I exit the bathroom, find my jeans strewn across the floor on the other side of the room and put them on. There’s a bottle of whiskey in the kitchen cabinet that I take with me outside. I hop out onto the fire escape and take the rickety, black-iron steps up five flights before I get to the top where a dark red door gives me access to the roof of the building.

The view from up here is fantastic. The city is spread out beneath me like a wet slut waiting for my dick. Twinkling, bright, and ready to be conquered. Fucking glorious. I bring the bottle to my mouth and take a swig and then another, washing down the bad taste in my mouth with the sweet burn of good whiskey. I set the bottle down in front of me on the floor. Searching inside my back pocket, I take a cigarette and my lighter out of the box. Three turns of the spark wheel puts fire at my fingertips. I light the cigarette, bring it to my mouth, and take a long drag of nicotine into my lungs. My exhale releases noxious fumes into the air.

Picking the whiskey bottle back up, I head to the edge of the building and take a seat over the ledge. Ten stories up doesn’t seem like a high enough point to plummet from. Relax. I’m not going to jump. Although I’m sure there’s a hundred-mile long list of people who’d be too happy to see me kiss the pavement. Now I ask you, what kind of person would I be if I gave them the satisfaction? Besides, I’m too much of a sadist to contemplate suicide. I enjoy my self-imposed hell. I can feel my demons beating against the impenetrable walls of memories I’d sooner forget. Persistent little fuckers. Another swig and a drag of smoke into my lungs doesn’t work in washing away that taste of self-loathing. The contempt is stomach acid crashing against the jagged edges of my emotions.

What the fuck brought this on? It can’t possibly be because I just treated Grace no better than my own personal cum rag. That’s me daily. Asshole is my first, middle, and last name. I sigh, close my eyes, and they pop right back open again when an image of my dad flashes in my mind. I laugh. But it lacks humor. Yeah, we’re not doing this shit tonight. Strolling down fucking memory lane isn’t something that’s going to happen.

I’m off the ledge in seconds. The climb back down to the fifth level of our apartment is a short one and the instant I enter, I find Dro sitting on the ratty couch in the living room. The naked blond girl with the tattoo sleeve and septum piercing sitting on the floor rolling up little plastic bags of grayish-white powder is Dro’s girl, Wynn. She’s been in and out of his life since he took me in two years ago.

I frown, muttering, “When’d you get in?” He wasn’t here—I glance at the watch on my wrist, thirty minutes ago when I left.

“Been here.” He’s lost in concentration counting the bills in his hands. There are already four stacks of wrinkled cash on the coffee table, along with seven small sandwich bags filled with weed. Three 9mm Glocks are set next to an empty box of latex gloves. Looking at the mess surrounding Wynn on the floor, the fingers on the gloves she’s cut up have been thickly packed with the newest product. SKY. A scientifically modified version of ecstasy on crack. It sold great with the high school and college crowds. Weed is still the number one seller but SKY is gunning in at a very close second. SKY is where the money is right now. With the twist of the top and pull into a knot, Wynn sets down the last lump onto the small mountain she’s created before moving on to her next project.

The large, silver tray is topped with heroin. The box of starch, bottle of baby powder, and can of Ajax are a clear indication the batch on the tray has already been cut.

“You put on a hell of a performance, Maxie. Maybe you and I should get in front of the camera. Give you a taste of a real woman.” She looks up at me with a leer, and her half smirk is teasing.

Finishing off what’s left of my cigarette, I flick it outside the window. “Let me know when you find one.” I head to the kitchen to put down the nearly empty bottle of whiskey.

“You little shit.”

I chortle, “Yeah…that seems to be the consensus.” I should get that tattooed on my ass. “What do you got for me, Dro?”

“Got a runner. Baz in Dresden Heights has been skipping out on me. Two months, no payments. We’re tracking him down tonight.”

***

Going after a runner is going to put things back in perspective. It’s exactly what I need to get rid of that little bit of conscious that wanted to pop up earlier. Runners are unpredictable. It’s either a hit or miss with them. From what I know, Dro has ten dealers working under him, including myself. Of those ten, I know of three who’ve skipped out on paying Dro his cut since he took me in. From the beginning, he’s taken me along to see how this part of his drug business worked. The dirty part. The part that’s all adrenaline, pain, and blood. I’ve seen him gouge an eye out with a hot spoon. Sick curiosity has me wondering what sort of creative torture he’s going to use this time around and whether he’ll let me participate.

Ten minutes later, we’re out of the apartment. He left Wynn inside. He told me once to never trust a bitch. Apparently this one is different. Guess she’s the sort of pussy who’d take a bullet for her man. Fucking stupid if you ask me. We take the gray concrete staircase down to the first floor. There’s a perpetual stench of piss, vomit, and other bodily fluids that hits you the instant you round the last staircase and head to the back of the building. You get used to it after a while.

“Take your truck. Got business in Dorchester I gotta take care of after.”

A little TLC over the last few months has my Chevy purring like a kitten. It’s still a piece of shit though compared to Dro’s souped-up, old school black Mustang. I follow behind him, weaving in and out of lanes until we jump off the expressway ramp and take the Dorchester exit. It’s the next town over from Trenton. We park a block away from the row of red brick buildings standing tall against the night sky. Walking side by side, we don’t talk. It takes us roughly ten minutes to get to the second building. When we enter, we head straight for the elevator. There’s a family waiting. A mother and her two children. One looks to be around ten while I’d put the other one around my age. Once the elevator doors open, Dro and I step inside. The family doesn’t follow. The mother holds onto her younger child and while the older kid moves to get on, she whips her arm out to stop him from taking another step.

“Coming?” Dro’s inquiry sounds like a threat. He’s a big guy. And standing at 6’4 with a bald head and half his face covered by a chest-length full beard, he looks intimidating as fuck. He’s not quite as decorated with tattoos as I am, but the Hannya mask covering his bald head is disturbingly frightening at first sight.  There’s also the fact he’s carrying a crowbar and impatiently tapping against his left leg waiting for an answer.

The mother shakes her head. “We’ll catch the next one.”

A shrug comes off from his massive shoulders. “Suit yourself.”

A very small part of me appreciates her oldest son’s glare at us, and I smirk back at him as the elevator doors close shut. It smells like curry and BO in the hallway of the twelfth floor we get off on. Not pleasant, but I’d take this smell over piss and vomit, any day. The green door at 12D is a little dented up, like someone took a baseball bat to it. At the cock of Dro’s head, I slightly lean against the opposite side of the doorframe while he stands a little out of sight of the peephole positioned in the middle of the door. He doesn’t immediately barge in like I assume he would, but gives a courtesy knock. Three slow, but firm, knocks that’ll alert the fucker we’re here. No big surprise when he’s met with silence.

“The fuck you knocking for?”