Fearless

by Allana Kephart

  “Hard pass,” I say.

  “You have to!” he whines. The tough-guy act is gone and replaced by the rebellious teenager he really is. “I can’t go alone.”

  “Perfect! Sounds like my plan is working.”

  “Nigga, you don’t understand,” he gripes. He puts his hands on his hips and purses his lips, trying his damnedest to look intimidating but shit, he reminds me of any female I’ve ever pissed off in my life. “This is serious.”

  “So am I,” I say. “And I don’t care what reason you’ve come up with this time—”

  “There’s a girl,” Rhett chimes as he—finally—detaches himself from the mirror. He’s still not satisfied with his hair from the way he’s still fussing, but his curiosity got him back out with us.

  “Shut the fuck up,” Duke hisses.

  “If you didn’t want Linc to know, you shouldn’t’ve told me,” he says. He rests his elbow up on my shoulder and leans on me, his lips curled up in an evil type of smirk. “Duchess here has a girl he’s trying to meet up with.”

  I cross my arms. “Does this girl know you’re a nineteen year-old punk?”

  “Yes,” Duke grumbles at the same time Rhett laughs, “Hell nah.”

  “Duke,” I groan.

  “She’s only twenty-two, man! It’s legal, quit trippin’.”

  “Then why do you need Daddy to go with you?” Rhett taunts.

  “I don’t,” Duke says. “I want you two with me. In case she rides with a bad crowd, or the coppers show up again, or—”

  “I told you to stop calling them that,” I mutter.

  “And I told him to stop using the N word around me,” Rhett bitches. He throws his hands up and walks towards his bedroom. “Sonofabitch’ll never learn!”

  “Fine,” Duke says. “I’ll go by myself.”

  “Kid—”

  “Nah, man, I ain’t begging you to watch my back. I can take care of myself,” he says, loud enough to make it to Rhett’s bedroom. Rhett laughs at him still, but his words feel like a smack to my face.

  “I know you can, just—you’re not old enough to be drinking.”

  “Yes, Ma, I know that,” he says. “She’s not at a bar. She’s at a party. I’m just trying to live my life while I’ve still got one to waste.”

  I wish he wasn’t so pessimistic. He’s a brilliant kid; quick in the head and a genius with the keys. But he’s got a chip in his shoulder from way back before I got into his life, and a jaded view that death-by-cop is the only possible end of his story. I keep trying to convince him otherwise—maybe if he’d stop hanging out with meth heads and crack whores, he could become something. Someone.

  Ditching him in his antics probably ain’t the best way to get him out of there, though.

  “Sit down and gimme twenty minutes,” I grumble. “I’ll go chaperone your little date.”

  Duke’s eyes widen, and he snorts. “Shit, you’re old. People don’t date anymore.”

  I smack his head as I walk by. “Real men do.”

  He chuckles at first, then his eyes narrow. “Wait a minute...” he mumbles.

  “Just say thank you and stop talking,” I say.

  He grunts. “Thanks.” It’s petty and forced, but I’ll accept it.

  I reluctantly pull on a pair of blue jeans and a black band tee shirt, trying my damnedest to ignore the siren song of my lonely bed. I’m too old for this shit—maybe not physically, or by societal standards, but kill somebody and get back to me. Puts a damper on...well...everything. In my soul, I’m eighty.

  “Rhett!” I call. “I’m going with Duke to...”

  Rhett steps into the doorway, having changed out of his sweats and tank for distressed black straight legs jeans, a plain white tee shirt, and a black bomber jacket. Clearly, he does not plan on staying home alone tonight. “Obviously,” he says. “Hurry up.”

  “Weren’t you just bitching me out for not having the balls to say ‘no’?” I taunt.

  “And you proved me right yet again, old man. Let’s go,” he says. “I still think you’re a dumbass, but hell. I ain’t missing a chance to get laid.”

  More toxic waste on those poor sheets. Wonderful.

  “Guess I’ll be watching superhero movies all night,” I gripe. I genuinely don’t give a fuck what or who he does, but it’s my favorite sport—giving him shit for it. “Again.”

  “You brought this on yourself,” he says. “Lincoln Sanders, out to save the world, one lost cause at a time. As always.”

  “The young man shot during a routine traffic stop last month has died as a result of his injuries. The victim, fifteen-year old Phillip Jordan, allegedly threatened Officer Martin McLeon with a weapon when asked to step out of his parent’s vehicle that he had illegally taken out on a joyride. The type of weapon has yet to be disclosed. Officer McLeon is back on the job after only a week long suspension, though it is rumored the event is still pending investigation.”

  Old school Fall Out Boy blares out of my cell phone and jolts my attention away from my father’s stony face on the television. They pictured him next to this kid, Phillip, who Dad said was out of his mind during that stop. He came home shaken with tear brimmed eyes and hugged me as tight as he did the night Mom died.

  He seemed so genuinely afraid and guilty.

  Putting him up next to this chipmunk cheeked kid, all bright eyes and wide smile in his too-big football jersey, I can’t help but further doubt my dad’s story.

  That’s just media for you, though. Take the gruff cop and make him the bad guy. Dad wouldn’t hurt anyone for no reason—he must have seriously feared for his life to have shot a kid. Someone younger than me.

  Right?

  God, how’s he gonna react when he finds out the boy died? The last rumors were he had been stabilized, still comatose but on the mend. He could breathe on his own, the internal swelling had stopped. What happened this week that changed everything? Did he wake up before he passed? Did his parents get to say goodbye, or did they lose their son over what should’ve been harmless fun?

  Stop thinking about this, I scold myself.

  I answer my cell phone. I don’t want to hear any more, so I turn the TV off. “Hey, party girl,” I say.

  Carly, my best friend since forever, giggles. “Hey, hey. You ready? I’m about to pull up and I’m not waiting for you.”

  “I’ve been ready for an hour,” I lie. I’m sitting on the couch in my jeans and bra. But I have my shirt in hand and my shoes are at the door, so I’m more ready than I’ve ever been when she shows up. “I’m sitting here watching the news like a grandma waiting for you.”

  “Mm. Seems fake, but okay,” she says.

  “Are we still going to the alley in Littleton?” I ask. “‘Cause we need to get you cake, Birthday Bitch. I need coordinates to find the best place near there.”

  “Right, about that,” Carly says slowly. “Cheyenne doesn’t really want to go bowling.”

  I am going to be completely honest—I hate Cheyenne with every fiber of my being. She’s some popular girl with a lot of money, a holier than thou attitude, and a stalker complex. Back in middle school, before Carly decided to befriend the thing, she was arrested for peeping on some high school junior, Ross Drumm, at his seventeenth birthday party.

  Obviously nothing happened, since she didn’t go to juvie and Ross and all his other buddies thought it was ‘dope’, but that’s beside the point. She’s a freak. And up until this year, she hated Carly.

  I’m pretty sure she still hates me—I’m cool with that. The feeling is mutual.

  “Well, it’s your birthday, not Cheyenne’s,” I say. “We can all go stalk older guys on her birthday.”

  “See, her brother is getting us into...a party,” Carly says. “Downtown.”

  “A party downtown,” I parrot her.

  “Yeah!” she chirps. “It’ll be really cool, Ri, I know we’ll have so much fun.”

  “Told you she wouldn’t want to go,” I hear Cheyenne in the backgrou
nd, the judgement in her voice making my skin crawl. “Her dad’s a cop anyway.”

  “What does my dad have to do with anything?” I growl.

  It comes with the territory. When your dad is well known in your community, with ties to just about every organization in the county, people talk. I don’t even live in a small town, and that almost makes it even worse when everyone knows who you are.

  Everyone thinks that I’m the biggest goodie-two-shoes you’ve ever met. Daddy’s little girl.

  They’re not wrong, but still. It’s not a reputation I want to be known by.

  Carly shushes Cheyenne with a laugh before coming back on the phone to me. “Just trust me, okay? We’re pulling up out front. I’ll tell you more on the way!”

  “Carly—” I say, but she’s already hung up. I groan my frustration to the empty house as I pull my shirt on. It was too much for bowling, I thought—cyan blue cold-shoulder sweater, high neck with a heart cut out on my chest. But for a party, I feel underdressed pairing it with white Bermuda shorts and my Converse.

  Cheyenne’s infamous older brother, Mason, lays on the horn out front and I have no time to change. As much as I want to, this idiot will leave without me and I am not letting Carly go to any frat party without me.

  The girls are dressed to the nines—Carly is in a pastel pink halter top and skinny jeans, her red hair done up in elaborate ribbon curls. Cheyenne’s shorts are so tiny they disappear between her thighs, her crop top just a little too tight to be sexy. She’s trying way too hard with the outfit alone, but the silver glitter eye shadow and maroon lipstick take the cake.

  I sit up front next to Mason, who wreaks of smoke and skunk. His eyes are glazed over and his smirk lazy when he says, “Damn. You really are the good one.”

  Carly and Cheyenne snicker in the backseat.

  “So where are we going?” I ask, choking on the air in the car. “And why does it smell so...”

  “Awesome?” Cheyenne supplies. She passes up a metal stick, with a tiny glass bowl filled with oil screwed to the top. “Take a puff of that.”

  “Is this weed?” I ask.

  Cheyenne cackles. “No, stupid, it’s a vape.”

  “I don’t think you should be calling her stupid,” Carly laughs. “You’re the one who puked trying to use it.”

  Cheyenne’s ears go red, but she ignores the comment. Against my better judgement, I press the button and pull a long drag from the device. The smoke billows into my mouth, nicotine sticking to the back of my throat while the artificial chocolate flavor coats my tongue. I exhale through my nose and pass it back to Carly.

  “Shit, shortcake,” Mason chuckles. “I take the good girl thing back.”

  “I’ve never done that before,” I admit, sniffling. My nose tingles.

  “Yeah right,” Cheyenne mutters.

  Carly pulls a smaller cloud off the machine, blowing it in Cheyenne’s face. “So the plan,” she says finally. “We’re grabbing Elliot, and headed downtown. He’s gonna be our DD.”

  “Designated driver?” I ask. “Why in the world do we need a DD?”

  Cheyenne sighs. “Can you be cool for one night? No one wants a surprise visit from your dad.”

  “Where are we going?” I ask, my voice holding an edge. “And what are we doing?”

  Carly reaches up behind me to rub my shoulders, her voice soothing. “Ri, relax. Your dad is on an overnight, right? And we have school tomorrow, and he’ll be gone again by the time you get home. Can’t get in trouble if you don’t get caught.”

  “So that automatically means we go to college parties?” I ask. “We’re seventeen!”

  “Uh, some of us are eighteen,” Cheyenne cheers, nudging Carly like they’re old pals. “And we’re almost eighteen, girl, it’s cool.”

  “Eighteen is still three years shy of being allowed in a bar!”

  “Whoa, whoa, easy there,” Mason says. “No need to get hysterical. I can drop you off to get ice cream or something if you’d rather.”

  I can’t tell if he’s intentionally making fun of me, or if his offer had good intentions. But my supposed best friend snorts under her breath while my enemy guffaws at my expense, so I turn my glare on the man next to me and snap, “Fuck you. You’re the older brother, you’re not supposed to be okay with this shit.”

  “Riley, c’mon,” Carly snaps. She’s pissed at me? Seriously? “It’s my birthday, and I want to do this. It’s fun, and stupid, that’s what we’re supposed to be now, right? Having a wild senior year before we start the rest of our lives?”

  “YOLO!” Cheyenne bellows.

  I swat her hands off my shoulders. “Young and stupid, sure, this is fucking reckless. We could go to jail.”

  Phillip probably thought that was the worst that could happen, too. Chances are he wondered about being grounded, not shot down in the middle of the road like some wild animal—

  Stop thinking.

  “Boohoo. I do this all the time and I’ve never been caught,” Cheyenne says. “Then again, I’ve never brought Daddy’s Little Girl with me before...”

  I clench my jaw so hard my teeth squeak together. I want to throw myself out of the moving vehicle, maybe break my face on the way out just to get away from all three of these idiots. But somehow, my pride is bruised, and I feel childish for not wanting to do this.

  I have to prove a point, I guess, and to do that I need to go with them. If what I’ve heard about Elliot is true, it’s gonna be a seedy dump on Colfax to make this a million times better.

  Everything inside of me wants to tell Mason to pull over. All of the horror stories my dad told me about pulling over drunk minors rattle around in my mind. I can see it all playing out in front of me like a sick movie. Ego be damned, this isn’t safe. And safety should come first—my future should come first.

  But I’m mad, and I’m a McLeon, so it doesn’t.

  Besides. Maybe a bit of misbehavior is exactly what I need in my life. It will take my mind off my dad—maybe even erase that poor boy’s smiling face from my memory.

  I reach around behind me and snatch the vape back out of Cheyenne’s hands before she can put her painted lips back on the rim. “Eat me. We’re not getting caught tonight, either.”

  Everyone in this house is too damn young to be drinking.

  No one is guarding the door or anything, and the screaming, stumbling, and excessive lack of clothing make it obvious I’m surrounded by bratty children. We’re all crammed into some huge apartment under a brunch spot and gift shop overhead, and while the place is spacious, you can’t move without bumping into someone. I’m choking on the stench of drugs that smell of burning rubber and dog shit, never mind the actual piss and alcohol that fumes the whole area.

  It’s not my scene. Never has been, probably never will be, but I tolerate it for Rhett and Duke. They’re having a great time, no surprise there. Rhett already has a set of ladies at his side, one of them far more into the other girl than they are into him. He doesn’t give a shit about that, it’s not like he goes back for seconds on anyone. Gay girls aren’t an issue for him, in spite of his favoring of the southern beliefs. No shock there. How I love the south.

  Looks like it will be loud times three tonight, if he doesn’t get his rocks off in the bedroom of whatever poor bastard owns this dump. I don’t know how this guy does it, but he’s a sex magnet.

  Duke pushes a drink in my hand, some neon blue monstrosity that smells like straight orange juice. “Loosen up, brotha, damn.”

  “Someone has to make sure you and sexpot over there don’t get abducted,” I say. “Or killed, the way you two run your mouth.”

  He chuckles and nurses his own drink, a beer that’s far too light to taste better than panther piss. “We’ll be fine. You look like a cop, all hard-ass, hands in the pockets shit. You’re freaking people out.”

  I shrug, but sip at the drink anyway. Tastes like orange juice, too. I make a mental note to take it easy on this one—it doesn’t hurt on the way down, s
o it’s a roulette game on how fucked up I’m about to get. “So where’s this old lady you’re trying to meet up with?”

  He scrunches his nose. “I dunno. She hasn’t shown up yet. Keeps texting me that she's here, though.”

  “Sounds like a troll,” I say.

  He grumbles, stuffing his phone in his back pocket. “Whatever. There are some fine hunnies out tonight.”

  “And yet, here you are,” I taunt. “Bothering me when you could be dancing with literally anyone else.”

  “I figure if I stand next to you I might get a cute one,” he says. “Y’know. Since you’ve got that whole broody danger-zone vibe.”

  “I do not—”

  “Like this phat queen right here...ooooh, boy!” he howls, pressing his fist against his open mouth.

  I follow his gaze to the door, a group of four girls and two guys plowing their way in. The men abandon the girls almost instantly, pushing at each other as they make their way to the kitchen. The girl in the front that caught Duke’s attention is a chubby fairy, thick thighs and big boobs, with glitter painting her eyes and purple lipstick lining her full mouth. She throws her arms out to her sides and spins on the balls of her feet, her honey blonde hair flying around her shoulders. “Let the party begin!” She cries.

  Two screaming extra kids. They’ll get along great.

  It’s the girl in the back, her eyes trained on the ground, that stops me in my tracks. She’s taller than all of them by a good half foot, with dark brown hair falling in a mess down to the center of her back. She’s a perfect hourglass, with a little extra weight on her thighs and stomach, her skin so fair it practically glows under the tacky black light they’ve hung near the doorway.

  Feeling my eyes on her, she looks around the room, her shoulders squaring off defensively like she’s anticipating a blow. Her eyes are green, I notice, full of trepidation but rimmed by a mild curiosity, and a fierce determination. She glances my way, freezing in place when our eyes meet. I smile at her and nod my head, and her cheeks go red as she looks away again.

  “Damn,” I whisper.

  “What’re we looking at?” And then there’s Rhett, loud as hell, following our dazed expressions to the girls. He sighs heavily and claps me hard on the back. “Bro. Nah.”