I casually walked across the street so as not to draw any attention to me or Bryce.
“Jackson,” he said, leaning out the window of his car. “Thought I’d give you a ride home from school. Get in.”
I walked around to the passenger side and got in. “What’s up?”
“Just wanted to say thanks for a job well done.”
“Not much of a job really.”
“Well, you’re right, it wasn’t much of a job. More like a test.”
But I’d already suspected that. Now, at least, it was out in the open. “That kryptonite didn’t seem like much of a drug.”
“You opened the package?”
“Of course.”
“You tasted the product?”
“It seemed like the thing to do.”
“What did you think?”
“I think it was bullshit.”
Bryce let out a little laugh, put on a pair of aviator sunglasses, started up the Honda and began to drive. “Sorry, dude. I wasn’t sure I could trust you.”
“Let me guess,” I said. “Brown sugar.”
“How’d you guess?”
“I used to help my mother bake cakes when I was little.”
Bryce nodded. “Mother’s little helper.”
“While I was waiting to get high, I read up on kryptonite. Sounds like some pretty powerful stuff.”
“You better believe it. You don’t want to take too much. Just a little will do ya.”
“So you actually do have the real thing?”
“Hell yeah.”
I had read it produced an almost instant mind-numbing high but that the buzz didn’t last long, so some users would snort it, get zonked, come down, snort it, again and again. But there were side effects. Headaches, nausea, paranoia and hallucinations. Doctors were warning that it could produce psychotic episodes. But Bryce was telling the truth. It wasn’t illegal.
I was curious to find out how Bryce felt about selling something that could hurt people in a big way.
“When you sell it, do you give people advice on how much to use?”
Bryce looked as if I had just said his mother was ugly. “I don’t sell to users. I only sell to dealers.”
“And they sell to people who want to get high?”
“Of course. But it’s just business. I don’t give a rat’s ass who uses it or how. That’s not my concern. My business is to move the product, make the money. It won’t last—I know that. So I need to keep things moving now.”
“Before the law catches up.”
“Of course.” Bryce tipped down his shades. “You want in?”
I hesitated, I suppose, but knew there was only one answer. “Definitely.”
I guess I had passed Bryce’s sugar test. But as we drove through town, it occurred to me that he wasn’t as smart as he thought he was. Bryce thought I was just another hustler like him, greedy to make a buck and not caring what damage it did. But that wasn’t the real me. Not really. I was beginning to realize that my feelings for Abby had changed me.
Maybe I could be like him if I wanted to be. We were both willing to use whatever means necessary to get what we wanted. But even after the delivery, I wasn’t quite sure why he was so willing to think I could be trusted.
“Why me?” I asked.
Bryce pushed his sunglasses back on his face as we pulled up to a red light. “Who the hell else do I know who is still going to high school?” Then he flipped open the glove compartment and handed me a tiny baggie with some brown powder in it. “Here, Jackson. Try the real thing.”
I knew I had come this far and would have to see it through. So I dipped thumb and index finger into the powder and sniffed it up my nose.
Nothing happened at first. And then the roof blew off the top of my brain.
Chapter Fifteen
Bryce let me keep the little bag of kryptonite. “That will have to hold ya until I make another trip south. Seems kryptonite is turning out to be more popular than I expected.” I took the bag home with me but never touched it again. And Bryce never said a word about the hundred dollars he had given me to deliver the box of sugar to his buddy or whoever it was.
Before he dropped me off, Bryce stopped at the drive-through and ordered us some hamburgers and French fries. It kind of caught me off guard, him doing something, well, normal like that. We sat in the parking lot and ate our food out of the bag.
“What about girls, Jackson?” he asked, biting into a burger. “You have any luck with the ladies at your high school?”
I wasn’t sure how to answer this. I didn’t want to say too much or too little. I shook my head. “I’m not much of the social type,” I said. I didn’t tell him that any girl who really started to get to know me soon pulled away. I had a habit of saying the wrong thing or pushing things too fast. I didn’t really want to talk about it, so I turned the question around.
“What about you? You have a girlfriend?”
Bryce laughed. “Too many fish in the sea to stick with just one.”
“Come on. There must have been someone special along the way.”
Bryce chewed some more and then stopped. “Well, there was someone. It was a while back. We had some wild times together. Man, she was up for anything. We’d waltz into people’s houses…” Bryce seemed to drift off for a second. Then he tilted the rearview mirror and studied his face.
“And what, steal stuff?”
“Hell yeah. Just to see if we could do it. I guess it was a little childish, now that I think about it.”
“No. Sounds pretty cool. What happened to her?”
“Turns out she was a stupid little bitch. Got herself caught. Could have got us both in big trouble.” Bryce took a huge bite out of a second burger. Ketchup dripped down his chin. “So I had to let her go.”
“She got busted?”
“Yeah,” he said and then shrugged. “It was just the way things turned out.”
“But she didn’t turn you in?”
“Guess not.”
I wanted to see what else he would say about Abby but was afraid to push things any further. I was thinking that if somehow I could get Abby to see this side of her precious Bryce, she’d forget about him. Maybe I could get him talking again and secretly record it on my cell phone or something. What had he called her? Stupid little bitch? That would do it.
A couple of nights later I took Abby out on another date. I used the money Bryce had given me for another fancy dinner, since she had enjoyed the first time we went to a restaurant. “I like it when people spend money on me,” she said. I supposed that good ol’ Bryce had spent a few ill-gotten dollars on her during their crime spree.
I was wondering if I had enough ammunition yet to tell her I’d found Bryce and that he was still a scumbag who didn’t much care how he made his money or who it hurt as long as he could profit from it.
“I know this guy at school,” I said, trying to test the waters. “I’m pretty sure he’s selling coke or speed or something like that. I’m not sure it’s good stuff. Maybe something cut with nasty crap. I think maybe some kids are getting sick from it. Do you think I should tell somebody?”
Abby stopped eating and set down her fork. She gave me a stern look. “You mean snitch on this guy?”
“I was just thinking out loud,” I said, looking down at my plate.
“When I was in school, I always hated people who ratted on others.”
I wanted to pursue the conversation but realized I had the answer I was looking for. If I told Abby that I’d found Bryce and he was selling this new drug that could really mess people up, she wouldn’t care. She’d run to him as fast as she could.
“Yeah,” I said. “I know what you mean. Kids used to rat on me when I did something they didn’t like.” This was entirely true. I used to do mean stuff to people to get my way or to get back at them for insulting me in some way. That w
as before I smartened up and figured out more sophisticated ways of getting what I wanted.
I changed the subject, and after the meal I walked Abby home. She told me how much she had enjoyed the evening, and she didn’t mention Bryce once.
Chapter Sixteen
I didn’t hear from Bryce for a week. I knew he was off to Mexico to score some more kryptonite and wondered if something had gone wrong. I was secretly hoping it had.
During that week, though, I worked on getting Abby to see me as more than an ally in her search for the missing Bryce. I wanted her to see me as more than a friend. My dad was off to some conference, so I invited Abby over. We raided the liquor cabinet, watched an insanely vicious horror movie and ended up making out on the couch. The girl was truly hot. I thought maybe we were going to go all the way, but she suddenly stopped.
“Jackson,” she said, “I feel this overpowering need to do something really crazy.”
At first I thought maybe she was talking about sex. “Like what?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “That’s my problem. I just don’t know what it is I want to do. My life has become so ordinary. I need someone to help me change it. To make it exciting.”
I wasn’t exactly sure what she was saying. Maybe she didn’t know what she meant. But I understood one thing. Bryce was good at coming up with crazy things. Stupid, even dangerous things. But they were exciting things. And she liked that. She liked the thrill.
“You have keys to your father’s car?” she suddenly asked. “That blue thing in the driveway?”
“The Lexus?”
“Yeah. I can drive. Why don’t we go somewhere?”
I knew it was some kind of test. And I didn’t want to fail it. I had to do something. But I was pretty certain driving my dad’s car was a bad idea. Shit. What was I supposed to do?
So I did the only thing I could think of. “I’ve got a better idea,” I said. “Stay put.”
I went to my room and brought down a tiny bit of kryptonite. Maybe not the wisest thing to do, but I figured it was better than getting out on the highway in my dad’s Lexus with tipsy, thrill-seeking Abby at the wheel.
I showed her the tiny amount of brown powder in the palm of my hand. “What is it?” she asked.
“Kryptonite,” I said. “Put some on your finger and breathe it in.”
Abby suddenly looked scared. “What will it do to me?”
“You’ll like it—I promise. But only do a little.”
Abby gave a hint of a smile. “You’re not trying to knock me out and then take advantage of me, are you?” And she began to giggle.
“Absolutely not.”
“You’ve tried this stuff before?”
“Only once.”
“And?”
I tapped the side of my head. “You’ll see.”
So Abby sniffed up a little hit of kryptonite, closed her eyes, let out a loud whoop that scared the shit out of me and then fell back on the couch.
I had planned to take a hit as well, get both of us high. But watching Abby lying there with her eyes shut, a big smile on her face but totally out of it, made me realize I had better stay in control.
She opened her eyes a long minute later and sat up. “That was amazing,” she said. “Let’s do it again.” She wanted another hit. She was staring at the small amount of powder still in my hand.
“I don’t know,” I said, but it was too late. She leaned over and licked my outstretched hand and then looked up at me with the sexiest smile. This time the drug took a little longer to kick in. But when it did, she slumped forward into my arms.
So there I was in my own living room, Abby in my arms, her warm breath on my neck. I had finally gotten to hold her. But this just wasn’t playing out the way I had hoped.
When Abby returned to the planet, she was surprised to see that I was holding her, but she didn’t pull away. “This is nice,” she said innocently. “And you are nice.”
I kissed her then, and she didn’t pull away.
The trouble was, she wanted more kryptonite. I lied and told her I didn’t have any more. Part of my brain registered the fact that I did indeed have more, and if I wanted to take advantage of this crazy, beautiful girl, I could totally do it.
But I knew deep down, that wasn’t my style. That wasn’t me.
Chapter Seventeen
After that, Abby and I fell into a nice little routine. I’d come meet her when she was done working and we’d hang out at my house or hers or find some comfortable spot at a coffee shop to be together. I had never really had a girlfriend before, but this sure felt like she was not just a girl but my girl. We fooled around a bit when we could but nothing too serious.
She asked a few times about the kryptonite and said she wanted to get high again with me, but I knew she really meant she just wanted to get high period. I told her it was gone and I didn’t know where to get more. Each time I told her that, she grew kind of sullen.
As the days went by I could see that she was getting more restless. “I’m thinking of quitting my job,” she said finally. “Maybe move to the city with my older brother. Start new. This town sucks.”
I wanted to ask, What about us? but I didn’t. I was afraid of what she’d say. I knew she was looking for something that was missing from her life. What was missing were the thrills she needed, the crazy stuff I couldn’t even begin to supply in enough quantity.
Whenever I tried to steer the conversation back to us, Abby would smile and kiss me and then change the subject. But the more I hung out with this girl, the more I wanted to be with her. I thought about getting high with her—both of us together this time—but I never said that out loud either. My gut instinct told me it would set us on a path we might not be able to return from.
Nine days had passed since I’d heard from Bryce, and I was beginning to think he was good and gone. Maybe he had gotten into trouble in Mexico, or maybe he had just buggered off. I realized that if he had simply disappeared, it would be about the best thing that could happen—for both of us.
But then suddenly he was back. I got a text from him while I was in math class.
Meet me at Bonner’s tonight at 8.
Shit.
I had to make up an excuse to explain to Abby why I couldn’t hang out with her that night. I said I was meeting with a study group to prep for a history test. It was a lame excuse, I guess. I had always been such a good liar but only when I had to. I must have been losing my edge.
I walked her home from work, and we watched another horror flick together in her living room. The girl was crazy about gruesome movies. The more blood and guts, the better. Chainsaw murders, decapitation, lopped arms and legs. She loved it all.
She kissed me at the end of the movie. “Forget about history. Stay with me. I’m lonely,” she said in such a sexy way that it was almost impossible to turn her down. But I knew it would not be smart to keep Bryce waiting.
He was sitting in his usual seat. He looked tanned and full of himself. He wore several new rings and had a piercing in his eyebrow. When he saw me walk in, he waved me over.
“I scored pretty big this time,” he said. “This shipment will move me up to a whole new level. Just wanted to check in with you to make sure you’re still on board. If not, I’m sure there’s plenty of others who’d like to be.” It was clear I had to make a decision if my plan to convince Abby about Bryce’s true character was going to work.
“I’m in,” I said.
“Good,” Bryce replied. “I knew you would be. Have a beer, and we’ll celebrate our good fortune.”
So we had a beer and celebrated our good fortune. It was all idle chitchat after that, but Bryce had a way of saying complimentary things about me. That was his little game. He knew exactly how to make someone, anyone, like him. Even if you knew you should be running the other way.
“Okay, champ,” he said when he starte
d to wind down. “Meet me back here tomorrow night. Same time. I’ll bring the supplies you need. All you need are your wits and your charm. We’ll get you set, and away you go.”
We shook hands like a couple of old businessmen, and I went home to a sleepless night. I didn’t want to do it. I had no desire to sell supposedly legal or illegal drugs to anyone, especially not to kids at school. I’d been a troublemaker many a time but not that kind of troublemaker.
And then there was the problem of Abby. I’d have to make up another excuse. Two nights in a row.
School went badly. I felt like I had ants crawling all over me, I was so tense. And then when I got together with Abby after school and told her I had to split again, she got all weird.
“You’re seeing another girl,” she blurted out.
“No way,” I said. “I just have to go to this thing with my father.”
“What thing?”
“It’s some kind of seminar, a wacked-out motivational speaker he wants me to listen to. I turned him down a dozen times, but he insisted I go to this one talk. It’s some guy he’s really excited about, giving a talk on how to think like a millionaire. I’m sorry. I promise it’s just tonight.”
And then Abby did something I was not expecting. She started to cry. “I feel like I’m losing you,” she said.
“You’re not,” I answered. I felt so bad I almost changed my mind. I almost stayed with her. Bryce could go fuck himself, I was thinking. I wanted this girl so badly.
But I knew I had to see it through.
Chapter Eighteen
Bryce was all smiles when I showed up. “I got the goods in the car, but let’s just hang here for a little bit. I’ve had a busy day.”
My smartphone was already on the Record setting, and I’d tested it. I wasn’t sure how I was going to steer the conversation back to his time with Abby, but I was sure if I could just get him going, get him to say what he had said before about her, the “stupid bitch” stuff, that would do it. I could convince Abby the guy was worthless. A true piece of shit.
Kryptonite Page 4