– Stop it. Bob! Stop it, your hand’s cold. Stop it!

He doesn’t stop. And they go to the bedroom.

– Cops impounded my car, vato.

– Fuck do I care about your fucking car. Ain’t your fucking vato, neither.

Fernando raises his hands above his head.

– Hey, no shit you ain’t my vato. Don’t worry about not being my vato. Worry about the cops having my car. Worry about when I finally get it back and it still has that hole you put in the window.

– Send me a bill.

– A bill. Ese, I give a shit about the bill. I care about you broke my rear windshield.

He pulls Hector’s chain out of his pocket.

– A fucking chain you threw at my car. My car. Fuck you and the bill, you broke my glass.

He lashes Hector’s face with the chain.

Hector folds in half, hands over his face, face between his knees, eyes squeezed shut, mouth closed tight around the shriek that comes up his throat. He opens his eyes and watches the blood that runs out of his face and between his fingers and trickles down to pool on the warped hardwood floor between his feet while Fernando whips his shoulders with the chain, the Levi’s jacket on his back the only thing that keeps his skin from being ribboned.

– Save a little for me, big brother.

Fernando stops beating Hector and looks at Ramon coming in the front door.

– What’s up?

Ramon knocks the door closed with his crutch.

– Cheney got away.

– Got away? Get Timo and go find him. What if he calls the cops?

– Kid’s got a half kilo of meth. Ain’t calling the cops.

Fernando drops the chain on the floor.

– Hope he don’t, little bro, fucking hope he don’t.

Ramon leans against the wall.

– You hope he don’t, man, I been in prison. Shit don’t touch me. I can do that shit I have to. Worry ’bout how you handle a little real time. Where’s Timo?

– Yo, ese.

Timo comes down the hall, joint between his lips, trailing smoke.

Ramon lays out his palm and they trade skin, Timo slipping him the joint.

He takes a toke.

– Thanks, bro. What’s up?

– Whelan and his kid bro are out cold.

– Want to wake those bitches?

– Let’s do it.

Fernando holds up a hand.

– Don’t wake shit. I say to wake shit?

Ramon holds out the joint.

– Bro, take a hit, chill out. Ain’t nothing. Just gonna wake them up. Ask some questions. Find out where the shit is.

– Nobody asking questions. Nobody asking questions till the man gets here.

Ramon and Timo bug their eyes at each other.

Timo smiles big at his big brother.

– Get all jefe on us, ese? What’s with that? This your thing all a sudden? We all not in the same shit? We all not takin’ the same bust?

Fernando takes two steps and pops Timo in the nose he broke two days ago in their last fight.

Timo screams and goes down.

Ramon cocks his fist, but Fernando has him by the neck. Ramon unclenches his fist.

Fernando nods.

– That’s right, bro, relax that shit.

Ramon points at Timo.

– What the fuck?

Fernando lets him go.

– Little shit talking about we all got the same bust. He’s a fucking minor. No priors. Nothing. Bust means shit to him. He’s talking jailhouse tough shit he gets from you. And you? Acting like it’s a fucking joke? Joint don’t mean nothing to you, bro? That your story now? What I remember when I went up there to visit, I remember I seen what you look like comin’ down that hall, sittin’ on the other side of that window. I remember you so lonely you were crying. Remember what I said that day?

Ramon touches the bandage around his thigh where the cops put a bullet in him.

– Yeah.

– Say it.

– Said. Said it was no good me being inside. Being away from my brothers. Said not to forget how it felt, not being with blood. Said outside we had each other. Inside we got nobody.

– That’s right. Inside we’re alone. And we’re not going inside. Not you, not any of us. You want to go against those charges with a public defender? Some whitey from the county gonna get you off that shit? The man is gonna get us off that shit. We do his thing, he’s gonna get us a real lawyer. That’s what I want. Till we got that settled, you’re right, I am the jefe. We all work together, but I am the boss and you gotta listen to me. Gotta follow what I say. Do that, stay together, stay on the outside. Stay family. Blood?

Ramon puts out his hand.

– Blood.

Fernando takes his brother’s hand.

– Blood.

Timo sits up, fingering his nose.

– Thit’s brothen again, futhcker.

Fernando helps him to his feet.

– Come on, blood, let’s clean that shit up.

He takes his brother back down the hall to the bathroom.

Ramon watches their backs.

– Jefe.

He smiles, takes a few steps and, leaning on his crutch, bends and picks up the snake of bloody chain. He looks at Hector, still folded and holding his face.

– Check you out, ese, you’re all fucked up. How’s shit like that happen, holmes? How’d you get into this shit?

He takes a seat on the couch, leaning forward to take the hacksaw from his belt and tuck it next to the armrest. He stretches his wounded leg.

– I don’t want to fuck with you while you’re down, but you gotta be told, you ain’t got it so bad.

He taps his thigh.

– This shit, taking a.38 in the leg? That hurts. No lie. Know what the bullet did? Skipped off the bone. Check that out. Doc said it could just as easily shattered the motherfucker. ’Stead, it skipped off the bone and went right out my leg. Told him I wanted to keep that bullet, good luck charm there ever was one. Said they can’t give it to me. Said it’s evidence. Evidence in the resisting arrest part of the case. Cops got a case against us, it’s so big it’s got fucking parts. Makes my head hurt as bad as my leg. Take it from me, little man, you ain’t got it so bad.

He leans back.

– Still, this shit is all fucked up. This brown on brown thing? Know what I’m talking about, holmes? Yeah you do. This ain’t right. Mean, here you are, three white dudes and one Chicano. And, whoa, stop the presses, who’s in here getting fucked up? Two white dudes in the back room sleeping it off, other white dude ditched this shit. Cue up the same sorryass story.

He wiggles the chain.

– And us, here we are, three brothers, hermanos, the real deal lowrider vatos. Who we waiting on? That’s right. White dude. In the meantime, how we spending our siesta? Beating on a fellow Chicano. That seem right? There something wrong with this picture? Know there is. Blanco Nortinos steal all of California from us, right? That’s how this shit started, that’s how far back. Still there’s places like this, towns where we got the numbers. Still we can’t seem to do shit any different than before. Ain’t right, ese. All us Chicos here and hardly any Mr. Browns in sight, and we’re still fucking each other up instead of taking it to them.

He levers himself up with the crutch.

– That’s some prison education for you. Lessons direct from the school of hard knocks. Santa Rita social studies.

He looks at Hector, still bent over, bleeding face still in his hands.

He looks at the chain, watches a drop of Hector’s blood slowly creep from link to link.

– Anyway, whatever. Let’s see how this shit works.

And he puts the chain to use.

– Andy. Andy.

– Leave me alone.

– Andy.

– I hurt. Leave me alone.

– Let me see your face.

– I donwanna.

– C’mon, man, just let me take a look.