Guarded Dreams

by L. J. Evans

  “How did you get so smart?” I asked, my smile slowly coming back into my voice.

  “I was graced with wisdom by the fairy godmothers,” she teased.

  “I hate what he’ll do to them,” I whispered my thoughts out loud.

  “What can he do?”

  “Demerits at a minimum.”

  “That’s just lost privileges. They’ll survive.”

  Lost privileges could be as painful as bruises. I knew. I thought back to the time, my junior year, when I was supposed to be at the coffee shop, working, and had gone down the street to play at a club. I’d left my phone at the shop on purpose because Dad tracked it with the Find My iPhone app. Dad had come in for a coffee—really to check up on me— and I wasn’t there.

  When I’d gotten home, he’d taken my phone and my guitar and locked them away. I hadn’t gotten my guitar back for six months. The phone he’d given me back after a week as a concession, because he wanted to track my every step. He told me if I ever left my phone somewhere I wasn’t again, or if I didn’t answer his call on the second ring, I could kiss away any future I thought I had.

  “I should have left last year,” I said quietly. “When I turned eighteen.”

  “You thought he was paying for college if you stayed. You thought you were sacrificing one more year for your dream of Juilliard.”

  I laughed bitterly. “How was I so naïve?”

  “You can’t blame yourself for wanting to believe in him.”

  “The only thing I should have believed was his actual words. He hated that Mom was on that plane with my grandparents because of her dream. He said she was reaching for things that could never be. He wouldn’t let me do the same. He told me that over and over again. Why did I think this would be different?”

  When I was younger and stupider, I’d asked Dad what her dream had been. It had made him turn purple in a way he rarely showed emotion. Not only because I’d dared to challenge him by asking the question when he was telling me I was a ridiculous dreamer like her, but because I’d dared to ask about her at all.

  It wasn’t until I was older and had access to the internet that I’d been able to scrounge up articles on my grandparents, and mom, and the crash. One of the articles had talked about not only my grandfather’s career in the senate, but how my mom had been developing a political news website. In 2000, that would have been something fairly new: a fact-based political blog. Supposedly, she’d been going to D.C. with my grandparents to meet with the Washington Post as a potential investor in her fledgling business.

  It had made me realize that my mom hadn’t been stupid. Maybe a dreamer. Maybe motivated to create something. But she couldn’t have been dumb.

  It had made me dislike my father even more. For making me feel like she was some flower who’d had to be carefully protected from doing ridiculous things. For making me feel that I, too, was ridiculous for having ambitions.

  Jenna was silent, unable to disagree with me.

  No more. I wouldn’t be subject to his contempt any longer. I just hated, with every fiber of my being, that my freedom had been at someone else’s cost. The fact that Eli and Mac Truck could be hurt by my actions riddled me with guilt.

  “I gotta get back on the road,” I told her, determined to put as many miles between Dad and me as I could. Determined to put the tears behind me just as I put the house in Rockport filled with muscled men behind me.

  “Okay. Keep me updated on your drive?”

  “Of course.”

  “Take care of you.”

  “Take care of you.”

  We hung up, and I looked at myself in the rearview mirror, unaccustomed to the tears that I’d shed. Tears I hadn’t been allowed, just as I hadn’t been allowed a chance to make my dreams come true. But I was going to make those dreams happen anyway. Jenna was right; this was just an experience I had needed. It was just one stanza, though. It wasn’t the whole song. It was just a few lines in the more important adventure that was still to come.

  Falling

  Craving You

  “I never had something that I can't walk away from

  But, girl, my self-control's so paralyzed

  When it comes to you, no, I ain't got no patience

  There's something 'bout you girl I just can't fight.”

  —Performed by Thomas Rhett

  — Written by Julian Bunetta / Dave Barnes

  Chapter Eleven

  Eli

  WHATEVER IT IS

  “When she walks in the room, I can hardly breathe

  Got a devastating smile knock a grown man to his knees.”

  —Performed by Zac Brown Band

  —Written by Durrette / Brown

  I ran up the steps of the apartment two at a time, partially because I knew I was late but partially because I was freezing my nuts off. New York City in March was not always a happy place. The weather was sporadic and inconsistent. I should have been used to it after being back on the East Coast for almost four years now, but I wasn’t.

  I still longed for the heat of Texas on many days. It felt like Galveston—and my time there—was a mirage amongst my lifetime of memories. Texas had been on my mind lately. Ever since I’d gotten a glimpse of dark brown curls in a messy bun walking out of a SoHo coffee shop. They reminded me of Ava’s hair that summer in Rockport.

  Truck would literally stuff me in a closet if I told him that—or even mentioned that name to him. He had no love lost for Ava. For me, she was the closest thing I associated with love. Or at least the possibility of love. I loved my mom. I loved my almost mom, Leena. Hell, I even loved Mac Truck like you loved brothers. But I hadn’t ever loved another female even close to that almost-love that I’d felt in the not quite four days I’d known Ava Abrams.

  As soon as I put the key in the lock, I heard a voice on the other side of the door. Mac’s voice.

  “’Bout goddamn time!”

  When I opened the door, he was already there, engulfing me in a hug. I’d missed him more than I’d known, because hearing his voice filled me with an ache in my gut. I’d been in New York for four years, and Truck had been there three, but our wingman had been on his own in D.C. ever since we’d left Texas. And it had been a year since we’d gotten to catch up.

  He was dressed in his Navy whites and smelled like he’d piled a whole bottle of aftershave on his body, but his smile was wide as ever.

  “Jesus, what did you do, break a bottle of cologne on your head?” I asked, pounding his back and then stepping away to choke clear of the fumes.

  “The ladies love it,” he said. His smile grew as I continued to cough and frown at him while dumping my gear on the nearest available chair and heading for the kitchen and the fridge stocked with beer for his visit.

  “Still a grumpy ass old man, I see,” Mac teased. I was taken back to the fact that Ava was the one to start calling me all of those things. Shit. It had been almost four years, and she still hadn’t let go of her hold on all of us. For many reasons—some not so great.

  “Still an asswipe waiting to get his dick wet,” I tossed back, but I was smiling, too. I brought him a beer with mine. “Where’s Truck?”

  “Getting his uniform on.” He moved closer to me and asked quietly, “How’s he doing?”

  It was the same question we always asked each other. Truck wasn’t the same. Not after that summer. He was hardened. Cold. His laughter less frequent.

  “He’s the same.”

  Mac nodded then looked down at my workout gear. “We’ll wait while you get changed, too.”

  I nodded, because I did need a shower, but there was no way in hell I was putting on my uniform. Mac was insane if he thought I was going out in it. Not in New York. Not with him in his Navy whites. There was a difference. Coast Guard members weren’t treated the same way as Navy guys. It was almost like the difference between a police officer and a crossing guard. It didn’t matter how much you told people that the
USCG was the fifth arm of the military. It didn’t matter that you told them you had as much, if not more, training than some other branches of the military. You were a member of the Coast Guard. It was like saying auxiliary or reserves.

  I’d known that when I signed on the dotted line. My dad had griped about it enough when I was little for me to remember it. But growing up in New London, where the USCG academy and DCO facilities were at, it had shielded me from the full extent of it. New London loved its Coasties. New York City saw you like a dock worker.

  Not that there was anything wrong with being a dock worker. Those people made more money than me and had set schedules. They were good people. I ought to know. I worked with a lot of them day in and day out.

  But the truth was, disparaged or not, I got a thrill every time we boarded a boat and stopped drugs from entering the country. I loved helping people when they needed it. I loved being part of a unit and having enlisted people under my command—leading. It was everything I’d wanted.

  I was damned proud that I’d made it happen.

  I loved it, and yet, I’d felt restless these days. I’d worked so hard to make this dream happen that I wasn’t sure what to do now that I had. What was next? A series of promotions? A boat of my own someday? I had this blank slate of my life in front of me that I was struggling to fill. It was a strange kind of loss. To have the loss of a dream, not because it hadn’t happened, but because it had.

  Truck came out of the bathroom that we shared in the tiny walk up that we’d rented near the station. It took more than our housing allowance, but it was close enough that we were never late to work and could be onboard a ship in less than thirty minutes.

  “You’re an ass for letting him talk you into that,” I said as I walked by him in his dress blues, a jacket in his arms.

  Truck rolled his eyes, no smile. “I know, but I don’t get to play wingman to him very often anymore.”

  I grabbed clothes, showered, and joined them in less than ten minutes. My hair was normally still stubble, whereas Mac Truck had let theirs grow to a military-allowed ear length. I just didn’t have the patience for it after so many years of shaving it to almost nothing. At the moment, it had grown to what I considered an unacceptable length. It needed a cut.

  When I came out in jeans and a plain T-shirt, Mac groaned. “Come on, man. We’re going out on the town in New York City. Let’s at least act like we’re something big for a night.”

  “Says the man working in D.C. Aren’t you really a big wig?” I tossed back and Mac glowed. He loved working at the Pentagon. His computer training, and his dad coming to his aid, had gotten him a post that Truck hadn’t been able to claim. Not after Ava. Not after her shit-for-brains dad. Working at the Pentagon also put Mac closer to the politics, and he loved that. If only Professor Abrams had added him to his collection, maybe that last year as a Sea Aggie would have gone differently for all of us.

  “Go change, dude,” Mac insisted, but I ignored him.

  I opened the Lyft app on my phone and ordered us a car. “Come on. Driver’s going to be here in five.”

  I swallowed the rest of my beer, shrugged my way into a thick jacket, grabbed my USCG beanie out of the jacket’s pocket, and pulled it on before heading out. The other two, in just their stupid uniform jackets, shivered as soon as we hit the stairs.

  “Goddamn, it’s cold,” Truck griped as we waited for the car that was coming. It wasn’t just because of the cold. Truck griped all the time. The guy who used to laugh everything off had still not shaken what had gone down four years before.

  “It’s your own fault. You caved to the Mac-pressure,” I insisted.

  “I’m going to change,” Truck said.

  “Too late,” I replied as the Lyft stopped at our feet. We got in, and the driver headed toward a bar we liked near Midtown that would give Mac the whole NYC feel. It wasn’t the bar we liked best—that was near our apartment—but it worked for when we were showing off the city to our pals.

  I liked New York. Liked that you could lose yourself in the anonymity of it all. Be just another person, living just a normal life. I liked the diversity and possibilities that were always at your feet. As a single guy, it was fine, but I couldn’t imagine being married with a family in the city. I saw families here every day, but it didn’t seem like a way to grow up.

  Not that I was envisioning myself with a wife and kids. The military life was hard on a family. I knew that from experience. Yet, a part of me objected to that. We’d had a good life, my parents and I. We’d been happy.

  Truck was itching for a new assignment out of New York. He wasn’t used to city life, having grown up in a small town in Northern California. I wasn’t sure I wanted him on his own these days. He was a somber bastard as it was without Mac or me around to lighten him up.

  But we were both up for promotions, and that probably would come with reassignments, whether I wanted Truck on his own or not. They were promotions we’d earned. I just didn’t have a desire to go anywhere else. I liked being close enough to my mom and Leena that I could see them on the weekends. Not that they needed me. They were strong and independent and had each other if they needed anything. But as they started to get older, would they need me then?

  “You should have put on your uniform,” Mac said, not letting it go like he’d always ridden everything into the ground.

  “Let it go, Macauley,” I said.

  “Jesus, I thought you were the only sourpuss of the bunch these days,” Mac said to Truck. “What’s wrong with Captain Grumpy?”

  I wasn’t grumpy. The name Ava had given me tore at me as it always did when they said it. I was just…in a funk. I had to get my head out of my ass and think about my next assignment. Then I’d be okay. New goals. New plans.

  “He’s been that way for a few weeks. Storm a brewing, I think.” Truck shrugged. As if he could talk. As if he wasn’t like this all the goddamn time.

  I tried to shake off my attitude. It wasn’t my normal mode of operation. I didn’t usually wallow. Hell, I hadn’t even wallowed when Professor Abrams had done his best to get us all thrown out of the academy.

  Shit. Back to the Abramses.

  “I need to get drunk,” I said with a sigh.

  They both looked at me in shock, stunned, mouths hanging opened. I laughed, pretty sure I’d never said those words aloud to either of them in the eight years we’d known each other.

  “Well, hell, you’ve come to the right person for that,” Mac grinned, and I thought Truck almost smiled. That was something. “I can certainly make sure that happens.”

  Drunk wouldn’t solve my problems. Losing myself in a woman’s arms wouldn’t either, but for some reason, I just needed all of that tonight. A moment of forgetfulness.

  We pulled up outside the bar, and I added the driver’s tip on my phone before joining the guys as they entered the building. It was loud for a Thursday night. Then again, New York City was pretty much always loud. A pre-season baseball game was playing, and the Yankee fans were all screaming at the TVs. We made our way to the bar and ordered beers with shot appetizers that Mac thought would send me on my way to the drunk I was seeking. It probably would, because, even with my build and metabolism, I didn’t drink much.

  Mac Truck were already drawing eyes from the ladies in the room, but the bar held way more male eyes than females. They were drawing some male eyes too, but I knew neither of them swung that way.

  After a couple drinks, and not really being interested in the females that were available, Mac demanded we go somewhere else. I blurrily brought up my Google Maps app and found some more bars in the area.

  We started a long-forgotten college habit of bar hopping.

  As we left the third bar for the fourth on the list, Truck grunted. “Hell, if we don’t stay put long enough, we aren’t going to get laid at all.”

  Mac slung an arm around his shoulder. “Dude, we’ll find someone for you to take home yet.”
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  “I don’t want to bring her home with you assholes. I want to go to her place where we can make some noise.”

  “She might have roommates,” Mac teased.

  “Maybe they’ll want to play, too.” Truck shoved Mac off of him. He shoved his hands into his pockets, his permanent glower on his face.

  “Maybe they’ll be as ugly as yo mother,” Mac said.

  I groaned. “Not the yo mama jokes. Please. Anything but that.”

  Not even that pulled Truck into the ribbing Mac deserved.

  As we hit the door of the last bar, we caught sight of a board that read “Open Mic Night” with the times listed. The music streamed out to greet us. It was sultry, soul music that was being sung by a female, and we all stopped dead. It wasn’t Ava’s voice, but it still brought us all back to Rockport and her onstage at the Salty Dog.

  “Maybe not?” Mac hesitated, flicking his eyes at Truck.

  “There’ll be more ladies here,” Truck insisted and went in. Mac and I exchanged a startled look.

  As soon as we entered, we could tell the crowd was different from any of the other bars we’d hit so far—more moody, artistic types than working class. I wasn’t sure if this was the place for Mac Truck to get laid either, but at the point in my drunk that I was at, I didn’t really care.

  We found a table in a corner, ordered another round of beers and shots, and turned to the stage where a blonde, all in black, was finishing up. She was good. Her voice dragged you to her, but she’d never get into my soul like one singer had.

  The crowd broke into a loud round of applause and whistles that had the singer smiling like she’d won an AMA award. The MC came on, a guy in his thirties that was eyeing the blonde as she exited the stage like he was hoping for more than a goodnight kiss from her.

  “Next up is one of our regulars. Give a round of applause for Brady O’Neil.”