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her. “Put on the helmet, Kylie.”  
    She twists around, grabs the spare, and stuffs it onto her head, clips it. “Oz, about Ben—”
    “He’s just looking out for you.” I effectively cut off the conversation with the belly-churning roar of the engine.  
    We don’t talk again until we’re pulling up into her driveway, which is filled with cars.  
    “Shoot,” Kylie says. “I think the studio is occupied.” She gestures at the cars. “This looks like The Harris Mountain Boys. Mom and Dad’s new project. Wait here.” She’s off the bike, tossing me the helmet and jogging into the house.  
    A few minutes later she comes out. “It’s them, and they’re recording until late tonight. I told Mom I’m with you. So we’re good to go.”
    “Where are we going?” I ask as she adjusts behind me.
    “Your house?”
    I blink a few times. “My house? You don’t want to go there.”
    “Why not?”
    “Because it’s a shithole?”  
    “I don’t care. All we’re doing is playing music.”  
    I don’t know how to respond to that. It’s kind of a non-sequitur. Playing music has nothing to do with the fact that Mom and I live in a not-so-great section of town, and I doubt Kylie’s ever spent time anywhere like that. But yet somehow I can’t say no to her. I’m pointing the bike across town, weaving through traffic, running yellow lights, dodging onto the shoulder, relishing the way her hands tighten on my stomach and the way her thighs grip me.  
    The buildings get older, grimier, the streets get dirtier. The cars get rustier. We pass liquor stores and adult video stores, abandoned shop fronts, industrial buildings belching smoke, mechanic garages, apartment complexes. I can sense Kylie’s unease with our surroundings, can feel her discomfort, her fear. We pull into my complex, pass the abandoned swing set missing three of the swings, the rusted yellow merry-go-round, the climbing structure tagged with graffiti. The cars are all twenty to thirty years old. A plastic bag whips across the lot in front of us as I pull to a stop outside the entrance to my building.  
    I don’t cut the engine. “Let me take you home, Kylie. You don’t belong here.”  
    A trio of black guys with sagging khakis, oversized white T-shirts, and huge hoodies sidle slowly past us on the sidewalk that runs in front of the buildings. Their eyes meet mine, and I don’t look away. They seem to recognize that I’m one of them, unlike the chick on the back of my bike, and they keep walking. One of them nods, a kind of acquiescence. When they’re gone, Kylie sighs in audible relief.
    “Do you know them?” she asks.
    I shrug. “Nah.”
    “Why were they staring at us?”
    I don’t know how to explain it to her without scaring her. “We’re white.” I pause, and then continue. “It wasn’t a challenge, just…curiosity, I guess. I don’t know.” I wasn’t about to tell her that I didn’t dare look away, or show any kind of fear.  
    She seems to sense that I wasn’t telling her everything. “Is it safe here?”
    I shrug again. “As long as you’re with me.” I twist to look at her. “Let’s go, Kylie. Let me take you home. We can play another time. At your place.”
    I feel her stiffen, straighten. “No. It’s fine. Let’s go in. I want to see where you live.”
    I sigh. “Okay. But…I warned you. It’s a shithole.”  
    With my hand on her back, I push her ahead of me, guiding her through the entryway, which isn’t secured. There’s a keypad and a series of call buttons, but they haven’t worked since before I born, probably. The door sticks, and I have to jerk it hard to get it open. There’s a small foyer, covered in threadbare industrial blue carpet. It smells of old beer and new piss. I nudge Kylie up the four stairs to the landing. A hallway extends to our left, the walls scratched and pockmarked, pale blue doors lining the walls, numbered with tarnished black numerals. A stairway leads up. Five