CHAPTER TWO [sativa]
The truck swerved off the freeway onto a gravel road, jostling and bumping and steadily slowing down. “Where the hell are we going?” said Nell, but neither Ozzy nor Byron heard her over the gravel crunching beneath them. The truck sent up a cloud of dust in its wake as it trundled along. Trees began to sprout up in increasing profusion on either side of the road. Soon the highway had vanished from sight.
“I don’t think this is the right way,” Byron murmured.
They were pulling into the driveway of a derelict farm, a cluster of vine-festooned barns and fenced-off pastures devoid of any livestock. As the truck slowed Nell pulled something out of her jacket pocket, stuck it in her mouth: a joint. She shielded the joint with one of her hands and lit it with a silver Zippo.
She breathed in a deep drag, blew out several rings of smoke. “Toke?” she said, proffering the joint to Ozzy.
Ozzy wavered. Then nodded. He took the joint. Pulled a deep experimental drag from it—
And then Piratehead emerged from the driver’s door and approached the trunk. He was holding a revolver in his hand. Ozzy’s heart rocketed into his throat. The joint slipped from his lips and landed at his feet. He vomited a plume of smoke.
“Where did you get that?” said Piratehead, his expression no longer jovial but dead serious.
Ozzy choked on his tongue. “M-me?”
“Yes, you. You know what I’m talking about. Summer Haze.” His lips creased in a lazy grin. “Nature has a funny way of saturating the world with her deadliest and most beautiful creations, doesn’t she? Now climb out”—he motioned with his revolver—“and walk towards me. Now.”
Ozzy, Byron and Nell shared a horrified look. They had no choice: they climbed out of the trunk and walked slowly toward Piratehead. Ozzy felt Nell’s fingers lace through his. He didn’t dare take his eyes away from the barrel of the revolver, but he could feel her next to him. She squeezed his hand.
Piratehead ushered them across the muddy yard, up to the porch of the first dilapidated barn. “Knock three times, loud,” he grunted once they were standing on the doormat.
Nobody moved.
“You. Girl. Knock three times. Loud.” The revolver went click as Piratehead switched the safety off.
“Shit,”Nell muttered. She let go of Ozzy’s hand, pounded on the door with her fist. Once, twice, thrice.
“Good,” Piratehead rasped.
They heard movement behind the door. Heavy plodding footsteps. Then it opened and a sallow, reedy man with greasy black hair towered above them. He was wearing a leather trenchcoat, a baggy T-shirt, baggier shorts. The left half of his face was sagging, and his left eye was milky and rimmed with red boils.
He leered down at the three minors on his doorstep. He had a large silver shotgun in one
hand. A serrated knife tucked into the waistband of his shorts.
“Hello Matt. Three young ones, like you requested,” said Piratehead. “Good looking, too. Fresh from the side of the road. Naïve as all hell.”
The sallow man named Matt nodded, stroked his chin pensively. “Good.” He spoke quietly enough that he could’ve been talking to himself. “Good.” He looked up. “And in return?”
“You know what I’m here for.” Piratehead leaned forward, drew the next words out in an oily drawl: “Summer Haze.”
“Summer Haze?” Nell echoed under her breath.
Matt sneered. “Of course.”
“Twelve pounds of it, if you please. And don’t play games with me. Or I’ll spread the word about your… methods.”
“Yes, yes.” Matt scowled. “Stay here a minute. Watch the children.” The way he said that word—children—made wish he could drop to the ground and trust the earth to swallow him. But the revolver was still hovering in the corner of his vision. He didn’t dare move.
Matt vanished into the barn, returned a few moments later carrying a giant cardboard box, which he set down at Piratehead’s feet.
“Open it.” Piratehead pressed the barrel of the gun to Nell’s temple. “Slowly.”
With a whimper, Nell knelt beside the box. She dug her yellow-stained fingernails into the cardboard and pried it open. Inside were about a dozen bricks wrapped in black plastic. A familiar scent wafted from them.
“Move,” Piratehead grunted, shoving Nell aside. He pulled one of the bricks out of the box, tore the plastic. Ozzy caught a glimpse of something green beneath it.
“That’s worth almost four thousand dollars,” said Matt.
Piratehead grinned a satisfied grin. “Excellent. Thank you, Matt.” Then he stepped back, motioned with his revolver to Ozzy. “Carry that to my truck, will you? Put it on the passenger’s seat.”
Ozzy bent over to obey—but then a hand landed on his shoulder. “No,” Matt growled. “You belong to me now. You do as Isay.” Matt turned to Piratehead. “I think it’s time for youto leave, my friend. You can carry your own boxes.”
Piratehead’s jaw quivered. For a moment Ozzy thought he was going to shoot Matt point blank. But then he stiffened, smirked, shoved his revolver into the waistband of his jeans. He picked up the box and carried it over to his truck—set it on the passenger’s seat, then climbed in on the driver’s side and drove off. The truck vanished in a cloud of dust, and that was the last any of them ever saw of it.
Matt turned to Nell, Ozzy and Byron.
“Now,” he said softly, a wicked gleam in his one good eye. “Now, now, now. From now on you belong to me.Is that clear?” He raised his shotgun slightly—just enough to show that he knew how to use it. “Now come with me, and I’ll show you how you’re going to spend the final hours of your short, miserable lives.”
J. Herrera Kamin 