Read Drowning Tucson for Free Online Page B

back. She’s actually going to give it to me.
    But then she started laughing and put one hand over her mouth and pointed the other—the one with the egg—at his crotch. At the cold wet stain he hadn’t noticed while he was running. The left leg of his jeans was saturated and sticking to him. He felt more pee seep into his underwear and embarrassment rush into his cheeks. Still, at least no one else saw, if anyone else sees I’ll just die, and the girl bowed her headlaughing. Davey walked up to her, ignoring his pee-squishy shoes, and grabbed the hand with the egg. Get the egg. Gotta get the egg. She stopped laughing and jerked her hand away, backing into the bushes. He followed her, ignoring the branches scratching his face and arms, grabbing at her leg. She fell backwards and tried to scoot away, still clutching her hand to her chest, trying to scream for her mommy. Shut up. Just shut up and give me the egg and pretend you never found it.
    NO. She squirmed, kicking at his hand. He ignored the pain, thinking of his dad back there telling the other parents how Davey’s got this one in the bag, the golden fuckin egg, probably dancing around and scratching his nuts.
    The girl’s hand touched water, and she stopped moving. He knew she was trapped, but she didn’t stop kicking, wouldn’t hand over the egg.
    He crawled through the bush, holding her leg down and trying to block her other foot from kicking his face. The girl turned to look for an escape but he pinned her down and lay on top of her, trying to wrestle the egg from her hand. It’s mine. If she’d just stop screaming and give it to me. He pushed her head into the stream then pulled it out again. She spat up water but didn’t let go of the egg. Just gimme it. Pushed her head under again. Gimme. Dunked her head again and held her down, ignoring her kicking and her hands scratching and punching at his neck and face, listening to her screams bubbling up through the water and pulling her hair harder and harder and wishing he’d gone pee before he left the house instead of wetting his pants like a baby, thinking Dad’s gonna beat me when he sees my pants, especially if I don’t come back with the egg, and then the girl finally stopped kicking and lay still and Davey thought good, she’s going to give up and maybe we can be friends. I’ll let her ride my bike and when I get too big for it, I can sell it to her for cheap and then maybe she’ll be my girlfriend, and he held her head underwater a little longer while he felt around her body with his other hand, looking for the egg, and when he located it he felt a calmness in his heart and he rubbed the egg’s sparkling surface with his thumb and crawled off the girl and crouched beneath the bushes to catch his breath and to think of a reason for having wet pants so he could bring the egg to his dad.
    He watched the water running through the girl’s hair, thinking how pretty her hair looked all spread out in the stream like that. Like seaweed. Then, when he caught his breath, he scrambled out of the bush and started walking toward his dad, imagining how much fun it’s gonna be to jump the ramp on my first try and with all the kids watching.

Manny came for the tits, but now he didn’t notice them jiggling in his face. He was looking for Vinnie and thinking of the men lining the stage and the way they whooped and yelled and slapped each other’s backs and winked at the topless waitresses walking by, obviously not of the same ilk as the girls deemed worthy of baring not just their breasts but also their neatly shorn crotches in front of the hardworking men who came to the Loveboat at each day’s end. The waitresses didn’t mind getting less attention than the girls on stage, because lord knows we get our share of ass-grabbin and titty-pinchin from the airmen who come across the street from Davis-Monthan Air Force Base at the end of each day in stumbling groups yelling gonna see us some tits tonight and man,