When the cannabis sinks in, I can breathe again, even though it’s hotter and smellier than ever. “Thanks,” I say, sinking back on the warm, disturbingly soft bags. “Sorry I was being a bitch. Not my first dumpster dive, either.”
I don’t add that mine were voluntary, that I’ve scavenged food this way when things were bad, mostly the year I skipped school. The year before, at the end of my eighth grade, Mom had gotten a decent job and a halfway decent boyfriend and moved us out the trailer park, and for a while, I’d thought it could be better. She spent most of her time at her boyfriend’s house, but I’d take that over the ones she dragged home to bang her headboard against the wall and keep me up all night, then leer at me over coffee in the morning.
And then came the end of summer, and with it, the inevitable. I’d been holding my breath waiting for it even as I hoped it would never come—the moment Mom stumbled in sobbing in the middle of the night. I took care of her as she ranted and raved about how evil he was, how evil all men were. That night was followed, as always, by all-nighters with her friends and whatever guy was drunk enough to bang her, then the loss of her job, this time accompanied by the confession that the only reason she got the decent job in the first place was that she was already seeing Mr. Hot Shot. Still, that was one of her longest relationships, and one of the worst breakups.
Hence the attempts at finding food, which didn’t go too well at first. But then one night after I’d been out with Zephyr, he wanted to stop by a store on the way home. I told him it was closed, and with no shame whatsoever, he shrugged and said it was one of the best places to Dumpster dive. After that, he showed me the places that had good food like dented cans or ones missing labels, and those that locked their Dumpsters, and those that would call the cops if they saw you on their security cameras. Apparently some people would rather the poor starve than get anything for free—even expired food they couldn’t sell and considered trash.
Colt nudges my shoe with his. “What you thinkin’ about there, Teeny?”
“We’re getting high in a Dumpster right now,” I say. “Reclining on our throne of garbage.”
“That’s what you were thinking about?”
“Nah,” I say. “Just some guy I used to know. But what we really should be thinking about is how to get out of here before we bake into a garbage casserole.”
“Ah, relax,” Colt says, tugging at my elbow when I start to rise. “Don’t you want to know what I was thinking about?”
“Sure. What were you thinking about?”
“About that blowjob.”
I can’t help but laugh. “You can’t be serious. We’re in a literal dump surrounded by rotting garbage. That turns you on?”
“No,” he says, grinning at me with slow, stoned eyes. “You turn me on.”
“Be serious,” I say. “And you better not be thinking about raping me just because Baron said that.”
“Not a rapist,” he says. “Even if I was, I wouldn’t fuck with you.”
“Good,” I say. “Because I have a knife.”
“I’ve seen you fight without a knife,” he says. “I wouldn’t fuck with you even if you didn’t have one. You’re a crazy bitch, you know that?”
I jerk my chin in a nod. “Thanks.”
“No worries, Teeny,” he says.
“Well, we’ve got some worries,” I say. “I can’t break the corner of this, and it’s too thick to bend.”
“Someone will come,” he says, toking on the joint and thumbing through his phone.
“Seriously?” I say. “That’s your solution? What if they don’t come? Do you know when the trash truck picks up?”
“No,” he admits.
“And do you have a plan for when they dump the whole bin into their truck and compact us?”
When he doesn’t answer, I take out my knife and start trying to saw my way out. It’s ridiculously hard and agonizingly slow. At last, I hear the rush of students as school lets out and everyone comes outside to hang around and talk or rush to their cars and peel out of the lot.
I hear the scuff of shoes on pavement and freeze, suddenly sure that someone will come tell me I’m destroying city or school property by trying to cut myself out of a death trap. Instead, I hear the jingle of keys, and a second later, someone throws the lid open. I blink against the sunlight, blinded after so long in the dank inside of the bin.
“Not again,” comes a familiar sweet, southern voice. “I thought they were done messing with you. What’d you go and do this time?”
Colt jumps to his feet and vaults over the side of the bin, reaching a tattooed arm over the side for me. I grab it and jump down with him and Dixie, our savior for the day.
“See, someone came,” Colt says, waving his phone at me. “Patience, Teeny. Sometimes that works better than brute force.”
“Tell that to my fists.”