Chapter 2: Marcus Comes Collecting
The diner was a greasy spoon that had somehow survived three recessions and a fire, which meant either the owner had friends in city planning or God had a twisted sense of humor. Ender pushed through the back door at six-forty-five, ten minutes before his shift, and the smell hit him like a wall—bacon grease, burnt coffee, the lemon-scented bleach they used to mop the floors. His stomach clenched. He hadn't eaten since yesterday morning.
"You look like hell."
Marisol stood at the prep station, slicing tomatoes with the kind of precision that came from thirty years of doing the same thing every day. She was sixty-two, had hands like leather, and was the only person at the diner who ever looked at Ender like he was a person instead of a pair of hands.
"Didn't sleep," Ender said.
"Mm." Marisol didn't push. She never did. She just slid a piece of toast across the counter—dry, no butter, the way he liked it—and went back to her tomatoes. "Eat that before Diego sees you. He's in a mood."
Ender ate the toast in three bites. It was cold and slightly burnt, and it was the best thing he'd tasted in days. He washed it down with water from the tap, then tied on his apron and pushed through the swinging door into the front of the house.
The diner was already half-full. Truckers at the counter, nursing coffees and staring at their phones. A family in the corner booth, the kids fighting over a coloring book while the parents ignored them. An old man by the window, reading a newspaper that was probably three days old.
Normal people. Normal lives.
Ender grabbed a coffee pot and started making rounds.
The morning passed in a blur of refills and orders and the kind of small talk that required no thought. How's your breakfast? Can I get you anything else? His feet moved on autopilot. His mouth smiled on autopilot. His brain stayed somewhere else entirely, counting hours, counting tips, counting the distance between now and the moment he'd have to walk back through that door.
By noon, he'd made forty-three dollars. Not enough. Not even close.
"Hey."
Ender looked up from the register. Marisol stood in the doorway to the kitchen, wiping her hands on a towel that had once been white.
"Diego says you can stay for the dinner rush. Mandy called in sick."
"I—" Ender's throat tightened. "Yeah. Yeah, I can stay."
He needed the money. He needed it so badly his hands were shaking.
The dinner rush was worse than the morning. A bus of tourists, a birthday party that took up three tables, a man who sent back his steak twice and then left without paying. Ender ran between tables, refilled drinks, apologized for things that weren't his fault. His ribs screamed every time he bent over. His head pounded from the fluorescent lights.
By eight o'clock, he'd made eighty-seven dollars.
Still not enough.
He stood in the back alley behind the diner, his breath fogging in the cold air, and did the math. Eighty-seven dollars plus the thirty-two he had in his wallet from last week's tips. One hundred and nineteen. He needed two hundred. He needed two hundred by tonight.
His phone buzzed.
Ender pulled it from his pocket, his hands numb from the cold. Pete's name lit up the screen.
Where r u
Ender stared at the words. His thumbs hovered over the keyboard.
Still at work. Picking up extra shift.
The reply came instantly.
Don't care. Get home. Now.
Ender closed his eyes. The alley smelled like garbage and rain. Somewhere in the distance, a siren wailed.
I'll be home in an hour.
Now.
Ender typed with shaking fingers.
I need the hours. For the money.
A long pause. Three dots appeared, disappeared, appeared again. Then:
Fine. But you better have it.
Ender slipped the phone back into his pocket. His hands were still shaking. He pressed them against his thighs, tried to steady himself, and walked back inside.
---
The walk home took forty minutes. The bus would have been faster, but the bus cost money, and Ender didn't have money to waste. He walked with his head down, his coat pulled tight around him, his bag clutched against his chest like a shield.
The city was different at night. Softer, somehow. The neon signs blurred into watercolor streaks. The streetlights cast halos on the wet pavement. People passed him without looking—couples holding hands, teenagers laughing at something on their phones, a homeless man pushing a shopping cart full of cans.
Ender envied all of them. Even the homeless man. Especially the homeless man.
He reached the apartment building at ten-fifteen. The elevator was still broken. He took the stairs, sixty-eight steps, one hand on the railing. His legs felt like lead. His ribs had gone from sharp pain to a dull, constant ache that radiated through his whole body.
Fourth floor. Apartment 4D.
Ender stopped in front of the door. The television was on—he could see the blue glow seeping through the crack at the bottom. He could hear voices, too. Pete's voice, low and rough. And another voice, deeper, calmer.
Marcus.
Ender's blood turned to ice.
He stood there for a long moment, his hand frozen on the doorknob. He could leave. He could turn around, walk back down the stairs, disappear into the night. He had eighty-seven dollars in his pocket. He could find a motel, a shelter, somewhere.
But his feet wouldn't move. His hand wouldn't let go of the knob.
He opened the door.
The living room was dim, lit only by the television and a single lamp in the corner. Pete sat on the couch, his arm draped over the back, a beer in his hand. He was smiling—that particular smile, the one that made Ender's stomach drop.
Marcus sat beside him.
He was exactly as Ender remembered—tall, broad-shouldered, with graying stubble and eyes that never quite met yours. He wore a plain black t-shirt and jeans that looked expensive. His boots were propped up on the coffee table, and he held a beer of his own, half-empty, the condensation dripping onto his fingers.
"Hey, baby," Pete said. "Look who stopped by."
Ender didn't move. His bag hung from his shoulder, heavy and useless. His mouth was dry.
"Marcus," he said. It wasn't a greeting. It was a recognition. A resignation.
Marcus didn't say anything. He just looked at Ender with those cold, calculating eyes, and took a slow sip of his beer.
"Come sit down," Pete said. "You look tired."
Ender's feet carried him forward. He didn't want them to. He wanted to run, to scream, to do something other than what he was doing. But his body had learned this dance a long time ago. His body knew the steps.
He sat in the armchair across from the couch. His hands found his lap. His eyes found the floor.
"So," Pete said. "You got the money?"
Ender's throat tightened. "I have eighty-seven dollars."
Silence.
Pete's smile didn't waver. But something behind his eyes shifted. Something dark and quiet and dangerous.
"Eighty-seven," he repeated.
"I tried. I picked up an extra shift. I—"
"Did I ask for excuses?"
Ender shook his head.
Pete leaned forward, setting his beer on the coffee table. "I asked for two hundred dollars. That's what I asked for. And you brought me eighty-seven."
"I'll get the rest. Tomorrow. I promise."
"Tomorrow." Pete laughed, but there was no humor in it. "You always say tomorrow."
Marcus shifted on the couch, his weight making the cushions creak. He still hadn't said a word. He didn't need to. His presence was enough.
Ender's hands were shaking again. He pressed them flat against his thighs, tried to still them.
"I can get more," he said. "I can work doubles all week. I can—"
"Stand up."
Ender looked up. Pete was on his feet now, standing over him, his shadow blocking out the lamp light.
"I said stand up."
Ender stood.
His legs felt like they belonged to someone else. His body was a puppet, and Pete held the strings. Pete always held the strings.
"Give me the money."
Ender reached into his pocket. His fingers found the crumpled bills—ones and fives, a ten he'd been saving for bus fare. He pulled them out and held them toward Pete.
Pete took them. Counted them. Stuffed them into his own pocket without looking.
"Eighty-seven dollars," he said. "That's not even half."
"I know. I'm sorry."
"You're sorry." Pete stepped closer. His breath smelled like beer and cigarettes. His eyes were dark, empty, the eyes of a man who had never loved anything in his life. "Sorry doesn't pay my debts, Ender. Sorry doesn't keep Marcus off my back."
Ender's gaze flicked to Marcus. Marcus was still sitting on the couch, still holding his beer, still watching with that detached, predatory calm.
"Pete," Ender said. His voice came out thin. "Please."
"Please what?"
"Don't."
Pete tilted his head. "Don't what?"
Ender couldn't say it. He couldn't put it into words. But Pete knew. Pete always knew.
"You know how this works," Pete said. His voice was almost gentle now, which was somehow worse. "You don't have my money. So you pay a different way."
Ender's eyes burned. He wouldn't cry. He never cried. Not in front of Pete, not in front of Marcus, not in front of anyone.
"Pete," he tried again. "I'll get the money. I swear. Just give me until tomorrow. I'll find it. I'll—"
"Marcus came all the way over here." Pete gestured toward the couch. "It'd be rude to send him home."
Marcus set his beer down. The sound of glass against wood was loud in the silence.
"I don't mind waiting," Marcus said. His voice was low and smooth, the voice of a man who was used to getting what he wanted. "But I'm not leaving empty-handed."
Ender felt the walls closing in. The apartment was small—too small, always too small—and Marcus was big. Marcus was so big.
"You can't," Ender whispered.
"I can," Pete said. "I can do whatever I want."
He grabbed Ender's arm. His grip was tight, his fingers digging into the bruise he'd left there last week. Ender bit the inside of his cheek to keep from crying out.
"Go to the bedroom," Pete said. "Wait for Marcus."
"No."
The word was out before Ender could stop it. It hung in the air, small and defiant and utterly useless.
Pete's face went still. "What did you say?"
"I said no." Ender's voice was shaking. His whole body was shaking. "I'm not—you can't make me—"
Pete's fist connected with his stomach.
The air left Ender's lungs in a rush. He doubled over, gasping, his vision going white at the edges. Pete let go of his arm, and Ender stumbled back, hit the wall, slid down until he was sitting on the floor.
"Don't tell me what I can't do," Pete said. "You don't get to say no. You don't get to say anything."
Ender couldn't breathe. His ribs were on fire. His stomach heaved, but there was nothing in it—just the toast from this morning, threatening to come back up.
Marcus stood up from the couch. His footsteps were heavy on the linoleum.
"I'll give you ten minutes," he said. "Clean him up first."
"Whatever you want," Pete said.
Ender heard the words, but they didn't make sense. Nothing made sense. The room was spinning, and his body was a stranger, and somewhere far away, someone was crying.
It took him a moment to realize it was him.
"Get up," Pete said.
Ender didn't move.
Pete grabbed him by the hair and yanked him to his feet.
"Get. Up."
Ender got up. His legs barely held him. His hair was tangled around Pete's fist, pulling at his scalp, making tears spring to his eyes.
"Walk."
Ender walked.
The hallway was dark. The bedroom door was closed. Pete opened it, pushed Ender through, and flicked on the light. The single bulb buzzed, flickered, settled into a sickly yellow glow.
The bed was unmade. The curtains were drawn. The room smelled like stale cigarettes and sweat and something else—something bitter, something old.
Pete let go of Ender's hair. Shoved him toward the bed.
"Sit down."
Ender sat.
Pete crouched in front of him. His face was close—too close, close enough that Ender could see the broken capillaries in his nose, the yellowing of his teeth.
"This is your fault," Pete said. "You know that, right?"
Ender nodded. More than once, he wasn't sure it was true. He just needed this to end.
"If you'd brought me the money, this wouldn't be happening."
Ender swallowed. His throat was raw. "I know."
"So don't blame me."
"I don't."
"Good." Pete stood up. He looked down at Ender with something that might have been satisfaction, if satisfaction and cruelty weren't the same thing. "Take off your clothes."
Ender's hands moved to the buttons of his shirt. They were trembling so badly he could barely manage them. He got the shirt open, slid it off his shoulders. The cold air hit his skin, raised goosebumps along his arms.
Pete looked at the bruises. The old ones, yellow and green at the edges, fading into something that might eventually heal. The new ones, purple and red and angry, blooming across his ribs and stomach like flowers.
"Don't just sit there," Pete said. "Everything off."
Ender stood up. His hands moved to his belt, his zipper, his waistband. He pushed his pants down, stepped out of them, stood there in his underwear with his arms crossed over his chest.
"All of it."
Ender closed his eyes. He counted to three.
For the last nine years, Ender had convinced himself that his stomach problems, headaches, and unexplained fatigue were just "symptoms of a weak womb." His mother had taken him to clinics, prayed over him, fed him strange herbs—but no one had ever mentioned mental illness. It wasn't the sort of thing that was discussed in their town, not really. Especially not after what had happened with his own mother. Perhaps the adults whispered about it behind closed doors, but no one ever said it out loud.
The underwear came off.
He moved his hands behind his back, counted to two, and pressed the razor blade against the skin of his left forearm and cut, deeply. Blood ran down into his palm, slipping through his fingers and dripping onto the floor. The pain flared—sharp, bright, alive—and for one beautiful second, it blotted out everything else. Then he pulled the blade across in the perpendicular direction, one quick, decisive stroke, carving a number from someone's skin. 2 2 4. He didn't know whose it was—someone from before he could remember. But he knew what it meant: worthless.
The self-harm itself wasn't the goal—it was just the only way he could think of to stop being a burden. But even after he'd done it, crouched on the floor with the word carved into him, he hadn't felt any better. Instead, he'd just felt stupid and tired, listening to the neighbor screaming in the next apartment about her own dead child.
That was the first time it clicked: no one was coming. Not his mother, not the state, not some kind, smiling couple with a clean house and an extra bedroom. He'd been waiting his whole life, waiting, waiting, waiting. It was a beautiful lie. The truth was blood and rust and the smell of his own breath in a dark room.
Pete moved to the door. He looked back once—that smile still on his face, that awful, knowing smile—and then he stepped into the hallway.
"Ten minutes," Marcus said.
"I know."
The door closed.
Ender heard the click of the lock, heard Pete's footsteps recede, heard the murmur of voices in the living room.
He was alone.
He was trapped.
He was nothing at all.
The lock clicked into place with a sound that lived somewhere between a whisper and a scream.
Ender stood in the center of the room, stripped bare, his arms hanging useless at his sides. The single bulb overhead buzzed and flickered, casting his shadow in jagged shapes against the wall. His skin prickled with cold and something worse—that familiar dread that settled into his bones like water finding cracks in concrete.
He could run. The window was right there, three steps away, covered by curtains that hadn't been washed since they moved in. But it was four floors down, and the glass was painted shut, and even if he got it open, even if he jumped, what then? Broken legs on the pavement. A crowd gathering. Pete's voice in his ear, telling everyone Ender was crazy, unstable, a danger to himself. He'd tried that once, years ago. The hospital had kept him for seventy-two hours, and when he got out, Pete had been waiting at the entrance with that smile.
So Ender stayed.
The floor creaked in the hallway. Footsteps—heavy, deliberate, unhurried. Marcus didn't rush anything. Marcus never rushed. He moved through the world like a man who knew nothing could touch him, and maybe nothing could.
The door opened.
Marcus filled the frame, his broad shoulders blocking the light from the hallway. He had to duck slightly to enter, and the room seemed to shrink around him, the walls pulling closer, the ceiling pressing down. He closed the door behind him with the same casual click of the lock, sealing them in together.
"Pete said you'd be ready."
Ender didn't answer. His voice had retreated somewhere deep, somewhere Marcus couldn't reach.
Marcus walked toward him—slow, measured steps. His boots were loud on the linoleum, each footfall a countdown. He stopped a foot away, close enough that Ender could smell him: expensive cologne, beer, the faint salt of sweat.
"You're shaking."
Ender looked down at his hands. They were trembling, fine vibrations that ran up his arms and into his chest. He pressed them against his thighs, but it didn't help.
"I'm not going to hurt you more than I have to," Marcus said. His voice was calm, almost kind. That was the worst part. "But you know how this works."
Ender knew. He'd known for years, since the first time Pete had called Marcus, since the first time the door had locked behind them. It was always the same. The same words. The same hands. The same silence afterward, lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling, waiting for his body to feel like his own again.
"Look at me."
Ender couldn't. His eyes were fixed on the floor, on a stain near the edge of the bed, dark and faded and shaped like a map of somewhere he'd never go.
Marcus grabbed his chin. His fingers were rough, calloused, and they dug into the soft flesh beneath Ender's jaw. He tilted Ender's face up, forced their eyes to meet.
"I said look at me."
Ender looked.
Marcus's eyes were gray, like storm clouds, like the ocean before something terrible rises from the deep. They didn't blink. They didn't waver. They just stared, cold and calculating, and Ender felt himself disappear into them.
"There you are," Marcus said. "I was starting to think you'd gone somewhere else."
I have, Ender thought. I'm not here. I'm not anywhere.
But he was here. His body was here, and Marcus's hands were on him now, sliding down his neck, across his shoulders, gripping his arms hard enough to bruise.
"On the bed."
Ender moved. His legs carried him to the mattress, and he sat on the edge, his hands gripping the sheets. The fabric was rough, worn thin from years of washing and sleeping and everything else that had happened here. He stared at his knees, at the pale skin stretched over bone, at the freckles that dotted his thighs like constellations.
Marcus undressed behind him. Ender heard the rustle of fabric, the clink of a belt buckle, the soft thud of clothes hitting the floor. He didn't turn around. He didn't want to see.
The mattress dipped as Marcus climbed onto the bed.
"Lie down."
Ender lay down.
The ceiling was water-stained. He'd never noticed that before, or maybe he had and forgotten. The stain was shaped like a hand, fingers splayed, reaching down from the corner. He focused on it, on the way the light caught the edges of the plaster, on the tiny cracks that ran through it like veins.
Marcus's weight settled over him. His hands moved down Ender's chest, his stomach, his hips. They were methodical, clinical, like he was checking for injuries instead of causing them.
"You've lost weight," Marcus said.
Ender didn't answer.
"Pete not feeding you?"
The question was almost funny. Pete didn't feed him. Pete took everything he had and left him the scraps. But Ender didn't laugh. He didn't do anything.
Marcus's hand pressed against his ribs, against the bruise that had bloomed there two nights ago, and Ender's breath caught in his throat. The pain was sharp, electric, a white-hot flash behind his eyes.
"Does that hurt?"
Ender nodded.
"Good."
Marcus pressed harder.
The room dissolved. Ender's mind floated up, up, past the ceiling, past the apartment building, past the city. He was somewhere else—a beach maybe, somewhere warm, the sun on his face and sand between his toes. He'd never been to a beach. He'd seen pictures, though. He'd imagined it. The sound of waves. The smell of salt. The feeling of being small in the face of something vast and indifferent.
Someone was crying.
It took him a long time to realize it was him.
---
When it was over, Marcus got up. He dressed in silence—shirt, pants, belt. The click of the buckle was loud in the quiet of the room. He didn't look at Ender. He never looked at Ender afterward.
"Tell Pete I'll be back next week."
The door opened. The door closed.
Ender lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling. His body felt like it belonged to someone else—a stranger's body, a stranger's pain. He could feel the bruises forming, the new ones layering over the old, a map of everything that had been done to him.
He didn't move.
The clock on the nightstand ticked. The bulb overhead buzzed. Somewhere in the apartment, Pete was laughing at something on television.
Time passed.
Ender didn't know how much.
Eventually, the door opened again. Pete stood in the doorway, his arms crossed, his eyes scanning the room like he was assessing the damage.
"You alive?"
Ender blinked. Slow, deliberate.
"Good." Pete stepped inside, kicked a shirt out of his way—Ender's shirt, the one he'd worn to work—and sat on the edge of the bed. His weight made the mattress dip, rolling Ender toward him. "Marcus said you did good."
Ender didn't feel good. He didn't feel anything.
"He's gonna come back next week. Maybe the week after." Pete reached out, brushed a strand of hair from Ender's face. The gesture was almost tender. Almost. "You're gonna be nice to him, right?"
Ender's lips parted. His throat was dry. "Yeah."
"Yeah what?"
"Yeah, I'll be nice."
Pete smiled. That smile—the one that made Ender's stomach turn, the one that had been there from the beginning, the one that said I own you.
"Good boy."
He stood up, stretched, and walked to the door. At the threshold, he paused.
"Oh, and Ender?"
Ender waited.
"You still owe me one hundred and thirteen dollars."
The door closed.
Ender lay there, alone in the dark, and listened to the television's muted laughter through the wall. His body was a ruin. His mind was a fog. He had work in the morning—another shift, another eight hours on his feet, another day of pretending he was a person instead of a ghost.
He should get up. He should shower. He should find some food, something to fill the hollow ache in his stomach.
He didn't move.
He just lay there, staring at the ceiling, at the water stain shaped like a hand, at the cracks that ran through the plaster like veins. And somewhere, deep in the quiet, he heard his own voice—the voice of the child he used to be, the boy with purple-white hair and glasses too thick for his face, the boy who believed his mother when she said everything would be okay.
That boy was gone.
Ender closed his eyes.
Sleep didn't come.