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mutual, but she couldn’t think of a single way to say that without sounding horrible. You really are a bitch , thought Betty, and the thought carried a weight that the words spoken by June had been missing.
    “I get it,” said Jake. “And I know that it’s all at least half my fault, and I’m really sorry—”
    “ Half your fault?” she said. “You have got to be fucking kidding me, Jake! You sent me that stupid message, and you weren’t joking. And so I did the only thing I could think to do and—”
    A whistle cut her off, and then the Carp’s voice boomed from across the gym. “Martinez, drop and give me ten!”
    Betty groaned and walked to the side of the track, assumed the push-up position, and got to work. She could see Jake running away from her, his perfect calves carrying his muscled body across the floor. Perfect Jake was somehow coming off clean again, even though he was the one always asking to see bewbs and then talking while running.
    Betty heaved against the floor, doing the push-ups as fast as she was able while her classmates circled the track, and for what felt like about the millionth time that week, she wanted to be anywhere except where she actually was.

FIVE
    My temperature got up to 103 degrees in the week after I killed Gary, but I never even considered the hospital. Instead, I worked my way through my purloined drugs and tried to sleep as much as possible.
    Bad memories came and went with the fever, some of Sam, a lot of Fillmore and Spider. Spider had been easy, in retrospect. I shot him and he fell. When I went after Fillmore, the camp had been put to the torch, and he was in his office trying to make some history disappear. When all was said and done, my hands were raw, he was dead, and there was a money roll in my back pocket. I thought I’d leave it all behind me, but the flames of that day haunted my fevered mind in wakeful dreams and nightmares that have faded in and out ever since.
    The wound in my side had opened up during the fight with Gary, my hand was swollen up like a balloon, and all of my other nagging injuries were finally taking their toll. Coming out of that fever was like being reborn. I had yet to tell anyone besides Lou that I was back in town, but I didn’t even worry about it while I was boiling at home alone. Either I’d see Jeff and Rhino again or I wouldn’t. They know what I do, and I think they both know that one of these days I’m going to just disappear.
    Even now that I’m on the mend, seeing my friends will need to wait, unfortunately. I need money, badly, and there are a legion of messages left for me on dummy Facebook accounts, e-mail addresses, texts, and calls on burner cell phones. I know before I even get started that most of these leads have undoubtedly dried up in my absence, but I start from the top anyway. Gary was supposed to be my salvation, but instead he’d damn near killed me, and now I needed to pick up the pieces.
    It’s two hours later, and the leads are even drier than I expected. The few people who’ve responded to my follow-ups have either given up on the problem or taken to other means to solve it. I’m craving the work that I normally hate—finding out if somebody’s old lady is cheating, or if some employee isn’t quite as injured as they say they are. Those are the boring jobs, but they’re also the ones that pay, and that’s exactly the kind I need.
    Don’t get me wrong, I’ll never forget about what Dad wants me to do, and I sure won’t ever turn down a kid that needs help. I just need a few things to get me back on my feet. Pot grows fast, but it won’t be done tomorrow, so I need a solution that I won’t need to watch grow.
    And then, right when the outlook’s blackest, I get a legit response. A woman named Claire tweets me and wants to get together to talk about some concerns she has for her daughter. She balks when I mention money, but I assure her that we’ll be able to work something out, just as