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tops—although the permit covers us for a hundred.”
    Lex lowers his voice, and for a few seconds, I’m in the dark. Then Harvey’s voice comes back, bright and bouncy. “ Ten thousand? ” he says, as if the number astounds him.
    Lex stands. “To divvy up as you see fit,” he says. “And another ten for charity. Asthma’s prevalent around here, isn’t it?”
    “It is,” replies Harvey.
    “So the American Lung Association might make sense. It’s your call.”
    Harvey simply nods. “That’s mighty generous of you.”
    The brunette struggles with the door, so I rush over and shove it open from the inside. She blows by me, splashes down on the bench and says, “I’ll take ‘em.”
    Lex grins at Harvey. “Do you accept out-of-state checks?”
    “Sure do.”
    “And where are those registration forms?” says Lex.
    If I could do a cartwheel, I would. Instead, I say, “Right this way.”
     

----
     
    Brent Flynn is a repeat customer and the only boy who calls to schedule appointments to screw me. I like that he knows my name and brings me little gifts (trinkets from the vending machine at the Bowl-A-Rama) as some kind of reward for when it’s over.
    “Hello?” I squeak when I pick up the phone, my throat tense in anticipation of hearing Marie or Duncan.
    “Bobbi?” It’s Brent. He’s called enough now that I recognize his voice.
    I lean against the kitchen wall and spiral the phone cord around my finger. “Oh, hi.”
    “What’re you doin’?”
    “Nothing much,” I say. I think about Brent, how he might be a good guy (unlike the rest of the trolls who screw me), how he’s never uttered a mean or degrading word in my presence, how he’s extraordinarily sweet and polite to Melissa, his long-term girlfriend, who’s a virgin and intends to stay that way until she and Brent are married.
    “I’ve got my dad’s car until nine,” he says. “Can I come get you?”
    Between my legs, a sneaky little humming sensation begins percolating. Even though it’s wrong to keep letting these boys screw me, I can’t stop. Probably I’d have better luck quitting the Milky Ways. “Okay,” I say. If I’m going to give up the screwing, at least I could end on an up-note, with the quasi-respectable Brent Flynn.
    Brent says something I don’t hear due to the way Orv’s just clomped into the house. “Gotta go,” I blurt into the phone and then quickly hang up.
    Orv stops in his tracks and stares me down. “Who was that?”
    “Huh?”
    I slink into the living room as if I’ve been headed there all along, and Orv follows. “Who was on the telephone, Bobbi-Jo?” he persists.
    I’m not supposed to get calls from boys, and usually I don’t, with the exception of Brent and, sometimes, Tom. I click the TV (one of those clunky, prehistoric tube sets that looks like an overgrown robot’s head) on and say, “Ruby?”
    Orv collapses into the thrift store La-Z-Boy and begins unlacing his work boots. “Don’t lie. You ain’t very good at it.”
    I flip through the stations until I land on one of Orv’s favorite shows: Swamp Loggers. As borderline poor as we are, we still manage to squeak out the thirty bucks a month for satellite TV. “I have no reason to lie,” I proclaim to a symphony of chainsaws and earth movers. “We have a study group for Biology. I’ll be gone an hour or so.”
    “Who’s ‘we?’ ” Orv asks, raising an eyebrow.
    “Me, Ruby, Brent, and…I forget the other kid’s name.”
    “Where’s it at?”
    “Ruby’s house. You can call her mother, if you want,” I bluff.
    Orv’s eyes widen as a mud-caked guy on TV is nearly pancaked by a runaway load of timber. “How’re you gettin’ there?”
    “It’s too far to bike,” I say, baiting the hook. “Either you can give me a ride, or…” I pause as if I’m awaiting his response. “…or Brent can pick me up.”
    Out of the side of his mouth, Orv says, “How long’s he had his license?”
    I shrug, even though Orv is now