8. Kai #2
The light turns green and she moves with the traffic.
I close some of the distance between us.
Not enough for her to notice me, but enough that I can see what the fuck is happening around her.
Traffic thickens near the larger intersection ahead, several lanes narrowing and splitting as drivers position themselves for their turns.
Julia is in the lane she needs to be in.
But that’s when I notice an SUV several cars ahead that has been weaving through traffic since the previous light.
Silver, oversized and driven by an asshole who apparently believes turn signals are optional and every open three feet of asphalt exists solely for him.
He cuts left. Then back right, then pushes between two cars with barely enough room for either driver to brake, which earns him a horn.
Every time he moves, my irritation rises because his lane is slowing down but Julia’s is moving now, and I see what he's about to do before she does.
He starts moving into her lane, only there isn't enough room.
Julia doesn't react because her eyes are still fixed straight ahead.
“Fuck.”
Without giving it another thought, I accelerate, revving my bike so that he can hear me.
The bike shoots forward between lanes before the asshole can finish moving over, and I position myself alongside his front quarter panel, forcing him to give up on the merge or hit me instead.
Which, I would fucking love to see him try, but he steps on the break and his car jerks from the sudden stop at the same time his horn blares. I turn my helmet toward him.
He looks exactly like the asshole I expected him to loom — one hand thrown in the air, mouth moving behind the glass, probably cussing out all of my ancestors.
I can't hear him, but I don't need to. He tries edging forward again, his front bumper only inches away from my left leg and my temper spikes.
I twist the throttle hard enough for the bike to answer with a deep, aggressive roar that cuts through the traffic around us.
Stay in your fucking lane.
He gestures again, nervously turning his wheel to the left but I hold my position.
Behind me, Julia's black car keeps moving toward the right-hand lane she'll need to take through the intersection, still completely oblivious to the fact that a few seconds ago the SUV would've forced itself directly across her path. There’s a small opening between the car in front of her and hers and the SUV driver tries once more.
Wrong fucking move.
I accelerate just enough to get fully ahead of him, then shift toward the right and position myself where his only safe choice is to follow straight instead of cutting back to turn ahead of Julia.
He slams his hand against the steering wheel.
He’s yelling and gesturing which only makes every ugly piece of my temper wake.
I could stay where I am, I could get off the bike, walked over to his fucking piece of shit SUV, drag him outside and deck him just once.
That’s all it would take. Instead, I just motion with my index and middle finger that I have eyes on him and speed up after Julia who has already successfully turned and is driving down the road.
She passed the intersection safely and everything else stopped mattering, though my pulse is still hammering.
Not from the maneuver itself, I’ve done dumber shit than this.
But from the image of him trying to fucking cut in front of her and the way she just stared dead ahead without even noticing.
And that becomes my newest justification.
See? She shouldn't be alone.
The thought is convenient enough that I almost call myself on my own bullshit. Almost.
Julia's car turns down a quieter street and I let the distance between us grow.
The buildings change first, commercial blocks giving way to rows of mature trees and Craftsman houses sitting behind deep lawns and wide porches.
Most of them are renovated without losing the heavy wood trim, broad windows and low rooflines.
The street curves slightly toward the end, where the houses thin and a darker wall of trees begins beyond the last few properties.
Julia keeps driving. My chest tightens when I realize where she's going.
Her house is the last one on the left side of the street, leaning against the thick woodland that stretches along the remaining length of her street and towards the rest of the houses on the right side of it.
And then she turns towards that small Craftsman.
Large front windows, a driveway cutting along the side with trees running thick behind the lot and spreading around one side of the property until the house seems almost tucked against the woods.
Of course she chose this. Somewhere quiet and separated enough from everyone else to breathe.
Her car stops in the driveway and I keep going. I slow couple of houses down.
This is where I leave, right? She made it home safe. I made sure of that. Everything I told myself was the reason behind following her home has been confirmed. She didn’t crash, she didn’t stop somewhere to sit alone in the car. She’s home and she’s safe, so I should keep riding. Right?
Wrong.
The voice in my head has zero problems with admitting the real reason behind me basically stalking my patient. Because that’s what this is. Let’s call a spade a spade and not beat around the bush.
No, but we’ll hide in one like a creeper.
I turn the bike back from where I came from but instead of going home, I ride towards the edge of the road where the trees grow thick enough to hide most of the property from the neighboring houses.
The decision barely feels like one. I kill the engine several yards into the darkness.
Still straddling it, I push it with my feet the rest of the way between two broad trunks.
The tires crunch softly over dirt and scattered gravel, until the road disappears behind the vegetation.
For several seconds, I just stay seated. I leave my helmet on, hands resting on the handlebars as the engine cools beneath me. In the sudden silence, every professional instinct I've developed over the last decade waits for me to come to my senses.
Unfortunately, I don't.
I swing my leg off the bike and move closer.
Not all the way to the property, but close enough.
I decide the helmet stays on. Not because I’m leaving, there’s no point in telling myself that.
I’m staying because I want to make sure she is safe inside the house as well.
So I lean against the tree, cross my arms over my chest and wait.
A lamp somewhere deeper inside casts a soft amber glow across part of the kitchen, enough for me to see Julia enter through one of the large side windows.
My body stills for a moment and then I straighten to see her better over the brush.
I watch her as she drops her purse somewhere outside my line of sight and walks toward the refrigerator.
She opens it, then she just stands there.
One hand rests against the door while light spills across her face and the front of her dark green sweater.
I wait for her to reach for something. Anything.
But she doesn’t move. Doesn’t seem to be looking for anything.
It doesn’t even seem she’s looking at the food.
She simply stares at her open refrigerator as if she’s trying to remember what to do now that she’s opened it.
My jaw tightens.
Come on, little ember. Take something. Eat. Drink. Fucking do anything.
My foot makes an absent move forward when Julia closes the door but remains in the kitchen for another few seconds. She bracing herself against the counter with both hands, as her head lowers between her shoulders.
Fuck.
Every part of me wants to move. I want to go in.
The impulse arrives without analysis and the image forms too easily.
She opens the door, surprised at first. Confused.
But I tell her that I was worried, that she shouldn’t be alone tonight after what we talked about in the session and apologize for missing the signals.
I tell her that she needs to sit down while I make her something to eat, something warm that she can get into her stomach.
I’m aware that this is just want, devoid of any clinical justification.
Go to her.
My fingers curl slowly into my palms.
No. Not yet.
The answer surprises me more than the impulse. Not “never”, not “absolutely fucking not.”
Not yet.
I don't have time to psychoanalyze myself because Julia is finally leaving the kitchen and walks into the living room, stopping near the couch. For a moment, she just stands there, looking around the room as though she’s not entirely sure what she's supposed to do inside it.
That lost look on her face fucking makes my chest painfully tighten.
Then she reaches for the throw blanket draped across the back of the couch and holds it in both hands.
Thankfully, she lies down on the part that is turned toward the window and I can see her without having to leave my hiding place.
She pulls the blanket over herself, curls slightly onto her side and stares upward at the ceiling.
No TV, no phone. Just lies there, motionless. Gone again.
The recognition of absence lands before I can stop it.
My mother used to look like that. That strange vacancy left behind when someone's body has reached the end of what it can process and simply shuts down and locks the rest of the world out.
She, my mother, had two versions after my father hurt her.