by Drew Elyse
I turned to see my big brother there. He wasn’t supposed to be there. He was at the middle school now. He took a different bus somewhere else. He took me to the bus stop in the morning, but I had to go home by myself. It was okay, I could do it. But I missed Joel being at my school.
“How’d you get here?” I asked.
“I walked.”
I didn’t know where his school was. I didn’t know if it was far or how he knew the way.
“But won’t you be in trouble for leaving?”
He put a hand on my head and messed up my hair. He did that a lot. I always pushed him away, but I kind of liked it.
“Don’t worry about it.”
That meant he would be. Joel was always telling me not to worry about stuff.
“Come on. Let’s have some fun.”
He took me through the whole thing. We saw everything there was, except some of the real girly stuff. We were eating hot dogs and sitting on the ground later when I really noticed everyone else again.
I didn’t say anything to Joel. I didn’t want to make him feel like I did. It might have been bad, but I was glad he came to be with me. I just wished we had a normal family.
“One day, little brother, we’re gonna have that too,” he said. He knew what I was thinking. Joel always knew.
“You think?”
He took another bite of his hot dog and nodded. “Mmhmmm. We’ll find a couple pretty girls who aren’t annoying and make our own families.”
“But we’ll still have each other?” I didn’t want a girl. I just wanted my brother.
“Always,” he promised. “We’re already family. That’ll never change. We’ll just make it bigger.”
“Bigger sounds good.”
“It will be. It’ll be awesome.”
He was right. He’d found Kate. They’d made Owen.
I had my brothers and their women. A whole fucking club to call family.
But neither of us ever imagined we’d find all that and not have each other.
Always.
He’d promised. Joel had never once in my entire fucking life broken a promise he’d made me. He’d run himself ragged to give me all he could.
This promise was one it just wasn’t in his power to keep.
“Who are all dese people?”
I looked down when I heard the little voice and saw Owen standing beside me.
“These are my brothers,” I told him.
“Like you Daddy’s brother?”
Fuck. Every time he mentioned his dad, it was like a knife to the gut. He still didn’t get it, not totally. I think he was starting to understand Joel wasn’t just at work and would be home any time now, but the real permanence of it wasn’t sinking it. It was a shit situation for us all. It killed me when he brought up Joel, but it destroyed Kate. She couldn’t hack it. Every time it had happened, she’d had to dismiss herself from the room. It was easy to tell she was upset, even for Owen. Her reaction was distressing him probably as much as the fact that Joel wasn’t around.
There was no fucking version of events where I thought we’d be anywhere near making progress yet, but I didn’t expect that we’d still be on the fucking downslide. I kept waiting to slam into rock bottom. Instead, we seemed to be in a perpetual freefall.
“Kind of, buddy,” I responded, trying to keep my voice level even though I had to force the words out. “Remember I told you about the Disciples?”
“You ride mo’cycles!” he declared.
“That’s right. This is them. We don’t all have the same mom and dad like most brothers, but they’re my family anyway.”
He looked around and back to me with a little-boy contemplative look. “But me and Mommy your family.”
“Yeah, you are,” I assured him.
“They my family too?”
I tried to imagine seeing the club the way he was seeing it then, having to look up even as they all sat astride bikes at a distance. It was probably intimidating as hell, even if he hadn’t been engrained to be afraid of bikers like a lot of folks were. Joel’d ridden a Harley for years, and I’d never even owned a fucking car in the time Owen was alive, so bikes weren’t an issue. Still, that kind of crowd would be a lot for any kid.
I picked him up, holding him against my side. “Yeah, little man. They’re your family now too.”
Owen—that fucking kid—lifted his little hand in the air and offered a floppy wave to the crowd watching him. There were chuckles as the guys waved back, and he beamed.
Serious as shit, I needed to check the stats on catching feelings as a cause of death. Owen could have taken his tiny, three-year-old fist and drove it right through my fucking chest and it wouldn’t have hurt so much.
Trying to keep my shit together, I asked him, “Where’s your mom?”
“Bed.”
Like I said, we were just slipping further and further here.
Kate seemed to be harder to get out of the bed with every hour that passed. Part of it was probably the fact that the woman was exhausted. I’d lost enough sleep myself to hear her quietly crying at all fucking hours. The rest was the plain fact that she didn’t want to face any of this, and I couldn’t blame her.
All I’d wanted for days was to drown myself in whiskey and never fucking resurface.
Looking through the throng of bikes, I found Gauge and Cami astride his new Iron 883. With one look, Cami was climbing off the back and heading my way. I was chalking it up to mom instincts. She had plenty of experience raising a little boy to sense when someone needed help.
“Hey there, handsome,” she said to Owen when she made it close. “I’m Cami.”
“Hi.” He smiled at her with a look I recognized. It was a cuter, innocent version of the same smile Joel and I—but mostly I—had been using for years to charm women.
“Do you like motorcycles?” she asked.
Owen nodded. “My daddy has a mo’cycle.”
Has.
Fuck.
Cami’s eyes jumped to mine, the flash of sympathy poignant, but quick enough to hopefully keep Owen from noticing it.
“How about I take you around to see everyone and their bikes?”
Clearly taken with the idea, or Cami, or both, he squirmed his way right out of my arms into hers. Like the pro she was, she wrangled him and took them off to make the rounds.
With a deep breath to steel myself, I went back inside and up to Kate and Joel’s room. I knocked, but didn’t bother waiting to let myself in. I’d already seen Kate was dressed and ready to go, so I wasn’t worried about walking in on her. The light was off, the thick curtains drawn. It was dark enough to seem like it was night.
“Katie?” I called.
“I’m not ready,” she responded, her voice clogged with tears. I was starting to forget what it sounded like without the evidence of her pain there.
I walked into the room fully, moving around the bed to sit on the same side she was on. She always laid on that side, away from the door. I understood why without having to ask. The other side was Joel’s. He’d have chosen it to be closer to the doorway.
Kate’s back was to me, facing the place her husband should be. She was in the fetal position on top of the covers, dressed in a plain black dress that was simple and conservative, but fit her well enough, I knew Joel would have liked it.
“I’m not either,” I admitted.
Her head turned to look at me over her shoulder. There was just enough light to make out the hint of surprise in her features.
“Really?”
“Never be ready for this,” I answered gruffly. “No way any of us could be. But it’s happening. I fucking hate it. I’ve never hated anything in my life as much as this. I hate it for me, for you, for Owen. I hate it for my brother, who we all loved, and who deserved everything good in the world for a long fucking time. I could, I’d get beamed up to wherever we end up after this and take on the man in charge in a heartbeat over him taking Joel.
“Problem is, there is
n’t a damn thing we can do. Not one of us. All we have in our power is to give ourselves the goodbyes we need, and the goodbye he would want us to have. I know exactly how much this is killing you, babe, but you gotta think about what he would want for you now. We both know that’s not laying in the dark alone.”
She didn’t argue, couldn’t really. Joel wouldn’t want her in that state. Ever. For any reason.
Even after losing him.
“How do I do this?”
There was that fucking question again.
“I don’t know. I’ve got no fuckin’ clue how we get through this. I just know we don’t do it alone,” I told her. “I’d trade places with him in a fucking heartbeat so he could be here with you and Owen. I’d give all of you that if I could.”
Her delicate hand covered mine. “I’m glad you’re here.”
I knew that was nothing compared to what she would feel if Joel could magically be back. There was no comparison between the two. That didn’t diminish what hearing that from her meant.
“I’ll be here, right at your side forever, sis. You won’t face anything alone. Yeah?”
Her hand squeezed mine.
“Okay,” she said softly. “Let’s go.”
The phone rang behind the bar. Typically, that meant Roy would answer, but he was preoccupied restocking. I was seated a bit away, watching Becca fumble through a routine she was meant to be doing tonight.
Obviously, it was not going to happen.
Becca was a sweet girl, but she was green. She had a dance background, so it wasn’t actually the moves that were tripping her up. No, she was struggling with the reality of stripping for an audience. She’d get there, or she’d quit and find a different route. Based on my experience, there’d be progress one way or the other in about a week.
I left her to her dancing while I went to get the phone. There was no need for her to keep going. It was more than clear she wouldn’t be premiering the new moves tonight, but I let her go on. Maybe spending a little more time on the stage without the whole audience would help her adjust.
By the time I got around the bar and within arm’s reach of the phone, I was honestly surprised the person hadn’t given up.
“Hello?”
Nothing.
“Hello,” I repeated. “You’ve reached Candy Shop. How can I help you?”
I remembered what Daz had said a couple weeks back about the calls and hang ups. My rounds with the girls hadn’t turned up any leads. No one had any issues—at least none they were ready to share. Odds were it was just some random, creepy guy with nothing better to do.
Hanging up, I shook off the thought that some weird person was probably out there touching himself right then because he’d actually gotten a woman on the line. Unfortunately, this wasn’t unfamiliar territory with my job. I just tried at all times not to think about it.
I was about to head back to my table and pull Becca off the stage when the damn thing started ringing again. Taking a breath to stay composed, I picked it up.
“Hello?”
Roy walked back behind me, a box of bottled beer in his arms. I watched him for a beat while the line stayed silent.
“Look, whoever you are, you need to stop calling. If you want a show, come see it any night. If you want to get your jollies off by hearing a hot chick on the phone, call a damn sex line. They’ll say whatever you want. Harassing the dancers here is just going to land you in hot water with men you do not want to mess with. Capisce?”
Roy chuckled as he knelt to load one of the fridges beneath the bar.
“Capisce? What’s next, you gonna go to the don and have him whack someone for you?” he teased.
“You don’t know where I come from. I could be a principessa for all you know,” I shot back.
“Not thinking your mafioso family would approve of your job,” he pointed out. “And if anything, with that hair, I’d guess IRA ties before the mob.”
“You might be right,” I said. “The only time I got her to talk about it, Ma did say the guy who she figured knocked her up had a weird accent.”
I grabbed a couple of the Buds he was replenishing and handed them to him while he looked up at me like he was trying to guess whether I was fucking with him or not.
“Why do I get the feeling you’re gonna rain down a whole lot of trouble for us one day?”
I started to make my way back to my table and the sound system remote I’d left there as Becca’s song wound down. “I try to avoid trouble as best I can,” I told Roy as I walked away.
“I don’t find the word try there to be real reassuring.”
He wasn’t wrong to feel that way. I did try. I’d been trying my whole life to keep my head down and my nose clean. That didn’t mean I succeeded.
Case in point: sleeping with Daz.
And for anyone keeping score, that had to be the tenth time I’d thought about it that day. At least that was slowing down a bit. Now, he just had a tendency to creep into my thoughts when I was in bed.
He’d made an impression. I hadn’t craved sex often in my life, but Daz had stoked that desire in me. My plan had been that going to bed with him would extinguish it.
Tell God your plans, right?
It wasn’t helping that I felt like a lecherous slut whenever it came to mind now. The man was dealing with the loss of his brother. I’d never had any siblings—at least not full-blood ones, or any type I actually knew about—but I imagined losing someone you loved hurt about the same regardless of their specific relationship to you. I didn’t need to be working myself up the entire time he was gone, then resorting to jumping him when he got back.
What I needed to do was focus on my job.
So I did that, clicking off the sound before the next track cued up, then going up to the stage to have a few—hopefully encouraging—words with our newest dancer.
It was late that night—or early the next morning if we wanted to split hairs. I was sitting in my bed, the lavender comforter bunched up at the foot of the mattress while I flipped through Netflix. This wasn’t an uncommon occurrence. Even though it was the middle of the night, getting home from the noise and activity of the shop had a tendency to leave me wired. This was even worse at the moment when I was just there as a manager, not actually taking the stage. At least dancing was work and it helped exhaust me.
At this rate, it was going to be one of those nights where I didn’t get to sleep until after the sun came up.
I was resigned to my fate and about to cue up something I actually wanted to watch when my cell started clattering on the nightstand.
Grabbing it, I pulled up short when I saw it was Daz. What did he want at this hour?
“Hello?”
“Hey, sugar,” he greeted.
“What’s up? Why are you calling so late?”
“My brothers all left. 'Cept Doc. His ass is jus’ sleepin’.”
As soon as I heard him speak some more, I noticed the slur.
“Are you drunk?”
He laughed. “I better be. Or this bottle o’ Jack was defunktive.”
“Defective?” I clarified, biting back a laugh.
“That too.”
There was a short silence while I figured out how to handle him. Eventually, I just decided to be direct and see where it got me.
“Why did you call me, Daz?”
“Can’t sleep, not in this fuckin’ house that was his. Ran out of Jack an’ I’m still up. And the boys all left. All o’ them’s on the road home. Jus’ needed somethin’ to take my mind off shit.”
That feeling wasn’t one I’d ever forget. The hours of lying awake, the memories haunting you. I hadn’t even been in Gran’s space like he was in his brother’s, but I could imagine how much worse that made it. If you’d asked me when we’d first met—or even just a few weeks ago—if I’d be on the phone in the middle of the night, commiserating even silently with a distraught Daz, I would have called bullshit. Yet, there I was.
If it was wh
at he needed to get by, I’d be his distraction.
“Everything at the club is going well. No serious issues, though I’m worried about whether Becca will make it,” I started, not sure what to talk about with him besides work.
He cut in as soon as I paused. “I don’ wanna talk 'bout that.”
Fair enough. It wasn’t likely he’d remember this conversation in the morning anyway. No point in filling him in when he’d just need it all repeated as soon as he got back.
“What do you want to talk about?”
“What’re you wearing?” he slurred.
“Seriously?”
He chuckled, and I blatantly ignored the way the sound made me feel. “I’m going to picture that leather top that zips down the front,” he pushed on, sounding wistful.
“Yes, Daz, I’m laying here in the middle of the night in one of the costumes I wear onstage,” I drawled.
“Fuck, you’re in bed? That's better than leather.”
Why did that, of all things, make him sound instantly more coherent?
Okay, I knew the answer to that.
“If this is what you want, there are phone lines you can call,” I pointed out.
“No way they would sound as good. ’Specially when I can’t stop thinkin’ about what it was like to finally get a taste.”
That should not, in any universe, have brought on a flush of pleasure. It shouldn’t have. He sounded like a jackass—and a drunk one at that. But the fact was, I couldn’t stop thinking about it either.
And I’d tried.
When I didn’t respond, he went on, “You were so fuckin’ sweet. Knew you would be, but you were still sweeter than I’d expected.” He paused for a long time, and I understood why when he spoke again, his tone betraying the emotion creeping in past the drunken haze. “Now, everything’s shit. I prefer to think about your sweet.”
I wondered why it was me. Daz no doubt had plenty of women he could—and probably did—call to distract him in any number of ways. There were probably a few among them who would be happy to do a little phone performance for him without question.
Instead, he was on the phone with me, his employee—who’d already crossed the line in an indelible way when I let him take me to bed in the first place. Now, he was making himself vulnerable to me, and I worried that was risky as hell for both of us.