by Trent Jordan
Third, I was going to go to Albuquerque.
Yes, I was serious. I didn’t know if Lilly and I were going to be romantically linked when we got there. I fully recognized that, past experiences and stories in my head aside, there were many reasons that our chemistry may have been an artificial development of being confined to a small space and me having rescued her. Once “normal life” took hold, maybe we’d realize we had absolutely nothing in common, nothing to keep us together for more than a couple nights of sexless cuddling.
But I sure did know that I could not just go to San Diego or Las Vegas, two cities that, while distinct from the greater Los Angeles region, could be reached in a single day. Albuquerque was a twelve-hour drive on even the best of days, meaning that even if I got found, I’d have a full day to prepare for the arrival of whoever from my past wanted to drop in. It was a fertile place for riding a motorcycle while also giving me the distance from my past.
Would I start another club? I didn’t know. I hadn’t thought everything out to the point that I could lay out a five-year plan for my life. But I knew that as long as I had my motorcycle, a new city, and my freedom, I’d be in a much better place.
And isn’t that what you thought a year and a half ago.
Again, my phone rang.
“Are you fucking serious?”
But this time, it was not Lane calling me. It was Phoenix.
For a second, my finger hovered over the “Answer” button, tempted to give someone who had not confronted me a chance to speak to me. But Lane had given himself away, saying that he was in a meeting. Nope, I would not answer.
At that point, I just turned my phone off entirely. I didn’t want to speak to anyone. I just wanted to be by myself.
I wanted, quite literally, to ride off into the sunset, saying farewell to my home for the last twenty-plus years, and start over as I moved through the darkness of this Friday night.
Just one problem.
It was only about four o’clock, and the sun would not set for another three hours. Maybe I was leaving myself open, but I decided to just open a couple cold ones, sit on the couch, and watch some TV. There was a lot I was leaving behind, but there was a lot I needed to leave behind.
In the end, I just turned it on to The Empire Strikes Back. I had never been a big Star Wars, fan, but what else was I supposed to do, sit on the porch and meditate until sunset?
As I saw lasers and brightly colored swords clash on the screen, I thought about all of the experiences I’d had in Springsville, from the bad ones, like getting bullied in middle school by Lane and his friends, to the good ones—almost all of them in the last six months. I thought about the women that had been, and the women that could have been, most notably, yes, Shannon.
The one that has driven all of the changes over there with the Black Reapers.
It was sort of funny to me, in a fucked-up, not actually funny way, how one person’s death had driven so much change throughout the Carter family and the Reapers at large. Her death had caused Lane to go to a dark place for a year. Her death had caused her father, a local politician, to stop giving so much under-the-table support, leaving the Reapers somewhat grounded. Her death had caused me to vanish for some time. Her death had caused Angela to return to Springsville, where she and Lane were now dating.
One death.
Endless consequences.
Who would have thought? Not my father’s death. Not my mother’s death. Not the death of Lucius’ wife. But the death of Lane’s significant other.
Love made people do some fucking crazy things. Love was a beautiful force, but it also had a dark underbelly. Maybe I’d been too scorned and too jaded, but I saw love less as the thing that allowed people to find peace on Earth and bring about goodwill to humanity and more as the catalyst for the strongest side of their personality. Love could just as easily drive someone to hug an enemy and ask for forgiveness as it could compel someone to go on a murder spree in the name of their God, their spouse, or their kids.
Maybe it was best that I had avoided love all of this time. Maybe it was best that Lilly had gone her own way. Maybe it was best that I was without love; while I liked to think the strongest side of my personality was my openness, maybe it was actually my neediness.
A couple hours passed, and the movie ended. I didn’t see what had come on, but given the giant robots that appeared, I assumed it was some Transformers film. Now, I joked to myself, I had even less of a reason to watch the TV. It was six p.m. Maybe I just needed to head out now. Maybe I just needed to stop waiting for the perfect moment and just go.
I stood up from my couch and looked at my bag. It was all I was bringing. I was just going to stop paying my landlord, let him seize whatever was in here, and leave this life behind. Would it fuck up, say, my credit score? Probably. Would I—had I—ever cared? Nope.
Let’s go. You’ll get your sunset at some point.
And besides, you idiot, the sun sets in the west. You’re going to ride off away from it.
I snickered to myself. I’d tried so hard for perfection I’d never actually analyzed my plan with any care. I went over, grabbed my bag—
POW!
“What the fuck!”
I hit the floor as a gunshot fired from no more than fifty feet outside. It was close enough that it had to have taken place on apartment grounds.
And then a fucking Molotov cocktail broke through my window, lighting the carpet on fire.
“Shit!”
How the Fallen Saints had found my place, I had no idea. But they seemed intent on making sure that I would never get out of it alive. And all the while, I kept hearing gunfire outside my place.
This was terrible. Ashton had never seen a public gunfight like this before. My place, though not exactly the abode of the rich and famous, was also a relatively upscale place, the kind where you never expected to hear anything more than a rare, loud argument between couples.
And now, Ashton was never going to be the same.
I got low to the ground. I had a clear path to the door but walking outside unprepared right now seemed like a fatal choice. I had my gun on my hip, so I was guarded, but if there were multiple Saints…
And then a fucking gas bomb of some kind went off in my apartment, and I suddenly began to feel very lightheaded. Outside, I could hear the gunshots continuing, along with the screams of what sounded like Saints and... Reapers? Police?
It was getting impossible to say. My senses were dulling by the second. I had to get to safety, to fresh air.
The way to the door was blocked by gas and fire, and even if it wasn’t, it would be like walking straight into the line of fire. I turned to my bedroom and started crawling, but my body was already weakened from the combination of gas and smoke. I moved like a man under barbed wire, just trying like hell to get to his freedom. If I could just make it…
Rest... it sounded so good.
No, I had to keep going!
“Kill them!”
I had to... take a quick... crawl to the bedroom and... just sleep…
My will to fight faded. I groaned and knew I had to keep going, but I could barely keep my head up. I crawled blindly—for all I knew, I was moving toward a corner of the apartment.
“Fuck his bike! Get him!”
The cries sounded so familiar, but from where... from who…
I just…
My eyes shut…
No, don’t die like this. Don’t fucking die…
Another crash. Another shattering of glass. More bullets. More shouts.
And then blackness.
“Cole, my son.”
I opened my eyes. The world around me had frozen. But I was not in my apartment.
I was outside my father’s old home.
“Cole, my son.”
Dad?
I looked around. It was like time had frozen for everyone except me. I could see Butch, Owen, Axle, and some other bikers standing outside the front entrance of my father’s house, g
uns drawn. I could see a black van nearby, at the bottom of a hill. I could see bodies on the ground inside, and a... a woman…
Shannon.
“Cole, my son.”
“Dad?” I shouted.
But the voice had not come from outside. It had come from within.
This made no sense. Lane had sold the home a month after my father’s death and pocketed the sale himself. I’d never asked for anything; I didn’t want anything to do with him. But the house had since been demolished and rebuilt. What the hell was it doing here?
“Cole, my son.”
I looked around cautiously. It felt like at any moment, bullets could fly, I’d get shot, and I’d be dead. But then again, how could I die while I was in the middle of something that wasn’t... real?
Or was it?
In any case, it was like my feet moved without me doing so. Actually, even that wasn’t the case; my feet remained still, but I nevertheless moved through the air. My body moved through the front door, up the stairs, and through those double doors to my parents’ room. The last time I had walked through there, my father had just died, and I had never returned.
Until now.
“Cole…”
I looked around. I did not see my father, and yet I could hear him as clearly as I could hear my own breath, even though “hear” was not quite the accurate word.
“Turn around.”
I did.
And there, with the doors now shut, was my father. He looked as I had always envisioned him—grizzled, old, and veteran, but also caring, protective, and proud.
“Dad?”
“You look forlorn, Cole,” he said, his voice now sounding like an actual voice and not something in my head. “The last year and a half have not been kind to you.”
“Dad…”
He came up to me and touched my face. It felt warm to the touch. I raised my hand, wanting to hold his, but it just went through him.
“I have but only a few moments,” he said, his voice far too steady for what was an unusual and bizarre... dream? Alternate experience? Reality? “Allow me to ask. What are you doing?”
I scrunched my face.
“Listening to—”
“You know what I mean, Cole. I understand your fear of facing my question, but you understand what I mean.”
Shit. I know I do.
“I’m running away again,” I said. “I’m a failure. Lane has grown. Lane, as usual, wins. But this time, I don’t resent him winning.”
My father walked to my side and put a gentle hand on my shoulder. And then, with that deep baritone of his, he laughed. It was a kind and gentle laugh, but it was a confusing laugh all the same.
“What does winning have to do with anything?” he said. “I told you both I loved you equally, and I meant it.”
“But I always thought—”
“You create a story in your head to drive you, but you know the truth,” he said. “You do not need to compare yourself to Lane in any way. You only need be.”
I... I…
I suddenly felt so free. Just hearing those words made my skin feel lighter, like I was really floating in place. A tingling went through my torso and my limbs.
“You are enough, Cole,” my father said. “You are enough.”
“I want to believe that,” I said. “But…”
“Cole, my son.”
There it was again, the internal voice. But this time, it was not my father.
“Mom?”
“Turn around, Cole.”
I looked back to the bed, and there she was. Mom.
I had never spoken to her in my life. I hadn’t had the chance to.
She had died giving birth to me.
I had seen enough photos and videos of her, though, to know what she looked and sounded like. She had long brown hair and piercing brown eyes; some mistook her for Italian, though she was actually closer to Scottish in heritage. She had a look that could have easily been used to cast judgment or make people feel on guard, but every time I had seen her, she looked happy and empathetic.
“Mom…”
She was wearing a white sweater with blue jeans, but I barely paid attention to what she was wearing. I was so in shock by her presence... that…
“You are so hard on yourself, child,” she said. “You say you will never love again, but I have always loved you. You know this to be true.”
I…
I did.
I had just never allowed myself to feel that love.
“You believe yourself to not be good enough, fearing that you will hurt the other person or, most of all, yourself. But you must let go of this belief. You only need be.”
I only need be…
“We must return,” my father said, coming around and sitting next to my mother.
Suddenly, around me, the world started to crumble. The frozen images outside the bedroom disappeared, replaced by a blinding light. Even corners of this very room started to be overtaken by the light. I looked at my parents, who held each other’s hands tightly.
“No!” I said. “I just came back to you—”
“You never came back,” my mother said. “You were always here. You just never realized it.”
I bit my lip. Mom... Dad…
“Our bodies are gone, but our spirit resides in both you and Lane,” my father said. “You must recognize this. And in doing so, you will find peace.”
“But Lucius—”
My mother smiled at me.
“Do not worry about what others may do to you,” she said. “You have everything you need inside of you.”
“But Mom—”
“Go forth, my son.”
“Wait!”
I jolted awake. I was staring at the ceiling of a small room. I sat up and looked around.
In a chair about two feet away was Lane. Sitting by his side were Phoenix and Patriot. Butch and Axle guarded the door.
“What the fuck…” I said. “What the hell happened?”
Lane smiled.
“You survived.”
“Survived what?”
Lane chuckled.
“Shit, you really don’t remember, huh?”
I sat up, but some serious dull, aching pain had me falling right back down. At least my head was free of any aches and pain—it was mostly just in my core and in my back.
But there was something more important than that. I could remember vividly what I had just dreamed, except “dream” felt like the wrong word. It felt like a conversation with my... soul? My spirit? My subconscious? My something…
And that conversation’s effects were carrying over.
“I remember, right before I passed out... I remember gunshots,” I said. “I remember someone throwing a Molotov cocktail into my apartment. Someone threw a gas bomb of some kind into my place. I tried to get... I don’t know. I want to say I tried to get to my bedroom, but it’s just as likely I lost control and went nowhere. And then…”
It won’t make sense. And besides…
That’s your dream. Not theirs.
“I just blacked out, I guess. Waking up just now. How long has it been?”
But no. Lane needs to know. You need to speak to him.
“Just a couple of hours.”
That’s it?
Even if that was true, something about me just felt radically different. What I had experienced in that dream, that vision, whatever you wanted to call it, it felt like it had truly fundamentally altered me. I just felt…
At peace, I guess you could say.
Like I didn’t have to prove anything to anyone. Not Lane. Not the Reapers. Not even myself.
I could just... I could just be. I could just do what I wanted. I didn’t need to live up to anyone’s ideal of me. I didn’t need to fear the judgment or wrath of others.
I could just be Cole Carter.
But even more than that, even beyond my name, even beyond my identity, even beyond whatever you wanted to say that described me... I ju
st was.
I lacked the words to appropriately describe it, and maybe my smoke-filled mind had created a hell of a hallucination. Maybe the afterlife wasn’t real, and maybe all I had experienced was a massive coincidence. Maybe I was just tripping some serious balls right now.
But to be frank, I didn’t care. I just wanted to implement what I had learned.
“Crazy,” I said. “But how did you—”
“I got concerned when you weren’t answering your phone,” Lane said.
“You always answered your phone,” Phoenix said. “At least, whenever I called. I knew if you weren’t answering when I called, something was up.”
“At first, man, I just said let them be,” Patriot admitted. “But Lane knew you best. He said after everything that had happened yesterday, he feared losing you again.”
He feared losing me?
“It’s true,” Lane said. “I might have been ‘happy,’ if you could say such a thing, the first time you left, but Cole, I need you in this battle against Lucius. So, yeah, we decided to send a group down to get you, to make sure you were OK. Turns out, we got there right at the same time the Fallen Saints did.”
“How the fuck did they know where I lived…”
Lilly?
No, no way. It couldn’t be. We were close... and besides, she’s probably somewhere in a train in Arizona right now. No reason she would have said anything to her father.
“Honestly, Cole, I think they know where we all live,” Lane said. “We know where Lucius lives. We’ve just been avoiding escalating to this point... until now.”
“Because I had his daughter.”
Lane nodded.
“I need you to answer this honestly, because it’s going to affect what we can expect from Lucius,” Lane said. “Were you intimate with her?”
I bit my lip.
“We didn’t go that far, but we were close. Definitely romantic.”
I said the truth before I could debate it. But strangely, that feeling of “oh shit, here comes the blowback” never came. I just felt at ease with having spoken the truth. Whatever happened, happened. It helped, of course, finding that center in me.