Don’t Let Me Go(34)

“Hmm,” Rayleen said.

“Well, we’re all in one piece,” Felipe said. “So I’m going back upstairs. If it was a drive-by, we’ll hear sirens in a minute.”

“Goodnight, Felipe,” Grace shouted. Then, when he was gone, Grace said, only slightly more quietly, “I’m going to go ask Mr. Lafferty if he gave me this. Because then if he says yes I can say thank you.”

“It’s ten thirty,” Rayleen said. “That’s a little late to go knocking on his door. Besides, Felipe said he wasn’t home.”

“Or that he just wouldn’t answer because it was Felipe. Besides, we know he’s awake if he’s home, because somebody just shot off a gun.”

“OK, you can try,” Rayleen said. “But then come running right back down.”

“’K,” Grace said, and flew away.

As soon as she did, Rayleen leveled Billy with a look reserved for the adults of the building.

“What do you make of all this?”

“No idea,” he said.

“You really think Lafferty would do something that nice?”

“Maybe. He might. When she asked him for the dance floor, he had it back here in under an hour. Maybe he hates other grown-ups and loves kids. Some people can only tolerate little kids or dogs. Or both. It happens.”

“You don’t suppose these two things are connected?” she asked, holding up the gift certificate.

“What two things?”

But just then Grace came bounding down the stairs again.

“He must not be home,” she said, “because I said through the door all about how it was me.”

“OK,” Rayleen said. “Let’s just start settling down again, so we can get you back to sleep.”

“Are you kidding me? I’ll never get back to sleep thinking about my tap shoes!”

“Try.”

Grace sighed and slouched back into Rayleen’s apartment.

Rayleen looked up at Billy again.

“No sirens,” she said.

“Yeah. Well. In this neighborhood, minutes might mean hundreds of minutes. Or maybe they won’t come until morning. Maybe even the police don’t want to be down here at night. I wouldn’t put it past them to wait for a safer hour to investigate.”

Rayleen snorted. “And we’re so used to this shit, if nobody was hit, maybe nobody even bothered to phone it in. I’m going back to sleep.”

“What was that thing you were starting to ask me? Something about two things being connected.”

“Oh. Never mind. That was a crazy thought.”

“You know what I think is interesting?” he asked her.

“No, what?”

“I was thinking about the drive-by a few months ago. Lafferty was out in the hall, running around, checking on everybody, but that was almost…it’s like he needed to take charge of it or something.”

“No ‘almost’ about it,” Rayleen said. “It was a power trip. Pure and simple.”

“But other than that, nobody checked on anybody else. We just stayed in our apartments.”

“We didn’t know each other. That’s the difference.”

Grace appeared at Rayleen’s open door, across the hall, looking impatient.

“Are you coming already?” she asked.

Then she rolled her eyes and left again.

“I was thinking that was the difference,” Billy said.

Rayleen smiled just a little, and then let herself out without saying more, and Billy locked the door behind her.

He walked into his bedroom and sat down on the edge of the bed.

“Now we’ll never get back to sleep,” he said.

But he was not entirely correct. Mostly. But not entirely.

? ? ?

For twenty minutes or so, well after the first light of dawn, he drifted off. And was nearly blown over by the wind currents of the beating of wings. Then they disappeared, suddenly, driven away, in a kind of evaporation, by a sharp sound.

He opened his eyes and blinked into the light.

“Don’t tell me. Let me guess,” he said quietly. “Someone is knocking at the door.”

A second knock.

“I want my old life back,” he said.

Grace’s voice, through the door.

“Billy, it’s me, Grace. Don’t get up if you’re in bed, I just want to tell you that I’ll be really late today, because Felipe is taking me to Rayleen’s salon, and then I’m waiting there till she gets off work, and then she’s taking me on the bus to the Dancer’s World store to get tap shoes.”

“Right,” Billy called out. “I saw that one coming.”

“I wish you could be there with us, so I’d know I’d got the best ones.”

“You’ll do fine. Trust the clerk and tell him how much money you have to spend. He’ll help you.”

“What if it’s a she?”

Billy sighed. “The trust part still goes.”

Rayleen’s voice now, through the door.

“Just wanted to let you know I’m right here to make sure you heard that, Billy.”

“Thank you,” he said.

“Go back to sleep now.”

“I will,” he said.