I’d downed some pills with coffee and a couple of boiled eggs and now that roiled in my stomach. The shades were drawn on the far end of the living room. In the dimness, the place didn’t look like my fancy apartment by the river. It looked like the ratty house where I’d grown up.
I’d tried taking a girl like Gabi there once. Marcia Goodman. She was one of the richest girls in school - which for our shitty neighborhood meant that she wasn’t living on welfare. I’d already been hitting most of the hot chicks, but I felt a special pleasure in getting this rich girl wound around my finger. She’d taken one look at the overgrown lawn and the flaking blue paint on the house and cut herself free.
Things had only gotten worse in the place. Right about now, my old man would be sitting on a shittier version of this couch, sucking at his oxygen or maybe a cigarette. The doctor had yelled at him to stop, but he was as stubborn out of the ring as I was in it.
“Earned this, Boy,” was all he’d say whenever I would threaten to knock it out of his hands.
“Ain’t earning shit now, Pop,” I’d remind him, pinching it out and crushing it in a bowl next to a dozen other spent butts.
He might growl a bit, but he knew it was just a matter of waiting me out. I could barely stand to stay there anymore. Course that just made me feel guilty about leaving Sarah there. I’d tried to get her so many times to at least come test drive living here. I wasn’t a poet to put this place into words she could understand, but I’d gotten Troy to come in and give it his best shot.
“Kid, it’s beautiful,” he’d said. “You’re high up over the river, above the trees. You’ll feel the sun, smell the water, hear the birds and people chirping. It’s a whole other world your brother’s living in. Let him take you to see it.”
See it.
He caught himself and backtracked, but not before I could elbow him in gut. To his credit, he’d barely flinched, but nothing escaped Sarah. She’d laughed that sunshine laugh of hers and told us she couldn’t leave Pop in the darkness. What he had done to deserve that sort of loyalty, I could never understand. He’d put food on the table and kept the roof mostly patched up, but that was it. The bare essentials of being a father.
Well, I could pull off the bare essentials of being a son by showing up a couple times a month. But goddamn, did I hate leaving Sarah there in that world. I knew she was comfortable knowing exactly where everything was without having to feel or tap it out. I knew our neighbors set aside their craziness to treat her like the special girl she was. I knew our house was close to that busted down juvenile detention facility that passed for her high school.
But what use was any of my success, if I couldn’t even give my kid sister a better life than that?
The front door rattled under the pounds of a fist.
“Come in,” I yelled.
The door shoved open and Troy strode in. He had switched out that dumb suit to just jeans and a button up, but he still managed to look like white trash chic. By the time I started winning UFC sanctioned pots, he might actually have learned to look the part of a manager.
“You alright?” he asked. “We need to go to the hospital?”
“Na, just rough night.”
He lit up and perched on the arm of the sofa. “Nice, player. You really did a number on that chick huh?”
I really had, though not in any way I had planned. “It was alright. Just couldn’t get much sleep.”
“I bet.” He peeked over to the bedroom. “She’s not still here right?”
I wagged my head against the cushions.
“Too bad, would have liked to see how she was walking this morning.”
“I can get you walking bowlegged, if that’s what you want.”
“I’m good. Shove over.”
I groaned up to a seat and Troy sat where my feet had been. He watched the TV edged in like he was in the front row of the actual fight.
“Man, that Randy Pareno’s got nothing on you. I can see his kicks coming a mile away. You should be in that ring.”
My mind was clear enough to remember the details of this fight. “Randy gets creamed in this one.”
“I did say you were better.”
I rubbed the cobwebs from my eyes. “Alright, so get me in there.”
“Trying to, homie. We’re working our way up.”
He had his phone out and glowing in his face. I rose and opened the curtains. The light rushed in.
“Here for business?” I asked.
“Nope, just keeping the party going. I did want to run the next date past you. You think you’ll be good by Friday?”
“Pssh.” I waved him off. “I’ll be fine by the end of the weekend.”
“Yeah, but you need to be good. This next guy sure is.”
He held up his phone and I grabbed it to scan the pic. The guy was tall, black and stacked with muscle.
“This dude’s in my weight class?”
“Barely. Probably dried his black ass up before weigh in.”
Black ass. I had the urge to tell him to shut the fuck up. There wasn’t anything wrong with it, but it had given me a flash of Gabi with her rear hanging in the air and her legs on my shoulders. She’d been loving me then. Why hadn’t that part stuck with her after?
“You worried?” Troy said.
“Na, let him come. He’s gotta fall sooner or later.”
“Alright then, we’re good with the business.” He popped to his feet and clapped his hands. “Ready to party?”
“Yeah, fine. Gimme a minute.”
I shucked off my shorts for jeans and an official UFC shirt. One day they’d have these with my name on them, but the logo would do for now. Let people know what this body was about.
On second thought, I went to the mirror and shaved down my stubble and gelled up my hair. Some girls dug the just-awake look, but an unkempt face just reminded me of Pop. I needed class to get the sort of ass I wanted.
Gabi flashed again in my head, this time lost in the throes of ecstasy. Yeah, that’s how I wanted to remember her. The girl possessed by my body, not the toy I’d broken.
A couple seconds into the memory, though, and my pants were straining at the crotch. Christ, she had been good. Taking a girl like that in my brand new SUV - that was a true pleasure.
She should know how good it was for me. Maybe then she’d understand that it was nothing to be ashamed off. Maybe if I made it right, I could bring her back here and settle this crazy feeling I had in my head. Brain injury or not, that should fix it.
Troy was at the door jangling keys when I ventured back out. “Where you wanna go?” he asked.
“I’m starving.”
“Alright. Mexican? Eat some tacos before we eat some tacos?”
“You know, I didn’t really eat Italian last night,” I said. “I think I need to call a redo and experience that place proper.”
Troy balked. “You serious man?”
“Lunch menu’s cheaper.”
“That’s not the issue. Just… it’s not fucking Mickey D’s you know, to go through drive through twice in a row.”
I shrugged. “It’s what I want.”
Troy sighed. “Alright.”
We hopped into his used Audi and drove the few blocks over. The place looked different in day, not all warm reds and yellows. With daylight streaming through the tall windows, the entire room sparkled like a giant glass trophy.
I scanned the place as I walked in for any sign of Gabi, instantly seeing what a dumbass idea this had been. She didn’t need to work back to back shifts in a place like this.
The hostess came up, bright and chirpy. Even she was different from the night before.
“Hi gentlemen,” she said. “Reservation?”
“No,” I said, still looking around hopefully.
“No problem. Let me see what I can get you.” She tapped her monitor a few times and said. “Table by kitchen ok?”
“Yeah, fine.” I leaned over her screen, but it was undecipherable. “Hey, you know if you have a Gabi working the lunch shift here? Gabrielle’s her full name.”
“Gabrielle?” The woman looked at me like I was talking about a ghost. She tapped the screen a few times. “Gabrielle Williams?”
“She black?” Troy chimed in.
“Uh, I don’t have that information here. I don’t really know her. I think she only serves at dinners, but I don’t have her schedule.”
I chewed my lip to keep from cursing. “Alright, never mind.”
“Mexican?” Troy whispered.
“Yeah, whatever.” My appetite had vanished.
We turned and walked out. This was just dumb all around. Troy seeing me acting like some lonely puppy was gonna bruise my rep. I could get a dozen girls who looked like Gabi tonight. No need to sit around like some teenager waiting for a text.
Text.
“Hold up,” I said, as Troy opened the door. I jogged back to the hostess.
“Got paper?”
She handed me a post-it and a pen, puzzled. Didn’t know why. It was crystal clear to me.
I wrote down my cell number and underneath wrote:
You ok from last night’s fight? Let me know either way.
“Get this to her, alright?” I said, passing it back. I started to slip a twenty from my wallet, but she held up a hand.
“Oh no, that’s fine. I’ll see the note gets passed on.”
I shoved her the bill anyway. “Make sure.”
She nodded and I headed back to Troy. He had a brow raised, but I didn’t give a shit.
Gabi might not want to see me, but I needed to know she was ok.
Then maybe I could let her go.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Gabrielle
I was almost back to normal by the time Jada and I got to work the next day. My mind didn’t run at that super-fast pace anymore. But as I walked through the kitchen towards the dining area, my heart began skipping beats.
There was no reason he’d be back tonight. We hadn’t exactly parted on the best terms. Maybe that was why I wanted to see him to begin with: to let him know that he’d stirred up my life in a good way, not bad.
Romance had been a series of predictable interactions, no different than any chemical reaction. Take a dash of sweet words, stir in a tender kiss, finish it off with a properly paced invitation up to your bed and repeat until you had a relationship.
To go from eye contact and flirting straight to sex in a van? That was wildly unstable. Now the whole world looked full of possibilities.
My breath caught as I pushed open the door. The first diners were trickling in, but it was just our usual upscale crowd. I moved up to Alice at the hostess booth and checked through the glass lobby for any black SUVs in the garage across the street. All I saw were Mercedes and Cadillacs.
“Looking for something?” Alice asked.
“No, I guess not.” I sighed. “Do you have a table for me?”
“Yep. But I’ve got something else for you first.”
She smiled a coy little smile and handed me a piece of yellow paper. I unfolded it and read the note.
Sean.
My heartbeat pounded in my ears, and I could barely hear Alice: “Guess the thing you were looking for found you, huh? Didn’t realize you guys were only fighting in his car the other night.”
I looked up to see her full on grinning. “You know?”
“I saw the guy drive the SUV out back. I saw it rocking when I came out. I saw your car still there. Everything fit.”
I held down the urge to run away. Guess I wasn’t free enough to let people see when I was getting the business. “Maybe I was in trouble,” I said. “Did you come check?”
“Nope. Cause I also saw the way you guys were looking at each other all night.”
Was I really that much an open book around him?
Alice welcomed an elderly couple, then turned back to me rocking her hips. “I gotta say Gabi, I didn’t know this side of you. I always took you for the cautious, analytical type.”
“I did, too.”
“So when are you gonna call him?”
“I’ve got to decide
if
I’m gonna call him.”
“Riiiight.”
Her pale eyes saw what I wanted even before I did.
“After the shift, I guess.”
The dinner ran for four hours, but the time crawled like days in my head. I had plenty of time to talk myself in and out of saying another word to that boy.
What are you even doing considering this, Gabi?
I wondered on more than one occasion.
He was fun. He was hot. But he was dangerous. Guys like him weren’t looking to play for keeps. They took what they wanted and got out. I’d been lured by his type once or twice in college, but I’d managed to keep my panties on.
This guy hadn’t given me a chance to back out, which meant he must be better than most. Did I really want another chance to get more attached to him?
Once a bond forms in the chemical world, it takes energy to break. In reality, usually one person finds the energy and leaves the other with the wreckage. I knew on which side I’d fall.
But some deep part of me kept tugging me to call. I had fun right? I had lived something I’d never lived before. Why not just run with it? Maybe I could use some wreckage to look back on.