Read Online Dead Boys by RICHARD LANGE - Free Book Online

knees.
    After lunch I begin to work myself up to sticking my finger down my throat. That’s how I’ll get away, by vomiting and telling El Jefe I’m too sick to keep going, maybe blame it on a spider bite. I’m prying open a new can of paint when my phone rings. It’s Maria. There’s worry in her voice. Sam has fallen at kindergarten and may have broken his leg. She can’t leave school right now and wonders if I can pick him up and drive him to the hospital. No problem, I say. Relax. Everything’ll be okay.
    “Jefe!” I yell, approaching his car at a run. “I’ve got to go. It’s an emergency.”
    He rolls down the window. Chilled air breaks over me like a wave. “I’m not paying you for today, then,” he says. “You have to work the whole day to get paid.”
    “Do Whatever you want. I’ll pick my shit up later.”
    It’s not until I’m driving away that I think to look at my watch. Quarter after one. I’m supposed to have a gun in my hand and a bulletproof soul in less than two hours.
    S AM IS LYING on his back on a cot in the school nurse’s office. He stares at the ceiling, afraid to move, his face pale and sweaty.
    “I’m hurt,” he says, “but not bleeding.”
    He whimpers when I scoop him up, cries for his shoes, which the nurse has removed. She gives them to him, and he twines his fingers through the laces, clutching them tightly. I shield his eyes from the sun as I carry him across the parking lot. A bell rings behind us, doors open with a
whoosh,
and hordes of screaming children run for the playground.
    He lies across the seat of the truck. The top of his head rests against my thigh. He looks up at me as I drive, his bottom lip held between his teeth. I know he’s in pain, but he doesn’t complain once, though every block seems to have a pothole that makes the truck shake like an unwatered drunk.
    “Want to play music?” I ask. He’s not usually allowed, but I need to see him smile. I turn on the radio and say, “Go ahead.”
    He reaches out tentatively, as if this might be a trick, and pushes one of the buttons, changing stations. When no scolding follows, he sets to work in earnest. We listen to snatches of some rapper, the Eagles, news, a Mexican station, and back again, and he laughs at the cacophony he’s creating. I feel awful for ever depriving him of this pleasure, for ever slapping his hand and shouting,
Knock it off
.
    Meanwhile my partners are waiting, and the ticking of my watch grows louder with each passing second. If I don’t show up, they’ll call the job off, but I know Moriarty and his completion principle. He’ll just plan another, and that’s unacceptable. I want this to be over now. I want to be a citizen again. I want to spend my fucking money.
    I lay my hand on Sam’s chest. His heart is beating as fast as mine.
    “I’ll teach you a song,” I say.
“Oh, the monkey wrapped his tail around the flagpole . . .”
    W HEN THEY WHEEL Sam off for his X-rays, I call Maria at school. Her phone is off, so I try the office. The secretary puts me on hold, then comes back on to ask if I’d like to leave a message, because Mrs. Blackburn is unavailable at the moment.
    “This is her husband. Tell her I’ve got our son here at Kaiser in Hollywood.”
    “Let me write it down,” she says. “You’re her husband?”
    I don’t have time for this, so I hang up on her and call Moriarty. No answer, but I decide not to leave a message. You never know who’s listening. Then I try the school again. The same woman answers, and I slam the receiver down.
    I’m clenching my jaw so tight, my teeth hurt. Any minute something inside me is going to burst. I lean against the wall, close my eyes, and breathe deeply, which only makes me feel worse, because the air in the corridor reeks of shit and medicine. There’s a TV on somewhere. A woman on it asks, “Do you love me?” and a man answers, “I don’t know right now.” “Do you love me?” the woman screams. I begin to