun at all. They were tragic. Devastating.
They were really fucking dark…