The Outskirts

by T. M. Frazier

  I tried to sound casual. “How do you know Finn?”

  “Told you. I know everything and everyone. Finn’s a good kid, but he ain’t been around in a long time.”

  “Why did he stop coming around?” I asked, washing my hands in the sink.

  “That’s not for me to say.” Critter smacked the register and it sprang open. “I’m not one to go around telling other people’s stories.”

  “So what you’re saying is that you don’t know?” I teased.

  “That’s not it. I told you. I know everything and everyone.”

  Suddenly I wished I hadn’t torn the picture of my mother into bits and pieces. Critter had told me when we first met that he didn’t know her, but it was a long time ago. Maybe the picture would’ve jogged his memory.

  “Finn giving you any kind of trouble?” Critter asked. Wrinkles formed on top of his wrinkles as a worried expression crossed over his face.

  “Not really,” I answered. Not the kind that Critter could fix anyway.

  “You let me know if I need to kick that boy’s ass for you. I may be getting on in years, but I’ve got some fight left in me for punks like that.” Critter adjusted his belt.

  “I thought you just said he was a good guy?”

  “Good guys,” he wagged his pointer finger, “those are the worst kind of punks.”

  “Let me ask you something, Critter,” I started, arranging napkins into the little plastic holders clipped to the inner edge of the bar. “Do you think people can change?”

  Critter paused and licked at the corner of his mustache. “Well, I think people can do just about anything they damn well want, including change. My mama used to tell me that we’ve all got the devil in us, some just got it buried deeper, while others take direction from it. If that helps any.”

  I looked up at the tings on the ceiling. Every time the front door opened they danced and twirled together. “I don’t know if it does just yet.”

  “You’re something else, kid,” Critter leaned in and whispered, “and you can quote me on that.”

  The door opened again, the tings clapped together as Josh and Miller burst through the front door, squawking at one another like seagulls on the beach fighting over breadcrumbs.

  “It’s not polite to eavesdrop,” Critter nudged me on the shoulder.

  “Eavesdropping would mean that it would take some effort on my part to get closer so I could listen in.” I pointed to Josh and Miller who’d been talking and arguing back and forth LOUDLY for hours.

  “That’s what I told you the first time,” Miller groaned.

  “That is not what you said,” Josh waved her finger in his face.

  I smiled up at Critter. “I don’t think it’s eavesdropping if they’re talking loud enough that I can hear them from all the way over here.”

  “Noted,” Critter replied with a laugh and a tip of his chin.

  “Josh, baby, when are you going to get that pretty head out of Vaginaville and let me introduce you to Cocktown again?” Miller asked, at a volume slightly above the guitar player in the corner.

  “I dated one girl. ONE. And it was six years ago. You’re never going to let me forget that, are you?” Josh jabbed a finger into Miller’s chest.

  “No, and I hope I never forget it either. Actually, I think about it all the time.” Miller closed his eyes. “In fact, I’m thinking about the two of you together right now.”

  Josh smacked him with her menu.

  Miller didn’t seem to notice. He was too busy staring at her chest.

  “And I believe it was your introduction to Cocktown,” she glanced down toward his crotch and scrunched up her face in disgust, “that turned me off of men to begin with.”

  Miller stuck his bottom lip out in a pout but rebounded quickly. “Best two out of three?”

  “By the way, how’s your mom, Miller?” Josh asked, slyly, pausing to take a slow sip of her beer. “She still wiping your ass for you?”

  Miller held his hand over his heart. “That really hurts, Josh. First of all, you know that my mom is a lovely lady who makes amazing pot roast. It’s not my fault she needs me to live with her so I can taste test it for her. It’s a rough job, but I’m willing to make that sacrifice.”

  “Speaking of jobs,” Josh said, raising an eyebrow. “Don’t you have to be at yours?”

  It was Miller’s turn to roll his eyes. “No one was speaking of jobs, Josh. No one. And just because I refuse to conform to modern day slavery hours, doesn’t make me any less of a person.” He smiled. “However, upon your visit to Cocktown, all of your racist ways will be forgiven.”

  “Sure, I’ll visit Cocktown.” She winked at Miller whose mouth dropped open. “Just not yours.”

  “That hurts, Josh. It hurts a lot.”

  “I’m going to the ladies,” Josh announced, sliding off her stool. “Don’t follow me.”

  “That’s bullshit and you know it!” Miller shouted after her.

  “Guess that didn’t go so well,” I commented, replacing his empty beer with a fresh one.

  Miller frowned. “Huh? Why would you say that?”

  “Never mind.” I left Miller to live in his own alternate reality while I restocked the napkins.

  “Sawyer!” Sterling called over with a bright smile. “When do you get off?” He was standing at the end of the bar with a piece of paper from the ting bucket in hand.

  “In about ten minutes,” I answered.

  “Want to take that walk with me?”

  I thought it over for a moment before answering. “Sure, just let me finish up and I’ll meet you out front.”

  Sterling smiled and scribbled something down on the paper before hanging it next to the one he’d hung on the day he declared us friends.

  Taking a walk with a beautiful girl.

  -Sterling

  “He’s so hot,” Kayla said, waving with her fingers at Sterling.

  “I could eat him for breakfast, lunch, and dinner,” Maya joined in, biting at the air and growling. When he waved back the two girls giggled and whispered between them. Sterling winked at me.

  I should’ve been excited. Or at the very least as excited as the girls were to get a little wave from Sterling.

  Suddenly I needed some air. I gathered the trash from the bar as an excuse to go outside.

  I pushed open the back door and had only gotten a few steps when footsteps sounded behind me.

  “Do you even realize how fucking beautiful you are?”

  I slowly turned around to find Finn standing by the back door, leaning against the doorframe, holding a small brown-paper-wrapped package in the crook of his arm. He stubbed out a cigarette on the bottom of his boot.

  My palms began to sweat. My skin tingled. Everything inside me came alive. Panic. Fear. Anticipation.

  LUST.

  I tossed another bag into the dumpster and turned back around to face him. “I came by to see you. To say thank you. You weren’t there.”

  “I left town for a while. Had to tie up some loose ends.” Finn raked his gaze up and down my body. “I never got a chance to tell you. I like the boots.”

  My heart raced. His words were like a stroke of his strong fingers between my legs.

  “I brought something for you,” he said, meeting me in the middle of the alley between the dumpster and the back door of Critter’s.

  “You don’t need to bring me anything.” I tried to pass him to get through the door but he stopped me. “You don’t owe me anything, Finn. You can go back to hiding in the woods. It’s obvious you don’t want to be my friend so let’s not force it. We don’t have to be friends.”

  “I don’t want to be your friend,” he said, taking a step forward.

  “Then why are you here?”

  “I missed you,” he said, gazing deeply into my eyes. I tried to look away but Finn grabbed my chin and turned my head back so I was facing him.

  “Then why did you leave?” I asked, unable to hide the hurt in my voice. “Afte
r everything. I woke up and you were just gone.”

  Finn searched my face like he was searching for answers he didn’t have. “I’ve never met anyone like you. I’ve never even seen anyone like you. These freckles,” he ran the pad of his thumb underneath my eyes. “This mouth,” he did the same over my lower lip, brushing his own lips over mine slowly and gently until I found myself shifting under all the sensations swarming inside of me. “You make me want things, Say. Crave things. Things I haven’t thought about in a long time.”

  Say? I wanted to hate the nickname. I wanted to tell him that it was stupid and to never say it again, but I couldn’t. I repeated it again over and over in my head using his voice and I couldn’t help it.

  I loved it.

  My body hummed. It was getting harder and harder to appear unaffected. “Crave? You make me sound like a meal.”

  “That would make sense.” Finn pushed his fingers up into my hair and pulled just enough for my scalp to sting. “Because my mouth is watering to taste you,” he pressed his lips against mine and this time there was no storm to blame or anything else he needed to distract me from. “I want you, Say. So fucking much. More than I’ve ever wanted anything or anyone before.” He took a deep breath like he was breathing me in. “You terrify me.”

  I felt warm all over.

  “Well, I did bite you,” I said. Finn smiled. Feeling brave, I reached up and touched the corner of his mouth where I’d made him bleed. There was no evidence of the injury but it was as if I could still see it there.

  Finn growled and tugged me against him, lowering his lips to mine, parting them with his tongue. When our tongues touched I shuddered. I raised up on my tip toes and wrapped my arms around his neck, deepening our kiss. Our connection. Needing to be closer.

  “I have no idea what I’m doing,” I breathed as his lips left mine and trailed down my neck, leaving goosebumps in their wake.

  Finn grinned against my tingling skin. “Neither do I.” His words send a rush straight between my legs. He continued to kiss and lick his way around my neck and ear, palming my breast through my t-shirt with his big hand.

  A nervous excitement took over. I trembled with fear and anticipation.

  “Fuck, you’re perfect,” Finn groaned, rocking against me. His hand fell from my hair and wrapped around my waist, trailing down to knead my butt cheek through my shorts and then lower, reaching up into my shorts and taking another handful. I moaned at the contact. His skin against mine.

  I wanted more.

  I rocked against him to try and ease the ache growing in my lower belly.

  He gripped me hard, holding me still. “Don’t do that,” he warned with a groan. “It feels too fucking good for you to be doing that.” He playfully pushed against me until I staggered back and connected with the corner. He followed me and caged me in with his hands next to my head on the wall. My breathing was erratic. Finn’s pupils were dilated as he reached down and popped the top button of my shorts. “Tell me you want me, Say.”

  The back door swung open. “You need a hand?” Critter called out.

  Finn released me.

  “No, I got it,” I said, breathlessly.

  I turned back around to where Finn was just standing, but he was already gone.

  I was righting my apron just as Critter stepped outside.

  “You sure? You sound a little winded, kid,” he asked, eyeing me skeptically.

  “I’m sure,” I reassured him. “The bags were just heavier than I thought.”

  I ducked under Critter’s arm and when I came face to face with a picture of a younger looking Finn with his arm around a beautiful blonde hanging in the back hallway I paused. “Who is this with Finn?” I asked.

  “That’s Jackie,” Critter said. “Unfortunately, she’s no longer with us.”

  “What happened to her?”

  “How did I know you were going to ask that?” Critter teased. “Not my…”

  I finished his sentence for him, “story to tell. I know.”

  I leaned in closer to get a better look at the picture. Finn was smiling from ear to ear. I’d never seen him smile like that before.

  “The lord’s lady,” I whispered to myself.

  “What was that?” Critter asked.

  “Nothing.” I grabbed two more bags and hauled them back outside.

  Maybe it was for the best that Critter had interrupted us because I was just about to tell Finn that I wanted him too.

  But when I saw the picture of him and Jackie, reality washed me over the head like a bucket of cold water.

  I didn’t know the details, but it was stupid to give myself over to Finn when he clearly had already given himself to someone else. Someone who even in death still had a hold over him he couldn’t shake.

  I grabbed another set of trash bags and went out back, hoisting them into the dumpster. When I turned around, I noticed the package Finn had been carrying was sitting on top of a metal trash can by the door.

  In my fumbled attempt to pick it up, I dropped it on the ground. I knelt down and tore a strip of the brown wrapping off, revealing a book.

  The title was only partially visible, but I didn’t need to see the entire thing to know exactly what it said.

  I ripped the rest of the packaging off and ran my fingers over the cover. Each raised letter I felt was somehow making it harder and harder to breathe.

  When I got to the end, I read the title out loud to myself.

  “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Sawyer

  “Finn called me last night,” Josh announced, handing me a big mug of coffee with a cartoon policeman on the side peeing off the top of a bridge.

  It was seven in the morning. After my shift, I’d told Sterling I’d walk with him another time and took Josh up on her offer to drive me back to her place.

  “He did?” I asked, perking up at the sound of his name.

  “He called me to ask about you. He wanted to make sure you were staying with me and that you were okay.”

  “And what did you tell him?” I asked, looking into my mug.

  “I told him you were fine.” Josh set down her mug and put a hand on her hip. “What’s going on with you two?”

  “What do you mean?” I took a sip of coffee and immediately spit the thick bitter mud back into the mug when Josh turned her back.

  “I mean you two, as in Finn and Sawyer. That man hasn’t called me in two years. TWO FUCKING YEARS. And I was his best friend. Then you roll into town and suddenly he remembers my number?” Josh shook her head. “Something about this don’t add up.”

  “Maybe he just wanted to make sure I didn’t plan on staying at his place again,” I offered, knowing that wasn’t the case.

  “Nooo,” Josh sang, cocking her head to the side. She tossed me