Among Thieves

“And we’re go

“I’ll be in my seventies when this kid graduates college,” he said, his voice flat.

“If you’re expecting me to wear some big frilly white dress and walk down an aisle somewhere, you can forget it,” she replied.

“My seventies,” he repeated. He took another sip of his beer.

She looked over at him, studying his face. Then she reached over and slid her arm under his, grasping his hand. “You’ll be a better father in your seventies than any other man I’ve ever known at any age.”

He squeezed her hand, then turned to look at her. “You’ll look beautiful no matter what you wear,” he said.

They sat there for a long time, both of them struggling to adjust to the sudden, tectonic shift in their worlds. Neither of them was particularly comfortable with change, and Lissa knew that this was a bigger change in Kozlowski’s life than he could ever have anticipated. But she also knew that he would handle it. As much as he hated change, he was the most reliable man she had ever met.

As she considered the changes to her own life, a strange feeling came over her. It was a feeling with which she had little experience, and it overwhelmed her as she tried to put her finger on what it was. It took several moments, but at last she figured it out: for the first time in her life she felt totally, utterly happy.

Sally wasn’t used to the quiet. She’d spent her life in neighborhoods where the noise never died. There was a constant stream of yelling and slamming doors and sirens. There was always a bar nearby that violated last call, and her mother was always one of the last to leave, often just coherent enough to find her way home. Sally couldn’t remember a night when her sleep wasn’t interrupted.

In Fi

She sat up in bed. Fi

She’d had a glimmer of hope a year before, when her mother left her with Devon. She’d felt deserted, but she was old enough to recognize that her mother had sunk so low that she wasn’t able to function. Sally had been taking care of herself for a couple of years by then, and had already come to terms with the fact that her mother loved her drugs more than she loved her daughter.

When her mother a

And so, when her mother a

Devon hadn’t quite fulfilled her dreams.

It wasn’t his fault, she knew. Sally’s mother had never told Devon about her. They showed up that morning on Devon’s stoop, and Devon had come to the door warily. Sally wondered what had transpired between the two of them for her not to tell him he had a daughter, and for him to approach the door that day with such trepidation. They never told her, though.

The introductions were short. “She’s yours,” her mother said. “Her name’s Sally.”

Devon had just stood there, his mouth open, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his lips. He was wearing a dirty T-shirt and he hadn’t shaved in days. Neither one of them knew what to say. For a moment, Sally thought he was going to slam the door in their faces. She wouldn’t have blamed him, either. He didn’t, though. After a healthy pause, he said, “I’m Devon.”

To his credit, he never complained about taking her in. Most guys would have, Sally knew. Most guys would have at least asked for a paternity test. That was never an issue with Devon, though. He seemed to accept instinctively the fact that Sally was his daughter. In some ways, he even seemed excited about the prospect. He treated her with a sort of fearful awe. She supposed it was something approaching love, but she had little with which to compare it to verify her suspicion.

All the love in the world, though, couldn’t improve their living conditions. It was a step up from her mother’s situation, but then a step up from crack houses wasn’t exactly the Ritz. She gathered quickly from his schedule that Devon didn’t have any legal employment, and she deduced that he was a thief. She asked him about it once, and he didn’t even try to lie. That didn’t bother her; in her experience, theft seemed a minor sin. She just wished he was a better thief; he was barely making enough to feed them and pay the rent. Every once in a while she would catch him looking at her with what she could only describe as shame in his eyes. As if he was failing her. Maybe he was, a little, but she was safe and dry. She’d learned not to hope for more.

Recently, that look had begun to recede from his eyes. He’d seemed more confident; optimistic, even. Once again, she had allowed herself to believe that maybe-just maybe-better things were on the way. Now he was in jail. She vowed never to feel hope again. It was a promise she’d made before, but seemed unable to keep. Hope was crack to her; she couldn’t seem to give it up no matter how hard she tried.

She took another drag off her cigarette just as the silhouette of a head appeared in the window to her room, making her flinch. “You scared me,” she said.

Fi

She considered lying, but decided against it. She held her cigarette up in view.

“You shouldn’t smoke,” Fi

“You’re not my father,” she replied. It came out with a harsher edge than she intended. “ Devon lets me smoke,” she explained. “My mother was too fucked up to care one way or another.”

Fi

“It’s not bad,” she said.

“There’s a roof deck upstairs. It’s got a better view. You can see both the water and the monument.”

“This is better than any view I’ve ever had.”

He looked down at her. “Fair enough.” He stood there for a moment, then took two steps down the fire escape and sat next to her. It was cramped, and she shimmied toward the building to give some room; she didn’t want their legs touching. He sat there for a minute. Then he turned and looked again at her cigarette.