“Not tonight, sugar.” I immediately hate myself as her eyes dim and she sets her jaw, taking it like a champ.
“Sure,” she says. “Sure, some other time.”
I give her a weak smile and run my hand over my buzzed hair, feeling sick. Then I pat her on the shoulder and split.
I MEANT
to take the long way home, change my clothes, and go for a run so I could sleep.
At first. But then, yeah, all right, even with my jaw still throbbing from last night’s encounter, I kind of knew I’d end up here again. The Cellar.
It started when my youngest brother, Daniel, moved away last month. I don’t remember where I heard about it. Okay, maybe I looked it up online. While Daniel lived in Philly, there was no way I could go to… that kind of place. There was always the chance, no matter how slim, that he might be there. But once he was gone, I couldn’t stay away. It was like there was a light blinking in my periphery that I had to go turn off. Of course, when I flipped the switch, the light just burned brighter, hotter. Impossible to ignore.
Inside, it’s so dark that all I can see is the curve of a chin, the bulk of a rounded shoulder, a gesturing hand as it catches the light. For a second, my eyes land on an uncommonly tall guy at the end of the bar who’s staring at me. In the whirlwind of seeking bodies, he’s noticeably still. I lose track of him fast as I scan the crowd for a likely target. When a built blond guy settles on the stool next to me and orders a beer, I lean toward him and grin. I nod toward the tip I’ve put on the bar and slide his bottle on top.
“Betcha I can get that dollar out without touching the bottle.”
He just raises an eyebrow, clearly unimpressed, eyes icy and face hard. His remoteness suits me fine. He doesn’t snatch his beer back, so I do the trick, rolling the bill with my fingers on either side so it nudges the beer onto the bar top. It’s usually enough for at least a smile, but he just picks up the beer and drains it. Then he nods at me and tips his chin toward the alley, and the tightness in my chest loosens a little even as my stomach clenches. The room tilts when I slide off the stool, but I steady myself and follow him.
It happens so fast that it takes me a moment to understand that what’s going on isn’t what I planned for. I was distracted, one hand at my fly. The second man must’ve been behind me and I didn’t notice. He’s squat and heavily muscled, but I could definitely take him one-on-one. Could probably take either of them one-on-one, but the hits are coming too fast, and when a hard shove sends my face into the greasy brick and then me to the ground, I can’t quite get my feet under me again. And maybe I don’t try that hard. When they start kicking me, I close my eyes because the alley is spinning and focus on each distinct point of impact, each throbbing, stinging locus of hurt.
Like a sick meditation, I can lose myself inside the pain, make it bigger than I am, pull it around me like a blanket.
Then someone rips the blanket away and my eyes jerk open. There’s a third guy, and for a moment I panic. But he’s pulled the other two off me and is—Jesus, he’s systematically taking them apart. He fights dirty, but every motion is perfectly controlled, as if he were making a science of hitting exactly as hard as is necessary to take these guys down and not one bit harder. I’ve been in a lot of fights and seen even more, but I’ve rarely seen anything like this level of control. His face is expressionless and he’s totally silent. He shoves the men down the alley and they scamper off like rats. I close my eyes and try to sink back down into my body, hoping that when I open my eyes, the alley will be empty just like all the other times.
The guy grabs me by the shoulders and pulls me up. His grip is unbreakable, but I try anyway because sitting up doesn’t agree with my spinning head.
“Get the fuck off.” I try to push against him, but he may as well be the brick wall behind me for all that he gives. Irritation is quickly overshadowed by the humiliating impulse to puke, and I shove at him again.
“Get
off
.” He doesn’t let go, just keeps holding me steady with that maddening pressure: not tight enough to hurt me, not loose enough to let me go.
“Oh fuck,” I groan after I’ve puked my guts out against the wall. I twisted at the last minute and avoided vomiting on the guy. Mostly. His fault, though, since he wouldn’t let me go. Now that I’ve thrown up, the shame hits. I’m in a filthy alley where I followed a complete stranger in the hopes of getting my dick sucked. I got the ever-loving crap kicked out of me and was too wasted to fight back. I got rescued by some hulking giant who—shit—may actually be mute. And to say thanks? I puked on him. Heat rises in my cheeks and throat, and I need to get the hell away.
Suddenly, I become aware of my breathing and that thing happens where I can’t quite take a deep breath. I scramble to my knees and hunch my shoulders, willing my lungs to expand that last little bit, but the more I pay attention to it, the worse it gets.
“Is there blood in it?” The man’s voice is low and detached.
“Huh?”
“The vomit. Is there blood in it?” He leans down to look at the puke on the ground, nodding once at whatever he sees. He slides a hand under my shirt and pulls it up.
“The fuck?” I say, pushing him away again. He’s looking at where they kicked me, leaning me forward to examine my back and sides.
“You a doctor or something?”
He shakes his head, then slowly pulls me up to a standing position.
“I’ll call you a cab,” he says, propping me against the wall like a bike or a piece of furniture, one arm loosely across my chest.
“Uh, no, man, I’m fine.”
He snorts. And finally looks at me. Well, looks down at me. Dude’s even taller than I thought when I saw him in the bar. And bulky with muscle. He has shoulder-length brown hair, and his left eyebrow is broken by scars, the kind you usually see when someone’s taken a bottle to the face. His mouth is grim and his brown eyes are sharp, and he’s looking at me with a combination of amusement and scorn that immediately pisses me off. Like he knows me or some shit.
“You’re wasted,” he says. “Those guys would’ve killed you.” My brain shies away from this piece of information and focuses back on my breathing. As I try to get a deep breath, the edge of panic is back. I know I can get enough air in, but the sensation freaks me out every time. Like at any moment I could drown where I stand.
“Come on,” he says, patting my shoulder lightly, like my old Little League coach—
You’ve got it, tiger; back in the game!
—like I did to Katie.
Suddenly, I’m so humiliated that I think I might puke again. Pathetic. I squeeze my eyes shut.
“I’m fucking fine, dude,” I say coldly. “I could’ve handled it.”
I jerk away from him and stagger down the alley. When I glance back, he’s still standing there, completely still, watching me.
THE ORANGE
BMW 320i rolls in just as I swallow the last bite of a mediocre hoagie. Next to me, my younger brother Brian lets out a low whistle. That is one ugly color. It was probably originally a bright orange, but it’s faded and patched and has been painted over a few times. The driver’s side door is maroon and the diving boards are spotted with rust.
I’ve been out of it all day. I took a bunch of Tylenol this morning, but my head is still killing me and my whole body aches. I don’t remember it happening, but there’s a deep scrape on my shoulder so I guess that’s where I hit either the brick wall or the ground in the alley last night. I keep leaning against it to remind myself of what an idiot I am.
“Eighty-one?” Brian asks me. Pop shakes his head in disgust.
“Naw, man,” I tell him, pointing at the elongated aluminum bumpers, “That’s the E30. In ’81 it would’ve been the E21.” I turn to Pop. “I’d go ’85.” He nods.
I actually love the early to mideighties BMWs. Underneath that shitty paint job and mismatched door, the lines of the car are pure, the boxy form sharp and perfectly balanced.
When that maroon door opens, though, it drives away any thoughts about the car. Because the long legs and broad shoulders that emerge belong to the guy from last night. My ears start to buzz and my heart beats unnaturally fast. He scans the garage, and when his eyes land on me, it’s like a physical force catches my breath and pulls it from my chest.
“What?” Brian pokes me in the shoulder. “You know him or something?”
I shake my head and walk toward him before Brian or Pop can.
“Um, hi.”
“Hi,” he says, his voice low.
“Uh, can I help you?” I’m trying to keep my voice steady and professional, but with my eyes I’m begging him not to say anything. To be just another customer.
He jabs his thumb behind him at his car and says, “I wonder if you could take a look. I think I’m leaking oil.”
I grab my clipboard and his key and take down his driver’s license information. Rafael Guerrera. He’s thirty-eight, two years older than me.
“Pop the hood,” I tell him, and I definitely
don’t
stare when he bends over to pull the lever, his hips twisting and his shirt rucking up just enough to show a sliver of light brown skin. I look at the engine blankly, taking in no information whatsoever. I close the hood and nod at Rafael.
“I’ll take a look, but you’ll need to leave it. That okay?”
“How long will it take?” he asks, and there’s something about the way he says it that makes me think he knows exactly what I’m doing. That I don’t want him to wait here while I look at the car now. That I want him gone, stat.
I shrug, trying to look casual, but it’s more of a twitch. “Tomorrow most likely.”
Rafael nods. He picks up my clipboard and writes something on it. Then he hands it back to me with a completely neutral look and walks out of the garage.
I look at the clipboard. He’s written a phone number and, below it, a note:
Your sweatshirt is in the trunk.
Shit. I do vaguely remember dropping it on the barstool last night. For a second, it occurs to me that it was nice of him to bring it back. But then my stomach tightens and my skin starts to crawl with unease.
I CATCH
up to him at the corner.
“Hey!” I reach for his shoulder, but before I come close to touching him, he whips around, looming over me, feet set shoulder width apart. “How the hell did you know where I work?”
“How’s your stomach?” he asks as if I haven’t spoken. His stance has relaxed slightly.
“Look, man. I don’t know what the fuck you think is going on here, okay. But how did you know where I work?”
Rafael runs a hand through his hair and looks away.
I take a good look at him, trying to focus on not punching him. His thick, wavy brown hair is shoulder length, but neat, not like he forgot to cut it. There are freckles across his nose, barely darker than his skin. Judging by his skin and his name, I’m guessing he’s Latino. Is that the right term? I’m not sure. Hispanic? Shit, I don’t know. His lips are full, and his teeth are sharp and crowded, the left front one chipped. His long stubble looks soft, but his mouth turns down in a snarl. I shake my head to clear it.
“Look,” he says, “I wasn’t going to say anything about how we met if that’s what you’re worried about.”
I nod my thanks. “Dude, seriously, how’d you—”
“Colin.” He says it like I’m a skittish animal he doesn’t want to freak out. Damn name tags. “I was concerned last night. It wasn’t safe for you to be wandering around that drunk in the middle of the night. I followed you to make sure you got home okay. That’s all.” He puts his hands up.
“Wait, you followed me. All the way home? I didn’t… I didn’t see you.”
“I know.”
“But wait, how’d you… did you…?” Did I talk to him and not remember it?
“There was a car parked outside your house. It had a bumper sticker for the garage on the back. I figured I’d take a chance it was yours.”
“Um.” Who the fuck would go to that much trouble for someone they don’t even know—especially someone who blew them off—unless they wanted something? Unless—oh, jeez, unless he’s one of those wannabe vigilante freaks with a superhero complex who think they have some mandate to beat up evildoers in alleys and protect the downtrodden…. I saw a movie like that once. Of course, that’s better than the alternative, which is that he’s an entirely different kind of freak.
“Listen,” he says, “can we—”
“Okay,” I say, cutting him off. “So, I’ll be in touch about your car.”
Then I hurry back to the shop before he can say anything else.
THE AXE
comes down before the man has time to scream, blood splattering the barn, the hay, and the rakes that lean ominously against the wall, and I look away from the TV. I put the movie on in the background for some noise. Usually, I love horror movies and gory war movies. Tonight, though, the sounds are getting to me. Every time someone screams, I find myself looking up. I’m trying to finish the model of the DeLorean DMC-12 that I started months ago and abandoned for a while because the plasticard I got from the hardware store wasn’t setting properly and it was pissing me off. I got new sheet plastic at a hobby shop that’s malleable enough that I can dunk it in hot water and mold it around a can, secure it with rubber bands, and it’ll hold a curve without cracking.
A knock on the door startles me. It’s got to be Brian. He’s the only one who stops by unannounced.
Still, I yell, “Who is it?” at the door as the deranged killer mows down an attractive young couple with a thresher.
“Uh, me.”
I’m lucky Brian didn’t just use his key. Thank god I pretty much broke him of that habit last month when he walked in on me jerking off.
A chorus of screams and revving motors is the soundtrack to my brother grinning in the doorway, holding up a six-pack of Yuengling bombers. A few years ago we saved a bunch of those twenty-four ounce cans to be the base of a beer-can Christmas tree, moving to twelve-ouncers toward the top. It was pretty epic.
“Game’s on,” Brian says, tromping in and plopping down on my couch. He cracks open a Yuengling and tosses one to me. It’s warm. “Dude, what the fuck is this gonna be?” he asks, waving around one wing of the DeLorean’s chassis.