“What’s wrong with you, man? You look messed up,” said Berto.
“Yeah. I just failed some test.” It felt good to tell the truth. Because I knew I’d be lying in an hour when I talked to Irina and my mom.
“Tests are bullshit,” said the bald guy with an eagle on his neck.
“Yeah.” Berto blew out smoke. “Relax. It ain’t the end of the world. Unless it’s an AIDS test . . . then you’re fucked.”
They laughed. I laughed, too. Flunking an AIDS test, now that would suck. “Yeah, you’re right.”
“What’s your name, son?” said the eagle tat.
“Gabe.”
“I’m Smiley.”
“Pelon,” said a little one with a red bandanna.
“Oso,” said the one missing a tooth in front. He had thick lips and narrow, friendly eyes.
Berto eyed me. “Hey, you get that job?”
“Yeah, I’m bartending at Hush now.”
“For reals?”
“You should come see me, I’ll hook you up good.” I leaned against the cinder-block wall and looked up at the tree. It was a scrawny Vegas tree with puny little branches. The winter sky above was bright blue. The guys started talking Spanish, and I let it roll around me. Nice, soft sounds.
Smiley flicked away his cigarette and pulled out his phone, checking a text. “Lalia wants us to come get her,” he said.
I didn’t want to overstay my welcome. “All right. Peace.” I raised a hand and started off.
“Peace,” Berto called after me. It was nice to have some friends in my complex. Or at least to know some friendly people.
Irina called exactly when I knew she would: five minutes after the math test was supposed to end.
“Hey,” I said. I was sitting on my floor, watching a movie on the computer. I hit “Pause.”
“Well?” she said.
“I passed.” I felt sick lying to her.
Irina let out a breath that turned into a little shriek. “I told you! Baby, I told you! I’m so happy!”
I looked up at the cottage cheese ceiling and made a face.
“Gabe?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“How come you don’t sound happy?”
“I don’t know. I got that dizzy thing I told you about.”
“You mean when the letters start moving around?”
“Yeah, that.”
“Well, you still passed!”
“I’m worried about the reading section.”
Irina’s voice got softer. “If you passed this part, I know you can pass that one. And . . .” She trailed off.
“What?”
“You got mad last time I said it.”
“I won’t get mad.”
“Remember Anya’s little brother?”
“I told you it’s not that. I don’t see letters backward.” She thought I had dyslexia.
She sighed. “It’s not always backward letters. All I’m saying is, if you’re worried about the reading part, you should get tested. Anya’s brother got to take an audio version of the SAT and he got extra time. Like double time or something.”
An audio version and double time. I’d never heard of that before, but it sounded perfect. I actually thought about it for a minute. “Yeah, thanks,” I said sadly.
“What’s the matter with you? You should be happy! You just passed!”
“Sorry, I’m just stressed.”
“I understand,” Irina said quietly. “You just sat at a computer for two hours.”
“I’m going to look for tickets for you,” I said, to change the subject. “What do you think about January? December tickets are probably crazy right now.”
“Any time is fine. I’ll make it work. But I don’t want you spending money on this. I can buy them.”
“No way.” I was stubborn about not letting Irina pay for things. Maybe it was because my mom had hooked up with so many leeches who sucked our bank account dry. Or maybe it was because Irina was filthy rich, and it made me extra self-conscious about looking broke around her.
“What if I want to buy them?” she said.
“No.”
“Maybe I will anyway.”
“Stubborn!”
Irina giggled. I knew she’d take that as a compliment. “I love you, Gabe.”
“Love you, too.” I stared at her picture on the wall and thought about burying my face in her chest. Smelling her hair and just hugging her. She was the one person I wanted to tell about the GED, but I couldn’t.
“You sound really tired,” she said softly. “Go rest. Call me later.”
As I hit “End,” the phone screen started flashing. Mom. I felt like I was stepping off a building, but I answered. I didn’t give her a chance to say anything. “I passed, but I’m tired and I can’t talk right now.”
Mom whooped. “Oh, wow! Gabe!”
“He passed?” I heard Phil ask in the background.
And then, I don’t know, I kind of snapped. “Like he fucking cares,” I said.
“Gabe!” Mom sounded hurt.
I breathed out, trying to stop myself from going off on her. The thing was, Mom was the only family I had. My dad, whoever he was, had never met me. And my mom tried to be a good parent. But she had a weak spot for assholes, and sure enough, she’d found the biggest one of all to shack up with. Which was part of why I was in Vegas instead of at home with her in Washington.
“Go drink a toast with Phil,” I said. “I gotta go.”
“Gabe?” Mom sounded like she was about to cry. “I’m just really proud of you, honey.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
“Okay, well, call me when you’re up for it, okay? We need to talk about you coming home for Christmas.”
“Will Phil be there?”
“Well . . .”
“I’m not coming. I have to go, Mom.” I hung up.
I stood up and paced around my apartment like it was a cage. It was, in a way. The only thing I had going for me in life was a good job. And there were about twenty places that bucket could spring a leak.
CHAPTER FIVE
The next morning, my day off, the knock was so loud and fast that my first thought was Cops! I jumped out of bed and stood, staring at the door. I was breaking a lot of laws. But I couldn’t believe they’d send somebody to my house.
The knocking stopped for a moment, and I pressed myself against the wall, trying to clear my head and get a strategy together. I’d sneak out through the kitchen, tap on Tilda’s door, and ask her to let me out. If she wasn’t home, I’d have to try my other quad mate, the dude who shared my bathroom, Moldy Razor Man . . .
Knock knock knock. “Gabe?”
I ran to pull open the door.
Irina was standing there, grinning. She jumped into my arms, and we stumbled back into my apartment, kissing and laughing. “I knew you were home!” she said between kisses. She smelled incredible, like the ocean and flowers.
“How?” I demanded, kicking the door shut behind her.
“I saw your car. I figured you were sleeping.” She slipped off her backpack and dropped it on the ground.
“No, I mean how are you here? Did you fly?”
“No, I hitchhiked.” She gave me a wicked grin. “Of course I flew. I took a 6:00 a.m. flight. I wanted to surprise you. Are you surprised?”
“Yes. I thought you were the cops!”
She thought that was hysterical. I carried her, laughing, to my mattress, and set her down gently. I covered her with kisses, lifted her hair, and kissed the softest part of her neck, under her ear. “I told you I wanted to get your ticket.”
She ran her hands down my chest and grabbed me around the waist. “You can get the next one. I didn’t want to wait any longer to see you. And I have two days off school.” She
made a face. “I knew I had to do it without telling you, because you’re so weird about paying for everything.”
“What if I was one of those guys who split every check down the middle? You’d be gone.” I rolled over, pulling her on top of me.
“That’s true,” she admitted. She dipped her head, and her hair fell in a silky tent around our faces. Her nose was touching mine. I loved this view of her, so close that all I could see was her eyes. “You realize you live in a complete pit, right?” she whispered, looking around.
I chuckled. “What are you talking about? This is the Hilton.”
“No, I mean, this is bad. You don’t even have sheets.”
“That’s because I don’t have my sweet woman to take care of me,” I murmured, biting her jaw.
“Sexist!” she shrieked.
“Well, maybe I’m just dirty, then,” I said. “Maybe I’m a gross caveman who would never even take a shower if you didn’t make me.”
“That’s probably true.” She kissed my cheeks, my neck, and my mouth. And then we didn’t talk anymore for a while.
Irina had thirty-two hours until her return flight, and I didn’t want to waste a second of it. First I drove her to Red Rock. The desert was on my side, popping with light and color and clean, spicy smells. The sky was pure blue except for the curling white trail of a stunt plane. It was a giant’s playground out there: rocks piled up in crazy shapes, sun sparkling on stripes of white, yellow, and red on the canyon walls.
We parked, and Irina was out of the car before I cut the motor. She ran to the railing and shaded her eyes, blond hair whipping like a flag in the wind. “Can we climb on them?” she asked.
“Climb at your own risk,” I read from the battered metal sign sticking out of the rocks. “Which means yes.” I boosted her over the rail, jumped after her, and we started up a dusty path—or something like a path—winding between boulders. The rocks closed behind us quickly. Gray-and-brown plants poked between the gaps in stones, and fat white-tailed chipmunks skittered out of our way as we climbed.
“This is amazing,” Irina panted, hoisting herself onto a ledge.
I grabbed her foot, and she shrieked and tried to pull away. I held on and kissed her ankle, grinning up at her. “I still can’t believe you’re here. What did you tell your parents?”
“I said I was going camping with a friend from school, Giselle. They like her.”
“Oh.” I let go and climbed onto the ledge next to her, raising a cloud of red dust. “Do they even know you’re still seeing me?” I tried to sound casual, but she gave me a look, and I could see she wasn’t fooled.
“No,” she said quietly.
“Oh.” I picked up a small, sharp stone and scratched the ground.
Irina touched my hand. “When I ran away with you before, it crushed them. They’re . . . they’re different than your mom.”
“What?” I said bitterly. “You mean they actually care what you do?”
“No, I didn’t mean it like that. I mean they’re protective. Overprotective.”
“You’re eighteen. How long are they going to treat you like a little kid?”
She frowned. “I don’t think they treat me like a kid. I ran away with you without telling them where I was going. It’s not that surprising that they don’t like you.”
“You’re not giving them a chance to!” I tossed the stone and it clattered off the rocks below. “They don’t even know I’m still in your life. I mean, how long do we have to be together before you tell them?”
“I don’t know,” Irina said, looking down.
Suddenly a cold feeling crept into my gut. She doesn’t love me. She’s just having an adventure. I pictured her driving off into her future in a white Lex, leaving me in the dust.
As if she’d read my mind, Irina scooted closer and put her arms around me. Her body was strung tight, and I couldn’t tell if it was from the cold or a strong feeling. “I love you,” she said into my neck. “Please try to understand. I’m already breaking their hearts by not going to conservatory. I can’t add this on top of it.” She squeezed me harder.
I finally hugged her back. “Okay. But they have to know sometime.”
“Okay.”
“I’m not that bad of a guy. Your dad might like me if he got to know me.”
Irina snorted gently. “Or not. But I like you, and that’s what matters.”
“Is it?”
“Yes,” she said.
I let her go and stood up. “Let’s keep climbing.”
We ended up spending most of the day at Red Rock. By the time we got back to town, we were starving, and wolfed down two pizzas at this funny place called Battista’s Hole in the Wall.
When we got back to my place, Irina looked at me, her eyes gleaming. “Gabe, let’s play strip poker.” I think she was still feeling like a badass for surprising me.
“Hmm, let me think. Okay!” I said.
“Just prepare to lose,” said Irina. She always said that. I’d taught her poker—it was how I won our first kiss—and she had a mad competitive streak.
I was already pulling out the cards.
“You shuffle. I’ll be right back.” Irina scooped her backpack off the ground and headed for the bathroom.
“Um, I should warn you . . .” I started, but she was already opening the door.
“Oh, no,” she said in a seriously horrified voice. “Gabe!”
“I call him Moldy Razor Man,” I said. “If there’s something in the toilet, don’t look.”
She gave a high-pitched laugh and shut the door behind her.
“Don’t touch anything!” I called.
There was some bumping and banging, and I smiled to myself, wondering what Irina was seeing in there. The dude was nasty. Once I’d found stained drawers hanging off the showerhead. Another time, shampoo bottles turned upside down over takeout containers, draining every last drop. And once, a toilet plunger sitting in the tub.
The door cracked open, and Irina’s foot poked out and waved around. She had a Nike ankle sock on. “There should be a soundtrack for this,” she said.
“What are you doing, you lunatic?” I asked. “Come out of there!”
“Da na na na na,” she hummed and shimmied out.
I almost peed myself. She was layered, wearing a pair of pajamas, striped and baggy, on top of her clothes, with a hat, a scarf, sunglasses, and a little lace G-string on her head like a cap. “I know you’re a little better at poker than me,” she said, swishing over and sitting down on the carpet. “So this is just to keep things fair.”
I tried to snatch the underwear off her head, but she slapped my hand away and shrieked, “No! You have to win a round before you get to take anything off.”
“You’re cheating,” I said, as I dealt the hole cards. “Totally cheating.”
“Consider it a handicap.” She was obviously very pleased with herself, which made me even more determined to win. Unfortunately, Lady Luck was with the freak in five layers. I couldn’t get a break: treys, deuces, not a single face card. Nothing higher than three of a kind, four hands running. By round four, I was down to my boxers, because all I’d started out with was a shirt, pants, and my watch. Meanwhile, all she’d lost were the sunglasses.
“I want to eat your abs with a little, tiny spoon,” she said, eyeing my six-pack. I looked down. I did look ripped. Eating on the cheap plus a few eight-hour shifts as a bar slave had tightened me up.
“Feel free.” I held out my arms. To my surprise, she put down her cards, took the underwear off her head, and moved closer. She pushed me down gently and started kissing and biting my stomach. “Lower,” I said.
She went about an inch lower, nibbling.
“Lower!”
Now she was at my waist, and things were getting serious.
“Lower!” Will th
is work?
She pulled back, flushed. “I’d really like to . . .”
I squeezed my eyes closed and smacked my chest. “Nooooo fair!” I howled.
“Sorry,” she whispered. And then we both started laughing, until we were shaking and rolling and pounding the floor. Tears squeezed out the corners of my eyes.
“We’re in Vegas. We should just run away and get married so you can quit with the waiting thing,” I gasped. Because Irina was religious, she was waiting until she was married. Long story. But I dealt with it because . . . well, because I was whipped.
“I wish!” She giggled.
I rolled to my side and grabbed her hand. “Why not? We could get married by Elvis.”
Irina’s eyebrows popped up. “You’re kidding, right?”
“I can’t wait that much longer,” I said. “This is torture. I know it’s your religion, and I respect that, but this is out of control.”
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have done that.” Her warm fingers threaded through mine.
I breathed deep for a few minutes, stared at the ceiling, and tried to picture roadkill, tests, Phil, and other things to calm me down. Outside, an ancient motor turned over. “Sometimes I wonder what we’re doing,” I said.
“Me, too.”
“I want to make love to you.” I squeezed her hand.
“I want that, too.” Her voice was quiet.
“And I know you’re waiting until you’re married. But we’re only eighteen. I can’t wait ten years. I don’t even think I can wait five years.”
The other thing, which I didn’t say out loud, was that at first I’d thought Irina was all talk, and I just needed to prove myself. It was only recently that I’d realized it wasn’t true. She was dead serious about waiting. Which made me almost serious about the Elvis idea.
Irina glanced over and caught my eyes. “I don’t want to wait a long time, either. But I’m not ready to get married now. Eighteen seems insane. Twenty-three, maybe.”
I groaned. “See, you can handle this because you’re doing it for something big that you believe in. I’m just doing it because you’re making me.”
Out of Aces (Betting Blind #2) Page 4