One of the men, obviously the medical examiner, said, “I was just about to flip her anyway.”

With help from another cop, the doctor gripped her by the shoulders and turned her so that she was facing up.

Cynthia’s mouth gaped open, blood spilling out and dribbling down her neck like a slow leak from a faucet. Her beautiful face was marked by a deep cut slashing across her temple. Vacant green eyes stared up at the open sky. Strands of hair were stuck to her face, and he tried to lean down to brush them back but Trent wouldn’t let him.

Michael felt hot tears stinging his eyes. Somebody should cover her. She shouldn’t be exposed like this for everybody to see.

The medical examiner leaned down, pressing her jaw open, peering into her empty mouth. He said, “Her tongue is gone.”

“Christ,” one of the cops whispered. “She’s just a kid.”

Michael swallowed, feeling like he was choking on his grief. “Fifteen,” he said. She’d just had a birthday last week. He’d bought her a stuffed giraffe.

“She’s fifteen.”

PART II

CHAPTER SEVEN

OCTOBER 2, 2005

John Shelley wanted a television. He had been working the same crappy job for the last two months, showing up every day on time, making sure he was the last to leave, doing every nitpicking shit job his boss assigned, and to him it wasn’t just a matter of wanting, but deserving a television. Nothing fancy for him, just something in color, something with a remote control and something that would pick up the college games.

He wanted to watch his teams play. He wanted to hold the remote in his hand and if Georgia was playing bad, which was highly likely, he wanted to be able to turn the channel and watch Florida getting its ass kicked. He wanted to watch the cheesy halftime shows, hear the stupid commentators, see Tulane at Southern Mississippi, Texas A&M at LSU, Army-freakin’-Navy. Come Thanksgiving, he wanted an orgy of bowl games and then he’d switch to the big dogs: the Patriots, the Raiders, the Eagles, all leading up to that magic moment come February when John Shelley would sit in his crap room in his crap boardinghouse and watch the freaking Super Bowl all alone for the first time in his life.

Six days a week for the last two months, he had looked out the bus window and stared longingly at the Atlanta City Rent-All. The sign in the window promised “your job is your credit,” but the asterisk, so tiny it could be a squished bug, told otherwise. Thank God he had been too nervous to walk right into the store and make a fool of himself. John had stood outside the front door, his heart shaking in his chest like a dog shitting peach pits, when he noticed the fine print on the poster. Two months, the tiny type said. You had to hold down a steady job for at least two months before they would allow you the honor of paying fifty-two weekly installments of twenty dollars for a television that would retail for around three hundred bucks in a normal store.

But John wasn’t a normal person. No matter his new haircut or his close shave or his pressed chinos, people still felt that otherness about him. Even at work, a car wash where mostly transients showed up to wipe down cars and vacuum Cheerios out of the backs of SUVs, they kept their distance.

And now, two months later, John sat on the edge of his chair, trying to keep his leg from bobbing up and down, waiting for his TV. The pimply faced kid who had greeted him at the door was taking his time. He’d gotten John’s application and rushed to the back about twenty minutes ago. Application. That was another thing they hadn’t put on the sign. Street address, date of birth, social security number, place of employment, everything but his freaking underwear size.

The Atlanta City Rent-All was noisy for a Sunday afternoon. All of the televisions were on, bright images flashing from a wall of tubes, whispered undertones from nature shows, news channels and do-it-yourself programs buzzing in his ears. The noise was getting to him. Too much light was pouring in from the floor-to-ceiling windows. The televisions were too bright.

He shifted in his chair, feeling a bead of sweat roll down his back. John didn’t wear a watch, but there was a big clock on the wall. This represented poor judgment on the store planner’s part, considering the fact that all it served to do was remind people they were stuck here waiting for some kid fresh out of high school to tell the lucky customer that they had qualified for the extreme honor of paying five hundred bucks for a Simzitzu DVD player.

“Just a TV,” John whispered to himself. “Just a small TV.” His leg was bobbing up and down again and he didn’t bother to stop it. His hands were clenching and unclenching, and that was bad. He had to stop doing that. People were staring. Parents were keeping their kids close.

“Sir?” Randall, John’s own personal sales assistant, stood in front of him. He had a smile plastered onto his face that would have given a Labrador pause. “Sorry to keep you waiting.” Randall reached out his hand as if John might need help up.

“It’s okay,” John said, trying not to mumble as he stood. He started looking around, wondering what was going on. The kid was being too nice to him. Had something happened? Did someone call the police?

“We can show you these sets here,” Randall offered, leading him to the back of the store where the big screens were displayed.

John stood in front of a television that looked as huge as a movie screen. The set was almost as tall as him and twice as wide.

Randall picked up a remote control the size of a book. “The Panasonic has advanced real black technology that gives you—”

“Wait a minute.” John was walking around the television. It was only a few inches thick. He saw the price tag and laughed. “I told you what I make, man.”

Randall flashed him a smile, took a step forward that made John want to take a step back. He kept his ground, though, and the kid lowered his voice, saying, “We understand when some of our customers have outside income sources they can’t list on their credit applications.”

“That right?” John asked, recognizing something illicit was happening but not quite sure what.

“Your credit report…” Randall seemed almost embarrassed. “The credit cards came up.”

“What credit cards?” John asked. He didn’t even have a damn checking account.

“Don’t worry about it.” Randall patted John on the shoulder like they were old buddies.

“What credit cards?” John repeated, the muscles in his arm aching to slap the kid’s hand away. He hated admitting he didn’t know something. Being in the dark made you vulnerable.

Randall finally dropped his hand. “Listen, guy,” he began. “No big deal, right? Just make the payments and we don’t care. We don’t report to anybody unless you stop paying.”

John crossed his arms over his chest, even though he knew it made him look bigger, more threatening, to other people. “Lookit,” he said. “I want that crappy TV up front, the twenty-two inch with the remote control. That’s all I want.”

“Dude,” Randall said, holding up his hands. “Sure. No problem. I just figured with your credit score—”

John had to ask again. “What score?”

“Your credit score,” the kid said, the tone of his voice passing incredulous and settling on plain dumbfounded. “Your credit score’s the best I’ve ever seen here. We get some people in, they’re not even breaking three hundred.”