The Debt

by M. O’Keefe

  “Tommy! Beth needs you!”

  I opened my eyes as best I could, which meant one eye kind of opened. The other not so much.

  “Oh, thank God.” It was Simon, next to me. “Your breathing is so shallow, man, I thought you died.”

  I lifted my hand to try and touch my eye, but my hands were handcuffed to the chair I was sitting on. Simon was next to me in the same situation. Across a small table sat Carissa. She was handcuffed too.

  And her pajamas were covered in blood.

  Oh. Shit.

  I gagged and it hurt so bad I almost passed out.

  “Where’s Beth?” I asked, clinging to the thing that mattered most.

  “We don’t know,” Simon said.

  “Don’t… know?” I gasped.

  “The ambulance came and they took her away.”

  Ambulance? Was that bad? Or good? I decided good because it meant she wasn’t here and she wasn’t dead.

  “Where… are we?” I asked. The room was totally bare. Four chairs. One table. A two-way mirror on one wall. Well, shit. Stupid question. I’d been in enough police interrogation rooms to recognize where we were. The smell alone—bleach not doing its job against bitter coffee and vomit. “Who called… the police?”

  “She did,” Carissa said, looking out the small window of the door. “His wife.”

  “What happened?” I asked, my eyes on Carissa’s previously pink pajamas. “Is he dead?”

  “We shouldn’t talk about it,” Simon said, looking at that big wall full of one-way glass. “They’re probably listening.”

  “He’s dead,” Carissa confirmed, expressionless and still.

  “Did you kill him?” I asked. I mean…it seemed obvious…all that blood. But I couldn’t remember a fucking thing. I pushed the knife across the floor and he knocked me out.

  Carissa opened her mouth.

  “Don’t!” Simon barked. “Don’t answer that. For the love of God, don’t…say another word.”

  Well, that seemed like legit legal advice.

  Carissa must have agreed. She shut her mouth and turned again to look out the small window in the door. The bright rectangle of yellow light.

  We were going to jail—the fact was as real as that door. As real as the handcuffs. As real as my broken face.

  “Police brought us here,” Simon said and I could tell he was still clinging to some kind of hope. Like his big brain would get him out of this. “We were all in separate rooms, I thought you’d been taken to the hospital. But about ten minutes ago, they put us in here with you.”

  “That’s…weird, isn’t it?” I asked, because my head was so fuzzy and as far as I’d ever experienced, divide and conquer was pretty much police procedure. Letting us sit in here together and get our story straight was not how this shit went.

  “Listen,” Simon said. “I don’t know why they have us all together here. But it’s fucking serious. So no one talks. Not to anyone who comes in that door.”

  I felt myself smile. Or try to anyway. Fresh blood flooded my mouth from a split on my lip. “You gonna…be…our lawyer?” I panted.

  Simon’s dark face flushed red. “We’re in serious fucking trouble, Tommy.”

  Well, I was pretty sure that I was going to die, and that felt like all the trouble I could handle. But Simon… Simon had had big plans. He took his life and his future seriously. He was going to age out in a few months, take the government money and go to college. Make a difference. It didn’t take a genius to know he wasn’t made like me. He was made for more than St Joke’s. And dude deserved that. So did Carissa over there covered in blood. I’d remember her coming up those steps with the knife in her hand for the rest of my life. Standing beside me at the door.

  Ride or die, that was Carissa.

  “I’ll tell them…it was me,” I said. “Only…me.”

  “You were knocked out,” Simon whispered. “You don’t even know what happened.”

  “And it wasn’t just you,” Carissa said. “We did it together. All of us.”

  That shouldn’t make me feel good. Shouldn’t make me feel a little bit like I wasn’t alone, dying handcuffed to a chair. But it did.

  The door opened, finally, and we blinked at the brighter light it let in. God, my head felt like a helium balloon.

  One man stood there, tall and thin and blond. He looked like a serious lawyer in a serious suit. He said something to someone behind him and then he walked in and shut the door behind him.

  The silence in the room pounded. Cold sweat ran down my whole body.

  “Are you a cop?” Simon asked, sitting up straight. I liked that he was speaking for us. I was shit at talking my way out of trouble. Simon had that kind of thing locked down.

  The man sat down in the chair next to Carissa, unbuttoning his jacket as he sat. “I am not a cop,” he said in a low voice. He glanced at all of us but did a kind of funny double take when he saw me. He had eerie-as-fuck pale gray eyes, and they narrowed like someone was going to be in trouble.

  “Have you had medical care?” he asked.

  “What does it look like?” Simon snapped. “This is police brutality and we demand a lawyer.”

  The stranger smirked at him.

  “I’m fine,” I wheezed, determined to give this man nothing.

  “Clearly,” the stranger said. He stood up and went back and opened the door. A cop followed him back in.

  “I think the cuffs can be done away with,” the stranger said.

  “You’re joking, right?” the cop asked, scowling at us like we’d shit on the floor.

  “Do I look like I’m joking?”

  “You know what these kids did?”

  “I do. And I don’t think them killing the man who abused them means they are about to go on a killing spree,” he said.

  We all looked at each other at the word abuse. What the fuck did this guy know?

  “It’s your fucking funeral,” the cop said, and one by one he unlocked our handcuffs. Simon immediately stood up, his back to the corner, rubbing his wrists.

  I stayed slumped in the chair, because nothing really worked anymore. Not my lungs or my legs.

  Carissa too stayed seated, her hands spread wide over the table.

  “Where’s Beth?” I asked when the cop left.

  “The hospital,” the stranger said. “Her mother is there.”

  Carissa, Simon and I all shared a brief look at that. Her mother was real. And finally showed up. Too fucking late. I wondered, in some faraway way, if that was good or bad, her mother finally showing up.

  “Who are you?” Simon had his chin up like a proper street thug.

  “My name is Bates,” the stranger said.

  “Is that supposed to mean something to us?” Simon asked.

  “To you?” Bates looked at Simon in one long sweep of a glance. “No. But I work for a man named Lazarus.”

  “Oh shit. What does Lazarus want with us?” I asked. Because Lazarus was bad news. Lazarus was king of all the darkest parts of San Francisco. And if this guy worked for him—that was why we’d been put together in a room like this and how Bates got our handcuffs off.

  Lazarus and his men had the kind of power that could get shit like that done—even in a police station. Especially in a police station.

  And if Lazarus was mad that we’d killed The Pastor tonight—we were dead. Finished.

  Bates could be here to walk us out into the parking lot, put us into the trunk of some car, and we’d never be heard from again.

  Distantly, behind all the pain, I felt fear. A lot of fear.

  “Lazarus wants nothing to do with you,” Bates said. “I’m here on my own business.”

  Weird, but that didn’t make me feel any better.

  “I know who you are,” said Carissa. She was fucking chilling, sitting there in all that blood. “Who you really are.”

  The guy was unreadable, and he and Carissa just looked at each other for a long minute.

  “Were you hurt?”
he asked her in a quiet voice.

  Carissa leaned forward and said through her teeth, “It’s not my blood.”

  Fucking badass, our Carissa. Who would have guessed?

  Watching Bates, I realized he wasn’t too much older than us. I was sixteen, Carissa fifteen, Simon seventeen, Bates might have been twenty-five? Hard to say, but he was young.

  If he was in Lazarus’ kingdom, it didn’t matter how young or old he was, all that mattered was that he was brave enough, or crazy enough to kill for the kingdom.

  “You a lawyer?” Simon asked.

  “No,” Bates answered calmly.

  “We demand a lawyer.” Simon’s voice cracked and his glasses slipped down his nose and he pushed them back up with his wrist. He didn’t look like a murderer. He looked like a spelling bee champion.

  “A lawyer isn’t going to help you.” Bates crossed his legs at the knee and pulled a piece of lint from his pants.

  “Then why are you here?” Simon asked.

  “As you can imagine, you three are in a great deal of trouble. The thin ice you were on as court-placed minors is broken. The prosecutors would like to try you all as adults for first-degree murder.”

  “It was me,” I said, gasping. It was really getting harder to breathe. My vision was gray at the edges. “All me. They didn’t do shit. Look at him,” I said, tilting my head towards Simon. “He’s going to be a fucking accountant. And she…” My head rolled listlessly towards Carissa. I hoped this was enough because this was all I fucking had. “Tried to stop me.”

  “That’s a very noble lie you’re telling,” Bates said.

  “Fuck you. I’m not lying.”

  He didn’t believe me.

  I opened my mouth to keep arguing but Carissa interrupted. “Just…shut up, Tommy.”

  “I’m afraid the man you killed, his wife has told everyone who will listen that that the three of you acted together. That you planned it, and you planned on killing her and robbing them and the church.”

  “That’s not true!” Simon cried.

  Bates shrugged. “That is something you are welcome to prove in court.”

  Again, Simon, Carissa and I looked at each other. We knew how this would go. A public defender who wouldn’t bother to learn our names would represent us, and it would be considered a success if we weren’t gassed when we turned twenty-one.

  We’d grow old in jail. Get out as middle-aged adults with our GEDs and a black mark by our names.

  “This can’t be happening,” Simon moaned and I felt bad for him. I did. He should have stayed at his desk.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Carissa said. “The system is made up of people like us. Wrong thing for the right reasons and no money to defend ourselves.”

  If I survived my injuries, I was going to jail. And I couldn’t say it wasn’t worth it. I was too late to stop him from hurting Beth, hurting all of us really, but we’d paid him back. We’d brought some righteous vengeance down on him. I wondered what his congregation would think of that.

  But these two…they deserved better.

  I had to figure out how to get them out of this.

  “However, I am here to present you another alternative,” Bates said.

  Simon perked right up and I wanted to tell him to calm the fuck down. To not be so eager to make a deal with the devil. Because this guy, in his slick suit, he was the devil.

  It was as plain as could be.

  “What’s the alternative?” Simon asked.

  “You can walk out that door. Free—”

  “Why? How?” Simon asked, and Bates held up his hand to silence him.

  “With the understanding that you owe me a debt. And when I come calling for payment on that debt, you’ll do as I ask or you will find yourself right back in this room, only there will be no escape. And you will go to jail.”

  “But the statute of limitations—”

  “I don’t think you understand the nature of my power,” Bates said, looking angry for the first time. Next to him, Carissa stiffened, her face creased in a quick taut panic. “I can free you from this room. From the very serious charges against you. I can wipe away the crime you’ve committed. The crime with witnesses and murder weapons found in your bloody hands. I can make that all go away. Do you honestly think for one moment I can’t also settle upon your shoulders another crime, equally violent, equally disturbing, that you had nothing to do with?”

  Simon wanted to argue, I could see it on his face. But this man got our handcuffs taken off. He got us put in this room together. He walked in and sat down like he owned this precinct.

  “Dude,” I groaned. “It’s real. He’s legit. Why do you think we’ve been put together like this? Not even questioned? That cop acted like he was his boss.”

  And if he worked for Lazarus, he had that kind of power and more.

  Simon swallowed, his glasses catching the light from the hallway. He was having a hard time believing it, and maybe I would too if I wasn’t about to pass out.

  “What will we have to do for you?” Simon asked. “In the future.”

  “Whatever I ask.”

  “Will it be illegal?” he asked.

  Bates smiled like a shark. “Probably.”

  Simon swallowed, his face gray.

  “Listen,” I said, feeling a horrible collar go around all our necks. “You don’t want these two. I’ll owe…you. Me. I’ll work for you. Whatever you want.”

  “Tommy,” Simon breathed. “No.”

  “Interesting,” Bates said. “You know what I’ll ask you to do, don’t you? What it means to work for me?”

  Killing, maybe. Hurting, definitely. Bile rose up in my throat but I nodded anyway. “Better…me…than…them.”

  Bates watched me for a long time and I tried to sit up straight as if to show how big I was.

  “I’m growing…if…I got…enough to eat…”

  Starving me was a favorite punishment of theirs. I had not been full in years.

  “You’d be massive,” Bates said, cocking his head. “But it’s not your size that interests me. It’s your loyalty.”

  “Tommy,” Simon said. He touched my shoulder but I shook him off. “Don’t do this.”

  “What about The Wife?” Carissa asked, pulling Bates’ attention from me. “She witnessed everything.”

  “I can handle her,” Bates said in a voice that sent chills down my spine.

  “There was another girl,” Simon said.

  “Rosa.” Bates nodded. And it wasn’t even weird that he knew her name. I mean it was, but this guy was like God coming down and promising shit that didn’t even make sense. Of course he’d know about Rosa.

  “She might get in trouble—”

  “I’m trying to find her,” Bates said.

  Rosa was good at disappearing, but I was still surprised he was trying. I could see Simon trying to swallow back all his questions and I totally understood. I had plenty of my own.

  “Will we have to go back into foster care?” Simon asked.

  “That’s not my concern,” Bates said. “My deal only gets you out of these doors. After that, everything is up to you.”

  “They have to find us first, right?” Carissa asked. “The parole officers and social workers?”

  “That’s the view I would take,” Bates said in his calm cool voice.

  There were a thousand places in this city kids like us could hide. We’d be smarter this time. We wouldn’t get caught.

  Carissa got to her feet, her chair screeching across the floor behind her. “I agree to your terms.”

  “No!” I shouted and nearly passed out. “Don’t, Carissa!”

  “You didn’t kill him, Tommy. This isn’t your fault. I’m doing this.”

  Bates watched her out of the corner of his eye, like she was some unpredictable animal that might attack. It was the blood on her pajamas. Totally unnerving.

  And just like that Carissa walked out of the room. I heard her footsteps down the hallway and no o
ne stopped her. Not one cop. I imagined her walking out into the night. No cops. No foster homes. She would vanish just like Rosa.

  I couldn’t pretend I didn’t want that freedom. I wanted it so bad I could taste it.

  “So do I,” I said. “I accept your terms. Leave Simon out of it.” I got to my feet, ready to follow Carissa down that hallway, but the room spun around me and my knees buckled. Simon rushed to my side and helped me back into my seat.

  “You need to get to the hospital,” he said.

  “I’ll be fine,” I said, swallowing down vomit. God, I was fucked up. Breathing was growing impossible.

  “What about you, Simon Malik?” Bates looked at Simon. “Do you agree? Because it has to be all of you or none of you.”

  “Why are you doing this?” Simon asked, and I wanted to tell him to just shut up. To stop questioning everything.

  Bates stood, buttoning his jacket, looking like a CEO and not a killer, though I knew he had plenty of blood on his hands.

  He shook his head. Whatever the answer was to that question, he wasn’t telling a bunch of kids. “Do you agree to the terms or should I have the police come in and start the booking process? At this point, you would be the only defendant. And that will not look good for you.”

  “Agree to the terms, Simon,” I said. I’d lost the fight to keep my friends safe. We were all drowning together, tied to a killer named Bates. Jesus, the lights were suddenly getting brighter in here.

  “I agree to the terms,” Simon said.

  And it was done. Our futures sealed.

  Bates walked out, the door clicking shut behind him. It was weird…eerie how it felt like we’d dreamt him.

  “Simon,” I said. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Fuck off with that. We got bigger problems.”

  Bigger problems. And I caused them all.

  Simon crept to the door and looked out the window.

  “No one’s coming,” Simon said.

  “We gotta get…out,” I panted. Simon helped me to my feet and we lurched our way out of the police station. Waiting, every step, for someone to stop us.

  But we pushed open the door and the sea salt air of San Francisco and the roar of traffic in the outside world felt like a goddamned hug.