Sixkill

11

DAWN HAD TWO FRIENDS with her the day she met Jumbo. I met them for lunch in the food court of the Galleria near Lechmere Square, close to the community college, which was just across the Gilmore Bridge. One friend was a girl with maroon hair cut short and square across her forehead. The other was a boy with an earring and one of those hairdos where it looks like you just rolled out of bed. They both wore black: jeans, sweatshirts, sneakers. The girl had on a lot of dark eye makeup. They weren't exactly goths. But they weren't a couple of management trainees, either.

When they came to my table carrying a cup of coffee each, the girl said, 'Are you the detective.'

'Am I sitting alone, wearing a dark blue Braves hat with a red brim and white B on the front?' I said.

'Yeah.'

'Then it must be me,' I said.

They sat down. The girl's name was Christine. The boy was James.

'My treat,' I said. 'You want anything.'

'I just want coffee,' James said.

'Just coffee,' Christine said.

'Cheap date,' I said. 'Tell me about Dawn and Jumbo Nelson.'

'You got a gun?' Christine said.

'Yep.'

'On you?' she said.

'Yep.'

James did a mock shiver and said, 'Oooo!'

'You ever shoot anybody?' Christine said.

'Being a detective,' I said, 'I'm sort of used to asking the questions. Tell me about Dawn and Jumbo.'

The big room was full of people, mostly adolescents, eating pizza, lamb on a skewer, and sweet-and-sour chicken with red and green maraschino cherries in it. I might have been the oldest person in the room.

'We gonna get paid for telling you stuff?' Christine said.

'No.'

'I thought snitches got paid,' James said.

'Not by me,' I said.

Christine shrugged.

'Never hurts to ask,' Christine said.

'It might,' I said.

Christine shrugged again, more elaborately this time.

'We was watching them make the movie,' Christine said. 'And, you know, Jumbo spotted us, and come over.'

James took out a pack of filter-tip cigarettes and lit one, and put the pack on the table. He inhaled deeply, held the smoke for a moment, and exhaled slowly. He held the cigarette between his first two fingers, up near the top joint.

'And he says to us, something like, how you like it so far?'

'Was he interested in Dawn right away?' I said.

'He was interested in all three of us,' James said.

'You, too?' I said.

'Uh-huh.'

'Was his interest carnal?' I said.

'Sure,' James said.

'And you?' I said to Christine. 'He interested in you?'

'Oh, yeah,' she said. 'Me and Dawn.'

'And it was carnal?'

'You mean did he want us to screw him?' Christine said. 'Yeah, sure. He wanted to hook up with all three of us.'

'He say so?'

'Uh-huh,' James said.

He took a card from his pocket and put it face up on the table. Christine took out a card just like it. On the front