Heroine(53)

The one Oxy I had left is doing its job, but I can’t count on such a low dose for the heavy lifting required to actually make me happy. I’m comfortable for now, but the warmth is fading and I’m very aware that I’m going home to an empty pill bottle, and a mom who is going to be making sure no cash walks out of the house in my hand from now on. I’m wondering if I should text Josie again to see if she figured out anything when my phone goes off with a text from Carolina.

Luther Drake? Are you shitting me?

That didn’t take long.

How did I not know about this?

Her second text takes the smile off my face. She doesn’t know about Luther because I don’t think another story about meeting someone at physical therapy will fly with her, and the truth will go over like a lead brick. I settle for taking a selfie with him and sending it back to her in response.

She answers with a shot of her and Aaron, making faces of extreme shock.

You guys are assholes, I tell them in a group text, to which Aaron sends me a pic of an actual asshole.

That’s not his, Carolina assures me. Witness.

Gross, I shoot back, adding, don’t get pregnant.

People don’t get pregnant from assholes, Aaron replies. Do we need to talk?

YOU don’t get pregnant! Carolina says.

One of the guys Luther knows hits a three and Luther jumps up with the rest of the crowd, both arms in the air. I check once more, but Josie hasn’t answered me yet. I put away my phone as Luther sits back down.

“When’s the last time you talked to Josie?” I ask him.

“When she called Derrick a pussy because he didn’t want to go to a crack house for her,” Luther says. “I’m not in a big hurry to see her again.”

I think of Josie, the loss in her eyes when they left, the shaking of her hands as she positioned Jadine’s needle.

“She didn’t mean it,” I say. “She was just—”

“Strung out. Yeah, I know,” Luther says. “Josie hits it too hard.”

I don’t say anything, checking to make sure my sweatshirt is pulled down to cover the tiny hole in my arm.

“Did what I give you keep her off your back last night?” Luther asks.

“Yeah,” I say, but don’t offer anything more.

A silence falls between us, the first one of the evening.

“So, uh . . . do you know where you’re going to college yet?”

It’s an awkward question, one that anyone could ask, not a guy who likes a girl. But it’s a topic, so I go with it.

“I’m looking at Vencella,” I tell him.

“What are you majoring in?”

“Physical education,” I tell him, and he laughs.

“What?” I ask.

“No one wants to be a gym teacher,” he tells me. “It’s just somewhere they end up.”

“I do,” I insist, hitting him on the shoulder a little harder than necessary. “No, seriously,” I go on, telling him about how I discovered this during our summer softball camps, bringing in the kids and showing them the basics. I have no patience for people my age who can’t step and throw with opposite sides of their bodies, but somebody’s got to teach a kid how to do it.

And it turns out I like being that person.

There was something about seeing it click in their little faces, some with sweat-streaked braids and grime around their mouths. Seeing tanned, skinny arms dotted with freckles and tiny noses scrunched up in concentration when a pitch came in really did it for me.

“Okay, cool,” Luther says, hands up in surrender. “I just don’t want to see you . . .” He pauses, trying to find the right words.

“What?”

“I think you sell yourself short a lot, Mickey,” he says. “I’m not trying to be a downer, I’m just saying. When I came to see you play, I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact you were the same girl I met at Edith’s, you looked so confident.”

“Yeah, well, you know what it’s like when you’re in your own place.”

“Yep.” Luther nods in agreement. “But there’s more to it than that. Your pitcher gets a lot of attention, and I think you’ve convinced yourself you’re just her sidekick.”

“She’s the pitcher,” I remind him. “What I do, it’s not sexy.”

He gives me another look up and down.

“The hell it’s not,” he says.





Chapter Thirty-Four


economical: managing with frugality; guarding against waste or unnecessary expense

Monday brings an ache in my bones as soon as I wake up, the focal point buried deep in my hip, radiating. I can pinpoint the healed cracks in every bone I’ve ever broken, identify every fracture as the waves of pain touch them. Everything I’ve got hurts, but I’m not sweating yet, and my guts aren’t liquid.

I skip my Monday coffee with Big Ed, instead stopping at the dollar store on the way to school, where I grab some Imodium. I wash down four pills when I’m back in the car. I don’t care if I don’t shit for a week, as long as it’s not running down my leg. I chase them with a few Advil so that I don’t feel like my skeleton is pulling apart at the joints. I eye the bottle of water as I feel the last capsule stick in my throat, but resist the urge to drink. I can only sweat so much if I’m dehydrated.