AVA
Age Twenty
A text.
He sent a one-word text at one thirty in the morning—help. That’s all it said. He couldn’t even be bothered to capitalize the H. He had absolutely no concern for my agenda. None. I could have been at an event. There were a million happenings in our world that lasted all night—concerts end late, rock stars party hard. Sure, after six years as his parents’ right-hand woman, I mostly had control of my time, but I absolutely had responsibilities. Places to be, people to take care of. Honestly, I could have been sleeping—most people would be sleeping—but he didn’t care. He didn’t even care enough to clarify what kind of help he needed or where I could find him. And still, irritatingly, when Bruno said jump, I jumped.
The truth was Bruno knew where I was and what I was capable of. He knew I could ping his cell phone. He knew I was toiling away on the top floor of the LSA Records tower in Midtown Manhattan, doing everything I could to make his parents happy, and that it would take me hours to get to him in Boston—even if I took the helicopter and the private plane—but he didn’t care. He sent one word, and on the promise my old and ugly debt that bound me to him forever, I jumped.
Three hours later, with the company plane still warm on the tarmac, I found myself standing in front of a funky-looking brick building in Boston’s South End. It was obvious that there had been a party. Bruno was a junior at the Randell School of Music. He got in on his own merits, didn’t use his parents’ name in any way. He wanted nothing to do with their legacy or LSA Records, but it wasn’t beneath him to spend their money. He pontificated about changing the industry and starting a label of his own, but as far as I could tell he spent most of his time making messes, not albums.
On a huff, I trudged up the steps past the lingering collection of cigarette butts and red SOLO cups. There was no need to ring the bell. The door was open. Inside was worse than outside. It was dark and there had been a DJ, but he was gone, leaving behind an empty booth and flashing red and green lights. I coughed, choking on the stagnant air as I stepped over a dude who passed out a few feet from the threshold.
Growing up surrounded by twisted, broken prickery things meant I’d been in worse places. So at first I was unfazed by the rush of adrenaline that surged under my skin. I let my eyes adjust to the moving shadows and willed my senses to heighten and my mind to grow steely. Bar the one slipup, I knew how to move through mountains of shit unscathed and unseen. It was a skill that had served me well, landing me the job with the Difrancos and keeping me in their good graces for over half a decade. Shields up, I scanned the first floor quickly. Bruno wasn’t there. But it was clear this wasn’t just a bunch of college kids throwing a kegger. This was a trap house. Sure, it was a highfalutin one, the kind rich kids frequented. Either way, I knew junkies when I saw them. That detail, that I was in a drug den, made me pause and started the icy trickle of panic in my blood. I called out, “Bruno?”
After the day he saved me, being the defiant rebellious son of the owners of one of the most successful record companies in the world made Bruno deliciously decadent tabloid fodder. As a teenager at boarding school he had some freedom, but whenever he was in New York, cameras tended to follow and he put on a show. Sometimes he threw a punch, knocked out a paparazzo, or a bouncer at a bar. Sometimes he drunkenly bared his ass or sloppy-kissed whomever was nearby, gender norms be damned. He humped statues and climbed buildings. It was all very rock 'n' roll. He was a nuisance, a youthful ne'er-do-well. But he was rarely in real trouble. There were a few times when I needed to get him out of a situation or two without the flash of cameras—but mostly an SOS from Bruno was a frustrating inconvenience, not a real emergency. And since he transitioned to the life of a co-ed, he seemed happy to stay out of the limelight.
Still, the trap house felt different, and for the first time in a long time, I was forced to remember that he wasn’t my enemy. I didn’t hate Bruno Difranco. As much as I tried to smush and smash my feelings deep down into the section of my heart that was locked up tight and one hundred percent VIP access only, I cared deeply, too deeply. With my heart pounding in my ears, I raced up the flight of stairs in front of me and called his name a second time. “Bruno?”
Still no answer.
Pulling a determined breath in through my nose, I braced myself as I threw open one door after another on the second floor. A bathroom with vomit spewed next to the toilet and a passed-out girl in the tub. A dark room with a black light buzzing, the crackle of a bong, the flash of glowing purple teeth and a slow, stoned drawl, “Hey, babe.”
Not Bruno.
Another bedroom, dark too, the breathy sounds of fucking. The blue glow of the moon reflected on the pale skin of a young woman’s back as she bounced and bucked on the lap of a man beneath her.
“Bruno?” I asked sternly, trying to decide if I would be relieved if he was her ride.
The woman looked over her shoulder, and then turning back to him, she giggled and asked, “You Bruno?
“Fuck no,” the stranger growled, and I moved on.
I found him on the third floor behind a locked door. I twisted the knob and pushed, rattling the handle. When it didn’t give, I quietly pleaded, “Bruno? Are you here?”
I could feel his presence just behind the rattling wood between us, but I wasn’t one hundred percent sure about his physical and emotional state. Resigned to the fact that I might have to take the door off the hinges, I spoke plainly. “If you’re in there, don’t make me make a scene if I don’t have to.”
I heard the creak of the floorboards and his heavy footsteps moving toward me. The old metal lock above the knob twisted, but he didn’t make the effort to pull open the door.
I didn’t know what I was going to find, so I looked both ways down the hallway, assessing my level of exposure. I knew that my movement through the house was meaningless. No one would remember me specifically. I was just another chick, a flutter of movement in a night of blurry images. But this moment mattered. No one could see me and Bruno together. Together we would become recognizable. I inspected the spaces to my left and right, looking for movement, listening for slowed breaths. Was there anyone watching from the shadows? Were there prying eyes, needing a few dollars for their next fix, willing to snap a photo to sell to the highest bidder? No. It was utterly quiet. Certain that we’d gone unnoticed, I slipped in, relocking the door behind me.
Bruno sat on the floor, his back pressed against an old gross mattress on a metal bed frame, his head hung between his knees, his dark hair long and loose, and limp, the hard cut of his nose still visible even as he covered his eyes with his hands. He was a big dude and he looked awkward and gangly, sitting on the floor. The room was sparse. The wood floor was scratched and the walls were tagged with spray paint. The bed had sheets, but they were ratty and unkempt. A partially dressed woman was curled in a loose fetal position on the far side of the bed. The back of her gray cotton shirt and T-shape of her thong faced me, and I could see the rise and fall of her rib cage. I wasn’t worried about her. She was fine, but the young man next to her was not. His lips and the skin around his mouth were blue and his eyes were open but empty and unfocused. He was definitely dead.
He was also Bruno’s best friend, Garrett.
My breaths shortened as Bruno’s suffering gripped my heart. I let my eyes gently close for a second, holding back the need to drop down on the floor by Bruno’s feet and pull him into my chest. But he didn’t call me because he wanted a hug. He had a gaggle of close friends and he could have reached out to any of them. He called me because I was the cleaner. I made the mess go away.
When I was sure that I’d stilled my emotions enough that my affection for him wouldn’t shake in my voice, I asked, “Has she been asleep the whole time?”
Bruno nodded.
Taking a small step toward him, I continued my line of questioning. “Did she know you were here?”
He didn’t look up at me, but he pushed his hand through his hair when he said, “I found them like this.”
And there were the facts. As long as the girl stayed asleep, he had an option, a window of opportunity.
I stood very still and even to me, my voice sounded cold when I asked, “Did you touch him?”
The question was not unsimilar to the kinds of questions he had asked me all those years ago in the Spring St. station, but still, Bruno’s eyes snapped up, hot with anger. Snidely, he whisper-yelled, “He’s fucking dead, Ava. I didn’t need to take his pulse or give him a high five. He’s dead.”
I didn’t react to his emotions. I’d be more upset if he didn’t have them. If he needed to be angry at me, that was fine. Avoiding his need to argue, I sighed and said, “Two choices. One, you get up and we walk out, and you let her find him. Or two, we call the cops and you're in the middle of a shitstorm.”
The anger drained from his face and his bottom lip trembled as he spoke. “I don’t want to leave him here. I can’t leave him here. I have to take care of him.”
This was why he texted me. Because he had to leave Garrett and he didn’t know how.
I crossed the room and crouched down in front of him. As quietly and gently as I could, I said, “His death will be in every paper. His parents will have to read about his mistakes. Reporters will hound you and your friends while you grieve. There will be new rumors about your drug use and your links to the drug trade. It will be a fiasco. You know that.”
His voice trembled when he said, “I was hoping she’d wake up. I wanted her to wake up.”
“I know you did, but she’s still out cold.” I held out my hand. “It’s time to go.”
He didn’t take my hand. He just stood.
I was perfunctory, that was my role. Quiet as I could be, I said, “I am going to scan the hallway. When I give you the all clear, you go straight down the stairs and out the front door. Outside, make a right, go two and a half blocks to Worcester Street and there will be a car waiting. I’ll be ten paces behind you.” I took the baseball cap I was wearing off my head and handed it to him. His nostrils flared, but he took it and fiddled with the plastic snaps, adjusting the size. I added, “Don’t stop. Don’t look back.”
Ignoring my intention to give him an all clear, he pushed past me, heading for the exit. “I know the drill. Be invisible. I am no one, nothing to see.” Behind us the girl made a noise, a little sleepy sound. He started to look back toward the bed so I stepped left, bisecting his line of vision. He was forced to look at me, not her. I brought my finger to my lips—shhhh—and with a stern look, I urged him to get going and get the fuck out. He swallowed, turned back, and pressed his ear to the door, listening for possible witnesses. When he was satisfied, he went, casually, without looking back.
In the room alone, I counted to twenty. Then I turned, taking one more glance at Garrett. I didn’t know him well, but I knew he had a bad story, a fucked-up childhood that kept him twisted and sinking, even after he made it safely to the shore. I pitied him. I felt sad he was dead in a dirty bed next to a girl who might not even care enough to report his death. But if she didn’t, there would be an anonymous tip because Bruno loved him, so I would make sure that he was discovered. He would be well cared for. I’d do it for Bruno.