Spin: List 3

Every time I closed my eyes that bag was back on my head, and eight showers later I still felt the tacky adhesive from the tape around my wrists.

I looked down on Cooke High’s tiny Tumblr maven in pink-framed glasses she probably didn’t need.

Visions of me selling Starbursts in a half-packed school auditorium while our mediocre marching band did a rendition of “Calm Down, Turn Up!” made me shudder.

Yet, I was being tortured in Cooke High’s version of a sensory deprivation chamber.

The school secretary and Principal Corgis sorted paperwork on the other side of the main office windows; I skirted by them quickly, in case Corgis’s soul was still bound to Dad’s intimidation magic. Didn’t need him infringing on this rare bit of school-day freedom.

Whatever he has, we don’t want to give him too much more, and we don’t want to give him explicit permission to publish any of it.

A boisterous party at the back pulled together several tables, and a bouquet of birthday balloons hovered above the midpoint, bopping along as folks talked loudly, laughed loudly, and made the entire place part of the celebration.

The only black man in the place, with gold-framed glasses and long salt-and-pepper dreadlocks falling down his back and shoulders, he pecked away on his MacBook, the Apple logo obscured by colorful band decals.

The only black man in the place, with gold-framed glasses and long salt-and-pepper dreadlocks falling down his back and shoulders, he pecked away on his MacBook, the Apple logo obscured by colorful band decals.

Winston nodded. “Fair enough. Here’s where I come in. I think the story becomes about injustice. The police work on this thing, shoddy at best.”

Heck, I’d done tracks with Lil’ Redu...I was only so discerning.

“Hey, Dad,” Fuse didn’t even look at him, indifferent.

“It wasn’t a request, Fatima. You can play mogul when schoolwork’s finished.”

“This is a lot. I could probably spend a month digging into this dark faction of the Nation. They seem organized, tech-savvy. I got people I need to holler at who can maybe tell me how deep the rabbit hole goes. You two keep looking into the ex. We got each other’s numbers when we need to link up.”

It took some internal bolstering to work the door latch and let myself out.

They all turned to each other, grinning and gyrating slightly, as if my music was playing at that moment.

Nothing was more stressful than preparing to deal with whatever overbearing lecture Dad was going to have for me not coming home right after school.

I’d just gotten my car keys back. A privilege likely to get rescinded if Dad felt froggy.

“Your father wants a word with you.”
Nooooooo! “Um, he’s on a call, right?”
“Poke your head in anyway. He was adamant.”

I’d expected an argument to keep all of my driving and phone privileges even though I’d come home late, and my impulsiveness might have me handing them over for unnecessary sass.

The ancient tile in the kitchen that looked dingy despite me mopping it three times a week.

“No, that’s not what I meant. There are several cases backlogged with better leads than what we have on your friend. There were two shootings last night that we have a greater chance of clearing than the DJ case. If someone doesn’t help us with some real information...” He shrugged, sipped from his glass.

“I don’t know anything else.” Lie. I knew about the music vigilantes extorting Fuse and me. Knew better than to let that slip.

“I don’t know anything else.” Lie. I knew about the music vigilantes extorting Fuse and me. Knew better than to let that slip.

He initiated a staring contest, sincerity in that gaze.

My knees felt watery from the revelation of walking around tagged and monitored like a Nature Channel wolverine.

Over his shoulder a couple of his cousins loafed. One on his phone, the other ogling some chick sashaying up the sidewalk.

Over his shoulder a couple of his cousins loafed. One on his phone, the other ogling some chick sashaying up the sidewalk.

In the threshold, the bright light of the day—of my future—beamed, casting a long shadow into that dank, old, stifling prison cell of a town house.

In the threshold, the bright light of the day—of my future—beamed, casting a long shadow into that dank, old, stifling prison cell of a town house.

“The library sure is crowded,” Fuse said from the driver’s seat, her voice too loud and stilted, her hand gestures elaborate.

“It occurred to me that there might be sounds in real life you wanted to sample, like a school bell. We all got audio recorders on our phone, but it’s not the best quality if you’re not using some sort of mic attachment. So if you went to record the school bell, and a bunch of people were talking, the playback not only sounded distorted, you probably got more ambient noise—the conversations, the laughs—than anything else. SoundChek fixes that.”

“Heck yeah. That’s some intriguing stuff! You built like—what’s the bowl thing with the holes you put spaghetti noodles in when you want to drain the water?”
“A colander.”
“Right. You built a sound colander.”

“So when you record stuff to a digital file, it’s ones and zeroes. And serious musicians will tell you there’s a mathematical element to music, and music is sound. So Jim, our math whiz, worked up an algorithm that rearranged the ones and zeroes in a recording, to the point where you could separate and enhance noises the app recorded. Once separated, you can sort noises into silos, and mix them back together any way you wanted. SoundChek.”

Blustery, with her shoulders hunched, like a small woodland creature making themselves look bigger for an approaching bear, Fuse bounced a few steps ahead of me, spun on her heels to walk backward, so we were face-to-face.

A half-circle desk, also white, provided a workstation for a guard dressed primly in a navy-blue blazer with a V-neck sweater and collared shirt beneath it.

Brushed bronze sconces lit the corridor every dozen or so feet, and I heard my mom’s voice low, at the back of my skull, admiring the art deco aesthetic.

The hallway split into a T shape, and placards indicated the general location of this floor’s apartments. 14-D was to the right.

Kya angled for the kitchen, visible immediately in the open floor plan, stepped on the pedal at the base of a stainless steel trash bin, and popped the lid. She flinched away from the resulting, noxious cloud.

Fuse talked fast, with barely a space between words, pacing, explaining to me in not-quite-succinct terms what VenueShowZ was.