and a fat bastard had fucked it out of her.
Black had a dream too. Or so he said: fast cars, speedboats, a fucking Miami Vice soundtrack playing in his head as a beautiful bitch sucked on his cock. That was his version of heaven.
Looking at Tonya just made Pappy all the more determined to hang onto his dreams.
Once they were gone, they’d be impossible to find again.
He looked at his watch. Three thirty.
The first bus out to Detroit left at seven. He was going to be on it.
“I thought you were splitting, Pappy,” Tonya said. She slurred her words a little. Her eyes were glazed. It was a permanent state of affairs.
“Soon enough,” Pappy replied.
“He don’t want you to leave, you know,” she said, like it was some great secret. “Fool needs you around more than he can say.”
The thing was, after today it didn’t matter what Black wanted anymore. It was all about what Pappy needed from now on.
It had to be.
Someone passed him a bottle of bourbon.
He sank down onto a leather sofa. The stitching sighed—it had seen its best days end with Reagan.
Despite everything, he felt comfortable here. Sometimes home didn’t have to be home. Sometimes it just had to be a good, safe place. And this was as good a place as any to spend his last night in town.
And no matter what else, Black knew how to party.
Someone turned the music up. Bass drove the rhythm—hard, pounding, incredibly sexual. This was the music of life. This was the hammer of life. Raw. Primal. The words bled into each other and he could imagine the guy, oil-slick skin, tats like tribal markings, girls coiled like snakes around his well-defined physique.
Pappy lost himself in it for a moment, grateful to forget the failure of the day. The music grew louder. He closed his eyes, felt his body shake with it. Sometimes he couldn’t express himself—he wasn’t good with words, he couldn’t say what he wanted to, not in the same way he could put something into a computer and make the thing dance to whatever tune was in his head. He wasn’t a words guy. But sometimes he could imagine himself up there, the guy behind the mic rapping out from his soul, reaching people. Making them understand. And then there were days like today, when getting wasted seemed like the best fucking idea in the world and a viable way out that didn’t involve applying to some IT department in some school where his gang tats wouldn’t serve as a reference.
He felt a hand on his thigh, then it moved on to his cock, stroking gently, insistently, and breath on his ear, warm, hungry.
She bit at his ear, and pressed down harder, grinding up against him.
“You’re such a cliché,” he said, without opening his eyes.
“And you fucking love it,” she whispered.
It was hard to argue with that.
He heard shouting somewhere, but didn’t feel like going to investigate. Let the fuckers have at it. If it kicked off then he’d know soon enough, and that would be too soon, given what her hand was doing. He didn’t even know her name.
Then there was a scream.
Then silence.
Whoever played deejay just turned the volume up, drowning out the sobs. He opened his eyes eventually with a damp patch in his lap that wasn’t from the bourbon.
The girl was gone.
There was no sign of Tonya or Black.
He saw Von and Ant arguing in the corner.
The crew.
No matter how much he tried to convince himself otherwise, he was going to miss the niggas he grew up with.
Gee had crashed out in an armchair with a naked Latina curled up in his lap. She had spectacular tits and very little else going for her.
Pappy pushed himself up out of the sofa. The stale air was playing havoc with his head. Fuck knows what was floating in it. He needed some fresh air.
He went over to the window and cracked it open. Fresh air—or as fresh as the shithole that was the city allowed—filled his lungs. He counted to ten, exhaling on each number.
When he turned around he saw Tonya standing behind him. She had swelling around one eye and a smear of blood—already dried—staining her lower lip and chin like kids’ makeup. There was nothing cute about the image.
“Fuck, Ton,” he said, reaching out to touch her cheek, “you okay?”
She tried to force a smile. Even he could see it hurt. She had tears in her eyes. He started to instinctively hold her in his arms, but then he saw Black in the doorway, face like thunder.
“You and me, we need to talk, Pap,” Black said. He inclined his head toward the door, beckoning Pappy to follow him out of the room.
Black had that bug-fuck crazy look in his eye. It was a look that Pappy knew well. Now wasn’t the best time to stand up to him. Pappy took another glance at Tonya, but she didn’t peer back at him.
The bedroom stank of stale smoke and hot sweaty sex. There was no smell in the world like it. It filled up every inch of the place. Alive. It smelled alive. Pappy felt Black’s eyes boring deep into him. Pappy didn’t move. He waited for Black to say something. Black shook his head. Pappy felt the sweat trickle down his back. His empty stomach shrunk down to a fraction of its size.
“Tonya says I should just let you fuck off and follow your dreams,” he said, finally, as though it was the craziest shit he’d ever heard.
“We’ve had this conversation. I’ve always said I was going. This place, the whole fucking thing, it’s not me, man. Not anymore.”
“I know it’s what you said, Pap. But saying and doing, they’re two different things, nigga. You’re my boy. We’re like this”—he crossed his fingers and put them over his heart—“and I need you here, man, you gotta keep me straight. I’ll go fuckin’ under without you, Pap.”
“I’m sorry, man, I’m done.”
“No.” Black shook his head. “You’re done when I say you’re done. One last job. That fuckin’ shit today wasn’t a job, it was a fuckin’ piece of shit. You owe me a job. A proper fuckin’ score. I need it, man.”
“I’m not listening to this shit, Black. Get out of my fucking face, I’m out. Done. Over.”
Black stared him in the eye. “You owe me, bro. One last job. I can’t do it without you.”
“I’m not listening.”
“Of course you fuckin’ are. You haven’t pushed me out of the way, have you? No you fuckin’ haven’t, so cut the bullshit, nigga. We get this one right and I’m gone for good. We both get the life
