Page 108 of Jake Forever
I stopped. "For what?"
"If we get too close, we'll distract them."
I gave a quick shake of my head. "What?"
"If we get in the middle of it," she explained, "they'll be more worried about us than themselves."
I paused. It was funny. I'd never quite looked at it that way. But she was right. Still, I had to ask the obvious question. "Then why are we out here?"
Releasing me, she gave a weak laugh. "I dunno. Backup?"
I looked to the street. "Speaking of backups…" I didn't bother finishing the sentence. Selena had eyes. She could see for herself.
Ronnie was still hanging out of the passenger's side window, but now, traffic was piling up behind him.
On the other side of the street, a food delivery truck had claimed the other lane, which meant that until Ronnie moved, no one else could get through.
It was barely dawn, and a Saturday, too, so traffic wasn't even that heavy. Unfortunately, the cars were still stacking up scarily fast. I heard a horn honk, followed by the sound of a male voice yelling out, "Move your ass, dipshit!"
Like so many other times over the past few weeks, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
God, what a spectacle.
The only upside was that, for whatever reason, Ronnie didn't seem inclined to actually get out of the car. And for whateverotherreason, Jake and Bishop didn't seem inclined to do much more than watch, looking – from what I could see now – stupidly amused.
I couldn’t say I blamed them. Itwasentertaining, in a freak-show kind of way. And like all freak shows, it had attracted a crowd, not a huge one, but at least twenty people, watching from the sidelines.
Ronnie looked drunk off his ass, which no doubt, explained what he was doing out here so early. To him, it was probably the end of a long night, not the beginning of a new day.
He was still hollering, slurring out toward Jake, "You think you're such a big man. Well, you're not a big anything. You're an asshole, that's what you are."
Jake gave a low laugh. "That's what I hear." He turned to Bishop and said, "Doyouthink I'm an asshole?"
Bishop's voice was deadpan. "Don't ask."
Suddenly inspired, I turned to Selena and said, "Hey, can I borrow your phone?"
"Why?" But already, she was reaching into her purse. "Are you gonna call 911?"
"Actually," I admitted, "I want to get this on film."
She paused in mid-motion. "What?"
"Well, not on film-film," I explained. "I mean I wanna record it. You know. For Jake."
Selena looked at me like I'd lost my mind. "Why? For legal reasons?"
"Does it matter?" I thrust out my hand, palm-up. "Come on. Just hand it over, okay? I'd use my own if I had it."
But Ididn'thave it. The phone still hadn't turned up, and I was starting worry it was gone for good. How or why, I had no idea. It's not like I'd gone anywhere since using it last.
To her credit, Selena handed her phone over without further argument. Hers wasn't terribly different from my own, and within a couple of seconds, I was lifting the phone to capture the action.
I focused in on Ronnie, who was looking like a total idiot. He was now hanging so far out of the car that I started to wonder, was someone hanging onto his legs or something? Whether that was the case or not, it looked decidedly unsafe.
Next to me, Selena asked, "Is this for Jake's channel? This wasn't planned or anything, was it?"
I held up a single finger. "Shhh!"
