Instead of answering, Johnno reached for the cup holder, grabbed a bottle of Sprite, and took a swig. Johnno had always drunk Sprite like it was water.
With a jerk he palmed my head and whacked it with the butt of the gun, Sprite spreading in the air like a fountain. Pain streaked through my nerves, my teeth, my spine.
“I need more time,” I slurred, lemon-lime pop in my eyes. “I’m serious. You can kill me but I don’t have it.”
“If you don’t have it, I’ll come for your family, too.”
I broke out in a cold sweat. “What am I supposed to do?”
Johnno chugged the rest of the bottle. “Not my problem.”
“Half in three months,” I said, blinking against the knives in my skull. “Half when I get back.”
“Fine.”
I tried not to shake. Johnno spit out the crack of the window. Kaz pressed a button to unlock the doors, and I staggered out, dripping blood.
The squeak of a door opening sounded from across the street, and my breath caught. Jake stepped out on his stoop. JJ’s little blond head poked out from behind him.
He caught sight of me, and paused.
Go back inside, I silently commanded. Jake’s gaze turned to Johnno through the open window, then to Kaz. His face hardened. I knew what he was thinking. We were double-parked in the middle of his peaceful street. It would look the same way if we were pulling some other shit. If we were high. He turned away to shuffle JJ back inside.
This wasn’t the plan. The plan was to say sorry, to show him I’d changed. Now it looked like I had lied to his face. It looked like I was the same fucking idiot I’d always been.
Cassie
I was sweating through my Kinks shirt, biting a hangnail off my thumb, pacing up and down a block in West Lake Hills next to the Gopney Playground. After Nora had left, I’d brooded all last night, scheming, and drove over an hour early so I wouldn’t miss him. I’d had to turn back once because I’d forgotten my phone at home, then I’d gotten in and out of my car three times, and almost made it down the block before turning around and parking again. Frankie and I used to dangle off the monkey bars here, kick in sync on the swings, play TV tag, freeze tag, bridge tag. Inside the little plastic cabin near the sandbox, we used to set up a house. Then we’d run around the borders and pretend we were fighting aliens, protecting our progeny. While my mother cleaned his house, Frankie was my day care.
I stood on the curb, waiting for him, the pads of my fingers sore, just like they used to be from playing piano. But now my fingers hurt because I had pricked them with a glucose meter. Now I waited for Frankie ready to play a different kind of game. Now, in my head, I was proposing to him.
Frankie, please fake-marry me.
Frankie, we both love snacks, and we are both from Texas. I think this could work.
Frankie, remember that time that you stepped on an ant and cried? I do. Who else knows you better than I do?
Before we lost touch, Frankie and I were best friends. He had started hanging out with the football players, and though he ignored me in the hallways, here on the Gopney benches he’d told me that I was better than all the guys I had crushes on, congratulated me when I’d made our high school’s jazz ensemble on the keys as a first-year, listened to every story I exaggerated, affirmed every vague, ecclesiastical notion I had about music.
For a time, at least.
Can I come over and see ya? I had texted him.
Yeah!!! Eating lunch with parents but will be done at 1ish, he’d replied.
Here’s what I figured: According to the army website, if Frankie and I got married, he’d get two thousand dollars more a month, for a housing allowance and subsistence benefits.
We would each get one thousand dollars a month, I’d get on his health plan, and I’d up my hours in bartending. This would still cover my student loans and copays and blood sugar checks. Frankie could do whatever he wanted with his share of the money. And in the meantime, I wouldn’t have to get another day job. I could spend my days writing an album.
And most important, if something went wrong, if my blood sugar got too high or low, that one-thousand-dollar ambulance ride that isn’t covered by insurance, and all the other bills—the hospital visit, and overnight stay—wouldn’t be sending Mom or me into poverty.
Then there’s the other part of it, the whole faking-a-wedding endeavor. No problem. Frankie and I would go to the courthouse, claiming we’d loved each other since childhood. It wasn’t far from the truth, and hell, I know how to be in love. I’d done it a few times.