Malaise

by Max Henry

  I feel Carver’s chest twitch beside my shoulder, his arm tight around me as though the slightest lapse in concentration could mean I’m whisked away by the devil himself. “Where’s Deb?”

  “Out with the other fucking tarts.” He lifts one side of his top lip in a sneer at the thought. “Probably be home later, half off her tits and stinking like some other cunt.”

  Is this man for real? Whoever the fuck Deb is, the way he talks about her has me reconsidering my safety around the jerk. I edge into Carver’s hold as he bristles with pent-up energy. I almost want him to lose control and take the bastard down. Who the hell talks about a woman—relative or not—like that?

  “Well, if you won’t introduce us,” his father barks, “I might as well.” He moves his stone-cold stare from Carver and swings it my way, the lines around his eyes softening as he does. “Jon Carver.” A thick hand is thrust my way. “Nice to meet you, love.”

  I accept—what other choice do I have—and shake his warm hand. A calloused thumb rubs my wrist before Jon lets go and steps across to where Tanya returns the juice to the fridge. “Grab us another while you’re in there, love.”

  “Here.” She passes him a dark bottle of beer with a smile. It’s forced, it’s obligatory, but it’s a smile nonetheless.

  Jon either doesn’t mind or doesn’t care. I suspect both explanations fit the cocky bastard. He heads back through to the lounge, swagger in his stride, toes pointed out, and shoulders set firm.

  I release the breath I didn’t realise I’d held as Tanya slides the glass of juice across the counter for me. “Sorry about him, sweets,” she whispers. “You’ll get used to it.”

  “Whoa,” is all I can muster as I stand there wide-eyed and in shock.

  Guess Carver wasn’t so wrong when he said my family aren’t that bad, all things considered. At least my dad doesn’t alienate half of society through his choice of tattoos alone.

  Carver’s arm snakes around my shoulders, pulling my back flush against his front. I sag into his hold as he places a gentle kiss to my temple and murmurs, “Welcome home.”

  TWENTY-THREE

  The upholstered sofa is worn through to the bare fabric in places, the stitched pattern rubbed raw. I stay cemented in place, alone on one of the two armchairs at the insistence of Jon, and turn the empty glass slowly in my hands.

  Two hours we’ve been here in his presence. Two hours I’ve sat still as a statue and watched the disintegration of what had to have once been a happy family, judging by the pictures on the wall.

  A young Carver smiles down from the embrace of his much less tattooed, but by no means smaller, father in the largest of the selection. Given the age of the three kids in the picture—Carver, Tanya, and a baby boy—the photo has to be at least ten years old, if not more. Sponge effect blue over white covers the backdrop in the image, reminiscent of so many cheap photo packages on offer around that time. Every home has one of these portraits displayed proudly, but I’m pretty damn sure that most families still match the effigies that hang over their head.

  Who’s the baby?

  “Anyone thirsty?” Deb calls out as she gathers her empty wine glass and heads for the kitchen.

  She arrived home a quarter hour after first introductions in the kitchen. A whirlwind of leather and leopard print, the woman left a cloud of cheap perfume in her wake as she swept the length of the hallway, only to promptly backtrack and check out the “new girl,” as she’s so kindly dubbed me. Before I could come up with an excuse on why Carver and I needed to head back to the motel right there and then, she’d ushered us through to the living room and set about instigating “family time.”

  As it so turns out, Deb is in fact Jon’s on-again off-again girlfriend. Although what the real reason is for the arrangement, I haven’t figured out yet. It sure as shit isn’t out of love or a need to be with each other.

  “How’s the job hunting going, Dad?” Carver sits to my right, his arms spread wide over the back of the sofa he shares with Tanya.

  Jon dismisses the question with a raised palm.

  The tinny gunshots echoing out of the TV fill the awkward void left by the lack of conversation. Tanya catches my eye and smiles. I can’t even force one in return. Get me the fuck out of here. I give what I hope is my best pleading eye, hoping she’ll elbow Carver for me.

  The TV cuts off abruptly; the lack of noise leaves a distinct ringing in my ears.

  “Tell me,” Jon booms, swivelling in his armchair to face us all. “How did you two meet, then?”

  “What does it matter, Dad?” Carver grits out through a clenched jaw.

  “Oh, it doesn’t matter shit, really.” He leans forward, heavy-set arm braced on his equally thick knee. “I was just wondering what a lovely girl like her is doing around a fucking idiot like you?”

  “Dad,” Tanya softly pleads.

  “No, love. You stay out of this. It’s between me and the boy.”

  “If you’ve got nothing better to talk about—” Carver starts.

  Deb’s nasally voice slices straight through his. “You boys aren’t at it again are you?” She sets herself down on the empty sofa and gulps at least half her glass of wine, leaving me to wonder how much of the bottle she polished off before she decided to re-join us.

  Jon’s eyes rove the length of me as I still the glass in my hands and squeeze it hard to keep from crying out. He looks between a visibly irate Carver and me, clear confusion pulling his features inward.

  “Tell me, Meg. How old are you again?”

  Shit. What’s he getting at? I know Carver’s a lot older than me, but is there a limit for his father? Do I need to lie about my age? Every pair of eyes in the room is on me, with vastly varying expressions to match. Tanya looks worried, Carver like he could murder his father, and Deb… as though she’s daring me to tell the truth?

  “I’m seventeen.”

  “Pardon, love? Didn’t quite catch that.” The thug cups a hand to his ear.

  I look across to Carver as he shifts to the front of his seat, preparing to stand. Tanya places a gentle hand on his leg to still him, and he swallows thickly before giving the slightest nod to tell me to continue.

  “Seventeen,” I say louder and clearer.

  Deb bursts into a fit of giggles.

  Heat flames my face.

  And his disgusting father licks his chapped lips. “That so?”

  Kill me now. Why the hell has Carver done this to me tonight? What the hell was he trying to achieve by bringing me here while everyone’s two parts pissed? The answer strikes me as hard as his father’s next words do.

  “At least this one’s legal, boy.”

  He was testing me. He said I needed to know what I was getting into, and I guess trial by fire is the warning of choice for him.

  “This one?” Tanya voices the words that echo through my head.

  What the fuck does he mean, “this one”? How many have there been?

  Deb laughs harder. The damn woman literally has to set her wine down before she spills it all over her figure-hugging dress.

  “Meg.” I blink through the unwanted tears pooling in my eyes and look up at Tanya. When the hell did she get out of her seat? I shake my head clear and take her offered hand, allowing her to lead me from the room.

  There’s no need to look behind me to know that Carver follows; I can practically feel the anger that radiates off him searing my back.

  “Put the glass down, Meg. We’re getting the fuck out of here.” Tanya gestures to the cup I have a white-knuckled grip on.

  I set it in the sink, catching Carver’s eye as I do. He stands off to the side, arms folded over his chest and a deep frown marring the face I’ve only seen the best of until now. Furious Carver is a damn intimidating Carver—just like his old man. I wonder if he knows just how much like the guy he is?

  “Keys, arsehole.” Tanya holds her hand out and snatches the bunch away as he crosses her palm with them. “Come on, honey. Let’s get you somewh
ere where you can take a full breath, yeah?”

  Deb still laughs as we step out the front door, his father yelling insults at her in an attempt to silence the woman. The chill of the night bites me hard as we trudge down the path and then the driveway in single file. Tanya leads, and Carver follows: a silent and sullen procession.

  “What the fuck were you thinking, bro?” Tanya unleashes her fury on Carver as he unlatches the gate.

  “You don’t need to know.”

  “I think I do.”

  “Bullshit! How about I tell you what I’m thinking now?”

  “Yeah? What’s that?”

  “That’s it’s none of your fucking business!”

  I back away, placing not only distance between them and me, but removing the thought that I could be siding with either of them if I were to accidently stand closer to one than the other.

  “It’s my business when you bring a girl into our house knowing what the old man’s like.”

  “She needs to see that,” Carver hollers back, jerking the gate open.

  “Why? What the fuck were you trying to prove?” Tanya asks, storming toward the driver door of the Falcon. “What a right prick you can be?”

  I rush through the gateway and for the car after Carver glares in my direction. He shuts the gate behind us, the metal clanging violently as he shoves the rod back in the ground harder than necessary.

  “What the fuck did he mean by ‘this one’ being legal?” Tanya hollers out the car window at him.

  “Nothing,” he bellows back, securing the gate.

  “Why would he say it, if it’s nothing?”

  “Because it would do this,” he shouts, jerking his hand toward the car. “He planted the seed of a lie, knowing it would fester no matter what I say now.”

  My door is jerked open, and yet, he doesn’t look at me as he indicates I should get in.

  “You don’t get it,” Carver mutters.

  “Why?” Tanya turns the key, still yelling from inside the car. “Why the fuck wouldn’t I understand? Do I not live in the same house?”

  Carver and I take our seats in unison, his door slamming shut while I carefully latch mine after me.

  “Because you don’t have half as much pressure on you, being a girl,” Carver snaps.

  Tanya turns the car over and sits for the longest fucking minute of my life, her hands tight on the steering wheel, her gaze fixed firmly out the window. “I might not have to worry about being ‘enough’ for Dad, because there’s no expectations on me to succeed since I’m a woman, but fuck, Brett. I worry just as much as you do that one day I’ll wake up and realise I’m just like them.” She jabs her hand toward the house before slotting the car in gear. “You think I want to be some alcoholic wench who gets her jollies off down at the pub because her boyfriend is too disgusted with her to be able to get it up?”

  “Too much information, Tanya.”

  I slide down into my seat, my nose barely above the door panel. Trees and streetlights flash by as Tanya lead foots it towards town. The silence that accompanies the journey is welcome.

  A flash of red around the headliner of the car is quickly followed by blue, the short, sharp, blip of a siren cementing my suspicions. Tanya glances in the rear-view mirror and curses as Carver spins in his seat to look out the back window.

  “What the fuck?”

  My heart rate spikes as I straighten in my seat, the deafening whoosh of my breaths as I struggle to pull them in and out all I can hear. This night has turned to shit in the blink of an eye. Carver’s mad at me, his dad is such a jerk that I doubt I’ll ever know if he was why Den was in town that day—not that I really care anymore, and now this.

  Tanya pulls the Falcon over to the side of the road and cranks the driver’s window the rest of the way down while I watch the lazy swing of the cop’s flashlight as they check the car over.

  “This better be fucking routine,” Carver mutters, hand to his forehead as he rests an elbow on the windowsill.

  “Evening,” the cop greets as he reaches Tanya’s window. “I’ll need all the occupants to please step out of the vehicle with their hands held out in front of them.”

  I spin in my seat to see another cop approach from the passenger side, and then back to Carver. “No.”

  He twists to look me in the eye. “It’s okay, Meg. Just do as they ask, all right?”

  No, it’s not all right! What the hell? Why now? They can’t be.

  I open my door at the same time as the others, and following Carver’s lead, sticking my raised hands out first and then step out. I’m spun around, shoved against the back of the car, and warned not to move as my hands are brought behind my back. Are those zip ties? The thin plastic bites into my healing skin, and I cry out.

  “Hey, don’t you fucking hurt her,” I hear Carver bellow before the distinct sound of a body hitting the ground.

  I twist my head around to see what’s happening as Tanya shouts across the car, and spot Carver sitting on the back of the cop who restrained me. The officer holding Tanya gives her the same warning as I got, and then dashes around the car to wrestle Carver off the guy who cuffed me.

  Carver relaxes when the second cop reaches him, calling out that he’ll cooperate as he’s jostled over the hood of the car. The first cop, wiping blood from his nose, pats Carver down and removes his wallet. He flicks it open, and exchanges a look with his partner.

  The real handcuffs come out.

  I look over at Tanya, but she’s fixated on what they’re doing to her brother, a look of sheer disappointment in her eyes.

  “Brett Carver,” the second cop says. “You’re under arrest for breaking and entering, theft, and assault on a police officer. You have the right to remain silent….”

  White noise. My ears begin to ring, the whining tone growing louder the more I screw my eyes shut. No. It can’t be happening. Don’t they know it wasn’t him? It couldn’t have been. Could it? How did he pay for the motel, Meg? No, he wouldn’t have….

  How could I doubt him? After everything he’s done for me?

  Time passes at an excruciatingly slow pace as Carver’s straightened up and marched to the back of the cop car. He looks over the door at me, fighting against the cop who tries to push him down. I shake my head, refusing to believe that this is it: he’s being taken from me too. His gaze drops for a fraction of a second before I catch him swallow and raise his chin defiantly. The cop gives him another shove, and Carver braces a shoulder against the roof of the cop car to buy a few extra seconds.

  I watch in equal parts horror and adoration as he mouths three little words to me before he’s violently bent into the back seat: Love you, Meg.

  I can’t. Fucking. Breathe.

  No. It’s not fair.

  My name comes through as though it’s spoken underwater, my ears taking their sweet time to attune to what’s around me once again.

  “Meg,” Tanya repeats.

  I look over the Falcon at her as the door on the cop car is slammed shut.

  “Meg, honey. It’ll be all right. We’ll sort this out.”

  I simply shake my head again, refusing to believe that a guy with a prior record has any hope in hell of getting off a charge that now includes assault on a police officer. What was he thinking?

  “Don’t let them get to you,” Tanya says, glaring over at the cops who walk back toward us. “They’ll do their job, and we’ll do ours.”

  I don’t even know what that is.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Tanya and I are released from our restraints, free to go, after the cops are satisfied they got what they’re after—Carver. We follow the patrol car down to the station in the Falcon and wait for three and a half hours to find out what’s going on behind closed doors. Carver’s charged with burglary, and assault on an officer, which means he’ll be remanded in custody until his preliminary hearing. The female officer who informs us stands with her hands clasped before her hips as she breaks it down at Tanya’s request.r />
  “Brett will be put before a judge tomorrow, and he or she will be the one to decide if bail is to be granted awaiting trial.”

  “As if that’ll happen,” Tanya mutters under her breath.

  I look up to the lady with the immaculate blonde bun and ask, “What’s the likelihood?” She grimaces, appearing to think it over. I quickly add, “In your opinion?”

  “I really can’t say. It’ll be up to the judge who presides over his hearing.”

  Tanya takes my hand in hers. “Given his priors, Meg, it won’t be likely.”

  The officer takes her leave and disappears back through the coded door to the heart of the station.

  I stand at Tanya’s request and stare at the sterile cream doors, aching so bad at the fact Carver is just there and yet I can’t see him. All I want to do is be there, sit beside him and let him know he’s not alone in this. Let him know I won’t walk away at the first hurdle.

  “So what now?”

  Tanya wraps an arm over my shoulders and gives me a gentle squeeze. “We head back to the pits of hell to let the old man know what’s happened.”

  “Really?” I squeak out. “What the hell for? What will he do?”

  She shrugs. “He’ll find out sooner or later, so we may as well get on the good side by telling him first.”

  True. My head hurts from all the outcomes I’ve run through while we’ve been waiting. How are we going to prove his innocence? There’s only one way I can think of.

  “Your dad has to come tell them Brett was with him that day.”

  “What?” Tanya drops her arm from my shoulders and turns to face me. “When?”

  “The day this was supposed to happen, Thursday.”

  “Is that what he said?” She ducks her head, staring out at me from under her brow.

  An unease I’m not all that happy with swirls like an ominous eddy in my gut. “He said he went to talk to your dad while I was at work that first night at the motel.”

  “Meg, he never came home after he snuck you out. I met him while you were doing your shift on Wednesday, but prior to that he wasn’t returning my calls.”

  “No.” I shake my head, feeling every part the fool. “Why would he lie to me?” Again?