These Things About Us

by Laura Beege

  “She finally found the time to pick up, what a surprise.”

  My stomach fell to the floor. “Dad?”

  “Happy Birthday, Antonia.”

  He’d never been one to remember dates. Him even acknowledging I turned eighteen this month was out of the ordinary, but it was not what bothered me about his phone call. “How did you get this number?”

  “You know I have my ways, kid.”

  “Tony?” Wes took two tentative steps into the room. I was about to shoo him off when he held up a couple of tissues.

  “Who’s with you, Antonia?”

  I felt a warm drop hit my lower lip and when I wiped it off, my finger came back smudged with blood.

  “A friend,” I answered and took the tissues from Wesley. He must have seen my nose bleed when I ran out of the bathroom. As long as the blood helped washing away the drug traces, I had no problem shedding it.

  “I don’t like talking to you when there are people in the room.” Even now, stuck in prison, my father sounded like the solid all-business man he was, still unbroken. I hated that. I hated him for being that strong, when he had broken me in so many ways.

  I wiped the blood off my face and tried my best to mimic his cold tone. “Well, you’re not supposed to talk to me in the first place. What do you want?”

  “Can’t I call my daughter without motive?”

  “Dad, we both know you can’t.” I eyed Wesley who mastered a poker face while handing me another tissue.

  “I want to know how you are doing, where you are now. I’m just checking up on you.”

  “I have other things to do than catching up with you.”

  “Talk to me kid, don’t freeze me out.”

  “I have to go now. I bet you have your ways to find out whatever you want to know.” And before he could say anything creepy about his prison friends and their connections, I hung up on him.

  I hadn’t heard my father’s voice in almost a year. Not his real voice. There was always the echo stuck in my head but it wasn’t as bad as hearing him in person. Knowing he’s alive and probably doing great in his tiny cell was a kick in the stomach. I’d hoped they’d show him he was not as invincible, but maybe he was. I had yet to see the day he wasn’t wearing a smug smile. No, actually, I never wanted to see that. I never wanted to see him again.

  “Tony?”

  I jumped at Wesley’s voice. He hadn’t left yet.

  “Yeah?”

  “You should sit down, put your head back. Come on, I’ll get you some ice.”

  He didn’t ask intrusive questions. That was a first. He just led me to my bed and gave me the pack of tissues, before taking off and running down the stairs. Tilting my head back, I tried not to think about my father but failed miserably.

  I have my ways.

  I should have known that I couldn’t run away and pretend he didn’t still have a couple of puppets at the ends of his strings. Of course that asshole would always find a way to reach me. I just hoped he didn’t figure out that I was looking for Mom. He’d move heaven and earth to make sure I was still his and that he was, after all, still the winner in this parenting battle even if I was lawfully an adult.

  “One big ice delivery for one Antonia Ainsley. Is that you, miss?” Wesley wore a great, big grin, unaware of how much I despised my name.

  “Unfortunately, yes.”

  “So your Dad’s a wally, huh?” He placed the icepack on the bridge of my nose, folding the corners away from my eyes.

  “Uhm…”

  “An idiot.”

  “He’s an asshole, but a really smart one, not an idiot.” Talking to Wesley about him wasn’t going help with my peace of mind, maybe even the contrary. The second everyone figured out that they had a big-time criminal’s daughter under their roof they started acting super weird or kicked me out, most of the time both. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure.” Wes fell onto the bed next to me.

  It was time to save the situation with a topic change. “When I left early yesterday, I went to this party and Trace was there, too. He was kind of drunk and…” Only at the sight of Wesley’s raised eyebrows, did it occur to me that maybe I shouldn’t give him the scoop on what happened. I kept Wesley’s secret safe. If Trace was in the closet about being a hug-aholic, it was wrong to tell on him.

  “And…?”

  “Why do women even like him? He’s the biggest douche. I mean, even for a one night stand… If a girl came into the bar and just saw the both of you, you’d be the much healthier choice, you know… if you weren’t gay, which the girl wouldn’t know at first sight. But they swarm to him like moths to the light.”

  “I’m not sure if you hid a compliment in there, but to answer your question: Very few women want healthy, Tony. If they can choose between a healthy, boring carrot stick and an exciting box of chocolates, they’ll go for the chocolates.”

  “You’re not a boring carrot stick.” He couldn’t think that of himself, right? I didn’t want Wesley thinking he was boring. Compared to a sociopath everybody would pale. “You’re genuinely nice, and you’re caring and you’re a terrible singer when it comes to Hispanic songs. And that’s way better than chocolate, which melts away if you try to hold onto it and you’re left with a giant mess.”

  “You forgot that I’m an amazing football player.”

  “See, it just gets better and better.”

  He stood up, only the faint trace of a smile on his lips. I was desperate to widen that smile since my question seemed to have thrown him off. He had no reason to be jealous of Trace or the fact that women apparently dug his bad boy streak.

  “I’d choose you over him any day,” I said and tried to smile at him from under the ice pack and tissues.

  Wes chuckled. “Don’t let him hear that.”

  “He can surely deal with one woman not throwing herself at his feet.”

  “Are you going to be okay here? I have to get to class.”

  “Yes, sure. A little nose bleed won’t kill me. Thanks for helping out.”

  Wes bowed down to kiss my forehead, but with both my hands clutching my face, he had to settle for an air kiss next to my head and then I was left on my bed with nothing to do but let my thoughts run wild. It didn’t take long for the nose bleed to die down, but it was long enough for me to replay my father’s call in my head about three times. I hadn’t exactly found out why he’d called. My best guess was that he was somehow trying to regain his control outside of jail. And who would be easier to control than his own flesh and blood?

  Except, I was not planning on ever caving in to him again. He could call his friends and henchmen, not me. I wasn‘t part of his lifestyle anymore.

  Nine

  That night the pub was hauntingly empty. A couple sat in the corner having hushed conversations over their drinks, Jean lounged by the payphone like every other day and Trace sat on the wrong side of the bar, hunched over a notebook. Unfortunately, the emptiness didn’t take over my brain. My father’s stale voice had clawed itself into my mind until it was a constant loop of old memories mixing with the call from earlier and I couldn’t tell the sentences apart anymore. The words were racing through my head.

  You don’t stand down. I have my ways. Fear is weakness, Antonia. Why don’t you show your old man what Mitch taught you? You’re special. I’m just checking up on you. You and I, kid, we stick together. Family is forever.

  I had to find something, anything to occupy my thoughts. There had to be a way to shut Dad out of my mind. Leaning against the counter, I tried to peek at what Trace was scribbling down. The text was structured in neat blocks with arrows and notes at the sides. “Are you writing a song?”

  Trace’s head jerked up after being so sunk into his words he hadn’t even noticed me sneaking up on him. “What’s it to you?”

  Good, he was being pissy. That meant being nice to him required so much more concentration. “I’m just curious. I think it’s cool.”

  “Cool?”
<
br />   “Yes. I’ve never actually seen someone create something just like that, you know. A couple of minutes ago there was nothing there but then you came with your thoughts and ideas and now there’s a new piece of art in this world. You just made something. I think that’s pretty cool.”

  Trace studied his song for a couple of moments before he found me with his gaze and squinted his eyes at my face. “What happened to your nose?”

  “What?” My hands flew up to cover my face. I had triple-checked the mirror. My nose looked fine. I’d put on some extra makeup to hide the red blotches but it wasn’t crusted in blood anymore, let alone swollen.

  “I saw you washing the blood off.”

  “Oh.” That had been hours ago. I’d grabbed my bag and went to buy a charger for the camera afterwards but I couldn’t recall seeing Trace out in the hallway. “I just had a nose bleed.”

  His eyebrows arched. “Do you get them often?”

  “No, actually it was because I got some shampoo… Hold on!” That sneaky little bastard. How foolish of me to think he had a drop of compassion in his body. “We were just talking about your song. You’re not changing the topic, buddy.”

  “You caught me,” he grinned and it almost sounded like he was proud… of me? Surely my ears were mishearing things. “What do you know about music?” Trace leaned on the counter and spun the notebook around, so I could catch a good look at his smeared, unreadable handwriting.

  “Uhm… it comes on CDs or as MP3s and you can listen to it.” I shrugged my shoulders, unsure what else to say. I’d never developed some sort of preference for a certain kind of music or a specific artist. Music was always merely background noise for me and I started to feel bad about it now that I knew someone who was genuinely interested in it. It seemed wrong to discard something so easily if it was important to someone else.

  “So you don’t think this is music? Because you can’t put it on your IPod?”

  “To be honest, if you sang it or played it, it could be music but right now these,” I tapped the paper, “are just words on paper. And they’re so messy I can’t even read them.”

  “Probably better this way.” He smacked the notebook shut and slid it out of reach to the end of the bar. “We wouldn’t want you thinking I’m a misunderstood, depressed asshole writing silly love songs about girls I used to know.”

  “Don’t worry, I figured you’re not a serenading Romeo kind of guy,” I replied while I fixed myself a glass of cold water.

  “Tell me, then.” Trace leaned over the counter and I got a whiff of that dark scent surrounding him that I’d noticed before. He shouldn’t be allowed to smell this nice. Scratching the back of my nose, I tried to find traces of my perfume left on the sleeve of my dress. It was all kinds of screwed up to think of how good Trace smelled. Maybe that was his secret to getting that many girls to sleep with him. “What kind of guy am I?” His hand folded around my glass of water and a moment later he’d emptied it.

  “That was mine. Apparently you’re a thief.”

  “No, that’s you.” He sank back into his seat and let the glass clink against the counter. “We were talking about what you think of me.”

  “Okay. You asked for it. I think you’re weird, infuriating, possibly a sex-addict, aggressive and violent.” I snatched the glass from him and filled it again, this time not putting it down but drinking up right away.

  “I’m not a sex-addict.”

  “Seriously, that’s what you’re going to deny? I’ve lost count of how many times your girlfriends woke me up.”

  “I told you before that I can’t sleep. When I don’t have any sleeping pills left, or I don’t want to be completely out for hours, sex is the easiest way to get exhausted. Most of the time, it’s just a means to an end. I’m not addicted to it.”

  “You’re using women as sleeping pills, wow, add misogynist to the list.” I was losing hold of my ‘be nice to Trace’ rope, but he was just pushing too many buttons to not let myself get worked up.

  “I like women, Kitty. They know that all they’re getting from me is sex. They get what they want, I get what I want. Quid pro quo.”

  “That’s-” My answer was interrupted by the office door smashing into its frame and Alex charging past the bar and out of the pub. That didn’t look good. Just as I was about to ask Trace for answers, he shrugged as if having read my mind.

  Deciding that it was best to drop our conversation before something stupid happened, I busied myself with cleaning glasses that were already sparkling and ordering the stack of CDs alphabetically. After the couple left and Jean headed back upstairs to his room, Trace decided it would be okay to close up early.

  “So, do you plan on taking your pills tonight?”

  “Kitty, no part of my body thinks you’re hot in case that’s your way to beg for a fuck.”

  I rolled my eyes and started upstairs. “That was my way of asking if I’m going need earplugs tonight.”

  Trace sighed right behind me. Even my way of taking steps probably displeased him. Only when we’d arrived on our floor he said, “No earplugs.”

  “Okay. Thanks,” I said and went for my room. I still caught Trace’s confused look, but I left it at that. I had no desire to get into another discussion.

  With the camera now fully charged, I spent the next few days running around London taking pictures of the most touristy things I could think of. I went to the palace and watched the change of guards and tried to spot anything behind one of the dozens of windows. On the London Bridge, I asked strangers to take pictures of me. Tuesday night I went to see the London eye all sparkling with blue lights and Big Ben just across the Thames from it in all its beauty. I’d expected it to be taller, but this way it was easier to fit into just one photograph without losing any detail. However, with my new hobby taking up all my time – and thankfully all my thoughts - I kind of totally forgot that I should do my laundry someday and by Sunday I was out of proper clean clothes.

  You could only wear a shirt so many times until it started to feel icky. Holding up my only two options, a black tank I hadn’t worn yet or a yellow blouse I hardly ever wore, I mentally weighed their pros and contras against each other. In the end it came down to a very simple comparison: The black shirt exposed my shoulders, the yellow blouse would hitch up all through the night and expose my belly on various accounts. I’d go with the black shirt.

  Including my ripped jeans, the outfit made me look more badass than I felt comfortable with. As long as I could have my hair down as an extra cover for my shoulders, I’d survive the night.

  “Hi, Darling!” Sierra greeted me with a peck on the cheek while she was already wrapping her apron around her waist. “Aren’t you a sexy little kitten? Are you trying to impress someone?”

  I didn’t feel sexy. I felt naked. “Nope. It’s laundry day. I’m wearing my last clean clothes,” I said and brushed my fingers through my hair but without mirror it was indefinitely harder to keep it in place.

  “You should do laundry day more often. Who knew you had tits?”

  “I knew. Actually, I see them every day, and there’s no one else who has to know about them,” I answered, glad that Wesley was standing next to me, not Trace. He’d said he didn’t think I was hot, but I had yet to encounter the straight man whose eyes didn’t travel south at the mention of breasts.

  “You have a tattoo.” Oh, God. Speak of the devil. He stood right behind me and I knew with certainty that he was not interested in my boobs. He was staring at the ink crawling out beneath my top. I tried not to stiffen, not to move my shoulders under his observation, because it would draw even more attention to the tattoo. Sierra moved back to check it out, too, whistling her approval.

  “Yes,” I said as firmly as I could manage, “You didn’t think you were the only person who could get one, did you?”

  “What is it?” he asked instead of answering me.

  “It’s none of your business.” There was so much about the tattoo that I hated. I
hated the original intention behind the picture, I hated the year it reminded me of and I hated who I was when I had it made. Still, I had never made plans to get it removed. It was my constant reminder to be better than the girl who walked into the tattoo parlor with a fake ID.

  “Is it the only one?”

  “Trace,” I warned, glancing back over my shoulder. His eyes were trained on my back, as if the tattoo would shine through the black fabric if he stared long enough. Sierra had already moved on to picking a CD.

  “Answer one question. Only one.”

  “Fine, will you shut up about it then?”

  “Yes. How big is it?”

  I sighed and arched my back until I could reach a hand around and feel for the knobbly vertebra beneath my neck. With the other hand, I located the two dimples above my tailbone.

  “That’s your whole bloody back.”

  “I know.”

  “Are those feathers?”

  I spun around, turning my back towards Wesley who undoubtedly was staring at the ink just the same. He was just much more polite about it than his brother. “One question. That’s it. Enough.”

  He held up his hands. “Okay, you don’t like talking about the tattoo.” Too early, a breath of relief escaped my lungs. “Then let me see it.”

  I should have just gone for the yellow blouse. If I had tied the apron tight enough, it surely would have stayed in place and I wouldn’t have to deal with Trace poking his finger into barely healed scars. “I am not going to take off my shirt just because you have a thing for tattoos.”

  “Okay, fine. Wesley, you saw her naked. What is it?”

  “Can’t you just let it go?” I shrieked way too loud and stalked straight for the stairs. I was going to change clothes. I didn’t care if I was going to smell like two-week-old sweat as long as every bit of skin was going to be covered up. I brushed past one of the guests on the stairs and ran straight for my suitcase as soon as I reached the top floor.

  I needed a shirt or at least a cardigan. God, why did I have so very few long-sleeved clothes? I knew the blue hoodie that swallowed me whole was somewhere in my suitcase. I rummaged through my stuff, letting out a frustrated sigh when I couldn’t find it.