by S. R. Grey
Did the court-appointed psychiatrists overprescribe medications, turning me into a zombie who had no way of comprehending the charges I so willingly pled to? Yeah, pretty much.
And that was just the start.
I never would have expected it, but Mr. Big Shot Attorney turned out to be not just a good lawyer, but also a good guy. I slowly grew to trust him. When the time came, he argued my case before the judge, insisting I’d been railroaded. He spread out all the documentation, presented the evidence. He was nothing if not thorough. And when all was said and done, the judge agreed. My six-year sentence was commuted to time served. I couldn’t believe it. I was a free man. Finally, I could go home. Unfortunately, I had no home to go to.
I’d already decided—even before I was released—if I got out of prison I wasn’t going back to Vegas. There were just too many memories there, most of them bad, some of them sadder than fuck. So no, I had no desire to return to the town that had broken me.
My mother, who had no idea I’d already made up my mind, gently suggested I give Vegas another try on the day she visited with my brother. It was the morning of my court date.
At the courthouse, while we all waited in a holding cell in the courthouse, she said, “We have a big house out there in the desert, Chase. There’s plenty of space. I can decorate a room for you any way you’d like.”
It was a sweet sentiment, but it was about seven years too late. I had needed a mom who was interested in stuff like decorating and taking care of her wayward son right after Dad died. But what can you do? Mom was more into gambling, not nurturing, back then.
I didn’t go into my real reasons for not wanting to go back to Sin City. I just told Mom, “Thanks, but no thanks.”
It was ultimately Greg’s home she was inviting me into, and her new husband had already done enough for me. Despite all we’d been through over the years, it was still great seeing my mother. She may piss me off, but I’ll always love her. She looked so fantastic at the courthouse that day, healthy and together, no more vices. No more gambling, no more smoking. Although I could have sworn I smelled smoke on her clothes. But Greg had definitely gotten her help for her gambling addiction, and she assured me she’d stopped going to the casinos months ago.
I begrudgingly conceded to her that Greg was an okay dude, better than all the rest of the guys who had never cared what my mother did in her spare time. I guess I missed my mom more than I’d realized. I actually got a little misty-eyed when I first saw her that day at the courthouse. Maybe she missed me too. Lord knows she sure held on to me for a small eternity when I gave her a hug.
“I love you, Chase,” she told me in a strangled voice as she struggled to hold back tears. “I’m so sorry all this happened to you, baby. I wish we could go back in time. I’d do things so differently.”
No, you wouldn’t, I thought.
But it didn’t matter, and it doesn’t now either. And though I couldn’t say it back that morning, I think she knows I love her. She is my mother, after all. She’s far from perfect, but she’s the only parent I have left. And I’ve lost too much time these past few years to waste any more of it being bitter.
Will, who’d accompanied Mom to the courthouse, stood quietly in the corner of the holding cell that day, eyeing me warily throughout the whole exchange with our mom. I couldn’t believe how tall he’d gotten. But he is almost fifteen now. He’s a good-looking kid, favors Mom a lot. His hair is dark blond, same shade as hers. His eyes are also the same vivid green. A color that never fails to remind me of freshly unfurled spring leaves.
“Give your brother a hug, Will,” my mom said when she was finally done hugging me.
“Do I have to?” he asked, hurt and betrayal evident behind the hard stare he leveled my way.
“Of course not, buddy,” I cut in, not wanting to push.
The look of venom I received in return cut to the quick. “I am not your buddy,” Will hissed, “not anymore. Not ever again.”
Fuck, his words hurt like hell, still do. But he has every reason to hate me. I let my baby brother down. I disappointed a kid who once looked up to me like I was some kind of a hero. I am no hero, that’s for sure. It seems the only thing I excel in is disappointing the ones I love. Yet another reason why I knew that day that Vegas was most definitely out.
I wasn’t sure where I was going to go once I was released. I feared freedom would yoke me in the same way as prison. But then I got word that when my grandmother had died she left me the farmhouse out on Cold Springs Lane, all the property too, and even a little bit of money. Grandma Gartner accomplished in death what she had strived to do in life—she saved my ass. And that in and of itself would have been enough, but she’d also miraculously managed to convince Father Maridale—probably as a dying wish—to have mercy on me.
Father Maridale came to see me the day I was released, once everything was official and I was truly free. He urged me to come home to Harmony Creek and move back into the farmhouse. It didn’t take too much convincing, I’d just found out the house now belonged to me.
I guess I could have sold it and moved anywhere. I may have chosen that path in the past. But when I considered it, for a few brief seconds, it just didn’t feel right. I hadn’t seen the farmhouse in almost four years, but all I could do was sit and wonder if the frame exterior was still the same antique white color I’d painted it one September. Would the shutters still be blue, blue as a country twilight sky? I needed to know, it seemed more than important. Everything in my soul told me it was time to go back.
I did have a home, and it was time to go to it.
Father Maridale must have seen in my eyes that I was going home to Harmony Creek. He immediately offered me a job with the church, painting, fixing things, taking care of some carpentry work. “Can you do that kind of stuff?” he asked.
I nodded.
“The school needs a lot of work too,” he continued. “And summer will be here soon. The school is right next to the church, maybe you remember?” I didn’t have time to answer; he kept right on going, seemingly thrilled to have someone get started as soon as possible. “Another month and the kids will be on break. You can start over there then. A lot of the rooms need painting, and there’s stuff in the gymnasium that needs repairing, too. But until June gets here there’s plenty to keep you busy at the church and in the rectory.”
My grandmother must have told Father Maridale about my sketches, because he asked to see my work. I was afraid to show him at first, knowing that what my sketchbook contained was a reflection of my life in prison, and the terrible things I’d seen. Needless to say, none of the drawings were virtuous…or particularly clean.
I sketched things like charcoal renderings of bloodied men, beaten inmates, examples of how power is exerted in prison. There’s one particularly detailed drawing in my sketchbook of a broken man lying on the floor of his cell, his bones are jutting through his skin. He’s in pain and close to dying. His cell mate stands at the bars, smoking a cigarette, indifferent. It’s a depiction of something that really happened, something I actually witnessed.
There’s another sketch in my book, done in oil pastels. It’s of an inmate shooting up. The soft, muted colors contrast so perfectly with the vulgarity of the subject matter. It’s more than just a picture of a man jamming a needle into his vein. I saw scenes like that every day, so with this sketch I took artistic liberties.
The cell walls around this chemically blissed-out inmate are peeling back, revealing five beautiful angels with halos and harps. But the angels are naked, their poses pornographic. And the caption, scrolled on a cloud, reads: simply heaven.
I fully expected Father Maridale to throw the sketchbook in my face and condemn me to hell. Rescind his job offer, for sure.
But he did none of those things. Instead, he told me I had a gift from God. He said art was subjective, so he’d not offer an opinion on the subject matter. But he did say he’d prefer to see me use my talent to do things like touch up the Hol
y Trinity fresco in the church, and maybe paint a nice mural over in the school.
“But nothing like that,” he joked, nodding to the sketchbook as he handed it back.
“Of course not, Father,” I replied, appalled he’d even joke about such a thing.
He asked me again if I wanted the job, and this time I said, “Yes, absolutely. I promise you I’ll give it my best shot.”
I then thanked him for giving me a chance.
“Don’t disappoint me,” he warned when he stood to leave.
“I won’t.”
They say you can’t go home again, but here I am. Back where I started. Oh, and the farmhouse, you may ask. It’s still antique white. The shutters? Still country twilight blue. When I first walked up the wide porch steps, four years of my life gone forever, it took everything I had to hold it together. Never again, I thought. Now that I’m out—devouring every day and feasting on freedom—I can never go back. I would die first. And that’s why keeping my life on track is so fucking important.
The rain picks up as I round a bend, the truck swings out. I slow it down a bit. All this reminiscing has me pressing my foot to the gas, harder than necessary.
The stone bell tower and the wooden cross atop the slate steeple of the church come into view. I’ve almost reached my destination.
As I turn the wipers up a notch, my heart rate increases, in tandem with the blades. Swish, swish. Beat, beat. Along with my in-synch heart rate, images from last night start to flip through my head, like grainy cells of film.
Missy’s hand migrating to my thigh…flip…
Missy slowly turning toward me, smiling like the proverbial fox in a henhouse…flip…
And then I see why.
Missy, the devil in disguise, tilts her open purse my way…flip…
I see what she wants to me to see. How can I miss it? A little plastic packet nestled in the bottom, half-filled with white powder…fucking flip…
“Want some?” Missy asked, nodding to the cocaine in her bag.
That shit still calls to me—and last night was no exception—even though I haven’t touched it in years. But if I do it once it will only lead to more. There is nothing to stop me. I don’t know if any of my new reasons for being are strong enough to quell the demon that lurks just underneath, waiting. I can’t let that monster loose, not ever again.
I scrubbed my hand down my face. Get it together, Chase, I said to myself.
To Missy, I said, “It’s probably not a good idea.”
“Suit yourself,” she replied with a shrug, snapping her bag shut and wiping at her nose.
Missy leaned in close. She slid her hand up my thigh, and whispered, “A bad boy like you…” She squeezed and trailed higher. “I thought you’d be more fun.”
I chuckled a little and lifted my beer. “Sorry to disappoint,” I muttered into the neck of the bottle.
With one hand closing in on my cock, Missy used her other hand to take the straw out of her drink. She licked it suggestively. “The night’s not over yet, Chase,” she purred, tapping the straw against her lower lip.
Drugs were out, but Missy was clearly offering something I could indulge in. It had been a long time since I’d been with a woman. The guards would occasionally sneak prostitutes in, and for the right price you could spend twenty minutes in a locked visitation room with one. The public has no idea of the intricate bartering system that exists in every correctional facility across the land. There’s always a black market where you can obtain almost anything you desire, and the prison I was in was no exception. Almost anything can be bought or sold, and everyone has a price. During the time I served I tried to limit my interactions with the women of the night, but a man has needs. So I occasionally paid the going rate for a condom and a blow job. And sometimes, when head just wasn’t enough, I bought a condom and a fuck.
The lure of the coke in Missy’s bag had left me edgy; I needed some kind of a release. And she was obviously more than willing.
Missy’s glass was empty, so I tipped back my beer, drank down the rest. “You want to get out of here?” I asked, setting the empty bottle back on the bar.
She nodded and her smile widened. I threw a few bills on the bar, then steered Missy through the crowd to the employee exit in the back.
“Should we stop in there?” she asked, jerking her chin in the direction of the restrooms.
I didn’t have any protection on me—and apparently neither did she—but I wasn’t sure if I really wanted to stick my dick in Missy Metzger anyway. Those glitter-coated lips promised to be more than enough for me, so I shook my head and continued to the door.
But then, when we stepped out into the alley, I almost called the whole thing off. Nasty-smelling drain water dripped by the door, and the alley itself was a noxious mixture of piss and vomit.
Why am I doing this? I wondered.
But then Missy put her hand on my crotch and started rubbing my dick through my jeans. Seedy surroundings were all but forgotten.
Snaking a hand up under my T-shirt, Missy scraped her nails across my abs. “Damn, Chase,” she squealed, bouncing up and down on her heels. “You feel so good. I can’t believe we’re doing this.”
Believe it, sweetheart. I rolled her top up until the material bunched over her hot pink bra. I skimmed my hands back down her chest, grazing nipples through sheer. Light, so light, I touched her softly, but then I reminded myself Missy wasn’t a fragile kind of girl, like Hot Chick seemed to be. So I changed it up—grasping and pinching her flesh, and handling her roughly as I whispered filthy things in her ear.
Missy trembled against me, like she was enjoying what I was doing and loving the things I was saying.
“Yes, Chase, yeah,” she moaned, dragging my hand down to panties that were already soaked through. “Please…”
My hand hovered. “Please what, Missy?”
She moaned and quickly shoved the damp material aside. “Touch me,” she begged.
But I had other ideas. I told her to touch herself instead and let me watch. She did as I asked, and I eventually joined her. Missy got fucked with four fingers—two of hers and two of mine—until she came.
She collapsed against me after her release, breathing heavily. Once she recovered, she tried to kiss me. I had no desire to comply, but I begrudgingly allowed her lips to pass over mine so I didn’t come off as a total prick.
But when I tried to turn my head covertly she caught my lower lip with her teeth and bit down lightly. “Don’t move,” she whispered, giggling.
I figured the best way to keep her from kissing me was to get her off again. Since my fingers were still in her pussy, I started jacking her off. She’d removed her own fingers so I added more of my own. Missy’s breathing quickened as she groaned and grunted, soaking my whole hand. Within minutes, I felt her spasm once more.
I removed my hand from Missy’s crotch. Her face was still near mine and she tried to kiss me again. This time, I allowed her, which was probably a mistake, since I immediately tasted something bitter.
Fuck.
I knew right away what that chemical taste was—residue from the cocaine she’d snorted earlier. And sick as it was that bitterness made me crave the coke I knew she had in her bag. I suddenly wanted white powder more than I wanted any part of Missy’s body.
A long-dormant voice in my head piped up, she’s already offered to share. I’m sure the offer still stands, especially since you just got her off…twice. Ask her, ask her, go ahead and ask her now.
But no, just no, I needed to get the fuck away from temptation.
I buried my face in Missy’s neck to escape her lips, her coke-tainted mouth. But still, all I could think about was that white powder, and how it used to make me feel—invincible, uncaring, an attitude of fuck the world.
What would one little bump hurt?
Maybe a little more would even be okay. Maybe it’d be enough to stop caring about the past four years and the things I’ve done. Hell, maybe it’
d be enough to stop caring about judgmental people staring back at you; maybe it’d be enough to forget about a brother who hates you so much that he can’t remember he used to love you more than life itself.
So, yeah, I opened my mouth, intent on asking for something that could take away the pain. Or at least mute it.
But then I remembered how quickly things can spiral out of control, how one little bump often leads to one big, fat line. More and more, since one is never, ever enough, either.
Everyone has a dark side, but mine has the power to consume me. You hear about not starting down a certain path, and maybe you wonder what exactly that shit means. I used to myself, wonder, that is, once upon a time. But now I know. I’ve been there, done that.
And here’s exactly how it goes…
The path is dark, black and twisting, the unknown.
But it’s also alluring. It beckons your soul.
It calls to you, whispering seductively.
It’s good at convincing, so you take one tentative step.
You hold your breath and wait and wait for the world to fall apart.
But nothing happens.
In fact, it feels kind of good to say, “Fuck it. Who cares?”
Scream it, the path whispers. So you do.
And then you push further…you take another step…then another.
Still cool, baby, see? And don’t you feel good?
Sure you do. You feel fucking invincible.
So what the hell, what’s one more? Make that a few more.
And then…
The fucking bottom falls out.
And, shit, you’re tumbling down hills, crashing into boulders, searching for something—anything—to grab on to.
But you’re on your own, baby. It was all one big lie.
And you fall.
Down, down low, until you wake up.
And when you do you’re battered and bloodied at the bottom, surrounded by rubble from the destruction you wrought.
Your life—that shit’s completely ruined.
And there I was last night, about to walk right off the edge…again.
That was me as I felt for the wall behind me, leaned back against the bricks, and closed my eyes. I just wanted to get out of that shitty alley, away from the fucking demon in Missy’s purse, away from Missy.