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The Verdict again last week. That’s what this one is. It’s a good one.’
    ‘It seems like it.’
    ‘So you still like Paul Newman, too?’
    ‘That’s one thing I don’t change on,’ her mother said and laughed.
    ‘Does it go on all night?’
    ‘All night.’
    ‘Do you mind if I stay here tonight?’
    ‘Of course not.’ She took a drink from her beer, finishing it, and set it on the coffee table.
    ‘You just get off?’
    ‘An hour ago. I’m supposed to go back on nights, but it’s a nice break to live like a normal human being for once. How’s the Plaza?’
    ‘All right,’ the girl said and took a drink from the soda.
    ‘You should start dealing. It’s not the best life, but the money’s pretty good. At least you don’t have to carry trays of food and bang your head into a table.’
    ‘I’ve been thinking about it. I don’t know. You need another?’
    ‘I got one in the freezer. It should be cold enough by now.’
    The girl went into the kitchen and took the beer from the freezer and set it on the counter. She opened the refrigerator and looked inside. It was bare except for condiments, a quart of milk, a head of wilted iceberg lettuce, a gallon jug of water, and a half empty twelve pack of beer.
    ‘I think I’m gonna take a shower,’ she said and brought the beer back to her mother. ‘I put another one in the freezer for you.’
    ‘Thanks.’
    ‘I got paid yesterday. You mind if I take your car and go grocery shopping after I get cleaned up? I could make us dinner.’
    ‘The keys are on the counter. You and me, maybe Evelyn if she gets back in time. We could eat in front of the TV and watch Paul Newman, like a real family.’
    ‘Maybe I’ll make lasagna then,’ the girl said and walked down the hall and into the bathroom. She locked the door behind her, turned on the light, started water in the sink, and undressed. She stood in front of the mirror and looked at her face. The cut above her eye was swollen, but it was so close to her eyebrow it wasn’t that noticeable. Her nose and chin were swollen as well, but there was nothing she could do about that. There was dried blood caked around the cut, and she took a wash cloth from the bathtub and put it under the water. Her face was sore, but the cut didn’t look too bad once the blood was off.
    She started the shower, grabbed the shampoo, held it in her hand, then turned off the light and in the darkness stepped into the tub, under the warm water, and sat down.
    Her leg was sore and the bruise looked worse. Dark blue and purple and yellow. She put the shampoo next to her, felt around for a bar of soap, and washed her body. She let the water flow down. She sat back, opened the shampoo, poured some into her hand, and washed her hair. Then she turned the water hotter, curled in a ball directly under it, and finally let herself cry.

Chapter 4
Safeway
    As she backed her mom’s Chevy onto the street she had the soda wedged between her legs. She’d added fresh ice to it and the last of the vodka. The radio was set on AM country classics. Her black hair was still wet and pulled back with hair pins. She was dressed in a pair of jeans and a faded black T-shirt that read ‘Johnny Cash Live at San Quentin’ in white block letters. She wore her mother’s large, mirror-lensed sunglasses and ran the A/C in the car on full.
    The neighborhood was mostly Mexican. The majority of the white families who had once lived there had moved to the suburbs, to gated communities and planned estate housing. When she was a kid it had been different. She could walk down the street by herself at night. Her mom would send her and her sister to the 7-11 with money for milk or candy or soda. Now her mom wouldn’t even drive there. She would go to a store two miles away. They had installed window locks and bolt locks on the door. They had gotten a dog from the pound, a German Shepherd mix they named The Hulk. The car had been stolen twice, their house broken into