Chapter Five
Chapter
Five
“I thought your leg was sore.” Lucas kept his
towel wrapped around his waist while he pulled boxer briefs on
beneath it. He’d shared a room with Sean, off and on, since before
they’d hit puberty, and there had been a time when they had been
casual about their nakedness. But that had all changed even before
the night things went so wrong in the bar.
Sean grinned and massaged his bruised thigh.
“It was sore, but now it’s feeling a lot better.”
“It was too sore to go to work, but you think
you might be able to make it out for a few drinks,” Lucas
clarified.
“Yeah, that sounds about right. I mean,
working is a lot of climbing and stretching, and it wouldn’t be
safe for me up on a roof, not if I’m not totally steady on my feet.
The bar?” Another grin. “I’m going to be falling on my ass for a
whole other reason after a couple hours at the bar. Besides, I can
sue for lost wages. No need to work for money if I’m going to get
it anyway.” He pulled his T-shirt up over his face, sniffed it, and
let it fall back to cover his chest. Apparently it had passed the
test, because he showed no inclination to get changed. “Put some
clothes on and let’s get going.”
“I still have curfew, man. And in case you
forgot, things didn’t go so smooth last night. You go on, but I’ll
just stick around here and watch TV or something.”
Sean flopped down on his bed and stared at
Lucas. “What the fuck, man? It’s like you don’t even want to go
out. Like you don’t want to have any fun.”
Lucas pulled on jeans and a T-shirt before
sitting on the corner of his own bed. Sean was waiting for an
answer, and he’d always been able to outlast Lucas. So apparently
they were going to have the talk, or at least some of it.
“Sean. The last time I got drunk, a guy
died.” No, that wasn’t quite enough. “I killed him.” He looked up
to see his friend frowning at him.
“Yeah, that sucked. But you did your time,
Lukey. It’s over. I mean, the parole stuff is a drag, I get that.
And, yeah, okay, I see why you want to be careful. The cops are all
over your ass and you don’t want to get sent back. Fair enough. But
we could figure out a way around all that, you know. Like, we could
go to the bar for a bit and then bring people back here. Mom’d be
pissed, but she’d get over it.”
“I did my time? Some of it, yeah. But Sean,
the guy’s still dead. It’s permanent. His family, his friends, all
the shit he wanted to do with his life? He’s gone, forever.” Lucas
stared at his friend’s uncomprehending face. Sean was almost
innocent sometimes. Like he refused to accept any of the harder
truths of the world. Mortality. Responsibility. Guilt. “I can’t
just go on with things like it never happened. Three years and then
it’s all over? It’s never over, not for the people who miss him. So
it should never be over for me.”
“Jesus, you’re talking like you did it on
purpose. Like you planned it or something. You just got worked up,
man.” Sean craned his head around so he could peer into Lucas’s
lowered face. “I mean, you were shitfaced. That’s what everybody
said. So you did something dumb when you were drunk. It sucks that
the guy got hurt so bad, but you didn’t do anything that lots of
people wouldn’t have done. You were just unlucky that it went
bad.”
“I was unlucky? I think the dead guy is the
unlucky one.”
“Okay, yeah, him too.” Sean hitched forward
and gave Lucas his most charming smile. “I know how this shit
happens, Lukey. And I’m sorry I wasn’t there to back you up. But
you can’t spend the rest of your life doing penance for something
that was just bad luck.”
“I hit him over the head with a bottle.”
Lucas’s memory of the fight was spotty, blurred by alcohol,
adrenaline, and a couple blows to his own head, but he’d heard the
testimony at the trial, heard too many people describe what he’d
done. There was no way around it, no way to pretend it was
something else. “It wasn’t bad luck. I did it on purpose.”
“You meant to hit him, sure. But you didn’t
mean to kill him. Right?”
Lucas stared at the cigarette burn in the
carpet by his bare toes. Had he meant to kill the man? He could
remember the cheap shot that had hit way too close to his balls,
the hot red anger that had exploded from somewhere deep and
primitive, the drive to attack, to hurt…to kill? “I don’t know. I
don’t…I don’t think so.” He didn’t want to think so, and the
conviction for manslaughter instead of murder had showed that the
judge didn’t think so. But sometimes, lying in bed, staring at the
ceiling of his six-by-nine cell…sometimes, Lucas hadn’t been
totally sure.
Sean shrugged carelessly. “You’ve got a hot
temper, man. We both do. If people mess with us, we mess with them.
We mess them up. So, you know, they shouldn’t mess with us. That’s
all.”
Lucas didn’t have any more words. He’d spent
the brief period before his conviction in panicked denial,
desperately searching for justifications or excuses. But his
court-appointed lawyer had made it clear that there was no real
doubt about the facts of the case, and Lucas had been almost
relieved that things were settled by his guilty plea. Sitting in
the court room during sentencing, listening to the testimony of
witnesses, unable to even glance toward the grieving family in the
front row, he’d stopped trying to escape from what he’d done. He
was a killer. He couldn’t go back in time, couldn’t change anything
that had happened. But he’d decided to stop trying to lie about it.
At least to himself.
“I just need a bit of time,” he told Sean.
“It’s a pretty big adjustment. That’s all.”
Finally, Sean seemed satisfied. “Yeah, okay.
I guess it would be. You still need to tell us some stories, right?
Maybe this weekend we’ll have the boys over in the afternoon, and
you can fill us in. Tell us about life in the big house.”
There was no way that was going to happen.
“Yeah, maybe,” Lucas said. “But there isn’t all that much to tell.
It was just boring, mostly. Lots of routine, schedules. Nothing too
exciting.”
“You put that many bad-asses all together in
one place, and there’s going to be some crazy shit,” Sean said
gleefully. “What is there, some code of silence or something?”
“Something like that,” Lucas said, and he lay
back on the bed and lifted his arm up to cover his face. “You
should head out, man. And try not to be so loud when you come in
tonight. One of us has to work tomorrow.”
“Okay, Granny,” Sean said. Then he leaned
over and rested his hand on Lucas’s calf, squeezing just a little
as he said, “It’s good to have you back, man. I missed you.”
Lucas tried to ignore the way Sean’s hand was
warm even through the layer of denim. “I missed you too.” He pulled
his arm away from his face and added, “But now I’m sick of you
already. Get out of here. Go have fun.”
“Yeah, okay,” Sean agreed, and then he ran
his hand up Lucas’s leg, over his knee and halfway up his thigh
before squeezing again. “Good to have you back,” he repeated, his
voice a little softer this time.
Lucas wondered what would happen if he put
his hand on top of Sean’s. If he guided their fingers upwards,
inwards…would Sean swear at him and pull away, or would he welcome
Lucas’s initiative? It had always been Sean who’d started these
little…whatever-they-weres. And he’d take them so far, but no
further. Maybe they were just affection, a gentle side to an
otherwise rough man. Or maybe they were something else.
Lucas kept his arm where it was, covering his
face. “Have fun,” he said, his voice a little muffled, and Sean’s
hand lifted away.
“Yeah, okay,” Sean said. “Sleep tight. Make
sure you take your dentures out before you doze off.”
“Go away.”
Sean didn’t go, not right away. But finally
he stood with a sigh, bent to slap a gentle goodbye to Lucas’s
stomach, and left the bedroom.
It was all the same. Nothing had changed at
all. Lucas had been gone for three years, and he’d come back to the
same patterns, the same attitudes, and the same confusion. It was
like a damp blanket, one that didn’t give Lucas the warmth he
needed but that was still better than facing the night with nothing
to protect him.
Or maybe it wasn’t better. He swung
impatiently to his feet and looked around the bedroom, not that
much bigger than his prison cell. The last few sessions with his
counselor in jail, once it had become clear that he was going to be
released, had been all about this. Lucas was going back to the life
he’d been ripped out of, and there were good things about that
life, things he should try to preserve. But there were problems
too, things that had led to his trouble in the first place and that
he needed to get away from if he wanted to avoid getting into
trouble again.
They’d mentioned it in the sessions, but
obviously hadn’t spent enough time on the most difficult aspect of
it all. Lucas was supposed to cling to the things that were good in
his life while removing himself from the things that were bad. But
what the hell was he supposed to do when the good and bad were
mixed so thoroughly and inextricably in the exact same person?
He took a moment to smooth the blankets on
his bed, and then stepped back when he realized what he was doing.
Was he worried he’d get demerits for leaving his surroundings less
than pristine?
He looked down at his watch, a cheap one Mrs.
Gage had found for him when she’d realized how worried he was about
being where he was supposed to be on time. It showed just past
seven o’clock. The bar was a bad idea, but that didn’t mean Lucas
had to stay inside. In prison, he’d thought he was going crazy
sometimes, staring at the same walls all the time. He was out now,
and he needed to remind himself of that freedom. Just a walk, a
quick tour around the town to see what was the same and what had
changed in the three years he’d been gone.
He pulled the front door open just as Mandi
Carter was raising her hand to knock on it. She laughed, a
surprisingly gentle sound from someone with badly bleached hair and
boobs pushed up practically to her chin. “Lucas! Hi. Sean gave me a
call and said you weren’t going to make it to the bar. He said his
family was all out, though, so he thought you might want some
company at home.” Her smile would have seemed shy if she hadn’t
reached out and hooked her fingers around his waist at the exact
same moment. “So? Are you going to invite me in?”
Lucas forced himself to stand still. It had
been a while, but this was nothing new, not really. And Mandi
seemed as attractive as any of the other girls from the bar.
“Okay,” he said. He felt tired and old and hopeless. “Would you
like to come in?”
By way of an answer, Mandi stepped forward
and locked both her hands behind Lucas’s neck, then pulled his
mouth down for a kiss that was instantly wet and dirty. When she
finally released him, she licked her lips and said, “That’s a good
start. You and Sean are sharing a room, right? He won’t be back for
a while…”
She shut the front door and led the way into
the house and up the narrow staircase, then waited for further
directions into the appropriate bedroom. Lucas knew what he was
supposed to do. What Mandi expected, what Sean expected…hell, the
Gage family had disappeared magically enough that maybe it was what
they expected too. “I don’t…” he started, but he couldn’t quite
find the words to finish the sentence. “Could we maybe just go for
a walk, or something? Watch TV, maybe?”
Mandi squinted at him and for a moment he was
sure he was going to get cussed out in a truly impressive fashion.
But then her expression softened as if she had been trying to
figure him out and had finally managed. “You’re just not into me?
Or something bigger than that?” She made it seem as if either
answer was equally acceptable, even though Lucas was pretty sure
neither one was something he should express to anyone.
“I’m having some trouble adjusting,” he said
lamely. “I think I need a bit of time to get myself figured
out.”
She was kind enough to not push any further.
Instead, she wrapped her warm fingers around his and said, “I’m a
waitress. The last thing I want at the end of the day is more
damned walking. But TV would be okay.”
So she led the way back downstairs and they
sat on the couch together, and when she nestled in under his arm
and leaned against his shoulder, it was nice. She handled the
remote control and he sat there with his arm around her and he felt
pretty good, really. And she seemed content as well. Maybe this was
possible. Maybe he didn’t need to make any big changes or grand
proclamations. Maybe he could just stay like this for a while.
Maybe, if he was careful to not disturb anything, he could be
happy, at least for a while.