Sam kicks the Blazer’s rear wheel. It rocks with the force of the blow.
“Take it easy, Sambo,” Todd pleads. “We were just partying.”
Sam’s fist swings up under Todd’s nose. “You stupid dink. I should leave you out here. Fuck you all. I’m going to.”
Striding to the wrecker, he hauls into it and throws it into reverse. A few yards back, he stops and sits in fuming silence. He pounds the wheel with his fist.
They stand there in his lights hugging themselves and stamping their sneakered feet against the cold. The Mutant in her chains, looking like a clown in Satan’s own circus. At Christmastime she gives him a line about staying straight to stay healthy and here she is, a whole nine days later, partying her skinny ass off with his own teammates. Maybe she thinks he’s so dazzled by her tits in that red bra he’ll believe any amount of shit.
They stare at him with all the acuity of a riff of stoned Zepheads at a laser show. Dazed and confused. You thuds want a light show, climb this fucking stairway to heaven. He flicks his brights up in their eyes. Flinching, they throw up their hands in the familiar horror-flick gesture of defense, as if he had crossed his fingers against them.
The Mutant emerges from the glaring lights. She opens the other door and climbs into the wrecker. She sits on her knees, head cocked like a curious puppy, the tag ends of her headrag on one side like a big floppy ear. “What are you gonna do?”
“Quit. Quit! You people don’t give a shit about anything except partying. So go party. I got a life, I don’t need this shit. You got no right to ask me to cover up for you when you blow off the rules. How old’s Michaud anyway? I don’t even want to know if one of those bozos screwed her. Probably they all did. You got weed in that truck, you got booze, you’re all fucked up. Grey’s fucking passed out. You know what kind of box I’m in now? Now I got knowledge those stupid dinks were out here blowing dope, they had some underage kid out here, got her loaded and probably gangbanged her. Why’d you have to come pull this shit in my town?”
“You gonna leave us here or not?”
“Why the hell not? You put me up Shit Creek without it bothering you too much. You march back and tell your asshole buddies they can walk their wasted asses right down to the Narrows again and call Maxie or the cops or their mummies and daddies or W. Axl Rose and the United States Marines, I give a shit.”
The Mutant sinks back and rests her cheek against the seat.
He refuses to look at her anymore. “Get out of my truck. I’ve had it up to here with you too.”
“No. I didn’t do anything.”
“You’re here. You didn’t mistake Pete’s Blazer for the last bus to Depot Street, did you?”
“There wasn’t anyplace else to go. I didn’t drink anything. I couldn’t help breathing the smoke. I kept my pants on, not that it’s any of your business.”
“Oh, then, I guess you get a gold star,” Sam gibes. “Now get out of my rig.”
The Mutant crawls across the seat. “What was I supposed to do?” She rests her head on his thigh like a repentant puppy. “She was willing, for fuck’s sake. I just wanted a warm place to hang out so I didn’t have to go home.”
He closes his eyes. The knot of her headrag digs into his thigh. The tips of his fingers pass down her jawline to tickle the chains between her nose and ear. Any more time out here in the cold, she’ll get sick again. Not that she doesn’t deserve to get sick, the lying druggie slut.
In silence he chains the Blazer and extracts it from the ditch. When he’s finished, he motions Lexie back of the Blazer.
“I’m taking the girls home. You guys help Grey into my truck.”
Pete and Todd look at each other, shrug and do as they’re told.
Lexie grins. “Ta ta.” As she sashays past Sam, he grabs her handbag. She yelps in protest but he searches it anyway, takes out several baggies of weed and pitches them into the woods.
“Shithead,” she shrieks.
Before she can get in next to Lexie, he tosses the Mutant’s bag too, turning up nothing for his trouble but a smug smile when he hands it back to her. Probably ditched whatever she was carrying—if only cigarettes boosted from the supermarket. Amazingly, she has her basketball with her. Great. They can all go to the high school and play HORSE on the outdoor court. He can’t wait.
He crooks a finger at Pete. “That’ll be thirty-five bucks, asshole.”
With an exasperated moan, Pete strips his wallet, bums the rest from the others. Billy Rank smiles dazedly as Pete shoves his hands into Billy’s jeans to pick his pockets.
Sam folds the money into his jacket pocket.
“You fuckups better haul your idiot asses back to Fosses’ camp and crash there so you won’t be picked up OUI and get kicked off the team. And if you put it in the ditch again, don’t bother to call. You can freeze your dicks off. Oh, and fuck you all.”
Pete’s pale face flushes with anger. “Fuck you too, Samson.”
“Shut up, Pete,” Todd mutters. “Shut the fuck up.”
“Whose idea was this anyway?” Bither complains.
“I don’t feel good,” Billy Rank says in a clear plaintive voice. Covering his mouth to cough politely, he clutches Bither for support and vomits all over him.
Like a faraway star, the porchlight at the Greys’ farmhouse gleams weakly. Grey slung over his shoulder, Sam pounds on it. Her grandfather, a bent old man with white stubble on his chin, comes to the door.
“She’s loaded,” Sam says.
The old man backs up, gesturing toward a rump-sprung couch. A light comes on
