Ten minutes in and my bowl was clear. I was a growing boy apparently and Mom was intent on her interrogation of Gigi.
“What’s your favorite subject at school?”
“All of them. I think I just love learning.”
Mom’s next question had Gigi all embarrassed, and because I’d zoned out thinking about the girl sat opposite me, I’d missed what was going on until Mom started shouting.
“If I’d known I’d have baked a cake. I’ll bake one for tomorrow.”
“That’s okay, Mrs. Gears. Honestly, it’s not—”
“It’s Geraldine, dear. Griffin will pick you up at the same time tomorrow and we’ll have a little party in your honor. Won’t we, Griffin?”
“Party?”
“For Gigi’s birthday! Pay attention, boy.”
“It’s your fuckin’ birthday?”
“Mouth! I swear if I tried to wash his mouth out with soap, even the soap would reject my attempts.”
Gigi giggled and looked at the table to avoid my eyes. “I was eighteen yesterday.”
I didn’t know what to say, but my eye caught the clock on the sideboard, and I knew if we didn’t get moving, she’d be late and I’d be in for another earful from JP.
“Hate to have to take you back, sweetheart, but I don’t want you to be late.”
“You kids go. I’ll clean up.” Mom took Gigi in an embrace and then pushed her in my direction. “I’ll see you for a belated birthday lunch tomorrow.”
Back in the truck, things were awkward. I knew if I let her go and didn’t clear the air I’d have another restless night.
“Gigi, don’t take my moody shit personally. Sometimes I just struggle.”
“With?” she asked.
I had two options: lie to her and be her friend or tell her the truth and see how that went. I went for the second one.
Moving my hand to her face, I pushed her long, flowing hair behind her ear and ran a finger along her split lip. “I hate that this shit happens to you.”
On some kind of instinctual level, her head tilted towards my hand, before remembering who we were and replying. “This time I fought back.”
“Yeah? Good for you, sweetheart. But be careful. I can’t believe you’re eighteen now.”
“Me neither. I feel like I’ve crossed a threshold filled with opportunities that are just out of reach.”
I switched lanes, hating that there were only a few more miles left of the journey. “How so?”
“I could leave, you know, get as far away as possible from… my troubles. But Momma is too sick and needs me.”
An intense swirl of emotion began to stir inside me. I wanted her to be safe, and if that meant leaving then so be it. But that would also mean she’d be out of my reach. “You’ll figure it out and I’m always here if you need me.”
We parked in the school parking lot. “You don’t have to pick me up for lunch tomorrow.”
“Are you kidding me? Ma would kick my ass and then withhold cake. She makes a mean fucking red velvet sponge.”
Gigi laughed. “Same time then?”
I reached for her again and this time, when she leaned into my hand, she did it quicker and closed her eyes, relishing the moment. “Have a good day, beautiful,” I whispered.
I watched as she walked into school knowing that if her perfect lips hadn’t been hurt, I would have definitely tried to kiss her.
Gigi
“Momma? You awake?”
She stirred a little but didn’t reply. With her head resting against the pillows, I could see now just how frail she’d become. Each and every day she was noticeably worse. The thing was, I didn’t know what was wrong with her. I told myself that giving up on life could do this to you, but I was convinced that our instinct to survive was much greater. After all, I was proof of that. Every time I’d suffered at the hands of my brother, my overriding sense of survival removed the other choice I would have jumped at.
Momma had to know what was wrong with her; she just had to. Her face was sallow and her once striking cheekbones were now striking for a very different reason.
“Momma? I don’t know if you can hear me, but how do you know if you’re in love? Is it even possible to love someone after just one kiss?” I asked, thinking back to the best belated birthday celebration ever.
When I’d dressed for school, it was the first time I’d ever been bothered about my appearance. I wanted to look nice for my birthday lunch.
I was having a birthday lunch!
I was so excited that when the lunch bell sounded in the classroom, I was out of there like a shot. Nothing was going to waste time I could be spending with Gears and his mom. Like the day before, he was waiting for me in his truck.
“Hey, Gigi.”
“Hi,” I breathed. It was absolutely pointless trying to ignore it.
Gears affected me. Really affected me.
It sounded utterly ridiculous. I’d only been in his company a few times, but each time he’d treated me like a porcelain doll that should be loved and protected. I wanted to think about how crazy it all sounded, but my heart ignored every ounce of sense that my brain desperately tried to impose. The best I could do was convince myself that it was just a crush.
Nothing about my life was normal, so why should my feelings be any different? Why did I ever think I would find a guy in the normal ‘guy meets girl’ way?
Feelings and emotions had kept me alive so far; ignoring them wasn’t in my nature.
I tried to play it cool but when he said, “You ready?” with a smile that only caused my heart to thump louder, confirming my suspicions, I returned that smile tenfold.
“Jesus, fuck me,” he mumbled as we pulled up outside his house.
“What? Oh… Okay?”
“I’m gonna kill her. I told her not to make a fuss. Just think of it as an adult form of TP’ing the neighborhood, but with fucking balloons and what is that? Does that say—”
I giggled. “Happy Retirement?”
Gears’ mom had made a great attempt at crossing it out and scribbling Happy 18th over the top of it, but with the sun reflecting off it, it was still visible.”
“Any chance you wanna just head out to Wendy’s instead?”
“No chance. It’s my party and I’m pretty sure there will be cake involved.”
“That’s not how the song goes, but yeah, there will be,” he grumbled. “And looking at that shit, I’d say more than one cake. Listen, something you need to know about Ma: she’s different.”
“Different?”
“Yeah, my old man fucked off not so long ago and she’s been a little up and down since then.”
“Sorry about your dad.”
“I’m not. He chose someone else over us. That’s his problem not ours. But, Ma isn’t quite there yet with that kind of mindset. Whatever happens, the things she says and does, she means well.”
“Gears, your mom seems just fine to me and we all have our own ways of dealing with the hand life has dealt us. She’s got such a kind heart and the way…” I gulped, not wanting to bring up the night I stayed. “She helped me that night.”
“Christ, it’s your birthday. The last thing I want to do is remind you of, well, you know. Let’s go eat cake.”
I was out of the truck in an instant, completely blowing off my cool exterior and bouncing around on the sidewalk like a kid at Christmas.
The afternoon was lovely. Beyond lovely.
Mom Gears—that’s what I called in her my head—had gone to town with the decorations in the house. The table was all fancy with party plates and pretty napkins, as were the party hats that she made us all wear. The two of us got in the spirit of it. Gears… not so much.
The best thing was that none of it matched. It was all thrown together, like the retirement banner, but the plates were anniversary, the napkins were something to do with a wedding and the party hats had little unicorns on, clearly for a small girl.
“I tried to get to the fanc
y schmancy party store on the corner of East and Webbing, but it was closed, so I rounded up what I could. I changed the banner and I was going to have a go at the plates, but then I figured they’d be covered in food. I also tried to change the unicorn on one of the hats, but it didn’t quite work.”
She nodded in Gears’ direction and without him noticing he’d put a hat on his head that she’d attacked with a permanent marker, leaving it looking less like a unicorn and more like an alien with a big penis. Unfortunately, I was sipping soda from a plastic cup when she pointed it out and I couldn’t help but inhale with glee, which resulted in some of the soda coming back down my nose.
“What?” he asked, all innocent, but by that time I was in bits with laughter. “What the… Ma! I’ve got a dick on my head.” Gears tried his best to appear unimpressed, but the more I looked at him the more I could see he was trying to hold back his own laughter.
“That mouth of yours, Griffin!” His mom tried to admonish him, but it wasn’t working. “I never was good at art.”
The lunch pretty much continued in the same vein. We had sandwiches and party cakes, and as I was listening to Gears ramble on about some car he was working in the autoshop, I found myself mesmerized by his voice, the way his jaw moved when he talked, and every now and then I could see his tongue forming words. It sounded really old fashioned, but he was really handsome. I was quite happy to sit there and just be with him, when his mom interrupted my staring activities and jumped up shouting, “Presents!”
That pulled me up short. I wasn’t expecting presents. “Uh no, no presents necessary.”
“Oh nonsense. A party isn’t a party with presents.”
“I’m pretty sure you said the same shit about the hats, plates and midget sized sandwiches that wouldn’t feed a toddler,” Gears muttered, but his mom had already left the table, quickly returning with a gift bag.
“Happy 18th birthday, Gigi.”
Feeling overwhelmed and embarrassed, I took the bag from her and felt my fingers tremble a little at being given a gift by these people who’d only known me for a short amount of time but had come to love me like I was a part of their family. Inside the bag were three items wrapped in tissue paper. The first was a pretty paper book, a journal of some kind.
“That’s a place to write down all your hopes and dreams, your ambitions and thoughts because every girl should have a journal.” The second parcel was a pen to go with the journal. But the third gift, that was something special and it took my breath away. It was a tiny silver necklace with a small piercing blue stone hanging from it that resembled an eye.
“It’s so different and pretty, I can’t accept it.” I snapped the box shut and went to slide it back across the table.
“You can and you will.” She put her hand on mine, stopping me from pushing it towards her. “It’s an old family heirloom.”
Now I really couldn’t keep it.
“Griffin’s gran was a bit of a traveler. One summer during her misspent youth she found herself in Europe, Turkey to be exact. Turkey borders the Middle East and Europe. It’s a mix of religions and cultures. This eye, an Arabic nazar, is called the blue evil eye. They use it as protection against bad luck. They hang the charm in shops and homes, too. Legends say it sees all and protects you against those who do not have genuine intentions.”
Her words had stolen the very essence of breath from my lungs.
“I laughed it off when my mom gave it to me, but I think like all legends, the power is in what you choose to believe.”
“Thank you.” I forced the reply from somewhere deep inside me. “I will treasure it. Are you sure, though? You said it was an old family heirloom.”
“That’s the thing about heirlooms, dear. You need to pass them on to keep the traditions going. Now, Griffin, you’d best get her back before she’s late for class.”
I grabbed my presents and clutched them to my chest. They were amongst some of the most precious things I’d ever been given. “I’ll just use the bathroom.”
A couple of minutes later when I returned, Griffin and his mom were having a moment. “He was a fucking fool to leave you, Ma,” I heard him say. “What you just did for Gigi proves it.” I watched as she tenderly smiled at him and affectionately put a hand to his stubbly jaw.
“I’m proud of you, son. Seeing the man you’ve become makes my heart burst.”
“Love you too, Ma.”
We climbed back in his truck and for about the three hundredth time this afternoon, I was feeling yet another emotion. For so long, I’d been all about fear and anger, but Gears and his mom brought lots of other things out in me. Good emotions, more hopeful, and full of possibility. That was even without the love I was beginning to feel for both of them and the desire I was struggling to push back down for Gears.
“I fucked up. Totally forgot to get you a gift, Gigi.”
“Oh God, don’t. You and your mom have done more than enough.”
“I know, but I’m sitting here wishing I had.”
I didn’t know how to answer that because I was sitting there wishing he had, too. I would have loved an excuse to throw my arms around him and hug him in thanks. The excuse to feel his body next to mine.
“It’s not too late to get you something. Tell me what you want and I’ll sort it,” he offered.
“A kiss,” I bluntly threw out there before I’d even realized what I’d said. Gears’ head spun to the right to look at me like he couldn’t believe I’d said it, either. “I didn’t mean that. Shit. Sorry. Please forget I said that.”
Gears pulled the car to the side of the curb, causing cars following us to beep and honk their horns. “Gigi, I—”
“Honestly, I think I ate too much sugar and it’s fried my brain.” I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me. I’d never been so brazen before.
“Gigi, stop talking.” I looked at him. “That’s what you want? Not money or some expensive ass blingy piece of crap? Just a kiss.”
Looking at him now, I knew he was asking me this seriously, like he couldn’t believe something as simple as a kiss from him could be more important than possessions.
“I’m so embarrassed right now,” I mumbled in the direction of my feet.
I felt his hand lightly pull my head and turn it in his direction. “Don’t ever be afraid to tell me what you want, Gigi. Life is too fucking short.”
Feeling the new found sense of bravery he’d helped me discover, I looked at him. “Just one kiss. A kiss that can wipe it all away.”
My throat dried instantly while I waited for him to turn me down, but instead I felt my heart beat wilder as I watched his face come closer to mine. An inch from my face, he stopped.
“Breathe, Gigi.” I inhaled and pursed my lips before screwing my eyes shut. A few seconds later I felt the softest, warmest lips touch mine and back off. “You ever had a proper kiss?” he whispered.
I just shook my head.
“Just do what comes natural, no pressure, okay?”
This time, our faces were closer and I felt his stubble as I nodded before I felt his lips again. Gears began to peck the sweetest, smallest kisses on my lips until the time between those pecks was no more and it was one long kiss. When I opened my mouth to breathe, I felt his tongue touch the edge of my lips. The gasp that escaped me gave him the space he needed to gently find my tongue. As soon as our tongues connected every nerve ending in my body exploded. Letting him guide me, I felt brave enough to follow his tongue back with my own and before I knew it, I was having the most intense experience of my life.
An experience that I would remember and think about for the rest of my life.
All too soon, he pulled away from me, and if the look in his eye was anything to go by then I knew he’d enjoyed it as much as I had.
“Wow,” I whispered.
“Yeah, Gigi,” he breathed back. “Best get you back to school.” His voice sounded strained and hoarse.
Just like that, it was over. He’d done
what I’d asked and given me my first proper kiss and I was sad that we were going to fall back into our easy, friendly relationship. When he pulled up outside school, I nervously reached for my backpack. “Thanks for… everything.” I put my hand on the door handle and went to pull it open.
“Gigi—”
“It’s okay. I get it.”
“Your turn to kiss me now.” Shocked, I looked back at him to see if he was joking. When I knew he wasn’t, I leaned into him and kissed the first boy I’d ever wanted to kiss. “Now go to class before I start the car and drive us both somewhere I can have more of those kisses.” Breathless, I pulled away from him, smiling like I’d won the jackpot. “Pick you up for lunch tomorrow, sweetheart.”
I snapped out of the most perfect daydream when Momma coughed.
“Momma?”
“I heard you, Gigi. You deserve some happiness in your life.” She coughed again and the hollowness inside of her chest was only broken up by the sounds of phlegm and mucus rattling around. It was like listening to liquid inside a drumskin.
“But he’s different, Momma. He’s not from school. He’s older.”
“Older? How much?”
“A couple of years. Not much. And he’s…”
“He’s what, honey?” I watched as she tried to sit up before conceding and leaning in to help her.
“He’s a biker.” Her eyes spread wide, showing me the discoloration of their whites. Was that panic? “But he’s good and decent, and he saved me. They threw me a birthday party.”
The pain of disappointment and recognition on her face, told me that she knew what Edward was up to, but more importantly she’d realized she’d forgotten my birthday. “Yes, you’re eighteen now. A grown up and a beautiful eighteen-year-old at that. People come in all sorts of packaging, always remember that. I’m tired, honey.”
“But—”
Turning her head was a crystal clear sign that she was done with this conversation, but I wanted to ask more. I’d expected her to bluster and fight back at me, not throw a comment in that confused me more.
Gigi: A Black Sentinels MC Novel Page 12