by Nikki Wild
“Rev, get back in the car,” I said, slamming the trunk.
“It’s nice out,” he replied as though I hadn’t spoken at all, and eased himself onto the Bel Aire’s hood, waiting for me. I glanced at the fresh holes burned into the car’s blue exterior on my way over to him. I was surprised at how much I didn’t fucking care.
For a stubborn, stupid, macho man, Rev was right. It was nice out. A lovely night to sew up someone’s bicep. In the unforgiving lamplight, the circles under his eyes and the pallor of his skin looked even worse, and I bit my lip while scrubbing my hands with sanitizer.
“You don’t look good,” I mumbled. “Maybe I should drive…”
“I’ll be fine,” he said, watching me pull out the sewing kit and a thick curved needle. “I’ve driven through worse.”
I believed him. He didn’t hiss or shake when I doused the wound in alcohol and rubbed the surrounding skin clear of blood. I paused with the needle against his skin. He was staring at the needle’s point. I was staring at him.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“For what?”
I didn’t know. I hadn’t planned to apologize. For getting him into this mess? For what had happened the night before? For the fact that I needed to stitch him up? For the pain he was feeling, and about to feel?
He looked at me for a long, full moment. The air between us felt humid and heavy. I held his bicep in my free hand, my fingers still and certain around the thin metal needle. He was warm despite the blood loss. He smelled like gunpowder and sweat and the bite of aftershave. The lamplight glanced off the Bel Aire’s hood, defining the hard edges of his face.
My heart pounded dully behind my ribs. I was touching him again, and it was like touching something forbidden, something forgotten for a long time and then found. It was like touching myself for the first time. Being fifteen and finding those places on my body that wouldn’t be ignored.
“Just…sorry,” I said.
He licked his lips, and my own fell apart, my tongue mimicking his. Weak as he was from blood loss and pain, he didn’t hesitate. He leaned in and covered me with his mouth, his uninjured arm winding around my waist and tugging me in towards him. I let him kiss me, let his tongue probe into my mouth. But when I squeezed his bicep, I felt a fresh trickle of blood and pulled myself away.
“You gonna sew me up, Misty-Lee?” he asked, white teeth now glinting between his smirking lips. My own mouth went dry. “Or am I gonna bend you over this hood? ‘Cause one of those two things has to happen. I’m enough of a gentleman to let you choose.”
Okay. O-kay. That had me swerving right back into reality. Asshole. The needle was still poised against his wound, and now I dug it into his skin, making the first stitch. His muscle twitched but he didn’t make a sound. Just watched me. His eyes on the side of my face. On my neck. Watching me wind the thread through his skin, pulling his flesh against itself, closing him up. Making his body whole again. I barely noticed that he still had his fingers on my waist until I was half-way done with the job, and then I shook them free with a twist.
“You’re good at this,” he said, soft surprise in his voice.
“It’s not too different then sewing up a cat or a dog,” I said, then glanced at him. “In fact, in your case, I’d say it’s exactly like sewing up a dog.”
He grinned and held his free hand over his heart.
“You gonna sew up my feelings when you’re through with my arm? Because those cuts are just as deep…”
“Ha, ha,” I intoned, and yanked the thread a little harder than I had to. Two more stitches and he was all closed up. It wasn’t the best job I’d ever done, but it would hold. It would scar, but he had worse scars to show for his twenty-eight years of running roughshod over the earth. I cut the thread and tied it off, liberally dousing the wound in alcohol again, and wrapped it all up under gauze. He was looking a little better already. He flexed his arm a few times, making a fist and watching his muscles respond.
“Nice,” he said. “Good as new.”
“Something like that,” I said. I looked away, putting the first aid kit back together. “Rev, don’t kiss me again. Last night was a mistake. I don’t want…I don’t want that for us. For me. Whatever. Just don’t do it.”
There, I said it. Came right out with it. His jaw set tight as I blinked up at him and waited for his reaction.
“Alright,” he said.
That was all.
“Alright?” I echoed.
“Alright,” he shrugged. “No more kissing.”
He licked his lips, shoved off until he was on his feet again, towering over me. Throwing all that hard, rushing heat of his body against my skin. Reminding me of what it felt like when he touched me.
“No kissing,” he said. “I guess that means no licking, either. Or sucking. Or nibbling. Or biting. Or holding, squeezing…”
Each word hammered against my ears, made my blood rush a little further. Each word was like a thrust against my meager barricade of willpower.
“…no thrusting. No pumping. No pushing, or pulling, or stretching. Right, Misty?”
I didn’t respond, my mouth too dry to speak, my eyes trapped in his, so dark they rivaled the sky beyond his head.
“No fucking,” he finally said, leaning in close enough that I could almost taste the salt of his skin on my lips. “That what you want, Misty?”
He took a step forward, I took a step back. My ass hit the door, cold metal on the backs of my knees. Instinctively, I spread my hands out at my sides. He pushed himself forward, found my hands and lifted them over my head, grinding his hips against mine. Everything was exploding inside me, protesting and pleading, my flesh on fire and my heart shuddering in its cage.
“Alright, Misty,” he whispered into my ear. “I can keep my lips off you. Just as long as you promise to do the same. Don’t you come looking for me in the middle of the night, Misty-Lee. Not unless you want me to break you in half. ‘Cause I can, girl. And I want to. And if you let me, I will.”
And then, just like that, he was gone. Stepping back. Releasing me. Not even looking at me. Acting like he didn’t know about the throb he’d planted between my legs. Acting like he couldn’t see the way my chest heaved. Acting like he hadn’t just taken me halfway to climax against my father’s car, using nothing but his words and his hips.
“We should get some food,” he said, pointing towards the gas station. “And then get our asses back on the road. I don’t feel good standing still right now.”
He stepped to the door and opened it; I was still pressed tightly to the metal, and had to shimmy forward to let him into the driver’s seat. I walked away with numb legs, settling into the seat beside him.
“How you doing, Purrloin?” he asked idly as the cat hopped up into my lap and he eased the car across the parking lot. “You like honeybuns? Get me some honeybuns. And, you know, snacks or whatever. We got enough gas…yeah, plenty of gas. Just load up on junk food…”
I did as he said, filling my arms with junk food (and a little something for Purrloin, too) and paying in cash. And then we were back on the road. His stitches held with no blood leaking through. We didn’t talk about what I’d said, what he’d said. We didn’t talk about anything. Just listened to the radio playing Townes Van Zandt and watched the mountains get closer and closer.
When he finally pulled off the highway, I was halfway sleeping. My head pressed against the window. I wondered how he was doing, but if anything, Rev seemed amped up. Another winding country road and we made a notable turn. We traded asphalt for dirt, pocked with bumps and dips and gulleys. Rev drove it like he knew it by heart. Even in the dark, I guess he did.
We passed barely any signs of human life for a good ten minutes. And then the headlights caught on a big, hulking mess of a house. Grinding closer over the dry dust, I could make out the two-story monster tucked behind the trees.
“Shit,” Rev hissed, and the car stopped suddenly. My blood chilled. We looked at the same t
hing. The bike. Not covered in dust or ivy or dirt or weeds. The bike was fresh and shiny. There was a light on in the house.
Someone was here. Someone was here.
Panic landed like a flock of birds in my chest. How? How did they know? How did they find it? How could they have known, even before I did? We had to go – we couldn’t stay here – they must have heard us pull up…
I grabbed Rev’s hand and waiting for the sound of gunshots, wondering why he wasn’t turning the damn car around and racing back down the road. He looked at me.
“It’s not what you think,” he said. He didn’t shake my hand off, but he was clearly agitated.
“What? What the hell, Rev? Who’s in there? We gotta go, we have to go…”
“No,” he said, and turned the engine off. I could have screamed. I could have ripped his eyes right out of his head. What the fuck was he doing?
“Rev! Shit on a fucking stick! Let’s…”
“It’s not what you think,” he said again, and his voice was heavy with disgust. “It’s got nothing to do with you.”
“Then what the fuck is it,” I hissed, one hand on the doorknob, ready to run away if Rev wasn’t going to drive away.
“It’s my brother,” he said.
.
Chapter 19
Rev
I was looking at a smaller, thinner, younger, way more fucked-up version of myself. Trick stood in the wide circle of the headlights, his hands in his pockets, a dour smile on his thin lips.
“You have a brother?” Misty asked. She sounded as tired as she looked. I thought maybe this last surprise might do her in for the night. Harmless as Trick was, he was also a pain in the ass, and I was sure that him being at the safe house wasn’t a good sign. But Misty didn’t know that. I wanted to keep her from knowing that for as long as I could.
“Something like that,” I admitted. I put a hand on the door handle and fixed her in my eyes. “Stay here, will ya?”
“Whatever,” she groaned, and visibly collapsed back into the seat. She stroked Purrloin with one hand, the other coming up to cover her eyes. “God, Rev, this night needs to be over…”
“I know,” I grunted. “Just let me talk to him and we can get you inside and into bed.”
She took the chance to look at me through the veil of her fingers and I almost felt like smiling. Because I knew where her mind had gone. It would be a long time before she could think of the word bed without picturing me lying beside her in one. I had made sure of that.
I can be a right awful motherfucker sometimes, and I’m the first one to admit it.
But I could never reach the levels of awful my brother wallowed in, that was for damn sure.
The car door slamming seemed to scare Trick, even though he could see that it was just me with a chick. Nothing for him to worry about – not really, anyway. I might not harbor an overwhelming amount of brotherly love, but I’d never hurt the little shit.
Not unless he really deserved it.
“William,” he croaked. The closer I got to him, the surer I was that he’d come out to the safe house to detox. I could tell from his junkie’s pallor, his cracked lips, the crazed paranoia in his eyes. He was shaking, too. The fact that he was up and standing straight meant he was probably over the worst of it.
“Sam,” I said, close enough to smell the sour sting of his sweat. “What the fuck’re you doing here?”
“It’s my place too,” he snapped. “Dad left it to both of us.”
“Yeah, alright, but what are you doing here?”
“What are you doing here? Who’s the chick? Wait…when… did you break out?”
Finally, he remembered the reason I hadn’t seen him in four years. Took him long enough. This was turning into a regular welcome home party.
“They let me out,” I grunted. “And she’s with me. How long you been on the horse again, Trick? You look like shit.”
He scowled. He’d been going by Trick as long as I’d been going by Rev. Growing up, he proved to have fast hands. His first foray into the streets involved a deck of cards. Always had a trick up his sleeve. You get the picture.
“Ah, fuck, man,” he said. “You come all the way out here to judge my ass? I’m tryin’, I’m tryin’. Never fuckin’ good enough for you…”
“Jesus, Sam,” I groaned. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself. I was just saying, you look like you’re on the wrong side of needing a fix. You come up here to detox?”
“Maybe,” he said, sweat now spilling down his face, the effort of standing and talking to me taking its toll. He kept glancing all over; at me, at the car, at Misty, at the road. Like he was waiting for someone. Was it just his fucked-up junkie brain, or was he actually looking for something?
“It’s fine if you are,” I said. “We’ll have a grand old time. But if you’re meeting someone…”
“Why? Why? Did you see someone? Did someone follow you? Who’d you see? Who’d you see? Were they on the road? Did you pass someone? Are you with them? Fuck!”
He went from suspicious to frantic in less than a second. His eyes rolled crazy in his head. He looked like he was about to have a seizure, and the only thing I could think to do was grab him, hold him in front of me, and shake until he stopped asking stupid questions.
“Tell me now, Trick,” I said, forcing his eyes to meet mine. “Did you come here to get straight, or did you come here to hide?”
“He sent you, didn’t he? He sent your ass up here. I ain’t got shit for him! I ain’t got shit! How’m I supposed to pay him with nothing to sell! I need…”
Fuck.
“Who, Trick? Who do you owe money to?” I took a step forward, ignoring the wild rolling of my brother’s eyes. This was no good. We had enough of our own shit, without needing any of his shit.
“Like you don’t fucking know,” he snarled. He backed away a step. I knew how this would end, but I kept going. Kept walking towards him. Backing him up into a corner. What happens when you back an animal into a corner? Give you three guesses.
“I don’t know,” I said. “No one fucking sent me. But you’re hiding up here. How much do you owe, and who do you owe it to? I don’t have the time or the patience for this shit, Trick…”
He stopped, lips all but foaming. Blind anger sparked in his eyes. A second later, we were both on the ground. My freshly-sewn arm howled its protest as my brother rolled me over, but I ignored it and wrapped my leg around his, pushing until I was on top. He was thin and weak and I should have felt bad fighting him. ‘Should’ being the operative word. I grabbed his shirt and lifted, then slammed his back into the ground. We were both hollering fit to raise the dead, and Trick got his hands around my neck. Why’d it always end like this? Seeing my brother never once ended in a handshake and a beer. We always wound up getting dirt on our clothes and blood on our cheeks.
I was too distracted trying to keep my position on top of Trick to hear the door slam, but we both stalled mid-struggle when Misty rose her voice. Didn’t hear what she said, but we stopped all the same. Trick gazed up at her and blinked.
“Who the fuck’re you?” he asked. I gave him one last slam before releasing his shirt and untangling myself from his legs.
“Dammit, Rev,” Misty said, ignoring my brother’s question. “How many friends do you have in this world?”
“Ain’t my fault they keep popping up,” I scowled. “And he started it.”
“I’m not your den mother,” Misty sighed. “I’m not here to break up all your schoolyard tussles.”
Finally, she looked down at Trick, who had gotten himself up on his elbows and was shuddering below us, feeling the pain of withdrawals harder now that he’d used up all his adrenaline.
“You don’t look very good,” Misty observed. “Rev, get him up. You think there’s any coffee or tea in the house? That door’s open, right? Come on, then. Let’s get the hell inside. I’ve got to get the cat and the food…”
She left us to our own devices, and of cours
e we fucking did what she said. Why’re women so good at that? Making a man see the right way to do something, when all he can see is the wrong way? Trick’s hand was thin, his pulse fast, as I pulled him up to his feet. And he cast a glowering look over his shoulder as I pushed him up the stairs. But he didn’t do more than grumble on our way into the kitchen.
The house smelled familiar, looked just the way it did last time I was there. Going on eight years. All Dad’s shit. All the shit his thousand girlfriends left behind, all the ways they tried to make his life a little nicer. The art - yard-sale stuff, mostly, kittens in baskets and flowers on bikes and shit. Vases and knickknacks, covered in dust. Trick had been sleeping on the sofa in the front room. It looked heavy with his sweat. Detritus surrounded it in an surprisingly perfect half-circle.
There’d be time enough for looking at everything later. We needed time, and there wasn’t anything to do at the house except look at the stuff in it. The kitchen was mostly bare, a few cupboards open to show where Trick had gone foraging for food. The sink was leaking, but when I turned the handle the drip stopped. Trick collapsed at the table, groaning his head into his hands.
“We gotta talk,” I said.
“Yeah, I guess we do,” he said, not looking up. Misty appeared in the doorway, holding the bags of food. Purrloin wasn’t with her, probably occupying some dark corner of the house, waiting until hunger or curiosity or sheer pride inspired her to come out.
“Tea?” Misty said, and now Trick did look up. We both looked at her. What the hell did she think, that tea was going to solve all our issues? Unless it was seasoned with a few shots of whiskey, I wasn’t interested in any fucking tea. But Trick pointed to a closed cabinet, and she went about preparing it.