Chase
Erratic knocking raps on my front door out of nowhere. Zeus jumps from his spot on the floor, losing his mind in a barking frenzy as I pull him away from the entrance by his collar. Crazy dog. He’s been moping around here like he lost his favorite chew toy for the past six weeks. Whatever’s on the other side of the door has him losing his mind.
“Go lay down, Zeus!” I shout, using my foot to shoo him from the entrance as I turn the knob. When I look up, there she is. The angel of death come to steal what’s left of my soul.
Raven hair blows around her glistening face. Black lines of kohl stream down each reddened cheek, her lipstick smeared across her mouth. She’s a hot mess but just as beautiful as I’ve ever seen her.
“I’m sorry to just show up like this. I just. . . needed a friend.”
The expression falls off my face. I stand like a stone wondering if I’m alive or dead, asleep or awake. After weeks of no contact, she rolls in without warning, her charcoal eyes glittering in the setting sun. “And you couldn’t find one?”
Her bottom lip quivers. Up until now, I was doing all right, but seeing her now has my heart storming like a hurricane. “You were my friend before you were my boyfriend.”
“Well, I’m nothing now.”
“Why are you doing this?” she sniffles.
A gust of wind swirls the orange leaves dappling my porch. It ruffles her thin sweater, causing shivers to quake her petite frame. My fingers twitch, wanting to pull away the rogue strands of silk that stick to her wet temples. I shove them in my pocket, adjusting my stance to keep from scooping her up in my arms. If I let her in the house, she’ll end up in my bed, and I can’t go down this road with her again. Not now. Not after all this time. “Me? I’m the worst thing that ever happened to you, right? So, what? Now you’ve come back after all this time to say you’re sorry?”
“No. I’m weak. I’m human. I let my anger cloud my judgment, and I would take it back if I could, but I’m not sorry. I am who I am.”
“Yeah, well. Right now, you're just another girl crying on my porch.”
“We both did things we regret, I’m sure.”
I suck my bottom lip between my teeth pondering that statement. Regret. My life is full of them, but the only one I have right now is not having told her how I feel before everything fell to crap.
“Yeah, well. Doesn’t make a difference now, does it?”
I turn and begin to close the door, but she holds out her hand to stop it. “My dad died.”
Slush pools, seizing my heart. I’m a dick, but I can’t deal with this. Kat’s shit is no longer my problem. That ship sailed the minute she went home with someone else. “I’m sorry for your loss,” I say just before closing the door on Kat for good.
The droning buzz of the air compressor is like a drill piercing straight into my skull. I rub my forearm over my throbbing head and try to block out the noise as I finish my work for the day. “Dude. Are you almost done with that fuel filter, or what?”
My boss laughs. “Rough night?”
“Rough life, bro,” I mumble, tightening the lag bolts on a tire. What little sleep I’m used to getting is a distant memory now. Even the numbing mindlessness of late-night TV doesn’t help turn my brain off. Every time I close my eyes, all I see is her tear-stained face. When Kat walked out on me, I lost a piece of myself I didn’t know was even missing until I met her. I just wish I could go back to that day, watch her walk away, and never think about her again. Sure, I was miserable then, too, but I was a lot happier than I am right now. “I’m done with this. You got anything else you need me to finish up before I head out?”
“Nah, man, go ahead. See you next week.” Jameson chucks his chin as I head out the door with a wave.
A brand new QuickChek takes up a massive amount of space on the other side of the road along with a liquor store and a dry cleaner. I jog across, dodging oncoming traffic like a live-action game of Frogger. It might sound stupid to cross a major highway by foot, but taking the car would only result in having to take two U-turns to get home. Ah, the joys of Jersey driving.
“Chase!”
The sound of my name echoes in my ear as I enter the convenience store. I turn, and all the hair on my arms stands to attention when I lock eyes on a face from my past.
Jarett’s sallow complexion sends the nagging voice in the back of my brain into a hysterical uproar. Heavy eyelids blink over pinhead pupils. His cracked, sore covered lips stretch over rotted teeth when he smiles. He’s high as shit. A walking corpse standing amongst the living. A mirror image of myself from not so long ago.
“How ya been, man?” His voice is slow and slurred. He runs the back his hand over his nose and sniffles hard as all the moisture evaporates from my body. My tongue is the Sahara.
Jarett and I go way back. Before Desiree, before my family fell apart piece by piece, Jarett and I had our world by the balls. Dealing weed and dogging chicks—those were the only things on the agenda. We made good money; people knew us by name. It was awesome.
Last time I laid eyes on him was six months ago or more. He had a wife, a baby. He was finally getting his shit cleaned up. What the hell happened?
“All right. Workin’,” I eek out. “How’s the family?”
“Ack, Jess . . .” He swats the air. “She and Skylar went back to Florida to be closer to her family. Don’t need me around no more, I guess.”
“Sorry, man. That sucks.”
A gravelly chuckle rattles his chest. “Ain’t no thang. You? Any family yet?”
The question makes me wince. Being with Kat was the first time I’d ever even considered such a concept. When I looked at her, I didn’t just see a beautiful, sexy woman. I saw a wife, two dogs, and a house in the suburbs. Maybe even a kid someday. A real family. But I should have known better. That shit doesn’t happen for guys like Jarett and me. We were always chasing the big wins. “No.”
“Smart man.” I can’t help noticing the fresh track marks that mar his left arm when his fingers inch under his shirtsleeve to scratch. A twisting, churning feeling roils in the depths of my gut. I lick my dry lips in a futile attempt to moisten them.
Fuck it. I’m tired of doing the right thing. I’m sick of the misery and the boredom. What’s it all for? I tried to live a normal life, but what’s normal anyway? My dad’s in jail, my mom couldn’t care less whether I live or die, my grandma doesn’t even know who I am, and I destroyed my last chance of having something real. I’m not the strong-willed man Kat needs. I’m a coward and a liar. I thought if I pretended I had everything figured out, then it would eventually fall into place. I just can’t do it anymore.
I’m an addict. Now and forever.
And I need this pain to end.
“Who’s your embalmer, bro?” I ask, my voice low.
“Funny you should ask. If you got the cash, I got a bag of China White with your name on it.”
“Yeah.” I swallow hard, the bitter taste already sitting on the back of my tongue like a lost love. “I got money.”
I'm dehydrated. My eyes are so red I look like I have the worst case of pink eye in the Northern Hemisphere. The drops sting like acid as they hit. “Allergies. Really bad right now,” I tell the clerk ringing up my second jug of vodka for the day. I sniff as if my nose runs, playing up the act.
The rumbling cab waits for me out front. “You all right, pal?”
“I will be soon enough,” I reply, eyeing the fifth of temporary relief sitting on my lap. This isn’t going to work. It doesn’t matter how much I drink; it’s never going to squelch the need sitting just below the surface. Only one thing can help me cure the festering ache, this dirty desire simmering deep inside my veins.
I lay my head back against the seat and look at the grungy ceiling of the beat-up taxi. Step on it is all I can think.
A twenty crinkles in my sweaty fist. I throw it at the driver as I fall from the door. “Keep it.”
The bottle is open and at my lips even before I reach the front steps.
“Where is she?” I stagger past Athena, my boot catching the edge of a table near the door. The lamp tumbles to the floor, shattering into a bazillion tiny pieces at my feet. I laugh at the irony. Behold, my shattered heart.
“Chase.” Athena grasps the lapels on my jacket as I trip on the shade and lose my balance. “Kat’s not here.”
“What do ya mean she’s not here? It’s . . .” I look down at my watch, but the numbers on the dial dance before my very eyes. “Where is she?”
“You’re drunk.”
“I’m not! I’m finally seeing things clearly!” I slur, aiming for the sofa and falling onto the carpet. “Okay, maybe I’m little drink. Drunk. Maybe I have been drinking. So what?”
She helps me up and drops me on the couch. “I’m going to go make you some coffee.”
“I don’t want any fucking coffee! I have something to say, and you’re gonna listen!”
“Chase, I already told you Kat’s not here. I suggest you sober up and talk to her tomorrow.”
“No!” I shout, jumping back to my feet. Bad idea. The room spins in a complete circle. I stumble forward, but luckily, the coffee table breaks my fall. “I was fine before you walked onto that parking lot. With your fuckin’ eyes and your smile and that goddamned laughter that sounds like bells . . .”
“Mama?” a small voice calls from somewhere in the house, but my psychotic rambling doesn’t quit.
“Why am I full of all this fucking emotion? I wish I was full of tacos instead.”
Athena turns her head toward the stairs then back at me with a sigh. “All right. Why don’t you sit back down and I’ll call her, okay?”
“Let me tell you something about crazy people.” I sway on my feet and tumble back onto the couch. “The sex is incredible. How do I get her back?”
“Wait here.” Athena pulls her phone from the charger and disappears into the kitchen. I crane my neck, trying to listen to the hushed whispers, but I can’t make out what she’s saying.
The bold scent of coffee turns my stomach. I lift my hand to my mouth, fighting back the nausea climbing up my esophagus as she pads back in, setting the mug down on the end table near my resting head. “She said to sit tight. She’s on her way.”
My droopy eyelids feel too heavy to keep open. I blink slowly, forcing them to part. I want to be awake when Kat gets here. She needs to hear what I have to say. “One more question. What’s say aga poe?”
“What?”
“Say aga poe. What does it mean?”
“Se agapó,” she repeats in the same dialect I’ve heard a hundred times purred from Kat’s mouth. “It means I love you. Why?”
She loves me.
She’d been telling me for months, but I was too busy pretending she meant nothing to me to realize it. What was the plan here? I rolled up in Athena’s house with guns blazing, tearing shit up. For what? To beg her to take me back? To tell her I’m an idiot for letting her go in the first place? She’d probably tell me to go fuck myself. After the way I treated her, who can blame her? I was reckless with a delicate heart. I don’t deserve Kat’s love.
“Oh. Well, I love you, too . . .” I hear myself mumble just before everything goes black.
A frigid shot of cold water smacks me in the face. I pop up like a Weeble then fall back down, shielding my eyes from the burning sun.
“Get up, Chase.”
Kat’s voice feels like a thousand tiny knives stabbing me in the forehead. Or perhaps it's the two quarts of grain alcohol fighting its way through my pores that are making it hard to focus.
“Feeling shitty, are we?” she snaps again. I loll my head toward the sound of her voice, cracking open a crusty eye with a grunt. “What were you thinking, getting drunk and barging in on my family? Have you lost your damn mind?”
It takes every ounce of strength I have to push to a sitting position. My stomach flip-flops. You know how when you turn a shampoo bottle upside down, that bubble floats through the liquid and pops on the other side? Yeah. It’s like that.
A bottle of water lands in my lap. I grip the cap with trembling fingers, trying my best to twist it off, but my hands are too shaky to get it. I fucked up. Big time. So much so I can’t even stand to be around myself right now, and not because I feel like ass. The expression in her eyes says it all. The stomach churning mix of anger, pity, sadness, and contempt. A look I’ve seen on a thousand other faces, I’d rather die than see on hers.
I sealed the nail in my own damn coffin.
“Tell me you didn’t . . .”
She grabs my arm and tears at my sleeve. When Jarett pulled out that bag, every nerve in my body vibrated with want. The needful feeling zipped through my body, radiating from my fingers and toes. Even my cock twitched with the anticipation of feeling that bliss cycle through my veins.
As I stood there, watching his twitchy fingers hold it out for me, I realized one simple truth: I get that same feeling when I look at Kat.
I jerk it back, turning my face away. “I didn’t use. Just drank.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know!” I clutch my head as the clatter of my own outburst pinballs between my ears.
“That’s an unacceptable answer.” The crack in her voice twists the blade deeper in my heart. As my eyes begin to focus, my fogged brain attempts to process what exactly happened here last night. Memory loss—the prize waiting at the end of every vodka bottle. What did I do?
Snapshot images come and go in waves.
A smashed lamp.
A busted coffee table.
An admission of love.
“I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry I fucked everything up. And I’m sorry I led you to believe you were less to me than you really are.” I stare deep into her tear-filled eyes, hating myself for being the cause of those darkened pools of glistening glass. “I like to pretend that I have it all together, but I’m a fuckin’ mess, Katarina. The truth is, I’m hanging on by a thread and was ill-equipped to handle how much I really feel for you.”
“And you thought slamming the door in my face when I needed you most was the best solution?” I chew on my lips allowing her anger to seep inside the gaps splitting my broken soul. “After all these months, I finally get a little honesty out of you, but it’s too little too late. I came to you in a moment of weakness, and that was wrong. I know my place. You’ll never have to see me again.”
She rises from the edge of the busted table and crosses her arms over her chest as if she’s cold. Considering Athena’s house is set at the temperature for London Broil, I can’t imagine that’s the case.
“Your place is with me. Come home, Kat.”
“I am home. And if you’ll excuse me, I have a funeral to plan.” She pads across the room, but stops short in the doorway, chucking a quick look over her shoulder. “For what it’s worth, it was fun while it lasted. Have a nice life, Chase.”