by L. A. Fiore
The car pulled up in front of a townhouse and we were escorted inside and shown into a room decorated in fancy paper and gold moldings. I picked through the fucking trash to eat and this asshole had fucking gold hanging off his walls. Snake tensed at my side and I followed where he was looking and damn near flipped the fuck out. Drake’s dog was eating off china, a meal better than anything Snake and I had seen in years. Drugs got him all of this; and prostitution, forced prostitution. Kids were dying in crack houses; innocence was being raped, so this motherfucker could live like a king.
I had learned the hard way the importance of keeping your feelings hidden. You showed them and you gave your opponent an advantage. That lesson came in handy today.
Drake sat on a sofa that looked to be made of silk. The gold on his fingers matched the gold around his neck. “Your friend has sticky fingers.”
“He’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer. I’m sure you’ve figured that out.”
“An example needs to be made of him.”
Einstein was crying in the corner. I wanted to tell him to grow a set. Yeah, the situation was dire, but you never showed your enemy your fear.
“What are you going to do with him?” Snake asked.
“Kill him.”
Einstein whined loud and long.
“And since he is your friend, you’ll work off his debt.”
“Debt?” Snake asked.
“The money not made last night because of the bags he stole.”
He was going to sell us for fucking pocket change. “No,” Snake and I said together.
Drake’s glare was ice cold. “I’m not asking.” He signaled to one of the guys behind us. Snake and I moved at the same time. There was no way they were taking us without a fight. We took out four of them before we were overpowered. They beat us to within an inch of our lives. Then they starved us. When the human body was hungry, really hungry, it started to eat itself. The pain was unbelievable, your mind was affected too because your body was dying. You would do anything for something to ease the pain, to make it go away. That was how Drake manipulated people to do his will. And for Snake and me, his will was to sell us to whoever wanted to pay the price.
I didn’t know how long it had been since I had last seen Snake, but I was sickened to see how thin he was. I knew my own body didn’t look any better. I was surprised Drake allowed for one John to buy us both for the evening. Drake was either really confident in the power he wielded, or he thought we were too weak to fight back.
The man took us to his posh apartment on the Upper East Side, but we didn’t use the front entrance. He brought us around back. I guess he didn’t want his neighbors to know he was a fucking pedophile. Drake’s boys followed behind us to make sure we didn’t make a break for it. At the door, the John signaled to them and the black SUV sped off down the alley.
There was a sick gleam in his eyes as he closed the door to his apartment and locked it. He walked toward us, then around us. “A little thin but still totally fuckable.” He reached for a remote and flicked on the television. It was porn, but it wasn’t mainstream porn. He watched it for a second, his hand moving to the front of his pants. Then he turned to me. “You, get on your knees,” he said as he unfastened his belt and unsnapped his pants. I didn’t move.
“On your knees.” He yanked his belt free. “Now.”
Snake pulled his shirt off and the sick fuck’s head snapped to him, the look in his eyes made me sick. Snake’s hand moved to his jeans. The man forgot about me. His belt dropped as he started stroking himself through his pants. Snake lured the man from me so I could grab his belt. I didn’t hesitate, grabbing the belt I wrapped it around his neck and pulled hard. It took me longer than it should have. I thought to just render him unconscious, but then I thought of all the others who would suffer at his hand. I tightened my grip. His face turned a funny purple color, he made a sick gurgling sound and he shit himself. Then he died. I heaved, but since my stomach was empty it was a dry heave.
“Take the belt,” Snake said as he reached in the man’s pocket for his wallet.
I was in shock; I had just killed a man. Not that I mourned the fucker, but I had just killed a man. Snake grabbed me by the shirt and hauled me to the door. Before he pulled his tee back on he opened the door with it and closed it behind us.
“You okay?”
I just shook my head because words wouldn’t come. He tugged his shirt on and we ran.
“We can’t go back to the bridge,” Snake said as soon as we left the building through the back entrance. “But it’s a big city and we’re nobodies. We can get lost in it.”
I made it a few blocks from the apartment building before I doubled over and dry heaved until it hurt.
“He was a sick motherfucker.” I knew Snake was trying to justify what I had just done. “He deserved to die.”
And that was part of why I felt sick because I didn’t have remorse for killing him. I would fucking do it again.
WILLOW
2004
Standing at the bow of a ship, I inhaled the salty, tangy sea air. There was nothing but water for as far as the eye could see. The line where the water touched the sky was uninterrupted. It was like we were the only people on the planet.
It was summer break and Granddad had arranged for me to spend it on a ship hunting lost treasure at sea. Over the years, my wish to hunt treasure in the ocean hadn’t diminished. Well, there was that brief time right after I turned thirteen that I thought I wanted to be a ballerina. The museum was hosting an exhibit of Monet’s works, his collection of ballerinas. I took three lessons. Yes, a little old to start ballet, but I had two left feet so that dream fizzled fast.
College was right around the corner and I wanted to study maritime archeology, but Granddad thought it would be wise for me to actually spend time on the water for some duration to see if that life was for me. Lucky for me we knew a diver.
“You ready, kiddo?” Harry asked as he joined me at the railing.
“I’m a little nervous...okay a lot nervous, but I can’t wait.”
“Being nervous is smart. It means you know what you’re getting into. The ocean is beautiful, but she can be deadly. If you weren’t nervous, I wouldn’t take you down.”
I turned to him. “So how was the transition from being on a team to running the show?”
“Easier than I expected, but it helps that I have an incredible crew. Speaking of which, the kid I’ve partnered you with is good, maybe the best diver I’ve worked with. Follow his lead.”
“What do you like better? Diving or running the show?”
He grinned. “Who doesn’t like being the boss?” he chuckled. “I love diving, I love bringing things up. It was always those finds with your parents that I liked the best.”
“Why don’t you do the media circuit after you find something, like my parents?”
“Because I’m in it for the hunt. All the media interest takes away from the hunt. Besides, I’m not a huge fan of being in the spotlight.”
“My parents love it.”
“It cost them enough to get there, so they should make the most of it.” There was an edge to his words. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”
I reached for his hand. “I’ve accepted their priorities and how I’ll never be one. It doesn’t upset me anymore.” Not really.
He turned to me. “It upsets me enough for both of us.”
Decker Acker was older than me. He was cute, enough that I got a little tongue-tied around him—blond hair, a long lean body and a smile that could brighten the most gloomy day.
We were on the back of the boat, he was giving me a refresher and I was grateful for it because this was a much scarier thing than the dives I had done in the bay.
“It’s warm, the wreck is only thirty feet below so it’s up to you if you want to wear a wetsuit. Before you decide that though, a brief review. The tanks have the regulator that’s attached to the hose that feeds to the mouthpiece. There sh
ould be an airtight seal with your mouthpiece. Once it’s on, I understand it can be scary and you might be tempted to breathe too fast, too shallowly. The trick is to try to breathe as normally as possible. You good?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want a wetsuit?”
“No, I’m okay.”
“Let’s get the tanks on and get down there. You want out, point up.”
We dove and the deeper we went the colder the water grew; though it was still warm enough to not require a wetsuit. Decker pointed. Had I not known it was a ship, I wouldn’t have. There was very little left of the clipper ship and what remained was coated in mineral cement—the deposit that formed on most surfaces when submerged in the sea for any duration of time. Harry had shared the story; it was a Spanish galleon ship that had been traveling from Manila to Acapulco. Had the seas turned rough and though the crew fought valiantly, had Poseidon been unforgiving that day? Or had it been pirates? Decker signaled to me. I looked where he pointed and froze. A shark swam lazily around in the distance. My heart pounded in my chest. I knew how to handle a shark, but knowing and doing were two different things. We watched him, my breathing growing a little shallow, but he lost interest and swam off. Decker pointed up and we ascended. Once we broke the water, he pulled out his regulator.
“You okay?”
“That was a little scary.”
“Rarely will a shark engage. The important thing is to stay calm and not make any sudden movements to attract its attention.”
“You sound like you’ve spent some time around sharks.”
He grinned. “I swam with great whites off the coast of Cape Town with Harry.”
“No way. That sounds amazing and terrifying. I don’t think I’d have the courage to do that. What was it like?”
“Life changing. They aren’t as fierce as people would have you believe.”
We were removing our gear when I asked Decker, “What did you study at university?”
“I didn’t go to college. I couldn’t afford it. Hell, I couldn’t afford an apartment for the longest time, but I don’t need a degree to dive. Harry gave me that, gave me the hunger when he took me down for my first dive. It’s an adrenaline rush the likes of which is hard to beat.”
He didn’t mention parents. Were they absent parents like mine? Or worse. I was curious, but prying seemed wrong. He was right about the adrenaline rush.
“I understand you will be off to college soon. What do you plan on studying?” he asked.
“Maritime archeology, but it’s the questions around something that interests me the most so I might minor in anthropology.”
“Sounds like a plan. So about the dive, thoughts?”
“I feel as comfortable under the water as I do above it.”
“The heart of a diver.”
“Thanks for taking me down.”
“Anytime. It’s not every day I get to dive with the daughter of celebrities,” he said then winked.
“I wondered if you knew who my parents were.”
“In this business, it’s hard not to.” He glanced down and seemed a little hesitant before he asked, “What is it like having the Blakeleys as parents?”
That was a question I had been asked a lot. “Not as interesting as it sounds. I rarely see them.”
“Sorry, I didn’t know.”
“It is alright. When you reach their level of success, sometimes something has got to give.”
“Yeah, I guess.” He touched my shoulder. “Next time, we will see if we can dig something up when we are down there.”
My smile took up my whole face. “I would love that.”
KACE
Pastrami was fucking delicious. I took another bite and savored the flavors on my tongue. Snake and I lived in lower Manhattan in a shit, slumlord apartment that we shared with three other guys. It had been five years since I killed that man and still I felt no remorse for what I had done. I had accepted the reality that some people mattered and some didn’t. No one was looking out for the ones that didn’t matter. We had to do that for ourselves. So if I had to kill a man to protect myself or Snake, so be it.
We were both working now, our jobs were under the table jobs since we didn’t have identification or bank accounts. We didn’t pay taxes or file tax returns. We were ghosts. The number of ghosts in the city would surprise some. Snake bused tables at a local deli and I worked at a marina cleaning boats, scrubbing decks, washing down vomit from the pier when the rich kids partied too hard on their parents’ yachts. It wasn’t glamorous, but at least we had money to put a roof over our heads and food in our mouths. A roof filled with leaks and not a hell of a lot of food, but it was better than starving.
Snake got an employee discount at the deli, so every once and a while we shared a sandwich.
“So fucking good.” He echoed my thoughts, but when you were used to your food coming from a dumpster, this was gourmet. Even though we each only had half a sandwich, it took us a while to eat it because we savored every bite.
“I still don’t understand why you chose a job at a deli. All the food. Why torture yourself?”
Snake looked up from his sandwich. “Discipline and control. Want is a weakness. You have to control your baser needs.”
He wasn’t wrong; still those words from his mouth were fucking weird. “Are you watching Dr. Phil?”
He flicked me off.
The sun pounded down on me as I emptied the trash cans along the pier of the marina. Laughter pulled my attention to see two chicks in tiny as shit bikinis dancing on the deck of a yacht docked at the end of the pier. A huge sailboat that was a thing of beauty. Although at the moment, the chicks with their tits practically bursting from their bathing suits were quite a bit more beautiful. My dick twitched, but there was no point in looking because I was as likely to get a piece of that as I was to buy a Bentley tomorrow. I finished with the trash cans and moved onto cleaning the dock where the fish stations were. Fish that sat in the sun...fucking worst smell imaginable.
It was close to lunchtime when the old man came down the dock. For the past four months he came every day at the same time. He had a small sailboat that he took out rain or shine. He always carried a brown bag, my guess was it was his lunch, and a raincoat. I wondered what his story was. I watched as he raised his sail and untethered from the dock before I got back to work.
I was cleaning out the minnow traps when the old man returned. Normally, he effortlessly pulled his boat into his slip, but today the winds were up. Seeing he was coming in too fast, I ran over and managed to stop the bow from crashing into the dock.
“Thank you. It’s a little rough out here and I’m not as young as I used to be.”
“I think it’s pretty amazing you can read the wind and sail.”
“It’s not as hard as you think.”
“You make it look easy.”
“I’ve been sailing a long time.” He looked up from securing the sail. “I can teach you.”
My boss was a pretentious little shit. Always looking to kiss the ass of the rich folk that docked their yachts here. Bent the rules and turned a blind eye when money was pressed to his palm, but he didn’t like his employees fraternizing with them.
“It’ll give this old guy something to do. There’s nothing like sailing.”
He looked kind of lost. I wanted to learn how to sail. I would likely never see the inside of a sailboat of my own, but I wanted to learn. “Okay, I can take my lunch break early. Thanks. I’m Kace.”
“Seymour Travers. We can start in the morning.” He looked at his watch then moved more quickly. “I have an appointment.” He climbed from his boat and I walked with him up the pier. “See you tomorrow.” He walked slowly away clutching his brown bag and raincoat.
“The tiller attaches to the rudder, you push it forward to tack, bringing the bow into the wind, and pull it back to jibe, bringing the stern into the wind. The boom will whip around quickly when you jibe so you’ve got to duck or you’re goin
g over. Don’t forget to loosen your hold on the mainsheet so you don’t get rope burn. The mechanics are only part of it. You need to read navigational charts to know the water you are sailing in—depths, shallows, sandbars—and you have to watch the weather. It can change in a blink and some conditions can be deadly.”
“How long have you been sailing?”
His expression changed as a sadness came over him. “I started in my teens to impress a girl. It was like I’d been hit by lightning when I first saw her. We were on Coney Island and she was with her friends. I didn’t even see the others, just her. Blonde hair that shimmered like gold in the sun and she was wearing a yellow dress, a buttercup yellow. The wind was blowing her hair into her face and she had a way of pulling it from her cheek that mesmerized me.” He kind of lost himself for a minute, going back in his mind to that day.
“They were offering sailboat rides along the coast. Her friends wouldn’t go with her, so I stepped up. She didn’t even hesitate. She took my hand and went for a ride with a complete stranger. We were inseparable from that moment on.” He seemed to realize he wasn’t alone, that his meander down memory lane was in the company of someone. “I have an appointment. I’ll see you tomorrow. Do you like sardines?”
“I’ve never had them.”
He nodded his head. “Maureen makes a sandwich of sardines and mustard on white toast. I never had it before; it was her favorite, now I’m addicted. I’ll bring you a sandwich tomorrow.” I stood on the pier and watched as he walked away carrying his brown bag and raincoat.
“That’s it, pull the line in and lean back.” It was un-fucking-believable. I was sailing his boat, cutting through the water, harnessing the wind. It had been two months and I had taken to sailing like a fish to water.
“You’re a natural.”
“It’s amazing.”
“Yeah, it is.”
It had become routine that after the sail we had lunch together. I didn’t much care for the sandwich, but I ate it because food never should be wasted and his wife had gone to the trouble to make me one. He also talked about his life. He had been in World War II and also worked as a door-to-door salesman. He and his wife had several miscarriages and never had the family they wanted, but they had each other. He shared with me his wife’s love of gardening and cooking. I had never met anyone like him. So happy in his little world, everything he needed and wanted he found in his wife. To be so complete with so little. He had known hardship and yet he continued moving forward, finding the good in the bad; all the while he held the hand of the woman he loved. What must that feel like? To connect to another human being so completely that your life and their life were irrevocably linked?
