Brave New Love (2 page)

“Get out before I—”

The threat was lost in the roar of the wind as Giorgio stepped back out onto the top of the buttress. A narrow walkway without a railing was to his right. The walkway of sheet-metal-covered
wood, about three-feet wide, clung precariously to the sides of the building, but that was his only route—unless he went straight down head first.

Giorgio sidled quickly as he dared onto the walkway—just as a bullet whined off the building behind him. A split second later he heard the sound of the gunshot echoing. Living in Rooftown,
this wasn’t the first time he’d been shot at. But it never got easier.

Giorgio made the mistake of glancing to the left, where an abyss yawned—a long, long fall to a hard, hard street shrouded in brown-gray smog.

Suddenly dizzy with vertigo, he almost lost his balance—but he’d lived in Rooftown for the last two years, and experience enabled him to shift his attention forward, focusing on the
corner of the building ahead.

Just keep moving, he told himself.

A few steps more and Giorgio reached the corner, slowing so momentum didn’t propel him off the walkway. He turned the corner—just as another bullet shrieked by overhead. They
wouldn’t keep on missing.

Up ahead, on his left, was an unfathomable drop to a quick death; on his right were six windows. As he worked his way carefully past them, leaning toward the wall with the wind prying at him, he
found that window after window was boarded up from the inside—impassable. Beyond them, at the next corner, the walkway ended. It didn’t turn the corner.

Two more windows—they looked to be unblocked. There was nowhere else to go except down, so his choice was to get in through one of the two windows . . . or die.

Somewhere behind him, Limmy would be reaching the end of the rope walk, would be working his own way along the walkway . . .

Giorgio moved so he was between the two windows—and had to grab at the nearest sill as the wind rose again, almost peeling him off the walkway. He winced at the ache in his fingers as he
clutched at the windowsill—the wind seemed to be deliberately trying to pull him off into the void.

Then it abated—and he slipped through the shattered old window, scraped by broken glass as he went. He found himself in what appeared to be a small, empty old office—with a closed
door to the corridor.

He thought: My only hope is if they think I’ve gone somewhere when I haven’t . . .

If he could get them tangled up with Banker it might keep them busy till he could figure something out. Crunching debris with every step, he reached the door, and tried it. It felt locked.

Giorgio looked around, found an old crowbar on the floor. Demolition of the building had been started but, after the Dissolve Depression, never completed. He hefted the crowbar, then swung it
like a baseball bat as hard as he could, smack into the doorknob. The knob punched through the door, falling out the other side, leaving a hole. He reached through, pressed the internal lock
mechanism, and the door clicked. He shoved the door hard with his shoulder and it gave way into the debris-choked hallway, open just enough to let someone squirm through. Only, he wasn’t
going through.

Carrying the crowbar, he went back to the window, looked carefully out. Limmy and his pet thug hadn’t come around the corner yet. They’d be coming slowly with that wind on the
walkway inching their way along so they wouldn’t fall.

Giorgio climbed cautiously out on to the walkway, holding the crowbar close to the wall so it wouldn’t overbalance him the wrong way. He went as quickly as he dared to the second
window.

This window was intact, glass and all. He glanced inside—it seemed to be someone’s squat, with an old mattress in the corner, a few decorations. He used the crowbar, levered the
window frame, hoping it wasn’t locked, that the window wouldn’t break. It slid reluctantly up, and he eased into the room as quickly as he could. He turned, closed the window and locked
it—hearing Limmy’s voice from down the walkway.

Giorgio found an old bureau, pushed it up against the window, put a vase, a framed picture, other odds and ends on top, trying to make it look as if they’d always been there.

Then he ducked back, out of sight, pressed against the wall.

The faint light filtering through the window made a square on the opposite wall—he saw Limmy’s shadow, his rifle poking up behind it, appear in that square. Limmy was trying the
window, finding it locked.

Giorgio knew he could probably knock Limmy off the walkway—but he’d never killed anyone before, didn’t like the idea, and didn’t want to make enemies of every
roof-gangster associated with Limmy. Besides, there was Roman—who would be watching Limmy. Roman had that pistol handy. A crowbar wasn’t much use against a pistol.

He heard Limmy’s voice, muffled, through the window. “Thing’s locked. What? Nah, if I try to break the glass I could fall—What makes you think he’s in that one? Oh
yeah?” Limmy’s voice got fainter as he moved down the walkway. “Well go on
in
then, dumbass! I’ll be right behind you.”

Limmy and Roman had taken the bait, for now anyway.

Giorgio turned to look around—and saw a gun pointed at him. “I swear,” he muttered. “. . . everybody but me has one . . . I got to get one of those.”

A girl about his age was pointing a rusty-looking revolver at him. She was a mix of Asian and Hispanic—that was Giorgio’s guess—wearing cutoff jeans, sneakers that didn’t
match, a torn blue sweatshirt. She was compactly built, but with curves, had long, shiny black hair. But the expression on her face was no more welcoming than her revolver. She said, “Move
that stuff away from the window and climb back out,
now.
I’m gonna give you to a count of twenty.”

“Look, there’s a couple of bangers after me, just because I told them my uncle didn’t have to pay their protection money . . .”

“Seven, eight, nine . . .”

“And they’ve already tried to shoot me twice and all I really want is just to hide for, like, twenty minutes . . . for reals!”

“Fourteen, fifteen . . .”

“And . . . look.” He put the crowbar gently down on the floor. “I wouldn’t hit you anyway. My name’s Giorgio, what’s yours?”

“. . . twenty.” She made a show of aiming the gun at his head and slowly cocking it. “That’s it. Get out or I pull the trigger.”

“You know what? Before you shoot me, I’m going to just sit here on the floor, and say to myself, ‘If I have to die—’ ” He sat down and crossed his legs.
“ ‘—I’d rather this really cool, good-looking girl killed me than that creep Limmy’ ”

She stared at him over the top of the gun.

“Not that I want to be shot by
anybody,
” he added quickly. “I’d rather skip it.”

She licked her lips, and almost smiled. “Wait—Limmy, you said?
That guy?
You’ve got
him
after you? Well that’s just really tight. That means he’s
going to come in
here.
And I don’t want him coming in here.”

“Naw, I got ’em following a false scent, like.”

They might well come back here looking for him, he supposed. But he decided not to mention that.

“Well, you still can’t stay here,” she insisted. “Get out!”

“I will! Eventually! But for right now I’m gonna hope you don’t kill me. If I stay, and wait till he gives up
and
you don’t kill me—it’ll be easier for
me to leave. I mean, if you shoot me, I’m a big heavy messy old body to drag outta here. So . . .” He shrugged and closed his eyes, made a face as if expecting the bullet. But he was
pretty sure she wasn’t going to shoot him. Not
completely
sure, though.

He cracked open an eyelid a little, glimpsed another flicker of a smile on her face. She lowered the gun—and he opened his eyes.

“I’m an idiot to trust you,” the girl said. Then she frowned and pointed the gun at him again. “I’m not going to trust you. I don’t know you. I’m going
to keep the gun between us. But I won’t shoot you for . . . um . . . half an hour.”

“Half an hour! Okay! Thirty minutes! I appreciate the extension. Sorry about moving your stuff around. I don’t like people messing with my stuff either. I live in Rooftown too, east
side, the Rag-ass Branch. I know how hard it is to get stuff up to your place. Man, getting a mattress up there, when I first came up—big draggle. You all alone here?”

She sighed and sat down, cross-legged like him, on the futon at the opposite end of the little room. It had once been an office; she’d converted it to an apartment of sorts. She lowered
the gun so its butt was supported by one knee, but she kept it pointed in his general direction.

She uncocked it, though. That was encouraging.

Giorgio kept his voice just loud enough for her to hear him as he spoke, now and then glancing toward the window. “Yeah, my uncle was out of money and they came around demanding that east
side pay-up. I said, ‘Naw, you got to wait, and we’ll get you what we can.’ And the guy tried to slap me with a pistol and I pushed him over . . .”

“That was dumb.”

“Yeah, true dat. And uh—he started acting like he was going to shoot me, I slammed the door—place has a big metal door, must’ve been even harder to get up there than a
mattress. He started yelling for his homeys. I went out the back window, across the roofs to the bridge . . .”

She nodded. “Should’ve tried bartering something.”

“All out of stuff to barter. I got a street clean-up job coming if the Indigent Bureau comes through but that’s not for months and—”

Giorgio broke off at shouts from the hall. He put a finger to his lips. She nodded, as he got on his hands and knees, crawled to the door, pressed his ear against it.

“I don’t care who your low-hode ass is connected to!”
someone shouted, out in the hall. Banker, likely. “
We got our own organiza
tion here, they set me up
as collector and that means you want to pass through you pay what I tell you to pay and you leave the guns!”

Giorgio chuckled to himself. It was working.

Then there were two gunshots. A voice yelled,
“He got me, Limmy, he got me—”

Another gunshot, and the voice cut off—real suddenly.

The distinctive boom of a rifle, then a responding gunshot. Another . . .

Then a shout,
“I’m going, damn it, hold your fire!”

Giorgio sat up, and smiled at her. “Looks like they took the bait, went through the wrong door, and ran into Banker. Sounds like Limmy scratched outta there . . .”

“What’re you gonna do?”

“Well . . .” He took out his little instacell. He’d bought the disposable phone from a vending machine a week before, in one of his rare forays out of Rooftown. “Only got
a minute or so left on this.”

He called his uncle Tonio, afraid he wouldn’t answer . . . or maybe one of Limmy’s bangers would answer. Which would mean they’d killed his uncle and taken his phone. But a
weary Tonio answered. “That you, boy?”

“Yeah, uh—you okay, Tonio?”

“I borrowed some money from my sister. I paid ’em the hundred.”

“Okay, that’s good, I guess. Probably they won’t come after you, since they’ll think you’re gonna be a source of money. But uh—I kinda pissed them off . . . I
don’t think I should go back there.”

“You got that right, boy. I appreciate you were trying to take care of me but . . .”

“Look, I’m gonna go to one of the youth shelters, down on the ground, till I get my job. When I get it going, I’ll send for you, we’ll get a groundhog house . .
.”

“Kid? Don’t do that. I’m gonna die up here, in my own good time.”

Uncle had gone all cold on him, seemed like. He’d been drinking a lot lately and they’d been arguing about that. “Okay whatever. I’ll call, see how you’re doing. I
just—”

“This unit’s phonetime has expired . . .”
a robotic voice interrupted. Followed by a click, a buzz, and silence.

Giorgio tossed the disposable phone aside, and slumped back against the wall. “Anyway, he’s safe.”

He glanced at the girl and saw she’d put the gun aside. She was still sitting cross-legged but was now holding on to her ankles and staring at the floor. He noticed she’d taken off
her sneakers, too. Embarrassed to have two different kinds, he guessed. She had small feet, silver-painted toenails.

“My half hour up yet?” he asked.

“No. Anyway . . .” She looked at her silver-painted toenails. “I . . . you can stay until you’re sure they’re not coming back. ’Cause if you try to go back
across that bridge . . . or try to get past Banker . . . I mean, you can’t stay too long, but . . . awhile.”

“Yeah. Thanks. So—you know my name . . .”

“Um . . . okay. I’m Felice. You want some instajuice? I don’t know what the flavor is, some fakey fruit punch, but . . . It’s in that cooler.”

They drank instajuice, and sat across the room from one another, talking as the light dimmed outside and the room got gradually darker. Something about the room getting darker around them as
they talked about where they’d come from, how they’d ended up in Rooftown, was strangely relaxing. It was as if the friendly shadows were something they were sharing, along with the
juice.

He mentioned that he’d been to a roof concert of thug-juggers—contemporary jug-band/rapper crossover—and it turned out she’d been there, too. They were both fans of
thug-juggers, especially of Jerome-X. That commonality seemed to flicker like a candle between them, and Giorgio started to feel as if he’d known her forever. She told him a funny story about
her brother, who was in the Orbital Army now—if he were still alive—and a prank he’d pulled on a cop. She told it really well and he marveled at her sense of humor, living alone
in this place—alone in Rooftown. There wasn’t much self-pity in her, He liked that.

They talked thug-juggers some more and she recited a Jerome-X lyric she liked, and he finished reciting it with her, because it was one of his favorites too.