“You know, Dorothy came back,” Will said. “You could come back too. Be a Loner. Those phone chargers were a big hit.
They’d love you if they knew you supplied them.”
“Ugh, shut uuuuup,” Smudge said.
“I’m saying, we’d like to have you. Why not? It would be fun.”
“I like it here.”
Smudge ate raisins off the floor.
“Well, anyway… I’m gonna take her on a date,” Will said. “I just need to come up with somewhere great. I’m out of ideas.”
“Oh, I got it.”
Will sat up, excited for the big idea.
“In my pants,” Smudge said.
“Come on. I’m serious.”
“So am I. Do yourself a favor. Don’t fall for a Pretty One. Just don’t. They smile at you, but they don’t mean it, they just want the attention. The moment you go for it, they’ll laugh at you.”
“She’s not a Pretty One anymore.”
“No? You think that shit just goes away? Trust me, she’s a tease.”
“Lucy’s not like them,” Will said.
“Yeah, well, none of us are like we used to be, are we?”
“She’s different. Don’t say that shit about her.” Smudge flicked a laser pointer on and off, beaming the sparkling red light into Will’s left eye.
“Willie, she’s another bitch like the rest of ’em.” Will couldn’t stand to look him, the little worm, hunched over in the corner of his dirty box. What did he know about girls? Will shot to his feet.
“Fuck you, man. Why do I even hang out with you?” Will said.
Will stomped away, toward the exit.
“Hey, wait!” Smudge said.
“Go to hell.”
“I didn’t mean it.”
Will kept walking. “Yeah, well, you look like a fetus. I don’t mean that either.”
Smudge caught up with Will by the door and gripped Will’s elbow with his dry, chicken-bone fingers.
“Hey I’m sorry! You don’t have to leave,” Smudge said.
“Why can’t you be happy for me?”
“I went too far, okay? It’s probably gonna be fine with Lucy.
You’re right, it could be it, y’know? She could… like you.”
“Whatever, man. You’re still being dicky, even when you apologize.”
Will pulled his arm away and walked out the door.
“I know a place you could take her on a date,” Smudge said.
Will stopped. He turned back. Smudge’s eyes were wide, desperate.
“A place no one else knows about. Would blow her mind, for sure,” Smudge continued.
“Is this a joke?”
Smudge shook his head. His forehead wrinkled with worry.
“Can you vouch for her?” Smudge asked. “Can you guaran-tee she can keep a secret?”
Will couldn’t think of anyone he trusted more than Lucy.
And this was starting to sound really good.
“Yeah. Definitely.”
Smudge fished a folded-up sheet of paper out of his pocket, along with a pen. He scrawled something along the top edge, then tore that part of the paper off.
“You’ll keep coming by, right?” Smudge said, eyes downcast.
The torn ribbon of paper dangled from Smudge’s fingers.
Will ached to know what was on it.
“Why? So you can make fun of me more?” Will said.
Smudge looked up.
“You’re the only one who talks to me,” he said.
Will cringed. Smudge talked so much shit, sometimes Will forgot how sad and lonely he was.
“I can maybe stop by tomorrow?” Will said.
“Sure, whatever,” Smudge said.
He handed Will the paper.
“All right, dumbass, see you later,” Will said, and walked away fast.
“Yeah, later, prick,” Smudge said eagerly.
Will rushed around the corner, and when he got to the first functioning ceiling light, he opened the paper. It was the combination to a lock. And underneath the combo, in large, chicken-scratch letters, it read: Locker 733.
18
David’s machete clapped against his back with every step. He’d fashioned a sheath for it out of thick, folded cardboard and fastened it to his back with string. He looked over the chaos of the market, at all the flapping mouths, the bared teeth, and the grabbing hands.
He didn’t want to be here long. Get in, get out. Thirty Loners stood behind him carrying goods for trade; the rest he’d sent back to the Stairs with the food they’d need until the next drop came.
“Ritchie, take Nelson and your team to the Sluts. Try to get the bulk of supplies from them. Toilet paper, soap, the usual.
Everybody else, make your free trades, but stick close to each other.”
“Loners!” somebody shouted over the crowd. David didn’t have to look up to know who it was: Bobby Corning, the Freaks’ leader, who now insisted on being called Jackal. He painted his face white. He thought it made him look undead.
David couldn’t bring himself to call Bobby Jackal. Before he’d decided to reinvent himself as a satanic singer-songwriter, Bobby had spent his freshman year in pastel polo shirts. That was hard to forget.
“You picked a good day to die!” Bobby said as he cut through the market with a swarm of Freaks behind him. Other gangs stopped what they were doing to watch.
“That’s your big line?” David said with a grin that covered up the anxiety churning his insides. “I hope you didn’t spend all day on it.”
Bobby’s face soured. “No, I just came up with it right now!” he said. He flipped his blue bangs out of his eyes with his sharpened black nails.
David relaxed a little. He already had the upper hand.
“You owe us a TV, bitch!” Bobby said. He got in David’s face.
Will lunged for Bobby. David barely caught him by the waist of his pants. He yanked Will back beside him.
“You want that TV? You come and get it! Bring all your poser friends!” Will said, trying to fight David off in the same breath. David motioned for Gonzalo to intercede. Gonzalo wasted no time picking Will up and walking him away to the back of the group. But he still got one last jab in. “They can watch me beat your face in, toilethead!”
“It’s Jackal!” Bobby shouted after Will, spit flying from his mouth. He turned sharply to David. “Who the hell are you, huh? The Loners? You’re not a gang, you’re nothing.” The Freaks creaked forward in their shoes, waiting for Bobby to say the word. Grab your machete, Bobby’s eyes seemed to say. David had only thirty people with him; the rest were on the other side of the school by now. That’s why Bobby had picked the market instead of the quad to face off. Bobby had at least sixty Freaks with him now. The Loners would lose.
“Just take it easy, Jackal,” David said.
“Stay outta the drops, Loner. You’re messing with our livelihood,” Bobby said, getting louder so other gangs could hear.
“You’re messing with the whole food chain! I want to hear it, right now! I want to hear you say the Loners are off the quad for good.”
“Fuck off,” David said. His hand crept up toward his machete.
The Freaks raised their weapons, but they didn’t have a chance to use them. Varsity surrounded the Freaks. Bobby’s nose crinkled in confusion as Sam stepped out from the forest of his guys. David was shocked. Everyone was. Sam hadn’t made a public appearance since he was nearly killed by the Scrap mob in the quad.
Sam looked pale, which was an odd thing for David to think, considering no one had been outside over a year. But this sort of pale was different. It was a sickly pale; the natural ruddiness of his skin was gone. Sam’s eyes seemed darker too, like his pupils had spilled and stained his corneas. Sam rushed toward Bobby and David. David sped up his reach for his machete, and as he wrapped his fingers around the hilt, Sam grasped Bobby’s hair.
With a single yank, Sam pulled Bobby off his feet and dragged him to the closed door of a classroom. The door had a two-by-two-foot window in it, at head level. Sam slammed Bobby’s head into it. David heard the glass crack with a pop.
The Freaks lurched forward, shouting, but Varsity held them back. They watched as Sam pressed Bobby’s face hard into the cracked glass, and leaned close. He whispered in Bobby’s ear, but he kept his eyes locked on David. Sam’s eyes quivered with rage.