Us, Again

by Elle Maxwell

  With dramatically slow movements, she leans back on the couch cushion, crosses one leg over the other, and takes a sip from her glass. She is every bit as imperious as a queen on her throne ready to issue a decree. Then she pins me with her wicked gaze and demands, “Try.”

  * * *

  Graham

  I don’t know what to do with myself.

  I wander the house, doing whatever I can think of to stay occupied. Throw in a couple loads of laundry. Double my usual workout. Trim my beard. Scroll through some online college course catalogs. Call my parole officer for my weekly check-in. Go for a run.

  By mid-afternoon, I’m climbing the walls. Damn, I really need to get a life.

  I shoot Griff a text, hoping he’s free.

  GRAHAM: Want to grab a beer tonight?

  GRIFF: Good timing. The girls are at some playdate shit so I’m free 3-5

  GRAHAM: Great. Just say where.

  We meet at a hole-in-the-wall bar near his place and order beers that the bartender hands to us in the bottle. I appreciate how unpretentious it is—this is clearly a place that doesn’t mess around with things as superfluous as glasses.

  “You get your girl?” Griff asks me.

  I grin. “Yeah. I did.”

  He smacks me on the back with one of those giant paws.

  “’Atta boy.”

  We tap the necks of our beer bottles together. A silent toast to love and shit.

  “Any sign of those fuckers trying to come after you again?”

  “Nope.” Thank God. I’ve kept an eye out, but there’s been no sign of Eli or any of Curtis’ old crew. I’ve been hoping Eli has just dropped the whole thing, but the realistic part of my mind knows I don’t deserve that much luck.

  “I asked around a bit, wanted to see what the word is on Eli.”

  “I don’t want you getting into any trouble or opening any closed doors from your old life, especially not on my account. You’ve got too much to lose.”

  “Nah, I didn’t cross any lines. I got a few contacts, clean guys, who have ties to the old crew and hear things. And what they say about Eli … he’s bad news, Pretty Boy.”

  “What are they saying?”

  “Twisted motherfucker. Got a mean streak a mile wide. They say Curtis used to get shit done and made sure you knew who was boss, but Eli takes things too far, seems to get off on it.”

  I can’t say I’m surprised. I recall the evil glint in his eyes that night in the parking lot as he promised to kill me slowly and make sure my body was never found. Yeah, “twisted motherfucker” sounds about right.

  The top of Griff’s bottle disappears inside his beard as he tosses back some beer.

  “I know I already told you to watch your back, but watch with both eyes, hear me? Maybe bust out some of that money and hire professional security.”

  I shake my head. I think hiring a bodyguard would make me more visible, a bigger target. Plus, there’s no chance I could manage that without Mackenzie noticing and asking questions. I change the subject.

  “What else is new with you, Old Man? Getting everything ready for the baby?”

  “We’ve still got a while. Shaina’s only five months or so along. I was already locked up a couple in months the first time, didn’t get to help her out the way I should’ve. I gotta make up for it, you know? Her car has been acting up, so I’m trying to sell my Harley to get her a new one before the baby comes—something safe, better for two kids.”

  I see an opportunity and go for it without a second thought.

  “No shit? I’ve been looking at buying a Harley.”

  It’s basically true. I’ve thought about looking into it.

  He cuts those dark eyes in my direction suspiciously.

  “Don’t do me any favors, boy.”

  I put my hands up to show my innocence, palms facing him and fingers pointed to the sky except for one index finger and thumb, which are still curled around the neck of my beer bottle.

  “Wouldn’t think of it. And hey, I’m not making any promises, just saying I’ll take a look. I have to make sure it’s in good condition.”

  He grunts in offense as I knew he would. I’m well aware he treats that bike almost as well as his woman.

  “You ain’t gonna find better.”

  I hide my smile by lifting the bottle to my lips for another swig. Looks like I’m buying a motorcycle.

  Later we’re settling up our bills and getting ready to head out. Just as I start to rise from my stool Griff puts a hand to my shoulder and halts my movement.

  “One more thing. When I told Shaina where I was going, she tore me a new one for not having you over to dinner yet. And you’ll learn one of these days that when your woman’s pregnant, you give her whatever the fuck she wants. So, you free next weekend? Supposed to be good weather. I’m pulling out the grill. Bring your girl too.”

  19. NOT IN MY HOUSE, KIDS

  Mackenzie

  March in Boston is strange; the weather teeters unpredictably on the line between winter and spring the way a thirteen-year-old straddles adulthood, shifting weight between their new maturity and the foot that’s still planted in childhood. And with even more mood swings. Only last week it snowed, but today is unquestionably a taste of spring. The sun is out in its full glory and there’s not a rain cloud in sight.

  It’s the perfect day to hang out with Griff and Shaina in their small backyard. The adults are sitting in folding chairs, sipping beers Graham and I brought (except for Shaina, of course—we brought root beer for her), while their daughter Layla plays a few feet away. At the moment she’s creating a masterpiece with colored sticks of chalk on a strip of pavement. Griff keeps getting up to check on the burgers he’s cooking on the grill. We’ve been here for an hour, enjoying the sun and chatting as we get to know each other. This is Graham’s first time meeting Shaina, and it’s mine meeting both of them.

  “So, what, he was the hotshot quarterback and you were a cheerleader?” Shaina asks me teasingly.

  “This one?” Graham asks in a tone of exaggerated disbelief, with his thumb pointed at me. “Not a chance. She was queen of the nerds.”

  “Hey!” I laugh and swat at him playfully.

  The look he shoots in my direction is mischievous but bathed in a gleam of adoration that still takes my breath away every time I see it, even though it happens daily. He reaches out one long arm and drapes it around the back of my chair, lazily running his fingers through my hair.

  “Okay, okay. How’s this—she was the smartest, hottest girl in our school. She wouldn’t have had time for cheerleading with everything she did—I swear she was the president of every society, club, and council the school had—student government, honors this and honors that … I was lucky she made time to go to my games.”

  And now I’m blushing. He didn’t have to go into all of that. And he’s exaggerating … I was the vice president of some of those clubs.

  “How did you two meet?” I ask Shaina and Griff, diverting attention from myself.

  They proceed to tell us a story that I sense is highly edited, which likely means they met through Griff’s old crew or some other criminal connection. Since they clearly don’t want me to know, I refrain from mentioning that Graham told me about their backgrounds before we came here. He doesn’t think Shaina was ever directly involved in Griff’s old criminal activities, but she definitely has close ties to that world.

  Today seems like a big step for me and Graham. He’s openly including me in this, even though Griff is from a part of his life he shut me out of before. And it’s not just that he invited me today—he also trusted me with Griff’s past without trying to shield me from it. This is proof that Graham really has changed, that he’s grown beyond the boy who lied and hid things from me years ago. It means that he’s keeping his promise to be totally honest with me. Every day Graham chips away more of the hard shell casing I’d built around my heart—and as we sit here with his friends, I sense another piece disconnecting.
There are barely any left at this point, only the smallest remnants hanging on in an attempt to protect me from completely falling for Graham again.

  Our conversation has split in two now—the guys are discussing some mutual acquaintances from prison while Shaina and I talk about the new baby they’re expecting.

  Shaina is a little shorter than me, with thick shiny black hair that falls to just above her shoulders. I have a weird urge to reach out and touch it just to see if the perfectly straight strands are as silky as they look. There’s an indistinct exotic look to her—seemingly the product of an ancestry woven together with a myriad of threads from gorgeous people all over the world. She has high cheekbones and a slight almond shape to her eyes that hints at some Asian threads in her genetic tapestry. I might have a girl crush on her.

  Shaina is an adorable pregnant woman. She’s so tiny that the little protrusion of her baby bump almost looks out of place in the middle of her body. Looking at her, I understand what people mean when they say a woman is glowing; she has this aura of happiness as she talks about the baby inside her, and her hand inevitably strays to her belly every couple of minutes, where it rests lovingly.

  This afternoon has been wonderful so far, and I can’t get over how cute Griff and Shaina are together. Griff’s love for her is obvious—every time I look at him, I find his gaze on her or their daughter. He’s a giant of a man, and it would be almost comical seeing them together with such a vast disparity in sizes, but they’re so clearly in love that it only took minutes for me to see how they fit.

  Today has actually been a bit of a reality check for me. I generally think I’m a really open and accepting person, but I can’t deny that if I’d come across either of them in another setting I would likely have been hesitant, maybe even a little afraid, to approach or interact.

  Everything about Griff is intimidating. He is gigantic. I thought Graham was big, but Griff is on another level. He’s way taller than six feet (6’5” maybe?) and he’s not a lean basketball player type of tall, but a solid wall of bulk that is clearly all muscle. Tattoos cover every inch of visible skin from his chin down—colorful designs on his neck, hands, and both forearms where he’s pushed back his shirt sleeves exposing some skin. The way they disappear beneath his sleeves and at his shirt’s collar makes it clear they continue far beyond. (I wish I could somehow ask him to take off his shirt so I could see the full extent of his ink, but I’m sure Shaina wouldn’t appreciate that, and Graham would lose his shit without a doubt.) Even now, relaxed and happy in his own home with family and friends, Griff gives off a palpable vibe of “don’t fuck with me.” If I’d run across him some other time, I would honestly have crossed the street to avoid the encounter even in full daylight.

  In another context, I admit I probably wouldn’t have chatted up Shaina either, even though she is nowhere near as intimidating as “her man” (apparently the preferred label for their relationship). She, too, has tattoos covering both arms and peeking out from the neck of her shirt, and multiple piercings on her face that gleam and flash in the sunlight, including a stud in her nose, a hoop in her eyebrow, and a full row of earrings covering the shell of one ear. But it’s not just the body modifications—there’s an overall sense of roughness to her; even now when she’s comfortable she naturally emanates a sort of low-level hostility that I imagine successfully scares off most people at full force.

  It’s a moment of perspective I won’t soon forget. It would be so sad if I had missed out on the chance to know these two humans because I allowed their outer veneers to scare me away. I’m already completely smitten with the two of them and their little family. Shaina is someone I definitely want to meet up with another time without “the men.” She has a great sense of humor and has been so kind in her easy acceptance of me even though I’m arguably the odd one out among us. And Griff is a huge, fierce teddy bear (though I’ll never ever say that to his face). I can see exactly what Graham meant when he told me Griff is a “ride or die” type—deeply loyal and protective and one of the most decent human beings he’s ever met. It didn’t take me long to verify that Griff has a heart as big as his body; it’s downright endearing to see all 300 pounds of his formidable ferocity channeled into the love and protection of his family.

  Still concentrating on his talk with Griff, Graham’s hand reaches out to stroke my neck and shoulder lightly. It’s a sweet little way of checking in, connecting with me even while we’re part of different conversations. Again, I have that sense of rightness filling me, being here with Graham as a couple.

  It’s not that I was incomplete without him and now he’s somehow made me whole. I wasn’t lying all those times I told Marisa I didn’t need a man—I don’t need one. I wasn’t waiting around for a man to come and give me validity as a person. These past few years I really have reached a place where I am whole and content as a person all on my own.

  No, this is something different. I’d forgotten this feeling of being part of something more, a whole that’s bigger than just my own. I am still me, and he is his own person, but now we’re also connected in this new (or renewed, I suppose) entity that is us. I am here today as part of a unit, publicly making a mutual claim that we belong to each other. And it is amazing.

  Eventually, Griff and Shaina go inside to grab some things for the finished burgers, after adamantly denying our offers to help. Once they’re through the door with Layla close on their heels, Graham leans close and speaks to me in a low voice.

  “I forgot to tell you—I may need you to drive the Range Rover back to my place.”

  “Why?”

  “Griff’s looking to sell his Harley and I told him I’m interested.”

  My eyes widen.

  “You’re going to buy a motorcycle?”

  “I’m going to buy his motorcycle. He needs the money—he wants to get Shaina a new car before the baby comes.”

  I reach up and run my hand over the permanent scruff on his jaw, which is grown out a little at the moment so it’s softer. God, how I love this generous man.

  “That’s sweet, Y. But have you ever been on a motorcycle?”

  His eyebrows meet in a frown.

  “Well, no.”

  “You know it’s not like a bicycle, right?”

  He gives me a look that says “Please, don’t insult me.”

  “And you need a motorcycle license to drive it legally.”

  I watch his face fall in disappointment.

  “Oh.”

  I slide my hand farther up his face until I can play with his hair. He cut it recently (I objected strongly when I first saw), but it’s still long enough on top that I can run my fingers through it. I also made him promise to grow it back out, after presenting a very compelling list of reasons why he should. (Number 1: Man buns turn me on.)

  “I can ride it, though.”

  I wish I’d taken out my phone so I could capture the look on his face—it’s so shocked that I’m borderline offended.

  “I have my license. I ride Barrett’s bike sometimes.”

  A couple of years ago my brother had a six-month leave, and over the summer I convinced him to teach me to ride his motorcycle. Barrett is a Marine who works alongside some of the most badass women on the planet, so he never pulls sexist shit with me like telling me I can’t get my motorcycle license. When he was deployed again he gave me the keys to his Ducati, which is parked in the garage of his apartment that he rarely stays in, and permission to ride it.

  Mom was not pleased, but she knows how stubborn I am once I decide to do something. And I was determined. It was a heady feeling to conquer something so powerful and dangerous—another step in my quest to become stronger than I was at seventeen.

  “You’re kind of a badass now, huh?”

  “Did you think I was sitting around waiting for you to come back and be strong for me?”

  He’s looking at me with a mixture of awed respect and something else—maybe confusion? Or fear? It’s a look I see sometimes when h
e learns something about me that’s changed. I suspect it’s a glimpse into a part of him that fears my feelings for him will end up on that list.

  Our conversation ends when Griff and Shaina return carrying condiments, followed by a bouncing Layla who is proudly swinging a bag of hamburger buns at her side.

  * * *

  “Stop it!”

  “What?”

  “Stop thinking about having sex on that thing.”

  I don’t even need to see his sheepish smirk for confirmation; I already know I’m right.

  “You’re underestimating the logistics. That is not happening.” I rotate my hand in a circular motion over the saddle seat of Griff’s gorgeous Harley Low Rider.