Lawrence
In Lawrence’s ears,music throbbed, electric and rumbly and fast. Eyes closed, he swayed his hips back and forth and let his butt bounce to the music. He wobbled and almost stumbled, and when he finally opened his eyes, the world looked blurry and upside down.
He threw his hands in the air. Lawrence spun, and two vodka tonics, one joint, and a night’s worth of sweaty men swirled around in his skull. He tripped over something hard, kicked his feet backward as he flew, and then splashed into a cold, wet pile of yuck.
The music, which was apparently only in Lawrence’s ears, stopped throbbing.
He groaned and rubbed his face and, when he finally straightened his vision out again, found himself in a small puddle, just off the curb outside what appeared to be a dance club.
“What the hell, Lawrence,” he muttered, then pulled himself to his feet. For the evening, he was wearing a big floral bucket hat, matched with a pink satin shirt and a pair of tight denim shorts. It was a bit over the top, especially with the chunky beaded necklace, but he prided himself in being able to pull off that kind of outfit.
Which made it all the more upsetting that he was ruined with mud and New York City gutter water.
“Ugh,” Lawrence grunted, then pulled himself to his wobbly feet. He held onto a lamp post for balance as a few people strolled by, entirely unimpressed by his predicament. He tried to piece his night back together and remember where in the hell he actually was. It was just supposed to be a regular evening. He’d started out over at Mayer’s for white wine and Adderall. Things got a little blurry when they went to that stranger’s birthday party from Instagram, but he remembered with perfect clarity dancing on the bar later.
Reality snapped to focus again as Lawrence abruptly dry heaved by the curb. Once he recovered his dignity, a little voice reached through the fog and told him to take his drunk ass home.
He made it halfway down the block before he stumbled into a large, blurry person. Lawrence apologized and stepped backward, and an older man with curly gray hair and warm cheeks came into focus. He was pulling a shopping cart that looked to have his belongings in it, and Lawrence tripped over his words to apologize. “Sorry, sorry,” he said. “Wasn’t looking where I was going.”
“Me either,” the man laughed. “You’re okay.”
After staring for a second, Lawrence did the same thing he did every time he got drunk: he gave all his money away. He pulled his wallet out of little zippered fanny pack that he wore slung over his shoulder like a bag, grabbed the couple hundred-dollar bills he was carrying, and shoved them in the man’s hand.
“I ah-shhhure you,” he slurred. “It was entirely my fault.”
Lawrence stumbled away before the man could say anything more. He only had to stand on the corner for a second, squinting in his phone and trying to figure out how to call a Lyft, before a yellow taxi came by to swoop him up. After announcing his address, he lay on his back, surprised to see the sky turning a pinkish gray with dawn, and worked on keeping the contents of his stomach in place until he was home.
“This is perfect!” he announced to the taxi driver abruptly. He’d spotted his favorite deli and figured a big egg-and-cheese sandwich now would be doing himself a favor. He handed up the fifty he kept in the back of his phone case, hopped onto the street, and squinted at the sign while the taxi drove away.
“Exotic Pets?”
The deli, like his home, was actually ten blocks away, Lawrence discovered. Typical that he would make a mistake like that. He went to grab his phone and just call himself a Lyft but realized he had abandoned it in the back of the taxi. Cursing, he stumbled a couple blocks, then stopped for a bit to rub mud off his shorts. He stumbled another block, whistling to himself, then froze when two men stepped out from between the cars parked on the street, one on either side of him.
Lawrence took a step to the side, as though to walk around the sudden intrusion, and the man in front lurched forward. He was wearing a black baseball cap, a white shirt, and black pants, and from what Lawrence could see, he was all muscle.
Not good news.
“I don’t want any trouble,” Lawrence mumbled, fear creeping through the drunken haze.
“Great,” the man answered, narrowing his ice blue eyes. “Then give us your phone and your money.”
Lawrence frowned. “I don’t have my phone. Or any cash.”
A shove from behind sent him stumbling forward. His stomach lurched, and when he turned, he saw the other man, even bigger than his friend.
“Who doesn’t carry a fucking phone? Don’t lie to us, you little shit.”
The bigger man grabbed Lawrence’s shirt, then gave him a hard shake. At the same time, his friend reached into Lawrence’s pockets, then searched his fanny pack and pulled out his wallet.
“What is this?” he snarled. “You don’t even have a fucking credit card!”
Lawrence’s world went sideways in a really not nice way, and he wished desperately to teleport into bed. “I leave my credit cards at home when I go out,” he said, his voice tight. “Please don’t shake me again.”
But the men, apparently, didn’t care about Lawrence’s requests. He was supposed to be their payload, some rich kid in weird fashion who wouldn’t put up a fight, but the treasure chest was empty. And so the man shook Lawrence, and shook him again, and again, until Lawrence finally emptied his stomach all over the three of them.
Blech.
A fist slammed across his cheek; then another pounded into his side. Lawrence grunted, then wheezed with pain, his breath drawn tight. He felt a thud against his back and fell to the pavement, concrete scraping him like fire.
