Peter escorts me out, and we drive home, where the table is already set with candles and a bottle of champagne is chilling in a bucket of ice while delicious smells waft from the oven.
“To our new home,” he toasts after pouring us each a glass, and I knock back the fizzy drink, trying not to think about puppet-like bodies in dark alleys and spreading pools of blood.
About the live grenade who’s always at my side.
14
Peter
The movers aren’t due until noon, so after I drop Sara off at work on Friday, I go for a long run with a weighted backpack to imitate the training I used to do with my guys. I need the hard exercise to work off some of the restlessness I’ve been feeling—and to take my mind off how much I miss my workaholic wife.
Ending my run in a quiet, nearly empty park, I strip off my sweat-soaked T-shirt and start on a set of calisthenics, using the eighty-pound backpack to add difficulty to basic one-arm push-ups and pull-ups on a nearby tree.
I’m almost finished when I see a teenage boy running toward me, his T-shirt flapping around his skinny body. For one heart-stopping moment, he looks exactly like my friend Andrey, the one who gave me all of my tattoos at Camp Larko.
The illusion dissolves as the runner gets closer, but I still can’t look away.
The kid is sprinting like the hounds of hell are chasing him, his eyes wild and his arms pumping desperately at his sides. A few seconds later, I see why.
Four older, bigger boys—young men, really—are running after him, yelling out insults as they go.
It’s none of my fucking business, but I can’t help it.
As soon as the Andrey lookalike sprints past me, I unclip my backpack from around my waist and toss it casually on the ground. Then, just as his pursuers are about to barrel past me, I step into their path, extending my arms on both sides.
They screech to a halt, just barely avoiding crashing into me.
“What the fuck, man?” the biggest one snarls. “Move!”
He tries to shove me aside—a major mistake on his part. My well-honed instincts kick in, and a moment later, the guy is sprawled on his ass, groaning, as his three comrades back away, hands raised defensively.
“Scram,” I tell them, and they do, pausing only to grab their fallen friend and drag him away.
I’m bending down to retrieve my backpack when I spot movement out of the corner of my eye.
It’s the kid I helped, his skinny chest heaving as he stares at me. “How did you do that?” There’s awe and envy in his voice.
“Do what?” Picking up my backpack, I stuff my discarded T-shirt into it.
“Take him down like that.”
I shrug, putting on the backpack and securing the straps around my waist. “Just some basic self-defense training.”
“No, dude.” The kid’s blue eyes are huge—and eerily like Andrey’s. “That was something else. Were you in the Army? And are you doing a workout with that?” He points at my backpack.
“Something like that, and yes.” I turn to leave, but the boy is not done with me.
“Can you teach me? How to fight, I mean?”
I pretend not to hear and start jogging.
He’s not deterred. Catching up to me, he jogs at my side. “Can you teach me? Please?”
I pick up my pace. “I’m not in the business of training kids.”
“I’ll pay you.” He’s breathless from the run but somehow manages to keep up with me. “Here.” He sticks his hand into his pocket and returns with a pair of twenties. “They were going to take it anyway, so you might as well have it.”
I’m about to refuse when an idea comes to me. Stopping next to a bench, I eye the kid speculatively. “You want to learn? Really?”
“Yes.” He all but bounces in excitement. “I want to know how to defend myself. I mean, I took a little karate when I was younger, but it didn’t really—”
“How old are you?” I interrupt.
“Sixteen. Well, almost. My birthday is next month.”
“And who were those guys chasing you?”
The boy flushes. “My older brother’s friends. They’re all pledging to a fraternity, and it’s some kind of a ritual for them. You know, grab money from a nerd.”
I almost roll my eyes at the ridiculousness of it all. Am I really considering this?
“Please, sir.” The kid shifts from foot to foot. “My dad always says I need to stand up for myself, but I don’t know how. And the way you just stopped them… I would kill to be able to do that.”
The kid has no idea what he’s saying, but for some reason—maybe because I’m still thinking of Andrey and how he always got picked on at our hellish camp before the sadistic guard boiled him alive—I extend my hand and say, “Give me your cell.”