Excerpt
Clyde was exhausted. His feet were so sore he stood on their outer edges. The muscles of his legs burned and his inner thighs were raw and hot. The gi hadnt been washed since the last class and was dirty and stiff, like cardboard. When he came out of the trailer Jay was looking into a pit down the road. He walked to the next one. Maybe hed murdered Dale and wanted to show Clyde where the body was. Goddamn, that would have made Clyde happy. Clyde followed in the street as Jay went from pit to pit. Clyde came up beside him and smelled ammonia and decomposing animals. Dales corpse was nowhere in sight. A busted cement mixer lay half submerged in the middle crowded with food wrappers and disintegrating boxes from KFC and McDonalds and Long John Silvers. Something hissed, a possum; it crawled over a pile of bricks, its pink-rimmed eyes blank and crazy.
Damn,” Clyde said, and Jay punched him in the stomach.
Clyde doubled over and covered up but Jay didnt hit him again. He tried to speak but couldnt. Jay took a step and Clyde braced himself. But Jay only grabbed hold of his gi and jerked him to standing. It looked like he was about to say something. His lips were tight and dry and his nose puffed with breath like a bulls. Jay stared into him with deep, wet eyes. With his left hand he held Clyde at arms length; with his right, he punched him twice in the mouth.
Clyde felt an odd moment of peace before he blacked out. When he woke, he was drowning. He coughed and thrashed. The brown pit water was two feet thick. Clyde pushed himself off the cement mixer to get on his feet. Filth stung his eyes; he rubbed them with soiled fingers and blew bitter snot from his nose and looked at Jay, above, at the edge. It would have been disrespectful to meet Jays eyes so Clyde kept his down. He tried to slow his heart. It was as if he had no control over it. He made fists with his hands and said, Osu!” It made his abdomen ache where Jay had punched him.