Chapter 1 #2
Time is what changed it all. Marriages, children.
Now it is a biker bar minus the crude. But it is much more than that to these people.
And to Dad and me. I don’t love working the place, even for a week, but that isn’t to say I haven’t missed how fuckin great it is.
When I am a customer it is a different experience. It is a good time. In small doses.
The girl. There she is again making me look. I spot the crown first, through the press of bodies. She is dancing with the engaged couple. They act very familiar with each other. When she throws her arms around the groom, and they hug tightly, the bride looks pleased.
“Hey, Frank. Who’s the chick dancing with the bride and groom?”
He eyes the dance floor.
“Shannon said it’s the groom’s sister. I haven’t seen her here before.”
I didn’t know the engaged couple either till a few hours ago.
Well not the bride anyway. The groom I had seen somewhere.
A long time ago. Never thought a time would come when I didn’t know a vet at Holly’s practice.
Dr. Dominque Grant and husband to be Colter.
Sounds like a movie star couple. When we were introduced there was a feeling they knew our backstory.
Makes sense. Over the years it must have circulated through the families in the dramatic way it deserved to be told. A cautionary tale.
The memory of Stacy’s kidnapping kicks me in the stomach.
It grabs me. Still. I was just a fucking kid.
Eighteen and scared out of my mind for my sister.
Seeing Dad and these dudes being scared right along with me was a sobering first. I had never seen them as having fears.
Seems like yesterday that it happened. Thank God it wasn’t.
Being thirty-five has given me a wider vision of that time.
I see things now I didn’t see then. No wonder I wanted to move when the opportunity presented itself.
I was emotionally spent from the trauma.
My well-deserved reputation as a grump had gotten worse, and it began to look like a permanent state of mind.
An old man walking in a young kid’s body.
Living in a new city sounded like an answer, and it was.
Where what happened wouldn’t keep being digested over and over by everyone.
There would be almost zero chance of running into anyone I knew.
I expected to chill out. What I didn’t factor in, was there would be less distractions.
Turned out I had to face it alone. But with time, it all got processed.
Visits home were good, because I missed the family.
And mostly because they were short. When the parents figured out my pattern, they started coming to me.
Stacy too, until she met Rick and moved.
Things have panned out to be what I aimed for.
This time next week the Memphis house on the lake will be mine.
Closing day can’t come fast enough. A small place, with a manageable thirty-year mortgage.
A yard for the dog. Doesn’t sound like much, but it will be when I finish.
It seems like the perfect place to hide from the chaos of life.
The only one I have to look out for is myself.
One of the last things Mom said to me was to look for who I wanted to build a nest with. She and Dad had created theirs. The whole idea sounds unattainable at this point. I’m making my own nest with a water view.
If I hadn’t seen it myself, I would doubt their sort of relationship even existed. They were romantics. This is another time and I am a different kind of person. You cannot be cut from the cloth I am and see the world that way. Living alone, without rose-colored glasses, is more my jam.
It doesn’t stop my fantasizing about another life though.
The phantom female would have to be one hell of a woman to convince me to change my loner ways.
It cannot be just the right body. Great tits and every other body part are everywhere.
There are lots of things I would want. She would need to have soul and a soul.
That is the beginning of the list. No hurry.
“Landon! Good to see you, brother!”
I turn down the loud inner dialogue and look in the direction of the voice. A familiar but now older biker, whose name I have lost, catches my eye. We acknowledge the past with a look.
“Hey, bro. Good to see ya,” I call above the music.
Surprise at seeing me behind the bar settles on his face. A nod and warm smile passes between us, before the girl he has hold of reclaims his attention. Mine is pulled by a man almost completely in the shadows at the end of the bar. I have eyes on him.
The dude wants to start something. I feel it. There’s always one when closing time is approaching. You can almost smell it coming. The odd thing is the guy doesn’t look like he belongs here. He couldn’t throw a punch or ride a Harley if his life depended on it.
He’s about my age, but you couldn’t prove it by his looks. It is like he comes from another era. Thinning hair too perfectly in place, the clothes old-fashioned and pressed. Who irons nowadays? His gaze locks on mine.
“Who do I have to blow for a refill?” The quiet delivery makes it creepier.
Whoa. Didn’t expect that. Dad’s head turns and watches. He continues drying the shaker, but I know he has my back. So would most men here. This asshole doesn’t know that. Never laid eyes on him before. I give him another chance to shut the fuck up. Staring him down, I share the news as I pour.
“Last one.”
Pale grey eyes take me in. He is weird and not done proving it. Cheap booze pairs with the guy like chocolate and good wine. He downs the well whiskey. I expect some drunk men to be idiots. It is their handicap. I am not sure this one is though. He might be worse.
“Have a coffee, time to wrap it up.”
Dad’s voice carries, but the guy ignores the directive.
He is watching what approaches like a hawk has eyes on a field mouse.
My eyes follow the angle of his gaze to see the girl with the gold bracelet heading for the bathrooms. She walks with a gait easily recognizable.
Trying to walk sober when you are drunk is sometimes funny.
The rhythm is off just enough. Each step too small and purposeful.
There is always an expression that says ‘this is how I walk normally’.
But it never is. Tonight it makes her vulnerable.
Unfortunately she looks sexy, and it has not escaped the shadow.
She passes where he sits and is unaware someone is gathering bad intentions. No clue his head turned to see the view from behind. But I know. He sees me watching and looks away.
The sound of a body hitting the wooden floor breaks my concentration. Boom!
“The groom is down!” Lex yells the announcement over music and conversations.
“It’s a party, now!” a girl in the back slurs.
The bride to be is not finding it as amusing as some have.
She tries to catch the trickle of blood streaming down his face with a cocktail napkin.
Holding the side of his head, Colter sits up.
People surround them, blocking my view. Throwing his towel to the back counter, Dad grabs a handful of clean ones and heads for the man down.
“Frank! Watch the bar,” I say.
Taking a cold pack from the cooler, I round the corner and make for the injured party.
“Get the fuck back. Give him space!” Dad orders.
He places the towels against the wound.
I get there just as Colter speaks up.
“I’m okay! Everyone is overreacting!”
“You are not okay,” Dominique says without room for argument. “You’re drunk and hit your head on the table going down!”
“Here. Wrap a towel around this,” I say, holding out the pack.
Dad holds up both hands and gets everyone’s attention.
“That’s it, people. We close in ten minutes. All of you, say goodnight now and get your asses home. Call your rides.”
No one argues with Ronnie. They gather jackets and purses, kiss each other’s cheeks and begin a slow, noisy exit. The bride is working her cell while two guys help Colter up. Dad signals to Frank to turn off the music which settles any argument about the party being over.
There is a sudden awareness the woman hasn’t come out of the bathroom, and when I look, the man who had eyes on her is not in his seat. Fuck.
“Lex,” I call, passing where he stands. My chin lift in the direction of the back of the house is understood. He follows without questioning why. The hall leading to the bathrooms is dark. Unusually so. He twisted the bulb off.
As we turn the corner, the door of the ladies’ room is slowly closing. In the bright light of the rapidly narrowing crack I see the lurking figure, and without the music hear his quietly menacing words.
“I saw you looking at me.”
“Get out!” Her voice is shaky trying to sell strong.
“Hey, fucker!!” I yell.
When I push the door open the man faces us. He does not try to run or escape our anger. Standing behind him is the woman, pressed against the counter. Her face has gone pale.
“Thought she motioned me to follow.”
There is no agitation or uneasiness in his voice as he tries walking past. The expressionless face says he doesn’t care if we believe the lie or not. Sounds like he has said it before.
“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” Lex says.
The asshole has thirty pounds on me. But they are soft. I don’t give a fuck if they are made of steel. Grabbing ahold of his shirt, I smash him against a stall door. Then I bring my face to his. The smell of shitty aftershave almost makes me puke.
“You picked the wrong place, asshole. Don’t come back. We’ll cut off your shriveled dick and feed it to you. Got it?”
With a forearm across the guy’s neck, I go for his wallet.
“Let’s see who we have.”
Back pocket. I toss it to Lex, who belittles him and enjoys doing it.
“Look here. Mommy gave him his first grownup wallet.”
The decades old green cloth with a yellow stripe is flat as a pancake. Lex removes the driver’s license.
“Oscar DeLong. 3552 Harrison Way.”
“Take a picture of it.”
Lex takes the shot.
I give the guy an extra push back.
“We know who you are, where you live. Got it?”
He answers with a smirk and I spit in his face. A flash of rage appears. Then it is gone. Hidden.
Lex comes a step closer, boxing in the guy’s only way out. “He asked you a question!”
The man’s cold stare says he isn’t intimidated. Not even by the baddest guy here.
“Yeah, I got it.”
It’s the calmness that bothers me most. He holds my gaze in his dead eyes.
Spittle runs down his cheek. He does not wipe it off, even as it creeps closer to the mouth.
Then over closed lips. He wants us to understand who he is.
This would be the chilling part of the movie.
I’m not showing any sign of fear, but it is a fucking bluff.
Lex has had enough. He grabs the man and drags him out of the bathroom.
“Fuckface!”