by Max Henry
Bootsteps echo on the front path, and then still. If we cross over the threshold now, we’ll be spotted trying to make a getaway, given the front door is directly opposite the back one.
Shit.
“What do we do now?” Kate whispers, trying and failing to disguise her nervous giggle.
“Panic.” I snort in an effort to stop my snicker from breaking free.
The front door swings open, two definite bootsteps resonating throughout the otherwise quiet house as Dad steps inside.
I should feel bad that I’ve let him down by skipping my exam, feel bad for being so selfish. But the adrenaline still runs fast through my veins, keeping me in the thrill of the moment. He said he had errands to run before work; he shouldn’t be home.
Kate tugs on my shirt, and then points to the far side of the room. The dining room has two sash windows that open out onto the backyard, but the damn things always stick on their wooden tracks. There’s no way we could open them quietly enough.
I’m in the midst of whispering this to her when her eyes go wide and she slowly stands up straight from our crouched positions. “Hi.”
“Belle?”
Shit. Shit, shit, shit. So not Dad. Excitement conflicts with regret at the sound of his best friend’s voice.
“Zeus.” I straighten also and slowly turn to face him. “Why are you here?” It’s been years since he disappeared without a word. For some reason, the thought of disappointing him eats at my gut worse than upsetting Dad.
“I think the more important question is, why are you? Your dad said you’d be at your exam.” His steely gaze flicks to Kate. “And who’s she?”
“I’m Kate. Belle’s friend.” The hussy pops a hip as she sticks an arm past my shoulder, hand outstretched.
He simply stares at her, eyes hard and his lips set in a firm line. Her smile fades, and she slowly lowers her arm, stuffing her hands in the pockets of her jeans.
“We, um, we left some study notes here,” I lie. “Thought we’d pick them up before the next one.”
Zeus’s cool indifference slides my way, his eyes unusually void of expression. “Bullshit.”
I frown a little, my jaw slack as I try to work out what the hell happened to the fun, carefree guy that I last knew.
Kate gasps behind me, retreating toward where I threw her bag. “Um, we’ll get our things and head out, okay?”
“What are you really doing, Belle?” Zeus asks, his eyes narrowed as he waits on my answer.
“Skipping my exam,” I murmur, head down.
“Skipping your exam,” he repeats with a dissatisfied huff through his nose. “Still too cool for school after all these years, huh?”
I simply shrug. What does he want me to say? That yeah, I’m a selfish, spoilt bitch who’s yet again chosen to do what’s more fun for me, than easier for my dad to handle? Because that’s totally what I am.
Selfish.
Wonder which parent I learned that from?
“Don’t tell Dad,” I plead. “Okay?”
“Don’t worry,” he grumbles, stepping forward into the kitchen and forcing me back in the process. “I won’t tell him. You will.”
Kate stands wide-eyed, her bag now slung over her shoulder. I’m sure my expression is much the same.
“Zeus—”
“No.” He spins around, finger pointed my way as he frowns. “Maybe once I was okay with being the go-between, with trying to get it through your immature head what the fuck you’re doing to your dad by being such an ignorant little shit. You think you’re big enough now to make your own decisions about what’s best for your future? Well, then you’re big enough to see the effect those decisions have on the people around you.”
Jesus. Wherever he’s been the last few years, somebody’s been stealing all his porridge. The man is one grumpy bear.
“Fine,” I huff. “I’ll tell him.” Not.
Zeus nods as he takes an elastic off his wrist and proceeds to pull back his long thick hair. I stand in rapt silence as he lifts both arms to tug the black locks into a rough ponytail, noticing for the first time he’s in his gym gear: long shorts and a very revealing tank. He’s been busy while he was gone, or maybe I simply don’t remember him quite the same as I thought I did—the guy is huge.
I’m not the only one whose teenage hormones take note of his built physique, given the way Kate stands in rapt silence also, her hand flexing in intervals on the strap of her bag.
“Get back to school for your exams, girls,” Zeus instructs as he tucks the pony into a knot. “I’ll ring and let them know you’ve both been held up. Maybe you’ll get special consideration or some shit.” He glares at me. “Maybe not.”
Really? “Come on,” I plead. “You don’t have to go that far. We’ll go back, I promise. Isn’t that right, Kate?”
She stares silently at Zeus as he leans both palms on the counter behind him, making his triceps pop.
“Kate?”
“Huh?”
Fuck my life. I bend down on my way across to her and snatch my bag from under the table. “Let’s go.”
“Yeah, okay.” She flashes one last smile at Zeus. “I’m really sorry we put you out.”
If looks could kill I’m pretty sure he would have incinerated her into a pile of ash.
She giggles awkwardly as I throw a hand up over my shoulder to wave goodbye, pushing her toward the door with the other. “Bye, Zeus. See you in another couple of years.”
“I’ll see you when you get home tonight, Belle.”
Wait. What? I make a move to turn around and ask what he means, but Kate has me by the wrist as she tugs me viciously out the still open front door. I stumble behind, managing to wrench my arm free when we reach the footpath.
“What the hell was that all about?”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” she whisper-yells in response. “That is the Zeus you told me about in Year 11?”
“Yeah.” I frown. “So? Don’t tell me you think he’s hot.” I roll my eyes, feigning disgust at the idea when in reality it pisses me off somewhat. He’s my guilty pleasure, my eye candy.
Fuck, I’ve missed him.
“Of course I think he’s hot.” She skips backward, tugging me away from the house, presumably so we’re out of earshot. “Old, but hot.”
Old. I snort at the idea. Not as though he’s like seventy or something ridiculous. He’s only… I don’t even know. Younger than Dad, I think, but not by much because they went to school together. So that would make him at least thirty-four. Shit.
“Are you okay?” Kate ducks her head as she falls into step beside me.
“Yeah. I just… how am I going to tell Dad I skipped my exam?” I do my best to deflect the issue onto something more believable.
Kate shrugs. “Buggered if I know. Remind him it’s just Biology.”
“That’s not the point. He’ll be pissed if he knows I’m not taking this seriously.”
“Well then, sucks to be you.”
“Yeah.” It does.
More than she really knows. More than I let anyone know.
FOUR
Zeus
“How did you go?” John rises from his seat at the dining table and carries his empty coffee mug to the kitchen.
I toss my gym bag down next to the sofa, and shrug. “As well as you’d expect.”
After sending Belle back to school for her exams I moved my shit into the spare room, and then headed to the gym for a session with the weights. The mundane routine of lifting, pushing myself to do better, be better, calms my soul. The heavy metal that blasts through my headphones helps too, but mostly it’s that charge of adrenaline that I need to see my problems with a new clarity.
I was still mad at Jodie this morning for stepping out on me, but the truth is she saved me wasted years if I’d stayed with her. I was too blind to see what was happening with us.
Now I have a chance for a fresh start. A fucking hard one thanks to my record, but a new start all the same
.
“Want one?” John lifts a cold beer from the fridge.
I nod, walking over to accept as I frown. “Did you tell Belle I was moving in?”
“No,” he scoffs as he uncaps his bottle. “Mate, this is still my house. I gave up letting a woman dictate what I do in it years ago.”
“Amen to that.”
He leans a hip into the counter and narrows his gaze on me. “What makes you ask?”
Fuck. “No reason.” Almost sprung the fact I caught her out. “Just wondered what sort of grief I’d be in for,” I tease.
“She’ll be okay,” he muses. “I know it’s been a while since you’ve seen her, but not much has changed.” Everything has changed. “She still skips school—even though she thinks I don’t know it—and she’s still stubborn, just like you were at that age.” He smirks around the lip of his bottle.
“At eighteen, you and I were a lot more than stubborn.”
John shrugs. “Fair point. I don’t think you need to worry about her jacking cars anytime soon, though.”
He’s right, although I don’t doubt she’d do it if the idea struck her as a good one. Unlike John, Belle has always been fearless. The girl shows no consideration of the consequences at all, and more than a few times I’ve wondered if my influence here will have a negative effect on that trait of hers.
“What are you thinking?” my best mate asks as he gestures to the living room with a jerk of his head. “I can see the cogs working.”
“You think I might be a bad influence on her if I’m here?”
He frowns as he takes a seat in his armchair. “Do you think I’d let you around here if you were?”
He has a point.
“You’re the extended family she missed out on,” he continues, kicking the recliner out. “The uncle she never had a chance to know. I don’t give a shit about what you’ve done, as long as you don’t glorify it when she asks about why you’ve been gone for the past two years.”
“As if I’d do that.”
To make prison out to be something to look up to, I’d have to be proud of the fact I served time. But I’m not. Fuck that shit. Not when it makes me everything I swore I’d never be: my father.
I used to feel sorry for John when we first struck up a friendship as teenagers because he didn’t really remember his parents. Orphaned at a young age, he doesn’t have the extended family most of us do, and so ended up in the foster system. The fact that he wished he knew his parents, and I wished I didn’t, was one of the many things that set us apart. The other major one being the fact he’s a lean, tall white boy with golden hair, and I’m the tan-skinned half-caste with jet-black locks.
You couldn’t get two men more polar opposites if you tried. And yet I wouldn’t trade our friendship for anything.
“What’s she planning on doing after she finishes school?” I ask.
John shrugs, lacing his fingers behind his head as he stretches his arms out wide. “She’s still stuck on using her drawing skills for an apprenticeship as a tattoo artist, but if she doesn’t lift her test scores, I don’t know if she’ll get into tertiary courses.”
“Does she need to do any more studies?”
“You think she could slip straight into an apprenticeship without it?” He frowns as though the thought hadn’t crossed his mind.
“Don’t see why not. She’s bloody talented.” Belle started drawing as a distraction after her mother left. I don’t think either John or I expected her to be so damn good at it.
“I thought perhaps she could find some fill-in work to save money to back herself with, but then I don’t want her to get comfortable.” John sighs. “You know how it is when you get your first paying job: the cash is such a novelty that you don’t care what you’re doing as long as you get paid for it.”
“Yeah, I remember how that was.” Awkward silence hangs between us. “The whole rebellion thing is just a phase, J. She’ll grow out of it.”
“I hope so.” His eyes sharpen as he snaps out of his daze. “I better chuck this back.” He lifts the bottle in his hand. “Time to head to work.”
“Thanks again for the room.” I twist the bottle in my hand, choosing to stare at the label. “You’ve saved my arse. Promise it’ll only be temporary; a few weeks at most.”
“Where will you go?” The smile slides from his face as he leans forward in the seat and rests both elbows on his knees.
He doesn’t have to say it; the insinuation is there between his words. I’m going to need all the time I can get to find a willing landlord, considering my criminal record. People don’t readily let ex-cons into their investment properties very often, especially re-offenders.
Some of us don’t learn.
“I’m not sure where I’ll end up. The new job with Gillies doesn’t earn a lot, and I’ve only just finished paying what was left on the car. I’ve got nothing saved.”
He hums as he nods, hands clasped. “How is the new job going? I may have a solution if you don’t have any other plans.”
“It’s going all right, I think. But you know how it is.” I pick at a loose thread on my jeans. “I’ll get the trial run, they’ll tell me that my history doesn’t matter as long as I work hard, and then after three months they’ll let me go using my criminal record as an excuse so that they get casual work at permanent rates, just like the last crowd did.”
“Arseholes.”
“Yep.” I take a deep breath and shove the negative feelings aside to ask, “What was your idea?”
“I took a position on the night shift a couple of months back. The pay is another two dollars an hour, which adds up. I need it. We need it, but I don’t like leaving Belle on her own.”
“You saying I should stay here?” I frown, turning my head slightly.
“If you’re okay with that.” He spreads his hands wide and then claps them together again. “Look, I don’t expect you to babysit Belle, but it would make me feel better if she wasn’t alone.”
“I can do that.” Shit, he’s probably saved me a grand in bond and setup costs on a new rental.
“Sorted then.” He rises, bins his empty bottle, and then hesitates with keys in hand. “End of an era, huh?”
“Sure is.” I’ve kicked around with John since we were kids, and Jodie had been there too in one way or another. Back when John was dating his ex-wife the four of us used to head out to the bars at the weekend. Fuck, how times change. “Thanks for this, bro. It’s a real help.”
“We’re friends, Zeus,” he says. “This is the exact stuff I’m supposed to help with. You should have said something sooner.”
“I guess the right opportunity never came up.”
“Probably because I’ve seen you all of what? Twice since you got out?”
“As shit as it sounds, I was just busy, mate.” Busy trying to save a dead marriage.
“Yeah, well, I’ll probably be sick of your ugly mug soon, huh?” He chuckles, making me laugh also.
I give him a simple shrug as he heads for the door. “You had your own problems to worry about, anyway.” I tip my head toward a picture of John and Belle on the side table. “And we both know that she’s way more important than my cheating wife.”
He chuckles, ducking his chin to his chest. “I guess you have a point. Still”—he lifts his eyes to mine—“we’re here to help, both Belle and I. I sometimes think that kid loves you more than I do, mate.”
Yeah. Sometimes so do I.
***
The incessant tick of the cheap clock mounted in the kitchen matches the beat I tap on my thigh with my phone. Legs kicked out before me, I sit in John’s armchair and close my eyes. My body wants to rest, but my mind refuses to take its foot off the gas.
So many things to think about: money, the divorce, and most importantly what the fuck I plan on doing to keep my stupid arse out of the correctional system.
Six months for theft the first time was an easy stretch. Maybe too easy, considering it wasn’t enough of a deter
rent when I weighed the tyre iron in my hand and made a choice.
Fucker deserved it.
That much hasn’t changed in the least; I don’t regret a single fucking second of what I did. Only what it meant to the people who mattered: John didn’t have a helping hand in raising Belle, and Belle didn’t have someone other than her dad to lean on for advice.
Belle. Everything comes back to that kid.
She’s got the fiery pig-headedness of her mother, but beneath all that I was lucky enough to be given the occasional glimpse of John—the cool, calm, compassionate side. The better side. She was every part the young woman when I went in, every part the old soul back when she watched her mother tear the family apart for the sake of a fatter bank balance, but now…. Shit. I can’t stop thinking about how much she’s matured in two years. Maybe not mentally, given she was here when she was supposed to be taking an exam, but damn, that body.
Long, lanky teenage limbs have given way to a fuller, curvier woman’s body. She filled out, and the fact I noticed has me torn on what exactly that means. I guess it’s okay to look if I don’t touch.
Fucked. That’s fucked logic, old man.
The staggered beat of my ringtone breaks me from my thoughts, pulling me back to the here and now as I answer the call. “I’m not going to sit around waiting every time if you plan on always calling late.”
“I said around three,” Jodie snaps.
“You said at three.”
Her frustrated sigh punctures the line. “I didn’t call to argue, Zeus.”
“I know.” I drag a hand over my face, already tired with the prospect of another slinging match. “Have you signed them?”
“Yeah.” She hesitates; the fact there’s more inferred in her tone. “I don’t want this to get ugly; our split. We had some good years, Zeus. Made some good memories. I’d like to leave them like that.”
“The wounds are still raw, Jodie.”
“I know,” she breathes. “And I’m sorry. I really am. There were better ways to tell you I was done, a million ways I could have handled it better. I guess I got caught up in the moment.”
