I thought about going to Miguel’s, but it was probably still hot with cops. I don’t need to be associated with what went down there and get my probation revoked. Miguel and company can get along without me for a while.
Maybe Elizabeth? Nope, that chick is obsessed with the murder. She’s also good friends with Yolanda. Hell, that left only one thing, sleep. I stripped and slid under the sheets at ten and zonked out instantly.
I woke sober, wired. I showered and threw on my clothes, grabbed my backpack, and slid my sleek new computer into the padded compartment. Halfway out the door, I froze. There sat my brand-new printer, and I remembered how easy the gang could get in. Might as well tape a Steal Me sign to it. I dropped my backpack on a chair, strode to my kitchen and opened my oven. The assholes would never think to look there, and neither would I. Damn thing smelled of burnt cheese. Caked-on gook blackened every surface. Perfect.
* * *
“Mr. Alvarez could you stay after class? I’d like a word.”
“Yes sir, Dr. Walker.” Startled, I gathered my work and awesome new computer and waited for the rest of the class to file out. I stood in front of the guy who lived and breathed dirt and igneous clay.
“Mr. Alvarez, you have a unique and fascinating way of studying geology. I’m impressed, sir, and I’m not easily impressed. You have potential. I wanted to speak with you about focusing on geology as a career path.”
I left his office taking the stairs three at a time.
I have potential? Me? Junior Alvarez, professional skater on the fringes, keeping it real and not real successfully, has potential? That was a new one. Scum of the earth? Yes. Worthless? Always. Dear old Dad delighted in telling me how sorry he felt for screwing my mother in the back of his pickup and getting me as his punishment. Well, kiss my ass, Dad. I got potential, and by god a career with a future staring me in my ugly puss.
I swaggered down the hallway back at school and drew stares from my stares from my peers as I leaped up the stairs to class. Oh, hell yes, my peers. I could get used to A’s. Last semester I got on the dean’s list. Who knew there was a dean’s list? There are no boundaries for this vato. A future? I felt buzzed, electric, hopeful. It almost quieted that little voice inside that wondered how long it would last.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Kailey
“Mr. and Mrs. Williams, I am so sorry to say that your son, Levi, was a victim of a drive-by shooting last night.”
Mr. Williams slumped in his chair. His wife shrilled “Oh, nooo!” and covered her face with her hands. The sound must have roused him, because he leaned over and wrapped his arms around her. They stayed like that for a long minute, not saying anything, swaying slightly in their grief.
I felt their pain acutely, filtered through the tragedy of my own loss. They wept for all the promise and love lost to that random, brutal act of senseless violence.
Mr. Williams looked up; his gaze bore into me. “How? Where? Why?” he croaked. They were all the words his vocal chords could manage.
“No, no, no,” Mrs. Williams murmured to herself, her eyes closed. “No, no, no.” Her whole body trembled with the pain behind each word.
I cleared my throat. “I’m sorry to have to do this,” I said.
Their heads snapped up.
“If we are to catch the animals who did this to your son, I need to start with his friends. Can you tell me who they might be?”
“Roberta?” Mr. Williams queried.
“Yes, forgive me.” Mrs. Williams opened her eyes, and I watched an amazing transformation as the quivering, blubbering woman changed into one with steely resolve and clear eyes. She cleared her throat and brushed hair back from her face. I saw a glimpse of a formidable woman used to getting her way and navigating the treacherous waters of Midland’s moneyed class. “I have their names, addresses, phone numbers, and their parents’ names in my phone.” She thrust her diamond encrusted cell at me. “I have them grouped. Check under Levi. If any one of the names on this list gives you any trouble, call me.” She cleared her throat. “I will straighten them out.”
I grabbed the phone. She held onto it for a second, mascara streaming down her pampered, translucent skin. “Promise me,” she said. “When you do your job, which I fully expect that you will, and you find who did this, tell me.” One last tug before she let go. “Promise you’ll tell me who killed my precious boy. Will you do that for me, officer?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said.
“Do you swear it? From one mother to another?”
“How did you know I was—?”
“Oh, my dear, please. Do you swear?”
“You have my word.”
“That’s all I need.” She stood. “Come, Curt. We are through here.” She held her hand out and pulled her husband to his feet as if he were a big, lumbering child. “Keep the phone as long as you need. I’ll get another.”
I watched them leave and marveled at how deceptive first impressions can be.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Junior
“Hey, Junior, how ya doin?” Brittney hooked her arm in mine. She flicked her hair back with a toss of her head and marched in step with me.
“Brittney, hey girl. How ya doing yourself?”
“Since you asked.” She stopped and counted on her fingers. “I got up late. I couldn’t find a parking spot. Spilled latte on my best jeans. Plus, I need to sweet-talk my calc professor into an A or my dad will kill me.”
I copped a serious attitude. “Sounds like you’re doing great.”
I smiled and she laughed.
“Can’t complain. Much.” She slapped me on the shoulder. “Dude, why aren’t you at any of the parties around here?”
“Didn’t know about them, babe.”
A screech behind us startled me, and we turned in time to catch Grace as she flew into us. “Guys, guys. Did you get your papers done?” She panted.
I peered at my watch. Business Law 101 clear across campus began in two minutes.
“Of course.” Brittany dismissed her question.
“Did you, Junior?”
“Not until about two this morning. Don’t know if I’m cut out for business law. I won’t let it beat my butt. I’ll pass it if it kills me.”
Grace confessed, “I barely got it done. If Dad didn’t help me I wouldn’t have finished. I got hung up on torts and bailments. He had to explain the whole concept over and over. Old Mrs. Kingston drones on so, I can hardly keep my eyes open, and I love law. I can’t wait to get into real live criminal and civil cases. Trusts, property, bailments, torts, and consumer protection are all so boring.” She rolled her eyes. “I come from a long line of distinguished lawyers, and I’ll be damned if Kingston will ruin it for me.”
Brittney commented, “Maybe if you didn’t spend so much time with Ken you might be able to work on your paper.”
“Ah, Brittney, jealous of my bubba-licious?”
I opened the door to the classroom with thirty seconds to spare, and Brittney whispered on her way by me, “Give me a break. Bubba-licious my ass.”
I asked Grace as she passed, “Wait a minute, is your dad ‘The Carlos Sanchez’ of the Sanchez, Sanchez, and Sanchez Law firm? The criminal lawyer on TV who gets everyone he represents off?”
“Yep,” she whispered. “In five years I’ll be the next Sanchez on that door.” She stood tall and scooted past me to take her seat at the desk next to mine.
I leaned over after I sat. “I thought you two were only interested in drama, Grace.”
“It's perfect practice for presenting to juries. I’m learning how to nuance my performances to suit my audience. My dad told me to take the class. I’m learning how to lift an eyebrow and how to modulate my voice for effect.” She demonstrated, and it was a sight to behold.
These girls are funny, smart and sweet. Weird, the females I knew before Midland were only out for number one or drugs. Evolution. Who knew it would happen to me in the middle of Nowhere, Texas? It stopped for
the dinosaurs during the Paleozoic Era and picked back up for Junior Alvarez in the Vato Era.
After class Grace and Brittney fell in step with me. “Comin’ to the party tonight, Junior?”
I countered with “We have a lot of law homework, and the quiz tomorrow.”
“Let’s go to the library and do an intensive study group of three,” Brittney said. “We’ll shoot questions at each other until we know tort law inside out. Then, we divide up the chapters on real estate law and share answers. Any of them that don’t make sense we hash out until they do. If two heads are better than one, three heads ought to kill it.”
I’d never been in a study group. Sounded like it might be a trip. “Let’s do it. I don’t have another class until four.”
The girls and I headed for the library.
Two hours later I understood a lot more about real estate law and torts than I ever would have studying on my own. Those two ladies were smart, and I thought I did pretty well myself. Each of us brought something to the discussion.
“I think we nailed it.” Grace slammed her book shut. “All that's left is for you, Mr. Alvarez, to pinky swear you’ll come to the party with us.”
“Sorry. I do a pinky swear and I lose my Man Card. What kind of party is it?”
They both chattered at once.
“Hold it! Chill. One at a time, guys.”
They stared at one another, and Grace pointed at Brittney. “You go.”
“Okay,” Brittney said. “Our sorority has been invited to a campus fraternity party. We can bring a plus one, and since Grace is all tied up with Ken, I thought you could be my plus one. It’s not a date, Junior. Don’t give me that funny look.”
I had zero idea what funny look she might be referring to.
“It’s a plus one, not a date. You don’t want me to be that lonely girl in the corner, do you?”
“Somehow, Brittney, I don’t see you as that lonely girl at all.”
She laughed.
“Then it’s settled. You’ll come? Please?” Grace pleaded.
“Girls, I don’t have anything in common with your friends. Or, sororities and fraternities for that matter. I’d stick out like a sore thumb.”
“We like how you stick out.” That comment got both of them giggling. “We want you there. We need you there.”
“Pretty please?” They begged in unison, one on either side of me, clinging to an arm.
“It’s a Nuts and Bolts party,” Grace said. “You’ll meet bunches of people from this school that are a lot of fun and really nice.”
“What’s a Nuts and Bolts party?”
“Seriously? You don’t know Nuts and Bolts?” Brittany said.
I tried hard to appear interested. “Nope. Never heard of it. In all my party experience, that is a new one.”
Grace answered. “You pay your five dollars at the door. If you’re a girl, they hand you a nut. If you’re a guy, a bolt. Nuts and bolts.”
“I get that part,” I said.
“Then you have to find the nut that threads onto your bolt. When you do, you take it to the bartender for a special drink. Same old stuff: Skippy, kegs, Jungle Juice.”
“Skippy and Jungle Juice?”
“Skippy is cheap vodka, beer, and frozen pink lemonade concentrate mixed all up. Jungle Juice is usually purple . . .” Brittney scrunched her forehead.
Grace saved her. “Jungle Juice is Kool-Aid and grain alcohol. Now you will come, right?”
“The nuts and bolts are for drinks?” I asked.
“Junior, you dirty boy,” Grace said, all wide-eyed and innocent. “What did you think?”
“Never mind.”
They started up again. “Pleassse?”
Grace batted her eyelashes and tugged on my arm. “Our sorority sisters will be so jealous. They all think you are hot.”
“They don’t even know who I am.”
“Junior,” Brittney said, “you are new at school. You make all the other guys look like such boys. You are modeling for art classes. I mean, duh.”
“Duh, yourself. Fine. I’ll see you tonight unless there are more rules I don’t know about.”
“That's all, promise. Meet us at my house,” Grace said. “At eleven-thirty, and don’t be late. We’ll all go in together.”
“Don’t have a car, babe.”
“Where do you live?”
“Across from the college at the Chaparral Apartments. I could meet you on the corner of Garfield and Siesta Lane.”
“Date.”
The two girls each reached up and kissed my cheek and ran off clapping their hands and giggling.
***
Speakers thumped in the windows of a two-story brick house. Large blue Greek symbols and a banner over the front door announced NUTS AND BOLTS to everyone walking by. Who has to have a title for a party? Weird shit. Decorative white-gone-yellow shutters hung lopsided from every window. An assortment of trash littered the front lawn. This should be interesting. Never been to a bash like this, and I’m friggin’ sober.
We paid five dollars at the door. The girls were given a nut, and I got my bolt. The girls immediately tried to screw their nuts onto my bolt, giggling the whole time. Neither matched, thank the god of stupid party tricks.
We ambled into the crowded first floor. A frat smog of sweat, beer, marijuana, and cheap aftershave closed in behind us. We each grabbed a red plastic cup and handed it to a blond frat boy standing by a keg. Just looking at him I wanted to punch him in his entitled pretty-boy face. Lucky for him I resisted the urge. He pulled the tap on the keg of warm beer, flipped his long hair back, and said, “Hey, man, find your screw mate, and you get to go up to the second floor for a cold one.” Cute.
Brittney glued herself to my side.
A chubby angel-faced baby who couldn’t be old enough to be at this poor excuse of a party came up to us. “May I try?” she held up her screw, and her face turned the brightest red I’d ever seen on a person.
“Sure. What’s your name?” I held my bolt at her boob level, secure between my thumb and first finger.
“Calista. We’re in the same English class.”
I’d never seen her before. “Yeah, right,” I said. “Good to see you again.”
Her nut, way too small for my bolt, didn’t come close, though she tried it three times.
“Ah. Sorry we don’t fit, Calista. Maybe at our next party.” My finger rubbed her palm. I smiled and moved a little closer.
She took a swig of beer, swallowed wrong and coughed, gasping for breath. I patted her on the back, which seemed to make her cough more. Brittney took over and led the poor girl away. Ah, I still got it. Women swooning at my feet.
The music changed, and Ken and Grace moved to the middle of the room to dance.
After my second lukewarm beer and more women trying to nut my bolt, I’d OD’ed on over-privileged brats flashing hand signs and hitching up pants, posing, talking trash. I decided to explore. My shadow, Brittney, disappeared into a flurry of giggling sorority girls. I stepped around amorous couples draped on the staircase. At the top, a guy dry-humped a girl against a wall. Classy.
The second floor sported a pool table. A few guys slipped money on the rails and waited for their turn at a game. I grabbed a cup of jungle juice, tasty, stood and watched for a while. I got bored and wandered, checking out the place. Several dark bedrooms held couples in varying stages of undress. I watched for a while, felt vaguely like a perv, and moved on. I checked out a bathroom that held a crying girl, barfing. She looked up and shrieked, “Shut the door, asshole!” before she resumed hugging the throne.
I slipped down the staircase and followed it to the basement. Hello, a large sign announced, Drink a Skippy at Your Own Risk! A large bucket with pinkish liquid and a ladle sat next to a large plastic pot of ice. I grabbed a cup and sipped my first Skippy. I turned and watched a very drunk football player push another larger, more hammered football player against a wall as they slow punched each other.
> I’d had enough fun for the night and descended the staircase searching for Brittney and Grace to say good-bye. This party sucked, and an early test awaited me tomorrow.
I hunted for them in the kitchen, front porch, and the dining room. Screw it. I stepped out the kitchen door to the backyard and saw a circle of banger dude wannabes. They had Brittney and Ken trapped in their midst, shoving them from one part of the circle to the other. They hit Ken harder and harder with each guy he stumbled against.
Grace ran out of the house howling. “Stop it, assholes.”
The dudes in droopy drawers laughed and punched him harder.
Brittney stepped between Ken and the next bully up. “Stop this nonsense. Do you hear me?” She looked tough with her hands on her hips.
A big pimple-faced dude flashed a gangsta sign at his buddies and swung a roundhouse at her head. He clipped her on the chin, and she went down.
“Ah, shit.” Thick with rage, I jumped into the sweaty circle of tough guys. I kicked the first guy I came to in the ass, grabbed a fist full of his wife-beater shirt, and swung him around. His arms pawed at me, and I punched him in hard in the gut. He went down. I turned a half circle and grazed the Brittany-clocking jerk on his jaw. He slugged me on my bicep. I swiveled my side to him, hands up, open and ready. He took the opportunity to bull rush me low. The kid had some moves, I’ll give him that. The other dudes jumped in for a gang punch-fest and left me no choice. I went full-on jail on their asses. Rushing Bull got the toe of my boot in his nuts and he went down, puking in the grass. I head butted the next guy and dislocated his jaw with my fist. I blew out another one’s knee, and he screamed and fell to the ground clutching his wounded leg. Whiney bunch of pussies.
Grace rushed over to Ken and took a boxing stance, bobbed and weaved through a couple of drunk punches thrown by the skinny beaner about to hit Ken after I took care of his buddy. She connected with a respectable one-two punch. He went down with a whoosh.
West Texas Dead: A Kailey and Shinto Mystery Page 14