Chapter Seventeen
XAN
An arm around her waistand a plate in hand, I do something I haven’t done in a very long time. I take the woman I love to bed. Tuck her in. Push hair from her face and wait until she falls asleep–my hand gripped in hers.
Her armor fades away as she drifts off, but the buzzing energy of her kiss lingers on my lips. There’s no denying I still love her. There’s no arguing with my body over how desperately I want to return her passion and meet her touch for touch.
I sink into the despair of knowing after all this time that she is still my home. The only place I belong. That void inside me is shaped like her. But it’s too complicated to be here. It’s too hard to feel all the things that threaten to burst from my chest.
Slowly, I tug my fingers from hers, resist the urge to kiss her again and in a haze, I make it to my truck. I can’t turn the key, just stare without focus–my fingers clutching the steering wheel. My forehead tips forward with a thud.
All of my confusion and pain swirl together. Shunta’s words rattle through me what is truly important to you?
Control slips from my grip faster with each second and it all boils over into anger. Through gritted teeth I growl, tensing every muscle in my body until I vibrate with pent up energy. The only way to tame it was loosening my jaw to let it all out in one long furious noise. The steering wheel rattles as my grip shakes. When the feeling passes, calm washes over me, the demons set free. They’ll be back.
They always came back.
I get an urge deep in my gut to pick up my phone and call Nicole. I haven’t spoken to her since the funeral, no one really has.
Gravel spits up around my tires as I whip around and head back, but I don’t turn into town to see Nicole. I head to the small Raston cemetery and stand in the gate, staring at the rows of headstones, generations of Rastonites. Lives that were long and hard, others too short.
Gus is one of the latter. I didn’t know him well, but he was on my crew. A brother.
I take a deep breath and then realize I have nothing to offer so I lean over and pluck a flower from the manicured beds at the gate.
The moment I do I glance up, a habit from my youth, and hear my mother say God saw that.
I’m sure at this point God, if there really is a God, had seen me do much much worse.
Gus doesn’t have a gravestone yet. His family is waiting until the memorial to have it unveiled, but I remember the day they put him in here. I’ll never forget where to find him. I weave through the rows to the far corner and crouch down.
I want to say something, but I have no idea what. I have no clue how to put all the tangled thoughts to words, never mind speak them aloud. I lay the flower down by the temporary marker. There are already flowers there, wilting in the early summer heat.
My hands end up in my pockets and I rock back on my heels. Gus himself would give me shit for being awkward and weird. You’re so dang serious, kid, I hear the slight twang in his voice that you get from small town living and country music. He’d clap me on the shoulder and shove me into the break room on base. Gus was the glue of our crew. The guy who kept us all together, who stepped between arguments and extinguished tension with that god-awful laugh of his. Loud and screeching as he gulped in air. You couldn’t help but laugh with him.
The memories swirl through me, setting me off balance and I have to close my eyes and do what I do best—set it all aside. Fold up my emotions in perfect squares and tuck them in a drawer. Because if I let myself feel this, if I let this fire burn, it will destroy me.
My phone buzzes in my pocket and I scoop it out to read Tabby’s text.
Pris took the car, can you take dinner to Zeke?
I’m happy for a distraction. Happy to have a reason to leave this place.
This day was a mess, from meeting with Shunta this morning, to kissing Briggs, to I don’t know what possessed me to show up here.
I shift myself back into my comfort zone, taking care of my family.
#
Theshop is right on the edge of town in small industrial area of town. A rundown old warehouse with dirty glass and cracked up parking lot. The plywood sign is weathered and peeling but I remember painting that thing.
We bought the shop, Jet and I, with thoughts of turning it into a hardware or lumber store but it ended up used as a yard for his lumber and equipment. The guy who sold it to us was a mechanic and all his shit came with the warehouse. We let him lease the space to tinker around on vehicles and fix Jet’s equipment when it wasn’t running right. Zeke used to tag along when he was fifteen and help out Gordo. Zeke didn’t show much promise for anything but if you put an engine in front of him, he knows.
By the time Zeke was sixteen he dropped out of school and was working full time with Gordo. Jet and I tried to get him to go back to school but we both knew. A guy like Zeke is better in a place like this. Me and Pris are the only Rykers to graduate. Jet almost made it until his temper got him expelled in his senior year, not too long after Brigs disappeared to Vancouver. Del failed two core classes in Grade 12 and was supposed to go to summer school, which never happened.
Tabby is the smartest of us all, she’s set to graduate with honors and is on a fast track to Waterloo, the fanciest university in Canada.
I sit outside the shop thinking about my family until the sun begins to turn the air stuffy and hot. My reflective side is in overdrive today and I blame that therapist and her magical stare that seemed to crack my resolve. Briggs didn’t help, straddling my lap and kissing me like that. Her heat was the flood gate release, her drunk honesty and big brown eyes.