and then leaned in confidentially, as if he was sharing a secret. He motioned Reggie forward and Reggie pushed the bike closer with his feet on the ground.
The deputy cupped a hand conspiratorially around his mouth.
‘He raped and killed a woman and killed her kid,’ he whispered.
Reggie didn’t say anything.
‘You know what rape is, kid?’ the deputy said, speaking above a whisper now, but not by much.
Reggie nodded.
‘Do you really?’ the deputy said, cocking his head a bit like he didn’t believe Reggie. ‘Because I don’t think you really do unless you’ve seen the results.’
Reggie shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
‘We’ve got pictures,’ the deputy said.
Reggie didn’t know what to say.
‘Of the crime scene,’ the deputy elaborated. ‘I can show you, if you want.’
Reggie started pedalling again, steering around the deputy.
‘I’ve gotta go,’ Reggie said, his heart beating fast.
‘Stay on the road where people can see you!’ the deputy called after him.
The asphalt rolled along under him, the town drawing closer. The laughter behind him grew vague and distant and was gone. Leaving Reggie alone with his thoughts of pictures of raped women and dead children.
***
He chained his bike in front of the drugstore and walked in, the whoosh of the air conditioning meeting him in a cool wave. Brilliant white and sterile walls and floor made the place seem dreamlike. As he passed by the checkout area a clerk waved to him and said hi and Reggie said hi back and moved deeper into the store.
He found the pharmacy and drug aisles towards the back. A line mostly of old people stood in front of the window, behind which clerks in white lab coats browsed shelves for bottles and passed them over to the old people.
Walking past, Reggie peered down an aisle where a teenaged boy a couple years older than him was trying to discretely peruse the rubbers. He saw Reggie looking at him, and Reggie hurried past.
In the aisle with the aspirin and sinus and cold medicine he found some of what he’d come for. He had the names on a slip of paper in his pocket and pulled that out to compare it with what was written on the labels.
The man in the tree house had told him some of the drug names on the list wouldn’t be available over the counter, but Reggie thought he recognized them from bottles in the medicine cabinet at home. He grabbed a couple boxes off the shelves in front of him and headed back across the store to the checkout area.
Passing the aisle with the rubbers again, he saw the older kid and the kid looked up again as Reggie passed by. Reggie saw the torn box in the other kid’s hands, saw him moving as if to shove something in his pocket, before he stopped and looked up at Reggie.
‘What’s your problem?’ the bigger kid said. ‘Mind your own fuckin’ business …’
His words trailed off as Reggie moved past him and back towards the front of the store. He found the ten items or less express lane and put the packages on the counter. The clerk, maybe the same one who’d greeted him when he came in, said hi and smiled and Reggie said hi and smiled back.
He felt more than heard someone step into line behind him.
Reggie didn’t want to but looked.
It was the bigger kid who’d been stealing rubbers.
The bigger kid smiled at Reggie, and Reggie turned away, pulled out some money from his pocket, paid for the medicine. He thanked the clerk and headed out of the store and to his bike.
Bending, turning the dials on the lock to unchain his bike, he heard footfalls coming up behind him. Heard them stop very close. He could also hear the breathing of the kid behind him, like the puffs of breath from a prank caller.
‘Ain’t you the kid that cried last year?’ said the older boy.
Reggie ignored him and finished putting in the combination of his lock.
‘Hey,’ said the condom bandit. ‘I’m talking to you.’
Looping the chain out from around the spokes of the tyre, refastening it around the seat bar, Reggie rose and lifted a leg to swing over onto the bike. Caught off balance, the otherwise light shove of the older boy’s palms against his back sent Reggie toppling over.
His temple struck the wall the bike rack was bolted into.
Tangled with his legs, the bike clattered along with him and the pedals and spokes scraped him good along the calves and thighs. Pushing away from the bike, disengaging himself, he stood on shaky legs and touched his head where he’d hit it. His fingers came away without blood, but his temple throbbed smartly.
‘What the hell’s your problem?’ he said to the bigger kid, wishing he sounded braver and less pitiful.
‘I said ain’t you the kid that cried last year?’ the older boy said. He had a lazy smile on his face like this was nothing more than another day.
Reggie knew what he was talking about but didn’t say anything.
The older boy seemed vaguely familiar, like maybe he’d seen him around school. But being a couple years older, a senior most likely, Reggie probably hadn’t seen him much and couldn’t put a name to the face.
‘I don’t want no trouble,’ Reggie said. ‘I gotta go.’
He pulled his bike up and looked around the parking lot. There were people walking to cars and walking from cars, but none of them were terribly close by.
‘Yeah,’ the older kid said, ‘you’re him all right.’
He chuffed a wicked little sound that was something between a laugh and hocking a winner of a snot bomb.
‘You were walking to the office and crying,’ said the bigger kid. ‘Crying like a little faggot.’
Drugstore bag of medicine in one hand, gripping the handlebars, Reggie tried to steer away. The older kid stepped in front of him, placed a hand on the handlebar, a foot on the front tyre.
‘Did you poop your diapers that day?’ said the older kid. ‘Or did your boyfriend dump you?’
Reggie wanted to leave. His heart was thudding, pounding against his chest like a beast shackled. His vision blurred and reddened. He wanted to leave but the bigger kid was in front of him.
For some reason he thought of the man in the tree house. He thought of the crumpled bullet dug out of him. He thought of the shiny black gun.
Something in Reggie loosened. The pounding stopped. The blurry and red vision cleared. His formerly white-knuckle grip on the handlebars relaxed. He looked up at the older kid, looked him square in the eyes.
‘My dad died,’ he said.
The other kid blinked. His mouth worked like he wanted to say something, but didn’t know quite what.
‘So why don’t you go back to stealing your rubbers,’ Reggie said. ‘And while you’re at it, find someone with a dick who could actually use them.’
And just like that the older boy’s flustered moment was gone.
His fist found Reggie’s eye and down he went again, bike on top, hard sidewalk beneath. The older kid leaned over him and grabbed a fistful of Reggie’s shirt.
‘You watch your fucking mouth, dip shit,’ he said and shook him, making Reggie’s head bounce against the concrete under him.
‘Hey! What’re you kids doing there?’