Post reply

Reply to the message by Javier Escarra

Name:

Leave this field empty:

Subject:

Category:

Formatting help

skip to input

format text bold: [b]bold text[/b]
format text italic: [i]italic text[/i]
insert hyperlink: [link=http://example.com/]link text[/link] / [link]http://example.com/[/link]
set text color: [color=#rgb]colored text[/color]
font size: [size=small]small text[/size]; [size=large]large text[/size]
insert list: [list][*]list item[/list]
insert image: [img]http://example.com/image.jpg[/img]; left: [img=left]http://example.com/image.jpg[/img]; right: [img=right]http://example.com/image.jpg[/img]; thumbnail: [img=thumbnail]http://example.com/image.jpg[/img]; thumbnail left: [img=thumbnail-left]http://example.com/image.jpg[/img]; thumbnail right: [img=thumbnail-right]http://example.com/image.jpg[/img]

Message:

> Ah, shit. 
> 
> He’d been doing so well, but now it seemed that Javier’s luck was running out. Without planning and prep time to come up with something new and convincing, he’d fallen back on a couple of old routines that had worked a few times back in the day. Inventing a drowning victim was a variation on the old ‘I heard gunfire’ skit, and ‘the boys’ he was ‘cruising’ with used to be his older cousins before he was old enough to look like he could drive himself. This was where leaning on old routines was about to backfire, though, as Officer Fall asked where his uncle lived (how was he supposed to know, when he’d been in this town five minutes??) and then insisted on waiting for said uncle to arrive. 
> 
> Back when he used to run these kind of scams about as often as he went to school, Javi had an easy fix for this. The people he ran with gave him a couple of useful numbers. He’d hit speed dial on ‘Mom’ in his phone, hand the device to the over, and the woman on the other end would reassure whatever official he was caught up with. It worked every time. Upon hearing an adult woman’s voice speaking in a dialect which was similar enough to Javi’s, police, bouncers, receptionists, security folk and anyone else he needed to get past would back straight off. 
> 
> Unfortunately, Javi had been out of the game for a little over a year now. He couldn’t call that number now without incurring ire from people he [i]really[/i] didn’t want to upset, and that was assuming the number was still connected. Those people went through burner phones like most people went through shower gel.
> 
> He needed some answers, and fast. Now was not the time for hesitation.
> 
> “He should be here soon.” Javi couldn’t go into any more detail on where his uncle lived when he didn’t know a lick about Atroe City, so he went on another made-up tirade. “I been out here a long ass time waiting for you, in case you ain’t noticed. My [i]abuela[/i] in New York could’ve probably picked me up by now.”
> 
> He absolutely could not be standing around on the side of the road with a pig waiting for an [i]abuela[/i] he’d never met or his incarcerated uncle to rock up. Javi had one trick left to fall back on.
> 
> “Listen, man.” He scuffed the wooden planks with a ratty sneaker, his tone markedly different from what it had been a moment before. “I’ll be real with you, but you gotta be chill.” He inhaled, partly to buy himself time to get his thoughts in order and partly to cement the nervous vibe he hoped he was giving off. “My uncle, he like… he’s not got all his papers in order, you get me? So if he sees a cop or a cop car, he ain’t stopping. Like he might even have already swung by and taken off.” 
> 
> Finally, an excuse to check his phone. Javier pulled it out of his pocket and pressed the power button, seemingly checking for messages but in reality looking at the time. There were no messages, obviously, but the time display read [i]8.29.[/i] Ten more minutes to kill. 
> 
> “Alright, look.” He slipped his phone back into his pocket. “How about this, man. I’ll answer all your questions here, right, and I’ll give you, like…” He squinted. “Like, twenty percent less attitude. Then you go off with your girlfriend cop and I’ll text my uncle that it’s good. And if you give me the number to your office, I’ll call it when I’m in the car and ask them to tell you I got picked up okay, okay?”