by BB Easton
People got their heads bashed in with a baseball bat.
The blast of a waiting car horn startled me, causing my body to respond mindlessly. My left arm shot out of the open driver-side window and dropped the ticking time bomb into the mail slot. My left foot popped the clutch. My right foot stabbed at the gas pedal, and my coordination was so off that the car lurched forward and stalled out with a violent shudder.
Much like my heart when I realized what the fuck I’d just done.
Rct. Ronald McKnight
Marine Corps Recruit Depot
283 Blvd De France,
Parris Island, SC 29905
June 22, 1998
Dear Knight,
Peg gave me your address. I hope you don’t mind. Actually, I don’t give a shit if you mind or not. I’m not afraid of you anymore because you’re not fucking here. You went off and joined the Marines so that you could serve your country and keep me from spending the rest of my life with a psycho. Right? Isn’t that what you told me?
Well, Lance Hightower told me a different story—a story that began with you letting him suck your dick in the student parking lot and ended with you beating his ass to a pulp and getting him expelled from school the next day. I always suspected that you were the one who narced on him. I thought it was because you were pissed about him offering me meth, but it didn’t have anything to do with me, did it? You wanted Lance gone so that you wouldn’t have to face what you’d done.
I didn’t want to believe him at first, but the more I think about it, the more it all makes sense. Why you always insisted that Lance was gay, even before he came out. Why I saw you two together in the parking lot that day. Why you attacked him that afternoon. Why you took steroids and drove a monster truck and dressed like a fucking skinhead. Why you joined the Marines.
You were fighting who you really are, covering it up with every tough-guy thing you could think of. And when that didn’t work, you ran away from it.
I don’t care if you’re gay or bi or just fucking confused. That’s not the fucking point. The point is that, whatever you are, you hid it from me. You allowed me to believe that what we had was real. But it was all an illusion, wasn’t it? You never loved me. You lied to me. You manipulated me. You made my life a living hell. And now I find out that you fucking cheated on me too?
I don’t expect an explanation from you. I don’t even want one. I’m sure whatever you have to say will be another fucking lie anyway. I just want you to know that I finally know the truth.
Maybe now it will stop hurting so goddamn much.
Have a nice life.
BB
“Jules, I have a fucking date in two hours, and I don’t know what the hell to wear! I need you!” I held my glittery plastic Nokia between my cheek and shoulder while hopping up and down, trying to shimmy into a skintight pair of python-print vinyl pants.
“A date? For the past two weeks you’ve been too depressed to leave the house and now, all of a sudden, you have a date? Who’s taking you out? The mailman? ’Cause I’m pretty sure that’s the only guy you’ve seen since school let out.”
Juliet was sassy, even on a good day, but now that her boyfriend was in jail and she was stuck at home with a newborn, she was a raging hormonal bitch. I didn’t mind though. Talking to her reminded me that shit could always be worse.
“You’re one to talk. I’m pretty sure you haven’t left the house either,” I teased.
“I just had a fucking baby! My tits are leaking everywhere, I’m still in maternity clothes, and I haven’t taken a shower in four days.”
I laughed as I shoved my feet back into my well-worn black combat boots. “Excuses, excuses. So, back to my thing. I’m thinking python pants, boots—of course—and maybe a plain black tank top. I want to be casual but sexy. This guy is, like, in his twenties.”
“First of all, you know it’s June, right? It’s, like, a million degrees outside. I don’t know how the fuck you think you’re going to survive out there in pleather pants and those shitkickers you wear.”
“I get cold in shorts!” I whined, pulling the phone away from my ear so that I could push my spindly arm beneath the spaghetti strap of a black lacy camisole.
“And second, does this grown-ass man know how old you are?”
“What does it matter? I’m old enough. Sixteen is the legal age of consent in Georgia. Besides, your boyfriend is, like, twenty-six,” I said with a little more salt than I intended.
“Ex-boyfriend. And, Jesus, calm down, Judge Judy. I was only curious.”
“Sorry. Ugh. I’m just freaking out. I don’t want him to see me as some little kid, you know?” I stepped in front of my full-length mirror and turned sideways. With my thick black liquid eyeliner and red liquid-filled Wonderbra, I almost looked seventeen. Almost.
“So who’s the lucky asshole?” Juliet deadpanned.
“Oh my God, Jules, he’s so fucking cute!” I squealed. “His name is Harley and he’s a mechanic at the garage where I got my tires today and he has two full tattoo sleeves and this big, fat pierced bottom lip and he’s super fucking flirty and he has this sexy blond sex hair and oh my God”—I sucked in a breath—“he drives a fucking 1969 Boss 429! Or it could be a 302, but I’m pretty sure it’s a 429. And I think he’s going to let me drive it to—”
“Harley James?” Juliet cut me off, her tone significantly less enthusiastic than mine.
“Yeah!” That was the name he’d put into my cell phone before I left the shop anyway. “You know him?”
“Everybody knows him! He was, like, the original Peach State High punk. Don’t you remember? He had spiky blond hair, like Billy Idol, and got kicked out of school in eleventh grade for clocking the principal in the face! Oh, and I heard that he’d already slept with over a hundred girls by then, too.”
I did kind of remember rumors about somebody like that, but we had been in, like, sixth grade, so they hadn’t really made an impression. Plus, I’d been too busy obsessing over a certain gorgeous punk rock god in my own grade—Lance Hightower.
“Oh yeah,” I said, pretending to know who she was talking about while I dug around in my makeup bag.
“Girl, you better use protection,” Juliet warned. “That guy is a whore.”
“Okay, Mom,” I whined. “So, do man-whores like nude lipstick or red lipstick better?”
“Better go with nude, seeing as how it’s probably going to be smeared all over his dick later.”
“Ew!” I shrieked, causing Jules to burst into an evil belly laugh. It felt so good to hear her do that even if it was at my expense.
“Fuck, I think I just woke up the baby,” Juliet said once her cackle died down. “Ugh. There’s another reason why you need to use protection tonight. These things are the worst.”
“Girl, I watched you push him out. Trust me, I’m poppin’ birth control pills like Tic Tacs now.”
Juliet giggled a little bit, but I could hear the sadness creeping back in at the end.
“Have fun,” she said as the wailing in the background suddenly changed to coos and grunts. “Be safe.”
“You have your boob in that kid’s mouth right now, don’t you?” I said, trying to lighten the mood.
“Oh yeah,” Juliet said. “Don’t think you’re the only one getting action around here.”
Even though I followed the directions scrawled on the back of my A&J Auto Body receipt to the letter, I still missed my turn at least three times. Harley had warned me that there wouldn’t be a sign, but he’d failed to mention the fact that the street was in the process of being reclaimed by the fucking forest.
Oh, this feels safe, I thought as I crept at five miles per hour down what was probably the driveway of a rape shack. A grown-ass man you’ve never met asks you to meet him somewhere with no signs and no address in the middle of the fucking woods, and you say yes because he told you he might let you drive his car. You might as well have climbed into a panel van with a stranger for a piece of candy, dumbass.
My annoyingly persistent optimism refused to hear it though, snapping back, Yeah, but I saw the candy, and I saw the stranger. And they’re totally worth climbing into a panel van for.
Just then the narrow street crested a hill, and I was temporarily blinded by the six o’clock summer sun. Flipping the red heart-shaped sunglasses from the top of my head back down onto my face, I slowed almost to a stop and peered into a crater the size of a stadium below. It looked like it had been clear-cut by developers in preparation to build a neighborhood. The main street had been paved—just a large oval with a few driveways jutting off here and there—but there were no houses. There were no diggers. There were no Porta Potties, trailers, or evidence that anyone had been working on anything at all. The only thing down there was mud, pavement, and the sexiest car mankind had ever produced.
The Boss was parked at the bottom of the hill, and even though the June sun was blazing down on it without mercy, it didn’t sparkle, and it damn sure didn’t shine. That matte black finish took the sunlight and fucking swallowed it up, like a matte black hole on matte black wheels. And leaning against it—smoking a cigarette and wearing a pair of black Dickies, black boots, a chain wallet, and a NOFX T-shirt—was the only man sexy enough to drive it.
Harley fucking James.
When he heard me coming down the hill, Harley lifted his head and flashed me a sideways smile that made me feel a little less nervous. Or more nervous? Maybe less nervous and more excited? Whatever it did, it scrambled my brain because, as soon as I pulled up next to him, I threw the car into first, pulled up the emergency brake, and took my foot off the clutch…all before cutting the engine. My car shook, sputtered, and stalled out in spectacular fashion.
I shrieked and buried my face in my hands as Harley made his way over to my side of the car.
Be cool, BB. Be cool. You’re a badass. Right? So be a badass. What would a badass do if she stalled out in front of a super-hot grown-ass man?
I pried my hands off my face and looked around frantically for my cigarettes. Lighting one with shaking fingers, I exhaled and said a silent prayer before pushing open my car door.
I was swathed in thick, humid air and the rumbling sound of Harley’s gravelly laughter. I swung my ten-pound steel-toed combat boots out, sitting sideways in the driver’s seat, and looked up the length of Harley’s long, lean body. My heart was pounding, and my cheeks were on fire, but I exhaled a slow, steady stream of smoke and tried to pretend like I hadn’t just stalled the fuck out in front of a legendary bad boy.
“Hey,” I said, forcing myself to look him in the eye and thanking God for the advent of big plastic sunglasses.
He was even hotter than I remembered. It had only been a few hours, but the fact that he dressed like a laid-back punk rocker had my tits in a tizzy. He was the coolest fucking person I’d ever met, and he wasn’t even trying. And that face? Fuck me.
“Hey.” Harley chuckled, holding out both palms.
I stuck my cigarette between my teeth and put my hands in his, letting him pull me out of the car. Harley ran his callous thumbs over the backs of my hands before dropping them. The sensation made my insides quiver.
“You know, there’s a better way to kill your engine,” he teased.
I rolled my eyes behind my sunglasses and exhaled a puff of smoke out of the side of my mouth. “I know,” I said. “I just like to make a big entrance.”
I forced myself to meet Harley’s gaze, and my breath hitched. Goddamn. Even when he smiled, it looked like a pout with those bright blue puppy-dog eyes and that puffy, pierced bottom lip.
“Mustang clutches are a bitch,” he said in a voice that sounded like both sugar and sandpaper. “Maybe you should have started with a Vespa.”
I scoffed in pretend offense and smacked him in the chest with the back of my hand.
“Damn, woman! You said it first.” Harley laughed, shielding himself with his hands, as if I might attack again.
“Yeah, but you drive that.” I motioned over my shoulder with my thumb. “Somebody could probably call your mama a Vespa, and you’d be like, I’m sorry. I can’t hear you over the sound of my Boss 429.”
I shut my door and leaned against it, needing more than just gravity to hold me and my shaky knees up.
Harley smirked at me. “I thought you couldn’t tell if it was a 302 or a 429,” he said with mischief in his pretty blue eyes.
“Let’s just say, if you made me come all the way out here for a puny little 302, I’m gonna be pretty fucking disappointed.”
Harley smiled all the way, and I noticed for the first time that he had a gap between his front teeth. Just a sliver of space, but it was enough to put me at ease. I had a gap between my front teeth, too. Even after two years of braces, it still never closed all the way. But I liked it. People said it made me look like Madonna. A boobless, ninety-one-pound, shaved-headed Madonna.
“Welp, let’s get your disappointment over with then.”
Harley held out his elbow for me to take and walked me around to the driver’s side of his matte black orgasm on wheels. As if I were just going to hop in. As if it were a fucking Honda Accord or some shit. I let go of his elbow and kept walking, circling the car one, two, fifteen times. It was like being in the presence of the Mona Lisa. Or the Hope Diamond. How was there not an interconnected laser system protecting this priceless piece of art?
I glanced up at Harley who was obviously enjoying my reverie. I’m sure, out there in the suburbs of Atlanta, nobody had a fucking clue just how amazing that car really was. On the classic car auctions my dad and I watched on TV, the Boss 429s always went for over a hundred thousand dollars. How the fuck was a high school dropout driving around in that car?
He is a mechanic, the optimistic voice in my head insisted. Maybe he built it himself, from the ground up. Maybe he pieced it together from found parts, and now it’s worth six figures. Maybe he’s an entrepreneur with earning potential.
Or maybe he’s a drug dealer, my rational side chimed in.
Harley cocked his head to one side, squinting through the blazing sun, and said, “Are you gonna fire her up or just make her feel like a piece of meat?”
“Harley James, are you a feminist?” I asked with a smirk as he opened the driver’s side door for me.
“Sure. We’ll go with that,” he said as I made my way over to him.
I flicked my cigarette onto the pavement before climbing in—ooh, I’ll bet that looked super badass—and fought the inexplicable urge to wrap my arms around his waist and just inhale him as I ducked under his arm. I told myself he probably just smelled like sweat and motor oil. I know I smelled like sweat. My skintight, rubbery python pants were soaked on the inside.
As soon as my vinyl-wrapped ass hit his leather-wrapped seat, I let out a little moan. I couldn’t help it. I was sitting in my dream car, and it smelled like leather and testosterone. If there is a heaven, I’m pretty sure I was sitting in it.
Harley came around and sat in the passenger seat, leaving both of our doors wide open so that we wouldn’t die of heatstroke.
I ran my hands over the wooden steering wheel and looked at him in awe. “You kept it all original,” I said, marveling at the walnut dash.
“’Cept for the gauges, seat belts, pedals, and gearshift.” He chuckled. “But, yeah, I kept the steering wheel. That thing is too fuckin’ cool to replace. When was the last time you saw a wooden steering wheel?”
“I think my grandma’s Buick had one,” I blurted.
Harley’s hand shot out, pointing toward my open door. “Get the fuck out,” he said, scowling for about half a second before his wicked little smile slid back into place.
I exhaled and gave his veiny, tattooed arm a little shove. “Don’t do that, fucker!”
Harley smiled so big I thought his bottom lip was going to burst through the silver hoop restraining it.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. Then, he jammed one into the ignition. “Wel
l, if you’re not gonna get out, let’s see what you got,” he said, raising his eyebrows and locking those pretty puppy-dog eyes on mine. “Crank her up and tell me what she’s working with.”
Jesus, did I even know how to turn on a car? I’d only had one for a little over twenty-four hours.
Um, okay…left foot, clutch. Right foot, brake. Uh…first gear? First gear. Parking brake…
I looked at the center console where the hand brake was in my car and saw nothing but smooth wood grain and a pack of Camel Lights.
Fuck.
I looked at Harley, who was watching me in amusement, and said, “Sorry, man. I think your car’s broken. Somebody forgot to install the parking brake.”
A laugh burst out of him that changed the bubbly feeling in my chest from anxiety to adoration. It had been so hard to get Knight to laugh. Just making that grumpy asshole smile had been my singular reason for getting up in the morning. It had been a challenge and, at times, the only way to keep him from fucking killing someone. But Harley smiled for free. He laughed. He teased. He played. He flirted. Hell, I think he was fucking happy. I used to be happy, too, before everything turned to shit. Being around Harley helped me remember what that felt like.
I was starting to think that Harley and I might be the same person. He and I were as similar as Knight and I were different. And I liked it.
Harley leaned over so that his face was mere inches from mine. Then, he reached for a handle under the steering wheel. Tapping it with two fingers, he said, “Step on the clutch and brake at the same time, and then push this in.”
I did as I was told, leaving nothing left but to turn the key. I took a deep breath and cranked her up. The engine screamed to life, the entire car rumbled around us, and my panties were suddenly soaked.
“Now, give it a little gas, but don’t take your foot off the clutch,” Harley yelled over the sound of his purring sex machine.