Page 142 of Hellbent

“Like: Your mama’s so fat she jumped in the Red Sea and said, ‘Take that, Moses.’”

Mia said, “Your public-education tax dollars at work.”

Peter kept on, undeterred. “Your mama’s so ugly she made a blind kid cry.”

Mia said, “I like that one because it’s offensive in two distinct ways.”

“Your mama’s so fat she can’t even fit in the chat room.”

Joey looked away to hide her grin.

They reached the twelfth floor, and Peter shot out, holding the elevator open with one skinny arm.

“See you for dinner tonight, right, Evan Smoak?”

Evan’s face failed to conceal the fact that he’d forgotten.

Contacting Xavier upon touching down in Ontario, Evan had laid out a plan that required him to be in Pico-Union by ten o’clock. Dinner at seven put him clear by eight-thirty, which gave him time to get across town. As he ran this quick calculation, he felt the heat of Mia’s gaze. The elevator door bumped impatiently against Peter’s arm, retracting with an angry clank.

“Yes,” Evan said.

Peter smiled and let the door go.

* * *

Evan pounded the heavy bag, the blows echoing off the floor-to-ceiling glass. He reached his count and stopped, drenched with sweat, breath heaving through him. He’d just started back to the shower when he heard Joey call his name with urgency.

He jogged across the empty expanse and up the winding staircase to the loft.

She was sitting on the couch, the open laptop discarded on the cushion beside her. She peered at him over the red notebook he had pulled from the microwave in Richmond.

“Pilot FriXion pens,” she said.

He waited.

“Know how erasable ink works?” she asked.

“You use the eraser.”

“Funny,” she said, sans smile. “The ink they use is made of different chemical compounds. When you use the eraser, you create friction, friction creates heat, heat makes one compound activate an acid compound, which neutralizes the dye.”

“The microwave.”

“Right. They figured out how to use heat to make the ink disappear without friction. You can wipe out all your mission notes with a quick zap in the microwave.”

“But that would leave behind—”

“Impressions,” she said. “Unfortunately, it looks like the notebook pages are treated to, like, replump with heat to prevent that.”

“Is ‘replump’ a word?”

She ignored him. “Know how they feel a little stiffer, like higher stock?”

By way of display, she rubbed a page between thumb and forefinger.

“So everything’s wiped out?” he said.

“Almost. One page in the middle didn’t quite get there. Like, you know the cold spot in the center of a frozen burrito?”