70...

"What do you think?" Louis asked with a grin.
"Nice," she replied evenly. "Large."
"Yeah. I saved up for a couple of years for this," he was grinning like a child showing off a clay imprint of their hand, complete with incompetently scrawled first name. "A bunch of shitty jobs like fast food and delivering papers."
"Uh-huh."
"I got it used from a guy out by Saddleback. He kept it up real nice, I hardly had to do anything to it. He had just split up with his wife and was selling some stuff off. Sort of desperate, you know? I mean not like it was a total bargain or anything, but I got a pretty decent deal for it."
"Uh-huh."
The words were floating over her, surging through the warm Southern California night. Alexis was focused and watching him warily for any sudden movements. She had her fingers on the charm hanging from her necklace; a necklace that had yet to break. She moved the charm back and forth almost coquettishly.
"And black! It's awesome huh?" Louis asked wildly. He looked at her closely, breaking his revelry. "Do you like the black?"
"Uh-huh."
"Yeah I figured you would," he pulled his keys from his pocket. The keys dangled from what looked to be a metal lizard.
"Hey Louis?" she asked in a low and even voice.
"You should check out what I did with the speakers in the backseat," he opened the back door of the Cadillac. The dome light lit the inside up with a pale yellow of softly forgotten dreams, just out of reach.
"Louis?" she asked once again in that small voice.
Louis had one knee on the backseat of the car. He looked over his shoulder with wide eyes and a smile.
"Seriously, check this out."
Alexis yanked the charm in her fingers. The clasp of the necklace gave with practiced use and the chain fell to dangle on either side of her hand.
"Louis," she said. She used a little more authority in her voice this time.
"Yeah?"
"How's Vanessa?"
"Who?"
She moved closer to him, slowly but with purpose.
"Earlier, you said 'travel my way'. I'm just wondering how Vanessa's doing."
Louis looked confused. He shook his head slowly.
"I don't know a Vanessa. It was something Matthew told me to say to you, said it was an inside joke of some kind."
A large noise erupted from what sounded like the trash area behind the mini mall, behind the bookstore. Alexis, surprised, spun and looked and then quickly remembered the threat before her. When she turned back towards Louis, he was looking up at her from the backseat with sad and confused eyes. It took her a moment to notice the red line that ran below his chin like a ragged smile.
And then that smile began to fill his shirt with an impossible amount of blood.