by Alia Hess
“Sure, baby. Write me love note. Tell me something dirty again. I like that stuff.” He fumbled with the tablet, handing it to her.
Why try to deny who I am? The women all think I’m a pervy loser. Trying to be anything else isn’t working.
He looked at his orange shoes, a lump forming in his throat.
But this woman didn’t think I was a loser. She’s been kind to me.
Dewbell held out the tablet.
“I don’t want Dusty right now. She hurt me too much. But you don’t hurt me.” He put his hand on Dewbell’s thigh.
She frowned, pushing his arm gently away.
Dewbell wrote again, then held the tablet to his face.
“Nobody want to be with me. Scrawny failure.” Sasha pushed himself up unsteadily, then tripped over his feet and fell, skinning his palms. He sucked in a breath and rolled over, staring at the sky.
Dewbell sat next to him. She regarded him sadly and patted his leg, then gingerly picked several pebbles out of his bloody palms and flicked them away. His gaze traced her concerned face as she rubbed dirt from his fingers.
She’s so nice.
Sasha leaned in for a kiss. Dewbell pulled back in surprise and slapped him.
“Ahh. Going to feel that tomorrow.” He put a hand to his face, his cheek filled with a deadened sting. “You too, huh?”
Dewbell thrust the tablet into his face again. He squinted.
She tossed the tablet into his lap, then stood and walked to the ladder. Sasha lay back on the roof, staring at the orange sky as the world spun.
Was he better than this? His throbbing face was familiar, but the ache in his heart wasn’t. It was worse than with Irina. Dewbell cared about him. And so did Dusty? He couldn’t help her, though. If her old habits were that ingrained, all the gentlemanly behavior in the world wasn’t going to help.
When a shadow loomed, he expected it to be Dewbell again, but it was Dusty, looking down with a frown.
“What are you doing?”
Sasha clenched his jaw. “Trying to pick up pieces of my heart you broke. It’s not working.”
Dusty’s brows knit together. “What did I do?”
“Don’t pretend. I saw John. He have more lipstick on his face than you do.”
Dusty sighed and sat next to him. “That’s because he kissed me. You were right about him. He was jealous. I’ve never brought a guy here before, so I think that set him off. He finally thought it was now or never to win me over, I guess. Sorry. You up here drinking because you thought I was doing a trade with him?”
“Yeah.”
“I told you I’m not doing any more of those. And I don’t want to be with John as his consort either. I’m your consort.”
Sasha sat up, vertigo gripping him.
I want to believe that. I really do.
“So, you didn’t trade with him? You only want to be with me?”
“Yes!” Her eyes were big and searching as she scooted closer and closed her hands over his. “You don’t believe me? I swear, I haven’t messed up. I swear it. I only want to be with you.”
She may as well have punched him in the gut. He hung his head. “I’m so sorry, baby. I screwed things up. Like usual. And missed your party.”
“It’s okay. Just a bunch of kids going crazy down there, anyway. I think I prefer to be up here with you. Thank you for the cake, by the way. It was good. I got a bite of it before the kids attacked it like a pack of trashdogs.”
Sasha laughed, then his smile diminished. He pulled his knees to his chest. “How do you want to be with me? I’m not sexy like John. Got more eyes than him, but that’s about it.”
Her face pulled into a half-smile. “You are sexy. Your exotic accent, your blue eyes, your wild head of hair. And your personality. No one has ever cared about me the way you have. Not even John. He never tried to stop me from doing trades. You gave me all your money so that I wouldn’t. And you kissed my bruises better. John got me a girly shirt that showed all of them off.”
She was wearing his rainbow cat shirt again. He rubbed the sewn rip in the collar, face falling. “I’m sorry for drinking. And I was hitting on Dewbell. I, uh…”—he took a deep breath—“I tried to get her to sleep with me again, because I thought you didn’t want me.”
Anger flashed on Dusty’s face and she pulled back.
“I’m sorry! Wish I could take it back. Shouldn’t be drinking. That’s not excuse, though. I’m just big fuck-up.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “And now you both hate me.”
Just like always. I don’t deserve either of these women.
Sasha turned his head and pointed to his face. “Here, I got one cheek hasn’t been slapped yet today. Go for it.”
Dusty looked sullenly at the cornfields. “I guess I don’t really blame you since you thought I traded with John. And why wouldn’t you think that, after the other day when I messed up and did that with Cal again? Can’t trust me. I think both of us need to learn to show some restraint. Not exactly my strong suit.”
“Not me either.”
“But I promise I didn’t want John to do that.”
Sasha leaned back, groaning. “I messed up so bad. With you. With Dewbell. I am sure she hates me now. I would go apologize, but if I try to climb down that ladder drunk I would probably fall and die.”
“Do you want me to go get her?”
“She don’t want to talk to me. Maybe in little bit when I sober up, I’ll go try to apologize. You going to leave me up here by myself? I would.”
Dusty scooted back against the vent and pulled Sasha’s head into her lap. He rested on her, staring at the sky as she combed her fingers through his hair.
“You ladies are way too nice to me.” He closed his eyes, drifting off.
These women deserved more than his knee-jerk reactions to things. Even if Dusty had traded with John and didn’t want to be with him, Dewbell deserved better. And so did he. He couldn’t just throw his sobriety away every time a problem came up.
A pale blue glow tugged his eyelids open and he sat up. Dusty sat next to him, the light of his tablet illuminating the dark roof.
“You are still here?”
Dusty swiped past a picture on the screen. “You have a lot of pictures on here. And why do you have a video of some girl kissing and then slapping you?”
Heat climbed into Sasha’s cheeks. “You saw that, huh?”
“You’re really weird.” She handed him the tablet, eyes full of mirth. “You want to get off this roof now?”
“Yeah, sounds good.” Sasha stood, his limbs stiff but more coordinated than earlier. He climbed down the ladder, and Dusty met him at the bottom.
“Going to go talk to Dewbell?”
“If she will let me.”
She nodded, gave him a peck on the mouth, then pushed opened the back door to the theater. Lucky sat on the bottom step of the balcony stairs, flipping through a magazine. His face darkened as Sasha approached.
“Sasha, do you know how much force it takes to crush a man’s windpipe?”
Sasha’s eyes widened. He shook his head.
“Not much. Less than crushing an aluminum can.” He raised his metal hand. “And this hand has seven times the grip strength of my normal one.”
Gentlewave sighed from a theater seat. “Do you always have to use those lines?” He stood up and turned to Sasha. “He rehearses that and uses it for special occasions. You want to talk to Dewbell? She’s pretty upset.”
“I need to apologize.” He looked at his feet.
“Go on up—”
“Hang on, I’m her brother-in-law.” Lucky dropped the magazine. “I should be the one to decide whether Sasha can talk to her. And I say no.”
Gentlewave frowned. “You shouldn’t decide anything for her. She’s her own woman. Just because she doesn’t speak doesn’t mean she doesn’t have her own opinions. You’d know that if you stopped trying to constantly push your own on her.” He looked at Sasha. “Go up.”
Lucky glowered at both of them, but didn’t stop Sasha from ascending the stairs. Voices drifted up to the balcony and Sasha was glad Dewbell couldn’t hear them. She sat on a bedroll, crocheting something with a ball of pink yarn. Sasha sat across from her, pulse beating in his temple.
Dewbell’s face pulled into a pout and she set the yarn in her lap, hurt in her eyes.
It took a moment for him to say anything as he tried to maintain his composure. “I’m so sorry. You are so nice to me all the time, and I really like you as friend. Then I go and mess things up big time. I turned into old me. I don’t want you to see old me.” He pulled in several deep breaths and toyed with a cord on the bedroll, then looked into Dewbell’s face to ensure she could read his lips. “I don’t deserve your kindness. I feel so bad. I should not have tried to kiss you. You should have hit me harder.”
Sasha put his face in his hands. Dewbell’s closed over his and pulled them down. She pressed a kiss to his forehead. It hurt his heart worse than her slap from earlier and he covered his eyes again. She tapped his knee. He pulled out his tablet and handed it to her.
“Yeah. That is worst part. She didn’t even do anything wrong. It was John’s fault. He kissed her. But I got upset and screwed things up with Dusty and you because I thought she did trade again. I am idiot.”
He swallowed a hitch in his throat. “You are incredible woman. You forgive me?”
Dewbell wiped her eye with a shaking hand and nodded.
“Shit. I really make you feel bad. You trying to act like it’s not big deal, but I can see it is. I’m so sorry.”
Dewbell wrote on the tablet.
“Yeah, anything.”
Sasha knit his brows. “Why you care so much?”
“Other things…”
Dewbell stared at him, then set the tablet on the carpet and pushed up the sleeve of her white shirt. She pointed to a jumble of thin scars cross-hatching her inner arm.
Sasha grimaced. He hadn’t noticed them in the dark strip mall. “You seem happy all the time. You don’t seem like you got problems like that.”
Sasha bit his lip, his stomach like a lead weight. “So why do you hurt yourself? Can’t help it?”
She pulled down her shirt sleeve. She held up her crochet hook and yarn.
So now she’s coping because of me. “Damn. I feel so bad right now.”
This always happened. Try hard. Screw up. Rinse and repeat. How many promises had he broken to others? How many to himself? “I don’t want to give you promise I cannot keep. I don’t have ‘coping’ skill for my problems. I thought I was doing good, but…”
She wrote on the tablet again.
“But we are only traveling couple more days together—”
Dewbell waved a finger in his face.
Would that make a difference? If he could talk to someone when he was tempted? If he felt himself sliding, could he stop it with support?
“You are good friend to me. I will promise to try my best. I don’t like seeing you like this, ‘specially because it is my fault.”
Dewbell set her yarn aside and pulled Sasha into a hug, then wrote again.
Sasha smiled.
“Thank you.” He hugged her again. “You will be my rock, baby.”
11 ~ Weak Heart/Strong Heart ~
Sasha walked at the back of the party, deep in thought as he pushed the shopping cart down the cracked highway. Empty fields ran along either side of the road, punctuated by garbage and the broken remains of a wooden cart. The tattered canopy on top flapped in the breeze, and a chaotic bird’s nest sat in a dark crevice. Occasionally, they would see other travelers, hefting their own packs. Sasha would nod politely as they passed by, eyeing their roadworn faces for malice, but he never found any.
Dusty had left Sasha’s side to chat up Gentlewave about something or another. Sasha hadn’t really been paying attention. Dewbell looked back at him, then slowed her pace until she walked next to the cart. He instinctively handed her the tablet.
“Oh, yeah. Just thinking about stuff.”
He chuckled. Dewbell was so protective since his drunken antics and subsequent apologies. “Yeah, actually. I look nervous?”
“No, no. I was just… thinking about my Grandma. Russia. All the asshole stuff I done in my life. And Dusty. I like her a lot, and I’m afraid I’m going to screw something else up. She calls me her consort, and I never really been good one before. Never tried. And I feel nervous because I don’t want to let her down. I don’t want to treat her like those guys she did trades with. Like that stupid cowboy.”
Dusty walked with her hands in the pockets of her baggy slacks, one of Sasha’s shirts—this one purple—draped loosely on her small frame. The too-big collar hung to one side, revealing her shoulder and bra strap. There had been no sign of the white halter top since her birthday.
Dewbell patted his shoulder.
“My grandma died few years ago. She took care of me when I was kid and she was always there to kick me in ass when I messed up. After she died, it made me think I needed to change my life and do something better. So I moved here. Tried to be responsible guy. That worked for little while, and then I just went back to way I was before. I don’t want that to happen again with Dusty… You know some good place I can take her in Hammerlink? Want to do something romantic with her, you know? Do things right.”
His stomach clenched. Had taking things slow amped up his anxiety? Or was it just because he really liked her? Would he have felt this way if Irina had given him another chance?
Dewbell hurried ahead to Gentlewave, signing to him. Gentlewave looked back and smiled, then Dusty looked at Sasha as well. He wiped his sweaty palms on his pants. Quit thinking about it so much. It’s going to make you more lightheaded than you already are.
Gentlewave slowed his pace. “Dusty, have you ever been to Violet?”
Sasha pushed the cart faster to catch up, then regretted it as black spots whirled in his vision. He stumbled.
Dusty ran to his side, nudging him into the cart. Sasha held his head.
“I got it.” Gentlewave pushed the cart, and Dewbell and Dusty followed alongside as they caught up with Lucky.
“Yeah, I passed through there once. It was a nice place. Too hard to make trades there, though. People acted like they were above that sort of thing.”
Gentlewave leaned toward Sasha. “It’s a beautiful town just outside Hammerlink. Romantic. That’s where we’re going to go today.”
Lucky stopped and turned. “What? Why would we go there? We can be in Hammerlink this evening.”
“Because it’s r
omantic.”
A frown creased Lucky’s road-worn face. “You got a consort there you didn’t tell me about?”
“I didn’t mean for me. For Dusty and Sasha.”
Sasha smiled weakly, and Dusty’s cheeks bloomed pink. He leaned over in the cart. “Want to take you on nice date, baby. What you think?”
She gave him a full smile, instead of her usual half, then nodded.
It was hard to see Gentlewave from this angle, but Sasha turned anyway. “How come we don’t just go to Hammerlink? There’s no nice places there?”
“Not really. It’s an industrial city. A lot of smog, pickpockets, street vendors yelling. Not romantic. Violet is a little out of the way, but it’s nice.”
“And overpriced.” Lucky flicked his cigarette butt onto the road. “Hammerlink sells the same exact things, but much cheaper.”
“We’re not going there to buy souvenirs.”
Lucky squinted at Sasha. “Well, I still don’t understand. The boy didn’t care about romance when it came to Dewbell. Why does it matter now?”
Dewbell scowled and smacked Lucky in the chest, then signed angrily. Lucky rubbed his face. “Never thought there would be so much drama from my escort team. Fine. Whatever. But someone better buy me one of those expensive cigars they have there.”
It took most of the day to get to Violet. They passed well-maintained vineyards and orchards, columns of charcoal smoke smudging the blue sky on the horizon. A high, gated wall wrapped the little town. Guards at the entrance asked Lucky and Gentlewave a few questions, and they showed him some sort of escorting ID card. The guards ushered them through the gate, but not before confiscating the ammo from their guns.
Small buildings flanked a wide street, interlocking bricks in a shimmery white paved the road, and potted plants and flowers hung from the buildings’ eaves.
“This place is the anti-Hammerlink.” Gentlewave smiled as they walked down the street.
“Why you guys live in Hammerlink if it’s not great place?” Sasha asked.
“I like it there.” Lucky shrugged. “Crowded streets, noisy people, air that smells like burning plastic. That’s home to me.”
“Sounds like Russia. Not place I would ever want to live again.” Especially not now. He tried to push the thought away and focus on the scenery, but building fires, corpse-filled streets, and abandoned pets foraging for food filled his mind.