“Fuck!” Ty said in the useless dark.
Walter’s eyes swiveled. “East?”
“Did you do something with his shoes?”
“I didn’t do nothing,” Walter protested. “He kicked them off. Maybe we should get a head start? East?” Backpedaling already, finding the road with his feet.
Then mad, flying footsteps, and Ty was coming, the stripes of light painting him as he sped beneath the windows. In one hand the shoes, in the other the gun. “Go!” he panted. East turned: already Walter was pumping down the road. No other noise, no movement, no response. The quiet banks of mailboxes marked them passing by.
Quickly they made their way back around the stony road, thudding heavy of foot as it swept downhill, the pines less dense on their left between them and the lake. Their breath came and fled in quick mouthfuls. Around the lakeside curve, the parking lot came into view, the lone light on its pole stained yellow, a glimpse of their blue van shining beneath the trees. Numb, East hastened his steps. Get away, get away, his mind drummed. And also: What happened?
No talking, only the question the girl’s face made.
Then he saw the other car, an old boat of a Chevy jacked up on fat wheels, parked near the van, black like the pines in the yellow light. And two kids swarming around the van. Trouble.
“Look,” he said, pointing.
“Mother fuck,” said Ty, taking the lead. “All right. Guns up, and spread out. I’m a handle it. But be ready.”
“It’s just neighborhood kids,” said Walter.
Ty’s scowl locked down. “Do what I say, Walt.”
He fanned left, and East began a slow run across the lot, taking each yellow-lined parking space in two steps, Walter coming up behind. Ty’s gun made a heavy click, and East pawed at his pockets for the little gun. He found it clumsily, fumbling at it as he ran.
As yet the kids hadn’t spotted them. One might have been the ghetto-lake thug from yesterday. Meaty shoulders, moustache.
“That one got a gun,” East panted. Guessing. But just as much, telling Ty: Careful.
Ty raised his hand and squeezed a shot into the trees. Pock. The white boys saw them now. They clutched at each other, then broke for their car. The rattly engine roared. Ty followed them left, and East went for the van, slapping his pockets for the keys. “Hey!” Ty was yelling. “Hey!”
The dark car burned rubber. It leapt toward a gap in the trees. Instantly its lights were gone, just its whine climbing the road away from the lake. East reached the van, panting, key ready in his fingers.
But it wasn’t any use. The kids, they’d fucked it up. Walter came wheezing up behind, goggle-eyed. “Oh, shit,” he groaned. “Oh, shit!”
East breathed and circled. One side window had been popped off its buckle. It hung askew on its hinges like a flap. That had gotten them in. They’d pulled out everything—the clothes, the food, the first-aid kit and blanket. The case of water bottles, scattered on the ground.
“They took my game, man,” Ty swore from the back.
“We got the money, right?” said Walter. “Y’all still have the money?”
“They got my game.”
“We have to leave,” East said.
“Look, though,” Walter said. East stepped back. The problem wasn’t apparent. But down the hidden side of the van, the woods side, it said something in spray paint. It said, FUCK YOU NIGGERS.
“Bashed out the taillights too,” said Ty, shoes still dangling in his hand.
Walter chewed his lips. “We can’t drive like this,” he said. “Like, hello, help us out, every cop in the world. Right at the same time they’re finding bodies.”
“But right now we need to go,” said East. “Get in.”
—
He found a four-lane road westward and took it. Avoiding going back through town, where people would see them. Neighbors. The wind cut in through the broken side window, swirled through the van, searching. Ty was trying to rig a sling for it with the Ace bandage roll from the first-aid kit. East waited until his breath was steady before he turned around.
“The fuck was that, Ty?”
Ty, working on the window, was serene. “What? You hollering at me now?”
“What happened?”
“What happened?” Ty stopped and glanced forward for only an instant. “Mission accomplished, son.”
“The girl. I told you, don’t shoot the girl. Why don’t you just kill everyone you see?”
Ty said, “Thinking on it.”
East banged the steering wheel. “Just evil. Evil! And those dudes. Run right up where they can see you. Why don’t you just tell them how many people you shot lately?”
Ty paused ironically. “Sure. Say. Maybe you’re right. Maybe we should be subtle. Driving a van with nigger wrote down the side.”
“People can’t see that in the dark,” East snapped.
“People can see whatever they want.”