Before I could wreak vengeance, a strip of flesh, a tentacle of dripping black, descended from the rooftops above, wrapped around the thug’s neck, and yanked him upward. His hands went to his throat as his face turned gray and his eyes bugged out, and for a while I watched as he twitched at the end of the tendril. His face bloated, his tongue swelled, and with one final gurgle, he hung limp. The tentacle loosened from his neck, and his body dropped with a crash back into the refuse that filled the alleyway.

From the roof above me, something slithered into the night with the sounds of scales and slime.

Well. It appeared I had a cohort.

CHAPTER THREE

WE GET HOME, and Lon beelines it for his room while I sit down on the couch in the living room and let my head drop, like it was made of steel. Mom steps out of the kitchen and smiles. “Got everything you needed?”

“Yeah,” says Lon with a sigh.

Mom’s ears seem to twitch as her Mother radar picks up the vibe in the room. “What’s wrong?”

Lon shakes his head and tries to say something nice, but finally just throws his arms out at his sides. He’s like a little adult when he’s angry. It’s almost cute. “Locke flipped out. I’m never going to be able to shop there again.”

“Hey, Lon, I’m really sorry.” I am, too. He’s the last person in the world I want to hurt. But what the hell was I supposed to do, with that woman pulling shit like that? Should I have just shrugged and told him that we’d have to get his books later? How else could I react?

“Whatever,” he says, slamming the door.

My mom slowly ambles over to me and sits. “Dare I ask?”

I shake my head, catching a sob in my throat while I take off my glasses and begin to rub my eyes furiously. I will not cry. I’m a big kid. I will not cry.

She pats my back with the hand that still has the wedding ring on it. “Want to talk?”

I nod, and then whisper, “Um, can I have some chocolate milk?”

Chocolate milk is the antivenom. I have no idea why.

My mom goes to the kitchen and comes back with a big glass of Nesquik, and I toss it down my throat like it could save the world. The cool settles in my stomach, pervades my being, until I’m feeling fit as an athletic fiddle.

Seriously, I have no clue how it works, but it does.

“I’m just really upset about losing it in front of him,” I gasp after swallowing. “He shouldn’t have to deal with that.”

She nods in agreement. “I know, kidlet,” she says, “and I know sometimes the bad stuff just forces its way to the surface, and it’s hard to stay in control. But it’s not just him, y’know? You should be trying not to blow up like you do in front of anybody. It doesn’t help at all. Nothing improves.”

I nod and keep my mouth shut, and it feels like lying. In the past, the venom has always been reliable when it hits me-controlled chaos, a limited outburst of pure rage. But lately there’s been a jagged edge to the venom. There’s no black-and-white anymore. The venom is present all the time; even when I’m feeling okay, there’s a persistent sense of hurt in the background, like a rash that won’t go away. Its voice is clearer and constant. The full-on attacks come closer to the surface every day. The little show I put on at the bookstore wouldn’t have happened a few months ago, but today the venom took over quickly, like it was the most reasonable solution in the world.

What worries me is that the venom is growing restless, like it’s tired of the passenger seat and wants to take the wheel for a while. It’s always been an impulse, but I’m beginning to wonder where Locke ends and the venom begins. This concept terrifies me, sure. But if my mother knows about it, there’ll be more therapy. More long talks, more warnings to my teachers. Plus, Mom might cry. I can’t let that happen.

“You haven’t had an angry in a while.” An “angry.” I used the term maybe once when I was nine or something, and it stuck. Moms. “How’d it feel?”

“Like it always does. Really good and then really, really bad.”

“You know, if you wanted to go back to seeing Dr. Reiner…,” she says softly. That’s a laugh. Dr. Reiner was a shrink I saw, who was convinced that the venom was a product of some sort of sexual repression, a projection of my inner kink. He’d ask me about what I liked “to do” to girls, and whether I ever wanted “to do” things to other boys. When I told him that I knew I was straight and that gay sex never appealed to me, he asked me why I wasted his time by closing my mind. Well, he didn’t say it quite like that, but I’m no moron, and he wasn’t the champion of subtlety. You can always tell with people like that, whose sole purpose in life is to explain away what’s wrong with other people. So I broke one of his windows, and we don’t talk anymore and everyone’s peachier for it.

“Dr. Reiner was a chump, Mom. I think I’ll be okay.”

“Honey, maybe you should just give him another chance-”

“I gave him a chance. It didn’t work.”

She pats my knee again and gets back up to continue fixing dinner. “Whatever you want, honey. I’m just worried about you, is all. No harm meant. Whenever you need me, I’m here.”

I love my mom and my brother more than life itself. It’s not fair that they have to deal with the utter fucking mess that is me. I’m not even sure I could put up with it.

I wake up to the sounds of the doorbell and realize that I’ve fallen asleep. I take a quick look at the clock. Shit. Eight thirty. Randall’s here.

“Mom, I’m going out, okay!” I yell as I yank on my coat. “I’ll make curfew!”

From somewhere in the apartment, there’s a muffled, “Have fun, sweetie!”

I throw open the door and there’s Randall, all spiky blond hair and vintage suit. He has his acoustic slung over his back and a big Cheshire cat smile on his face. He’s shabby but stylish, awkward yet handsome-the kind of boy most skater girls dream of. He could be playing either the owner of a casino or a punk rock troubadour. I envy the whole dichotomy of it all.

“Why do you always wear black, Stockenbarrel?” he asks. It’s a Chekhov line; our joke.

“I’m in mourning,” I say dramatically, “for my life.”

He throws his head back and brays, his face all squinting and teeth. I think that’s what gets Randall so much attention-even I can’t deny that smile. When he smiles at you, you feel chosen. “You ready to go?”

I nod and we walk slowly down the stairs and out onto the street. I give him a smoke and light one myself.

“I thought you were quitting.”

“What are you, my mom?” I sigh.

He shrugs. “Just wondering. Didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Sorry. Long day. So remind me of their names again.”

“They’ll be a bunch of folks there, but you’re thinking Casey and Renée. This’ll be nothing big, just hanging out. But they really want to meet you.”

“Well, I’ve heard the names enough, I guess. It’s totally okay that I’m coming, right?”

“A small gathering, dude, nothing more.” I know this tone of his. He’s making sure I don’t get scared away, thinking this is, God forbid, a party. It’s somewhere between sweet and infuriating, but I let it slide. I’ve flaked out on meeting Randall’s outside-of-school friends enough times for it to be unfair. I owe him one. “Anyway. Why was your day long?”

“I had a venom moment in front of Lon today.”

“Ah.” I know what that “Ah” means, too. It means, Ah, you did what you always do, which is embarrass those around you by going apeshit. Randall’s like that: He doesn’t hide how he feels when it comes to me or the venom, so I can’t blame him for expressing those opinions, even if he doesn’t just come out and say them. He knows I can read his tones and movements.

We get down to Riverside, around 84th Street, coming upon the massive rock right next to a playground, what could almost be called a crag if it was a little bigger and sharper. Tonight, the rock and the entire area by it are lined with kids, but not normal kids. Circus kids: punks, mods, Goths, metal heads, indie kids, emo rockers, rude boys, all of that kind of crowd. (Randall uses these terms as though he were compiling a hipster encyclopedia). A bunch of them have guitars out; one or two of them have bongos. Surrounding them are about a hundred candles, all waxed to the ground, lighting up the entire area like a cathedral. These kinds of kids don’t exist in my little Manhattan private school universe. Parents send their kids to my school, hoping we won’t fall in with this crowd, unaware that the rich preppy kids drink and do drugs more than anyone on the planet. Randall refuses to buy it, though. He’ll go to punk shows and the skate park and return with a hundred new friends from all over the city.