A Shot at Us

by Cameron Lowe

  Juliet held out both her hands in a stop gesture, closed her eyes, and shook her head. “Uh uh. That one does not make sense.”

  “He cares about what I think! What I want! He brought me soup when I was sick. Calvin, he was in a meeting. When he got home, he thought helping me put on Vicks was an excuse to play with my tits.”

  “I mean… name me a guy who wouldn’t. I’m not even a lesbian and if I wasn’t your cousin, I’d want a feel of those knockers.”

  Gwen smacked her. “Knockers? Really? Ugh. And you’re not helping. Malcolm’s a genuinely decent guy, Juliet. He’s so… he’s… maybe I’m an attention whore or whatever you want to call me, but he looks at me and it feels like… like I’m the only thing that really matters in the room to him.”

  “So he looks at you and makes you feel funny. And he’s a nice guy. And…?”

  Gwen stormed away and gripped the bars of the merry-go-round, pushing against it, swirling the damn thing until the mechanical squeak became a grinding cry. Juliet rejoined her, putting a hand on her cousin’s shoulder.

  “I’m not saying you shouldn’t feel this way,” Juliet said quietly. “But I’m not going to lie and tell you it’s sane.”

  “I know, I know!” Gwen shouted.

  “Just… be sure you’ve got it right. Because Calvin is a great guy. And if you leave him for a fling, and this backfires and Malcolm turns out to be some drugged-out shitbird? There’s no unringing that bell.”

  Gwen turned to face her. “I know that mentally. But my heart… I spent half an hour yesterday convincing myself not to jump him when I went to go see him, and the only way I managed that is… um… you know, just never mind that part.”

  Juliet snickered. “I think I can imagine, not that I want to. But that’s lust, Gwen, not love.”

  “I know. But… I…” She couldn’t put voice to the words. Her mind didn’t want to acknowledge them. Juliet seemed to understand, though, and sighed.

  “So what now?”

  “For now? I go home again. If Calvin pulls this little homemaker bullshit on me again, I’m leaving him. Malcolm aside, that’s not who I am or what I want, and I don’t appreciate him waiting this long to tell me that’s what he expects.”

  “And Malcolm?

  Gwen shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe I never will.”

  * * *

  The RC car display restocked, Malcolm spent much of the first hour of his shift talking with a trio of customers about cables for their monitors. He was bored out of his mind but knew nothing about the topic, so he tried to pay attention to the lessons one of them, an IT engineer downtown, gave the room. Just when Malcolm thought the guy was wrapping it up, he launched into a discussion about sound systems shown off at that year’s CES show that plucked MP3 files wirelessly from a computer and played them through speakers, all wirelessly. Now that held Malcolm’s interest, and he almost didn’t register when Calvin walked through the door.

  “Be with you in a second,” Malcolm said, then it registered who had come in, and he turned. “Oh hey. Sorry Calvin.”

  “Take your time,” the other man said. He was usually in classes about that time of the day, but judging from the rumpled clothes and the faint hint of five o’clock shadow, Calvin had been either drinking the night before or had suddenly decided Malcolm’s own haphazard attention to style and shaving was in vogue.

  “Nah, no worries, just listening to these guys talk shop.” Turning back to the customers, Malcolm said, “Hey, I’m just gonna be over here. You guys need something, let me know.”

  Annoyed at being interrupted, they sank deeper into the store and resumed their talk while Malcolm headed over and leaned against the counter. “What’s up, dude?”

  “You, ah, you haven’t seen Gwen around, have you?”

  That felt more like an accusation than an actual question. “Nope. She came by a couple days ago. Brought me some of that meatball casserole for getting her the cold medicine and stuff.”

  “The cold medicine and stuff?” Calvin parroted, smiling tightly.

  “Yeah, she didn’t tell you? When she had that flu, what, last week or the week before, I came by your place to return your hose. Which, by the way, is in your office if you haven’t seen it.”

  Calvin stared at him, which Malcolm took to mean, “Keep going.”

  “Anyways, she was sacked out, using toilet paper for tissues. So I went and grabbed her some cold stuff. She tried to pay me but I told her to make me some of that meatball stuff instead. I gotta tell you, man, you are one lucky bastard. I could eat that food all day, every day.”

  “Hm,” Calvin said. “Did she say anything else?”

  “No, not really. She saw I had, uh, company. We were right in the middle of things, and I think Gwen got pretty embarrassed.”

  Calvin seemed to visibly deflate and relax, and he even attempted a smile. “You got some, huh? The taco date?”

  “Yeah, Runa. She’s… well, she’s pretty special.” Except that I don’t feel anything for her, Malcolm thought. Not like what I do with the woman you’ll probably end up marrying.

  “Let’s get some beer tonight and we’ll talk about it. I’ll buy.” Calvin grimaced and rubbed the back of his head. “Could probably use your advice, too. I think I fucked things up pretty bad between us.”

  Malcolm’s heart leaped and he immediately felt guilty about it. Calvin was his friend too, not just Gwen. “Sure, man.”

  “Good. All right,” Calvin said, and rapped the desk with his knuckles. In all the time Malcolm had known the man, Calvin had seemed so composed, almost ten or twenty years older than his actual age. But now, his walls exposed, he seemed nothing more than the teenager he’d been just a couple years ago.

  * * *

  The house was dark when Malcolm came down the street. Nic’s car was in the driveway, canted at a crazy angle. The Grand National was back in its garage after Malcolm came out to a trio of teenagers standing around the car cover, taking a peek underneath it. That was all right. All the walking to and from the bus stops was good for him.

  He thought maybe Nic had just run inside for something and hadn’t bothered to park properly. The house was unlocked, the Xbox on and frozen on Halo’s pause screen, and a cigarette in the ash tray on the coffee table had been lit and left, its ashes a long tube of white and gray. Maybe he was in the bathroom? No, Nic wasn’t there either.

  Malcolm grabbed the house phone, feeling uneasy. He had to look up Alicia’s number from a magnet pad on the fridge, and dialed it quickly, heading outside to take a look around. She didn’t pick up, but when he hung up, the phone rang in his hand immediately.

  “Alicia?”

  “Malcolm, hey. Sorry, was just hitting the treadmill. What’s up?”

  “Hey, are you with Nic?”

  “No. He was headed back to your place.”

  “So you were with him?” he asked, heading back up the steps into the house, a sense of dread congealing in his stomach.

  “All right, you’re scaring me.”

  “I’m a little scared myself. Came home, place is unlocked, car’s in the driveway, but he’s gone.”

  “What?” she asked, a mixture of anger and fear seeping their way in.

  “Don’t panic. Not yet. But let me know if you hear from him.”

  “I will. Fuck. That idiot. I told him dealing was going to get him in trouble.”

  “Me too,” Malcolm said.

  “Screw it, I’m coming over.”

  She hung up, and Malcolm headed for the kitchen. Without knowing why exactly, he grabbed their longest, beefiest knife, and headed out to the living room to toss it on the table. Moments later, his phone rang again.

  “Nic?”

  “Close,” Runa said, amused. “Question. Is he better in bed than me?”

  Malcolm laughed, but nervousness tainted it. “Hey, can I call you back? My roommate’s disappeared on me. Like… in a really freaky way.”

  “Oh shit, really? Hang on
, I’m coming over. I read, like, fifty Nancy Drew books when I was a kid.”

  Thinking of Calvin popping over later that night, Malcolm almost told her no, but Runa too was off the line. What was with the women in his life not bothering to say goodbye when they hung up? Irritated and worried, he started to tidy up. Apart from the initial week he’d moved in, when the place resembled a frat house, they kept things pretty neat. Nic wasn’t naturally given to cleanliness, but with the threat of Alicia dropping in at random hours, he kept himself less slovenly than usual.

  That was what worried Malcolm. No way would he have left things like this for such a long period of time, not unless there was an emergency. None of this was like him. His roommate even locked the door when they were inside.

  Malcolm headed outside to check his car. The doors were unlocked, and the keys on the floorboard. He got in, reversed the car down the driveway, and pulled back in straighter. When he got out again, a black and white Crown Vic pulled up to the curb, his roommate peering out the back window sullenly. The tall cop, the one that’d liked Malcolm’s Grand National, stepped out of the car and let Nic go free. Malcolm’s roommate darted up the driveway, head down.

  “Hey, what’s going on?” Malcolm asked him.

  Nic kept moving and said, “Less you know, the less you get involved, the better.”

  He headed inside, slamming the door behind him. The tall cop ambled up to Malcolm, frowning. Malcolm jerked a thumb at the house. “He all right?”

  The tall cop thought about that, inhaled, and shook his head while he let it out. “No. Not really.” He surprised Malcolm by sticking his hand out. It wasn’t the first time they’d shook, but this time the cop didn’t take it as a way to check for a pot smell. “My name’s Hunter Carr, and that’s Art Dixon inside the car there. Malcolm, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Malcolm, you see anything happening on this street, anything suspicious, anyone looking like they don’t belong, I want you to call up the police station, and you ask for one of us directly. And maybe think about a change of scenery.” The cop turned around and headed back to his car. Before he got in, he looked over the top and grinned. “And if you ever want to sell that car, you come talk to me first.”

  Malcolm watched the two cops take off, then raced inside. Nic was sprawled out on the couch, the game controller in one hand, a cold beer in the other. He rolled the bottle against his cheek, wincing. Malcolm came around the other side and for the first time noticed the bruises on his face.

  “Jesus, Nic, what happened? Was that from the cops?”

  “What? No,” Nic said, vacant and distant. He shook his head. “Nah. Dixon’s an asshole but Hunter’s good people.”

  “Well, what the fuck then, man? Where were you? Who did this?”

  Nic twisted the top of the beer bottle off and tossed the cap into the ashtray. “I mean it when I say don’t worry about it. But Malcolm, there’ll probably be a point when those guys or some other police show up. If they do, you tell them everything. You let them in, you don’t try to hide shit, you don’t try to protect me. Got it?”

  “No, I don’t get it.”

  “It’s going to be either them or my bosses. Don’t think there’s a third way out. This is totally screwed.” A car pulled up outside and Nic rose to his feet to check the window. “Alicia,” he sighed, relieved. “Good. I need to get laid.” He turned and placed one trembling hand on Malcolm’s shoulder. “I’m sorry I’m such a shitty roommate.”

  “Nic, you can stop dealing.”

  “It’s not that simple, buddy.” Nic said as Alicia started knocking. “It’s never that simple.” He stared at Malcolm forlornly. “I think I may have to go to prison.”

  * * *

  Runa showed up a few minutes later in matching pink sweats from head to toe, her hair pulled back in a messy ponytail. She bounded inside, and seemed almost disappointed when she spotted Nic and Alicia cuddling on the couch playing a game.

  “Aw, he’s home,” she said.

  “Don’t sound too excited,” Nic said.

  “I was hoping for a sexy Sherlock Holmes and Watson thing going on. Me and Malcolm.”

  Malcolm came out of the kitchen with a pair of bottles and handed one over to Runa. “Which one would be Sherlock?” The look she gave him answered that question. “Ah, right. Well, I would make for a pretty good Watson.”

  Calvin, almost forgotten about by that point, pulled up behind Runa’s car in another ten minutes. Malcolm walked outside as he pulled a paper bag out of the back seat. As Calvin came up the driveway, Malcolm was leaning against the doorframe.

  “I see all the cars,” Calvin said. “Bad timing?”

  “If that’s alcoholic, it’s the best timing,” Malcolm said. “Come on in. Looks like my roommate’s going to jail.”

  “Hey!” Nic shouted from inside. “Prison! Get it straight, dickweed.”

  Calvin grinned. “A jailbird party. I like it.”

  They headed inside, where Runa was just digging through Malcolm’s CDs and shaking her head as Alicia and Nic kept playing a game. She was sitting on his lap now, occasionally stopping for a kiss or three.

  “Beer in the fridge,” Nic said. “Funny enough, about the only thing I don’t have in the house is weed.”

  “I brought rum and Coke,” Calvin said, holding up the bag.

  “My man!” Nic crowed.

  Runa glanced behind her. “Mal-”

  “Don’t call me that,” he groaned.

  “-your music sucks.”

  “Hey! That’s a cultured blend of hip-hop, rap, rock, and Weird Al!”

  “Yeah,” she said, rolling her eyes. “It sucks.”

  Malcolm walked over and smacked her butt for that. She yelped and waggled it in his direction before returning to the task at hand, finally settling on an old workout mix CD. Before long, the house was bumping – as much as it could bump, given they were playing the music from an old CD player with one speaker on the fritz. Runa grabbed Malcolm and pulled him into a dance, followed by Alicia and Nic. Calvin poured drinks for the room, and crashed out on the couch to take over the game, grinning despite the mood he’d displayed earlier.

  Four or five songs later, while Nic, Alicia, and Runa pored over the delivery menu from Matto Furio’s, Rankin Flats’ best pizza chain, Malcolm ducked outside to sit with Cal on the stoop, both of them with half a drink in hand.

  “I needed this,” Calvin said. “Been so long since I just… relaxed.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I try to be this guy who has his shit together, right? I mean, I know what I want to do in life, I know what it is I want out of a relationship, and I know exactly how to get there. I’m so focused on all that, I don’t pay any attention to here and now. It’s exhausting.”

  “Think about how that must feel from Gwen’s perspective.”

  Calvin tensed, then took a long drink. “You know, I kinda want to punch you sometimes.”

  “Sorry. But you asked for my help. And if you really want it, then don’t expect me to sugarcoat shit.”

  “So help me. Because I feel like I’m losing her, Malcolm.”

  As Calvin recapped what had happened between the two, an angry, selfish part of Malcolm wanted to tell him no, to gleefully slam the door on Calvin and Gwen’s relationship so he could swoop in for himself. That part of him ached for Gwen with such a ferocious need he almost did it, almost came within a hair of telling Calvin something like, “You have to figure it out for yourself.”

  But a thought crossed his mind - do you deserve her any more than he does? Was he so much better than Calvin? His own girlfriend was a wonderful woman, and here he was, contemplating how to steal Gwen away from another man because he saw an opening. Young as he was, Malcolm knew the term “poisoning the well,” and whatever future he and Gwen might have together, be it as friends or as lovers, would definitely be poisoned if he came to her this way.

  And Calvin was, despite his self-obsessi
on, a good man. He had a hell of a future ahead of him, he was smart as a whip, and he treated Gwen so well. Maybe they had some problems to work out, but that was every relationship. Calvin didn’t deserve to be stabbed, in the back or the front.

  Flashes of her in his mind.

  Goodbye, Gwen.

  I love you.

  Fuck. He did, too. He loved her.

  “You want to hold on to Gwen? Listen. Not to me. But her. And I mean really, honest-to-God listen, and have the decency to pay attention and remember what you can. And don’t let your ego get in the way either. Either you want to hold onto her and you’ll listen to her, or you’ll think you’re listening and you’ll do what you want anyways.”

  “Hey,” Calvin snapped.

  “I’m not saying you’re a bad guy, Calvin. I’m saying your dream isn’t hers. So you have a choice, right now. You want to hang onto her, you accept the reality that what Gwen wants is important to you, that you lift each other up, not just yourself and what it is you want out of the relationship. Her working, her success, that’s no threat to you. That’s all in your head.”

  “And the other choice?” Calvin asked sullenly.

  “You keep going the route you’re going. And you drag an unhappy woman with you who loves you but resents not being able to chase her own dreams. You’d be living a lie, but if having your ego stroked is more important to you than her-”

  Calvin shot up, and for a moment, Malcolm thought the other man really might hit him. But instead, Calvin just stood there, staring into the row of untrimmed bushes in the neighbors’ yard, and finally shook his head. “You’re an asshole.”

  “But you know I’m right.”

  “Yeah. I do. Why are you telling me all this?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean… I know you like her, Malcolm. I’m not an idiot. I’ve seen the way you look at her, and… if I’m being honest, the way she looks at you. If you were going to cut my legs out from underneath me, this is when you should do it. So… why not?”

  “Because… because you’re my friend too, Calvin. And she deserves a guy like you.”

  “Hm.” Calvin shook his head. “I need another drink. Can I crash here tonight?”