Chapter Four #2
It was eclectic and groovy. Like her store. Like her skirt.
Like the welcome mat that had Spanish and Japanese on it. He saw a hint of a
lot everywhere. Moroccan. Native American. A big chandelier that looked made of
gold leaves hovered in the center of the ceiling that gave a slap of Italian.
Old West. Boho. Asian. African.
It was cluttered but still felt roomy, schizophrenic but it
made sense.
He dug every inch of it.
When he stopped inspecting it and looked at her, she was
standing, holding a compact in front of her face, and putting on lipstick.
Seeing that—and feeling the velvet smack of the extreme
femininity of it—he wanted to tackle her and fuck her on her tapestry-draped,
emerald green velvet couch.
He didn’t.
He asked, “What’s Archie short for?”
“Nothing,” she answered, rubbed her lips together, slapped
the compact closed, wound the lipstick down, capped it, and bent to her couch
to grab a bag made entirely of fuchsia pink fringe.
She shoved the stuff in and turned to him.
“Nothing?” he pressed. “Your birth certificate says
‘Archie?’”
“It isn’t funny, and it’s funny.” She started walking to
him. “They made a deal. Mom got to name the first kid. And Dad got to name the
second. My brother’s name is Elijah. Dad always wanted a boy named Archie.
Thing was, I came out a girl. Dad said it didn’t matter. Archie was a cute name
for a girl. Mom was having none of it. Sucks for Mom, but she was out of it
from giving birth and falling in love with me after, so she was all about that,
and he hijacked the birth certificate. Named me Archie.”
She stopped in front of him still talking, but now she
raised her hands at her sides, the fringe of her bag falling over the one that
held it.
“So, I’m Archie.” She dropped her arms. “Mom was livid at
first. Then it got to be a joke, her giving him shit about it. But she admitted
to me, she wanted him to have what he wanted. So once she calmed down, she was
glad he got what he wanted, even if she wanted to name me Emilia.”
“You are so totally not an Emilia.”
Her expression was amused, but also nostalgic, and not the
good kind.
“I like that I’m what he wanted, but also I’m her giving
that to him. I remember that happening a lot, both ways, when she was with us.”
“Yeah,” he said softly.
She tipped her head to the side in that curious, flirty way
he liked a fuckuva lot.
“Jagger? And I’ll just add for sake of time, Dutch?”
“My dad was a biker. My mom was and still is a biker babe.”
When he stopped speaking, she laughed, low and sultry, “I
guess that’s enough said.” Her focus on him changed when she went on, “Though,
I knew he was a biker. And not just because you’re walking in his footsteps. I
go to his tombstone almost every time I visit Mom. And the epitaph there made
it pretty clear.”
And again, he got that feeling in his throat and it was such
a bitch, he couldn’t hold her gaze and fight it, so he turned his face away.
She put her hand on his chest and called, “Jagger?”
He cleared his throat, swallowed, and looked back to her.
“I bet he likes that.”
This head tip was not flirty.
It was concerned.
“You okay?”
He nodded and said, “We should go.”
“All right, boyfriend,” she murmured.
He didn’t know what this “boyfriend” business was about when
they’d had two kisses and zero dates.
He just knew he liked it.
He took her hand, they paused outside her door so she could
make sure it locked, and he noticed what he didn’t notice on the way up, such
was his intent to get to her. The color-block flooring was up here too, but the
tiles were smaller, and instead of the contrast color of yellow, it was orange.
There was also a lot of light from kickass sconces in the
walls and two sunlights that were throwing late
summer sun.
“Seems you’re a good landlord,” he noted, still holding her
hand as he led her to the stairs.
“Place was a just-a-hint shy of a slum. Not
purposefully. My grandparents just got old and lost track of it. When we got
it, we took it in hand. Dad owns a security company. Because of that, he knows
a lot of contractors. We got some castoffs, overages, stuff that was dinged and
dented. He called in some favors, owed some more. Got the common places cleaned
up and secured, new kitchens and baths in the units.”
They were shoving through the inner front door when he
noted, “Better to charge more rent, I suppose.”
“Didn’t raise the rent.”
That caught his attention and he stopped and looked down at
her before he pushed through the outer door.
“It wasn’t about regentrification,” she told him. “It was
about safety and pride. This is a cool, old building. There’s history here. The
tenants who lived here then, live here now, save one, in the unit I have. A
couple of musicians. An older lady who’s been a schoolteacher for decades,
she’s also an artist. This is their home. I didn’t want to take away their
home. I just wanted to take care of them.”
“That’s cool, Archie.”
She grinned. “I know, Jagger.”
He squeezed her hand.
Then he pushed out and led her to his truck.
“Bummed you’re not on your bike,” she said when she saw it.
“You’re in a skirt,” he pointed out.
“So?” she asked.
Yeah, this girl, not conventional.
He beeped the locks, got her in, strolled around the grill
and angled in himself.
He was about to start her up when Archie wrapped her fingers
around his wrist.
He turned her way.
“I need to know something, and I need to share something.
I’ll go first. Fast. Band-Aid. Then you go. Same way. Then we’re done. For now.
Okay?”
He had no idea what she was talking about.
He still said, “Okay.”
“Car wreck.”
That was when he knew.
“Murdered.”
She made a noise that was little, but came from deep, and he
felt it through every cell of his body.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
“Me too,” he replied.
They sat there, staring at each other in the cab of his
truck, her fingers still wrapped around his wrist.
They tightened before she let him go.
He started up the truck and pulled out of his spot.
“We have parking in the back,” she shared. “It’s parallel,
against the building, but it goes along the entirety of it and there are six
spots, so two guest spots. Though one of my tenants doesn’t have a car, he
bikes everywhere. In other words, usually, there are three spots for the
taking. I have signs. Own that space. So I totally tow if anyone takes them
that shouldn’t be there. If there’s a spot open, you can park back there from
now on.”
From now on.
“Gotcha,” he said.
He drove.
She rode.
They said nothing.
He had a million things to say and a million more to ask.
All he could think was car wreck.
One day her mom was there.
The next, she wasn’t.
No warning.
No prolonged illness.
No time to come to terms or bargain with God or sulk about
bad luck.
There.
And gone.
Her laughter took him out of his thoughts.
“What’s funny?” he asked.
“Well, from the minute you left my store today, I had a
thousand and one topics of conversation to introduce with you. The ride to your
brother’s house would have to be three hours to get to it all. And now I can’t
think where to start.”
He started laughing too, through it saying, “That was what I
was just thinking.”
“Okay, in brief. Red. Cream, no sugar. Cat’s Eye. Insecure.
Tie Cinema Paradiso and Rear Window. I got the idea for my
shop from one in Boston where I went to school at Boston College, I just had
more space to work with and made it bigger. I opened two years ago. Yes, my dad
thought I was crazy and worried like hell. He’s remarried. Has been for nearly
seven years. I dig her. My brother detests her. Okay, now, you go.”
“Uh…” he said, smiling at the windshield.
“Favorite color, coffee,” she prompted.
“Red too. One sugar, no cream. Fight Club. And…”
“Book, TV.”
“The Stand for books. I don’t watch much TV. I’m a
mechanic, both car and bike and work at the garage at Ride on custom builds. My
mom’s remarried to the guy who helped raise us. He’s a Chaos brother too. There
was shit around that and it took them a while to get it together. But now
they’re together and I got a little brother who is the absolute best. His name
is Wilder.”
“I don’t have any half siblings, though I have two
step-sisters.”
“Right.”
“I dig them too. Elijah thinks they suck and treats them
like that. This is the biggest part of how he’s an asshole, because he does
that and doesn’t hesitate to hand that to our stepmom too.”
“Shit.”
“Unh-hunh.”
He reached out a hand.
She took it.
“We can get into that later, okay?” he said.
“Yeah.” Then, “You don’t watch much TV?”
“When the weather’s nice, I like to be on my bike. It was my
dad’s. It’s the only thing of his I have that’s tangible, outside his blood. My
stepdad is awesome, and my mom is happy, genuinely happy, for the first time
since I can remember. So I dig being with them. As mentioned, my baby bro is
the shit and he cracks me up. So I get time in with him too. Ditto my big
brother. We’re tight, always have been. He’s my bottom-line ride or die. I have
a lot of other brothers, and there is not a one of them who I don’t enjoy his
company. So there’s that. I like to play pool. I like to get loose. I know my
way around a dart board. If I get a wild hair, I follow it, even if it takes me
to Montana. And if my ass is ever in front of a TV, it’s usually to completely
unplug and I have no clue what I’m watchin’, and
don’t remember it when I’m done.”
He paused.
Then he finished, “Though, I happened onto The Sopranos
once and binged that motherfucker even if it took weeks. So I guess that would
be my favorite, because it rocked.”
She didn’t say anything when he quit talking so he glanced
her way to see her staring at him.
He looked back at the road and asked, “What?”
All of a sudden, she was in his space.
He could feel her nose brush his skin and her breath against
his jaw and neck when she said, “That is the fucking coolest thing I’ve ever
heard.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Do I need to pull over?”
“Maybe.”
Her “maybe” was Jag’s “no maybe about it.”
He found his shot, a parking lot outside a Little Caesar’s.
He pulled into a spot and barely got the truck in park and
turned his head before they were making out.
In the middle of it, she stopped kissing him long enough to
ask, “Are we gonna be late?”
“Yes.”
“Do you care?”
“Fuck no.”
He watched her eyes smile.
Then they started making out again.
And yeah.
They were totally late.