The Gamble: A Novel

by Xavier Neal

“Fine. I am. And that's even more fucked up. There's no reason we should've ever done what we did. You didn't deserve it. There's nothing you could've done in a million years to deserve it.”

  His words start to weigh on my shoulders.

  “And I know it was wrong. Even if Luca refused to admit it, he knew it too. But I'm not here to plead his fucking case. I'm here to plead mine.”

  Surprised by the declaration, I swivel my body to lean against the counter, and fold my arms across my chest.

  “I'm sorry, Alexxa. For everything. You're the best friend I've ever had and I fucked that up. Maybe it was the idea of actually having more than a hundred dollars in my bank account or maybe it was the joy I would get out of beating Luca at his own fucking game for once that drove me to be stupid enough to fuck over our friendship. Either way, it was wrong and I'm really fucking sorry. I know sorry will never be enough. And I know bringing you your favorite food isn't enough. I'm not looking for enough though. I'm just looking for a place to start. I don't wanna lose you.”

  Feeling my emotions sway, I look away.

  Alright, on a scale of one to murder him while he's sleeping and convince the cops I was sleep walking so I had no idea what happened, turning me into a bet because he let his pride get in the way has to be at least an attempt to smother him. He doesn't deserve instant forgiveness and he's not going to get either. But I can't stand here and pretend I've never lost good judgment because I let myself lose focus of what truly matters. And in his defense he didn't go out of his way to pretend to be someone he wasn't so he could trap me. He didn't use my emotions like his personal beer pong table. Warren definitely screwed up, but maybe after some time and several months of free enchiladas, we can get back to the way things used to be.

  “I don't trust you,” I whisper.

  “I don't blame you.”

  “I don't even like you very much.”

  He tries not to grin. “I'm not a huge fan of myself either.”

  “Good,” I hum and face my food again. After finally taking a bite, I sigh, “And just because I'm willing to listen to you grovel, doesn't mean you can act as the messenger for Luca.”

  “Nothing to worry about there,” Warren quickly says. “We're not exactly on speaking terms.”

  Surprised by the new information, I turn to face him once more. “What do you mean not exactly on speaking terms?”

  “I mean, we threw hands the day after all this shit got leaked and haven't spoken since.”

  We just keep getting more and more cliché, don't we? They bet on me. I ruin their friendship. When did we enter an out of date teen drama and how the fuck do we exit?

  I tease, “Well you can't live here, so don't even fucking ask.”

  This time he successfully smirks. “Wouldn't fucking dream of it.”

  I bat away my own smile by stuffing another piece of food in my mouth.

  Knowing Luca's lost his two best friends should make me feel a little better. The hollow victory of knowing he nailed the chick and lost everything else in the process should make me giddy. Should make me feel victorious in my own way. Should make me feel good to know Karma's a bitch and she's got my back. But it doesn't. Somehow it just makes the misery worse to know he's hurting and I can't be the one to numb the pain. Wow. How fucked up is that?

  Luca

  I poke at the strawberries in the bowl of fruit my ma served me about twenty minutes ago.

  Maybe it was forty-five minutes ago. Hell it could've been a fucking hour ago. My concept of time is shot to shit lately. Was an hour late to the game last weekend. Was twenty-five minutes late on bus duty. Completely forgot about helping out at some youth program shit Kellar asked me to. Life without Alexxa in it is only getting fucking harder. It's been almost a month and nothing. Not a single fucking word. I just keep waiting by the phone like a desperate fourteen year old girl with her first crush. Fuck. I need to get my shit together.

  “Mijo,” my mother sighs softly from across her tiny wooden kitchen table.

  Same house I grew up in. Same fucking table. She never understood the need for a large one since it was just the three of us for so long. Then two. Now just her.

  She keeps the tone gentle, “What's the matter?”

  Finally picking up the strawberry, I shrug it off. “Nothing. I'm fine, ma.”

  “You're lying,” her all-knowing hum causes me to roll my eyes. “Roll your ojos again at me young man and lose them.”

  I mumble, “Sorry.” Rather than let her continue to pester me with the epic failure haunting me, I change subjects, “How is everything? What did the doc say after your appointment this week? You didn't call me to tell me what the results were.”

  She reaches for her orange juice. “The new lump is benign. Stop worrying.”

  Stop worrying? Does a person ever stop worrying about their mother after she's been through cancer hell once already?

  “And they're sure?” I sit up straight. “They're absolutely sure it's nothing. Because last time-”

  “Luca-”

  “-they said it was nothing, less than a month later it was, 'Oops our screw up. We should start Chemo'. I don't want you to go through that again, ma. Absolutely not!”

  The woman whose skin tone and dark features I inherited, leans both her thin arms on the table and tilts her face. “Mijo, what's really bothering you.”

  I give the stubble on my chin a rub.

  “Tell me,” my mother commands with a firm voice. “Tell me right now what has been bothering my only son these last few visits. And don't try to change the subject about my health or the doctors or the fact you're sorry the backyard needs mowing and you haven't had a chance to get to it yet.”

  Yes. I still come over and mow my ma's yard.

  “I wanna know what's got you so...desdichado. I haven't seen you this way since we came home from the hospital after your injury. Talk to me. Don't shut me out the way you did then. You promised you'd never do that again, mijo.”

  After I realized my entire future was shot to shit, I shut down. Times got dark. Suicide crossed my mind more than once. Pain killers were a high I considered chasing. I was irrational, unstable, and buried so deep inside I was worried I wouldn't make it out alive. She had an in house therapist come visit while she went to run an errand. The woman had a great rack and knew the true power of an orgasm. Wasn't my first time, but was the first life I had breathed back into me since the life alternating injury.

  I drop the strawberry I barely had a bite of back into the bowl and push it away. “It's not a big deal, ma. I'm fine.”

  “Luca Larson.”

  The hairs on the back of my neck tingle and I instantly give them a scratch as I try to answer as casually as possible. “My girlfriend broke up with me.”

  “Oh no...” Her voice softens again. “Wait...girlfriend? You had a girlfriend and didn't tell me.”

  I toss a hand in the air.

  “We'll come back to that.” She points a stern finger at me and has a drink. “But what happened? What did you do wrong?”

  “Why does it have to be something I did wrong?”

  “Because you're my son and I may be old, but I'm not an idiota. Now tell me what happened.”

  Guess that's fair.

  I slouch further into my seat. “I made a mistake.”

  “We all make mistakes, mijo. We're human.”

  We could probably classify what I did as inhumane.

  “What kinda of mistake?”

  Would cheating have been better? What do you mean that's a stupid fucking question?

  “I bet Warren I could sleep with her by the end of the summer.”

  At first my mother simply just stares on in horror. It only takes a few moments before she begins to cycle through the possibility of mishearing me or misunderstanding me. However the second she realizes what I said is exactly what I meant, a simultaneous slew of English and Spanish insults flies at me to the point I can't actually understand what it is she's trying to s
ay.

  Gonna guess it's something about what a huge fuck up I am and a disappointment. Same shit I beat myself up with before having another beer trying to jerk off to the memories of Alexxa. It's been a really long fucking month.

  “Out!” She squawks at me and shoots to her feet. “Out! Out of my house.”

  “You're kicking me out?”

  Her firm nod is proceeded by a heavy sigh. “Si.”

  It's like having the coach kick you out of the game without knowing why you pulled the trick play you swore wouldn't be a big fucking deal.

  “Ma-”

  “No. You need to go. Go and talk to your father about this.”

  Suddenly feeling eight instead of twenty- eight, I whine, “Why?”

  “Because I said so.”

  I roll my head to the side. “Come on, ma. I know you're livid but isn't this taking it a little far? Wouldn't it just be easier to send me to my room?” The expression on her face remains intransigent. “You're serious?”

  “Si.”

  “I don't wanna talk to him.”

  “Too bad. It's exactly what you need right now.”

  There's no fucking way that could possibly be true.

  “You know he's probably too busy working so-”

  “So then go to his office and make him.” She folds her arms across her chest. “He is your father and rather than continue to lecture you about women and respect and how disgusted I am you would ever do something like that,” her sentence slips into a jumbled phrases of English and Spanish again, once more leaving me struggling to understand. Finally she huffs, “Just go, mijo. He's at his office.”

  Annoyed, I stand up and voice my complaint again, “Can't you just finish yelling at me?”

  “No.” A look I'm not familiar with floods her face. “I think some things are better heard varon to varon. Now go.”

  Without further objection, I leave the small home and head reluctantly across town.

  Sure it would be easy to lie, but what would be the point? She'd find out and then probably drag me down there by the ear to do it anyway. I fucking hate when she yanks me by the ears. Yeah. Grown ass man whose mother still doesn't hesitate to pull him around by the ears.

  Walking through the glass door after rolling my eyes at his name printed on it, I'm not surprised to see a busty blonde with her tits falling out of her top behind the front desk. She leans forward to give me a better view. “Can I help you?”

  “I'm here to see Mr. Larson.”

  The woman types on her lap top before questioning, “Do you have an appointment?”

  I slide my hands into my jean pockets. “Nope.”

  “Well Mr. Larson requires an appointment for potential clients.”

  “Which I am not.” My correction drags her eyes back up to me. “I'm his son.”

  “Oh!” She squeaks. “I...I...I didn't even know he had a son.”

  “No surprise there.”

  Barely acknowledged I existed growing up, why would now be any different?

  She holds up a finger. “Just give me one sec to let him know you're here.”

  My attention wanders around the steel and gray decorated office. The designer chairs look more like misshaped balls of clay while the rugs look expensive yet very uninviting.

  All the same staleness of an athletic conference setting. Only thing missing is reporters.

  “You can go on back now,” the woman says softly. “And on your way out, you can feel free to leave me your information. You know...to put in the system. In case I see you again.”

  Her less than sly attempt to hit on me is met with a shake of the head.

  I thought looking as fucking miserable as I do would scare off women, but instead all it does is make them come at me harder. Every time I go to the grocery store to grab more beer, someone is asking what's wrong or promising me they can make it better. If I would've known being heartbroken turned women on I would've faked it a long time ago just to mix up the old routine. You know, before I actually ever got that way. Before Alexxa successfully killed any possibility for me to ever think about another chick the way I do her.

  I walk past her desk to the end of the hall where I let myself in. To no surprise, my father is sitting behind his desk, on the phone, a fake chuckle leaking out of him.

  The business man responsible for donating most of my dominant chromosomes. Height. Build. Even my fucking smile. Have I ever mentioned how much I hate looking like him?

  After shutting the door behind me, I drop into one of the chairs he obviously uses for clients, and receive a one minute finger.

  Taking a moment I allow my vision to admire the prestigious space that looks like something out of a design catalog down to the lack of personal touches, such as family photos.

  Not sure there would be any. Not even sure if he even ordered copies of graduation photos.

  “You got it Marc. Take care.” He ends the call and offers me a smile. “Mayor's son.”

  I smirk sarcastically. “At least you're talking to someone's.”

  My father lets his expression fade, leans back in his chair, and taps his fingertips together. “I would talk to my own if he would answer my calls or messages.”

  “I've been busy.”

  “But you're not now.” There's a flicker of hope on his face. “What can I do for you?”

  “Ma' forced me to come.”

  To my surprise, his eyes instantly flood with concern. “She okay? Something wrong?”

  “She's fine. Or at least she told me she was fine.”

  “Then what's this about?”

  “She thinks I need to hear a lecture from you. Feels a few years too late in my opinion, but she's the head coach and one of the only people I still wanna fucking talk to, so here I am. As requested.”

  He nods. “What is the subject of this lecture?”

  As soon as my mouth drops to reply, his office phone begins to ring. He holds up a finger and doesn't bother asking me do I mind.

  Why would he? He's always been about looking out for himself first. Fuck everyone else. Fuck what it means for everyone else. He's always been a selfish son of a bitch and probably always will be. Why are you looking at me like that? I'm not like him.

  Another fake laugh leaves him and he says, “No. No. I've got time.”

  I lean over and press the red button, which ends the call. “You don't actually.”

  His eyes glance down at my finger before looking back up at me. An impressed smirk appears. “Alright Luca. You have my full attention.” He places the phone back on the receiver. “What do you need to be lectured on?”

  “My girlfriend broke up with me.”

  He tosses a carefree hand in the air. “Women come and go. I'm in the business of divorce. I have a summer house as evidence that that's true.”

  Yeah. See the problem with having a divorce attorney for a father. No fucking sympathy.

  “What's the big deal? You broke up. You're young. Move on.”

  Shaking my head in disbelief I grouse, “I can't believe ma' thought talking to you would be a good idea.”

  A short wave of silence rolls through the room. To my surprise, he tries again, “What happened? Cheat on her?”

  “I bet on her.”

  “Like a fucking show pony?”

  Rather than dispute the reference, I nod.

  He folds his hands in his lap. “Explain.”

  Guilt sinks me into the chair.

  “In detail.”

  Not enjoying how I feel more like a client than his son at the moment, I simply start, “Terms were simple. If I could bang her by the end of the summer, Warren had to do my laundry and if I couldn't, which I never considered an actual possibility, I'd have to pay his half of rent for the rest of our lease.”

  “You mean I'd have to pay.”

  “Fine print.”

  He twitches a look of disapproval. “Who is this her? Some random chick you two saw in a bar? I'll be honest, I never mistook you for t
he careless type.”

  “You don't know me.”

  “So you are?”

  “No.”

  “Then who was she?”

  The words are harder to leave than I thought they would be. “Our best friend.”

  Puzzled, he simply repeats, “Your best friend. As in...both of you?”