I may look a certain way and people might judge me for it, but at least I clean up well enough. I take a hot shower and laugh when I think about the other night with Emma. That was the wildest shit I’ve done in a while. Fucking her in the shower and feeling how tight she felt around me was like a breath of fresh air. I’ve missed feeling that close to a woman. I’ve missed their touch. It’s been… well, it’s been a long fucking time. Three months? Maybe even longer.

When I’m done, I shave my face and dry my body off. I throw some aftershave on my neck and cheeks. “Where’s my cologne?” I mutter. I look in a drawer and find the bottle. I spray it on me. I grab a white undershirt from my closet. I put it on, feeling my muscles fit tight inside the fabric. I grab the only suit I have and I throw it on. There’s no question about it. I look fucking good.

I leave my apartment, feeling my dress boots press down against the wood of my porch. There’s something about cleaning yourself up every now and then. It gives you a new confidence. Well, I’m fucking whistlin’ as I arrive to Emma’s house, and she’s sitting on her porch, wearing this nice sundress that leaves me scrambling to adjust myself. In her hand is a bottle of red wine. She’s fancy, or at least fancier than myself.

“Evenin’.” I smile. She sits up out of her chair and smiles back.

“Damn,” she says. “You look really good!”

“Thanks,” I laugh. “So do you, as always.”

I grab her hand. “You ready to get out of here?”

“I’m nervous, I have to admit,” she says.

“Good,” I say. “You should be. My brother’s an asshole.”

“Great,” she sighs.

“I’m kidding. It’ll be fine,” I assure her.

“Just do one favor for me,” she says. “Promise me that whatever happened all those years ago won’t be brought up tonight. I don’t think I can sit through one of those awkward family arguments.”

I turn to her and kiss her hand. “I promise. We’ll have fun.”

We head toward her rental car and drive the rest of the way. When we pull up to the massive driveway, it’s pretty damn clear that he’s won the family fight against me. “Jesus,” she mutters. “The place is huge. It’s like a fucking mansion!”

I immediately feel the bitter truth sweep into my gut. “Bastard,” I whisper.

“Do not,” she says. “I’m warning you. I’ll leave and call a cab home if you go down that route.”

“I’m cool,” I tell her. “I just can’t believe it. My brother is doing very well for himself.”

“What does he do?” she asks me.

“He’s a fighter,” I tell her. “You know, professionally.”

“Oh, boy.” She smirks.

I get out of the car, feeling pretty sour about myself. Where have I ended up with my life? Let’s see, I’m in my late twenties with no prospects, no girlfriend, and no real future that I can see ahead of myself. I’m wasting my life away and pretty soon, Emma will be gone. I’ll have no one and I’ll be expected to face the facts.

The Good Boys back in Buffalo will have to face someone who has nothing to lose. Then, at least I’ll have my revenge. Worst part is, I probably won’t be around to enjoy any of it.

I ring the doorbell and wait, feeling time start to speed up and slow down. For a second, I get dizzy. Everything that happened in my old auto shop comes back to me. The blood… my god, there was a hell of a lot of blood. The gunshots going off all around me. It makes me jump sometimes just thinking about it. It sends me shooting out of my skin.

“What’s wrong?” she asks me, noticing when I put my hands up to my face.

“Nothing,” I shake my head. “I’m good. Just got a little dizzy for a second.”

“Vertigo?” she eyes me carefully and puts a hand on my shoulder.

“Something like that,” I nod.

The door opens and Emma’s hand comes off my shoulder. My brother is standing in front of us and I have no idea what the hell to say to him. Emma takes the lead and says, “Hey, I’m Emma! It’s so nice to meet you. Thank you for inviting me into your home.”

“Emma!” My brother gives me a look of surprise. “It’s great to meet you too. Come on in. We’re just pulling the food out of the oven.”

As we walk, I want to hit him in the back of the head. Shit, he’ll probably steal Emma too, right? He’ll probably get the whole town talkin’ about me again.

“I got you this Merlot,” she says, as we walk through the massive hallway, lined with pictures of old boxers and fighters. The bastard thinks he’s among them all. The greats. What about us working folks? What about the ones who have no one to look up to but themselves and the hard work they do? That’s right. All the pictures in my house are of family. As much as I hate ‘em, they’re the only people that pushed me forward.

“Thank god,” he says. “We sort of emptied our last bottle the other night. We’ll uncork this bad boy in a second.”

“He seems really nice,” Emma whispers to me, after sitting down. I can hear Julia in the kitchen talking in a low voice. I hear them kiss.

I hate the bastard. I hate his confidence. I hate his smug attitude. I hate that I’m here right now. What the fuck am I doing?

“He’s… my brother,” I manage to say.

“Come on,” she whispers. “We can have fun, right? Otherwise, I’m just with the asshole creep that I picked up on the side of the road.”

“We’re good,” I promise her.

Julia comes out with a whole fucking pot roast in her hands, avoiding all eye contact with me. Unfortunately, I’m staring her down and she knows it. She sets the food on the table and finally sees me. I nod. “Julia,” I say. “How are you?”

“I’m good,” she quickly says. “Good to see you again, Soren.” I tense up when she says my name.

“So,” Gabe comes out of the kitchen with some mashed potatoes and gravy. “How’d you two meet?” He grabs the bottle of wine and pours everyone a glass, while she tells everyone the pitiful story about my truck giving up on me.

“We’re just friends,” Emma reiterates, before saying anything else. I look at her and tense up even more. Is she joking me? Friends? No. We’re fuck buddies now, obviously. And the next time she says something different, she’s going to get it two times harder in my bed.

“Right,” I mutter. “Friends.” She looks at me and doesn’t know what to say. An awkward combination of a smile and a frown forms on her face.

“I sort of picked him up on the side of the road,” she laughs a little.

Oh, goddammit. What the fuck is this story? Why is she telling it like this? I sound like a goddamn fool.

“On the side of the road?” Gabe laughs and looks at me, taking a slab of pot roast and putting it onto his plate. We all start picking at the food, but I can barely even think about eating right now. The whole thing just pisses me the fuck off.

“Tell me,” Gabe looks straight at me, looking like the bastard that he is, “Why were you hitchhiking on the side of the road, brother?”

I sigh and glare at my plate. “I wasn’t hitchhiking, dammit,” I tell him. “My truck shit on me and I needed a ride into town. I walked about ten miles before she picked me up.”

I see Julia smile at Emma. “That old truck?” she laughs. “You still have that thing?”

“Yeah, it’s gotten me through a lot, actually,” I say. “Made it to Buffalo and it almost made it back. Anyway, it’s at the shop now. Hopefully I can get another year out of her.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re here,” Gabe says. “It’s been how long since we’ve done this?”

“Family dinner?” I laugh and chew my potatoes. “Twelve years, I think.”

“Twelve years?” Emma’s eyes go wide. “You mean, you haven’t seen each other in twelve years?”

“I can’t believe it,” Gabe says.

“I left when I was young. Got out and never came back. There was a lot I had to deal with,” I say. I look over at Julia who has now decided to butt out of the conversation entirely.

“Yeah, well, you’re here now,” Gabe says. “That’s all that matters.”

“So, you’re a fighter?” Emma cuts into the conversation.

Gabe smiles. “Yeah, MMA. It’s my passion,” he says.

Passion. Yeah, right. Like it’s music, or acting, or something that requires anything except for strength and training. It’s not a fucking passion. It’s a way to get your head pounded in. His managers will shit on him eventually, and when they do, he won’t have this house anymore, or Julia for that matter. He’ll be like me. Alone and pissed off.

“But I’m actually getting interested in the business side of things,” he quickly reiterates. “I’ve started a charity fund that helps victims of ALS. It’s practically all I do now, besides the occasional fight. I reckon I’ll be done with the fighting in a year or so.”

I groan, loud enough to be heard, and Emma pinches my thigh. “Well, that was delicious,” I tell Gabe.

“It’s Julia’s recipe,” he smiles. “Thank her.”

Look, I don’t have any feelings for the woman. We dated a decade ago. I was young as hell. It’s not about her, per se. It’s about my brother always trying to put me down. It’s about the dreams we had together. We were going to be fighters together. We were going to open a gym where anyone could come in and practice. For the first half of my life, I thought we were going to take on the world.

And then he fucked Julia. My girlfriend. The woman I had invested all that time and energy into. I mean, we met in fucking middle school, for Christ sakes, and then my brother steals her? But it wasn’t just that. It was everything surrounding us. It just imploded and I realized the dream was dead. It wasn’t going to be real anymore because someone else got in the way. That’s why I left. I knew I had to start a new dream.

I look at her bitterly, but I don’t want Emma suspecting anything, so I force a smile. “Thank you, Julia,” I say the words carefully and it stings my heart. “It’s delicious, really.”

“Thank you, Soren,” she smiles. We’re like two broken robots, forced to act, but we’re not doing it well.

“Dessert?” Gabe claps his hands. “I’ve got a fire going outside. Might be nice to sit around it.”

Emma looks enthused enough, so we head outside. He clicks a button on a remote and the whole back wall slides open. Everyone, including Julia who lives here, ooh’s and ah’s. Everyone is feeling drunk and good off the wine, except for me I guess. And with every new sip, I get more and more angry, and more and more justified about feeling that way.

“This place is really amazing,” Emma exclaims, as we sit down around the gas-lit fire outside. It really is amazing and that’s why it makes me angry. His whole swimming pool is lit up and there’s a hand-built Jacuzzi attached to it. You can see the perimeter of the forest surrounding the house, and the lights of the city below.

“We go out of town a lot,” he says. “You guys can stay here anytime you want, if you promise to water the indoor plants.”

“Wow, I’d love to,” she says.

I nearly roll my eyes out of my damn head. I, for one, will never take him up on that offer.

“You know,” he turns to me next, “if you want to work in the business, you can come and work for me. Anytime you want. Just say the word. I’ll start you on a better salary than any of the other people.”

Emma looks at me, as if she’s saying, “You’re so lucky.” But I don’t feel lucky. I feel like charity, picking up the leftover scraps that I didn’t work for. I feel lame as hell.

“Thanks,” I mutter, trying to remain as civil as I can.

“We’re family,” he says. “We have to stick by each other.”

“Like Dad?” I laugh.

“I like to think we’re better than him,” he says. “The cycle has stop sometime, right?”

“It does,” I agree, for once, though I don’t know how to stop it. Am I as spiteful as my father? Am I turning into that man? It’s true that when I look in the mirror, I don’t recognize what I’ve become, but I’ve always just thought that life had dealt some terrible punches. It was out of my control. Now, I’m not so sure. Maybe it is all my fault. Maybe if I had stayed, things would have worked themselves out. Maybe I’d be in a house just like this one, instead of on the run with nothing to my name.

When the dinner party is over, I’m left feeling empty and Emma knows it. “That was really nice,” she says trying to stay positive. But when she turns on the car and I don’t say anything back, she sighs. “Try not to dwell on things too hard, okay?”

“I’m fine,” I tell her. “I just have to figure my shit out, I guess.”

“Well, isn’t that why you came here? To figure shit out, right?” she laughs and pulls out of the driveway.

“Yeah, but it’s a lot more complicated than you think,” I say. “It’s not like I can just press a magic button and make things okay.”

“You can start by telling me what happened over there, in Buffalo,” she says.

I close my eyes. Images of my friend dying in my arms. Men with guns held to my face. They’ll need the money in a week, they tell me. Fear pumping through my blood, mixed with adrenaline. I wasn’t thinking straight. I ran when I should have fought.

“Maybe later,” I tell her. “I’d rather not relive it.”

She doesn’t understand, of course. She thinks I’m crazy. No, she thinks I’m an asshole. We drive in silence the rest of the way, but when she gets to my house, she puts on the brakes hard.

“See you,” she says.

“Hey, are you serious?” I ask her. “You’re going to shun me now?”

“If you don’t think we’re close enough to tell each other things, I don’t think we’re close enough to go to our family’s homes,” she says, angrily.

“Look, it’s personal,” I tell her. “I don’t want you involved.”

“Just get out,” she says. “Get out and just leave me alone for a while.” She turns away from me and breathes in hard and fast.

“Alone?” I repeat her words. “You really want me to leave you alone? Like, this is over and done with?” I think about her ass, propped up in the shower. I smell her scent. I look into her eyes and I see that she’s bearing another harsh truth for me.

“Yes, Soren,” she says, pulling her hair back. “We should have ended this a while ago. I can’t get too close to you.”

My world starts to spin. I didn’t love the woman, but fuck, she did make me feel better about my life. “Fine,” I mutter. “Suit yourself.” I leave the car and close the door behind me.

Another night alone. Fuck it. Emma hates me. Great. I’ve been through this shit before. I’ll find someone new.