Always You

by Roxie Noir

  “You’re healing nicely,” she says as she peels away the bandage still stuck to me. “The blisters have really gone down. Hard to say how much scarring there might be, but it probably won’t be too significant.”

  Scarring. I hadn’t really even considered that yet, I’d just been worried about being able to move and do stuff again.

  “I’ve got a good nurse,” I say, nodding toward Trent.

  “I can see that,” the doctor says. “Any numbness or tingling? Any fever or joint pain?”

  “Nothing,” I say.

  She cleans the wound off carefully and wraps me up again. Now Trent’s leaning forward in his chair, elbows on his knees, paying close attention to what she’s doing, asking her a few questions.

  Finally, she turns me around and touches my bruised eye gently with two fingers, prodding it slightly like she’s testing it.

  “No impaired vision?” she asks.

  I shake my head, and she looks over at Trent, who’s still sitting in the chair.

  “Would you mind giving us a moment alone?” the doctor asks.

  Trent frowns slightly, but he gets up. I nod at him that it’s fine, and he opens the door.

  “I’ll be in the waiting area,” he says, and shuts it behind him.

  “He doesn’t like hospitals or doctors,” I say. “Bad memories.”

  She nods.

  “One of the things I’m trained to screen for is intimate partner violence,” she says softly. “Particularly with injuries like yours, so do you mind if I ask how you got these?”

  I almost laugh, and I almost tell her that Trent’s not my intimate partner, just my friend, but I don’t do either, because I don’t mind some people thinking Trent’s my boyfriend, even when they’re asking if he hits me.

  “I got lit on fire by a stray firework,” I tell her, and explain the whole story. I know that it must be in my chart somewhere, and she must know about the bass player who was on fire, but I definitely made the Tallwood news.

  But I think she wants confirmation from me, so I tell the story again. I do it clinically, trying to sound detached.

  Like I don’t remember that Trent saved my life, or that he held my hand in those seconds before help was there. Like I don’t sometimes fall asleep thinking about Trent staying with me like that, being there for me in one of the worst moments of my life.

  “There’s video of it,” I finish, and pause. “It wasn’t Trent. He’s never touched me.”

  The doctor just nods. I still don’t tell her he’s not my boyfriend, because it’s oddly thrilling that someone thinks he is.

  “Double-checking is part of my job,” she says. “Better safe than sorry.”

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “Just so you know, it was the nature of your injuries, not the impression I got from you two,” she says, sticking a pen through her bun. “Abusers don’t tend to be quite so genuinely concerned. They’re usually faking it.”

  I just nod. I feel horrible for Trent right now, probably sitting in the waiting room feeling miserable that he’s here at all, not to mention the doctor just asked if he’s been smacking me around.

  “I see,” I say.

  We shake hands again. She lets herself out, I put my clothes back on over the new bandage, and leave the doctor’s office. Trent’s sitting in the waiting room and we walk out into the parking lot in silence. I almost say they all think you’re my boyfriend, isn’t that funny, but at the last second I decide to keep it to myself and keep pretending.

  “It wasn’t because of you,” I finally say when we’re in the car and he’s driving out of the parking lot. “It’s because I’ve got a black eye.”

  Trent checks traffic, waits for a car to pass, and pulls out.

  “I know what it looks like,” he says. “Believe me. She did the right thing, asking me to leave.”

  There’s a long, long pause, as we drive down a curvy, tree-lined drive, Trent staring straight ahead.

  Of course he knows what it looks like, I think.

  “Thanks for coming with me,” I finally say.

  The corner of his mouth ticks up at last, and for the first time since we left for the doctor’s office, I feel better because he’s smiling.

  “Of course,” he says, then taps the steering wheel. He glances over at me, like he’s thinking, then back at the road. “You wanna go get pie?”

  “Fuck yes I wanna go get pie,” I say.

  We only found Aunt Sadie’s House of Pies two days ago, but this is at least our fourth time here. Don’t judge us. Pie’s fucking delicious. We each order slices — I get apple with cheddar cheese on it, Trent gets cherry — and eat them in one of the old-fashioned wooden booths in the back.

  “You know cheese on a pie is still wrong, right?” he asks, forking a pile of cherry into his mouth.

  “Am I judging your pie choices right now?”

  “Someone needed to tell you,” he says, shrugging.

  “I watched you put chili powder on watermelon the other day and I didn’t say a damn thing,” I point out.

  “That’s delicious.”

  “So is this!”

  “I tried it. It’s not.”

  I take another huge bite of cheese-topped apple pie and shrug at him.

  “More for me,” I say.

  “You can have it.”

  “I will.”

  Trent swallows pie, then opens his mouth to say something. Instead he frowns and pulls his phone out of his pocket. He looks at it, then at me.

  “It’s Gavin, do I answer or pretend I’m in the shower?”

  We’ve already talked to Gavin twice today, and I almost tell Trent not to answer, but the poor guy is scouting drummers all alone.

  “Be nice, answer it,” I say.

  Trent makes a face, but pushes the green button, and Gavin’s face pops up. He’s in our recording studio, chin in hand, looking tired.

  “Are you two eating pie again?” he asks.

  I stab the final bite of mine and shove it into my mouth.

  “No,” I say, flaky bits of crust spraying out of my mouth.

  “You were also eating pie the last time I called,” Gavin says.

  “That was this morning,” I say, and swallow. “We weren’t eating pie this morning.”

  “You’ve definitely eaten quite a lot of pie.”

  “Were you calling us to check on our diets?” Trent interrupts.

  Gavin leans back, sighs, covers his face with his hands, and spins around in his chair. It’s very dramatic.

  “I still haven’t got a drummer,” he says. “I’ve found at least three who could do some of the tour but not all of it since everyone’s got bands and tours and recording of their own, and finding an unattached drummer who I’d trust with this is...”

  Trent and I just nod, in unison, in the pie shop.

  “I’m still only partway through the list we brainstormed,” he says. “I’ve got meetings tomorrow with another six bloody drummers, and God knows that at least one of them is going to show up here and say tour? Oh I thought the advert said ‘snore’ and this was for a napathon so I’ve got that to look forward to as well.”

  “Let us know if we can make any calls,” I volunteer. I feel guilty just sitting up here eating pie and not helping, but there’s also not that much I can do from here. One of the nice things about being a successful, famous musician is hiring people to do the messy work for you.

  Gavin waves one hand.

  “Nigel’s done all the calling,” he says. “Practically won’t even let me near the phone, something about charging in and having no tact? I don’t know what he’s on about.”

  “Me either,” I lie.

  We all know the truth, and none of us is saying it out loud: until this time last year, Gavin was way more concerned about where his next fix was coming from than the logistics of a tour. There are plenty of people who wouldn’t bother answering his calls.

  “How’s your back?” Gavin asks.

&n
bsp; We chat for a few more minutes, giving Gavin the updates and the good news, even though there isn’t a whole lot to talk about. Trent and I have started watching those dumb ghost hunter-type reality shows, but that’s not the sort of thing you brag about.

  That’s the sort of thing that you keep secret with your best friend, because you know it’s kind of a stupid thing to do.

  “I ought to get home,” Gavin finally says. “Since I’m unexpectedly in Los Angeles, I’ve been roped into some sort of corporate law firm event with Marisol and I think I’ve got to wear a suit and everything.”

  “Do you own a suit?” I ask.

  I’ve sure never seen him in it. Gavin’s good looking, I’d remember him in a suit.

  “I’ll have you know I own two suits,” Gavin says, grinning.

  Trent looks at me.

  “We’ve lost him,” he says, very seriously.

  “First it’s suits, then he’ll be wanting to put synthesizer in all our songs,” I say. “Maybe we should also just quit the band while we’re ahead.”

  Gavin points at the camera.

  “That’s not bloody funny,” he says, and the three of us laugh.

  When we hang up, Trent leans back in the booth opposite me, hands on his head.

  I look at my pie plate, smashing the crumbs between the tines of my fork, and try not to notice how it pulls his shirt tight against his chest, or how I can see every muscle in both his thick arms when he does this.

  I notice nothing. Nothing.

  “I gotta pee, then you ready to head back?” he asks, sliding out of the booth.

  “Sure,” I say. It’s not like I had big plans in Tallwood today or something.

  He saunters off to the men’s room, and I do not crane my neck a little to watch him leave.

  When Trent informed me that he was sticking around to take care of me and there was nothing I could do about it, a big part of me thought that maybe, maybe, being around him so much would cure me of my dumb crush on him, but it’s done the goddamn opposite.

  Now, every time he looks at me, I wonder what he’s thinking. Whether he’s thinking the same thing as me. If we accidentally touch hands, I wonder what would happen if I held on. I wonder what would happen if I leaned against him while we watched terrible made-for-TV movies at night.

  Part of me desperately, desperately wants to try it, but what if he leaned away?

  And what if he didn’t? What if we fumbled through some make-outs, maybe even had sex a couple of times, only to find out that we just didn’t click that way? Then what?

  I can’t give Trent up. I can’t. And if keeping this means never getting to kiss him, never getting to straddle him on the couch while a stupid movie plays and—

  His phone buzzes, jolting me out of my quick fantasy. It’s still on the table, and he’s still in the bathroom, so I pick it up.

  The caller ID says COLLECT, and my stomach forms a tight ball. I’m pretty sure I know who’s calling.

  Fuck. Fuck.

  Phone in hand, I slide out of the booth and stand, peering toward the men’s bathroom. It buzzes again, but no sign of Trent.

  Shit. I don’t know what to do. I know he wouldn’t want to miss this call, but it feels really weird to just answer his phone.

  Another buzz. It’ll go to voicemail next, and Trent can’t possibly be more than another thirty seconds in the bathroom, so I think fuck it, hit the green button, and clear my throat.

  “Hello?”

  “Hello,” says an automated voice. “This is a collect call from the North Delano State Correctional Facility. Please press 1 if you’re willing to accept the charges.”

  I swallow hard, glance at the bathroom door, and wait a second. Still no Trent. I hit 1 on the keypad, palms sweaty.

  “Thank you!” the voice says, sounding way too happy about this. “You will now be connected.”

  I wait. I stare at an old-fashioned sign on the wall of Aunt Sadie’s — Farm Fresh Milk, only 5¢! — and I wait. Finally, there’s a click on the other end of the line, and a man’s voice.

  “Hey, Trent,” says a voice that sounds a lot like Trent.

  I scrunch my toes in my shoes.

  “This is Eli, right?” I ask, suddenly nervous.

  “Yeah,” he says, and pauses. “Who’s this?”

  “This is Trent’s bandmate Darcy,” I explain, still looking at the wall. “He’ll be back in a second.”

  “You answered his phone?”

  I blink at the wall.

  “Yes, obviously,” I say.

  “Damn, girl,” Eli says. “Damn.”

  There’s a long pause, because I don’t have a response for that. I’m not even sure what that means.

  “So, is he gonna be back soon, or should I call later...?”

  The men’s bathroom door opens, and Trent steps out. I wave at him like a madwoman.

  “Here he is!” I practically shout into the phone.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Trent

  Darcy’s waving at me like her car’s broken down on the side of the road and I’m the first motorist she’s seen in an hour. She’s on the phone with someone, and after a second, I realize she’s on my phone with someone.

  “Here he is!” she chirps as soon as I’m close, and doesn’t wait for a response from the other end before holding it out to me, eyes wide.

  “IT’S YOUR BROTHER,” she stage-whispers so loud that everyone in Aunt Sadie’s hears.

  Oh, fuck.

  I take the phone as the cherry pie in my stomach turns to lead, every muscle in my body tensing. Eli and I talk the second Monday of every month, and I’ve never gotten a good call from him on any other day.

  “Eli,” I say, trying to sound casual. “What’s up?”

  “They moved me up the valley,” my little brother says, his voice flat and affectless. Even though he’s sounded like this for three years now, ever since he got to prison, it’s still deeply weird.

  “Up the valley to where?” I ask, even though I’m pretty sure I already know the answer.

  “North D.”

  I turn and walk out of Aunt Sadie’s, Darcy still wide-eyed behind me, the bells on the door clanging as they smack against the door.

  “The fuck did you get moved to supermax for?” I ask, my voice rising.

  “North D ain’t supermax, it’s regular max,” Eli says. Still flat, like he’s explaining how to pour concrete.

  “Answer the question.”

  “These assholes came after me,” he starts. “I don’t know, man, I wasn’t doing nothing and out of nowhere these three fuckin’ cholos—”

  I shut my eyes, because prison hasn’t exactly made my idiot brother less racist.

  “—Come up and, you know, they start talking some shit like hey gringo, you know I like white ass-pussy—”

  “Spare me the soap opera and tell me what fucking happened.”

  There’s a pause. I can practically hear the wheels turning in Eli’s head.

  “They came for me but I had a shiv because this other guy’s been making noise about how he don’t like me, and I gotta protect myself—”

  “You stabbed someone?”

  Silence.

  “He still alive?” I ask.

  Now I’m standing on the curb, facing into the street, watching the cars go by. I feel oddly detached, because it doesn’t exactly surprise me that Eli’s gone and stabbed someone.

  Fuck, I wish it did. But I don’t think anything he does can surprise me anymore.

  “It was self-defense, man, they was comin’ at me and what was I supposed to do?”

  “Did you fucking kill someone else or not?”

  “Nah, that fuckin’ asshole is still alive, and his fuckin’ friends are all probably laughing their asses off right now, about how they started some shit and I’m the one who got caught? Fuckin’ sneaky sons of bitches, that’s the thing, in here all the Mexicans stick together and all the Blacks always stick together but the second us white me
n start sticking together, it’s—”

  “Are you getting charged?” I ask, cutting off his next racially-themed rant. “Is that why you’re calling me, so I can pay for your lawyer some more?”

  “It was fuckin’ self-defense, man, and they’re trying for assault with a deadly weapon and a couple other things, and you know all that is bullshit,” Eli says. “I got a right to defend myself. Even in here I got that. They came at me.”

  Just like that, anger flares through me, hot and black and poisonous. I have to take the phone away from my ear for a second, and I swear to God I almost pitch it into the street as hard as I fucking can.

  Nothing’s ever been Eli’s fault. Not according to him. None of the shit he did as a teenager, stealing cars to joyride or smashing up store windows just because he could, usually fucking high or drunk or both.

  When he got busted for assault and did eighteen months inside? Not his fault. He was totally being framed, according to him, because the police were out to get him. Nevermind that there was fucking security video footage.

  There was video footage during the robbery, too, the one where he held up a liquor store with his idiot buddy, probably out of their minds on meth, and Eli beat the owner with a tire iron. He died later. Eli swore the tape was tampered with somehow, and now Eli’s in prison for twenty-three more years.

  But it’s not his fault. It’s just that everyone’s out to get him. It’s always been that way.

  “Does Mom know?”

  Now I’m pacing back and forth, anything to get the anger and frustration out of my system. The bells on the door jingle and Darcy comes out, arms folded across her chest, and looks at me questioningly.

  I look away.

  “I ain’t told her yet. What’s the point?”

  “She should know where to visit you.”

  “She’s not gonna know the difference.”

  “You should still fucking tell her.”

  Eli snorts.

  “Yeah, sure,” he says. “I gotta go. North Delano. My cigarette money’s low, too, if you don’t mind.”

  “You have to be fucking kidd—”

  “Bye,” he says, and there’s a heavy click on the other end of the line. I’m left standing on the sidewalk, staring at the words CALL ENDED, my knuckles white from gripping my phone so hard.