“I have to go. Simon is waiting for me.” She turns to me. “I’ll call you. We have a lot to talk about.”
She pecks Carlos and me on the cheek and gets into a cab waiting at a stoplight at the corner.
“Interesting night,” says Carlos.
“That’s one word for it.”
“Don’t forget your burrito.”
He hands me a brown paper bag.
“Thanks. See you tomorrow.”
“Don’t get eaten on the way home.”
“That’s my mission statement.”
By the time I make the corner, my adrenaline is dropping and all the pain I felt when I woke up is coming back hard. The bullet wound throbs and I slip into an alcove half doubled up. Even with the pain, I’m thinking straighter than before. I lean against the wall and chant some healing hoodoo. Nothing too heavy. I just want to turn the pain down a few decibels, but not erase it. I don’t want to forget I’m hurt, but I don’t want to be stumbling around like a cripple. It’s stupid I didn’t think to use the spell when I woke up. What is it about me that it takes a massacre to clear my head?
I stop by Donut Universe on the way home and get coffee and a bag of glazed old-fashioneds. Waiting for my change, I remember New Year’s Eve and kissing Candy in the middle of the bodies, blood, and the smell of cordite the night we took down Avila and wonder why I seem attracted only to women who enjoy carnage.
I’M SITTING IN bed with Alice. She’s smoking and flipping through a magazine.
“Something happened last night. There was this woman I met.”
“I know. I’m dead. I’m not blind, dear.”
“That’s the thing. You’re dead, but I still feel guilty. Like I was cheating on you.”
“You’re such an idiot. That’s why I love you. It’s been eleven years since we last touched each other and I didn’t exactly die a virgin queen. I mean, I waited for you and hoped, but after a while it got clear that you weren’t coming back. A girl can’t rely on her Hitachi Magic Wand forever.”
“You always cheated on me with technology.”
“Technology is more reliable than boys or girls.”
“You’re okay with what happened?”
“You’re alive and I’m dead. Of course I’m okay.”
“Thanks. It feels like I’m coming off a six-month bender. Things aren’t straight in my head yet.”
“You are coming off a bender. Want me to tell you the secret of life?” she asks.
“Please, no.”
“Everyone in the world is a Charlie. The trick is to figure out which Charlie you’re going to be. Charlie Manson. Charlie Starkweather. Or Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.”
“Charlie Chaplin.”
“Charlie Parker.”
“Charly.”
“Who’s that?” she asks.
“The retard from Flowers for Algernon.”
“‘Retard’ is not a nice word.”