Parker Security Complete Series

by Camilla Blake

  “She thinks people from the city have all sorts of quirks,” I said. “Myself included, now that I’ve been living out there for a while.”

  “Well, I can tell they definitely care about you,” Lena said. “And that’s nice that you guys are so close-knit. I know I’m probably not who they’d pick for you to be going out with, but… hopefully they’ll change their minds about me over time.”

  “They liked you.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “I’m a big girl,” she said. “You don’t need to sugarcoat it. They didn’t like me. Not that much, anyway. But that’s all right. I am not easily deterred.”

  “That’s good to hear,” I said.

  We ended up going to my place for a little bit when we got back to the city. Neither of my roommates were home, so we hung out in the living room for a little while, checked on the movie times to see if we could still make the show that Lena had wanted to go to. There was still time, but we’d have to hurry if we were going to make it.

  “It’s up to you,” Lena said. “We don’t have to; we can always catch it another time.”

  “Let’s do it,” I said. “That had been the original plan, anyway.”

  What I really wanted to say, though, was, Thank you for being so easy to be with. Being over at my family’s house had just made me realize how nice it was to be with someone who was completely fine with accepting you exactly how you were.

  ***

  At work the next night, I was hustling, mixing up flirtinis and Long Island Iced Teas and cosmopolitans. They had a guest DJ in that night, some chick named Isa who had pulled a disappearing act or something but was now back on the scene. She was like goddess of the gays or something, the way they were all fawning over her. The music was all right, not my favorite, but I’d gotten used to the booming bass, the frenetic beats. And some of it was good, especially when they used samples from songs that I recognized—I liked that.

  There was nothing that notable about this particular night, but for some reason, I felt a little off. I wasn’t enjoying myself the way I normally would, and it wasn’t because my customers were being rude or hassling me, at least not any more than usual. It took me almost half the night to realize it, but I finally figured out what it was—I just wasn’t sure if what I was doing was the right thing anymore.

  I was thirty-five now. I had never given myself a deadline, never said You must have made it pro by the time you’re ____ age, maybe because I was arrogant and just assumed that it would happen. I had always been operating under the assumption that if you wanted something badly enough, it would happen, so long as you were willing to put in the hard work. And I’d been putting in the hard work, and it had been paying off, but not exactly as I’d hoped. What if I never made it to the UFC? Or what if I did and was promptly dealt a career-ending injury? Yeah, I had some money saved, but it wouldn’t last long and my life aspiration was certainly not to work at a gay bar forever.

  And then another realization dawned on me, as I was collecting another generous tip off the bar, all because I had smiled at the guy, this older queen who came around to ogle the young, hot guys and wax nostalgic about the good old days when he had been the one getting checked out. In the back of my mind, maybe way deep down where I wasn’t even really aware of it, I knew that I could always go back to my family, get involved with that. But I didn’t want to think that. I didn’t want to have that as my fallback plan. Even though I had managed to move away and was trying to do something else, in the back of my mind, I knew that there was always that safety net, if you could call something that was against the law a safety net.

  But I didn’t want that. I didn’t want that to be an option, ever. Not just because I knew that Lena would never be okay with something like that, but because I myself wasn’t all right with what they were doing. I wasn’t going to tell them they needed to stop, or get all self-righteous on them, but I wanted my father to know—I wanted the whole family to know—that I was not interested in ever partaking in their business, no matter what the hell was happening with the rest of my life. Whether I ever made it to the UFC, or got a different job. I’d work at a gay bar, slinging drinks for the rest of my life if I had to—there was no way I was going to help them sell meth. And maybe they needed to know that; they needed to be really clear about it. I decided that the next time I went over there, I would tell them exactly that.

  ***

  On Sunday, I drove over to my parents’ house after I’d showered and changed at the gym. As I drove, I thought about Lena, and it brought a smile to my face just knowing that I was going to be able to see her when I got back from my visit. In fact, it made me want to get the visit over with, return to the city as soon as I could, even though I knew that she had errands and stuff she was doing right now. I hadn’t really talked to anyone in my family since the cookout, or gotten their feedback about what they thought of Lena. The cookout hadn’t gone completely smoothly, but it hadn’t been that bad, either. It certainly could have gone a lot worse.

  Mom was in the kitchen making sandwiches when I got there. Typical fare: white bread, yellow mustard, what looked to be ham and plastic-wrapped squares of American cheese. I’d had to learn all about healthy eating on my own as I became more interested in fighting, after I realized how important diet was to overall health, not just if you were an athlete.

  But regardless of what I might have said to my family about it—and I didn’t even bother to bring it up anymore—they weren’t interested. They were set in their ways of microwave meals and prepared, processed food.

  “Can I make you a sandwich?” Mom asked me as Holden tromped in. He snatched one of the plates off the counter and took it over to the kitchen table. One bite and nearly half of the sandwich was already gone.

  “No, I’m good,” I said. “I just had something before I came over.”

  “At least have some lemonade.”

  I accepted the glass of lemonade, because I knew if I didn’t, she would feel slighted. The lemonade was in a red plastic pitcher, the same one she’d been using since I was a kid.

  “Man,” Holden said through a mouthful of food. “You really missed out the other night. Should’ve come to Buck’s. It was off the hook!”

  “I’m sure it was.”

  “I can’t believe my boys are thirty-five,” Mom said. She shook her head. “It just seems like yesterday that—”

  “Yeah, yeah, Ma, we don’t need to hear any dirty-diaper stories,” Holden said. “Come on now, we’re eating.” He turned back to me. “But really. I had a good time. But I would’ve had a much better time if my bro had been there with me to celebrate.”

  “I was with you to celebrate—we came over for the cookout, remember? Isn’t that what we agreed upon? I think you even suggested it. That we come to the cookout and skip Buck’s.”

  “Did I?” Holden said. “I can’t imagine a world where I would ever encourage you to skip out on Buck’s. Especially not when the ladies are going to be there.”

  I rolled my eyes. Ladies being his term for hookers. “Like I’m really going to take Lena there. She would love something like that.”

  “See, I wouldn’t be with a girl who wouldn’t be into that.”

  “Right. Which is why you have a girlfriend currently. Oh, wait—you don’t.”

  “Boys.” Mom gave us both a look. “I’m not even entirely sure what you’re talking about here, and I probably don’t want to know. But let’s just have a nice lunch, okay? Shep just got here, Holden, and I’m sure he doesn’t feel like bickering.”

  “He’s here all the time,” Holden grumbled. “You don’t have to put out the red carpet just because he managed to drive his ass over here from the city. It’s not like he moved to New York or something.”

  “That’s not the point,” Mom said, speaking in a sharper tone than I normally ever heard her use with Holden. It surprised him, too; I could tell by the look on his face. “The point is, when you two are here, I’d like you to get along. There
’s no reason not to. It’s not like we’re all living under the same roof anymore, or even all on the same property. So these moments are important. To me, at least.”

  We both ducked our heads a little, chastised.

  “Speaking of the cookout, though,” I said, “Lena and I both had a good time. I’m sorry we weren’t able to make it to Buck’s.”

  “Ah, Lena,” Holden said. “Mom, what did you think of her?” Just by the way he said it, I knew that they’d already been talking about it plenty.

  “Well, she’s nice,” Mom said. “Attractive girl, for sure. But… she seems a little, I don’t know… I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, or think that I’m putting you down. Because she does seem nice. But also… a little cold, I guess.”

  “It was her first time meeting everyone,” I said. “And that can be a little overwhelming—there’s so many of us and just one of her. I’d probably feel the same way if I met her family and there were a lot of them and just one of me.”

  “But you’d certainly be friendlier! I raised you better than that.”

  “Friendlier? What do you mean? Lena was perfectly nice.”

  Mom sniffed. “I thought she was a little… I don’t know. Snobby, maybe?”

  “I thought you’d be happy that we showed up to begin with.”

  “Oh, I am! Everyone is. We’re just not sure if she’s the one for you, is all.”

  “Is that so,” I said. I pressed my lips together, trying to get myself to refrain from saying anything else. “I guess it’s not up for you guys to decide.”

  This was what had always got to me about my family, every single last one of them, Holden included. Unless I was doing exactly what they wanted, it was never good enough, or they always had some sort of comment or criticism about how I could be doing things differently. First it had been that I didn’t have a girlfriend. Now that I had actually met someone I liked, it was that I was hesitant to bring her around. I bring her around and what happens? Suddenly, no one was sure she was the right person for me.

  “I’m not saying it’s up to any of us to decide,” Mom said. “But I would hope that having your family’s approval about the person that you’re going to spend the rest of your life with would mean something.”

  “Spend the rest of my life with? Where is this coming from? Lena and I haven’t been seeing each other for that long at all; I can assure you, there’s been no talk about spending the rest of our lives together.”

  “But you’ve thought about it.” Mom squinted at me. “Don’t think I didn’t see how you were looking at her. Hell, you might not even realize that you’ve thought about it yet, but I can tell. The two of you are quite taken with each other—that much is very obvious.”

  “Then I don’t see why you would say that you don’t think she’s the right one for me.”

  “What’s a nice way to put this?” Holden said. “She seems too uptight for you. I bet she’s never even gotten a parking ticket before. She just doesn’t seem like she’d be a good fit for this family.”

  “You guys are ridiculous.” I felt my face flush as my anger rose. “Why can’t any of you ever just support me in something that I do, even if it’s not exactly what you think I should be doing? Is that so much to ask? I try to be supportive of you guys, or at least not put down what you’re into.” I threw Holden a look. “Did I say word one about that Shana chick? Remember her? She was a real treat. I think once or twice you might’ve mentioned the words marriage.”

  Holden snorted. “If I did, I was five types of messed up. That girl was tapped.”

  “Yeah, no shit. But you took your goddamn time figuring that one out. Pretty much everyone around here was giving you a hard time for it, but did I say anything? No. I told you if she made you happy, then you should go for it. I didn’t tell you that I didn’t think she was the right person for you just because I personally didn’t like her.”

  “She might be crazy, but she was sure a hell of a lot more fun than Lena seems.”

  “You don’t even know her!”

  “And I would’ve actually appreciated if someone had said something to me about her. Honestly, bro? From what I know about Lena, I’m not really that interested in getting to know her anymore.”

  Was there any point in having an argument with someone who refused to acknowledge when the other side made a rational point? Again, it was something that shouldn’t have surprised me, because it had always been this way. My family liked to say it was because Parkingtons were opinionated and stubborn—which was true—but it went beyond that.

  Holden patted me on the shoulder. “Bro, you don’t have to take it personally. She just seems… I don’t know, so square. Not the sort of person that would really mesh well with this family. Does she even have any family of her own?”

  “Of course she does. She has a sister, who I’m sure isn’t giving her nearly as hard a time as you are. She has nieces and a nephew. She has family. Even if she didn’t—does that matter?”

  “You didn’t tell her, did you?” Dad had just walked into the room, but it was like he had been listening to the whole conversation.

  “What? About what you guys do?”

  “Yes.”

  “No, I didn’t tell her.”

  He nodded. “Good. She doesn’t seem like the sort of person who would take too kindly to knowing that sort of information. If you want to know the truth, son, she seems more like a narc.” He gave me a closer look. “You wouldn’t do anything stupid, would you?”

  I stared at him in shock, not quite believing what he was saying. “What—like bring an undercover cop here? Set up my family? Is that what you’re saying?”

  He stepped right up to me, a dead calm in his eyes. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  “Warren,” Mom said, a pleading note in her voice. “This is your son, Warren. It’s Shepherd. He would never do anything like that. You know that, Warren.”

  There was some weird energy in the room, weirder than I could ever remember feeling. I didn’t like it, but I also didn’t like being accused of doing something as shady as knowingly bringing a narc to my family’s place. What good would that do? I’d probably end up going down with them myself.

  Dad held my gaze several beats longer. I stared right back, even though my insides were squirming. It was better than to look away, to look scared. I learned this early on. Dad would take that as a sign of weakness, and he couldn’t tolerate weakness in his boys. As kids, it had taken Holden longer to realize this than myself, though I had always done my best to protect him from Dad’s violent temper.

  Now, though, I could tell that Holden was looking from Dad to me, wondering if that’s exactly what had happened—that Lena was a narc, that his feeling that she was “too square” was spot on, that I had somehow done something to betray my family. But then Dad stood down. He took a step back and looked away, went over to the fridge and opened it. He looked in and asked who had drunk the last of his Miller High Life.

  “Sorry, Dad, I was thirsty,” Holden said. “I’ll go to the store and get you more.”

  He stood up, grabbing his keys off the ceramic bowl in the middle of the kitchen island that was cluttered with junk mail and trinkets and empty food packaging.

  “Take him with you,” Dad said, jerking his thumb at me. “I think the two of you need a little brother bonding time.”

  Holden looked at me and shrugged. I could resist, but if I went with Holden now, it would probably smooth things over with Dad, at least for the time being.

  We took Holden’s ’69 Camaro, his pet project that he and Dad had been working on restoring for probably the past decade. It was one of those projects that would never be done, even though the car drove just fine. Holden let the engine rev a few times before he took off down the long gravel driveway, kicking up dust the whole way down to the road.

  “What’s up with you and the old man lately?” he said. He had the seat all the way back, his legs stretched almost straigh
t, right hand barely touching the steering wheel. “I mean, everyone knows you guys aren’t best friends or anything, but lately it seems like tensions have been kind of high.”

  “Why don’t you tell me?” I said. “You two are obviously way closer. I’m surprised that he hasn’t said anything to you.”

  “He hasn’t brought anything up. Anything new, anyway.”

  “Well, I have no clue what the problem is. Like I’ve said, I’m just trying to live my life, do my own thing. I don’t see why that’s such a problem with you people.”

  Holden raised an eyebrow. “You people?”

  “Yeah, you people. My family, who is supposed to be supportive—or at the very least not out to openly sabotage me.”

  “Who’s out to openly sabotage you?”

  “Sometimes it feels like anyone whose last name is Parkington. Except Uncle Cody, maybe. But that’s probably because no one’s heard from him in years.”

  “Actually… he called the other day.”

  “Uncle Cody did?”

  “Yeah. Pretty much out of the blue. He talked to Mom for a little bit. Dad got on the phone afterward, but that didn’t last too long. Seems that he was calling to see if anything had changed around here.” Holden slapped the steering wheel. “Which is stupid. Like he’s expecting us to just stop what we’re doing so he can come back home. Dad hung up on him after a minute or so.”

  “That’s kind of what I’m talking about,” I said. “Does it not strike anyone else as weird that we’ve ostracized the one person who has moved very far away? I just don’t think normal families do that. People move. They’re allowed to.”

  “We’re not ostracizing him,” Holden said. “Hell, I’m not even totally sure I know what that means. But Uncle Cody made it clear that he doesn’t want anything to do with anything we’re up to, and he’s got to be a pretentious dick about it. Even if he is one of the brothers, Dad’s not going to tolerate that shit. You know that. I know that. And there’s nothing wrong with it.” Holden glanced at me. “I just don’t want to see the same thing happen with you, is all.” Something in his tone had changed; it was a subtle shift that anyone else probably would not have noticed, but I did. He was actually concerned for me, and I could hear it in his voice.