Ariel with his fingers jammed into her mouth. “You didn’t have to do it. You didn’t have to.”
But Hellie said nothing, just wept silently. The tears looked like silver against her cheeks. Alex started screaming.
Len slammed through the door, his shirt untucked, his hair a messy tangle, already swearing that it was three in the morning and couldn’t he get some rest in his own house,
when he saw Hellie’s body.
Then he was saying the same thing over and over again. “Fuck fuck fuck.” Just like Hellie’s no no no. Rat-a-tat-tat. A moment later he had his palm pressed against Alex’s mouth. “Shut up. Shut the fuck up. God, you stupid bitch, be quiet.”
But Alex couldn’t be quiet. She sobbed in loud torrents, her chest heaving as he squeezed her tighter and tighter. She couldn’t breathe. Snot was running from her nose, and his hand was clamped tight against her lips. She scrabbled against him as he squeezed.
She was going to black out.
“Jesus fuck.” He shoved her away, wiped his hands on his pants. “Just shut up and let
me think.”
“Oh shit.” Betcha was in the doorway, his big belly hanging over his basketball shorts,
his T-shirt gapping. “Is she?”
“We’ve got to clean her up,” said Len, “get her out of here.”
For a moment, Alex was nodding, thinking he meant to make her look nice. Hellie shouldn’t have to go to the hospital with vomit on her shirt. She shouldn’t be found that
way.
“It’s still early. No one’s out there,” said Len. “We can get her in the car, drop her … I
don’t know. That nasty-ass club on Hayvenhurst.”
“Crashers?”
“Yeah, we’ll put her in the alley. She looks used up enough, and there’s got to be plenty
of shit still in her system.”
“Yeah,” said Betcha. “Okay.”
Alex watched them, her ears ringing. Hellie was watching them too, from her place beside her own body on the mattress, listening to them talk about throwing her out like trash.
“I’m calling the cops,” Alex said. “Ariel must have given her—”
Len hit her, openhanded but hard. “Don’t be fucking stupid. You want to go to jail? You
want Eitan and Ariel coming after us?” He hit her again.
“Shit, man, calm down,” said Betcha. “Don’t be like that.” But he wasn’t going to step
in. He wasn’t going to actually do anything to stop Len.
Hellie’s ghost tipped her head back, looked at the ceiling, started drifting toward the wall.
“Come on,” said Len to Betcha. “Grab her ankles.”
“You can’t do this to her,” Alex said. It was what she should have said the previous night. Every night. You can’t do this to her.
Hellie’s ghost was already starting to fade through the wall.
Len and Betcha had her body slung between them like a hammock. Len had his arms
under Hellie’s armpits. Her head lolled to the side. “God, she smells like shit.”
Betcha gripped her ankles. One of her pearly pink jelly shoes dangled from her foot.
She hadn’t taken them off before she came to bed. She probably hadn’t noticed. Alex watched it slide off her toe and thunk to the ground.
“Shit, put that back on her.”
Betcha fumbled awkwardly with it, setting down her feet, then trying to jam the shoe
back on like some kind of a footman in Cinderella.
“Oh for fuck’s sake, just bring it with you. We’ll throw it in with her.”
It was only when Alex followed them into the living room that she saw Ariel was still
there, asleep on the couch in his undershorts. “I’m tryina sleep, for shit’s sake,” he said,
blinking drowsily at them. “Oh shit, is she … ?”
And then he giggled.
They paused in front of the door. Len tried to reach for the knob, knocked over his stupid gangster bat that he kept there for “protection.” But he couldn’t balance Hellie’s body and get the knob to turn.
“Come on,” he snapped. “Open the door, Alex. Let us out.”
Let me in.
Hellie’s ghost hung halfway through the window and the sky. She was fading to gray.