Free Bloodroot by Bill Loehfelm

“Whatever you say, Kev. Maybe it will be different.”
    “Look at you,” I said. “You got your shit together. I mean, look at those fancy threads you got there.”
    Danny pretended to dust his lapels. “Yeah, I look all right these days. You, however. You still got your bum’s eye for clothes.”
    “My clothes money goes into my work wardrobe,” I said. “I gotta look professional. I can’t get my clothes . . . wherever it is you get yours.” I was getting worked up, desperate to cover the fact that I bought about two new shirts a year. And that the only time I got new dress pants or ties was Christmas and my birthday, when our parents bought them for me.
    “You remember high school,” I said. “We always knew who was wearing the same stained-up shirts and ties. Image is more important in teaching than you might think. It’s called the subjective curriculum.”
    “Hey, I was just breaking balls,” Danny said. “I’m sure it is important. You know better than me. What I remember from school? How Mrs. Fallenti’s nipples always poked through her sweater. That’s what I remember about teachers’ clothes.”
    “Those rumors that Al fucked her when you two were seniors,” I said, “are they true?”
    “You can ask him yourself,” Danny said. “He’s picking us up in ten minutes.”
    I looked myself over, hands in the air, my cheeks burning. The bedroom lamp was doomed.
    “Look, about going out tonight,” I said. “I thought on Wednesday night that I get paid today, but it’s not until next week. Maybe we can hang out here, get a movie or something.”
    “Fuck that,” Danny said. “You know how much TV I watched in rehab? I hate TV. You oughta throw yours in the street. I got the tab tonight.”
    “You don’t have to do that,” I said.
    “I know. I’m doing it anyway.” He leaned over me, smiling but jabbing his thumb hard into his chest. “I got the tab tonight.” It sounded almost like a threat. “Don’t worry about money, your clothes, nothin’. You’re with me tonight.”

SIX
    AL DROVE US OVER THE VERRAZANO AND INTO BROOKLYN. TO MY surprise, we got off the highway before the Manhattan bridges.
    The sun setting, we cruised through Park Slope, my mother’s old neighborhood, slowing for schoolkids still in uniform playing football in streets lined with SUVs. We slid by the regal brownstones, the sun an orange fireball in their windows, and we drifted through the shadows of expansive oaks and elms, acorns and itchy-balls crunching under the tires.
    Al dropped us off on Flatbush Avenue, along the edge of Prospect Park, outside a restaurant called Santoro’s. As he had on Wednesday night, he declined to join us, even offering the same excuse.
    “He must have a girl in each borough,” I said as Al drove away. I was glad to see him go. “Nice racket you’ve got, though, him driving you around.”
    “I kick in for gas and tolls,” Danny said, turning in a circle on the sidewalk. “I still can’t believe what they’ve done with this neighborhood. I’m glad Grandpa passed before he could see what happened to it.”
    An Irish pub nestled into one corner, Guinness and Harp signs glowing in the small windows. A trio of guys in suits with guilty looks on their faces stood smoking around an empty flowerpot. They didn’t speak to one another. On the opposite corner glowed a Starbucks doing brisk business. Men and women in business attire shouldered open the glass doors, each with a paper or plastic cup in one hand and a BlackBerry or cell phone in the other. Inside, a laptop on every table. Salons and boutiques occupied the rest of the block, most of them closed for the evening, their high-dollar, faux-bohemian offerings spotlighted in the wide, immaculate shop windows.
    “Fucking yuppies,” Danny said. “All they talk about is how much they love the neighborhood and then they completely fucking ruin it. Who drinks coffee through a fucking straw ? Watch, Kev, your