Objectify Me: A Fireworks Novella (The Fireworks Novellas) by Bibi Rizer

turns and gives me a look. I shake my head, carefully pulling the safety back on the pistol. I’ve never fired a gun in the direction of anything but a paper target or a tin can before. I don’t even like those targets with people on them – they’re way too morbid for me. But this guy is certainly armed. It’s him or us. Do I just shoot him in the back? Can I do that?
    Heavy feet thump on the stairs.
    “Get down! Police! Get down!”
    The guy turns from the door, pulling a pistol out of the front of his pants.
    And Levi leaps.
    They crash down in a heap. There’s a revolting cracking noise as the guy’s gun arm breaks against the concrete floor. The pistol flies out of his hand as he screams and lashes out with his other fist. Levi jerks back, but a millisecond later, he is on his feet. And bizarrely, since he’s obviously some kind of street-fighting superhero, Levi decides to hit this dude with the girl-mace instead. A full spray in his face and he’s screaming like he’s been castrated, scraping his eyes frantically.
    I dive out from under the stairs and grab the other pistol, holding it as Levi untangles himself, his eyes watering.
    “Police! Drop your weapons!”
    I throw the guns down and turn, raising my hands as four uniformed cops bear down on us.
    “Get down on your knees!”
    Valentina looks terrified under the stairs.
    “ Ne boysya, ne boysya,” Levi says. I glance over at him. He’s kneeling sort of lopsided with his hands on his head. For a West Coast boy, he sure knows how to behave around the police. Thank goodness. Cops around here can get pretty trigger happy.
    “I’m Levi Borovski,” he says. “I called it in.”
    “ID?”
    “Back pocket,” Levi says. “There’s a little girl under the stairs. You’re scaring her.”
    Two of the cops relax a bit. One of them reaches for Valentina, but she refuses to budge.
    “I can get her,” I say, as I hand over my ID.
    Valentina cowers there until the other two cops are done dragging the big Russian away. Then they frisk us and confirm Levi’s ID. I finally tug Valentina out and put my arms around her.
    “I’m going to have to book you for prostitution, ma’am,” one of the cops says. I appreciate that he doesn’t sound happy about it and everything, but jeez.
    “She’s not a prostitute!” Levi says. “She’s my friend. We came here together looking for two other friends. They might have been upstairs.”
    “Everyone upstairs is being arrested.”
    Levi slumps. “Fuck,” he says. “The women, too? You’re not going to arrest this little girl, are you?”
    The cops look at Valentina. “Is she a prostitute? How old is she? How old are you?”
    Valentina just stares at him.
    “ Skol'ko tebe let ?” Levi says.
    “ Chetyrnadtsat.”
    Levi hangs his head with a sigh. “She says she’s fourteen.”
    I’ve never seen a cop look so forlorn. He turns to his partner. “Get child protection down here.”
    Valentina starts to cry again.
    Levi pats her on the shoulder. “ Ne boysya, Kosmonashka, ” he says.

Chapter Eleven – Levi
     
    Shame is a strange thing. Unlike almost every other thing you might carry, it doesn’t diminish depending on how many people you share it with. So I’m sharing shame with the entire male half of our pitiful species right now, and it weighs on me like a neutron star.
    They dragged a Russian interpreter out of bed, and now it’s her job to translate Valentina’s mumbled details about what was happening in that place. I heard enough, though. Enough to never forget. I cried like a girl in the back of the police car. Thankfully they got a lady cop to drive Charlotte back to the station in her own car. Valentina got checked over in an ambulance first; she arrived a few minutes after me. So I only had a big Cajun detective to share my tears with.
    “Hey now, podna,” he said, looking back at me in the rearview mirror. “Don’t fret. It ain’t your fault.”
    But somehow, the way I looked at