Thinking about his parents upset him, and when he blinked he felt the horizon lurch abruptly. He took a deep breath. He should have eaten something before leaving. Or else he should have gotten some sleep instead of obsessing about whether or not he and Lorraine should get married.
Marriage was useless anyway. Nothing more than a bogus contract to ensure all parties wound up disappointed. At least that had been the case for his mother. Before this talk of houses with pools and good school districts with Mr. Lange, Brandi Rose had known better than to expect anything from the world. The rash of consolation prizes didn’t help. They reminded Sam of a military air-drop, except instead of humanitarian aid with food or cash, both of which they lacked and needed, a sixty-inch flat-screen TV would appear at their door. Or a Blu-ray player without any of the overpriced discs they couldn’t afford to buy. There were designer clothes, two boxes labeled ARMANI, containing a white cashmere coat and sweaters. For his fourteenth birthday Sam received a pair of silk pajamas from Calvin Klein that was missing only a big, fat Cuban cigar to complete the cartoon tycoon Halloween outfit.
Then came the weepy phone calls behind closed doors. Brandi Rose removed her emerald wedding ring. It was around the time she ceased communicating with her son, as if it had somehow been his fault. A wall of radiant rage was erected between them.
Sam pulled at his T-shirt. Good Lord, it was hot. The only shade was directly in front of the bars, and he didn’t want to get close enough to smell the tang of dirty bar mops and the sweet oakiness of whiskey. Sam’s head swam. He didn’t want to drop out of school and become a washout like his dad. This was a terrible idea. He had no business working at a bar or near one. Whatever swirl of ingredients that made both his parents such devout drinkers hadn’t skipped a generation.
He peered down the road. Miles to go. Sam’s vision wobbled violently and his knees hitched beneath him. Sam had passed out once, in fifth-grade gym. He’d hung slack in Coach Tremont’s arms and could hear her talking about his bird bones though he couldn’t lift his head. It was humiliating.
His arms felt leaden at his elbows, and when he formed fists to prove to himself that he could, the effort unnerved him. His hearing became muffled, sounds dropping out completely before returning. Sam examined his surroundings unsteadily. So many strangers. His heart pounded. A sharp pain pierced through his chest as his breath caught in his throat. He pictured himself as a voodoo doll being pierced by a large spike. There had to be somewhere for him to sit down. Cars. Banks. Bars. Restaurants. Food trucks.
Can twenty-one-year-olds have heart attacks?
Sure.
Babies have heart attacks.
Babies.
Could his unborn baby have a congenital heart condition? Yes. Would Sam have to wait for the bus at three a.m. to rush it to the hospital while it died? Most definitely.
Don’t call it an “it,” he reminded himself.
The pain in his chest was unbearable. He had to call someone. But who? Sam’s list was pathetic, starting and ending at Al and Fin. The list of who he absolutely couldn’t call was more impressive—Lorraine, his mom, Gunner, everyone else in the world.
Sam peeled off from the beery marauders, staggered to the nearest curb, and collapsed.
There were other people on the curb, and the bespectacled redhead he’d almost crash-landed into glared and scooched as if he were a plague-stricken hobo. He went to pull out his phone to call 911, but his jeans—his stupid hipster jeans—were too tight. He saw stars and then he died.
PENNY.
When it came to perspiration, Penny had a problem. Not that she stank of BO or anything. It’s that from March to around October she was invariably damp. She could feel the pool of moisture collecting in each underboob, and her sweat mustache beaded up no matter how urgently she wiped it away.
It didn’t help that she was dining al fresco in 100-degree heat downtown where the good shady patches had been staked out by the pushy and hyper-vigilant. Penny scanned the crowd. Hell really was other people.
Other than her car, Penny had no sanctuary. When Jude was out or at Mallory’s, she couldn’t relax, knowing that the two-headed monster of “best friends since we were six” could turn up as soon as Penny got comfortable. Penny wasn’t a covert crack addict or a compulsive masturbator, but she didn’t have an appreciation for privacy until she shared a room with a girl who could go to the bathroom with the door open while naked and eating pretzels dipped in hummus. Penny had to get away. She hopped into her Honda and headed downtown, paying five bucks for parking to sit on a splintery bench in the blazing heat for a disappointing seven-dollar Korean taco and a six-dollar blended “horchatalatta.” She wondered if the rest of early adulthood would be like this—avoiding roommates, getting ripped off for bad fusion food, and the peculiar loneliness of being smothered by people she didn’t want to spend time with.
Penny got up to toss her soggy paper plate in the garbage. There were an unseemly number of bars on either side of her—a Disneyland Main Street for day drinkers. The snack had been a bust, but the people watching was stellar.
A scrawny kid peeled off from the masses and almost ate it. Penny reached for her phone but was too slow on the uptake. She could never grab it in time for good snaps. Sweat ran down her back and seeped into her underwear elastic. The kid staggered over to the sidewalk and planted himself under a tree. He was gulping for air, a marooned fish on dry land, and his face was blinding white. Maybe it was heroin. Penny rubbed the inside of her elbow where she thought her heroin vein would be and then poked her forearm, leaving red circles. She should have worn sunblock. She watched the boy, slumped against the trunk, pull up his black T-shirt sleeves to fashion a sort of tank top. Man, he was skinny enough to be a junkie, and his arms were covered in tattoos.
The kid shoved back his hair, revealing his face. Except it wasn’t a kid. It was Jude’s uncle. Uncle Sam. Hot Uncle Sam. Hot Uncle Sam who was possibly OD’ing on opioids right in front of her. She had to do something! Oh God, she was in no state for altruism. Penny quickly pulled her hair into a bun and grabbed a mint from her go bag.
Priorities, Penny. Save the man from dying. Nobody cares about your breath.
She glanced back at Sam to see if he had stirred. He was probably in the throes of brain death now, drawing his final breaths while she was faffing.
What do I do? What do I do?
How to save a dying man:
1. Call the Texas Hammer. What? How was her only readily available resource an outdated local ad for a personal injury attorney?
2. Ignore him. Christ, he’s not your uncle! Ugh. But he was Jude’s. And Penny liked Jude even if she talked way too much.
3. Go see if he’s dead already.
Penny ran across the street to his lifeless body and peered into his face.
She hoped she wouldn’t drip sweat on him.
He certainly seemed dead.
And, for the record, the tattoo on his bicep wasn’t a chess piece. It was the head of a stallion with its eyes covered in a piece of fabric. What did it mean?
Focus, Penny. Shit.
“Sam?” She kicked his heel gently. They both still had on the same shoes.
SAM.
It was a face he knew and couldn’t place. He stared and tried to focus.
Friend or foe? Friend or foe? Do I owe you money? Are you friends with Lorraine? Please don’t be friends with Lorraine.
Sam closed his eyes again, embarrassed. Her voice was gentle. It was a nice voice.
“Sam, are you alive? It’s Penny.” She sounded far away.
Sam felt another kick on his foot, and he groaned.
“I’m Jude’s friend,” said the shiny face with the bright red lips.
“Who’s Jude?” he croaked.
“Your cousin.”
“Niece,” he corrected.
“Are you dying?”
He nodded and tried to slide his phone out of his pocket without passing out.
“Is Jude coming?” He didn’t want her to see him like this. He hated the thought of anyone seeing him like this.
“No.”
Thank God.
A Biggie lyric teased the corners of his brain.