Chapter 4 #2
I take the long way back, and pull into my garage as the door is lifting up. I kill the engine and hang my helmet on the hook by the door that leads into my kitchen. I ditch my boots just inside, and my phone’s already ringing by the time I step inside.
“You’re thinking about her,” Sava says before I can say hello.
“Which one,” I ask, because we both know there are two in my head. The woman under the streetlight is a wound I can’t stop touching, and the woman on my phone is my only solace.
“Both,” Sava answers. She’s the only person besides my brothers who gets to talk to me like this. “It’ll never work Cassius. Not with either of them. You’ll only make yourself bleed.”
“I’m not bleeding.”
“Not yet.”
I tap on my knife. One, two, three.
“Did you call just to be annoying?”
“No, everyone is settled in at the clubhouse. Dom will see if any of them have families worth going back to and find good families for the rest. I’m about to head out.”
“Thanks for riding with.”
“You text her? Or is your timer still ticking?”
“I’m being civilized,” I say. “And you called before I got the chance.”
She laughs once. “You left civilized behind a long time ago, brother.”
“I’m hanging up now.”
“Okay, lover boy.” Sava hangs up first. I open my messages and have seven unread from Lindy.
Lindy Girl:
Five I see: the ceiling fan, a stack of manuscripts, the mug ring on my nightstand, the city seam of light under the blinds, and the ghost pretending not to look at me.
Four I can touch: the cool hem of the sheet, my book, my hair, and the beat under my own jaw.
Three I hear: the fridge humming, a neighbor’s laugh through the wall, my breath trying to be steady.
Two I smell: my soap and the laundry soap on my pillowcase.
I hope you’re having a good day.
Are you okay?
Am I bugging you?
Part of me wants to stab myself for making her feel needy. The sick bastard part smiles at the fact that she is begging for an answer.
I had a long day.
I send. I read through her messages again. Ghost? She really is funny without trying.
I’m good. Just busy.
I send that easily too. It’s this last part that has me hesitating. She’s most definitely bugging the shit out of me, but not in the way she thinks.
You, Lindy girl, are the only person who has never bugged me.
I close out before I can over think that and text Adrian.
Send me feeds on her. Traffic. Crosswalk cams. Doorway reflections. Nothing private. Just what’s on the street.
That feels like control. I’m not asking to see inside her shower even though if anyone could get me that footage it’d be Adrian.
He replies with a thumbs-up, apparently it’s too late to argue with me about her.
A new window opens on my screen. Grainy, grayscale, but the angles are good.
I watch Lindy’s day. She leaves her apartment and there’s only a glimpse of her before she disappears into the garage.
But, Adrian finds her there too and I watch her get into her car.
I follow her on her drive to work and keep watching until she’s seated behind her desk.
The camera is in the hallway in front of her office so she’s out of frame when she scoots her chair back far enough, but I watch her whole day anyway.
Adrian fixed it so the video is up but I can still use my phone, it just pops up with each new screen.
God bless him. She’s home by six and the video now is just staring at her apartment door.
Is it live?
I text Adrian.
Adrian:
Yeah, leave it open and you can watch her go to and from work. If you want other routes, I’ll have to add those cameras manually.
Other routes. Does she go other places? I’m sure she does, but I’ve only pictured her in her home and at her desk. I wouldn’t even know what other cameras for Adrian to add. That’s gotta change.
Later that night, the timer chirps. I choose a different angle: her.
Let’s play one truth/one dare
Lindy Girl:
True: I alphabetize my spices.
Dare: Switch two of them.
Lindy Girl:
Monster. Your turn.
True: They call my best friend Monster. Me, Machine.
Lindy Girl:
I’ll ask about that later. Dare: loosen your tie.
You want me undressed, Lindy girl?
Lindy Girl:
True.
I pull my tie all the way off. My thumb finds the hilt. One, two, three.
Lindy Girl:
My dare?
Put your phone on Do Not Disturb, but leave me on. That way it’s just us.
I wait for her excuse for why she can’t, but she does. The little moon pops up. I feel it in my chest like a door sliding shut on the rest of the world.
Lindy Girl:
Your turn. Truth.
True: I haven’t stopped thinking about you since your first message.
Dots. Gone. Dots again.
Lindy Girl:
I haven’t stopped thinking about you either.
Don’t go just giving truths away, Lindy girl.
Your dare: Don’t fix those spices in the morning.
Lindy Girl:
You are unhinged.
Your truth?
When I want something, I build my life around getting it.
Lindy Girl:
What do you want, Cassius?
I look at the ceiling and make the decision to tell her the truth. That is the game after all.
For you to keep telling me things only I get. For you to trust me with all your truths.
I set the phone down, breathe, pick it back up.
Your dare: Write my name on the inside of your wrist. You can wash it off in the morning.
Lindy Girl:
You’re lucky I have a pen on my nightstand. Done.
A photo of the inside of her wrist follows. Cassius inked there in small, tidy letters. The pen lies uncapped on the sheet beside her, a smudge of black on her thumb. The corner of a book peeks into frame.
Good girl.
I don’t breathe. The room narrows to a pulse under tidy black letters that spell my goddamn name.
Heat knifes low; my cock twitches. She did it, and she sent proof.
For me. I zoom in, veins, ink, that smudge on her thumb.
My thumb finds the hilt. One, two, three.
The leash snaps tight. I save the photo. I save it again.
Sleeping with me on your pulse.
Lindy Girl:
Your truth?
True: I don’t ever give pieces of myself away. With you, I forget why I shouldn’t. Dare me.
Lindy Girl:
Send a picture. Nothing wild.
I grin despite myself. Collar open, tie already gone. I roll a cuff, find a pen and print Lindy over my wrist vein. I frame the shot from throat to belt making sure she can see her name sitting over my pulse. Snap. Send.
I want to sleep with you on my pulse, too.
I set the timer. Thirty minutes. Knife. Hip. One, two, three. I stare at my name on her wrist until the screen dims and reminds me that this was just a game. Then I admit my scariest truth of all: If I burn, I’ll burn kneeling, before a woman who only exists in words.
The next morning on my way to work, I swing past her street. I know she hasn’t left for work yet, and I plan to beat her there. I watch for a few minutes, before pulling my phone from the chest pocket of my jacket.
Send someone to replace the two out streetlights by Melinda’s place.
I text this in the group chat because I don’t care which of my brothers do it as long as it gets done. This isn’t me caring about her. It’s me caring about safety in general. I just took six girls out of a van last night for fucks sake. No one should be getting home in pitch dark.
I wait, helmet on, and notice a blind spot on my screen, compare it with my eyes, where a man could wait and not be seen. The knowledge bothers me, but blind spots always do. It’s not because it’s her. My knife knocks my hip again. One, two, three.
I text Adrian.
I want alerts on motion. Cars that slow, men who linger.
Adrian:
You’re taking this new hobby too seriously.
She’s not a hobby.
Adrian:
Then what?
A decision.
He doesn’t like that. He sends me that stupid face with the wide eyes and straight mouth.
Idiot. My screen disappears and then pops back up.
He added the sensors. This is nothing illegal, I tell myself, not that I think it’d matter if it were.
This is nothing she didn’t consent to by living in a city that loves its own reflection.
I catalog her without permission, but I always have. It’s how I lived past twelve.
I pull away from her street, zigging in and out of the morning traffic.
I park my bike on her side of the street, in the front, so I can’t see the warehouse from here.
I hope her using the back entrance isn’t her normal routine.
I’ll know after today so I can adjust accordingly, but if I don’t see her walk in I’m finding a reason to go in and ask for her.
My thumb finds my knife. One, two, three. The tap comes with a new answer it never had before: one, two, watch. And then I’m doing it. I’m staring at the little square of feed in the corner of my phone. No face. No movement. It happens at seven forty-five.
Hair like honey in loose waves teasing the collar of a black jacket shot through with beadwork that throws star-pricks when she moves.
Constellations stitched to cloth. Her mouth is bare, a pink that looks bitten even when it isn’t.
A lick of color at the V of a dress under the jacket, there and gone.
She pauses, but not for show. For her checklist. Her hand finds her bag on her hip and tests the zipper.
She nudges her phone in the front pocket so it sits perfectly straight.
Her wallet is pulled from the bag, put back in, and pulled back out, and then in again.
She doesn’t stop. She gets frazzled, takes a few breaths, counts to herself, stops on seven and then puts the wallet in to stay.
Her mouth shapes a quiet “thank you” toward no one I can see.
I file it as ritual, but I’m not sure if it’s self-praise or something stranger.
Then she moves and the air around her changes.
She doesn’t perform center stage; center stage finds her as she walks down the middle of the sidewalk.