Ally…

Damien helped me so much in the next few days. He helped me fill out the funeral paperwork and to pick the best option. My grandparents had believed in cremation and so we’d done that. I couldn’t help but wonder if that was what it was because it also happened to be the vastly cheaper option between cremation and burial.

When we went to the funeral home to give them the paperwork, he’d held my hand, and when they asked me if I wanted to see her, he had been the voice of reason, turning me to him and saying softly, “Speaking from experience with numerous families whose loved ones have died victims… you don’t want to do that, baby. You want to remember her alive and vibrant. Don’t let this be the memory of the last time you saw her.” The pleading in his eyes convinced me and I told the funeral director, ‘no.’

Likewise, the funeral director asked if there would be a service and I shook my head dejected. I couldn’t afford what they were asking, and I honestly didn’t see anyone but Dawnie, Mr. Comey, and myself attending. Even with the candlelit shrine in my grandmother’s garden, the Point Side residents and funerals were a fickle thing. They were likely to turn out and show up for a banger killed by another banger or the cops, but when Mr. Dodds had had his heart attack? It’d just been his family, my gran, and Dawnie.

Damien had taken me home after that. Had fixed us lunch while I quietly sulked on the couch and tried not to let myself fall completely into the pit of my despair. He’d brought the two plates of sandwiches and chips to the living room and handed me one, taking up a seat in his favorite chair.

“Turn on the news for me, babe?” he’d asked since the remote was closer to me. I took it up and turned on the television and the midday news flickered to life on the screen. More terrorist attacks overseas. More hate, more tragedy, more despair. I broke down and cried softly, overwhelmed.

The remote was taken from me, the television switched off, and gentle hands smoothed my tears away while intense dark eyes tried to assess how to help. Problem was, I didn’t know the answer to that.

“Okay, I want you to eat and then I want you to take a nap while I get some work done,” he said. I nodded, ate, and he tucked me in, laying with me until I fell asleep. It was one of the sweetest, kindest things I ever remembered a boyfriend doing for me.

When I got up, he was dressed in jeans and a tee, his biker jacket and motorcycle vest on the back of one of the dining room chairs opposite the wreckage of my latest sewing project that was under construction.

“Did you go somewhere?” I asked.

“Nope. It’s where we’re going.”

I frowned and he said, “Dress to ride. Casual, comfortable.”

“Okay,” I murmured.

I was curious and it was a Friday night, so why not? Maybe the ‘wind therapy’ of a ride, or so he called it, would do me some good. Who knew?

I dressed carefully, in jeans and boots, a thick sweater, and over it all, a more fashionable than functional leather jacket that I owned. When I came out, he smiled at me and said, “You’re lovely.” He held out his hand and I took it and we went down to the garage together. The ride was soothing, the cooler fall air a balm to the constant burning ache that had taken up residence in my soul.

He pulled into the alley by the 10-13 and tapped my knee. I got down and he backed his bike into the line of them that always seemed to be there. I sighed and he took my helmet from me and grabbing up my hand, we went around the corner.

A printed sign hung in the front glass of the door that read ‘Closed tonight for a private event’ which made me falter, tugging on Damien’s opposite hand as he reached for the door.

“The sign,” I said, and he turned to me.

“I know, we’re good,” he jiggled our combined hands reassuringly and pushed open the door, leading me in past him.

“I smell Yale, is Ally with him?”

“I’m here,” I told Dawnie, blinking in surprise.

“Just so you know, you’re supposed to wear cologne, not bathe in it. At least if you don’t want the blind girl calling you out,” she said, past me, in Damien’s direction.

Oz, who was beside my best friend, started cracking up laughing, and I admit I kind of laughed too. Dawnie turned in Oz’s direction and said pointedly, “I don’t know what you’re laughing at, buddy. You’re guilty of it, too.”

“Oh, you’re funny!” Oz declared, his amused grin intensifying rather than diminishing.

“I’ll be here all week,” Dawnie declared sarcastically, “No, really, I will. That seems to be how long it’s going to take me to get a drink around here.”

“Relax, sweetheart. Leave the salt on the glass,” Skids said, pressing a margarita into her hand.

“Thank you,” she said happily, and sipped from the rim, ignoring the two little straws. “Mm, Skids, was it?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s some good shit, thank you.”

“Anytime,” he said, laughing, and made his way back around behind the bar.

“What is this?” I asked softly.

“This, is your grandmother’s wake,” Damien said gently in my ear and I blinked, realizing pictures were playing on the bar’s television. Photographs of my grandmother. Well, photographs of photographs…

“How did you?”

“Took pictures of the pictures in your photo albums you brought with you,” he said gently. “Robbed some out of your phone when you weren’t looking.”

Different tears sprang to my eyes and Chrissy, who was standing nearby, said, “Awww! Don’t cry.”

“Precious, it’s her grandmother’s funeral,” Youngblood pointed out, and she turned and gave him a light smack against his chest. I laughed through my happy tears and Damien led me to a seat at our familiar tall table.

“I got a story for you,” Golden says after swallowing a sip of his beer and setting his bottle down and I said, “Okay.”

“Oz, you can back me up on this one,” Golden says, and Oz hung his head, shaking it laughing and said, “Oh, Lord!” like he knew what was coming.

“Okay, so we pick up this guy, a drunk and disorderly call, and as we go to put him in the car, dude’s like ‘I call shotgun!’ and the first responding unit let me know, ‘Hey, we ain’t searched him yet’ and me, I’m like ‘Thanks, assholes’ ‘cause now I gotta do it. So we search him, we ain’t find nothing on him, and I go to shove him in the back of our patrol car and dude be like, ‘Hey, I’m like 100% sure that I just called shotgun! Why are you shoving me in the back?’ Of course, that’s how arrest works, right?”

Already people were starting to laugh, and I could already tell this was going to be pretty funny. Golden says, “So my partner, being the dumbass strait-laced motherfucker he is, tries to explain to this guy he’s being arrested, right? Without missing a beat, and as drunk as this fucker is, he turns to Westin and is like, ‘Yeah, I know I’m being arrested, but the rules of shotgun are pretty clear, man!”

The table laughed, and I couldn’t help but join them. Oz just sat there shaking his head, laughing and said, “No, look! No, look! This guy bitched about this all the way through central booking. It was crazy, man. That dude was funny as hell, though!”

“I have a pretty funny arrest story…” I said and the table turned.

“Oh god, the one with your gran?” Dawnie asked.

“Your grandmother got arrested?” Golden asked, frowning at me like I was crazy.

“Okay, you have to understand, this was like a long time ago, the fifties or the sixties or something, right? So my grandmother and my grandfather had just gotten married, they hadn’t been married for very long, and my granddad was this troubleshooter for this hotel downtown here in Indigo City.”

“Okay, what’s a troubleshooter?” Oz asked.

“It’s like a bouncer,” I answered. “So, anyway, my grandmother is a seamstress, right? And she’d lent money to a girl staying at the hotel. So she goes to the hotel to get it back and she’s sitting with the woman at the hotel bar when the police swoop in and arrest her. She was a prostitute, and my grandmother had no idea. Well, they arrest my grandmother too, and she’s screaming at my grandpa, ‘Mace! Tell them who I am! Oh my, god, Mace! Tell them I’m your wife!’ but my grandpa is laughing so hard he can’t say it and they got her all the way into the back of the paddy wagon about to take her to jail!”

Everyone erupted into laughter and I glanced up at the television where a picture was sliding by of me sitting on my grandmother’s knee, my mom next to us on the couch. They were all gone now and I missed them all so much… My heart swelled so big with my pain that I felt like some of my ribs cracked. Tears sprang to my eyes and I crumbled around the edges and Damien was suddenly there, propping me up, holding me tight until the rainstorm passed.

“Sorry,” I said, at the pleasant but somber faces around the table.

“Don’t be, it was a good story,” Golden said, and held up his glass. “To Mace! Poor bastard probably slept on the couch for a week after that shit.”

“To Mace!” Everyone cheered and drank. I laughed and said, “I don’t know how long she stayed mad at him for that one.”

The door opened and I turned; a cluster of people from the Point Side was gathered in the doorway. I could see Mr. Comey at the back, and one of the young people at the front, Yvette, asked, “Hey yo, this where Miss Sylvia’s wake is supposed to be?”

“It surely is,” Skids called from the bar.

“Yo, this is a cop bar!” a male voice shouted from the back. I think it was Julio.

Damien looked at the group and said back, “Not tonight, it’s not.”

Several of them in the doorway exchanged looks, and Skids called out, “Food’s about to be up; I ain’t heating the whole of Indigo City. Either you’re in or you’re out.”

“Yeah, we’re in,” Yvette smiled at me and ushered everyone forward, and new happy tears kind of formed.

“Thanks,” I said softly and she said, “Man, I’m really sorry about Miss Sylvia, baby girl.” She came over and hugged me and everyone else followed suit.

“We were just listening to one of Ally’s stories about her; you got any?” Golden asked.

“Yeah,” Yvette said smiling. “A lot of us called her the Saint of the Point Side. She helped a lot of people, whether we done wrong or not.”

“Oh, yeah, what’d she do for you?” he asked, and one by one the stories started to come out. Some I knew, some were even new to me, but all of them were much the same. My grandmother loved everybody. She loved her community, and she wanted everybody to be safe and happy in a place that was inhospitable to both.

I turned to Damien and met his eyes, smiling, and mouthed ‘thank you.’

“Anything for you,” he murmured into my ear and I believed him. He didn’t say it if he didn’t mean it. I knew that about him. I loved that about him.

“Hey man, I ask you something?” Julio said a time later. Damien looked back at him over his shoulder and gave a nod.

“Sure,” he said.

“You and Ally a thing?”

“Yeah, Julio, we’re a thing,” I said, gently.

He nodded, but regret sort of took over his expression. “You gonna take her out of the Point Side?” he asked.

“Why?” Damien asked, picking up on something I hadn’t.

“’Cause, man. You’re the city’s prosecutor, dude. You’re on the news and shit. There be bangers and guys at the Point Side that’d hurt Ally just to get to you.” Julio looked at me and his face was a mix of sad and something else I couldn’t quite define.

“I like you, Ally Cat. I liked Ms. Sylvia. I don’t want to see nothin’ happen to you.” I nodded and took his warning to heart.

“We’ll have her moved this weekend if we have to,” Skids said, from behind the bar.

“Always knew you’d get out,” Yvette said. “I’m happy for you.”

I swallowed, things moved so fast, were moving so fast… I didn’t even know where I was going to go!

Yes, you do, stupid. He’s got you half moved in already.

I looked to Damien who reached up and caressed a light thumb across my cheek. Then I looked past him to Dawnie, who was visibly upset but trying to contain it.

“Oh, Dawnie, please don’t cry!”

“I’m sorry!” She put a fist to her mouth, pressing it to her lips for a moment and finally pulled it away and said, “I always knew you would get out, too. I just didn’t think it would all happen at once like this, you know?”

“Dawnie, she’s going to move, sure, but we have a little time for that and she’s not leaving your life completely. She’s still here,” Damien let her know and I loved him so much right then for trying to comfort my salty, distressed friend.

“He’s right, you know,” I said. “I can’t do anything without my best friend.”

“I know you can’t,” she warbled, “You’d be lost without me. Now get over here, bitch, and hug me.”

I went and hugged her tight, and had nothing I knew to say to make it better for her. We were caught in the same storm, but on opposite ends of it. It was as if my whole world had shattered and the pieces were tossed in the air. They were still coming down and hadn’t all landed, but as soon as I was able to snatch a piece, it felt like, I was able to fit it to the one next to it. Like, even though everything was broken, with Damien’s help, I was piecing it back together at a whirlwind speed.

It was much the same the rest of the wake, passing by at the speed of light. Laughter and tears, a roller coaster of emotion. When the last person had left and the doors were shut and locked, I sagged against Damien with relief.

“I think my girl has officially reached pumpkin status,” he said, with a light chuckle.

“To be expected,” Reflash said and I smiled at him. He’d cooked all of my grandmother’s recipes for the food. That was more sneaky-sneaky from my boyfriend, taking pictures of her recipes and sending them to Reflash to ponder over and expand.

“I’d like to buy a couple of them recipes for the restaurant,” he’d said and we were supposed to work out a deal later on. It would be nice to put some money aside for a rainy day, and I wasn’t opposed to it. My grandmother loved to cook and feed people, so it felt right, actually.

“You go on and get out of here,” Skids called. “We got clean-up just fine.”

“I can’t even begin to imagine what this cost you,” I told them.

“Nothin’.” Reflash leaned against the bar. “Your man there paid for it.”

I turned to Damien and he kissed my forehead in that way that made me melt. “I meant it, I’d do anything for you. Plus, money is really no object for me.”

I sighed, too wrung and turned-inside-out to argue or pitch any ‘but’s’ out there.

“Let’s go home,” he murmured, and I nodded. I wanted to go home. I wanted a bed, and I know it was probably wrong of me, but I wanted the escape Damien’s body in mine provided.

We said our final goodbyes, I gave hugs and my profuse thanks, and we were on our way back to the Calvert building by way of the garage next door.

We were silent all the way back up to his apartment. I didn’t even object to using the elevator. I mean, not that I ever did, but this time I didn’t even feel the usual accompanying anxiety that came with an elevator ride.

“How are you feeling?” he asked me.

“Empty,” I replied softly as we stepped through his front door. I didn’t want to give him the idea I wasn’t up for anything before bed, though, so I said, “I don’t suppose you would mind filling me up?”

He smiled and laughed at my crude joke and said, “Not at all; come here.”

He drew me into his arms and kissed me with one of those kisses of his that scorched the earth and made it all just fall away. I kissed him back and let my hands run over his fit body underneath his jacket and what he called a cut. The heat radiating off of him was addictive after the chilly ride home, and I wanted to warm myself by him like he was the fire missing from my soul.

I only hoped I could reignite next to him and he was, it would seem, determined to make that happen. His mouth was hungry, like he would swallow my sadness whole. His hands were just as starved, moving over my body, desperate to touch, desperate to feel every inch of me.

It was like we lost ourselves in one another. Hands divested bodies of clothes, without a hope or a prayer of ever reaching the bedroom. He laid me down, right there against the warm hardwood floors, mouth traveling all down my body, hands following. I ran my fingers through his hair as he kissed the apex of my thighs and I arched when his tongue licked out decadently along the seam of my sex.

“Oh, god! Damien…” My voice died on a lust-filled gasp and he growled his approval against me. My hips lifted at the sound and thrill of vibration and I gave myself over to his tender loving care.