The rounds, and the Virus in the street air

texture · 24 Dec YDPAH, midday

• When: midday 24 Dec YDPAH — the copping rounds between the two robberies
• What: The day's logistics map the crew's whole economy: they cop a half-bundle from the dealer Roy Tony, "always there on his bench" in the Brighton Projects playground in late AM; keep and use their "personnel works" stashed at the Copley library men's room; boost NyQuil and roll a foreign student for a worthless bookbag. Crossing Kely Vinoy, Eckwus, and Purpleboy, the ambient epidemiological terror of the milieu surfaces: word is out that Stokely Darkstar "got freetested again at the Fenway" and has "the Virus for sure," and — worse — Darkstar has said that if he is going down he will not care about transmitting it through shared works, so the street Word is to never use his works no matter how sick you are. yrstruly notes the addict's rationalization ("any thing would count in your mind when your' sick") and the crew's own discipline of keeping works "for only ourselves." His own serostatus is not disclosed; the Virus figures only as ambient danger.