The young man kneels on the rough carpeted floor, hanging his hands over the unfinished wooden surface of the low coffee table. He swipes the fallen playing cards off its face and draws a few cards from the stack. Atop the coffee table, he props a pair of them into a triangle. A couple more times, he repeats this trial, stacking cards, laying a foundation for the next story. From the next room over, a resounding thud echoes out. Shattering glass shrieks, metal clangs and grinds, and the floor trembles. The house falls silent and still.

He begins reconstruction, scooping his fallen house of cards off the table. The sporadic creaking of boots on wood approaches the young man as he slides a few cards from the stack. The creaking of floorboards subsides, replaced by the crunch of stomping through coarse carpeting. On the edge of his periphery, a lean figure strides toward him. A bloody stream flows across her hand, through the sleeve of her disheveled coat. She freezes in place, towering over the coffee table; her curly brown hair falls over her pale face. Glassy-eyed, he watches the rebuilt house of cards tumble. He springs up from his spot on the carpet, keeping his half-closed gaze toward the pile of cards.

“Hey, Flynt… That was fast. I got my half of the job done pretty quick… How about you get your ass in there and finish up your half?”

Flynt bows back toward the table. With one hand, he collects the empty box of playing cards from the arm of the recliner to his left. With the other, he sweeps the cards into the pack.

“Uh… There’s nothing worth taking here, but sure, go off and steal a shitty deck of cards… Good for you.”

Flynt marches around the table, straight into the hallway just outside the living room. Along the dim hall, with its peeling wallpaper and creaking floorboards, the pair traverses until they reach the kitchen. Broken glasses and shattered ceramics litter the floor, and the countertops are bloodstained. From behind the central island counter, a man’s arm sticks out, behind which gushes a pool of blood, staining the counter’s wooden trim.

The front door crashes open from across the hall. The woman jerks around to face the noise, while Flynt ignores the sound, now crouched, inspecting the body behind the counter. A burly hand stops the door before it can creak itself shut. Draped in shadows, the hulking man pries open the door and stomps across the dingy hall.

“The hell are you two doing?!”

“Hey, Deagon… I think we’re working.”

“Are you being smart, Avery?”

He marches toward her, reaches out with one arm, and smacks her on the head. The stench of alcohol trails behind him as he paces past Avery.

“Like hell you’re working; this isn’t even the right house! You didn’t even get the right man! You didn’t do the right job! Dammit, what are you doing back there?”

Flynt stands up and stares at the man from across the counter. Avery wanders into the kitchen, raising an eyebrow at Flynt.

“Look, it’s nice to see you two again. I don’t want to get rid of you guys. When you get your shit together, you get stuff done.”

Deagon tears a flask out of his coat pocket, outstretches his arm, and dumps it out over the floor beside him; the vodka cracks and sizzles against the hardwood in a brew of sparks, eating through a small portion of the floor. Avery stares, wide-eyed. The man takes a deep breath and marches toward the kitchen, staggering against the wall.

“Nah, this isn’t where you two need to be. You need to be at Harley’s place!”

Deagon clears his throat.

“Do you two dumbasses know where the Harleys live?”

“Uh... sort of. I know they’re rich as shit, right?”

“Yeah. That’s where you should be right now, kidnapping Jack Harley. Does that make sense?”

Avery glares at Deagon while Flynt nods. Deagon charges into the kitchen and throws Flynt out into the hallway.

“If you understand, then you should be gone already!”

Far in front of Flynt, Avery strides forth, throwing open the splintered wooden door. A small cabinet stands at the end of the hall, and Flynt snatches a matchbox from atop its cluttered surface, stashing it into his sweatshirt pocket. He trails behind her as they tread down the porch onto the concrete sidewalk. The sun sits almost directly overhead, casting slender shadows behind the two. Avery sprints across the street, tearing open the shotgun door of a beat-up red car. Flynt slides into the driver’s seat, dragging the door shut behind him.

꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂꧁꧂

The sputtering car erupts in sparks as it screeches to a halt. Avery scrambles out of the car, and she strides along the nearby sidewalk. Flynt ambles out of the car and paces just behind her. They walk over the neat sidewalk, the short and even lawn at their side, a row of streetlights illuminating the night before them.

“He seems sort of freaked out and shit, you know? That’s weird as fuck.”

Flynt coughs. Avery stuffs her hands into her pockets, and the two meander down the path. Beside them, a manor creeps into view, with Harley banners draped along its side. They veer off toward the wiry front gate of the mansion. Avery snatches open the gateway with a soft metal scratch, and the two walk into the dark yard. As they pace down the path of cobblestones, Avery turns her head to face Flynt.

“Don’t you think it’s weird?! We were doing our fucking job, and Deagon’s acting like he has no clue what’s going on…”

Flynt nods.

“And then he gives us some huge-as-shit undertaking like this, not to mention whatever the fuck was going on with his liquor—”

The two stumble up onto the concrete doorstep and pause before the pale entryway. Avery shrugs and throws open the front doors.