Izzy asks, “Where are we?” Stopped on the side of the street four houses down from Spyder's, I take the key out and groan the handbrake back.
“Owner of the hotel lives around here. I need to pick up my money,” I poke his belly, “for the bus tickets.” Then I scan out the windows at the imploding one-story houses. Tan and crumbling inside themselves. Garage doors with crooked slabs, as though they were tattered accordions. Windows grimy at the tops so they narrow in on us. Gutters drooping from the roofs, spilling brown leaves and crying black water. Frowns everywhere.
Izzy nods then reaches for the door, but I say, “Stay here.” His eyes jolt, just like when I tell him, “Lock it and don't open, even if the cops say you need to.”
He twirls his fingers into the bottom of his Darth Vader shirt and says, “Just hurry please.”
I rake his hair again, and this time his head rolls with my hand. Then I glance beside my left thigh to the storage area in the driver side door, where most teenagers hide cases of Camels. But do I really need it? I tap my bottom lip then point at Izzy's backpack. “Have a book or something for meanwhile?” He smirks, reaches between his legs, and unpacks his Game Boy. “Aren't those banned from school?” I ask, but by now, I've slipped it from the storage area to beside my thigh.
Powering his Game Boy on, Izzy whispers, “I can hide a lot in my backpack.”
I have to chuckle as I reach across myself to open the door with my free right hand. “Still stuck on the Sith Lord?” I ask him looking back over my right shoulder.
He sighs as the theme song plays. “Yeah. Even if I'm Vader, he k**s me. His lightning is so cheap. Can you please beat him later?”
My left hand swings outside and hides against the side of the car so he can't see it as I step out. I say, “No way, you can do it.” Then I exit completely, shut the car door behind me, switch it to my right hand, and turn around to look at him through the window. I wave goodbye with my empty left hand, smiling, my stomach tight from missing him already. My right hand slides it into the back of my waist band. The jazz ca**ettes aren't the only thing of Grandpa kept in the Honda.
From outside, I tell Izzy, “May the force be with you.”