by L. A. Zoe
Taking SeeJai to meet his family suddenly struck Rhinegold as worse than betraying her to the Spanish Inquisition.
“Well … “ Father said. “Rhinegold … stay in touch … please.”
So hard for Father to speak that word.
“I will, but don’t expect me to change anytime soon.”
Father nodded, a look of agony on his face.
He stood up, grabbed his coat, and made for the door. Then turned. “Father—how is she?”
Father knew who Rhinegold meant. “A lot better than you, son. Straight As her first semester at the School of Fine Arts, dates a variety of guys, all of them we’ve met seem like nice kids. Accepted into an exclusive sorority. Sees her counselor once a week, and she’s enthusiastic about the progress, says she won’t need more than another year before she gets over the trauma.”
The hell Sybille raised was the only trauma Keara suffered.
But no point in saying so. Reviving the old arguments. All in the past, now.
“Good,” Rhinegold said.
“And she goes to church regularly now. She doesn’t preach at us, but she reads the Bible every day.”
Overreaction? She was better off without him. Of course.
If only he understood that before they played their game.
He had to avoid dragging SeeJai into his messed up life.
Chapter Thirteen
Moving In and Moving Out
On a Tuesday night, I was lucky Arkady kept me until eight o’clock. I texted Rhinegold, and as usual he waited outside across the street.
While I served customers inside, the mercury plummeted, and as I crossed the road, the icy wind tried to blow me away.
“Your lips are blue again,” Rhinegold said, turning and walking down the sidewalk. Most of the businesses were closed and dark already. Only the Walgreen’s, an island unto itself, had bright lights and cars in its lot.
“No doggy bag tonight,” I told him. “So few customers, none of the cooks screwed up an order, and there weren’t any leftovers can’t go back into the walk-in. Not even rice milk.”
“We’ll grab a pizza on the way home,” Rhinegold said. “I’m tired of veggie burgers anyway.”
“Good news,” I told him. “I just got a text from Mr. Herald, you know, that old dude with the apartment building.”
“An old house split up into small rooms probably ought to be closed down for substandard plumbing,” Rhinegold said.
“Anyway, he’s accepted my application.”
“I’m surprised he even knows how to text.”
“Tomorrow I’ll go there, pay the money, sign the lease, and get the keys.”
“Why it’d take him so long?”
“I had to give him my Social Security number, everything. And the right to pull my credit report.”
“But you told me you don’t have any credit cards. But, I guess that figures. You don’t have a good credit rating, but nothing bad either.”
“I told him about Mr. Granger evicting me along with Mom, but officially that’s her bad record, not mine, because my name wasn’t on her lease. And I explained everything. And he even called up Arkady to verify my employment.”
“Didn’t you show him your check stub?”
“He said, ’Lots of people quit jobs fast.’”
“I guess I’d be suspicious too,” Rhinegold said. “I’ve heard lots of stories. Cute young woman wants to live alone in a cheap room. You probably smoke crack, sell your ass, and play rap at three hundred decibels.”
I tried to grab his arm, but he kept walking so fast I had to jog to catch up. Hey, can’t you be happy for me?”
“Congratulations,” he said, not smiling. “Now you’re not dependent on me any longer.”
Oh God.
“I never was. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, Rhinegold. I do. Is it my fault you won’t accept the one thing I have to give you?”
“Speaking of selling ass, one of Greco’s pets has a ten o’clock date waiting for her at the Deluxe Hotel. That’s why I’m in a hurry.”
“A snake or a lizard?”
“Huh?”
“You said, ’one of Greco’s pets.’”
“The mammalian kind. Yeah … Martine is definitely mammalian, with tits big enough to suckle triplets on the same nipple. I won’t disturb you when I come back.”
“You never disturb me,” I said. Except when he acted weird like that.
“All right,” he said without looking back at me, eyes focused straight ahead.
Have you changed your mind? Will you take me tonight?
I wanted to ask him, but not while he rushed at leg breaking speed over the still-treacherous sidewalks.
Was he angry? Hurt? Jealous? What? From the get-go, he knew I wanted my own place. I never said different.
And it wasn’t like we were boyfriend and girlfriend or anything. Not to me. If he thought so, why not tell me? Why not screw me? We hadn’t even kissed.
When we finally sat cross-legged in front of the fire, eating pizza and sipping beer, Rhinegold said, “I’m sorry I acted like an idiot. Of course I’m happy for you, you’re getting what you want. You deserve it. And you’re still under my protection.”
The hot cheese burnt the roof of my mouth. Did I want to remain under his protection? Then I remembered Greco. And Ami. And how many young men I passed in the streets, some wearing gang colors, some not, but all of them physically capable of robbing me—or worse.
“Thank you,” I said as warmly as I could. “Do you have time to help me move the boxes of my stuff from Mom’s apartment to mine, if Areetha drives?”
“Tomorrow?”
“I hope so. Soon as I go to the bank and withdraw the cash. He wants a cashier’s check for the deposit.”
“Trusting guy.” Rhinegold shrugged, ate another slice of pizza. “Sure.”
Rhinegold left to take the bus to The Mahogany Motel without saying goodbye.
Rhinegold had to get his own place. Why couldn’t he understand that? What did he think he was proving by living in a condemned house? He made decent money with his protection services. Greco paid him. The prostitutes gave him a cut of their tips. He charged the welfare mothers only a few dollars to take them places, but if he spent more time, showed some initiative …
Landlords collecting rent. Insurance agents collecting premiums. Business people making bank deposits. Funeral home reps collecting installments on prepaid burial contracts. Cable and satellite TV salespeople. Social workers making home visits. Pizza delivery drivers.
I could think of a lot of people who both needed and could pay for Rhinegold’s services.
He might have trouble getting into expensive apartment buildings without a real job, but I bet if Rhinegold applied to Mr. Herald, and slapped a two-month security deposit into his hands, cold cash, Mr. Herald would rent him a room for as long as he continued to pay the rent. For sure, Mr. Granger, Mother’s old landlord, the one kicked us out, would. He charged $10 more if I wrote him a check instead of paying cash. Something about taxes, he told me I’d understand better when I tried working a job myself.
After all the deductions Arkady swore the law required to take out of my measly little paycheck, I did understand Mr. Granger better.
I ate another slice of pizza while finishing off a can of beer. I stared at the three large slices still left in the box, decided Rhinegold wouldn’t expect them to still be hot when he returned, so I ate another along with another can of beer.
And then drank a can of beer without a slice of pizza to help it go down.
I threw a lot more wood onto the fire, added a squirt of lighter fluid just to make the flames flare up, then lay down, closed my eyes, and tried to sleep.
I did owe Rhinegold. A lot. That bothered me. A lot.
I didn’t want to owe Rhinegold, or any man. Or woman. Or bank or credit card company, for all that.
But, especially Rhinegold. Because I liked him so much. Too much.
> If he didn’t want my scrawny little pussy—and obviously he didn’t—then how could I repay him?
I could start paying him in money. That seemed obvious, and made the most sense, but he long ago refused to accept any money, except to let me buy some of our food.
He knew I was saving up to get my own little room. And would now need to make sure I had enough money to pay the rent on the first of every month. Arkady liked me, and so gave me decent hours, but only the weekend nights paid me a lot in tips, and lots of the waitresses wanted to work those shifts.
I should have enough to take care of myself, but not enough to pay Rhinegold to keep me safe every day, even if he would accept it.
I was still his damsel in distress, and apparently golden knights were not allowed to lust after those damsels. Or at least not to screw them even when they lay close by nearly every night I didn’t spend on Mother’s sofa.
The thing was, I already missed him sleeping close by. Even that night, when I knew he was just gone on a job and would return soon.
I wanted a place to call my own, yet somehow also wanted the big crazy lug next to me, even if he wouldn’t screw me.
Crazy, I know.
The back door plywood board pulled back, creaking. Rhinegold stepped inside fast.
“Thanks for building up the fire for me,” he said, shrugging off his winter parka.
“You hungry?” I asked. “I left you a couple of pizza slices.”
He lay down, as far from me as he could and still feel heat from the fireplace. “No, just tired.”
So it probably wasn’t going to be one of those nights when I could press myself against him while he slept.
“Rhinegold?”
“Um?” A sleepy voice, even though he hadn’t slept yet.
“I do appreciate what you do for me. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Slurred into two syllables.
Somehow, with him in the same room, acting so hurt, I felt even sadder and lonelier than before he returned, with just me, my own dispirited aloneness, and I.
Again, I wondered what more he wanted from me. Not sex. Companionship, certainly. What more?
But I couldn’t remain there in that condemned house smelling of mouse piss, moldy floor beams, and cooking grease staining the walls and ceiling. Haunted by Mortimer.
The room in Mr. Herald’s big house was no luxurious royal palace, but in its walls, water rushed through the pipes and electricity lit the wires. Hot air poured out of the overhead heat vent. A mail carrier delivered bills and packages.
Finally, I had to say it. “Rhinegold?”
An irritated, “Humph?”
“You want to move in with me?”
A long, symphonic silence.
“Are you still trying to pay me back with sex?”
“We could do that right here,” right now, please! “but we haven’t. I mean, you should live in a real place.”
“I’d still sleep on the floor.”
“But at least you’d be warm. And safe.”
“No place is safe. Not really.”
I waited a moment. “Rhinegold, you can’t stay here much longer.”
“So? I’ll just find another condemned house. Move on.”
“Weren’t still planning to protect me on the streets?”
“Of course.” He sounded hurt I even questioned his devotion.
“It’d be a lot easier if we lived in the same place.”
“It’s only a mile or so from here, in the Spanish Quarter. No biggie.”
“Look, I’m not trying to be nice. We could split the rent. I could save more money to go to college.”
“Thank you, SeeJai, but the answer’s still no.”
“Take more protection jobs. When Mr. Herald has another vacancy, you can take over that room instead. Come on, get out of this cold.”
He didn’t answer, and eventually I realized he fell asleep, so I put my head down, closed my eyes, and did the same.
An hour before dawn, the doors crashed inside.
Police came at us from all directions, breaths steaming in the harsh glare of their portable spotlights. Outside, their car flashers lit the air with red, white, and blue spinning fast as a nightclub light.
I held a hand up to my eyes. The sudden transition from quiet sleep to loud wakefulness rocked my guts.
“Looky here!” one of the police shouted. They all wore special blue uniforms that looked more like paratroopers than street cops. They carried shotguns and walkie-talkies. “A rich lawyer’s brat with delusions of grandeur even though he sucks off pimps.”
Although a few remained with Rhinegold and I, others remained in the kitchen, banging shelves, and took the stairs two at a time, shotguns at the ready position.
One pointed at me with toe of a shiny black calf-height boot. “This one probably munches Ami’s muff. Think we ought to alert the Health Department about the waitresses Arkady hires?”
I tried to hold my hands steady, but they just quivered together, along with my knees and my chin. The flashing lights made my head feel as though they put my brain in a hoop and were rolling it down the street with a stick. I nearly vomited from the dizziness.
A police officer wearing a uniform jacket and hat muttered about “not needing that kind of trouble.” He pulled out a piece of paper and read a declaration that he and his unit were removing vagrants from the house in pursuance with a court order at the request of the property’s lawful owner, blah blah blah.
Rhinegold simply sat with his arms over his head, not saying anything. I wanted to scream. I wanted to lose all control and run away. But just followed his lead.
One cop pointed to me, and asked Rhinegold. “Is it how she moves? It for sure isn’t her tits or her ass. Or do you pretend to be the wife?”
The officer in charge told him, “Knock it off.” He nudged Rhinegold. “What you say, boy? We charge you and your girlfriend? Trespassing. Destroying property. That gun in your pack.”
“It’s registered.”
“Got a concealed carry permit for when you’re walking around protecting the peasants and whores, Golden Knight?”
“Give us a break,” Rhinegold said. “We weren’t hurting anybody.”
“How easy would it be to find some rocks of crack?”
“You know I hate drugs.”
“Sure—you’re a hotshot vigilante.”
“If you guys would clean up the scum—”
“Your father’s buddies put back on the streets faster than we can finish the paperwork.”
“Ordinary people wouldn’t need me to protect them.”
“We’re not vagrants,” I said. I dug out my lease. “We move in to a room tomorrow. I mean, today. I just have to go to the bank first.”
The officer in charge studied the lease using the million candlepower torch. You stared at me. “You SeeJai?”
“That’s right, officer.”
“Funny way to spell a name.”
“My mother did that.”
“I don’t see no slime ball lawyer’s bastard on here.”
“As you apparently know, he doesn’t have a source of income the landlord could verify.”
“Two minutes,” the officer in charge said. “You and Ms. Cutie Pie get your shit together and be on the public street inside two minutes or we haul you in.”
After pulling on my boots and coat, I grabbed some blankets and a few cans of SpaghettiOs.
Rhinegold carried his sleeping bag and a few odds and ends, and before the two minutes ended, we headed up the street. By dawn, we reached McDonald’s, and ordered breakfast.
As he ate an Egg McMuffin, Rhinegold asked, “You can move in as soon as you give your landlord a certified check for the security deposit?”
“So we just have to wait for the Bank of America down the street to open up at eight-thirty.”
He nodded, swallowed. “Good timing.”
“I promised that policeman you’d move in with me. I don’t want t
o break a promise.”
“It’s only temporary.”
I gulped, because I realized him living with me in an apartment I rented felt the exact opposite as me living with him in a condemned house he occupied—even though he didn’t own or rent it, had no legal right to remain there, even.
I no longer felt so grateful. I still appreciated everything he did, but without me he’d now be wandering the residential streets with a sleeping bag under his arm, looking for another condemned house.
I no longer felt obliged to spread my legs for him, if he wanted me.
Didn’t even want him anymore. I swear, I didn’t. Maybe last night—all right, every night I spent with him—daydreaming about him made my juices flow. But not anymore.
“And, you know, it’s only friendly. We’re only friends, right?”
To my shock, he leaned over the small bright yellow table and aimed his lips at mine.
At the last minute, I turned my face. “Just friends, right?”
Rhinegold grabbed my hand, then pressed my fingers to his lips.
“Whatever you say. Just friends.”
JaeSea 2
Dear JaeSea,
I owe you the credit, right?
Or God. Or my guardian angel. Or Fate.
Whatever, I’m grateful.
I don’t know, it’s all so confusing. But I asked you for help, and you delivered.
The night I tried walking the Red Line, but froze my tailbone off in an ice storm instead, a tall, wild dude named Rhinegold saved me.
And my old buddy Areetha came through by helping convince her boss Arkady to hire me as a waitress. Can’t ever forget Areetha.
I’m not only working, I rented my own little room. Furniture and heat included.
What’s really nuts, is Rhinegold. I can tell he likes me, can’t stop helping me. Won’t stop protecting me on the street. Warned me about the two pimps, Greco and Ami. Says he’s my knight. I’m his lady fair, like we’re in the Middle freaking Ages.
And he won’t sleep with me. Is that because he loves me too much or too little? I can’t even figure normal dudes out, and Rhinegold is anything but normal. He acts content to sleep on my floor while I lie in the narrow single bed.