Page 42 of Seven+Four

“One…Two hours—” Lori starts to say when I see movement out of the corner of my eye.

“Watch out!” I scream just as parka dude comes down on us. Ollie tries to stop the punch, but it finds his stomach. Lori hits the dude’s throat as I splash my drink on his face. Michael pulls one of his arms back as Lori does the same on the other side until I hear two cracks, probably from both shoulders being dislocated, and a loud groan. They let him go and face him again.

With a grunt Ollie moves in front of him, glaring he raises his fisted hand and lands a few hard hooks to the guy's solar plexus. I hear a pop, and then a shower of white powder hits me. All of us.

I start coughing as I inhale the substance, while parka guy falls on his knees and then face on the ground, forcing me and Michael to take a couple of steps back.

“What the fuck is this shit?” Lori is blowing out air while shaking his head to make the powder fall down from his curls.

“It’s…cocaine,” I tell him. “I could test it back at the lab, but I’m pretty sure.” I’ve helped my brothers get rid of more than one drug dealer. Studying drugs became a side hobby.

“No need. It’s coke.” Ollie's eyes widen. “Dick used to sell it.” His late father.

“Oh fuck!” Michael mutters, spitting on the ground. His jacket has cocaine all over the right shoulder.

Ollie crouches near the guy on the ground and lifts an almost empty plastic bag that was hanging halfway out of the parka’s large, open pocket. There is residual cocaine inside. Ollie musthave broken the bag when he punched the guy, forcing the drug out. Gravity and the dude’s incredible height did the rest.

He starts slapping parka dude, but he doesn’t wake up. I turn to the other guy on the ground, but he looks out of it, as well.

“What should we do?” Ollie asks, clenching and unclenching his fists.

“Do you feel any discomfort?” Michael asks. “Shortness of breath, chest pain, itchy skin?”

We all shake our heads.

“No allergic reaction, then. That’s good.”

“Is it? We sniffed coke!” Lori barks.

“It was an accident,” I remind him. “And we didn’t inhale a large amount. We can go to the hospital if you want.”

Lori snorts. “And tell them what? That we accidentally inhaled coke while beating a guy?”

“We just have to wait for it to leave our systems,” Michael states. He goes to the windows and slides them open.

“You got some on your nose,” I let him know.

“Hairy Fucking Fairy!” Lori exclaims, standing on top of gel man’s back, who’s still lying on the ground.

“Why are you using our safe-bestie protocol code word?” Ollie snarls at him, receiving a shrug back. He kicks the parka dude twice in the side before looking up and growling. I also look up. The roof is pretty high.

I feel the change overtaking me already. Euphoria along with an elevated heart rate.

“Damn. This is the year of the high for me.” Lori chuckles. A couple of months ago, he was dosed, that’s how he kind of ended up with Gabe.

“Not again,” Ollie grumbles. “No. No. Don’t want to trip again.”

“Oh right, you were drugged too. Wait, no, you drugged yourself.” Michael frowns at him.

“Not on purpose.” Ollie suddenly snorts and slaps Michael’s shoulder, causing another cloud of cocaine to billow around us. I step back to avoid breathing it in.

“Fuck!I’ve seen this movie, and my character ends up dead on the way home.” Michael looks anxious. Exaggeratedly so.

“Don’t go home, then,” Ollie clips.

“Ah, Okay.”

“Stressed spelled backward is desserts,” Lori suddenly states.

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