Brandon
The attorney Adam sent was Sammie. I’m still reeling from seeing her walk into this shit hole, done up in her suit with that long blonde hair resting over her shoulder like a spill of gold. Fuck. She looked so different but just the same with her beautiful warm brown eyes that were the only ones, apart from my mom’s, that ever looked at me with love. I mentally calculate how many years it’s been since I had to leave with my dad. Has it really been that long since Mom died?
I flex my hands that are now bandaged thanks to Sammie and her demands. I didn’t want the nurse to fuss over me but I also didn’t want to be an asshole and tell her not to do her job. I couldn’t get over Sammie and the way she spoke, filled with authority and professionalism. She’s grown up good. I always knew she would.
The room is quiet and it gives me too much time to dwell on what-ifs. What if Mom hadn’t died? What if Sammie’s dad Nolan could have kept me? What if my dad hadn’t turned out to be such a scumbag?
What if?
On the outside I’ve crafted an image to help me fit in with my world, tattoos and muscles, street clothes and a scowl. I’ve modelled myself on the man I despise most in the world, the man who took me from a happy home only to neglect me as a kid and use me as an adult. I’m stuck in a world I don’t want to be in but there’s nothing for me outside of my current life.
Except Sammie.
I can’t think that way though. Sending her away is the best thing I can do for both of us. She needs to be dragged into my shit like she needs a hole in the head and I don’t want to spend my time thinking about how things might have been different if fate had just passed me over for once.
I shake my head, stunned at the woman she’s become. She was pretty before but she’s become a beautiful woman. Her lips were always sweet but when she smiled at me before she left I couldn’t stop looking at them. And when she turned to walk out of the room I noticed just how shapely she’s become.
Fuck. I don’t want to notice that shit. I want to remember us the way we were before life came along and shaped us for better or worse.
I sit waiting for a while, knowing Adam will be getting me more representation quickly. He doesn’t want me marinating in a cell, he wants me out there making him money. I don’t think he’ll be worrying about me spilling secrets but it will have definitely crossed his mind. He’s a snake like that. I guess it’s only natural for people to think the worst of others if they know they are capable of acting that way themselves.
Time passes slowly when you’re faced with nothing but your own company. I think through song lyrics in my head, but they all end up being something maudlin like Johnny Cash ‘Hurt’ and Waylon Jennings ‘The Road’. The funny thing is that I wasn’t feeling blue until Sammie walked into the room. I was feeling antsy for being locked up, sure. And smug for beating on that son of a bitch that thought he could shoot off his mouth behind my back and get away with it. There’s been a bit too much of that going on lately, with that new crew setting up in the north of the city, but that shit doesn’t bother me. It’s all in a day’s work, or a night’s scuffle. It’s sweet Sammie that’s left me feeling down.
I know that wasn’t her intention. When she said that thing about the wombat I wanted to get up and hug her, but there it is. Too many years between us for that kind of thing.
When my attorney finally arrives, I’m out in a flash. Adam’s been working behind the scenes to get that son of a bitch to say we were messing around, fighting for fun. The cops don’t look happy but there you go. We might be scumbags but that sure helps when you need to get someone to change their story.
I shake the suited dude’s hand as we exit the secure part of the PD, and start towards the door, scanning for Connor. I find him in the corner and next to him is Sammie. I curse under my breath because she didn’t listen and also because she must have left and come back seeing as she’s dressed in tight jeans and a loose blousy thing. Her eyes find mine and it’s like a zap of electricity hits me when I see the longing in them. I can feel how much she wants us to have some kind of reunion, a trip down memory lane or whatever, maybe because I feel the same. But the fact that Sammie’s sitting so close to a lowlife like Connor makes me clench my jaw. I know what he’s capable of and she has no idea, otherwise she’d be running in the opposite direction.
She should be running away from both of us.
Sammie stands and starts towards me, clutching a big tan purse like it contains the secrets of the universe.
“Brandon, you’re out. What happened in there?”
“Nothing for you to worry about,” I say reaching out to steer her towards the door. Connor watches, his all-seeing eyes following us as we step through into the street. “You need to go, Sammie,” I say.
“I’m not going anywhere, Bran,” she replies, and her use of my old nickname takes me back to our home and a time when I felt free of worry and guilt.
“Don’t,” I warn, because I don’t want to feel weak. I can’t. The only thing keeping everything in place is the hardness I’ve packed inside me.
“Don’t what? Want to see you and spend time with you after all these years? Don’t care about you? What?” She’s exasperated, folding her arms across her chest and almost stamping her sandaled foot. The pretty silver chain she has around her neck glints in the sunlight, the little angel-wing charm so perfectly right for her.
“Don’t think things can be the same as they were.”
“I’m not stupid Brandon. We’re not kids anymore. I’m well aware of that.” She seems to emphasize our size difference by making a show of craning her neck to look up at me. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t grab a coffee and talk.”
“Talk about what?” I ask, thinking that I can’t remember the last time I sat down and had a talk with anyone about real things, things that don’t involve the next ‘shipment’ or some problem with a rival organization that’s trying to encroach on our territory. I’m used to talking about business, sports, booze and women, and I can’t imagine that any of that would interest Samantha.
“About our lives. About old times,” she says hopefully.
“Old times are best left buried, and our lives probably don’t belong mixing in any way,” I say, shoving my hands in my pockets and glancing towards the door. Connor has stayed where he is and I’m grateful that he’s giving me space to put this to bed.
When I look back at Sammie, her eyes are glassy with unshed tears and I feel like a total prick. She turns and looks down the road, as though she needs time to compose herself.
“I missed you,” she says. “So much. But you never called or wrote me. Why didn’t you stay in touch like you promised?”
“It wasn’t because I didn’t care about you,” I say, and I see her swallow hard, as though she has a matching lump in her throat to mine.
“I didn’t know how to find you, and by the time I was grown enough I’d kinda got the hint that you didn’t want to see me again...”
“I did,” I say and I know I’m walking a very fine line. I need her to understand that I didn’t forget her but I’m not gonna stand in the streets and spill my guts about my asshole father and my ragged upbringing. “But what was the point, Sammie? We were living in different worlds.”
“We were still the same people,” she says. “We still are the same people.”
“No,” I say. “I’m not, and that’s why I want you to go, now.”
“Brandon,” she says and reaches out to cup my cheek. I want to pull back but the feeling of her soft hand on my skin opens a crack in my heart and I find that I can’t. I want her tenderness. It’s been so long since anyone touched me like this. “Please,” she pleads. “Just for tonight, let’s go somewhere. We don’t have to talk about the past or even the present. We can talk about the news…anything. Don’t walk out of my life again.”
I put my hand over hers and we stand, looking at each other. It’s strange to feel so connected with someone who’s been a stranger for so long, but I do. It’s like she knows me, the real me, not this substandard version of myself that I’ve become. And I feel like I know her too, the girl inside this woman’s body who used to tell me ghost stories and cry in her sleep for her lost mother.
“I need to tell Connor,” I say, gently taking her hand from my cheek, lowering and allowing it to slip from my grasp. I give in even as I know it’s a mistake.
“I’ll wait here,” she says and I turn and go back through the door.