The man opened the case and shook his head. “Where did you get this?” he asked in a hushed tone before shutting the case.
“My dad left it for me, but times are tough.”
“Whoever you stole this from, you better make sure it gets back to them. This is a legitimate business, sir.”
“It ain’t—” Roscoe drew in a deep breath before lifting the guitar off the counter. “All right.” He sauntered out of the building, growing more anxious as he passed under streetlights toward a much seedier side of town. Two scantily clad women sitting on a curb while sharing a crack pipe caught Roscoe’s eye.
“You ladies know where I can… do some tradin’?”
“Depends on whatcha want in return, good lookin’,” one of the ladies said in a thick, high-pitched Brooklyn accent. “Ben down the road deals in antiques. Vinny on Peachtree Lane’s got a more… modern inventory you might be interested in.”
Roscoe put up his hood and nodded. “Thank ya.”
“If ya go to Vinny, tell ‘im Sasha sends her best.”
“No, Roscoe,” I whispered, following him close. He told Darryl he sold the guitar to a pawn shop, but of course Darryl knew it was a lie. They never would have sold a stolen, priceless guitar that fast.
The vision finally faded, and I dreaded what came next, but instead I ended up in a black room with one uncovered lightbulb overhead and Roscoe rocking back and forth on the floor, his head in his hands, crying.
I knelt in front of him, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Roscoe?”
He looked up and nodded before bursting into tears again.
“I’m a baaaad guy, Cody. I manipulated you into keepin’ me around, and I destroyed the only friendship that ever meant anything—and I left my pack and my mate. It was a mercy mama died young so she didn’t have to see her screw-up boy turn out like this.”
“Roscoe, look at me,” I said, holding the underside of his jaw in my hand. The pain in his eyes broke me; he’d been hiding this for as long as I’d known him. Every funny antic, lighthearted jab, the way he’d shrug off my criticisms—it was all a mask. He hurt every time, and I’d been unknowingly making it worse. “You’re the most wonderful person I’ve ever met.”
“Yer lyin’,” Roscoe said, wiping his face. “You were right to be suspicious of me when we met. I was gonna get high, remember?”
“But you didn’t. You followed me home, where you belonged.”
Roscoe’s watery eyes grew wider, his voice cracking. “Home…”
“I couldn’t call that place home without you. You brought adventure and fun into my sad, boring life. You make me smile every day, even when you’re being an ass. I love that about you.”
Roscoe wiped his face and looked down. “I thought… even with the kuu, there’d be no way someone like you could stand to be around someone like me. I always expected you to leave, but you didn’t.”
“You’re stuck with me.”
“I don’t deserve you.”
“You grew up hungry and alone. Somehow you had the strength to keep on living. Then you met someone and fell in love, but you couldn’t help what happened. If you stayed, they’d have finished what they started. When no one else cared, you cooked delicious meals for all those homeless people and youhelped a veteran through the worst time of his life. You helped a strange human you didn’t even know make his dreams come true.” I shook Roscoe’s shoulder, forcing him to look up, and that was when I couldn’t stop crying. “Terrible people don’t do that stuff, Roscoe. You touched so many lives, and while you think it didn’t matter in the end, it did, and it made you a better person. You made mistakes. Everyone has. But we’re not defined by them.”
I wrapped my arms around his neck and fell into him. We stayed like that for several minutes, me stroking his head while he held me.
“Thank you,” Roscoe whispered. “Thank you, Cody.”
The room turned white as the visage of a broken Roscoe shattered under me, leaving me alone in silence.
Chapter 33
It’s a Beautiful Life
Roscoe
The stench of the city made me reel. It wasn’t just the smell, it was what they brought with them. Everything came flooding back to me, things I’d long forgotten. There was a calmness to it, though, somethin’ I never experienced with these memories, like someone wrapped me in a big hug.
It didn’t last.
