Russo laugh-coughs, a hacking blast as he exhales. “You got it all—” More coughing. “You got it all wrong. They’re not tryin’ to kill themselves, they just think the gun barrel is a dude’s dick!”

Then he mimics a slobbery blowjob on a finger-gun where his brains come blasting out the back of his head. He passes the joint back.

They high-five: slap. Russo says, “Hey, you comin’ to the fights later this—”

Atlanta comes up underneath the bleachers. Doesn’t bother trying to hide her presence. The two guys do, however, try to hide the joint—but when they see who it is, Lanky brings it back out from behind his back.

“Yo, baby, you want a hit?” Lanky says, sticking the weed down by his crotch level and tweaking his two fingers so the joint waggles back and forth. Ash falls. He laughs. Hurr hurr hurr.

Normally Atlanta would be into some banter, maybe say something like, “My, what a tiny dong you have,” but she’s mad and her patience is worn down like a chewed fingernail.

Instead she just kicks him in the nuts. Hard.

Embers from the joint swirl. The air goes out of him. Lanky tumbles sideways. Russo’s fast with his fists, but it doesn’t matter, because Atlanta’s ready. She has a new knife—a small lockback with a ruggedized orange handle and a fat little three-inch blade. A jerk of the wrist and the blade pops, clicks, glints in the sun.

A few swishes of the blade through the air, and Russo knows not to test her. By now they should all know not to test her.

A voice inside her mind screams and yells and tells her to go home, leave it alone—stop throwing rocks at beehives. But she stands her ground.

Lanky mumbles. Feels around the grass for the joint.

Russo blinks his bloodshot eyes. “You bitch.”

“That’s me.”

“Should learn to mind your own business.”

“Yeah, probably. But I’m going to need you to shut the fuck up when it comes to my friend.” She feels tears threatening the corners of her eyes once more. Not now, don’t cry in front of these jokers, quit it. “Chris was cool. The coolest. And it’s people like you that make folks feel bad just for being who they are, just for living in the world the way they got to. Anybody should off themselves, it should be you dumb shits.”

Russo takes a step toward her, but again she swipes the knife. It cuts the air with a hiss.

“Uh-uh,” she says. “I’ll pop you like a water balloon.”

“You don’t got the balls,” he says.

“Don’t much need ’em.”

From the ground, Lanky moans. “She’ll do it. Dude. Dude.” He tilts his head toward her. “We’re sorry. Okay?”

But Russo doesn’t agree.

“You’ll get yours,” he tells her.