“Okay, thanks.” I scoot my chair back and place my hand on the edge of the table to push up. A raucous growl interrupts my movement as Big penetratingly glares at me with broad questioning eyes from across the way, ignoring his girlfriend and the conversations swarming around us.
“Where are you going?” he demands a little too possessively that his girlfriend, the dunce, finally takes notice. From the scrunched up expression, I think a light bulb might have just clicked on in her head. It’s about damn time.
Controlling my reaction, I show no signs of his outburst affecting me. “I’m hungry,” I state, pushing up the rest of the way to stand. “I’m going to go to the kitchen to see if they have any cake.”
Big shoots up from his chair so quickly that I’m stunned it doesn’t topple backwards. “No, I’ll go,” he doesn’t offer, he commands roughly. His voice taking on its stringent inhuman air. He’s transforming into this ferocious beast like state in front of my very eyes. But why? I didn’t do anything to warrant this. His emotions have been an unbridled jumble since we first started talking. It’s like he can’t seem to control them at all. Big with no restraint in a room this large with this many people scares the shit out of me. I’ve seen him go off the reservation a few times, not with this many people around though. To avoid a blowout, if I do snap back at him, I decide to stamp down any cocky retort I wish to impart that would go something like, ‘Fuck off, bossy assbag,’ and muster up a compromise.
“How about we both go,” I innocently offer, sweeping my hands toward the kitchen doors. He jerks a strong nod and takes the lead, striding to the kitchen. I’m a few steps behind him. He shoves open the kitchen door, it swings wide and jolts right back. I stop it with my hands to keep it from smacking me.
As soon as I cross the threshold of the kitchen, forceful hands grab my upper arms and slam my body roughly against the wall beside the door. I yelp in pain as my head rattles, smashing into concrete.
“What the fuck?!” I screech.
Big’s manic face is wild and crazy, his eyes are frantically wide, and he rapidly looks me up and down, like he’s searching for something. Thick calloused fingers of his trembling hands dig into my biceps, and I bite my inner cheek to keep from crying out in agony. It hurts, but I can take it. Hot stress-laden breaths burst out of Big like an over exerted piston, sputtering uncontrollably. Maybe this is a psychotic episode.
“Big,” I try to push off the wall, his hands tighten and his legs plant themselves firmly to the floor, holding me to the wall with all of his might.
“Big,” I call out again.
Nothing.
“Big! Stop!” I shout, and suddenly his manic behavior plummets to an instant halt. He holds his breath, his hands stop shaking, and he freezes to stone.
Shrugging his hands off my biceps, they fall to the wayside, swinging loosely to his sides. I don’t even question what I do next. I grab his face in my hands and force his eyes to meet mine.
“Are you okay?”
He faintly nods repeatedly, all expressions washed from his deathly pale face. I’ve never in my entire life seen him this way. I’m scared. What if something is seriously wrong with him?
“Talk to me.” I cup his face firmer to let him know I’m not going anywhere, and I refuse to break eye contact with his cold dead eyes. He blinks, once, twice, and then closes his eyes for a moment and reopens them. Then I see the warmth and love flood back in. They soften around the edges, creases forming as they slightly droop, with his lashes accentuating his heart wrenching vulnerability.
“What happened?” I gently ask, keeping my tone low and sweet.
“Did you sleep with him?” he whispers, ignoring my question.
“Is that why you sent him?”
The guilty nod he produces is my answer.
“You’re mad you made that call, aren’t you?”
Another guilty nod.
“What if I had?”
He scours and tries to jerk his head to look away. I refuse to let him.
“Big, I didn’t sleep with Marshall just because you sent him. I didn’t want to sleep with him. I wanted to fuck you. There is no way his sex could ever compare to yours.”
The radiant smile that curls from his pouty lips makes my heart soar. I love when he smiles like that. It doesn’t happen often. I know I probably shouldn’t have told him the truth about his sex being that much better because it gives him too much power. In this moment, I think he deserves it.
“Are you done freakin’ out?”
He nods, and his smile begins to recede.
“Hey,” I pat the side of his face to make this melancholy disappear. “I need you to stop freakin’ out. You are Big Dick, the badass Sacred Sinners president. You aren’t allowed to scare me with this emotional roller coaster you got goin’ on. I need you to be the tough fucker I know you to be. Why are you actin’ so weird?”
“Cause,” he states, stronger than I expected.
“Cause, why?”
“Cause,” he shrugs his shoulders, “I love you, and…” he grunts. “I hate you. And, I hate that I fuckin’ love you.”
The words ‘Me too’ nearly slip out when the kitchen door swings open, and the familiar sound of Marylou’s gasp fills me with dread. I release Big’s face, and we both turn to see her standing with the door open, stunned, both manicured hands cupped over her mouth.
“You let her touch your face?” she whines, looking to me and back to him for an answer.
What kind of weird as fuck question is that? Of course I touch his face, bitch. What the fuck are you gonna do about it? He’s Mine. Oh, shit, I did not just think that. My protectiveness needs to chill the hell out. This is his girlfriend, not some other woman. I clench and unclench my fists at my sides to force my boiling blood to cool. I think I should probably go; me standing here isn’t doing anyone any good.
I stroll right past Marylou without sparing a single glance toward her or Big, as I re-enter the common room, forgetting to grab my cake in the process. Shit. Oh well… I’ll eat something later.
Heading back over to the table, I sit down and jump straight into some conversation about the Fourth of July Toys for Tots bike run. It’s a run I’ve been on once, and it’s a huge deal around here. It’s not about MCs. It’s about bikers as a whole, whether they be unaffiliated weekend warriors, MC members (motorcycle club), or RC members (riding club). It makes no difference. It’s for a good cause, and we all do our duty to raise funds.
“If I can ride this year, I will,” I intercede when Mickey gets off his customization tangent. He’s a firm believer that we need to polish up our bikes more to make them stand out at this event, or any event for that matter.
“I want to come too,” Pixie adds.
“You gonna ride bitch? Or you gonna learn to ride yourself?” I ask, without passing judgment. Although, I am a firm believer that women should know how to ride on their own.
“Bitch, of course.” Pixie sticks her tongue out at me, picks up her shot, and downs it. Then licks her lips to lap up any whiskey that might be left and torment me at the same time. Bitch!
“I wanna learn, if you’ll teach me to ride,” Jezebel says, entering the discussion.
“You want me to teach you?” I am taken aback.
Reclining in my chair and tossing my arms loosely across my chest, I give her the once over, like she’s lost her damn mind. She wants me to teach her? She’s got an entire compound full of willing men to show her how to ride who have taught people before. I know nothing about instructing a newbie to ride. It’s nothing like driving a car. You have to be able to hold the weight between your thighs without it falling over, know how to shift, know how to use your clutch and hand break simultaneously, and at the same time know how to accelerate. Those are the easier parts to master. Turning into curves, riding on loose asphalt, and clicking down gears so you don’t stall when you are suddenly riding on slicker terrain are important to master too. I’m not saying it’s impossibl
e to learn; I just don’t think I’m the one to teach.
Don’t get me wrong. I’ve never been in a wreck. Every biker I know has stalled many times, and some, like myself, have tipped a few bikes. Picking those fuckers back up is half the battle, if you have no idea what you are doing. The main thing is not all bikes are the same, kind of like cars in that sense. Size, weight, cc’s…. Some are tighter on the gears, some vibrate more than others, and some are more difficult to turn. A lot has to do with the kind of bike -- touring, sport, and so forth. The basics are almost all the same. It’s the perfecting that isn’t.
I remember when I started to ride. I began on a scooter first because they are automatic, so you don’t need to learn shifting. Once I had that down pat, I was upgraded to a 1988 black Harley Sportster 883. I dumped that bike four times; thank God it was in rough condition when I got it, or I probably would’ve had to pay for all the scratches and the one dent I put on it.
“Slowly, slowly release the brake,” Big advised me for the hundredth time of the day. I listened, and like the twenty times before, I gunned forward, lost my balance, and down it went. I was young, and the fucker had to have weighed close to five hundred pounds. I wasn’t the fastest learner, that was for sure. That time, my leg got pinned under the bike. Big lifted it off me, and I gave up for the day.
Limping back into the compound, he sat with me as Gunz went to fetch a bag of ice to help with the bumps and bruises and an Italian Ice to soothe my frustration. By that point with my shitty luck and skillset, I swore I’d never be able to ride without killing myself.
“I’m not getting on a bike again,” I huffed, tossing my head back into the threadbare couch.
“Yes, you fuckin’ are. Not everyone gets it right away,” Big assured me.
“He’s right, Baby Doll. Don’t worry, you’ll get it,” Gunz added, sitting on the arm of the couch next to me, his fingers combing through my messy hair.
I shook my head, staring at the tar stained ceiling of the common room. “Shouldn’t I learn to drive a car first?”
“Well….” Gunz started.
“No,” Big interrupted, and that was all Big said, no reasons why, nothing.
Two days later, I was back to practicing, this time with Gunz and Big. Three months following that, with a less temperamental bike, I had the hang of it.
Tuning back into the conversation, I realize Jezebel is arguing with Bulk about her wanting to ride on her own. Some men feel it’s emasculating if his old lady rides beside him, instead of on the back of his bike.
“I’m going to learn, Bulk,” Jezebel insists, growing irritated.
“I’ll teach you,” Big states, announcing his arrival, with messy hair down his back, puffy red lips, and a glowing girlfriend sitting down beside him with an extra bounce in her step. Fuck! He just banged his woman in that damn kitchen, after he went all emotional on me about Marshall. Screw him! I’m not hurt! I refuse to be hurt. I’m fucking pissed! What a jerk! Argh!! I hate him! That sick, self-righteous son of a bitch.
Scooting my chair to the side, I angle myself so I am not viewing him head on. I refuse to look at his stupid cheating… no, I mean, stupid… oh fuck... I dunno. I’m not looking at him. That’s all. Oh… and I hope his dick came in contact with a rare kitchen fungus that makes it shrivel up, turn gangrene, and fall off. It would serve him right!
Okay, enough of that. Back to the topic of Bulk and Jez.
“Prez, I don’t want her to ride,” Bulk grumbles, and Jez scowls at her old man, scraping her chair across the floor, moving away from him and closer to me.
“Why not? What’s your old lady’s hobbies?” Big inquires.
“I dunno?” I catch Bulk shrug out of the corner of my eye, stupidly unaware of what his woman likes. “Chill with the Sacred Sisters, read, and her kids… I guess,” Bulk answers after a moment, clearly unsure of his response.
“See,” Big clamors, “you don’t know your old lady,” he pauses, “Dallas.”
I’m assuming he’s pointing to Dallas, but I refuse to look.
“He knows his old lady likes to cook, help him with the dogs he raises, and?” Big prompts.
“Take care of our boys, babysit, and watch her shows,” Dallas finishes, and by the ‘aww’ imparted from Debbie, she’s smitten with his response. Somebody is gonna get lucky tonight.
“Which means,” Big clears his throat, “he and his old lady have some shit in common, and he knows how to take care of his old lady. Bulk, your old lady wants to ride. You could teach her, instead of me or Bink.”
I wince as my name smoothly flows from those kissable lips of his.
Big continues, “It’d be a bonding experience for you two. Your marriage ain’t like normal marriages, brother. It’s a club one. She’s got a bunch of shit she’s gotta put up with in order to hack it as an old lady. More so than most civilians. If she wants to learn to ride, to gain her freedom like the rest of us, then I say fuck yeah, let her do it. It’ll bond you, and it doesn’t mean she won’t ride bitch anymore. It just means you get to see her luscious tits bounce as you ride beside her instead of feelin’ ‘em against your back.”
Hate to give him credit after his kitchen fuckfest, but he’s right.
Jezebel thanks Big, as I concentrate on the back of her head to keep from looking over to the rest of the table, who has lapsed into more conversation about women riding solo. I faze in and out of listening to the conversations, picking up bits and pieces here or there. The less I hear his voice, the better I’ll be. Kicking off my shoes, I toss them under the table and curl my feet into the chair with me, sitting Indian style. I wrap my arms around my pumpkin baby, feeling her move around.
I’m torn from my daze when someone calls my name. I glance up and turn my head to see it’s Marylou who called me.
“Huh?” I mutter.
“I was curious. How’d you get your road name?” she innocently asks. As much as I’d rather not speak to her, I’m not going to be rude. She’s been nothing but polite to me.
“I picked it up as a kid. Binky obsession,” I try to explain. “I—”
“She used to fight me for her binky, couldn’t keep her away from the damn thing,” Big explains, cutting me off, while flashing me a single dimple grin and brilliant thoughtful eyes. Positively handsome, he nearly takes my breath away when he looks this way.
“You’re named after a binky?” Marylou asks, perplexed.
“Sort of,” I admit.
It’s not the coolest thing to be road named after, but I couldn’t change it if I wanted to. I am forever Bink in this club, and it’s a hundred times better than being known as Eva. Eva is the name my mother gave me when she named me after Eva Peron, a women’s rights activist, or so I was told during one of the times my mom argued that I was Eva, not Bink. She said Bink was a silly name I should be ashamed for using, and Eva was an astute, sophisticated name given to a strong female. What the fuck ever.
“When Bink was a toddler, her pops tried to break her of her binky habit,” Big explains to the whole table, who has decided to hush up long enough to get the full-fledged story.
“But somebody in this room, by the name of Gunz, decided he didn’t think Bink, or little Evie, which is what we called her at the time, should have her binkies taken away. So he kept buyin’ her new ones and stashin’ ‘em for her in the most random of fuckin’ spots. Turned into a big joke. Pissed the cunt off, and Steel was gone a shit ton on runs. That’s why she ended up at the clubhouse a lot. We’d usually find her roamin’ around the compound by her lonesome or sometimes with Brew. She’d sneak out and one of us would catch her, and she’d always be suckin’ on a damn binky, hiding behind a bush, in the garden, by the dog kennels—somewhere. After a few months of this, Lindy Sue stopped tryin’ to find her. Cunt of the year,” he rolls his eyes. “And little Evie decided to park in her new favorite hidin’ spot— under my back porch with this mean old tomcat.”
“I remember him,” I nearly shout, becoming
submerged into his story. “He was ugly and orange, and I named him Fuzzy.”
“That was him,” Big affirms winking at me, grin still present. “Fuzzy, the tomcat, was a mean old bastard. When little Evie would hide under my porch, that stupid fuckin’ cat would be curled up in her lap, and she’d be petting the fucker like he was the most docile creature alive, and in her mouth would be a damn binky. I’d try to get her out, but that meanest bastard of a cat would scratch and hiss at me. I’d hiss right back and try to convince Evie to climb out, so I didn’t hurt her kitty.”
I don’t remember any of this. I was too young. I just remember Fuzzy because he lived forever, and I was the only person on the compound he warmed up to. Now I know why. If I was Fuzzy, I wouldn’t have warmed up to Big either.
“This one time, after probably the sixth or seventh time I’d caught her under the porch with Fuzzy, she refused to come out, and it had just started to rain. I hated that cat, I wanted him dead, but I couldn’t kill him cause of Bink. So I left her and found Brew bouncin’ a basketball in front of my house; he was headed home because it’d just started to downpour. I ordered him to grab some of the brothers from the clubhouse to help me. Gunz and a few of the other brothers showed up. Five of us in all. Each of us got down on our damned hands and knees in the rain, getting our jeans muddy, to get her safely away from that crazy cat and inside before she got sick.”
“What happened next?” Marylou asks excitedly, riveted by the story like the rest of us.
He turns his head to gaze upon her, “I took her into my house, washed her up, let her keep the binky, and had her wear one of my black t-shirts, which was like a giant, extra-long dress on her.”
Aww! I wish I would have known this story sooner. This is the sweetest thing ever! I think I just melted into another puddle of sappy pink goo, along with all the other women at the table eating up Big’s loveable story with dreamy, star filled eyes.
He continues, “I carried her into my bedroom, covered her up with a blanket, and laid down next to her tiny little body. I had church and a bunch of other shit to do, but she needed me. When I pulled the binky from her mouth tryin’ to get her to talk to me instead of sucking on that fuckin’ thing, she whined for a minute until I shoved it into my mouth. ‘My bink’ I said, play suckin’ on her binky. She tugged it from my mouth, sucking it back into hers, blubberin’ ‘my bink,’ We did this back and forth, laughin’ each time until she grew sleepy and passed the hell out, as I combed my fingers through her tiny blonde curls.”
MC Chronicles: The Diary of Bink Cummings: Vol 2: (Motorcycle Club Romance Novel) Page 17
