Waiting for You

by Kasey Croshaw

  Waiting for You

  By Kasey Croshaw

  I waited for you,

  Because honestly,

  I don’t want anyone else.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Copyright © 2017

  About the Author

  End Notes

  Chapter 1

  I leaned my back against the splintered old telephone pole across the street, smoking a cigarette. It was almost midnight on that summer night. There wasn’t even a slight breeze to help cool the night air. Cigarette smoke hung like a shroud around me. I looked up to see the light come on in his bedroom. He was home. Just seeing his silhouette made me antsy to see him. It had been four years while doing my stint in the Army since I had last been home.

  I knew I had changed for the better. I was bigger, stronger, and more settled. I wondered if he had changed. He was only a senior in high school when I signed up for the Army and left this shithole town. We had emailed back and forth over the years. I couldn’t fucking get him out of my mind for five years, and now, here I was standing in the dark, smoking, looking up at his bedroom window. The light in his bedroom went out. “Sleep well, my man.”

  I toed out my smoke and noticed that my camos were still tucked into my desert boots. Some habits die hard. It was that way with smoking. I didn’t smoke the whole time I was in boot camp or in Iraq, but once I hit stateside and went to a bar, I bought a pack and started again. It looked like it was going to be that way with Dave. I couldn’t shake him from my brain. I didn’t want to. He would kick my ass if he knew that I was smoking again. I had written to him that I had quit.

  Dave was a year behind me in school, but growing up just down the street from him, we had formed a fast friendship early in our lives. His older brother, Karl, was twenty-six, and three years older than me. Karl and I didn’t have much in common except our love of fast cars, but Dave and I were buddies growing up.

  Karl had dated my older sister in high school, and they had taken Dave and me to the movies with them on their date one time. It only took once for Karl to figure out that you don’t take your brothers on a date with a girl you’re trying to seduce. Of course, Dave and I thought it was very funny to taunt Karl about kissing my sister.

  As I was walking home down the street, my mind was only on one thing. Dave. Thinking back, I had been kind of an ass to him. I had graduated from high school and immediately signed up for the Army. I didn’t talk to my folks about it or with Dave. I just left. It was chicken-shit, I know. Although I had good reason to get the hell away from this place, I could have at least said something to him. Dave knew my circumstances and would have been the first to agree with my decision, but I said nothing to him. I hoped he had forgiven me. I did write to Dave when I was in boot camp and apologized. He wrote back and told me that he understood why I left and that we were good. While the other guys in my squad were writing to wives or girlfriends, I wrote to Dave, and he wrote back.

  My old man was an alcoholic, and he had been on my ass for months before I graduated to get a job and make something of myself. Like he’d ever made anything of himself. The only jobs were at the Weston Coal Mine driving heavy equipment or moving to the Powder River mines. Neither of those jobs was particularly appealing, so when I turned 18, I signed up for the Army. I didn’t need my parent’s permission to join at that point.

  My senior year of high school had been a nightmare. My dad was drinking a lot, and so was my mom. We lived in a double-wide trailer just down the street from Dave’s house. It was more of an unpaved gravel trail. None of the streets in town were paved, except the Main Street and the old highway. There were no sidewalks or curb and gutter, just gravel. Dirty, dusty gravel roads, very much like some of the places I had patrolled in Iraq.

  Despite my problems at home, I was popular in school. I was on the wrestling team with Dave. Even though he was a junior, he was good enough to be wrestling Varsity. I had a girlfriend, Jessica, but I wasn’t that interested in dating. She was more of a convenience than anything. She provided an easy date for a school dance or party, but she was a lousy girlfriend. She couldn’t even give a decent hand job.

  Her lack of sexual ability is what brought Dave and me together on that fateful night. Jessica and I had a fight, and she broke up with me. It was right after one of our wrestling meets, and Dave heard and saw the whole messy argument. After we had showered and changed, he offered to drive me home. Dave always drove the coolest cars, thanks to his brother, Karl. I sank into the passenger side of his black Dodge Charger, and he peeled out of the school parking lot, leaving Jessica a wake of flying gravel.

  On the way home, Dave drove out of town, down the highway, and took a detour on a little way up a dirt road to a clearing in the trees. One thing led to another, and we ended up giving each other head. It was the first time either of us had done anything remotely like that. There was no kissing, no talking about it, we just did the deed.

  After we had each shot our wads, we both started laughing about it. Neither one of us had swallowed, so we were both a mess. Thank God for a box of tissue in the jockey box. I rolled down my window and tossed that nasty shit out while Dave drove us away.

  We never did it again, but after that Dave and I were even closer friends. Knowing that we had shared something seemed to cement our friendship into something more. What that something was, I didn’t know. Dave had been dating Alyse, but after that night, he broke it off with her. I don’t know if he dated during his senior year, but he never mentioned dating in any of his emails.

  I knew how I felt about Dave before I left for my enlistment, but there was no way that I could have a serious relationship with him. I wasn’t gay, and neither was he as far as I knew. While I was away, however, my mind would often find its way to Dave. I was falling for the guy, and not just because I was away from home and lonely. I may not be gay, but I began to think that I was gay for him. My jack off sessions, when I could get them, involved doing things with Dave that I never thought about doing with another guy, or even a woman. I certainly never considered fucking a woman in the ass, but Dave was another story. I wanted that hot ass. I wanted his dick in my mouth again. I wanted him to suck mine. I was hot for Dave, and I knew it. That is why I came back to this sorry-ass town. That is why I had been standing in the shadows, smoking, looking up at his window, and watching as he settled in for sleep.

  As I approached the trailer, I could hear the creek babbling behind my folk’s old place. The sound of the creek had always been a comforting sound while I was growing up. I unlocked the door and walked into the stale air of the hot fiberglass box called home.

  I had arrived on Saturday after flying into Denver from Ramstein on Thursday. I had to rent a car in Denver to get to Rock Springs, and then, take a shuttle home. It was a long and relentless journey. Believe it or not, I was happy coming back home knowing I would at least get to see Dave, even if nothing went the way I wanted. I didn’t have much choice in coming home anyway, so I might as well be happy.

  My dad had died, my first year abroad. He had been drunk and rolled his pickup, killing him instantly. I didn’t go home for the funeral, and neither did my sister. Maggie now lived back East with her husband and two kids. They were well-to-do. She no longer wanted anything to do with Mom, and definitely not Dad. Mom had written that they had to have a closed casket funeral because his body was so badly mangled. “Good riddance,” I remembered thinking.

  About six months before coming
home, I got an email from my sister saying that Mom had passed away with liver cancer. Again, I didn’t go home for the funeral, and neither did Maggie. I also got a letter about my Mom’s passing. This one was from an attorney informing me that my dad and mom had left Maggie and me the house and property. The old bastard had even managed to leave us a life insurance policy worth a couple of hundred grand. Not bad, I could use the funds. The fuckers owed my sister and me, but Maggie had her own money now and refused to take any of the inheritance.

  The gravel crunched under my footsteps as I walked up the driveway to the trailer. It was dark out with no moonlight and there no streetlights to help me see my way. I hadn’t been to the trailer yet, as the transit shuttle from Rock Springs had let me off at the El Dorado on Main. That had been about Midnight, and I had walked in the darkness of the street to the Weston house only to catch a shadow of Dave in his room.

  The door to the double-wide was locked. I moved my fingertips across the top of the door frame and found the key that had always been there. The trailer was hot, and the air was stagnant. It was clear that someone had locked up after Mom passed, but hadn’t been back to check on the place since. I felt inside and flipped the light switch. No power. “Better check on that tomorrow,”

  I flicked my lighter and tried to see my way forward. “Damn,” I said to myself when my thumb got too hot from the flame. Feeling my way through the living room to the kitchen, I located what was maybe the junk drawer that my mother had used for odds and ends. Bingo, I found a flashlight. The batteries were almost dead, but it gave off enough light for me to make my way down the hall to what was once my bedroom. The bed was made, and it didn’t look any different than when I left four years earlier.

  I was exhausted and too lazy to undress for bed. My boots came off, and I collapsed into a deep sleep. I had slept in worse places during my tours of duty. I don’t remember dreaming that night.

  My military training, however, kicked into high gear when I heard the beeping of an alarm. I jumped up to look for my M4. I was panicked when I couldn’t find my rifle. I was sure the beeping was a bomb. Finally, my brain kicked in, and I started laughing. It was the alarm on my cell phone.

  It was 7:00 a.m. and I was awake. In the kitchen, I found a can of coffee and filters and was able to make myself a pot of coffee. The doublewide wasn’t that old, and, fairly nice, probably one of the nicer homes in town. I opened the refrigerator but slammed it closed immediately. Big mistake. Whatever had been in there had gone from bad to worse. The smell was only equaled by the smell of death and dismemberment on the battlefield. My mom wasn’t what you would call a housekeeper, and the place needed some heavy-duty cleaning. However, I figured I could live there comfortably.

  Dad may have been an abusive asshole, but he made a good living and provided us a good place to live. However, I think that was more for his benefit than ours. He had been a supervisor out at the mines and liked show all the other guys in town that he was better than them. In the end, however, they all knew he was just a drunk with a big mouth.

  It appeared as though Mom may have stopped drinking in the last months of her life. There was no sign of beer cans or bottles, no wine bottles, and no vodka bottles in the garbage. Too bad, it was too late for her. She probably only drank to drown the pain of being married to Dad.

  I wandered through the trailer and decided that I could clean up the place and make it livable until I decided what I wanted to do. That meant that I had to talk to Dave. Otherwise, I should just burn the place down and leave town.

  “Nick Sloan,” I said to myself, “you’re twenty-two-god-damn years-old, grow a pair and go talk to the man that you have been thinking about for the last four years.”

  I unzipped my duffle and found a green army t-shirt and a clean pair of camos. I stripped down and looked at my body in the dresser mirror. Not bad, trim, 5’11”, muscled and smooth chest, and a nice set of abs. I guess I could be considered a catch. I was grinning as I made my way to the bathroom across the hall from my bedroom. Then I thought better of it and gave myself the luxury of using my parent’s bathroom. I sat my shave kit on the counter, ran a sink of cold water and shaved. I wiped my face with my big hands wet with water and inspected my shave. Good job, soldier. After brushing my teeth, I jumped in the cold shower and used my mom’s bath gel. It smelled good and wasn’t particularly girly.

  Stepping out of the glass enclosure, I opened the cupboard and found a towel. Not fresh, but it was clean. “Thanks, Mom,” I said skyward as if she could hear me.

  It was a little after eight when I finally locked the door to the trailer and walked outside. There I spied my mom’s Toyota Camry and my dad’s old Lincoln Continental, vintage 1976. I knew that the batteries would be dead after all that time not being run. I’d have to talk to Karl about fixing the cars and getting them running. I would need transportation.

  I walked down a block to Main Street, which was Highway 30 through town. The neon sign for the El Dorado Bar & Grill was on. Good, that it was open for business. The El Dorado did double duty. On one side was a cafe and on the other was a bar with a dance floor and bandstand. I walked into the café section, and the screen door slammed behind me. There was already a crowd in the place. People I had known all my life smiled or greeted me with a “good-morning.” I sat up at the bar.

  “Well, Jesus Christ, look what the cat dragged in,” a husky voice said with a laugh as she came out of the kitchen. It was a voice that I recognized. It was Georgia Weston, Dave’s mother. She owned the place, always had as near as I could remember. “Nick Sloan, when the hell did you get back,” she said as she came around the bar to hug me.

  “Hey, Georgia, good to see you’re still here,” I said.

  “I’m still here and kicking. Oh, but honey, I’m real sorry about your mama passing like she did. She was a good woman, putting up with that old sonofabitch all those years.” Georgia was shaking her head with a frown on her face. “Let me get you some coffee and some breakfast, honey. Pancakes okay with you?”

  “Yes, ma’am, thanks,” I answered.

  “God damn, Nick, you look good. They must feed you good in the Army.” She giggled with a smoker’s cough following. She disappeared into the back.

  “Son, I wanna thank you for your service,” Mr. Epperson said, walking up to me from his table where he had been sitting with his wife.

  “Thank you, Mr. Epperson, it was an honor to serve,” I said with a smile.

  These were nice folk, kind and gentle, salt of the earth people. Most were ranchers or owned businesses along Main Street. This was a poor town in a poor county, and part of a poor state. Wyoming is the Alabama of the West.

  “Have you been to the house to see Dave yet?” Georgia asked.

  “Not yet. Just got into town late last night,” I answered while she topped my coffee. The question made me a little nervous, and I tried to smile to cover.

  “He’s at work, out at the mine. He’s been driving truck for ‘em. Pay’s good, but hard work. He’ll be home after shift about 5:30. I know he’d love to see you.” Georgia grinned and winked.

  “Yeah, I was hoping I could get to talk to him soon. Tell you the truth, I missed him while I was gone,” I said sadly.

  “He’s missed you too, hon,” Georgia leaned in and whispered. “You are pretty much all he talks about after getting one of your emails.” She had her hand on my wrist while I held my coffee cup. Her long pink fingernails and bejeweled hand clamped tight and squeezed.

  She continued to whisper to me. “At first I was worried about him. He wasn’t interested in going out. He just went to work and came home, waiting. Then the light went on in my brain, and I knew that he was just waiting for you.”

  “Really?” I said with a wide smile. Now I had butterflies in my stomach instead of a knot.

  “Swear to God, Sweetie. A mother knows these things. That boy has it bad, and I’m only gonna tell you once, you miss this up and I will mess you up.” Georgia dug her
nails into my wrist until it was painful, then pulled away, patted my hand, and smiled.

  She brought out a short stack and side of bacon. It was good to have a meal that was not in the mess hall with 200 other soldiers.

  “Good stuff, Georgia,” I said, my words muffled by my chewing.

  “You eat up, you hear.” She grinned and went out into the café to top of coffee cups for her other customers.

  I finished my breakfast and stood up to pay. “Not this time, Hon, Mr. Sharp paid your bill,” Georgia said.

  “Thanks, Ted,” I said with a wave.

  “Is Karl around? I need to get my mom’s old Camry running,” I asked.

  “Sure. Karl went to work over to Ott’s Auto Repair,” she said. “Stop on in. I’m sure he’d be glad to see you too.”

  I left and walked down the street to the garage to see Karl.

  The two front bay doors of the garage were wide open, and it was starting to heat up that summer morning. I walked in and saw a man in a blue jumpsuit bending over the front of a Nissan Versa. The smell of grease and oil and tires brought to my attention the fact that I had worked in the engine repair shops in the Army.

  “God damn,” he yelled, and then, the clank of a metal wrench hitting the concrete floor echoed in the garage.

  He stood tall and wiped his hands on a grease rag. “Karl,” I said as I smiled at recognizing him.

  “Yup,” he looked over at me, recognized me, and bent down to pick up his wrench.

  His head went back under the hood. I moved in closer. “You’re back?” he said gruffly.

  “Yup,” I answered.

  “You staying?” he asked in that same gruff way.

  “Depends,” I answered.

  “On what?” Karl wasn’t a man of many words.

  “Dave,” I answered.

  “Ah hah.” Then there was a clank of metal on metal. The sound of a socket slipping off a nut. “Fuck,” Dave shouted from under the hood. His hand reached out to find the socket that had flipped off the ratchet. “I hate these goddamn Asian cars. No room to work and sometimes the nut is metric and sometimes standard. Fuck.”