Page 2 of The Social Affair (New Hope 1)

“I might have wound up dead. That is—if you didn’t kill me first.”

“I’m sorry,” he says. But it’s a lie, only as sincere as the predicament in which he’s now found himself.

“Give me one reason I shouldn’t pull the trigger…”

He doesn’t immediately answer me, and this makes me nervous. Every second counts. I’ve learned this lesson well. “It’s not like it wouldn’t be self-defense.”

“My grandma,” he says, finally. Before he starts huffing and hawing about his knees again.

“Your grandma.” I tilt my head. I hadn’t expected that.

“Yeah, I look after her. She’s blind and bedridden.”

“What does that have to do with me?”

“If I don’t go home, no one will find her. Not for days….”

I reposition the gun, lower it slightly and then raise it again. I look down the barrel and line up the sight. Then I squeeze one eye shut the way they do in the movies. “I don’t believe you.”

He starts waving his hands. This is his problem in life, I can see. No one taught him how to use words to get what he wants, so he resorts to violence. “She has diabetes. I need the money for insulin.”

I study him carefully. He has a sense of desperation about him. And not just because I have a gun pointed at his heart. I read about that on the internet, too. Where to aim. Makes it hard to miss. Anyway, I know the look, and somehow I think he might be telling the truth, which makes this situation all the more sad.

“Fine,” I say. “But prison is going to cost you a lot more than insulin.” I know as the words leave my mouth what I’m saying isn’t altogether true. If he is in fact telling me the truth, not getting the insulin his grandmother needs would have far greater effects than knowing he did what he could and went to jail for it. Either way, he failed. But in his mind, in the latter scenario, at least he would know he’d given it his all. Street credit. That’s his currency.

I watch as he shifts onto his side. He’s slow and careful about it and still I make sure the gun is trained on him. He reaches into his pocket, and I learn quick— there’s no safety. “Make another move and you’re dead.”

“Wait,” he calls out, and it’s a piece of paper he’s retrieved, not a weapon. “See—it’s her prescription.”

“Keep your hands where I can see them,” I say. It’s cliché. I feel it as the words float off into the breeze. Look how cliché you’ve become, Josie. But I have to admit, when your life is at stake, sometimes it’s the most logical thing to say.

I take two more steps backward. It surprises him when I throw my purse at him. He ducks and covers his head.

“In the right pocket, there’s a hundred-dollar bill. Get it out.”

His eyes narrow; he’s confused. He reaches for it and pulls it toward him anyway.

“Not that one,” I nod. “The small pocket.”

He digs. I look up at the sky and notice the big puffy clouds, the kind the kids and I used to spend hours staring at. We imagined they were dragons and dinosaurs, angels and other things too. I wish I could go back. Back to a time when I wasn’t where I am now, back against the wall, back to when things were idyllic and stable. Even if it was all a facade. You can’t know that you don’t want to know a thing until you already know it. Once it’s there, you can’t erase it. It’s interesting; you don’t realize how you’ll miss stability, predictability even, until the rug is pulled out from under you.

“Got it,” he calls out. I hear relief in his tone, and I know I will regret this later. There will be hell to pay. I also know I shouldn’t reward a kid who just tried to rob me. But when you’re down on your luck, sometimes it’s good to know others have it worse. Plus, it would have been really bad if I’d had to explain where I was when I lost my purse. I should count my blessings.

I cock my head. “Slide the purse back.”

He does, and I use my foot to inch it closer, keeping the gun on him.

“You almost shot someone’s mother. I hope you think about that tonight when you’re drifting off to sleep.”

He doesn’t say anything. I can see he doesn’t know what to say.

“Oh—and you’re going to want to ice those kneecaps.”

“Thank you…” he says, shoving the money in his pocket.

“And by the way, I’m keeping this,” I tell him, holding the gun up.

He sighs heavily, and I can see his weapon was hard to come by. This is both bad and good. Good because it shows he won’t easily be able to get a replacement. Bad because it tells me he needs one. “Turn around.” I use the gun to motio

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