THE AFTERNOON CRAWLED INTO EVENING. I wished my parents were home so that I could hear them moving around downstairs, but I knew they'd stay late at their office. Snow always messed up deliveries.
Around six I went down to the kitchen, flipped through the newspaper, and half watched the Sunday night football game for an hour. Then I microwaved a frozen pasta dinner, ate it in front of the TV, returned to my room, propped up some pillows on the bed, and sat there, my legs stretched out in front of me.
My parents came in around nine. I went downstairs and heard all about a delivery truck that had slid into a ditch in Shoreline. As I listened, I thought of my dad saying I could talk to him at any time. I wanted to talk to him now, but I couldn't think of a place to begin. By nine thirty I was back in my room looking out the window. Snow was falling, and the forecast was for snow all night. There'd be no school Monday.
I fell asleep quickly. I had about a million dreams that night, but I remember only one: I was back at the Tacoma Dome. The title game had ended; the parking lot was emptying out. I was waiting by the players' gate for Angel, just as I'd waited after the semifinals. I had a notebook with a long list of questions for him, but as I looked at the questions, the words somehow morphed into a foreign language that looked like Russian.
The players' door opened and guys started spilling out, walking down the long, brightly lit chute to the parking lot. I knew I should ask somebody something, but I couldn't think what.
I was about to leave when the door opened a final time and Angel stepped out, alone. He started toward me, down that walkway. What do I want to ask him? And then, like a miracle, the questions in my notebook morphed back into English. At that exact moment a car pulled up at the end of the long chute. The car had a Washington license plate—I remember that detail as clearly as everything that followed. The window came down. A hand holding a gun appeared. Tat! Tat! Tat! Tat! Then the car was speeding off toward Interstate 5; Angel was down on the ground just like Thomas Childress had been, his blood staining the concrete, and I was sitting up in my bed sweating from every pore of my body.
I'd never get back to sleep, so even though it was a little before six a.m., I put on about four layers of clothes and headed out into the frozen morning, making the first footsteps in the white snow as I walked up to Sunset Hill Park. I stared out over Puget Sound until the first rays of the sun lit up the peaks of the Olympic Mountains. There was something more than terror in that dream, some detail that gnawed at me. What was it?
Frustrated, I grabbed hold of the chain-link fence and gave it a shake. Snow cascaded from the little wires where it had settled. Then, out of nowhere, I knew. The Washington license plates. In my dream those plates had been as vivid as the gunshots. But knowing what detail mattered only increased my frustration. Why did it matter? I had no answer.
I turned and headed for home. I'd gone about one hundred yards when I stopped in my tracks. My phone call to Aramingo High ... what had the guy said to me? "We've got some homeboys out there who are going to pay him a visit."
Homeboys in Seattle.
The Washington license plates in my dream.
Nobody had to fly in from Philadelphia. The Aramingo guys were connected to a Seattle gang; it was Seattle guys who'd be coming after Angel.
I hurried home, frustrated that the snow slowed me. By the time I was back in the house, it was nearly eight. I didn't know whether Kimi would be up, but I called anyway. She answered right away. "You're going to have to make it quick."
"Okay, I'll be as quick as I can. Remember what you said about missing something?"
Then I described my dream and repeated the words the Philly guy had said to me over the phone. The phone stayed quiet. I waited. "Kimi?"
"I remember the walkway by G-1," she said. "I remember thinking that it was perfect for photographers because it was bright and there was no place to hide. If gang guys figure out Angel's playing in the Tacoma Dome on Saturday night, they can get him. There's a big sign that says PLAYERS ONLY. They'd have to be blind to miss it. Going in or coming out—they can get him."
"So what do we do?"
"Call McNulty. Tell him what you told me. Tell him Angel can't play."
"All right, I will. And then I'll call you right back."
"That won't work, Mitch. I'm going out for breakfast with my father and my aunt; they're in the car waiting for me right now. Besides, I think we should talk." There was a pause. "Okay, I've got it. I'm meeting Rachel at the library at ten thirty to study for a chemistry test. See if you can get one of those study rooms. I'll meet you there at ten."