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in solitude waiting for the door to open, wondering whether her youngest son would return home with a look of pride in his eyes or hanging his head in shame.

The grass in Reid Park was covered with eggs. Bright dots by the thousands. Up in trees. Sitting in the seats of swingsets. In clumps of brush. A mob of children stood behind a long line of police caution tape, waiting for the sound of the horn so they could break the strip and rush after the eggs.
    Alright. Fuck the ones sitting out in the open, Davey. Run right through em and head for the trees.
    Yes, sir.
    I mean it. Last year the golden egg was hidden at the top of the rocket slide. Kid won five hundred bucks and a family pass to Justin’s Water World. We
need
that egg.
    The whole time he was talking to his son, Davey’s father was thinking man, if Davey gets that egg, I’ll be in heaven. Five hundred to take down to the Mile, where I can get the finest piece on the strip, and when Rogelio Nuñez goes waving his fifty around like he does every night at the bar after work, I’ll pull out a nice crisp c-note and show that fuckstick up once and for all. No more of his talk about his bitch and her fat mooseknuckle of a puss bunched up in her acid-washed jeans. I’ve seen her come into the shop on our lunch break, and he’s got nothing to brag about. Hell, I’d be in the bar getting drunk too, fucking that. Damn Mexicans. He should be mailing that fifty to his family back in Meh-hee-co.
    He grabbed his son’s ear, jerking his head hard, and Davey heard a pop and felt the cartilage tear and the sting spread through his head like a web. He bit his tongue to draw his attention away from the worse pain.
    You hear me, boy? You’re bigger than the rest of those beaners.
    Yes, sir.
    Just run over the top of em and find the golden fuckin egg and everything will be fine. Now get in there. He knocked his son on the head with his silver-and-turquoise wedding ring.
    Davey walked to the rope where the rest of the kids were waiting for the horn to blow so the hunt could begin. He was taller than most of them and felt stupid. The other parents were giving him disgusted looks, making no secret about their disapproval of such a large boy among their children. Heads shaking. Grimaces. And standing in front of them was his dad, loudly telling the others how his son was gonna get that golden fuckin egg this year. Yep, Davey’s got it, he gloated, adjusting his ballsack in his tight jeans.
    Davey kicked at a clump of grass. I hate him. Always messin with me. Pullin my hair and rappin me on the head with that stupid ring. He wanted to punch the kid next to him. His head still hurt.
    The kids were getting antsy waiting on the horn. They bobbed up and down and nudged each other, plotting their attack.
    I’m getting all the blue ones. Blue’s my favorite.
    Red’s mine.
    Davey thought just the golden egg for me. He was ten years old. Right at the cutoff for being too old for the egg hunt or caring about the other stupid eggs.
    It’s not like anyone’s going to card you his father said during their walk to the park. But he had folded his son’s birth certificate into his back pocket anyway. Just in case. They aren’t keeping us out. Let those sonsabitches try. The entire walk his dad threatened the sonsabitches. Dared them to question his son’s age. Davey spent the whole time thinking of how badly he wanted the new He-Man toy—Castle Grayskull.
    And now, waiting on the horn to blow, he thought about how he hadn’t peed before they left the house, he hadn’t had the time, with his dad dragging him out of bed and into the bathroom, where he splashed cold water on Davey’s face then told him you have exactly two minutes to meet me outside, and Davey picked up a shirt off the floor and shook it and turned it right-side-out and stumbled to the front yard, where hisdad stood beneath the palm tree and said you got sixty seconds to get from this tree to that saguaro in front of the