to be drinking, but you’re going to let this bald-headed fool disrespect you like that?”
He faced Gerri like an animal trapped. “Hey, bitch, nobody’s talking to you.”
My hand came out of my purse; the stun gun gripped in my fist. I was going to fire his butt up. Had it in my hand, finger on the trigger, and I froze. Took short breaths through my wide-open mouth and told myself that he wasn’t worth it. I was worth more than this.
He was right about one thing. The night I tried to recapture old wants with Claudio, I’d been overwhelmed with desire for Vince. And I was lying in his rented bed thinking about Malaika, how she looked on that video, because that was exactly how I was feeling.
This was over. Was over before I ever made it to California. I’d mistaken the heat of a dead relationship for the warmth of real love.
Gerri’s hand slid down my right arm, eased down my leather jacket until her fingers made it to the stun gun. At least, I thought that was Gerri touching me. But Gerri was in front of me, going off on Claudio.
The hand belonged to Tia.
She yanked the stun gun from my loose grip. Watery eyes, snot running from her nose, lips pursed so damn tight. I wanted to stop, drop, and roll before she sent all of that electricity through my body, but she rushed by me and thrust the fifteen-dollar weapon deep into Claudio’s back. There was the loud static discharge. Claudio made a crowlike noise, cawed, and twisted. Agony was flowing through his body in ocean-size waves. He gagged, choked on his own saliva, all of that noise blending with the sounds of light applause from the comic’s closing routine.
She shocked him again.
Tia’s friend finally got enough wind to let out an animal-like scream. Claudio’s friends were leaping over seats, tripping over the rail, the men leaving the women behind, sisters squealing, jumping out of the way.
Tia did it again, sent another electrical discharge up his spine. His face twitched, convulsed, eyes were rolling into the back of his head. He struggled to get away from her, staggered toward me like a zombie. I pushed him off me. He bumbled back toward Tia. And homegirl extended that stun gun and sent another shock up his spine. Opened the rest of his nerves.
That was when I screamed.
Claudio’s bald head glistened—just that quick he had sprouted gallons of sweat. His mouth was wide open, but he was quiet, like he owned too much agony to create words. Looked like his muscles had locked up.
I tried, but I couldn’t breathe.
A faint voice said, “Help him . . .”
Someone else yelled, “Stop blocking the stage.”
“That what his ass gets.”
Claudio fell, slammed across a round table, sent wine and beer and shot glasses flying every which-a-way. He ricocheted to the ground, bounced and twisted, twitched, head bounced off the black and white tile.
Tia was frowning at me. Holding that stun gun and grimacing at me like I was the grinch who stole her Christmas. She came toward me.
Sounds faded. The world was getting darker. I was about to pass out. Told my legs to move, told myself to concentrate. Get control of my body and get away from that psycho flight attendant before she got to me.
Coldness made my teeth clatter. Tia’s thin lips moving so fast while she raised the stun gun. Pointed at me in a you’re-next kinda way. Couldn’t hear the words rushing from her tight lips. Everything muffled. Air too thick. Knees about to fold. Stun gun coming toward my body.
Darkness surrounded me.
28
Dana
A zillion lights flashed in my face. Buildings and billboards and homeless people went by me in a blur. My body was thawing out at thirty miles an hour. I was in the passenger seat of Gerri’s car. She was concentrating on traffic, whipping from lane to lane. I moved my tongue around the inside of my mouth, tried to add moisture to the dryness.
“What—what . . . Gerri, what happened?”
“Well, welcome back.”
“What happened?”
“I dragged you out of there.”
Yellow. I saw yellow lights behind us.
The stun gun was welded into my palm.
I asked, “How did I get this?”
“She gave it to you.”
“Gave it to me?”
“After she messed up Claudio, she sashayed right up to your face and put it back in your hands, bounced out of there with her head high in the sky, like she was leaving church on a Sunday after service.”