Stain

by Francette Phal

  On the other side of the table, the buyer Deacon set Dro up with stands with his three muscles flanking him. We’ve been here ten minutes now and so far everything’s gone according to plan. But ever the pessimist, I’m ready for something to go wrong.

  It’s a simple gun run. The buyer has brought a tote bag of cash. One hundred large to be precise, enough for the three black duffel bags on the table filled with a wide variety of rifles, semiautomatics, and ammo.

  “What do you have for me?” His voice is thick with an accent.

  “Why don’t you take a look?” Dro offers.

  The buyer, a short, bulldog-looking motherfucker with a receding hairline and the fashion sense of an eighties pimp, gives a signal with his gold ring-adorned left hand. The muscles in three piece suits each step forward to inspect the merchandise. They’re thorough, checking triggers, muzzles, magazine wells, front and rear sights, and the frames of each gun. When they finish, they interact in a language I can only assume to be Russian before finally acknowledging a silent Droski.

  “We’ll take this and whatever other shipment you receive in the future,” he says, “pay him.” While one of muscles removes the bags of weapons from the table, another one empties out the black leather tote bag onto the table. The third fucker still stands behind the pudgy buyer, just to his right. “Eighty grand as we agreed on.”

  “Hold the fuck up. What do you mean eighty grand? We’re talking hundred large here, man.”

  The bulldog scowls, his jowl moving like a pendulum as he speaks, “That’s not what I agreed on with Deacon.”

  “I don’t give a fuck what you and he worked out. My price is set. Hundred grand or nothing.”

  It happens quickly. Not sure who draws first, but in a blink of an eye everyone has a gun aimed and loaded on one another. I’ve got the Glock in my left hand trained on one of the meatheads, while the SIG in my right hand is aiming at the buyer. It’s a tense few minutes in which we all play a game of chicken. See who will flinch first. The dumbbell I have my Glock on is either dumber than shit or he’s got balls of steel as he boldly reaches down for one of the gun-filled duffel bags he’s set at his side. I say it’s the former. Following my first and only instinct, I squeeze the trigger and shoot. The bullet slices through the air and grazes its mark. He hollers, “Motherfucker,” and immediately hunches over with his hand pressing against his chest. It’s bleeding but that’s nothing considering I could’ve done worse.

  “The next one is going between your eyes,” I say, calmly. But now I’ve got a bullet with my name on it as muscle number two aims my way, ready to shoot.

  “Enough!” the buyer barks. In rapid-fire Russian he speaks to his men and they lower their guns seconds later. “This was a simple misunderstanding. We will have no more bloodshed. I’m sure you and I can work out some other arrangement, Droski. Perhaps over a few rounds of drinks and some good company?”

  “You pay me the rest of my money and we’ll talk further business.”

  “Of course, of course.”

  The buyer sends muscle number three to his car. He returns shortly after with—what do you know? Exactly the twenty grand that was missing. Everything after goes as smoothly as one would expect a gun run to go.

  ***

  A few hours later, I’m in the shower. I’m bone tired. For days, Dro’s had me running around the whole damn city collecting money owed to him by his dealers. When I wasn’t doing that, I was working double-duty at his garage. Stripping the parts from stolen cars and putting them in cars that needed to be fixed so we could jack up the total amount of parts and labor on oblivious customers.

  I’ve also been purposely fucking as many girls as I can get my hands on, not only because the site is growing faster than I anticipated, but it’s been my futile attempt at getting Aylee out of my head. After what happened with Noah on Monday, I’ve been running as fast as I can from her, from the memories that have become even more persistent since Noah said what he did about Dad and our mother. About how I was going to turn out like that abusive prick.

  Thinking about it gets my blood boiling. How the fuck could that self-righteous little shit say that bullshit to me, knowing all too fucking well the mutual hell we grew up in? I’ve made shit decisions but I’m not a shitty person. I’ve protected him, something that bastard never did, so how could he condemn me to being anything like the monster who raped us of our innocence without even a thought as to how it would affect me?

  Because I know he might be right.

  I am smug and self-centered, and have violent tendencies just like he did. But I accepted my fate a long time ago. These thoughts are like a bucket of ice water down my back. The realization that Noah could be right, even in the smallest degree, makes me feel like I’m going to be fucking ill. I’m a caged, beat-up animal that no one wants. So I attack. But it wasn’t always that way. I wasn’t always such a miserable rejectee. Our mom loved me, and she was the sweetest woman anyone could ever meet. Years of battling her own depression had made her reserved and so she’d kept mostly to herself. But she’d loved big and she loved hard and that inevitably had been her downfall. She’d fallen for a waste of human skin who’d exploited her kind heart, fed her pills, took advantage of her lack of close friendships, and manipulated her until he became her entire world. He killed her spirit. Robbed her of life years before she blasted that bullet through her head.

  Aylee… Damn it. Aylee is a lot like my mother. And I don’t want to taint her like my piece of shit father tainted my mother. She’s beautiful. She trusts so easily. She leaks emotions everywhere she goes. Her expressive eyes reveal everything, all the time. And what I see there are things I shouldn’t want but strangely finding myself needing. Like a flash of her smile or that weird sense of humor that shouldn’t make a damn bit of sense but it does to me. I don’t want to spend time with her and yet her time is something I’m craving. Just these last few days alone I’ve been champing at the bit to go see her. Stalk her if need be. And that right there is what I can’t have. I don’t do things like this. I’ve never, ever fucking thought about doing shit like this. That’s not the type of guy I am. I don’t chase females. I don’t fucking pine after women. I don’t need to. And when I do, it’s my dick briefly needing inside some pussy. Plain and fucking simple. It should be plain and fucking simple with Aylee.

  But then, who the fuck am I kidding? I do something as simple as close my eyes and there she is. She’s become my first, second, and last thought. I’m not even sure how or when the fuck it happened either. But I can’t stop thinking about her. Beautiful, sensual, and so damn innocent. I’m torn between wanting to fuck her, protect her, and locking her away somewhere like some deranged psychopath and never letting her out of my sight. Right now though, with my dick in hand, growing harder at the thought of her plump little mouth and her tight little cunt, the urge to fuck her is stronger than anything.

  I’m thinking about the art room, imagining how hot and willing she’d been. If I hadn’t stopped, I know she would’ve let me climb on top of her on that table and spread her beautiful golden thighs for me. She would’ve begged for it, and I would’ve given it to her exactly how she wanted it.

  I work my hand around my dick, use a little soap to ease my strokes, and with her name dragging from the deepest, most possessive part of me, I come in long, milky spurts that leave me drained but not nearly satisfied. It’s pent up frustration swirling down the drain. But I can still feel its grip around my throat. I’m barely breathing when all I want to do right now is have her here in front of me so I can claim her. But she’s not here. And I’m the pathetic prick standing here alone pining for her. What the fuck is she doing to me?

  “God damn it!” I scream, punching the already loose tile of the shower wall. This bullshit has to stop.

  In my room, I grab a pair of clean jeans and a shirt and put them on. The bag of salt and vinegar chips I left on my dresser yesterday makes for an adequate afternoon lunch. I take a seat at my d
esk in front of my laptop thinking I’ll get some work done to distract myself. Edit some porn. Make my white ass look good. Not even three minutes into one of my scenes with a blond-haired chic and my mind drifts to Aylee. I want to feel her, taste her. She doesn’t make fake noises for an audience, instead, she moans just for me. I want my dirty mouth on every fucking part of her. I want her face in front of me so I can see when I make her come. But her eyes scare the shit out of me. They see right through me. Through my bullshit. Make me want to sink so deep inside of her that I forget what it is to be alone. Fuck.

  I’m on my feet in a flash. I look down and as hard as I am right now, my dick could probably hammer a nail into a two-by-four. Damn it, it’s like I’ve never been inside pussy before. As if I think about her for a second and in turn feel like I’m popping back an entire bottle of Viagra. It’s not even just about fucking her either. My dick is not the only part reacting to her.

  I’m worried about her and it’s been eating me up wondering if her old man hit her again. I’ll confess I’ve taken a drive or two out to her neighborhood. The first time was the day after the rave, after dropping her off at her friend’s house. I drove out that Saturday night and sat about a block away from her house for a good hour before I realized how much of a creeper I was being and drove my ass back home.

  I thought it’d been a onetime thing. I gave into the impulse to check on her Sunday night, too, and I thought that would’ve taken care of whatever it was I’d been feeling. But that feeling is back again, and it’s a screaming urge right in the middle of my chest, an open wound that seems to only be getting bigger every second I remain away from her. It’s not going away either. I’ve been fucking lying to myself. I’m already in motion before I even register my next thought fully. Keys, watch, wallet, jacket, socks, and boots, I grab them all as I move with purpose, getting dressed as I rush to the damn door. I’m out the door and downstairs in a flash. School’s going to end soon. I’m hoping to catch her before she leaves for the day.

  Chapter 20

  Aylee

  I don’t see or hear from him for days after what happened in the art room and realize mournfully I have no way of contacting him. I can’t show up at his home again. I no longer own a bike. Once or twice, I’ve thought about going to Noah to ask for Maddox’s number, but what little pride I have remaining keeps me from further acting like the desperate fool. Besides, last time I saw them together, Maddox was throwing punches and Noah was on the floor. I tried to be there for him, but I can’t force it. Can’t make him trust me. He doesn’t judge me, so I’m going to make a conscious effort to attempt to do the same. I don’t know what Noah meant when he said those things that angered Maddox, but the way I see it, everyone has secrets. And they deal with them at their own pace. That I do understand. I’m not happy about his disappearance, and I miss him. So I’ll wait. My days progress in perpetual limbo while I wait for him to reappear back in my life. Either in group therapy, in school, or even at my house. I’ve become that needy for his proximity. It’s the end of the week again, and with the last ring of the bell, the end of school, too. I have my humanities study group upstairs in the library so I make a brief stop at my locker to drop off the books I don’t need to take home tonight. It alleviates the weight from my backpack, making it a whole lot easier for me to carry.

  The library is massive and is considered one of Brigham High’s greatest accomplishments. It’s emptier now that it’s the end of the school day, but there are still students milling around. Finding the four members of my humanities study group camped out on one of the solid oak, rectangular tables a little farther back, I hurry to them. Alex, David, Jen, Cory, and I rarely ever interact outside of class, but in class we do pretty well together. When we have an especially difficult test, like the one our humanities teacher is giving us next week, we band together and help each other where the other is weakest.

  Which helps tremendously considering the course load we get swamps all of us, especially with just this AP class alone.

  “Hey, Aylee, Jen’s going for a snack run. You want anything? It’s on Alex,” David announces with a grin as he leans back against his chair.

  “No, I’m okay, thank you.” I set my bag on the table and take the seat next to Cory, who has his ash-blond head down while texting.

  “So, Aylee, I was just going over what we discussed in class today. You’re still up to tackling Greece, right?” David asks.

  I nod, taking out my four-subject notebook, with its colorful array of Note Tabs sticking out from every other page. “Yeah, I got it.”

  “Great, so we’re doing what we agreed on. We each research one of the historical eras, take notes, and then we’ll write up a master note with all the necessary events that’ll be on the test. We’ll run copies and study off of that.”

  “You got it, commandant.” Cory’s snarky response earns a glare from the uncontested leader of our group.

  When Jen returns with a bag full of food we aren’t supposed to have in here, she leaves it under the table to keep it from getting confiscated by one of the librarians. We work silently for a bit before splitting up to go research our assigned subject. It would’ve been easier simply using the Internet to gather all the necessary information, but Mrs. Keegan is against Internet research. As she puts it, ‘any Joe Schmoe can create a Wikipedia page these days, and mess with history. Whereas the words written in history books will never be altered to fit someone’s biased view.’ She has a point. But it doesn’t make it any less frustrating. Cory and I head to the second floor where more of the history books are kept. There’s no one up here in the stacks but the two of us.

  “So, Aylee, I was wondering something,” Cory begins as we walk down the carpeted aisle and split to search for our section of history. I go right, while he goes left. Lost in concentration, I move through the towering shelves in search of books on ancient Rome, and am only half listening to what he’s saying.

  “What?”

  “What sort of music are you into? Because I have these Avicii tickets for Saturday and I know it’s last minute but I’ve been trying to work up the nerve to ask you out for a while now.” I hear him laugh softly, a noise that sounds both like relief and release of nervous tension. “So, anyway, are you free tomorrow night?”

  I’m grateful that we’re separated by the rows of shelves because I don’t know what to say. I’ve never had a boy ask me on a date before. Heck, I’ve never had a boy be interested in me. Ever.

  Except maybe for—

  “No.”

  One throaty word startles me to the core, and my mouth drops open as a gasp falls from my lips. I don’t need to turn around to know it’s him. I’d know that voice anywhere, even in a din. With eyes wide and a booming heart, I forget for an infinite moment how to breathe as he brushes my unbound hair to one side, exposing my neck to the delicious warmth of his wet lips. He’s right there, right behind me, pressing up so close I feel every inch of his hardened physique molding up against the softness of my backside. “Tell him no, Aylee.” It’s a whispered growl, heating with authority. Every inch of my skin crackles at his voice, at his nearness, like a livewire doused by water. With hands at my hips, he turns me around to face him. It’s been days since I’ve seen him and yet, the way my mind, body, and soul responds to the mere sight of him is astounding.

  “Aylee?”

  I can’t even think properly let alone reply when I hear Cory call me through the muddle in my head. “I’m...”

  “Aylee?” I turn my head to the right to find Cory standing at the entrance of the aisle. I can’t even begin to imagine what he’s seeing. Probably me being squished up against the bookshelf behind me by a scowling, pierced, and tattooed guy who doesn’t seem at all inclined to release me any time soon. “Aylee, are you all right?”

  “I’m…”

  “She’s busy.”

  Cory glares. “How about you let her talk?”

  “How about you fuck off?” Testosterone bri
mming, he pulls away from me and makes a beeline for Cory. I have to run and maneuver my way in front of him to get him to stop in his tracks.

  “Maddox, don’t…” My hand falls on his abdomen, just a few inches south of his rapidly-beating heart. When he looks down at me, it’s with storm clouds in his eyes. “Please,” I add.

  “I need him to go away,” he answers, almost too quietly, like he can’t quite get around to tempering his rage.

  I nod and attempt a smile. “I can do that. Just let me go talk to him.” When I move away, his hand whips out to grab my wrist.

  “Do it from here.” He doesn’t let me go. His hold is loose enough to have me pull away if I want to, but I don’t want to. Not even a little bit.

  Turning, I address Cory, who’s taken the entire exchange with a frown on his face. I can definitely understand how odd this must look. “I’m okay, Cory.”

  His skepticism comes through in his next question. “Is he your boyfriend or something?”

  “Or something,” Maddox growls.

  “Aylee…”

  “I promise, I’m okay. Maddox is just kidding around. I really wish I could go out with you this weekend, but I’m going to be painting Maddox for my art portfolio. That’s actually why he’s here. I need to talk to him about it.”

  “Oh,” he says, reluctantly. “All right. I get it. Just…maybe some other time then?”

  I nod slowly, chewing the inside of my bottom lip, “Maybe.”

  “I’ll see you downstairs?”

  “Yup, be right down.”

  “I’d give him an hour tops, before you lose interest in him,” he injects with a cocky grin.

  “Maybe, but at least I’ll be entertained for a good hour,” I answer back, meeting his narrowed gaze head-on. But because he’s too good at this game and the intensity of his stare strips me bare, I avert my eyes. “You’re here,” I say, inanely looking down at his large hand still encircling my wrist.