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The silence on the other end of the line was deafening.
“Dre,” she said finally. Her voice was flat.
“What?” I asked, bracing for it.
“You’re fired.”
* * *
Fired twice in one day, just when I thought things were finally turning around.
I should have known better. In my twenty-two years, things had never turned around for me. I curled myself up into a ball on my futon, watching as the sun came up over the sky. I hate the sun, I thought, and I did. I hated the sun, the sky, my futon, and James Preston. Not necessarily in that order.
I had no idea what I was going to do now. Without Elena’s assignments, it would be back to trolling for dates online. Or parking my ass on a street corner, trying to flag down Johns. Or waitressing.
Probably, it was going to be a combination of all of these. But none of it would be enough to keep up with Tommy’s rent. I couldn’t even bear the thought. Before he’d moved in there, he’d lived with my mother. It was a bad situation. My mother was, at best, a drunk. At her worst, she was an irresponsible, abusive user. She’d almost set their apartment on fire three times over the last couple of years by passing out with a lit cigarette in her hand. It wasn’t safe for Tommy there. She never bought him the food he liked or took him to the library. And then there was the string of dirty men she brought home.
I’d tried to move him in with me but I couldn’t do it and work. He needed someone to watch him, to take care of him. Once he’d wandered off and once he’d burned himself trying to make a grilled cheese. New Horizons was the right place for him; it was the happiest he’d ever been.
I needed to help him, and now I couldn’t help him.
I let the tears come then, hot and ugly. And then just as quickly as they’d come, they stopped. Winners never quit and quitters never win, I told myself, wiping my eyes roughly. I’d read that quote somewhere, and I often repeated it to myself, even though my definition of “winning” was probably wildly different from most people’s.
I made myself sit up—I wasn’t any good to anyone if I was just sitting here and wallowing. I’d found a way to keep Tommy safe this long, I reasoned. I could still do it.
I could do it because I had to do it.
I got up and washed my face. I had the idea of going to the library; they had computers and Internet access. I could look for a job online. Part of me wondered whether I’d be able to google “escort services” or “exotic dancer positions” at the public library, but it was better than sitting here, cursing James Preston for firing me and sniffling into my T-shirt.
The phone rang as I was getting dressed. It was Elena. I took a deep breath before I answered it, preparing for the worst. Maybe James had taken my clothes and thrown them all out. Maybe he’d told her that I’d stolen from her, and that he was going to press charges. He wouldn’t do that, part of me wailed, but that was the same part that had believed he’d cared for me.
The common sense part of me bitch-slapped that part, hard, so she’d be quiet.
“Dre,” she said.
“Yes?” I asked, willing myself not to start crying all over again.
“You’re back in my good graces, young lady. I just got off the phone with James Preston—he says he wants you back. He made it clear that he only wants you. He also very generously offered to triple the fee for our trouble. Half is now coming directly to you, per his very specific instructions.”
I couldn’t breathe. I stood there, reeling for a bunch of different reasons. I wasn’t good at math, but this was pretty easy to figure out—three hundred thousand dollars. Holy fucking shit.
“It appears you have nine lives, Dre. But only seven left.”
“What?” I spluttered, finally finding enough breath to talk. “What did he say, exactly?”
“Just what I told you. Oh—and one more thing,” Elena said.
She waited a beat.
“He said that this time, he wants to fuck you.”
James
In the Stratum's gym, I made myself run hard. Then I lifted weights. I did squats. Lunges. Pull-ups. An attractive young blonde nearby kept looking at me, smiling. She started following me on the weight circuit, that stupid friendly smile plastered on her face.
Finally, I just turned and glared at her. “I’m not interested,” I said before she even had the chance to say hello. She just raised her eyebrows and, scowling, backed away.
Smart girl.
