The Air We Breathe by Christa Parrish Page B

her rump. When it became clearshe wasn’t moving on her own, he picked her up again and carried her back to the living room.
    “Well, now, you’ve been gone quite a while,” Thin Man said. “Did you two have a lovely time?”
    “Shut up,” Short One snapped. He set her in an overstuffed armchair and covered her with the crochet throw from the back of the seat.
    “Sensitive, are we?”
    “There’s something really wrong with her. She’s like, catatonic or something.”
    Thin Man stoked his hairless chin. “That seems about right, considering she’s just watched her father gunned down in cold blood.”
    “No thanks to you,” Short One said.
    “And you weren’t there, were you?”
    Fat Guy chomped a cookie, chocolate dandruff fluttering from his lips. “He didn’t shoot no one. What you have to go killing them for?” He swore. “We’re in deep now.”
    “We have the money, correct? If I’m not mistaken, neither of you had much of an issue with the plan when you thought it would be solving your financial problems. And it did, did it not?”
    “No one was supposed to get killed,” Fat Guy said. He crammed another Oreo into his mouth. The open package, almost empty, teetered on the arm of the couch.
    “I believe you need to be going to work now. No suspicious deviation from routine, remember?” Thin Man said.
    “Fine. I’m going.”
    He lumbered out the door, breathing gurgly, shallow breaths. Hanna listened to his heavy steps becoming softer and softer until she could only imagine the sound in her head,thumping to each heartbeat. That was all she heard until Short One finally said, “We need to do something with her.”
    “Perhaps I’ll keep this little girl for a while.”
    “Don’t even.”
    “Are you planning to play hero now?”
    “I’ll turn all of us in before I let you touch her.”
    “No you won’t.”
    Short One didn’t answer.
    “Ah, such bravado. But don’t despair. I have someone who’ll take her off our hands, for a nice price. He wants this little girl . . . unsoiled. What a shame.”
    “What’s wrong with just dropping her on a corner and letting someone find her?”
    “Oh, my boy. You really are a genius, really. She’s seen us.” Thin Man twisted the cap off one of the green beer bottles on the end table, took a sip. “You want to be identified in a lineup?”
    “She’s wrecked.”
    “For how long? Modern psychiatry can do wonders. Look at me.” He laughed, took another swig. “If you don’t want another body on our hands, this is how we deal with it.”
    Short One pointed toward the collection of bottles. Thin Man picked up an unopened one and lobbed it to him. Short One caught it one-handed, covered the bottle cap with the hem of his shorts before unscrewing it. He swallowed most of the liquid without a break, wiped his mouth on his bare forearm. “You didn’t have to take her at all.”
    Thin Man grinned. “But where would the fun have been in that?” He left his bottle. “You’re here tonight, then.”
    “Do I have a choice?”
    “Lock her in the dog cage.”
    “You’re not serious?”
    “We don’t want her snapping out of it and running off while you’re asleep. I’d say gag her, but one more kid howling in this dump isn’t going to be noticed. I have difficulty believing a tenured professor would live in a place like this, I don’t care how ‘down’ he wants to be with the ‘common folk,’” Thin Man said, making air quotes with his fingers.
    “When’s he back?”
    “August, before classes begin. At least Bogus was good for something. He’ll be by again in the morning to watch her.”
    “How early? I have to be to work by eight.”
    “Well, you’ll know when he gets here. And I mean it—lock her up.”
    Thin Man approached Hanna, stroked her cheek softly. “She really is a beauty.” Holding up his hands as Short One tensed, he said, “I know, I know. I’m going. Be good, little girl.”
    Short One left her on the chair