Rough Around the Edges

by Ranae Rose

  “Well, you’re welcome here any time. If your brother bothers you, or you just want to get away and stay somewhere he’s absolutely not welcome, for however long.” It took all of his willpower not to suggest that she stay at his place indefinitely.

  “Thanks. That means a lot. But it’s not like I can just pick up and leave whenever things get tough. I have mamá. I think this is even harder on her than it is for me. She was really strong when all that stuff happened years ago, but it’s been a long time, and those years have taken a toll on her. No mother really wants to be estranged from her son, anyway.”

  “I understand.” He understood that loyalty and concern for others was part of Ally’s nature, but that didn’t mean the thought of her brother harassing her didn’t set his teeth on edge.

  “But remember my offer. Any time.”

  She took another sip of juice, and silence settled over the kitchen again. It was a heavy silence – how could it not be, after what they’d just discussed?

  “Do you want to watch that movie?” he asked. Bad things happened and life went on. Furious or not, he understood that. There was no use seething and ruining the rest of their day. She’d trusted him with something serious – he didn’t want to make her regret it.

  “Sure.”

  A spark of relief flared inside him when he glanced at the case of the movie she’d brought. It was a comedy – no explosions. It was a good thing, because he’d be damned if he was going to let anything stop him from putting his arm around her.

  Chapter 14

  When his phone rang, he didn’t want to move, not even a hand. He did anyway, slowly and reluctantly. “Hey.” His voice came out flat and tired, evidence that his body was still recovering from what he and Ally had just done.

  The answer that came from the other end of the connection made him wish he’d ignored the call and spent another ten or twenty minutes just lying in bed with Ally instead. It had been so nice resting beside her, stretched on top of sheets that were still warm from their body heat. Now, a prickle of unease zipped down his spine, prompting him to roll over so that his back was to her.

  “Think you can make it out here on Friday?” Feltz asked. “I’m having a get together. It’s nothing big, just a few guys. Thought maybe you could finally make it to Quantico.”

  “No, I’ve got plans already.” He said it automatically, though it was true – there was the fight.

  “That sucks. You sure?”

  “Yeah. Sorry.”

  “All right. Hey, listen – did you know your folks have been calling guys from the old unit and asking about you?”

  Ryan’s blood ran suddenly cold, then hot again, all in the span of a single second. “What?” Just like that, turning down the latest invitation to hang out from Feltz was the least of his worries.

  “Webber told me the other day. Said your mother called saying she needed your latest address or something. I think he gave it to her. Not a problem, is it?”

  Hell yeah, it was a problem, but he didn’t want Feltz to know that any more than he wanted to get into the matter in front of Ally. “No.”

  “Okay. Anyway, I’ll give you a call next time I set up something at my place. And you know you can come over anytime that’s good for you regardless of what’s going on.”

  “All right.”

  “You sound kinda pissed. You sure you don’t want me to say something to Webber?”

  “No, that’s fine.”

  “All right. Hopefully you can make it to Quantico sometime soon. Or I can swing by Baltimore.”

  Ryan ignored the second suggestion and the icy-cold stab of dread it sent through him. “Maybe another time.”

  When he ended the call, things weren’t the same as they’d been before. It was still twilight on a Wednesday – the purple-grey light filtering through the blinds made that clear. But the peace that had come after making love to Ally had disappeared.

  “Is everything all right?” She still rested beside him, though what they’d so recently done seemed like a faraway memory.

  “Yeah. That was an old friend. He’s stationed at Quantico now, not too far from here. He wanted me to get together with him on Friday.”

  “And you declined?”

  “I’ve got the fight on Friday.” There was no way she’d forgotten – though she rarely talked about it, it was obvious that she hadn’t warmed up to the idea of him fighting since she’d discovered his TBI the weekend before.

  “Maybe another time, like the Friday after this one?”

  “Yeah. I don’t know.” Actually, he did know – if Feltz called again, he’d turn him down again. He’d done it a dozen times already.

  “Your friend in Quantico – he’s a marine, right?”

  Ryan nodded. “We used to be in the same unit.”

  “Do you still hang out often?”

  “No. Haven’t seen him since I was in North Carolina. He hasn’t been up here long.”

  Though the better part of a year had passed since he’d last seen Feltz face to face, the sound of his voice was still familiar. Too familiar – he didn’t dare meet him in person, even if he was stationed relatively nearby now. He wasn’t a part of that life anymore – he’d cut ties once, and couldn’t take hovering around the edges of an existence so familiar he dreamt every night of returning to it. It was all or nothing.

  “Oh.”

  “He’s a good guy, but I’m not sure I want to go back and hang out around base, you know? It seems like it would be weird to go back when I can’t really go back.”

  After a moment, she nodded. “Maybe you could invite him to visit you here sometime.”

  He shrugged. “Not sure I want to show off how it’s been since then.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Myself, I guess. He’s really been moving up, but I don’t have anything to show for the past year, and I’m not really sure what I’m doing. I don’t even know that much about this city, other than where to get good chicken and waffles.” He exhaled, his breath coming out in an exasperated rush. “And who gives a fuck about that?”

  “Well, I think that’s something worth knowing.” Her tone was light – purposely light, surely.

  He bit his tongue and tried not to look bitter. In a way, he hated himself for envying Feltz. The guy had been a good friend and was still trying to be one. But it was hard to think of him thriving, walking the sort of path Ryan had envisioned himself following upon return from his deployment.

  Feltz had been in the convoy on the day of the explosion, but he hadn’t been injured. Truth was, Ryan resented him for being fine just as much as he resented Gibson for being dead. Being somewhere in between felt like a never-ending punishment; he didn’t fit in with any of the men he’d called friends anymore, living or dead. He simply existed, alone.

  There was no way he could make Ally understand – the burden was his and it would sound stupid if he tried to explain it. There was nothing to do but keep it inside and keep it quiet, taking care not to say anything he’d regret.

  He swung his legs over the side of the bed and resisted the urge to swear when a muscle in his left thigh spasmed in protest. He’d been in bed for a good hour – apparently, that was long enough for his leg to knot up.

  Before he could do it himself, Ally pressed a hand to his thigh. At first, he hadn’t realized what the pressure was – the scarred skin was mostly numb – but when he looked down he could see her slender fingers resting on the twisted ridges of scar tissue.

  For a moment, he just sat there with his teeth clenched, not daring to breathe. But her motions were surprisingly effective – as she massaged him, his muscles began to unknot and relax. He breathed a sigh as her touch drove away the pain.

  * * * * *

  Vomiting discretely wasn’t easy, but Ryan gave it his best try as he lurked near the edge of the construction site, bracing himself against an empty truck. His most recent meal plummeted to the dry ground, sending up a cloud of dust. He’d devoure
d the contents of his lunch cooler half an hour ago in a desperate attempt to ward off a bitch of a headache.

  Sometimes eating helped. Not always, and not this time.

  The migraine pills he’d taken were in there somewhere, too. He’d have to get more out of his cooler, where he kept a small bottle.

  Limbs still shaking, he made his way toward the truck where he’d left his belongings. As he dug out the bottle and opened it, dumping white tablets into his sweaty palm, he was riding the tail end of his break. He had five minutes before he had to be back on the roof.

  He swallowed the pills dry – even the thought of water was enough to make him want to heave again.

  The walk from the trucks to the new house they were roofing was maybe ten yards, but it might as well have been a mile. It was like he was wearing shackles – every step was a serious effort, and his legs felt rubbery. Usually, puking left him feeling as if the weight of the world had been lifted off his shoulders. When it didn’t, that usually meant he wasn’t done.

  There was absolutely nothing left in his stomach though and his break was over, so he kept on, ignoring the silver splotches dotting the field of his vision. Eventually, he made it to the ladder that led up to the roof.

  Just a couple more hours. His shift would be over in just a couple more hours, and then he’d have the weekend. The only problem was that he had to fight. He’d have a little time between when he arrived home and when he had to be inside the ring. Would it be long enough?

  It would have to be. There was no other way around it – he’d given his word. He couldn’t flake out on a match because of a headache. He’d been training hard, and Cameron had set up a special match for him again.

  “Hey Moore, piss or get off the pot.”

  Ryan’s vision swam when he turned his head, but he recognized Krause by his voice anyway. Krause stood behind him, eyebrows raised as he eyed the ladder.

  Ryan had been standing at its base, a boot on the lowest rung, for a minute or two. He began to climb it, but not in a hurry. He was too light-headed for speed, and Krause had been acting like a dick lately anyway.

  Slowly but steadily, he climbed.

  He made it up fine. It was climbing back down twenty seconds later because he’d forgotten his tool belt that sucked.

  Krause, who’d just emerged onto the roof, said something characteristically dickish as Ryan started back down.

  He was at the top of the ladder, at eye-level with the edge of the roof when vertigo hit him, striking with gut-wrenching suddenness. If he’d had anything in his stomach, he would’ve thrown up again. Instead, he missed his footing, his boots slipping against steel, missing the rungs entirely, kicking empty air.

  He couldn’t hold his own weight – not when he was so dizzy he didn’t know which way was up and which was down. He tried to keep his hold on the ladder and lost a layer of skin on his fingertips as a result when gravity thwarted his efforts.

  Falling off the ladder was like one of those bad dreams where a sudden fall ends in being jarred awake. Only instead of flopping against a mattress, he turned over in the air, glimpsing the too-bright afternoon sun, and hit the ground with shocking force.

  He landed on his right arm and a distinct breaking sensation hit his wrist, the click of bone separating from bone. He felt it and thought he might have even heard it, but there was no pain. The impact left him breathless for so long that suffocation seemed not only possible, but likely.

  “Holy shit!” A voice echoed over the construction site, and this time, there was no telling who it belonged to.

  He was lying face-down in the dirt like a beached whale when someone gripped him by the shoulder. “You okay?”

  Hernandez. Ryan was no more capable of replying to him than he was of leaping up and taking flight.

  “Don’t fucking move him!” Hurried footsteps pounded in their general direction and moments later, Ryan was breathing in the dust Lowell’s boots had stirred up. “You don’t fucking move somebody after a fall, don’t you know that?” He swatted Hernandez’ hand away and began a steady stream of profanity.

  “I can move,” Ryan said whenever he could finally breathe again. His words came out low and strained, so he pushed himself up with his unhurt arm just to prove he was capable.

  Turned out he was really toeing the line between being able to move and being utterly useless. The nausea, vertigo and stabbing head pain he’d been experiencing before the fall hadn’t faded. If anything, they’d grown worse. Just kneeling took everything he had.

  “Hernandez, help me get him into a truck.”

  Lowell had changed his tune awfully fast upon seeing Ryan push himself up out of the dirt, which hopefully meant he didn’t look too pathetic.

  “You sure we shouldn’t call 911?” On the other hand, Hernandez seemed to have grown more cautious.

  Who the hell was he kidding? Of course he looked pathetic. He’d just fallen off a ladder in front of the whole crew. “Don’t call. I don’t need an ambulance.” He still felt like he’d been punched in the solar plexus, and the strain in his voice was audible even to him.

  Lowell snapped at Hernandez again and together, they pulled Ryan up to a standing position. Lowell bumped Ryan’s right wrist and the pain he hadn’t been able to feel before flared sharp and hot. The back of his throat tightened and his mouth watered as they helped him into a company truck.

  Hernandez returned to the site at Lowell’s command. “You got a certain hospital you want me to take you to?” Lowell asked, backing the truck out of the lot and into the street.

  “No.” He’d never been inside any of Baltimore’s hospitals. Just the VA Medical Center.

  “That’s right – you’re not from around here. I’ll take you to Johns Hopkins, then. The other places aren’t shit compared to Hopkins.”

  Ryan let the huge truck’s rumbling motor alleviate the silence. It didn’t matter where Lowell took him; even with the best medical care, he’d be well and truly fucked. He wouldn’t be able to work – not with a broken bone, and not after that embarrassment of an accident being witnessed by the entire crew.

  And he wouldn’t be able to fight. That stung worst of all, though from a financial and commonsense standpoint, the job problem was worse.

  Then again, it was his right arm he’d fallen on, and he was a south paw. Maybe he could wrap up his right wrist and still fight. Yeah. Then all he’d have to worry about would be how to pay his rent. Given the circumstances, it could’ve been a hell of a lot worse.

  “We’re here,” Lowell said a while later.

  Ryan looked out the window, but his vision was clouded by silver flashes and patches of bright color. Shock. He’d experienced it before. Like then, it messed with his vision and left him feeling vaguely detached from the situation.

  Lowell helped him inside, and Ryan didn’t object. If he had, he wouldn’t have made it into the building. With his foreman’s assistance, he made it past the ER doors. They were only a few steps into the lobby when the pain in his head flared and a wave of knee-weakening nausea rolled over him, heralded by an explosion of silver lights.

  As it turned out, he hadn’t emptied his stomach at the construction site. What was left of his lunch splashed onto the floor tiles.

  Maybe the lights messing up his vision weren’t so bad – they meant he couldn’t focus on any of the faces that were staring at him. He tried to block out sound too as Lowell guided him to the check-in area.

  When he finally sank into a seat with a clipboard in hand, it was a relief not to be standing.

  “Need help?” Lowell held a pen the woman behind the check-in desk had given them.

  “I got it.” Ryan took the pen and scrawled answers across the form while trying not to let his right arm or hand touch anything. If his writing wasn’t legible, he’d find out later. At the moment, it was impossible to give a damn.

  He waited a while. How long, it was hard to tell – misery distorted time, and his thoughts ran in circle
s at a million miles per minute. How was he going to make a living? How was he going to survive? And the fight. What about the fight? It was only a few hours away.

  Lowell left when Ryan was admitted to a room.

  He was questioned, eventually x-rayed and questioned again. He told them about the TBI and tried to ignore the feeling of defeat that spread through him like a drop of ink in a glass of water, darkening everything.

  Meanwhile, pain exploded inside his skull, a full-blown migraine of the worst kind. They moved him around the hospital in a wheelchair, and he didn’t even care. He didn’t care when they told him his wrist was fractured, or when they put his right arm in a cast from his knuckles to a few inches below his elbow, either. And he definitely didn’t care about the lecture the ER doctor gave him – some crap about going back on prescription medication to control his migraines.

  He did care when they put an IV in his other arm and left him alone in a room with liquid mercy steeling through his veins – it was a sort of relief he’d only dreamed of during his worst migraines. The drug took the edge off his pain and enabled him to float above it. With the agony controlled, he was left vulnerable to the exhaustion pain had kept at bay.

  He drifted in and out of semi-consciousness for a while, his peace interrupted a couple times when a nurse slipped into the room. He must’ve been doing okay because she didn’t linger long, just looked at him and the IV, asked a couple questions he forgot within seconds and then left.

  Maybe he even slept – it was hard to be sure. Eventually a nagging sense of guilt drew him back to full consciousness, reminding him that he needed to do something other than lie in the hospital bed with his eyes half closed.

  Call Ally. He needed to call her. He was supposed to pick her up and drive her to the rented venue where the night’s fights were going to be held. He’d promised.

  He reached into his jeans pocket, but his phone wasn’t there. It took a while, but he found it on the stand beside the bed.

  She picked up almost immediately. “Hey. I was wondering when I’d hear from you.”