“It’s not drugs,” he protested. I stood up, and he stood up too. Other patrons were looking at us now.
“Why can’t you just have faith in me?”
“Are you really asking me that?” My voice rose as I asked him. He held out his hands, palms up, pleading.
“Edie. I love you. I just need you to believe in me. One more time.”
I stood there, looking down at him, torn between running away and running toward him. I breathed heavy, deep, then sat back down.
“Energy supplements,” I repeated, trying to talk myself into it.
He nodded. “They’re really popular. I’ll cover the phone bill next month. The whole bill. Not just my half. I owe you.”
“Okay,” I said to him, and to myself. “Okay.”
Our dinner came out. Jake opened up his burger and reached into his pocket, under my watchful stare, pulled out a palmful of glass vials.
I’d seen them before. Luna Lobos. Like the ones Luz had, which she may or may not have given to Javier when my back was turned. Jake’s vials held no such Schrodingerian duality—he popped off their caps and poured the contents onto his burger, where they pooled on the cheese. He saw me curl my lip in disgust. “Hey, I’m not just the owner, I’m also a member.” He put the top bun back on and gestured grandly, like he’d done a magic trick, then pulled another full vial out of his pocket and put it on the table in front of me.
“What’s in that? Vitamins and Windex?”
“Vitamins and caffeine probably.” He took a few bites of his burger, smiled, and set it down. “You know, Edie—I really think this stuff is what’s given me a new lease on life.”
“How so?” I held it up and inspected his face, refracted through its blue-tinged contents. There were a few grains of what looked like pepper suspended inside.
“It’s just—things have gotten easier, since I started this…” His voice faded, unsure what word to use, trying, I was sure, to pick one that wouldn’t piss me off. “… multilevel marketing opportunity,” he decided on.
“Uh-huh.”
“I don’t have the cravings I once did. I bought one of these, and as soon as I started taking it, all those other urges were gone.”
I remembered all the money I’d spotted him while he’d been taking “care” of me, post-stabbing. Clearly he’d spent it on more than just lunch.
“Once I found out who to talk to, so I could start selling them myself, and taking a cut—it’s been great, really. I have money now. I don’t want to get high anymore. The only high I’m after is that performance high.” I watched the light of memory go on in his eyes. “God, I haven’t felt this good since I used to run track.”
“You and I both know that was a long time ago. We’re not in high school anymore, Jakey.”
“But it’s the same thing. I want to see how far I can go. How well I can do. Just like running track, back in the day.”
Jake wouldn’t be the first junkie I’d seen kick one habit, only to replace it with another. I’d seen addicts who had burned away the septum between their nostrils become addicted to purchasing expensive shoes once the coke had lost its kick. There always had to be something to fill that aching need.
“Just try one. Really. You’ll like it, I swear.” And here he was, still trying to convince me, all over again. I remember the first time he’d handed over a glass pipe with a full bowl, and how hard he’d laughed at me as I coughed out hot smoke.
“You know, Jake—” I put the vial back on the table. “I’m glad you’re happier now, but it’s really not my thing.”
“This is what’s stopping me from trying to score, Edie. It’s like magic.”
“Yeah. Well.” I looked down at my unadulterated burger, and then picked it up. It wouldn’t do any good to tell him anything, and so I wouldn’t. I shoved the burger in my mouth and took a huge bite. Anything to keep from saying something I’d regret.
Jake sighed at me, shook his head, and then polished off the rest of the fries on his plate. When the waitress came by with a to-go box, he took the check, and he had the gall to flirt with her in front of me. She even flirted back.
I tried to see him as she must have—not as someone participating in a customer service transaction but as a person. He looked clean. Hell, he looked good. He had our dad’s brown eyes, and his shaggy brown hair needed a cut, but looking a little rugged around the edges was almost a rare thing in this town. Holing up for winter after winter made most people soft and doughy. He looked like he’d been outside recently, like he might know how to use a football, or a rake. He put down cash for both our meals and tipped her well, like a true adult.
I had to admit, weird water in little blue vials or not, I was impressed. And really glad I’d kept shoveling in fries.
“Here, Edie, keep this, in case you change your mind,” he said as we stood.
I inhaled to argue, then realized I was tired of fighting him. The thing with Jake was that he always wound up doing what he wanted to anyway. A salesman to the end, there was no way not to lose. I just wished he’d found this calling earlier.
“Sure, fine.” I pocketed the blue vial, and together we walked out to my car.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
We drove to the Armory in silence. I was concentrating on the road—the snowplows hadn’t hit these streets since dawn, and it was getting treacherous. Jake seemed pleased with himself, like he’d won some argument I didn’t know we’d had.
I pulled against the curb a block from the shelter, where I could manage to parallel-park without putting anyone else’s life or vehicle on the line. Jake grinned over at me, in the street’s half-light.
“Hey—I’d been meaning to ask, but I forgot. Can you see if someone’s at the hospital for me? You met him on Christmas—Raymond.” He saw the question on my face, and spoke more quickly than I could respond. “He didn’t come home to the shelter last night, and I’m worried he got hurt.”
“Caught in the crossfire of an energy supplement war?” I said sarcastically.
“Or frozen to death, after being beaten by asshole college kids,” Jake replied, just as sarcastic.
“I’ll keep an eye out.”
“All right,” he said, reaching over. We hugged in the front seat of my car, clumsy with coats and no-practice. He refastened all the layers of his sturdy new coat. “You know, Edie—” he began, and looked outside. “It wasn’t so bad living with you.”
I was glad it was dark inside my car, with the engine off—I hoped it hid the emotions running across my face.
“I could pay you this time,” he went on. “I know things are rough for you right now—I don’t know how come, but you can’t hide it from me, they are. I’m not talking put me on the lease or anything, but I could pay for half your rent, and we could share things again—”
I knew the thousand and one ways that having Jake live with me would be a bad idea—above and beyond the fact that a cyborg and a sleeping vampire had temporary residence. When the bottom fell out of whatever he was currently selling, and he wasn’t flush with cash, and he tried to use, or sell other, worse, things, then I’d be the bad sister who kicked him out, all over again …
“It was just a thought, Edie,” Jake said.
Just a thought, but painful nonetheless. “I’m sorry, Jake. I need to get my own life straightened out right now.”
“Yeah. I hear that.” He reached over and knuckled my head like we were kids again, then opened my car door. Winter air rushed in and took my breath away. I was sending him out into the cold. Again. “Bye, Sissy.”
“Bye, Jake.”
I watched him get out of my car and walk down the street while my heart broke in two.
It wasn’t a long drive back to the freeway, except that I missed the exit because I wasn’t paying full attention. I wished, not for the first time, that I could tell Jake everything. That I could trust him again, like when we were kids. But there was nothing I could do to change the past, and the future was hazy right now. I made three right-hand turns instead of one left and wound up going past the Armory again.
I slowed down to see if I could see Jake inside. The first floor of the structure had bank-window-type glass and was brightly lit. Warm, I hoped, and safe.
“Hey!”
I heard the voice even though both my windows were rolled up. I startled, looking around, even though surely whoever it was wasn’t talking to me.
“Hey!”
I spotted him, racing down the street—a man in a fedora. Viktor, the were from the other night. “Hey!” he yelled again, swinging his arms over his head, as if he was trying to flag me down.
I hit the gas, trying to outrun him, but my Chevy didn’t have much get-up-and-go. It lurched forward, and he ran from the sidewalk out into the street at me. I had to hammer my brakes not to hit him, and I slammed my car into reverse and started rolling backward, blind down the street.
“I just want to talk to you!” He ran alongside me, pounding on my car hood. Leaving dents.
“Jesus Christ!” I braced my arm on the passenger seat and looked behind me. There was an alley coming up. I wasn’t a stunt driver, but—
“I just want to talk!”
I yanked my steering wheel down and prayed there wasn’t any oncoming traffic. My car spun into the alley, and I put it into drive again, and then this time floored it. I traced my way down the dark street, watching him race behind me, arms still waving like an air traffic controller, until he gave up and the night made him disappear.
I caught the exit onto the freeway this time and drove straight in to work.
I parked nearby in the visitor lot, trusting the Shadows to keep me safe once I was on hospital grounds. What was Viktor doing skulking downtown? Was that a coincidence, or had he followed me there? Would Jake be safe? I should have asked Anna to protect him, too. The next time I paid attention to my surroundings I was in the elevator, dropping down to Y4.
