The knock returns—quick, deft, somehow playful, a light rapping of knuckles.

  Hannah dares to approach the door. Surely there is no danger, a burglar or an intruder would not be knocking.

  And no danger from Babysitter, he’d have no interest in an adult woman.

  “Wes, is that you? Or—”

  Hannah stares in appalled fascination as the doorknob is being turned.

  “Who is it? Go away.”

  Could it be Conor? Playing one of his jokes on Mommy?

  But not possible, Conor is miles away. And Conor would be giggling by now, Hannah would have heard.

  Boldly the doorknob is turned again, this way, that way, with an air of childish impatience, Hannah cries, “Stop! I’m going to call the police.”

  Whoever is on the other side of the door knows her, she thinks. She is certain.

  He knows that the door is locked against him. Yet, he’s taunting Hannah as a child might do but with an air of menace.

  What Hannah should do: barricade herself in the interior of the house, in a locked bathroom, and call 911. Instead, Hannah impulsively opens the door, sees to her astonishment the ponytailed boy standing before her, not three feet away, baring his teeth in a sneering wet smile.

  Y.K.’s driver! Him.

  In a grungy black T-shirt that fits his tight-muscled torso like a glove, in low-slung army-camouflage pants, in ankle-high black running shoes. Smelling of his body, excitement. His hair is coarse, dull-dark, pulled back into a straggling ponytail, his dark-tinctured skin is flushed and oily, eyes gleaming like hot coins as if he’s drunk or high, immensely pleased with himself.

  “Hey Mrs. J__, know what? You fucking forgot to tip me.”

  Beautiful Boy

  When I was taken it was within an instant.

  When I was taken it was between one breath and the next.

  When I was taken it was on the trail as Lupa trotted ahead.

  Swiftly he came up behind me, his arm clamped around my neck strong enough to snap my neck and I could make no sound, Lupa trotted ahead unknowing when he took me.

  Against my nose and mouth a cloth like flames, in that instant I could not breathe.

  Could not draw breathe to scream when I was taken, my knees buckled and I could not stand upright when I was taken, my brain was fainting, failing like a light switched off to blackness.

  When I was taken no one knew, no one saw.

  Grunting laughter as he half lifted me, dragged what remained of me out of the woods moving with such speed, such strength in his arms, his legs bearing me away and Lupa now whining, at a distance flattened against the earth ears laid back teeth bared yet quivering in fear not daring to come nearer when I was taken between one breath and the next.

  Beautiful boy no one will hurt you, no one has loved you the way I will love you beautiful boy this is the best thing that will ever happen to you in your life.

  Never Say No

  Fuck, yes! Never say no to Hawkeye.

  Steeling himself to learn what it is Hawkeye wants done this time—expedited.

  Drive to Bloomfield Hills, emergency situation, R__ is in bad need of help, a kid he’d picked up on Cass he brought to the house has had a heroin overdose (not R__’s fault, the kid brought the drugs with him).

  R__ can’t handle the situation himself, isn’t in great shape himself, can’t drive a vehicle himself, in no condition to leave the premises, calling an ambulance isn’t an option.

  Just get out there, fast as you can, expedite.

  What expedite means is: Clear up shit. R__ will pay up front in cash.

  And take the “little camera” with him. Of course.

  (The “little camera” is a Leitz Leica small enough to fit in a pocket of Ponytail’s cargo pants. Given to him by Hawkeye who says Nobody can take too many pictures of a good thing.)

  Ponytail wonders how much R__ has paid Hawkeye, up to now. How much more he can expect.

  Weird shit Ponytail has heard about R__, known as Mister R__ at the Mission.

  Living with his parents, in Bloomfield Hills. His father’s a “top executive” at General Motors.

  At his age, has to be almost forty. That is weird.

  The parents, Hawkeye says, are gone on a trip. Just R__ in the house by himself, and the overdosed kid.

  Rumor was R__ had been arrested for “sex abuse of a minor” more than once but charges are always dropped with sons of bitch perverts like Mister R__ living in Bloomfield Hills.

  When Mikey was still in residence at the Mission was the time Mister R__ began to show up at the motels. Younger than the old asshole fags and didn’t want to mingle with them like he was some kind of aristocrat and not a sick fucking fag himself.

  Hanging out at the edges of things. Little rat eyes behind dark glasses, dyed-looking mustache, camera slung over his shoulder. Called himself a photojournalist.

  In a good mood Mister R__ was okay. Generous! He’d pay you for just being photographed, all you had to do was strip, roll around on a bed, get high. His special boys he’d inject with heroin, he’d pay extra for that.

  Ponytail had felt Mister R__’s rat eyes moving on him when he was clueless Mikey Kushel but nothing ever happened between them, maybe Mikey hadn’t been sexy enough.

  There’d been an accident, Mister R__ and one of the boys, no one knew exactly what happened, but (it was said) Father McKenzie gave testimony to police the boy had a “severe asthmatic condition,” plus he’d taken drugs, his breathing just stopped. Not smothering, not involuntary manslaughter, but death ruled accidental.

  R__ has no idea, Hawkeye has plenty of “evidence”—photos, videotapes of him at the all-nighters. Ponytail has some curiosity how it will play out and how he might be involved.

  Don’t overthink it. Stay cool.

  Hawkeye is instructing Ponytail: If the kid is still alive when you get to the house, get him off the premises, fast. Bottom line is, he can’t die there.

  Transport him in the trunk. Not the backseat of the car. Got it?

  Got it. (Ponytail scowls, he’s no asshole.)

  Anywhere is okay to dump him, like a mall parking lot, at the edge. Somebody will see him there and call an ambulance.

  Don’t take him to an ER, don’t let anybody see you or see your license plate. If you do, you’re fucked.

  Ponytail asks uneasily what if the kid’s dead? Before he gets to the house?

  Hawkeye says irritably what d’you think, if he’s dead? Especially then, you have to remove him from the premises. Dump with discretion.

  Ponytail says okay, cool. But getting a bad vibe from this.

  Worst case, Ponytail might know the kid. He has acquaintances hustling in the gay bars on Cass. Kids who’d aged out of the Mission.

  Weird to be talking so casually about dead. Like Ponytail is familiar with dead.

  Hawkeye gives him the address, Ponytail writes it down: 11 Balmoral Drive, Bloomfield Hills.

  Hawkeye warns Ponytail: Get in and get out. R__ invites you to come back after you’ve dealt with the kid, get high with him, have some drinks, swim in his pool—don’t. Got it?

  Ponytail nods: He’s got it.

  Don’t take anything from the premises. You do, you will regret it.

  Ponytail protests: He isn’t a thief!

  Hawkeye says: R__ will pay you. We’ve negotiated. Don’t talk to him more than you need to. Take what he gives you. Don’t take time to count it—it’s all there. And wear gloves.

  Gloves?

  What’s called surgical—“latex.” Get them in a drugstore. You’re not going to leave prints.

  Ponytail considers this. Distinctly feeling bad vibes.

  Ponytail asks can he use the camera wearing gloves and Hawkeye says try.

  No need to warn Ponytail not to let R__ see the camera. (You never let anyone see the camera, and if it looks like they’re unconscious, eyes closed, even then don’t take a chance.) However Ponytail fucks up, he’d better not fuck up in that regard.

  Hawkeye tells him: Maple Road is “Fifteen Mile.” Exit west.

  Ponytail remembers that exit. Cool!

  Rare for Ponytail to journey out of the city. Rarer, into the rich white suburbs north of Royal Oak. Last time/first time he’d exited at Maple Road was when Hawkeye had trusted him to bring Mrs. J__ home in her fancy car.

  Thoughts of her come to him, often. In the night.

  How she’d trusted Ponytail, kind of. Didn’t fight him. Like he’d saved her life. Drove her home in the (classy) car it was a thrill to drive like in a dream where you can’t hear the powerful engine, can’t gauge how fast you might be driving, nothing like an ordinary car. For people who lived in Far Hills were nothing like ordinary people. How he’d found the house, drove around to the back and parked the car in the garage as he’d been instructed by Hawkeye, point by point. Helped the weepy drunk woman out of the car and into the house, smart enough to use her house key on the chain with the ignition key to unlock the door.

  Christ! Has to smile now thinking how when so many things could’ve gone wrong he hadn’t fucked up once.

  Remembered to hand her the Prada bag. And not to take anything from her. Might’ve emptied her wallet or at least taken a few bills but he had not.

  Ponytail could find the house again, he thinks. Far Hills, a smaller version of Bloomfield Hills. Not so rich, but rich. Weird road name—Rock Cradle. Or was it Cradle Rock.

  A natural instinct for geography like he can shut his eyes right now and make his way through every room in the house on Wyandotte where he’d lived as a young kid with his mother until she disappeared.

  Christ!—twenty years. Mikey’s old, lost life.

  Hawkeye is giving Ponytail his phone number, tells him to call only if something serious goes wrong, and even then don’t call from R__’s house but from a pay phone.

  Ponytail knows now this is serious. Never heard of Hawkeye giving anyone his telephone number.

  Ponytail gives a nervous laugh—okay, cool.

  He’s in some kind of weird state lately, not sure what, might be what’s called an “allergic reaction” making his heart beat funny, tingling sensation in tips of fingers, toes. He’d taken some steroids, plus smoked some weird dope called kif picked up at the Eastern Market.

  So half the time he’s feeling high and half the time he’s feeling wasted.

  High as a kite, wasted like shit.

  Doesn’t tell Hawkeye that. Crucial to keep that to himself.

  Ponytail hangs up the phone. Grabs the Leitz Leica, trots out to his car parked on West Warren. Always relief he feels, the motor turns over, car starts, which wasn’t true of previous cars he’d owned.

  This car, a 1973 Pontiac Firebird sedan, royal blue, buff interior Hawkeye has given Ponytail on “permanent lease.”

  Meaning that Ponytail is on “permanent lease” to Hawkeye.

  • • •

  Goddamn. Ponytail arrives at the address on Balmoral Drive, Bloomfield Hills, thinking for sure he’s fucked, there’s a wrought-iron gate blocking the driveway, ten-foot stone wall stretching out of sight, no way for him to get inside to ring the doorbell, and the house is barely visible from the road, but good luck!—turns out the gate isn’t locked, all Ponytail needs to do is get out of his car, push the gate open, he can drive through.

  The kind of fancy gate that operates electronically, he supposes. Somebody up in the house buzzes to open it. Nobody in sight.

  Ponytail makes sure that the gate remains open, doesn’t swing shut and lock him inside. He intends to leave swiftly as Hawkeye advised: in, out.

  Already wearing the “latex” gloves. So tight-fitting, his hands feel like they’re being strangled.

  It’s a long drive, uphill. No vehicles in the driveway. Nobody in sight. Ponytail parks the Firebird in front of the portico of the house with its several white columns. Wondering if, if he’s going to be carrying somebody out to the car, he should be parked at the rear.

  Up close now Ponytail can’t see where the house ends, it’s so big. Washed-looking pale brick, tall windows, white-painted stucco. By midsummer every yard in Detroit is burned out, but here in Bloomfield Hills the grass is weird emerald green and moist-looking, like a golf course.

  Ringing the doorbell, and no answer.

  Worried that R__ will recognize him and wonder what the fuck Mikey Kushel is doing here.

  Mikey Kushel who’s packed on weight, sheer muscle in his upper body, his hair has coarsened and sprouted from his forehead, his jaws are hard-clenched like the jaws of a pit bull, fuck Mister R__ recognizing him, he’s not going to obsess over it.

  Mikey who’d never looked like this, Hawkeye’s first lieutenant in black T-shirt, cargo pants, black running shoes as heavy as boots.

  After what seems like a long time the door is opened. At first Ponytail doesn’t recognize R__—this middle-aged guy so wasted he can hardly stand. Leaning against the door, panting. Squinting at Ponytail with bloodshot pinwheel eyes.

  Sobbing what sounds like Thank God you’re here.

  Clutching at Ponytail, to pull him inside. Shut the door!

  Ponytail is astonished to see Mister R__ in such a state, he’s a guy who tries to appear cool. Now looking much older than Ponytail remembers, and shorter. Face as sickly white as a fish’s belly, dyed-looking drooping mustache needs trimming and is wet with mucus. Bloated belly. Spindly legs. Wearing just (soiled) boxer shorts and a T-shirt stiff with smeared blood, dried puke. And barefoot, ugly white toes and toenails caked with grime.

  Ponytail’s sensitive nostrils pinch. Gross.

  Problem is, R__ can hardly stand upright. Drunk, or drugged, or (maybe) he’s had a stroke. Trying to explain something to Ponytail but he’s sobbing, his words are slurred, incoherent.

  Christ!—an adult man, crying. Ponytail is repelled.

  The most that Ponytail can comprehend is that R__ needs help desperately because he can’t drive in his present condition. He’d intended to deal with the emergency himself but discovered that he can’t. His eyesight is blurred like he’s underwater and he can’t walk straight, can’t use his car.

  Ponytail asks if R__ has something to give him. R__ hands over a medium-sized paper bag to Ponytail who takes it and only just glances inside—cash.

  How much cash, Ponytail won’t know until he counts it.

  Could be a thousand dollars? More?

  All for Ponytail. Though he guesses that Hawkeye will be paid, too, as the chief expediter.

  R__ instructs Ponytail to follow him. He’s got to lead Ponytail through the house. This is his parents’ house, R__ lives at the back, has his own entrance, that’s where the boy is.

  Explaining that his parents are away in Europe, he’s by himself in the house, told the staff to take two weeks off. He’d planned some photo shoots, just got started and things got fucked.

  Ponytail can smell alcohol on R__’s breath. Probably he’s high, too, on coke, sniffing and wiping at his nose.

  Leading Ponytail through the enormous house. Like through the lobby floor of the Renaissance Grand. Ponytail has an impression of spacious rooms, elegant furnishings, glittering things. A long polished dining-room table, gleaming candlestick holders, chandelier. Goddamned fucking joke, Ponytail thinks, how some people live.

  Yet: If his mother could see Mikey now. She’d be impressed!

  Along a corridor, into some open space like an atrium, plate-glass windows on all sides. Outside is a swimming pool so large Ponytail can’t see either end of it.

  From somewhere ahead, what sounds like cries, muted screams. Thumping rhythmic bass like music.

  So much effort leading Ponytail through the house, R__ has become short of breath. Asshole is sweating, shivering. Has to lean on Ponytail, too weak to walk by himself. Stumbling together like some stupid dance. Ponytail’s heart is beating hard in revulsion for the reeking breath, filthy T-shirt and shorts. Ponytail tries to ignore the naked white legs covered in hairs. And R__’s feet, grimy-webbed between the toes.

  So this is the rich “auto executive’s” pervert son: pitiful.

  In the past Ponytail had only seen Mister R__ kind of stiff-backed, superior. Dressing like some cool dude but always wore a baseball cap, probably going bald. Boasting he’s a photojournalist.

  Looking down on you even if (in fact) you are taller than he is.

  One good thing, R__ is so wrecked he doesn’t recognize Mikey Kushel. Hasn’t noticed the latex gloves that’d love to strangle his scrawny neck.

  As the music is getting louder, the thumping bass more emphatic, R__ is becoming more agitated, talking faster. Not his fault he’s saying, what happened. Not his.

  Ponytail averts his eyes from the sweaty face. Pleading eyes.

  Not his fault. His fault.

  Ponytail doesn’t know what to make of this babbling. He has a sick feeling in the gut, it isn’t an “overdose” he’s been summoned to deal with but something worse.

  In all his life Ponytail has never actually seen a dead person. A body.

  He’s seen pretty sick people who would later turn up dead. Cocaine junkies. Jaundice-yellow hookers, hepatitis C. Male hustlers, collarbones and ribs jutting like skeletons. Christ!—broken out in running sores.

  He’s smelled dead. But not up close. Not to touch and not his responsibility.

  Thinking now, maybe that’s what R__ has—some kind of rotting sickness like syphilis. Why he’s falling apart so young. Why his breath smells. Sick-white skin. Runny nose. Can’t catch his breath. Having to lean on Ponytail, panting and wheezing.

  Steering Ponytail into a newer part of the house. There are fewer items of furniture here—low-slung leather sofas and chairs, scuffed hardwood floor. Walls are dark blue and at every window venetian blinds have been shut tight against the sun. Dirtied glasses and plates, cutlery scattered on tables and on the floor, plastic takeout containers. Stale pizza crusts, crumpled napkins. A smell of something rancid, rotted. Empty wine bottles. Scuttling beneath a sofa, a hard-shelled beetle. Clothes scattered about, towels, wadded tissues. Camera equipment. On a worktable, glossy photos amid more dirtied dishes. Music from stereo speakers is deafening. A female voice so high-pitched it hurts Ponytail’s eardrums.