“The old guy had some money. I used it to buy food.
Then I started walking toward L.A.”
That old dream of his. For reasons that make sense to him alone, he’s always wanted to go to L.A. Any sane person would be thankful for the twenty miles that separate us from that oozing sore.
“He talked to you. He was friendly to you. And you shot him.”
“What was I supposed to do? Wait for God to come and give me some money? What was I supposed to do?”
“Come home.”
“Shit.”
“Doesn’t it even bother you that you took someone’s life— you killed a man?”
He seemed to think about that for a while. Then he shook his head. “It don’t bother me,” he said. “I was scared at first, but then…after I did it, I didn’t feel nothing. Nobody saw me do it. I just took his stuff and left him there. Besides, maybe he wasn’t dead.
People don’t always die just because you shoot them.”
“You didn’t check?”
“I just wanted his stuff. He was crazy anyway.
Alaska!”
I didn’t say any more to him, didn’t ask any more questions. He talked a little about meeting some guys and joining up with them, then discovering that even though they were all older than he was, none of them could read or write. He was a help to them.
He made their lives pleasanter. Maybe that’s why they didn’t just wait until he was asleep and kill him and take his loot for themselves.
After a while, he noticed that I wasn’t saying anything, and he laughed. “You better marry Curtis and make babies,” he said. “Out there, outside, you wouldn’t last a day. That hyperempathy shit of yours would bring you down even if nobody touched you.”
“You think that,” I said.
“Hey, I saw a guy get both of his eyes gouged out.
After that, they set him on fire and watched him run around and scream and burn. You think you could stand to see that?”
“Your new friends did that?” I asked.
MONDAY, JULY 20, 2026
Keith came to see me today just before dark. He found me walking home from the Talcott house where Curtis had been wishing me a very happy birthday. We’ve been very careful, Curtis and I, but from somewhere or other, he’s gotten a supply of condoms. They’re old fashioned, but they work. And there’s an unused darkroom in a corner of the Talcott garage.
Keith scared me out of a very sweet mood. He came from behind two houses without making a sound. He had almost reached me before I realized someone was there and turned to face him.
He raised his hands, smiling. “Brought you a birthday present,” he said. He put something into my left hand. Money.
“Keith, no, give it to Cory.”
“You give it to her. You want her to have it, you give it to her. I gave it to you.”
I walked him to the gate, concerned that one of the watchers might spot him and shoot him. He was that much taller than he had been when he stopped living with us. Dad was home so he wouldn’t come in. I thanked him for the money and told him I would give it to Cory. I wanted him to know that because I didn’t want him to bring me anything else, ever.
He seemed not to mind. He kissed the side of my face said, “Happy birthday,” and went out. He still had Cory’s key, and although Dad knew he had it, he hadn’t had the lock changed again.
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 26, 2026
Today, my parents had to go downtown to identify the body of my brother Keith.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 29, 2026
I haven’t been able to write a word since Wednesday. I don’t know what to write. The body was Keith’s. I never saw it, of course. Dad said he tried to keep Cory from seeing it. The things someone had done to Keith before he died… .I don’t want to write about this, but I need to.
Sometimes writing about a thing makes it easier to stand.
Someone had cut and burned away most of my brother’s skin. Everywhere except his face. They burned out his eyes, but left the rest of his face intact— like they wanted him to be recognized. They cut and they cauterized and they cut and they cauterized… . Some of the wounds were days old.
Someone had an endless hatred of my brother.
Dad got us all together and described to us what had been done. He told it in a flat, dead monotone.
He wanted to scare us, to scare Marcus, Bennett, and Gregory in particular. He wanted us to understand just how dangerous the outside is.
The police said drug dealers torture people the way Keith was tortured. They torture people who steal from them and people who compete with them. We don’t know whether Keith was doing either of these things. We just know he’s dead. His body was dumped across town from here in front of a burned out old building that was once a nursing home. It was dumped on the broken concrete and abandoned several hours after Keith died. It could have been dumped in one of the canyons and only the dogs would have found it. But someone wanted it to be found, wanted it to be recognized. Had one of his victims’ relatives or friends managed to get even at last?
The police seemed to think we should know who killed him. I got the feeling from their questions that they would have been happy to arrest Dad or Cory or both of them. But they both lead very public lives, and neither had any unexplained absences or other breaks in routine. Dozens of people could give them alibis. Of course, I said nothing about what Keith had told me he had been doing. What good would that do? He was dead, and in a horrible
