- 3 –

         The phone was ringing. He’d only been sleeping for three hours and now the phone was ringing. He took a moment to assess his location. His head was tucked firmly beneath his pillow, which left the space there hot as a hydra. His blanket was wrapped around him so that he looked like a human burrito. He uncurled a finger and waved it out beneath the covers. The air was freezing cold.

    With a groan he lifted his heavy head on top of the pillow and watched the phone ringing. His arm snaked out into the cold room and snatched up the receiver.

“Whoever you are, I am going to rip out your entrails and make sure you never have babies. If you aren’t dying or dead, you will be.”

“Aw. Did I wake you up?”

“Yes, you fucking woke me up. Olive.”

“Haden.”

“Did you need something?” he asked in a tired voice.

“Um. Well. I’m adopted.”

“What?” Haden asked, sitting up in bed. He wrapped the blanket around him a second later.

“Yeah. Hannah and James dropped the bomb. Then I was in a bar-”

“In a bar?”

“Yep. Well, if I can’t drink, I might as well get dizzy off the fumes.” Olive’s voice sounded defensive even over the tinny noises from the phone.

“Alright, anyway…”

“Yeah, I was in the bar and this weird dude comes up and tries to buy me a drink and then slips me this bright pink envelope with my name on it and-- Haden, I’m afraid to open it. What if there’s like Anthrax in there or something?”

    Haden ran a hand over his face. Olive was asking for his help. He was really torn. He desperately needed sleep before he went out on watch again. But then Olive was asking somebody for help. He weighed it.

“Where are you?”

“Dunno.” Haden sighed. “Alright, I’m outside the Wal-Mart.” Haden waited patiently. “In Thornwood.”

“Thank you,” he said. “I’ll be there in a little while.”

“I love you, Haden,” Olive said. He could hear her laughing silently.

“Shut up.”

    He hung up the phone and then rolled out of bed. He looked down at his bare stomach with a frown. The bruises were already starting to show in faint gray splotches on his skin. He checked his arms. Purple already. Haden smiled to himself.

    After pulling on a T-shirt and some jeans, the effort of which nearly killed him, he grabbed his keys and some shoes and headed downstairs. The lobby of his musty apartment building had a giant clock hanging over the entrance; it now read 1:00 AM. He frowned some more. He was probably going to murder Olive later. Maybe. If he wasn’t too sore.

    He climbed in the car and pulled on his sneakers. The drive out to Thornwood was quiet, the radio playing low in the car. He pulled up to the Wal-Mart, eyes out for Olive. She was hard to miss.

    His red-haired friend was standing on the very top of someone’s car, hand shoved in her jeans pocket, directly beneath a street lamp. Haden pulled up to it and stared.

“Hey.” He rolled down the window, still staring at her. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Trying not to be raped.”

“I feel sorry for the guy who tries to rape you,” Haden muttered as he climbed out of the car. “Come down from there before someone sues you.”

    He held out his arms for her to jump into but she merely gazed at him with those frank blue eyes. She turned around and jumped over the other side. She came around to him, smiling.

“I know your feet hurt now,” he told her. “You’re not smooth enough to pull it off.” Her smile faded.

“Shut up.”

    He laughed under his breath as they both climbed in the car. Of course she cranked his radio and he ignored it. She rolled down all the windows which ‘forced’ her to turn the stereo up even higher. They rode in peaceful silence for a while, listening to the music with the wind blowing wildly through their hair. Suddenly she reached over and clicked it off.

“How do you do what you do?”  She asked.

“Do what?”

“Your job.”

“I get paid a lot of money to do what I do,” he muttered, shifting uncomfortably. “Why?”

“I want to do what you do.”

    There was a moment of silence. He pondered her words, wondered how to react, and settled on ignoring it. He changed the subject ungracefully.

“Where’s that letter?” he asked. She slipped her hand beneath her jacket and produced the envelope. “Open it?”

    Olive looked at him briefly. She nodded. He watched her hands out of the corner of his eye as she tore into the paper. There was a card. It glittered and the colorful words shimmered in the glow of passing street lamps. She laughed bitterly.

‘“Hoping your birthday is a special one’,” she read. She opened it. ‘“We love you forever, daughter.”’ She looked at him. “The bastards have a sense of humor.”

“Does it say what their names are?” he asked. Olive nodded. Haden waited for the answer.

“My mom’s name is Daphne.” She took a deep shaking breath. “My dad’s name is Rudyard.”

“Last name?”

“Nope.”

“Sorry.”

“Not your fault,” she muttered. He reached over and turned the radio back on. He pretended she wasn’t crying.