…
Star
The yellow, orange, and brown leaves gently dusted across the long, curvy rural road. Remy eased off the throttle to take in the multicolored overhang of fall tree branches above us. The forest was still and traffic was sparse on this sleepy Sunday morning. The country road was peacefully quiet, save the loud, dull roar of Remy’s new motorcycle.
Remy had found and restored a nineteen-eighty-four Kawasaki Ninja that was the same year and model of the one that was destroyed and this was its maiden voyage.
We’d just gotten off the highway and were taking the back roads through New Hampshire. I smiled when I caught Remy’s head snapping around like a tourist. I really couldn’t blame him. The uneven and chaotic New England landscape was bursting with color, life and beauty.
While I lived here, I’d always poked fun at the “Leaf Peepers” the people that would fly in just to hang out in an Airbnb which were temporary rented homes just for the season while they gawked at the trees in autumn. But seeing it again after so long, made me understand why those camera-clad tourists came back year after year.
I didn’t realize how much I missed it too.
It’d been about a year since the “changing of the guard,” as it was now referred to. Remy’s first act as national president was a majority vote to drop all members with less than three years in the club back down to prospects. It was an extremely close vote, but Remy won. A lot of the new members outright quit rather than have to prove themselves as prospects again, but the ones that stuck it out were the ones the club deserved.
Everyone started trusting the people they surrounded themselves with and the Steel Veins thrived because of it.
My life had again changed dramatically. I helped Remy vet the prospects in our Leslie chapter, and took over the clubs bookkeeping. Deadeye had left it in a fucking mess, but I really didn’t mind going through it all. It was actually kind of a nice change of pace and it turned out I was really good at it. I got the chance to use some of that college training to solidify the club with the government, and to restore faith in the eyes of the people of Leslie. I helped keep our town happy and prosperous by donating to events on behalf of the club, and organizing fundraisers.
Remy kept the town safe by doing other things we didn’t tell the government or the town about. The club still had its enemies, but Remy was very aggressive when it came to squashing any trouble that came up. The Steel Veins stopped running drugs and started investing in infrastructure jobs and unions.
I hadn’t had to kill anyone again, which I was glad for. Still, I knew I was capable of it, if I had to, and that was a very empowering feeling. I had come to accept my dark side; it made me strong enough to never back down. It made me feel like I belonged by Remy’s side.
Everyone else saw that too. They all started calling me “Star Fire.” I’d never been more respected in my life and I felt worthy of every damn second of it.
A sign for the Merrimack River blurred by. We were getting close to my childhood home now. For weeks, Remy had been insisting that I contact my parents, and when I finally picked up that phone, I think my mom and I cried for an hour straight.
They understandably thought I was dead... It was a very long and difficult call, but one I was still glad I made. All the calls after that had been much easier.
Over the months, I told them what happened, well mostly. A few things I needed to leave out if I didn’t want them to have heart attacks. I eventually eased their fears about the club and introduced them to Remy over Skype. My mom thought he looked handsome and said the bullet scar on his cheek was distinguishing. She now referred to him as my “Pirate King.”
I liked it, and Remy even chuckled at that when he found out.
I was on the fence when they even invited us back home to finally meet Remy in person. I’d changed so much and couldn’t help feeling a little apprehensive about going back to the place I’d originally run from. The concept of family meant a lot to Remy, so he was very encouraging about the whole thing and helped me get past my hang ups. I also think part of that was him looking for an excuse to pay my old college professor, Jonathan a visit.
Remy did have two requests before we left on this cross country road trip to New Hampshire. One was that we planned it for early autumn, so he could see the leaves change, and the second was that I…accepted his marriage proposal!
I was going to tell my parents that we were getting married! I was beyond excited!
It was crazy to think that I was just a scared, wounded girl when Remy showed up at that gas station a year and a half ago. Now, after all that blood, horror and heartache, I had become so much more. We both had.
The road ahead of us was bumpy and full of sharp, unexpected turns, but we embraced our path. Every hazard only strengthened what Remy and I had become.
Our love was stronger than steel.
END