Chapter 7 - Fire Zone
Was she ever going to be able to read a book in peace again? Emma had serious doubts. The Perrault cousins hadn’t been upstairs for even 10 minutes and she already was hearing crashing sounds and muffled shouting, some of which she was certain was French.
Throwing down her book in annoyance and grabbing her keys, she paused only to lock up her apartment before cautiously climbing the stairs, unsure what would greet her there. She wasn’t the least bit surprised to find their door wide open - that would explain why they seemed so damn loud. Just before she reached the door, she heard what she could only assume was the tail end of a conversation.
“Bet’s on. Fucker.”
“She will still be mine.”
“Over my dead body.”
Emma furrowed her brow, wondering who exactly the boys could be fighting about. Had they already been to the rink and seen the trampy little things the team had hired to be cheerleaders? Whatever the case was, she was hopeful Ryan won – that would keep him from trying to be her shadow instead!
Finally knocking on the door frame, she whistled soft at their digs. It was clear the team was going all out to make a good impression on the players, and everything from the plush carpeting they were standing on to the flat screen TV looked to be accomplishing that feat. “Hi.” She gave them both a fake smile and a wave. When they turned in her direction, she continued, “I know there’s going to be fireworks tonight, but can you save the loud banging ‘til that point? Some of us actually have jobs and need to be able to concentrate.” She could tell Luke was about to make a smart-assed comment, so she added, “By the way pretty boy? Your expensive little car? It’s parked in a fire zone. Might wanna do something about that.”
Luke tilted his head then glanced over at Ryan, “Que se ‘Fire Zone’?”
For the first time since she’d been in the room, Emma saw a small smile curl over Ryan’s lips as he answered, “Pas de parking.”
“Hostie!” The word left his mouth as he sprinted past Emma, and as she glanced back, she noted he practically leapt to the bottom of the stairs in one single motion.
Turning back towards Ryan, Emma saw that the grimace had returned to his face, and as she looked closer, she should see a thin trail of blood trickling from his nose. “Motherfucker! What did he do to you?” Without even thinking about it, she moved to him, grabbing him by his elbow and tugging him into their kitchen, pushing him towards a chair, and turning to look for a paper towel.
“Nothing he or others haven’t done before, I assure you.” Finally finding the paper towels and wetting it just a bit in their sink, Emma turned back to find he still had a sour look on his face. As she approached with the towel, Ryan swiped it out of her hands and brought it to his own face to roughly jab at the blood, muttering at her as he did. “And just because I’m here to play a game doesn’t mean it isn’t a job, thank you very much.”
Emma stood in front of Ryan for a long moment, unconsciously rocking a bit on her heels before her mouth finally decided to start to function again. “I see. I’m sorry.” Turning to exit back towards her own apartment, she paused as she reached the door. “By the way, call your sister. She’s been trying to reach you all day.”
Finally returning to her own apartment, Emma was not surprised to find Trent sitting beside her door, quietly looking up at her on her arrival and asking, “Everything okay up there?”
Shrugging, and somewhat against her better judgment as she let him follow her back inside, Emma mumbled in retort, “They were physically fighting and making bets over bedding a girl. Class acts, those two, not sure how either of them can be related to Gabi. She can be brutal, but it’s always the truth.” And after another moment she just stared at Trent, her eyes locking on his telling far more truth about her emotions than anything she said.
“I’m sorry.” He told her softly, settling down into her couch, looking like some sort of origami figure trying to pretzel himself into formation, before waving his hand so she’d let him continue. “I know you like me. I’ve known that from the start. And I’ve done my damnedest to try not to lead you on, but I guess I have.” Rubbing a big hand through his mess of hair, he added softer still, “Maybe I’m strange, because I’ve never been involved with anyone before, like ever. But my heart, my mind, tell me I can’t get involved with someone I don’t hardly know. And maybe after we’d got to know each other it might work, but right now, I’m hoping I didn’t just lose the only friend I’ve got here.”
Giving Trent a sad smile, but having to stop herself from reaching out and cupping his cheek tenderly, Emma curled into her Grandpa’s chair, sitting sideways to be able to see him, talk to him. “My fault, honestly. I guess in that regard, I’m the opposite of you. I get interested, I pursue. But it’s not like it was a surprise to hear that you weren’t interested in me.”
Trent raised an eyebrow at that, asking after a moment, “Lover boy, though?”
And here, Emma had the decency to blush, head ducking a bit to tell him, “I was talking about you to the Malones - Ryan’s sister, and Luke’s cousin? - last night was her birthday. I can only presume at some point after I left my relationship status came up in question. And they were perhaps told I had eyes on someone.” Trailing off, Emma gave him another sad little smile before shrugging a bit, voice softer still, even though the thumping around had begun anew upstairs, “I told them though, I didn’t think you were into me. So, I can only presume anything she might have said was to get them to leave me be.”
Glancing upstairs at the stomping of feet, Trent started to untwist himself, asking her almost without waiting for an answer, “Should I go up there, remind them they do have a downstairs neighbor, and to behave themselves?”
Shaking her head just a bit, Emma told him, “No point. I texted Gabi on my way out of their apartment already. Told her no matchmaking, but that I’d rather live closer to you, Trent, than below her family. I’d feel safer and more comfortable that way.”
~*~
Still seated at the kitchen chair with the damp paper towel pressed to his face, Ryan was muttering without any words under his breath when Luke finally bounded back in. “Does your fucking cell phone still have a charge?”
“Of fucking course.” Luke retorted smartly. “What kind of a fool do you take me for? “
“Ferme ta gueule. You don’t want me to answer that. Just call Gabi and see what she wants, will you?” Finally moving the paper towel away from his face, Ryan started to gently feel at his nose, to try and determine if the dumbass had broken anything. He hadn’t heard anything crack, but he wasn’t sure how straight his nose was to begin with. Still, it didn’t feel broken, so he felt like he’d gotten off lucky.
“I haven’t done anything!” At Luke’s raised voice, Ryan pulled himself to his feet and wandered into the living room area, finding his cousin pacing and trying desperately to get a word in edgewise as Gabi no doubt read him the riot act. “But.” “Non!”
Shaking his head, Ryan finally held out his hand for the phone and Luke gave it to him without hesitation – and his sister was so riled up that he could hear her even before he put the phone near his ear, “She’s got severe social anxiety. It’s hard enough to get her to come out. She may seem all confident and cocksure but she so isn’t. In fact, I think she’s borderline autistic. So, leave her alone! We don’t need you making her feel unsafe! Crisse de Tabarnak!!”
“Love you too, Gabi. How was your day? Mine was swell. Luke wanted to see if my nose would bend to the left, and wouldn’t you know it? It does.”
There was a delay of several seconds while Gabi registered that she was now talking to Ryan, and while her voice was calmer than it was with Luke, Ryan knew his sister well enough to pick up the underlying venom. “What did you two do to her? We finally get her some place she’s safe, she’s comfortable, and now she wants out?”
Ryan sighed soft – he so didn’t want to be talking about Emma to his sister, especially not right now. “Why were you looking for me for, Gaba?” He was banking on the baby name cooling her down further, and when he heard a soft giggle in his ear, he knew he’d accomplished his goal.
“Oh Turtle, I just wanted to make sure you two were settled in. If you’d figured out dinner yet. There’s a great pizza place around here; you order it, then go pick it up and cook it yourself, so it’s cheap but it’s good.”
“Hang on, lemme see if cousin dear has anything up his sleeves.” Ryan pulled the phone away from his face as he went looking for his cousin, finally finding him settling his stuff into the bigger bedroom. “You. Are. An. Asshole. But we’ll fight over this more later. Despite your charming wit, Gabi wants to know if you had anything planned for dinner.”
“Non.” Luke murmured as he continued to unpack his clothes into the closet. Just before Ryan put the phone back to his face again, he saw Luke mouth at him, ‘She will be mine.’
Clenching his free hand into a fist, Ryan stalked out of the room, tripping over his own long forgotten bag in the process. Growling softly and kicking it towards the smaller bedroom, he grumbled at his sister, “His highness has no plans. Are we coming to you, or you coming to us?”
“Why don’t we come to you? I’ll park in Emma’s extra spot, I know she won’t mind. Maybe I can even invite her up and let her see that you guys aren’t the classless idiots that she no doubt thinks you are?”
Kicking at the bag again until it was completely inside the other bedroom, Ryan promptly closed the door and murmured at her, “One classless idiot, one justifiably cranky American. She came up here to yell at us cuz we were making so much noise, said that ‘Some of us have jobs’.”
He could almost see his sister rolling her eyes through the phone before she responded in a softer voice than he was expecting. “Emma doesn’t understand sports. She’s trying, but in her experiences thus far, it’s a lot of machismo, not a lot of what she equates to work, even if she acknowledges the skill necessary to compete. She was more likely trying to make the point that you two were interrupting HER work rather than trying to insult you.”
Going to wrinkle his nose then immediately regretting it, Ryan finally muttered sourly, “Well this is a job, dammit. I mean yes, I have my degree but…”
“I know Turtle, I know.” Gabi interrupted. “And you’re good enough. You’ll make it, I believe in you.”
He managed a half-smile at that. “You always have, Gaba. You always have.”
“That’s because you’re my little Turtle. Now go be a good boy and turn on your oven on to 425 and make sure there’s nothing in there first, please. I don’t want you burning the whole complex down.”
Snorting, Ryan left the confines of what was now his bedroom to head to the kitchen. “One time I put something metal in the microwave and I still can’t live it down, can I? I’ll take care of things on this end. I’ll see you soon, Gaba. Love you.”
“Love you too, Turtle.”
Hanging up Luke’s phone with a sigh, Ryan could still only shake his head. Dinner with his sister and her husband didn’t worry him. But dinner with Emma? That was another story entirely. He had to get to her before Luke did, and he just wasn’t sure how he felt about that.
But could he live with himself if Luke used her up and spit her out as carelessly as he so often did?