Page 130 of Not Quite Dead Yet

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‘Here,’ Billy hissed, wide-eyed, standing by the glass door into Dr Mandrake’s Dive Bar, half in, half out.

Jet was waiting outside, hiding from the orange pool of the streetlamp, fading into the darkness.

She hurried toward him, held out her left hand.

Billy dropped a set of keys into it.

‘Had to wait for him to go take a leak,’ he whispered. ‘Those were in his jacket pocket.’

‘Good job.’ Jet closed her fingers around the keys. ‘Now you’ve just got to distract him. Make sure he doesn’t come upstairs while I’m in there.’

‘Distract him?’ Billy’s eyes widened even more, endless pools.

‘Be neighborly. Buy him more beer.’

‘He’s an alcoholic,’ Billy hissed.

Jet shrugged. ‘So it’s the perfect distraction.’

Billy groaned, blew out a mouthful of uneasy air.

‘Just buy me ten minutes to find the laptop, then I’ll meet you in your apartment.’ She pulled herself out of Billy’s eyes, through the open doorway behind him, watching as a hunched figure slumped down at the table in the farthest, darkest corner.

‘Andrew’s back,’ she hissed. ‘Go.’

He went, the door swinging shut behind him.

Jet turned the corner and watched Billy through the windows, walking with the same pace, matching each other, one inside, one out. Billy awkwardly stuffed his hands into hispockets as he approached Andrew’s table, opening his mouth to say something, anything.

Jet ran out of windows, wished him luck and kept going, to the outdoor stairs just beyond the bar, leading to the apartments above.

She tripped, the steps doubling before her, feet falling between the cracks, a new stab of pain behind her eye. Nothing she couldn’t handle, testing her weight on each step to check it was real first, turning left at the top instead of right, toward 1A instead of home.

Jet gripped the key, pushed it into the lock, missed, blinked, tried again, and turned it.

Andrew Smith’s front door sighed as it opened for her, like it knew, an apology before Jet could take it all in.

Empty bottles everywhere.

Piles of unfolded clothes.

Balled-up tissues.

Food wrappers.

A couch that was too big for the room, half blocking the door to the bathroom.

The same layout as Billy’s apartment, just reversed. And noCedar Delightin here. It smelled musty, too lived in, rebreathed air.

Jet flicked on the lights and that only made it worse.

She let the door shut her in, picked her way through the trash.

There was a framed photograph on the wall, not quite straight. Nina grinned out of it, in a graduation cap and gown, standing between her parents. She and her mom looked so similar, the two of them standing side by side like this, same light brown skin and dark oval eyes. Andrew actually looked happy, a light behind his smile and behind his eyes that was gone now, dulled by the years of drinking.The Andrew in this photograph didn’t know anything about what was to come; he just smiled, happy, proud, forever frozen that way. Nina’s mom might have already been sick, and none of them knew it. They probably all went home to their house on North Street after this photograph, had a celebratory dinner. That house was gone now. And so was Andrew’s family.

Jet moved past the photo, past the kitchen counter, stacks of used plates and glasses. Into the bedroom. The curtains shut, like they’d never been opened, because you couldn’t let daylight into a graveyard like this.