When the kids had scattered around from the park and I tried a couple of new tricks I had seen during the competition, Mika joined me with a heads up.

"Seriously, ho," I whined, lying on my back and staring at her grinning face above me, "do you always just have to maltreat me whenever I'm at sight?"

"No," she replied, giving me a hand so I could get up. "But it's fun."

"Fun? Hell yeah, Mickey, and I'm all covered in bruises. How do you expect me to pick up that gorgeous Eastern European biker looking like a sucking pro boxer?"

"Um, Leon, sorry to kill you but she's a dyke. Face it."

"No she's not," I argued. "How would you know?"

"Trust me," Mika assured.

I heard her cell phone beep.

"Wassup honey?" she answered. After a while she added, "Yeah listen I'm with Leon now so, I ask him if he wants to join us OK?"

"Join who?" I asked.

"Me and Rave," she replied to me. "Now he has woken up and wants to go to some bar. He asks if we'd like to accompany him."

"He'll only be checking on ladies," I said. "And after all that effort he always ends up rocking home with a blonde hooker. I thought he had a hangover from yesterday?"

"He has," Mika revealed dryly. "That's exactly why he needs a beer and fast. So you coming or not?"

"Sure as hell."

All right, it was a little early for a beer. Rave looked real bad, as usual, and the reason why he had wanted company was discovered the second we got inside the bar.

"Uh, listen Mika honey, would you like to lend me a few bucks? I mean, really, I'll pay you back as soon as I get my economy fixed, but right now, I'm broke."

"And when might that be, the time your economy'll be fixed?" Mika sighed, handing him a banknote.

"Geez dear, I appreciate that, I mean, totally," Rave thanked his 'girlfriend' for the loan.

Well, Mika wasn't Rave's girlfriend in the traditional meaning of the word. They had been friends forever, and it was clear to everyone around them that they were quite fond of each other. And they occasionally had sex, but it was no problem for neither of them that the vast majority of Rave's sex partners were hookers. That would have been an open relationship, if they ever had agreed to dating or seeing each other or going steady or some of the normal terms. I had never heard a reason to that they had sex, but neither had I ever heard a reason they weren't a couple, since they obviously had feelings for each other.

We sat down and ordered our drinks. I don't know why, but usually when I get drinking, I never stop early enough. I lose a lot of money and get too drunk and do stupid things. This time was no exception.

After a good five pints – I'm not sure if I counted right – Mika and I exited the bar. We left Rave to finish his intimate and for sure witty conversation with a blonde woman who had too much makeup. It was getting dark already, and Mika asked me if I was hungry. We stopped by a Spanish hot dog seller, who thanked us a thousand times for 'buying my wieners, they rule the world' with a heavy accent.

After finishing her meal, Mika called the boy we had seen earlier that day, Rex.

"Uh hi Rex you busy?" she asked. "Good. Listen lad I'm at Fifi's now and me and Leon Alec are going to the dam now – remember Leon Alec? The guy you talked to this morning? --Great. So you wanna join us with some freakin' action on the dam?"

It didn't take the boy long to answer.

"Great, just great," Mika said. "So meet you there right? Yes, I know. See ya."

We made our way to the dam, a place full of workers and such little distractions, but also full of the best BMX terrains near our neighborhood. I spotted Rex's high and shocking blue mohawk from far away.

"Hi Alec wassup?" he greeted me.

"I'm fine thanks," I replied before Mika chuckled,

"Well hi Stallion wassup with ya man?"

"Either one of you guys seen Itchi?" Rex wanted to know, ignoring Mika.

"Nah. We were hangin' around with Rave," I told him. Itchi was another biker we knew, maybe just a little more talented than Mika, Rave and me. Usually he was seen at nights biking at the dam.

"So what now?" Mika asked. "You Rex wanna show us some of you latest tricks?"

"Uh, whatever. Don't know many though."

"Oh come on," Mika persuaded.

And Rex showed us. I thought the kid might have had a future around what he was doing. At his age, I still trampled around trying to jump a 180 degrees alley-oop without breaking any bones, and failing more than succeeding. Rex did far more, crashing only a couple of times. I noticed that usually when it seemed to turn out bad, he was falling his nose to the ground for example, he quickly grabbed the nearest edge in order to stall or grind. That was a neat way to avoid a crash and actually make a combo of tricks. A 540 degrees one-footer alley-oop to double peg stall to 180 degrees spin to fakie was one of his favorites. One that I still would have to concentrate on to get it right. And the guy was nine years younger than me.

Of course, I was so impressed by Rex's talent that I had to prove I'm a tougher guy. My 720 degrees cancan to icepick grind to 360 degrees no-footer spin to nose manual – yeah, that was the plan, a four-trick combo – ended before it actually started. I crashed down in the middle of the 720 degrees spin. Usually that didn't happen to me anymore, but the alcohol of course affected my skills aswell. I hit my head to the hard concrete, and my bike hurt a bit when I landed on it. I was sure I would just stand up and try again, but Mika and Rex convinced me that I'd better go home. Before I got there, I found myself from a filthy passageway between two buildings, throwing up my lunch. Somehow I made it to my bed, falling on it and still feeling sick. I fell asleep with my head full of hazy and surrealistic thoughts. The moon lit my barren apartment with its pale light.