"We probably would stake a claim in the Porn industry if it wasn't for all the Old Ladies. We aren't outlaw, but we do have some outlaws. One percent of the MC world is outlaw, but they are recognized more than most MC's because of the crime."
"So, the Sons of Anarchy would be in that one percent?" I ask and sip from my beer, wondering why he isn't drinking. I don't know why that thought appears considering I had no intentions of being in his life after I tonight.
"Yes, but real ones like the Hell's Angels."
"Are you one?" I ask, scared and captivated by what his answer might be.
"Yep, sure am." He says, and he is so cavalier and doesn’t care that thoughts of him killing people for a gram of coke rushes through my mind. And who am I kidding. I am an eighteen year old kid that has barely left my little island and never my state. And I am truly fascinated by this potent and fearsome man in front of me.
He is watching me and laughing. "No more Sons of Anarchy for you Emjay." He cracks his neck from side to side and looks at me. "I'm loyal to my MC. It means that yeah, if someone were to hurt my lady or harm a brother, by club standards I can retaliate for retribution."
"Have you ever?" I ask, this time not sure I want to know.
He nods and looks out to the water, fighting something inside. I am not scared and I don't falter by his answer. If I am honest, I find it hot that he is unafraid to kill for what he thinks is right. I should probably get a psychiatrist at this point to get to the bottom of that mine field. "Don't scream. I promise that you're safe within my presence." He looks at the water again then looks to me. "Please don't be scared of me Emjay. I don't know why I told you, with your eyes on me I can't lie for shit to you."
And I can't lie to him, whether my answer is wrong or not. I can't lie. "I'm not scared of you. Like, at all. I should be committed for that, but I can't see you hurting me or anyone for that matter."
"I could easily hurt your little Ken doll." There, right there he was back to that scary biker bad ass that hauled Kendal out earlier.
"I felt that." I say and laugh, catching how that must look I quickly explain. "We have been dating for a year. I don't know if I love him, and it hurt seeing him with Brittany Pike, but I don't want him hurt. With it all said and done though, I am relieved to be free of him. I meant what I said earlier. I want no attachments here other than the family kind when I leave." I can't look him in the eyes anymore though because that stare scares me on every girl level. Loving a man like him could kill a girl. "That's why we have this one night friendship Dante. Come August, I'll be long gone and off to Colorado for school." I look back to him with a soft smile. "What about you Dante?"
He smiles, and it stirs up some crazy butterflies seeing a smile that is truly happy. "I'm just D to you." He says and we both laugh. "I am from Indiana. I am a Midwestern boy born and raised. I have a brother and a sister, a mom and dad and I come to Friday Harbor every couple of weeks, to every couple of months and a number of other places. I work as a driver, but also runs for the club. I rode here."
"On a motorcycle? From Indiana? Ouch, D."
"I ride Harley's, or a Chopper I should say." He stands and reaches for my hand pulling me to my feet. He points to the parking area and the parking light shines right over two Motorcycles. "Mine is the satin black one with the chrome. The flat grey and chrome Harley is Nicks.
His face is next to my ear now and he says low, "Have you ever been on the back of a bike Emjay?" His voice vibrating on my neck as he calls me his little nickname has my nerves in a bundle of jitters.
I turn and he is close, way too close for friends and too far apart for more. "No…" I let the one word answer hang there as we stare at one another. I can't… I can't explain this feeling of true, undiluted need for him. It isn't sexual or emotional, it is him and it is me and, whatever he is about to do- I know it is what I need and that it will change me for the rest of my life.
He says nothing.
He does nothing.
Our eyes are locked, my heart is beating like a million tiny drummers in my chest. The breeze from the harbor lifts my hair, sticking a few strands to my lips. Before I can pull them free I feel his fingers along my cheek and against my chin as he slips the hairs free.
I shiver, like some trampy Hollywood harlot from the fifties and he groans softly.
"Mal!" The moment is shattered when I hear Kyra yell from the fire, D's friend Nick carrying her on his back. D pulled back from me and shoved his hands in his pockets and looked at them before laughing uncomfortably, forced. I did the exact same thing before taking the last few steps toward them.
"Dante?" Nick asks him. He looks shocked, maybe a little confused by our closeness. I am bothered by the instant attitude of his friend Nick, considering he's been tonguing Kyra for the last two hours.
"Hey, was just showing my new friend here our bikes. Nick, this is Emjay. Emjay, meet Nick."
"Hi there Nick." I say, not even noticing the name that D used. Kyra noticed though
"Who the fuck is MJ? This is Mallory Wayne my best friend since we were born." Kyra tells Nick, who is watching D closely. I am getting uncomfortable by the anger beneath Nick's stare.
"I am Emjay." I say laughing much harder than called for, but I was nervous and felt like I was being judged. "I forgot Dante's name and referred to him as D." I shrug and laugh lightly. "He since then has referred to me as Emjay for my initials…" I feel like everything I say is making it worse. Nick is downright glaring and D starts laughing and looks at me.
"I knew you forgot my name." He says to me and I swear, he doesn’t care that Nick is seething at this point.
I look between the two of them and laugh for the hundredth uncomfortable time. I could kill Kyra for interrupting us. We shared a moment, one I am fairly certain meant something. No clue what that something was, but I felt the meaning to my bones. It was real.
"It's time we hit the road." Nick says and drops Kyra's legs as she slides down his back.
"Hey, I thought we were gonna watch the sunrise from the dock?" Kyra says and pouts like a child and Nick eats it up.
"Awe, come here baby." He says and pulls her close. "Next time, I swear. I'll text you when I get home and let you know when the next run is."
Listening to Nick talk, I can tell that he and Kyra have either met before or he covered a lot more ground than D and I did.
"Looks like we are headed out earlier than I thought." D says and he looks forlorn and lost and I hope… hope he doesn’t want to leave either.
I feel foolish and like the typical teenage girl crushing on a boy she hasn’t got a chance with. Even as I think it, I know there is something here, a connection and I know he feels it too. How can he not?
"Walk me to my ride?" He asks and I nod wishing I knew for certain if something went wrong.
Once we were at his bike he took both my hands. "Listen here Emjay. You need to drop that piece of shit boyfriend, because he won't change. Cheaters never do. Find a guy that makes you laugh, because when you let loose and laugh it is the best sound in the world." He pulls on his bandana and I see his full head of hair as he runs his fingers through the strands. I can smell his shampoo mixing with the fire and the harbor and I am overwhelmed with the desire to cry. "I don't know where you'll be when I come back through here, but I think if you are here, there is no way I won't find you."
That!
That right there is proof he feels it too.
"You feel it too?" I ask and place my hand on his wrist, stilling him from getting on the bike.
He doesn’t look at me for the longest time and I feel a sense of panic when I see Nick and Kyra making their way toward us. "Please, Dante. If you feel it you need to tell me please." My voice is shaking as I beg him, but I know inside that if he doesn’t say something now, he will leave and I'll never know.
"I feel it, but the timing is way off Emjay." He looks at me then and leans until his lips are just a breath off mine. "If it was another time I would put
you on my bike and never look back, but timing is everything luv and we have some shitty timing." He kissed me then, soft and fast before sitting on the bike and bringing it to life in the loudest rumble I had ever heard.
"Nice to meet you." Nick says to me with a stiff smile before glaring at D and starting his own bike.
"Don't forget me." I say as loud as I can without yelling close to D's ear. "Find me when the timing is right."
I don't know what I expected, but the sadness in his hazel eyes was not it.
He was gone before I could think to ask questions.
"Holy shit! Mal, did you kiss him?" I hear Kyra's voice but I am too shaken to actually answer, so I nod. I didn't blink or breathe until the sound of his bike and the red of his tail light was gone. Tears burned my eyes when Kyra saw me. "Oh Mal. Not him Mal, not Dante."
That made me look at her with unease and resentment. "Why not? You were all over his friend. Who happens to be Keri Fairfield's nephew by the way. Besides aren't you the one who is always telling me to dump Kendal and find a real man?"
"Yeah Mal, but Dante…"
She doesn’t finish her thought and I am not willing to let her bad mouth him while she still had the taste of Nick in her mouth.
"He's a man Kyra, and I don't know… he's important somehow. To me, to my life… he matters and I don't know why, but he does." I am rambling and I can't make her understand because, like before there just really aren't words for that type of connection.
"Mal, I hate to be the one that tells you this." Her voice sounds far away and tripping on things she knows and I don't. "Dante is practically engaged to Nicks sister Mal. He's taken."
Chapter Two
Present Day
Seattle WA.
I turn and he is close, way too close for friends and too far apart for more.
I keep highlighting those words because they define us. I look at my computer, and like always I think of D and the road we took leading us to today. He molded me into the woman I am now, but I had a hand in who he is today as well. I slam the laptop in frustration and shoot him a text.
Me: So I am writing my thesis on you.
I head to my kitchen to get another cup of coffee and let Harley, my Great Dane out to the backyard. It is unusually warm for February in Seattle and I know Har will love the sun. I hear my phone chime to a message over the sound of Mad Season's, River of Deceit playing from my office.
I head to check the phone, leaving the sliding glass door open for Harley to come in when she is ready.
I swipe the screen of my smart phone and see the green light flashing. I know it's him because of the color of that light. He has been my green light since the minute I programmed his number in my phone.
D: Oh interesting. Will it be a fiction or a biography based on a tragic tale of unrequited love?
Me: Oh it's been requited for a long time now. I think the jig is up.
D: Is requited a word?
I look it up on Dictionary.com and send him the answer.
Me: Yeah, means respond to ( love or affection) returned.
I bite my thumb wondering if he thinks I knew or looked it up. Like always though, he knows me like his own skin.
D:You didn't know that. You looked it up.
Me: Whatever, stop thinking I'm obtuse D
D: Ah oh lol, she busted out the thesaurus.
Me: I hate you ;)
He says nothing for a few minutes and I wonder if he is busy, or being the obnoxious ass he always is when we discuss love. We have been living it for almost eight years, but to be real? Even in the slightest and he closes up. I have scars, scars that he knows he left on my heart and scars that were left when he was gone. He has his own fair share from me as well. We have caused one another more heartache than can be measured, but we have healed one another too.
I hear my phone chime and the green light tells me he isn't running yet.
D: It has been requited a million different times in a million different ways and always at the wrong time luv.
D and I now-a-days, he is one of my best friends and in moments like this I want to scream. D suffers from the stupidity of man. If everything isn't perfect and in place, lined up by fate and stars and everything easy, then the timing is off. What he has always failed to see was me and the worth of it all, of us. Perfect comes with a cost. It is hard work and time and suffering to reach it.
Dante was and will always be unwilling and that is the very definition of unavailable.
I went to shower and think on the ins and outs of D and Emjay. We are definitely intriguing, but that HEA all stories have will forever be missing from us. We just… are. I think of where I have been and what I have survived in the eight years I have loved D. How he saved me when I was too low to walk, and when I loved him through betrayals that break most men. I am twenty-six and unmarried and at times I feel like the average twenty-six year old single something I am. But, where D and I are concerned, sometimes I feel fifty-six.
I dress and take Harley for a walk, grabbing my phone as we head out and see he has sent another message.
D: Can I read it?
Harley, per usual likes to control the run so most of the time I am trying to slow her down, but I need to ponder him reading this story. I got into writing to share my words with the world. I love books and putting them together in a way that draws someone in to what story you tell. If I do this, it, like all my other stories will be published. It would leave us both open to scorn and judgment, even if the story is beautiful there are things about us both and choices we make that could hurt us both and others.
By the time we are back from our run I have gone through the ins and outs of his question and in the process of thinking it through, comes the undeniable fear that he will truly know the depth of the pain he has caused me over the years. He will know that story as a second skin, because I write it that way. I don't care how raw I get when the story takes over, and this will flay me like nothing I have ever written before.
I know that yes, I will let him read it. D and I will forever be what we are, there is no hope left for us. We have said our piece and honestly, the D and Emjay show is exhausting. He won't ever be who I need him to be. He already was once and like it or not, the timing was off and in the time it took us to find one another again, we were both damaged.
This will be a story about love and passion and loss and betrayal. Friendship and loneliness and forgiveness.
I pull up his message and read it a hundred times before I finally respond.
Me: Yeah, but no guarantees you'll like what I have to say.
Within a few minutes he responded in true D smart assness.
D: I'm guessing this was a five hour thought process for you to finally realize you were always gonna let me read it. Stop over thinking shit Emjay.
I honestly wished I could smack him. I am certain our friendship is as strong as it is because I can't choke him as often as I would like.
Me: I hate you
I sit at my desk for hours waiting on his response while I try to map out this story and how it needs to be written. We started eight years ago on the beach in Friday Harbor and so much has happened in that eight year. So much more will happen as I write it, because D and the way our lives are interwoven these days, keep it ever evolving. I have to start at the beginning, to explain how right he was on the timing sucking.
I have to show how he destroyed me, but fixed me time and time again. Tell the world how the one man who had ruined any shot of me finding love again, was also my savior. I have to accept that he, and I may be hated by everyone.
It is the cross we bare every day.
Before I went to bed that night he responded and like always, he leaves me to over think and wish shit was different.
D: You don't hate me, you love me. It has been requited for over eight years Emjay and we will remain a tragic love story for the next eight and so on and so forth until you realize you deserve someone who can touch you and kiss you g
oodnight.
Chapter Three
Friday Harbor, WA
June, 2009
I am sitting on the front porch swing waiting for Kyra to get here so we could hop the ferry and off this little hill in the ocean for a weekend away. She was now, thirty-three minutes late and not answering me over text. My bags for a weekend in Anacortes and away from here. Kendal had not left me alone for the last three weeks, since the night at the bonfire when I caught him with Brittany.
He was continuing to apologize then run off with her at night. I hated him a little for that. I told D that night we met, that I was relieved to be free of Ken, but I couldn’t hurt him as easily as he could me. There was a time I swore I loved him.
I have known him my entire life, spent every summer swimming and riding bikes. I have few memories without Ken in them, but now I wish I could forget him.
In the year we dated and the number kisses we shared, none compared to the small little peck D gave me before driving off with his cryptic, timing sucks bullshit. He had weaseled my number out of Kyra somehow, though she denied it daily. He only text me twice. The first one said it was him and that he wanted to explain about Nicks behavior.
I disregarded it entirely because I couldn’t do to his woman what Brittany had done to me. No draw, or bond or connection could make me lead someone to think they didn't matter.
The next message he sent asked if the number belonged to an Emjay.
That shit was hard to ignore, not gonna lie. I wanted to say yes, it was me.
I didn't though, I just laid into Kyra for the hundredth time for giving him my number. She was sticking to her story swearing she didn't. I knew this weekend I could wear her down though.
I finally see her small Honda RX7 pull up in front of my house and I grab my bags with excitement. "Are you excited?" She asks me and helps load my bags into the trunk. "Sorry I was late. I got a call that had me flustered and annoyed and had to pull over."
"Who upset you? I'll kill him and hide his body." I say in mock anger and she shrugs.
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