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March. It never seems to occur to her that if it wasn’t for him, she wouldn’t have me. And if it wasn’t for me, she wouldn’t have a big fat child-support cheque every month either.
    My mother has such a hate-fix on my father that I decided to stop seeing him until she cooled off. That was three years ago. But I blame my dad too. He could have made things better. If he cared. If he wanted to see me.
    Raffi stood up and stretched. “So the cops don’t even know I exist?” he said. “They don’t know your mom is seeing anybody?”
    â€œYou got it.”
    â€œI’d be lying if I said I wasn’t scared of them. Me and every other black guy in Toronto. I need the police sniffing around me like I need a hole in my head.”
    Mom’s voice was shaky. “Don’t even joke about that,” she said. One of Raffi’s friends, who is also black, was recently shot at by the cops for no reason at all.
    Raffi hardly ever got upset, so when he did, you really noticed. “Derek is still in the hospital,” he said. “For nothing. For being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
    â€œHe shouldn’t have run, though,” Mom said. “I’m not saying what the cops did was OK, but you have to remember, if they say halt, you halt.”
    Mom really likes Raffi a lot. He’s been her boyfriend since I was eleven, but he doesn’t live with us. He has a tiny apartment across the street. So I didn’t lie, not really.

CHAPTER 4
    It was Saturday morning, the second day after the murder, and I was just about awake when Kelly phoned. “Where were you?” I asked. “I looked all over the school for you!”
    â€œI messed up,” she said. “I’ll tell you later. Can I come over?”
    â€œNow? Sure. Just don’t panic when you see the yellow crimescene tape. Ray Bird was murdered yesterday.”
    â€œJeez, Jess, that’s, that’s ...awful. The big guy married to that airhead with the hair?”
    â€œYeah. Well, Tammi is a bit of an airhead, I guess, but I feel sorry for her.” I yawned. “Are you coming right now?”
    â€œCan I?” she whispered into the phone. “The Pain is watching TV. If I don’t get out of here while she’s distracted, I’m going to have her trailing after me all day.”
    The Pain is Kelly’s little sister. “Come now,” I said. “Please.”
    Kelly weighs almost as much as I do, but she’s a little taller, a natural blonde, and absolutely beautiful. We’ve been best friends since kindergarten. Lately though, since she’s been going out with Joey, I’ve been feeling kind of pushed away. Once I tried to talk to her about it, but all she said was that having a boyfriend changed her life, and I couldn’t understand until I had one too. Sometimes I wish she wasn’t so pretty, but I guess that’s mean.
    After I got dressed, I watched for her from the front window. When I saw her trudging around the corner I raced downstairs and held the door open, so she wouldn’t push the buzzer. “The Countess is still asleep,” I said.
    When we got back upstairs, Mom was standing at the door, making a liar out of me. “I am not,” she said. “Although I might be if some dummy hadn’t phoned at the crack of dawn.”
    â€œOh-oh,” Kelly said. “That was no dummy, that was me I waited ’till nine-fifteen...”
    â€œNot to worry,” Mom said. “It’s time I was up anyway. Have you had breakfast? Jess might make French toast if we ask her nicely.” She leaned her head on my shoulder. “Please, Jess, please.” This was exactly what I used to do to her.
Please, Mom, please
, I’d whine. It was one of those things that used to work.
    â€œSounds great,” Kelly said. “I’ll help.”
    Mom wandered back down the hall. “Save me some,”