Black Dogs by Jason Buhrmester

Author:Jason Buhrmester [BUHRMESTER, JASON]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-45202-3
Publisher: Crown/Archetype
Published: 2009-04-07T04:00:00+00:00

THIRTEEN

ACROSS THE CARNIVAL GROUNDS, SWEATY AND SHIRTLESS AND LOADED OUT OF HIS MIND ON BLACK BEAUTIES AND BEER. THE BEER MADE KEITH CLUMSY BUT THE SPEED MADE HIM MOVE EVERYWHERE AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE. THE COMBINATION WAS HILARIOUS. I LEANED AGAINST MY CAR WITH ALEX AND FRENCHY AND WATCHED KEITH HURL TOWARD US WITH UTTER FUCKING ABANDON. HE MOVED AS FAST AS HE COULD IN A ZIGZAG. HIS ARMS FLAILED AS HE PLOWED THROUGH THE CROWD AND STAGGERED OVER THE UNEVEN GRASS.

We'd spent most of the day sitting at Keith's kitchen table drinking beer and plotting. We needed a tight plan if we still planned to rob Zeppelin. Every time one of us came up with a workable plan, someone else found a hole in it. By the time we came up with something we could all agree on, we were drunk.

We decided to hit the annual carnival on the Inner Harbor to celebrate. Every summer the city put together a carnival in honor of the city's goodwill and every year it turned into a drunken riot. The families cleared out by sunset when the festival turned into a circus of drugged-up kids and drunken criminals. There were fistfights and stabbings and wasted kids puking everywhere, more from the beer and drugs than the rides. It was the highlight of our summer.

First, we needed to hit the beer tent. The bartenders didn't take cash, only colored tickets sold at a table manned by an off-duty cop who checked IDs. We worked around this every year by stopping at the party supply store and buying rolls of tickets in every color and smuggling them into the tent.

We sent Keith to scope out which tickets they were using and he'd just returned. The speed made him talk in a jumble of words even before he got close enough for us to hear what he said.

“… then they told me I had to go I had to leave you know get out but I wasn't gonna until I saw the tickets but it was too dark to tell and a woman spilled her beer down my back but I didn't care so I went to the—”

“Keith!” Alex interrupted. “What color are the tickets?”

“Red. I think they're red. Hard to tell. I need some water or something my mouth is dry …”

Keith talked to Frenchy, who ignored him. Alex leaned into the trunk and rummaged through a shopping bag filled with rolls of tickets. When he found the red tickets we each pulled off a long strip and stuffed it into our pockets.

The beer tent barely covered the crowd under it and no one noticed when we ducked under the ropes in the back. We decided Alex looked the oldest and he shoved off through the crowd with a fistful of tickets to buy the first round of beers.

Sara showed up to hang out with Frenchy. They stood to the side talking. Now and then I caught her glaring at me, still mad about the incident with her purse.

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