But the bus was steady on the road now, the driver in control of himself, radio close to his mouth as he shouted to make himself heard. “Highway 23! Six miles west of the crossroads! Request immediate assistance!”

A mesh wall kept the driver safe. No keys on this side.

Eighty-twenty, then.

He heard it like he saw it. Shinbones. Faces. Kneecaps.

That was the thing about batons.

When the last convict was beaten into bloody submission, the old prisoner looked again for the car, but didn’t see it. He remembered the faces, though, and every gesture. If he lived to a hundred, he would know the girls, and the men, too. That was his thing. He never forgot a face or an injury or a reason for anger. The way she’d exposed herself, taunting. He’d dream of the brunette for whatever years he had left alive. Dark fantasies. Violent ones.

But it was the car’s driver who really mattered, and the old prisoner pictured him as he had been in those final seconds: the sweat and over-pale skin, his hands on the wheel, and how he’d barely moved. He’d been an inmate at Lanesworth, the old man remembered, and there was a prisoner there, now, who’d pay dearly for a description of what had just happened. He’d want the nuance of every moment. How was the light? Tell me about the road, the wind, the grass on the edge of the road. He’d ask about the girls and the younger man, but only as reflections of the driver. The old prisoner could deliver all of that: the clothes they wore and how each had behaved, the hair colors and skin tones and breast size. The younger man was only a boy, but the prisoner at Lanesworth would want those details as well. In the end, though, it would come back to the driver. How did he seem? How did he look? Before it was over, they’d talk about the car. That was the rubber on the road; and the old prisoner would play the old games. He’d hold out for money and special favors, but in the end, he’d give it all. Letters and numbers came easily, too.

XRQ-741.

That was the plate.

6

The next day passed in a blur. I cut grass, spread mulch, joked with the old man. He didn’t ask about my day with Jason, but at times I caught him staring at me as if some vision might appear in the air between us. Monday was a school day like any other, but people wanted to talk about Jason, the dive, the darker stories. I ignored it all as best I could. That worked for everyone but Chance.

“Do you think he wants to die?”

We were in the courtyard at school. Bagged lunches. A group of girls close by. “The hell are you talking about, Chance?”