No one else laughed. Johnny was a celebrity of the darkest kind, a strange, wild kid with eyes that were savage and black. He’d seen things no boy was supposed to see. He’d lost a twin, found Tiffany Shore, and maybe killed a man.

He was war paint and fire.

Insane.

Johnny held up a single finger, then looked into his friend’s bright, brimming eyes. “Let’s get out of here.”

He started to leave, then saw Gerald, who stood three rows back, tall and broad, with sandy hair and skin the color of fired clay. Johnny pulled Jack into his wake, and the crowd parted. He stopped in front of Gerald and saw how the pretty girls stepped back, how naked Gerald looked without them.

Johnny dragged Jack from his shadow and draped an arm around his neck. He did not see how his friend lowered his eyes and rolled a curve into his spine, did not see the shame and the fear and the quick, nervous twitch. Gerald towered over Johnny, ten inches taller, a hundred pounds heavier. He was summer sweat and green grass, a hero in the making, but no one watching could doubt who was in charge.

Johnny held up the same finger, stabbed Gerald in the meat of his chest. “He’s your brother, you dick. What’s wrong with you?”

The boys stalked through the press of silent people. Johnny looked straight ahead and tried to avoid eye contact, but he did see one person he recognized, another senior, tall with white-blond hair and wide-set eyes. It was Detective Hunt’s son, Allen. From the river. Alone, in steel-toed boots and a jean jacket, he leaned against a column near the back of the crowd. A toothpick rolled between his teeth, and he guarded his eyes. When Johnny looked at him, he neither blinked nor moved. Just the toothpick. Side to side.

The security door accepted the key card that Steve had given him. The door clicked open and Johnny pushed through, into a cool, open space that smelled of damp and cement. Stairs rose to the right and beneath them was a low, gray space. Jack threw himself onto the floor, back against the wall, feet drawn up. Johnny sat next to him. Chewing gum made dark marks on the floor. One of Jack’s shoes was untied, and his jeans, at the knees, were stained with grass.

“Well,” Johnny said. “That sucked.”

Jack put his face on his knees and Johnny looked up. His fingers explored a rivet, then a weld line. When Jack’s face came up, Johnny saw wet spots that turned the grass stains black.

“How did you get us in here?”

“Uncle Steve.”

Jack sucked in two quick breaths, smeared mucus along the back of his bad arm.

“Those guys are dicks,” Johnny said.

Jack sniffed. “Shit munchers.”

“Yeah. Asswipes.”

Jack laughed, a nervous expulsion, and Johnny relaxed. “What was that all about?”

“He wanted me to say something,” Jack explained. “I wouldn’t do it.” Johnny looked the question and Jack shrugged. “Jocks rule. Gimps drool.”

“Fucking Gerald. How’s your arm?”

Jack rotated his arm at the shoulder, then pressed it across his chest. He pointed at Johnny’s chest. Bandages were visible above the buttons. “You’re bleeding, man.”

“I tore some stitches.”

Jack stared at the bandages. “Is that from the other night?”

The bandages darkened. Johnny pulled the shirt closed.

“I should have gone with you, Johnny. When you asked me for help, I should have gone.”

“It wouldn’t have made a difference,” Johnny said.

Jack beat a fist on his leg. “I’m a bad friend.” The fist sounded like a hammer on meat. “I am”-he paused, hitting again-“a bad friend.”

“Stop that.”

“I didn’t do anything for Alyssa.”

“You couldn’t have.”

“I saw it happen.”

“There was nothing you could do, Jack.”

But Jack ignored him. “I didn’t do anything for you.” He hit again, hard.

“Stop it, Jack.”

Jack stopped. “Is it true?” He looked at Johnny. “The stuff that they’re saying about you? You know?” He made a motion over his face, fingers wiggling.

Johnny knew what he meant. “Some of it, I guess.”

“What the hell, Johnny?”

Johnny looked at his friend, and knew, without a doubt, that Jack could never understand Johnny’s desperate need to believe in something more powerful than his own two hands. Jack had never felt the loss or the fear. He had never lived the nightmare that had become Johnny’s life, but he wasn’t stupid, either.

Johnny had to tell him something.

“You remember that book we read in English? The Lord of the Flies? About those boys on the deserted island and how they go feral with no adults around to tell them different. They make spears and blood paint. They run wild through the jungle, hunt pigs, beat drums. You remember?”

“Yeah. So?”

“One day they were normal, then one day the rules didn’t matter anymore. They made up their own rules, their own beliefs.” He paused. “Sometimes I feel like those boys.”

“Those kids tried to kill each other. They went insane.”

“Insane?”

“Yeah.”

Johnny shrugged. “I really like that book.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“Maybe.”

Jack picked at a thread on his jeans, looked around at the concrete and stairs. “I thought you hated your Uncle Steve.”

Johnny explained about DSS, Detective Hunt. “That’s why.”

“I wouldn’t do anything special for that cop,” Jack said.

“What do you mean?”

He waved a hand. “Stuff I hear from my dad. Cop stuff.”

“Like what?”

“Like he’s sweet on your mom. That they’ve been… you know.”

“Bullshit.”

“That’s what my dad says.”

“Well, your dad’s a liar.”

“He probably is.”

A silence fell. They were awkward together for the first time. “You want to spend the night?” Johnny asked. “It’s just Steve’s place, but, you know-”

“My dad won’t let me hang out with you.”

“Why not?”

“Lord of the Flies, man. He thinks you’re dangerous.” Jack tipped his head against the wall. Johnny did the same. “Dangerous,” Jack said. “Dangerous is cool.”

“Not if we can’t hang out.”

They fell into another long silence. “I really loved your dad,” Jack said. “He made me feel like the arm didn’t matter.”

“It doesn’t.”

“I hate my family.”

“No, you don’t.”

Jack wrapped his arms around his knees and his fingers went white where he squeezed them. “You remember last year? When I broke my arm?”

The arm was weak; it broke easily. Johnny remembered at least three times that Jack had been in a cast. Last year, though, had been a bad one, with breaks in four places. Fixing it took more surgeries: screws and pins and other bits of metal. “I remember.”

“Gerald’s the one that did it.” The small hand danced at the end of its narrow wrist. Jack’s voice fell down a well. “That’s why my dad gave me the new bike.”

“Jack-”

“That’s why I never ride it.”

“Shit, man.”

“I hate my family.”