Fifty-Nine
My demon is booking it. I’m trying to get to her, but she’s moving just as fast as I am, and to be honest, I don’t think I’m gaining any ground.
No one drove to the game tonight, and even if there was a car available, the line to get out of the parking garage is fucking crazy.
I can see all the headlights lined up from here.
All I do is run after this girl. There’s got to be some symbolism involved here, or some philosophical shit that can be derived from all the times that I’ve ended up sprinting like a maniac to get to her.
It makes me feel like my brother, and it really does have me questioning just how clinically insane I actually am.
With every grueling step that I take, I know deep down that I’d run to hell for her, just like Chase would sprint all over the world for Red.
Or in this case, for me. Because I can hear him, Max, and Alvi catching up, it doesn’t matter that they just skated and dominated out on the ice for the past two hours; they’re right behind me. And Alv had leg day today, so I know his old ass is hurting.
I’m strangling my phone to death with her location on my GPS, while my arms pump my adrenaline-filled body forward. It feels like fucking deja vu. Last November, I was also running to her and squeezing the shit out of a voicemail-filled screen.
It really is like I’m coming full circle with her. Maybe I’m finally closing the fucking loop with all this drama and shit that I can’t seem to outrun. Maybe it wasn’t the actual game that was the redemption, maybe it’s this.
I hook a right and bypass Jock Row; it’s gonna be wild down there with people partying, and I feel air get caught in my chest. I still can’t believe I didn’t tank the game.
My sister keeps calling me, and I keep sending her to voicemail. Meanwhile, her incoming calls keep cancelling out the calls I’m trying to make to Ed. It makes me wanna fucking scream.
“FFUUCCKKK!” I scream in frustration when I can’t get through to her again, just as a black Tahoe pulls up alongside us.
“Get in, boss,” Tommy yells out to Alvi as his face appears in the passenger side descending tinted window. He nods his head for all of us to get in, and we fucking listen; even Max and my brother, who have no fucking idea what the hell is going on.
“Where to?” One of the Family guys asks over his shoulder from the driver’s seat. As soon as I pull the back door shut, I zoom in on Ed’s dot.
“1389 South River Road. She’s on the east side of the building,” I shout over the packed car.
Tommy must’ve tracked Alvi, which makes sense.
He told me that he was gonna have guys out tonight, especially after word spread about the game.
“Why do I know that address?” I say out loud while staring at it.
“Thirteen, eighty-seven, nah wait, I mean eighty-nine –”
“It’s the shelter,” Alvi says in a tough tone of voice while he leans forward to reach inside the pocket of the seat in front of him. He pulls out a solid black gun, and a calmness washes over him as he holds it up to inspect it. What the fuck?!
“If anyone, including that fucking crazy girl, goes near my wife,” he pauses and checks the chamber for bullets.
Wait, what?! I hear both my brother and Max inhale a sharp breath, and I’m honestly not sure if it’s because of the wifey bomb that Alv just dropped, or the fucking gun that he casually just whipped out, “I’ll fucking kill ‘em.” Not if I do it first.
“Go around to the front of the shop,” Alv shouts, and the driver slows down to park in front of Rossi Ink.
I’m already opening the back door before he’s got the car stopped.
I don’t give a fuck. I can’t wait for his guy to parallel park this beast of a car.
I need to fucking get out, and I need to go get my girl now.