Tracey and I are driving down Riverside Blvd. to meet some people she knows from the Dance Center so we can all hang out. The place we meet them at is where the Logli’s grocery store used to be. The storefronts have been replaced with apartments. We pull up and are greeted from the doorway by two men with tiny goatees and dark eyes. I sit at a table with these 2 hip men and Tracey goes into the other room to talk to the girls she knows.
The room I am in is very dark, lit only by the light spilling over from the room Tracey is in. I feel uncomfortable, like something isn’t right.
Apparently it will be a party and we are going to be drinking. There is a liquor store in the little strip and the two men say to me, "If we give you the cash, you’ll get it?" with anxious, hungry gestures, intonations.
"Uh, sure," I mutter and shrug my shoulders.
Tracey hurries off with the other girls and gives me a curious smile as they whizz past and out the door.
I am now alone with the two guys and I think they are going to kill me. I can see blood dripping from the corners of their mouths.