“They taped the whole thing,” Jet added.
“Brody even cut it into a music video with some old footage of her scowling and glaring and making catty phone cal s. He gave it a soundtrack ‘The Bitch is Back’.
It’s fuckin’ righteous! I can’t wait for you to see it,” Al y said, grinning like a loon.
“Yeah, we al went down there and watched it a bil ion times. Dawn was total y pissed when Lee fired her. It was great!” Indy finished.
Considering the fact that I’d had a near-death experience, I knew I should be a better person, live my life doing good deeds and not be bitchy, even when it was being bitchy about someone who was a bitch.
Nevertheless, I couldn’t help being pleased that Dawn had been fired. Especial y since everyone seemed so happy about it.
And of course the stupid bitch was talking about me.
*
Fourth, Luke came to visit me. I was getting a lot of visitors. The girl gang; Tex and Nancy; Tod and Stevie; Duke and Dolores; Shirleen; Heavy and Zip. May came by al the time, ful of stories from the Shelter (and carrying with her purloined pudding cups).
Frank slunk in, talked to me for five minutes and slunk out, clearly uncomfortable with sunlight shining on him even through a window. A bunch of my kids came and the Nightingale Men came too, Mace, Ike, Bobby and Monty.
Then, of course, there was Nick and Vance who spent the evenings with me mostly kicked back and boring me to death by watching endless footbal games, talking about who would win the Heisman Trophy and shit like that, luckily I was drugged out most of the time and slept a lot.
It was awhile before Luke came.
I was sleeping and when I woke up I saw him sitting in a chair pul ed up to the bed, his fingers linked and resting on the side of the bed, he was bent forward, his forehead resting on his hands.
I was a little stunned at his posture. It was seriously un-Super-Dude-like.
“Hey,” I said and his head snapped up and he looked at me.
This stunned me too because Luke was not the kind of guy you could take by surprise and he was so lost in thought, I’d done that.
“Hey,” he said, face serious, mouth tight. He sat back and put his forearms to his knees.
“You okay?” I asked.
He stared at me and said, “I’l be okay when I can close my eyes at night and not see you lyin’ on the floor among a mess of dead bodies and blood.”
Yikes.
Not, I feared, a visual that led to sweet dreams.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered and wished there was something better to say.
There wasn’t.
He kept staring at me but didn’t say anything. Then with a voice low and quiet, he said, “You kil ed a man.” I nodded.
Shard was dead. I shot him in the head. The police waited until I was out of ICU and with Vance standing next to me holding my hand, I’d made my statement. Roam and Sniff had made theirs too. The police were not going to press charges as obviously I’d done it in self-defense.
Shard had kil ed Cordova, shot me and Roam. They were more than happy to close the case on him.
For my part, I was trying not to think about it.
“You gonna be able to live with that?” Luke asked.
I nodded again. “I don’t have much choice.” Luke kept staring at me so I kept talking.
“It’s the difference between him being here and Roam and me being here. I picked Roam and me. I think that was the right decision.”
“It was. It’s stil gonna fuck with your head,” Luke told me.
I had no doubt he was right.
“It starts fuckin’ with your head, you talk to Vance,” Luke went on. “You can’t get to Vance then me, Lee, Monty, Mace, Ike. Any of us’l listen and we’l know where your head wil be at.”
It was my turn to stare at him. If I was reading his underlying message, he was tel ing me they al had kil ed someone.
“Now I’m real y one of the boys,” I said softly, testing out my theory.
“Welcome to the club,” he affirmed my guess and said this in jest but he wasn’t amused and neither of us laughed.
“I was stupid. I shouldn’t have –” I started but he got up suddenly and leaned into me.
Then he stunned me again by kissing me. Not a Luke, teasing, sexy kiss but he put his hand to the side of my head and touched his lips to mine then pul ed back a couple of inches and stared me in the eyes.
“You can go over it again and again, relive it a mil ion different ways; it isn’t going to change anything. You saved your boy and you both are breathing. The end,” he said.
He stayed where he was for so long I felt the need to respond.