Page 3 of Devil Inside

Not me. I’m no angel, but I’m definitely not substituting. If I need a fix, I’ll just hit the road. Doesn’t matter the hour, the day, the weather. I’ll get out in the street and ride it out.

This city is mine.

That’s when I get the call. Static spits out from my radio, dragging me back to the curb. God’s voice drifts through the static. “STAT delivery. Thirty-minute deadline. Copy?”

“I’m not even on the clock, man,” I answer back into the receiver. “Can’t they wait?”

“Not this one,” God mutters, voice crackling as if he’s on fire.

“One minute. That’s all I ask. For the love of Christ, just gimme a friggin’ minute.”

“You taking it or what?”

“Fucking hell.” I pick myself up from the concrete, stretching my spine until the vertebrae pop, a xylophone rumba of cartilage and bone. “Gotta go.”

“All the way down to Shockoe Bottom?” Lys scoffs. “Good luck.”

“What?” I sense a challenge. “You don’t think I can do it?”

Freel huffs. “Thirty minutes or less? All the faith, bro.”

“Five bucks says I’m there in twenty.”

“Make it ten bucks.”

“You’re on.”

“Anybody else want in?” I ask. “Easy money...”

“I’m out,” Lys says.

“Why not?” Deak says.

“I don’t want to take the man’s hard-earned money.” She grins like a son of a bitch.

“Taking candy from a baby,” I say. “I’ll collect my winnings when we clock out.”

I turn to the café window and stop just for a sec, spotting Jenn behind the counter. She glances out. Finds me. Her expression doesn’t change. She’s still pissed. Fair enough.

I nod, anyway. Just a lift in my chin. Give her the slightest edge of a smile.

One for the road.

Maybe we’ll make up. Maybe she’ll forgive me again. Maybe she’ll take me back. Again. That’s a whole lotta maybes. I’ll take those odds.

Most jobs, you’re stranded behind a desk. Not us. The city is our office. These streets are where we work. No suit and tie. No briefcase. No office politics. I ride and get paid for it.

This is my life.

Was, anyway.

All we need is our bike. Our over-the-shoulder satchel. Our radio receiver connecting us to Dispatch, the disembodied voice of God that crackles out from the void, telling us where to go, what to pick up, where to drop off. A to B. In and out.Ride, ride, ride...

You need lust. I’m talking a downright rabid love for this job. That’s my sin. It’s not just a profession. It’s a pilgrimage.Ride hard.We tap into the very energy that is this town.

I know Richmond so intimately, inside and out. Its pulses,its rhythms. The seconds between red and green traffic lights. The flow of traffic.

My record is about 75 tags in one day. I’ve heard some guys go up to a hundred, but I think they’re just bragging. I spend just as much of my day in the elevator, going up, going down, dealing with receptionists’ BS, bringing along my bike into these startups whenever there’s no time to lock it, getting from A to B to C to D all the way to Z and beyond in a day.