The Original Crowd (A Whole New Crowd 0.50)

“I’m your best shot of getting it and that’s the deal. Take it or leave it. I won’t lose any sleep over it.”

Narrowing his eyes, he shook my hand. “You’re an operator. I should’ve guessed,” he said soothingly.

I smirked, turning around and crossing to my car. As I pulled out of the parking lot, I caught a glimpse of Tray leaning against his, watching me.

*

Mandy had asked me if I wanted to go to Tray’s party that night, but I had declined, instead choosing to slip out of the house and head to an old friend’s. As my car slid to a halt outside the ratty old house, I grinned, hearing the music blaring from inside.

Same old Geezer.

Chuckling, I approached it and swept through the door, knowing he’d never hear my knock. I found him where I always find him—his skinny ass stoned on the couch, a half grin on his face, his hair looking even shaggier than the last time I saw him.

Crossing over to him, I swiftly kicked the couch. I watched him stumble off, jolted from the bump. As his eyes lighted on me, a full grin spread over his face and he threw himself at me.

“Tartar!”

Laughing, I disentangled his arms and cut the music. “Geez, you don’t ever change, do you?”

“Never ever. Never ever,” he babbled, bouncing up and down in place.

Shaking my head, I replied, “It’s good to see you, Charles.” Using his real name, I saw a small tear slip from his eye. His smile vanished immediately and he threw himself at me again, wrapping his bony arms around me tightly, squeezing the life out of me.

After a moment, I kicked him away. “Okay, that’s enough.”

He was bouncing again.

Tilting my head to the side, I asked, “Can I ask you for a favor?”

“Yeah. Sure. Anything.”

“Brian been around?”

“No,” he said seriously. “He’s been off, like off off, if you know what I mean, ever since you left. I used to think he was scary, but man, he’s really scary now.”

“Yeah…he’s been calling me.”

“I think he never thought you’d leave him.”

“Yeah.” I sighed, rubbing a hand over my forehead. “Uh…I have a favor to ask.”

“Sure. Anything. You know that.” He beamed up at me.

“I need you to make a device look like it’s been wiped.”

“Any certain type of device? And I’m guessing you don’t really want it to be wiped?”

“Yeah. It’s a PRS-500. I only want one code to show up, one set of numbers. Everything else, I want it to look clean, but not actually clean. Got it?”

He saluted. “Yes, ma’am. Whatever you want.”

“Okay. Okay.” It was good to see him. Really good. Wrapping my arms around him, I hugged him back this time, something that I’d never done before. Brian was the only one I ever hugged. Geezer and the others, I let them hug me, but I never hugged them.

Geezer knew the significance. He was sniffling when I pulled away and swept out the door.

Getting in the car, I quickly started it and peeled out of there, flicking the tears away as they peeked at the corner of my eyes.

It wasn’t a long drive, from Pedlam to Rawley, but it was long enough to get my thoughts in order. If I was going to do this, I needed layouts, blueprints, and security parameters. Everything. If Tray wanted this device to get inside Pedlam before the homecoming game, I needed to steal it just before that evening. At the last possible minute so they wouldn’t change all the codes. That meant I needed to get it by Thursday night. I had six days to get this assignment perfected. I would need Geezer on standby, preferably away from Tray and the others. They didn’t need to mix.