Jack

 

“Get up, you lazy bastard.”

 

“Uurghnnn.” I peeked up into the harsh light the morning sun wreaked in my bedroom. It was my daily dose of ‘white shades: fail.’ I really needed to see about dark paint, or curtains, or something equally drastic. I was not good with mornings, especially those that came after long nights with bottles.

 

“Come on, Jack-o. You’re late. Again. Get the fuck up, man.”

 

“Whatimez…” I was totally lucid.

 

“Noon-thirty, you asshole. You were supposed to open at ten. Enough, already. Get. Your. Ass. Up.”

 

I groaned, swore, braced myself, and rolled up and out of bed. The throbbing vice on my frontal lobe intensified, and I took a moment with closed eyes to get a grip. This was not going to be my day.

 

But Grath was right—I needed to get into action. I’d been on a solid bender for…well, for a number of days, anyway. Long enough. Heart heavy with grief, I sent up a thought for my brother, Keith—whose birthday had recently passed—took a breath, and resolved to rejoin the living.

 

“Dude, seriously, you gotta go in. There’s some woman there waiting on you, with a baby. Kinda hard to tell for sure, but it does kind of look like you. I’d let you roll longer, but this…Jack, you gotta get up and deal.”

 

WTF?—I was still half-asleep, and full-on hung over. Woman and baby did not compute, but something clicked in my brain that sent my cells into action mode.

 

So I catapulted my sorry ass into a hot shower, which went pretty far to making me feel more human. By the time I got out, Grath was gone, but the guy had left me a lukewarm cup of dark roast. Not for nothing was he my favorite person alive.

 

I rooted around for clean clothes, which I was pretty sure was a lost cause, but I thought I’d give it a shot anyway.

 

Yeah, that didn’t work; it was definitely time to do laundry. I picked up a fallen tee, some jeans, socks, boots, pulled on my kutte, and rolled out.

 

By the time I made it to the shop, I was deeply regretting not having guzzled down a gallon of water and some painkillers the night before. Whoever invented sunshine should be shot. That fireball had no compassion.

 

Indoors at last, I was met by Trini, guardian of the front desk. She was a heavily-inked and pierced, five-foot-four, pink-haired, cat-eyed, militant organizer of the highest realm, and she provided snark at no extra cost. Basically, she was about the best thing that had ever happened to DeepInk, and we’d have been lost without her.

 

But on this day, I was cursing my luck that she wasn’t still out at lunch when I arrived.

 

“Hoo-boy. Look what we got today. Rating on the GM’s calendar! To what do we owe the honor?”

 

And so it begins.

 

“Shut it, Treens. And get me something for my head, would you?”

 

“Oh, is somebody suffering la cruda? Pobrecito! Yes, let me rush off to take care of your po’ widdoo head.” She shook her own at me. “Jerk. You deserve it. You back, now?”

 

Chin down, I peered at her over the tops of my sunglasses, which I tipped down but protectively kept on my nose. “Yeah, I’m back.”

 

She glared at me, then reached into a corner of her domain and pulled out a blessed bottle of ibuprofen. She tossed it to me as she headed to the back kitchen/staff room for what I hoped would be a bottle of water, giving me a shoulder bump on her way. Total gem.

 

I was looking over the schedule for the day—okay, I was procrastinating. I had no desire to meet with the mystery woman and her baby, if they were even still there.

 

When Trini came back with the water, she destroyed my hopes. “Heads up, boss. There’s a woman with a baby, looks like you, in your office. Been waiting there about an hour and a half, now. You been holding back on us, Jack? Deets, dude.”

 

I was careful. I was always careful. I could have been ten sheets to the wind, and I’d still use protection. No way could there be a kid out there with my genes. No way in hell. It was starting to piss me off.

 

“Name, Trini?”

 

“Didn’t get one. Just insisted on seeing you, I said you weren’t in yet, she said she knew your office was in the back and made her own way there. I don’t know this chick from nobody, but I am not getting in the middle of any lovers’ tiff. Your baby-mama, your problem.”

 

At that moment, the baby began to add in its two cents, as if on cue. It sounded like a catfight, but worse, since it came from the direction of my office. My space. This did not help my hangover. It was time to lose this woman and regain my peace.

 

“Yo, Jack-o, good, you’re here.” Grath poked his head out from behind the glass separating the artists’ stations from front reception. “That baby’s starting to cry and fuss again. You gotta get your ass back there, bruh. Babies are not good for business. Go deal, man.” He slapped my arm and retreated to his station.

 

This explained the coffee drop and home-visit intervention, then—light dawned.

 

I popped back a couple—okay, three—pills, took a long chug of water, and headed back. I’d make this quick. Whoever she was, she was not my problem. I’d already decided, and that was that.

 

The crying got louder as I got closer, but fantastically stopped just as I arrived at the door. I heard the woman heave a deep sigh, then strode in.

 

The first I saw of her was the back of her head, her long wavy blondies held up high in a ponytail, with a whole lot of them escaping around the edges. It looked soft and pretty, and kind of messy—which I loved, usually—but not this time.

 

My mind was already wracked to figure out who she was. I usually went for brunettes. The blondes I’d been with in the last year or two were few and far between. Still, that wasn’t really important; women changed their hair colors like it was a required ritual. But if she was claiming that I was her baby-daddy, then I’d have to have met her before. Ha!—understatement.

 

But seriously, from this angle, I got nothing.

 

She had, appropriately, seated herself in one of the two chairs facing my desk. The other was covered with her stuff. She’d come loaded down, her bags exploding with blankets and baby paraphernalia. Somehow, she had avoided the hell of the typical baby crap—that being all the Easter-egg-colored eyesores—and had opted for basic black, white, and red. Cool chick. I took note of the good taste, and filed it. Maybe this woman was rational. Maybe this would be quick. It gave me hope.

 

Best to make this fast. Still standing at the door, holding it open for her, I went for polite first. “I don’t know who you are or why you’re here, but you got the wrong guy, lady. Time for you to go. Get the fuck out of my office.”