Well, everyone but the guy in the dirty gray coveralls at the back of the bus. He’d been stretched across three seats and out cold since she’d gotten on near her apartment in Tremé. Whether he was drunk or just hiding from the quick January cold snap that had hit their fine city yesterday was a toss-up. But so far, nothing had made him budge. Not even the painful screech of the bus’s brakes at every single stop.

Twelve of them, to be exact.

At this rate, Bonnie was going to have permanent hearing loss before she got where she was going.

As if the bus driver had heard her snide thoughts and taken them as a personal attack, he hit the brakes and sent another fresh squeal ringing from under the chassis. The passengers had barely righted themselves from the sharp forward jolt when the he opened the doors and droned into the microphone, “Louisa and Abundance Streets.”

Bonnie sighed and stood. “Home, sweet home.”

She’d murmured the snarky comment under her breath, but the middle-aged woman who’d been trying to keep two energetic young boys in line piped up before Bonnie could make the front door. “Look at it this way. From here, anywhere you go is up.”

With a sharp laugh, Bonnie made her way to the pavement and readjusted her backpack on her shoulder. The lady wasn’t wrong. For a neighborhood called Desire, it was a long, long way from what anyone would consider desirable. More like a country town that had been forgotten and left idling in the seventies. A few tiny houses dotted what had once been a fully populated area—some mostly well kept and surrounded by chain-link fence and others falling apart. In between many of them were empty lots, the homes that had once stood in the decent-sized plots now well overgrown with weeds big enough to rival trees. The only new structure in sight was a decent-sized church surrounded by baby crepe myrtles.

The driver revved the engine and the bus trundled away, leaving Bonnie two blocks and a fruitless conversation away from her escape. Crossing the street, she ducked her chin deep in the collar of her jean jacket and forged into the crisp wind. “I have got to get my car fixed.”

The walk to Clouet Street was over in no time, and the sight that greeted her was the same as it always was—Dad’s Chevy parked a little off the tiny driveway, the gate to the chain-link fence left open and the trash can that never left the front curb close to overflowing. The house itself was basically a double-wide that had taken on permanent airs and was painted in the drabbest tan known to man. Once upon a time, the oak trees in the front and backyard had added a homey feel to their lot, but these days they’d gone so long without trimming they all but hid the house from plain view.

She rounded her brother’s Triumph motorcycle blocking the sidewalk, jogged up the cement stoop and—sure enough—the front door was unlocked.