57. Till It’s Gone #2
I’m so fucking horny, this ache is two seconds from turning flesh-eating just to literally eat me out.
It’s all pretty hilarious.
Not Goodfella funny.
Not funny like a clown.
More like
getting-played-by-a-man-whose-sidepiece-is-saved-under-a-hole-emoji
funny.
More like
my-stepfather-called-me-an-addict-last-night-like-that’s-all-I’ll-ever-be
funny.
Or
I-signed-a-contract-that-says-I-have-to-tell-Andrew-when-I-need-tongue
funny.
Real funny, right?
Hahaha.
Yeah, they can all eat shit.
I’m not telling Andrew I need to come.
I’m taking the high road.
And I’m not masturbating like some fucking addict.
I’d rather sit here and suffer.
Andrew gets off 17 at Sheridan,
a few exits early.
The GPS yells at him.
Ignoring it,
he glances at the rearview mirror,
making a right on Waldwick.
The GPS reroutes.
I’m too stubborn to ask him what he’s doing. I pretend not to care and glance out the window, where a gas station slides by, surrounded by mounds of dirty snow.
Andrew erratically taps the steering wheel, eyes jumping to the rearview every three seconds.
He makes another random turn.
His eyes flick back up to the rearview.
Down to the road.
Rearview.
Road.
I exhale. “Something wrong?”
He doesn’t answer.
I nod. “Cool.”
He checks the mirror again,
and that’s it—I’ve had enough.
I start to turn in my seat to look back,
but he catches me at my thigh,
stopping me.
I study his face, seeing a frantic set of nerves tangled up in his anger.
He notices me staring,
realizes he’s exposed,
and tries to force his shoulders back,
easing into the seat.
But his hand stays on my thigh,
fingers spreading wide,
giving it a hard, lingering squeeze.
It’s strange as hell.
So naturally, I take him off guard:
“Why do you have two phones?”
I just blurt it ‘cause ‘fuck me?’
Nah. Fuck you.
He tenses, brows pulling together,
head turning slow to look at me,
then his hand slips from my thigh.
“Not now, aight?” His focus abandons me for the rearview again.
I angle my body to face him so fast the seatbelt saws into my neck. “Actually, yes. Now, aight?” I mock, the pettiness tasting like acid on my tongue.
His eyes stay on the street.
Mine stay on him. “You don’t get to say ‘fuck you’ to me, then show up at the penthouse like nothin’ happened, then take me down roads not suggested by Siri like some cryptic serial killer with a crush on your rearview, so I wanna know why you’re bein’ shady with two cell phones or why you’re acting weird as fuck right now. Pick one.”
He stonewalls me again.
My word-dump hangs there
as his eyes chase the rearview.
And I lose my patience,
unbuckle my seatbelt,
and turn in the seat,
seeing a silver sedan riding our bumper,
its headlights cutting through morning mist, flooding his rear window. The driver’s wearing a dark neck gaiter up over their nose, a beanie down past their brows.
“Andrew… who the fuck is that?” My eyes swing from the faceless driver to Andrew’s profile. “How long’ve they been following us?”
His palm slips over the top of his steering wheel, betraying his panic. “Since the Turnpike.”
“Do you know who it is?”
The silence spreads, turning brittle.
He’s not answering fast enough, and it only makes my heartbeat thud harder inside my eardrums, drowning out the engine. “Andrew? Tell me right now.”
Andrew accelerates to put more distance between their car and ours.
But the silver sedan only surges closer,
chomping at every inch.
“He’s fuckin’ tryin’ me,” Andrew mutters, white-knuckling the wheel. Then the front of their car clips our bumper.
Enough to jolt me backward,
my spine heading for the dashboard.
Andrew’s arm shoots out like a steel bar, his palm catching me in the center of my back, and he shoves me safely into the seat.
“Turn around,” he snaps.
I’m turning fast in my seat,
sliding my belt back on,
fear filling inside me.
“Andrew. I’m scared.”
I didn’t mean to say it out loud, and his eyes shoot to me for a split second, a dark, blinding rage boiling inside them as his nostrils flare.
“I know,” he says, voice low. “I got you.” He reaches over and tugs on my belt, making sure it’s tight. “He’s just a stupid motherfucker. Nothin’s gonna happen to you.”
And then lastly, “Hold on.”
He rips the steering wheel right,
stomping down on the brakes,
and the Civic's tires jump the curb.
The violent jerk slams me forward,
and the belt catches me at my chest.
Behind us,
tires screech against salted asphalt,
skidding right toward us, headlights phasing across the back window—
Then stops,
rocking to a halt only inches away.
My lungs punch for air.
Andrew grabs my jaw, turning me until his eyes slam into mine. His are black and alive. “You good?” he asks, and I nod.
“Yeah?” His brow kicks up as he throws the Civic into park. “Don’t get outta this fuckin’ car. I’m serious.”
He flings his door open.
Winter cold pours in
before he slams it shut.
“Andrew!” I fumble with the seat belt. The latch jams. “Piece of shit Honda,” I hiss, yanking until it releases me.
I whip around to see out the back window.
Andrew rips open the sedan door, then pulls him out by the front of his jacket. He yanks the gaiter down his face, and Hunter stumbles backward onto Waldwick, hands flying up.
My stomach falls through the floorboards.
Andrew shoves him into the sedan, the car rocking on its tires. “I told you to stay the fuck away.”
Soon as I climb out of the Civic,
Hunter’s eyes skip right past Andrew,
and drive straight into me.
Andrew looks over his shoulder.
“Get back in the car.”
I shake my head fast, remembering what happened last time. I don’t trust Andrew not to do something stupid.
Panic flashes in his eyes. “Allison.”
The look on his face,
the sound of his voice—
it’s a plea.
He can’t handle Hunter
with his heart hanging out of his chest.
So I step back once, then again,
until my ass hits the hung-open door.
I slide inside, shut it, lock it,
and turn in my seat,
my arms clutching the headrest.
Outside, Andrew’s spitting threats, curses, but his voice is too muffled for me to hear any of it. And Hunter’s not fighting back. He puffs his chest, bouncing right back like a blow-up bop bag.
Then Andrew shoves Hunter so hard
he falls back,
palms and ass hitting the empty street.
Before he can stand upright,
Andrew dives into the sedan, half his body disappearing through the driver’s side.
Hunter scrambles. “What the—”
Andrew backs out of the car with his keys, then he pitches them across Waldwick, the keys arcing under the dead December morning with a jingle,
vanishing into a snowbank.
Hunter throws his arms out.
“You serious?”
Andrew walks back to the Civic.
“You fuckin’ psycho!” Hunter yells.
Andrew yanks his door open,
slides in, slams it,
and throws the Civic into drive,
steering us back onto the street.
I watch Hunter through the back window. He’s standing beside his sedan, arms raised, shouting, but both he and his threats shrink and shrink the more distance Andrew puts between us.
I face forward in my seat again, sliding my seatbelt back on with shaky hands.
Andrew keeps his eyes on the road, jaw tight, violent dreams stamped on his pretty face of all the ways he could’ve murdered him.
Meanwhile, my brain fractures into a million racing thoughts:
Raymond. I need to call Raymond.
Or the NYPD.
The restraining order—is it still active?
My gaze fixes on the dashboard, entirely paralyzed by a single, flashing thought: If Hunter tracks me down tomorrow, or next week,
And Andrew isn’t around…
what happens to me then?
The GPS breaks the silence—
“Continue on Waldwick Avenue.
“In one quarter of a mile,
“turn right onto Franklin Turnpike.”
Silence follows again.
The after-war hush,
debris settling.
It stays that way for a long moment.
Then—
“That phone’s for the hospital,” Andrew says out of nowhere, as if the last five minutes never happened.
His eyes stay on the road.
My eyes stay on the road.
“The old number’s still on paperwork, transplant stuff, Ma’s doctors, insurance… all that.” He grinds down on his teeth. “I changed my number after I met you, alright? Didn’t want nothin’ fuckin’ up what we were startin’. But I couldn’t toss the old one. Couldn’t risk it with Ma.”
He glances at me to see if I believe him.
“What if somebody calls that number with an update? What if—I dunno—there’s a match or some message and I miss it?” He breathes out tired. After everything. “That’d be my luck.”
Sounds like a reasonable answer.
For a woman who didn’t scroll his texts in the middle of the night.
Unfortunately for both of us,
I’m that psychotic.
The Civic rolls to a stop at a red light.
And we idle there—two hot psychos.
His head swings to me. “Anything else you wanna come at me with?”
I think about the pillow-panties…
The fifty grand under his bed…
The Yeah filling with air in my brain…
My head swings to him,
my stare showing its ass.
“You still mine?”
His jaw falls slack,
then his face goes still,
a timeless statue trapped with his lies.
All that moves is his heaving chest
before his jaw deadbolts shut.
Someone honks behind us.
The light’s green.
His eyes leave me
and return to the road.
Then he hits the gas.
// 10:38 PM - DOME SPORTS - WALDWICK, NJ //
The Civic rolls into a space at the sporting complex.
Andrew leaves the engine running,
the heat filling the cabin,
but the silence is loud between us.
He’s staring down at his lap, his thumb beating out some pissed-off drum solo against the wheel while his mind is a million miles away.
Through the windshield, I watch the dome ceiling tremble each time the wind blows, still haunted by the ghost of Hunter and his car, and the shadow my question left behind.
I want an answer.
I want an explanation good enough to never circle back here. But his silence turns into a different kind of violence.
He knows I crossed a line.
He knows I dug through his phone now, and I have no idea what’s going to happen next.
His lips part,
but only air comes out.
He swallows hard, tries again,
but the truth gets trapped inside him.
With a hissed curse, he snatches the door handle and throws himself out into the cold.