by Paige Notaro
“Holy shit,” he gasped in my ears.
There’s nothing better than feeling a strong man lose control inside you.
He grabbed my hips and lifted me on and off him. I wrapped tight around him and whimpered in his ear.
The house lay completely still but we fucked quietly. The feeling was transcendental, beyond anything our voices could describe.
He moved me faster and faster. I might as well have been nothing but a ball of pleasure in his arms, but he was everything inside me.
I couldn’t think of anything but the strength of him around me, in me. Something in me felt dammed up, something I hadn’t felt in a long long time and never this strongly. He was cracking it with each thrust. Slowly, my voice picked up, rose into my ears like a soft keen.
Calix started to groan and his voice just sharpened the cracks. I started bouncing in his grip, growing the vibrations.
“Oh, fuck me,” Calix growled, sounding utterly defeated.
It all broke over me. I nearly cracked every window, setting off in a wail. I bounced over and over, spurring new waves of pleasure.
Calix crushed me into his body and then he shuddered. He kept using me even as thick wet spurts shot up and filled me.
Finally, we lay in a deep grip, just a soft, sweaty hug. I kissed him haggardly on the lips.
“You’re a pretty good cook,” I said, landing on his shoulder.
“I’m inspired.”
He stroked my bare back. I knew we couldn’t stay here, knew that soon I would have to let him out of my body and get my clothes back on, but right then, I felt like a caterpillar in a warm, silk cocoon, with no desire to become a butterfly.
Calix must have felt the same. He even lay on my shoulder.
“You got me,” he said. “You really got me.”
He sounded exhausted. He sounded broken, like a beast tamed.
It made me feel wicked. I smiled to myself.
Now, he was mine.
CHAPTER SIX
Calix
After a restless night in my quarters, I limped in to base to report for duty. Sgt. Lilton frowned deep the moment he saw me.
“You lied to me, you son of a bitch,” he growled. He looked like an angry grizzly - dark, round and packed with coiled muscle
My breath tightened. There was no way he could know a thing.
“That’s no damn graze,” he yelled directly at the wound. “It’s through your damn thigh, Corporal.”
I released my breath slowly. “It doesn’t feel so bad, Sergeant.”
“Uh-huh, yeah. I’m calling bullshit. Go check in with the medic.”
I did as asked. If I’d been told two years back that I’d be rolling over at the commands of a black man, I would have laughed. But Lilton took no shit. And I’d had commanders of all colors overseas that took no shit. I couldn’t have done well if I didn’t start listening.
In a way, the army had broken me down. Not completely. Not enough to make me forget the cause.
But at least enough to allow last night.
The pain in my leg was nothing compared to the scratch of that memory. I popped a pill to dull that more than anything else. The meds had led to this whole damn mess. The least they could do was help me forget.
Forget the feel of that raw dark skin damp around mine. Forget the feel of her body lush in my arms. Forget the sound of me suckling her full lips like I needed them to live.
I wanted to leave it all in the dust. But trying to forget just dredged it all up again. I’d have to drown it out by getting back to work.
McPherson had a dedicated medical building, though it was only about the size of a stable and manned thinly. The medic on site had just a chevron to his rank.
“Private Velez,” I said, reading his badge as I approached his desk. “I need you to clear me for duty.”
“What’s the injury?” he said.
He had an unlined face, slightly darker than a deep tan could reach. He was young, but looked severe as he gave me a one over.
I rolled up my pant leg.
He whistled at the bandage. “It looks deep.”
“Deepest there is. A round went all the way through.”
“Oh shit,” he said.
“I’m fine. Sergeant is not convinced.”
“Well, let’s take a look.”
He led to an exam room, had me sit on a chair and began unwinding the bandage. I only felt it as a slight release of pressure.
I looked down at his shorn black hair and the much lighter skin it speckled. This guy was Latino, no doubt. They came a little darker, a little lighter.
Rosa might be on one end of the spectrum. Someone on the other side, I might not even notice wasn’t white. But his culture would be closer to Rosa’s than mine.
It wasn’t the first time I’d had to notice that the lines between people didn’t cut so neatly, but I couldn’t ignore it now. I needed to know how deep I’d gone into enemy territory.
The military lingo came naturally to me, but it didn’t sit right at all. My stomach turned just thinking through the words.
What happened between me and Rosa was no war. It might have been a mistake, but there was no need to put it in such sharp terms.
After all, she had been soft through and through.
Velez released my leg and asked, “When did this happen?”
“Two days ago.”
“Sounds about right. They gave you something for the pain?”
“Vicodin.”
“Dosage?”
I gave him the pill case from my pocket. He clicked his tongue and gave me a soft look.
“Sorry, Corporal, I can’t clear you.”
My mind turned dark. “I’m sitting at a desk in the armory, not training.”
“Still, you’re in pain. You’re not going to maintain discipline under Vicodin. Which is fine. You should be taking it. You just need a couple more days to heal.”
“Private Velez.” His name turned to acid on my lips. “I am asking you to clear me for duty.”
He stood and looked at me with a face flat as the full moon. “I’m here to keep you healthy, Corporal, not be your friend.”
I shoved off outside into the smothering heat. This fucking Mexican kid thought he knew my body better than I did. He could only dream of being in my skin. I hadn’t gotten a purple heart for being unable to act under duress.
I’d hope to slink out of base, but Lilton chose the moment I was walking past his office to come out for a smoke. He gave me a grim smile.
“What’s the status?” he asked.
“Unfit for service.” There was no use in a naked lie.
“Ah, it’s for the best, Black.” He took a draw of his cigarette. “Don’t worry, the US Army isn’t going anywhere. Head on downtown and find some place to watch pretty girls for a while. You’ve earned it, son.”
Son.
He clapped me on the back. I had the sudden urge to snap on him and unleash vile things. I wanted to collapse the reputable image I’d constructed for myself.
Rosa’s face flashed over Lilton’s head. He was darker than her, but I couldn’t say what I wanted without meaning her, too.
The words remained as breath in my lungs.
“I’ll go to my father’s for a bit,” I said. I wasn’t angry at him anyway. I was just burning up inside with nowhere to breathe flame.
“Sounds alright, too. Just stay away from that gun.”
He gave me a severe look, then burst out in a laugh. “Sorry, Corporal.”
“I deserved that,” I said.
It hadn’t even upset me. It was good. Let him buy deeper into the lie until it became a well-worn truth.
I caught another taxi back to my father’s place. I wasn’t worried for my bike in the garage, but I did miss the feeling of its power under me. The Storm’s Soldiers might have become a thing I didn’t understand, but my bike stayed true to its nature.
The pills helped me doze through the ride, but dozing just b
rought Rosa back into my mind. I could almost open my eyes and see her face on the other side of the window.
Maybe it was a good thing that it lay so fresh. Her memory had saved me from destroying my career.
But not by reminding me who I was. It hadn’t even made me forget who I was.
Thinking about her made me wonder who I’d become.
True rest was hard to come by with that thought in my head.
The driver deposited me on a quiet tree-lined street northwest of Atlanta proper. I unlocked the house door, but stopped to look around and remind myself of all the ways it was different from Rosa’s street.
All I could notice was the sunlight. This was day, and that was night.
I went in and squeaked the door shut. The entrance greeted me with a wall of photos big and small over floral wall paper. I looked left towards the musty living room.
It looked much like the one where I’d fucked Rosa.There key difference was the white flag with the blood drop that was mounted on the far side. Underneath, a hand stitched banner read, ‘White pride, worldwide.’
Low murmurs rustled down the hallway - men’s voices. It seemed I’d stumbled in on a strategic session.
I took the long path to the back porch, through the living and dining rooms. I glanced over the flyers and images that blanketed the walls.
‘Close the gates.’ A picture of the statue of liberty with bars over it.
‘Stem the flood.’ The US map with a brown wave washing over it.
‘Will you fight for them?’ A dated picture of some white family.
There hadn’t been a single new one added since I’d been gone. The Soldiers may have changed. I might be something different than before I left. My father stayed constant.
My father’s organization was purely a political entity committed to the nationalist cause. They had suffered setbacks, too, but they continued unwavering.
That was the key to this, I realized. Not the obstacles or the diversions, but the choice to continue down the road once committed. All I had to do was refuse the seductions the world offered.
The storm clouds in my head lightened a bit.
I came out in the kitchen. Past the screen door, the sliding glass leading out to the porch lay open. My father and the Storm’s Soldiers president, Homer, sat on plastic chairs and spoke in soft voices.
They made an odd pair: my father, a white-haired, soft-spoken professor and Homer, a thick denim and leather lineguard, his bald head burned red by the sun. They were the soul and the body of the nationalist movement.
Right now, that made me the heart - the thing that kept us from dying.
I yawned open the screen door. They both snapped to me.
“Calix.” My father reached for my arm. “My boy, how are you doing?”
“Surviving,” I said, aimed at Homer.
He just tipped his head. I couldn’t even see his eyes through his dark shades.
“Good,” he said.
Good. That’s all he had for me after nearly sending me to my death. My calm erupted right back into flame.
“Are you in pain?” My father stood. “Come, sit. I’ll get another chair. Would you like some sweet tea?”
“Sweet tea never hurts.” I sat as my father went in for it.
“Diabetes, brother,” Homer said, chewing on tobacco even as he said it.
He held out a hand.
I stared at it for a long while before clapping my hand down.
Brother.
I would have said that word without hesitation before I served. But it was becoming almost impossible.
It felt very close to another lie.
I was grateful when my father came back and handed me a glass of cold tea. He clacked down another chair next to me.
“There’s no permanent damage, I hope,” he said.
“I doubt it. It missed the knee.”
“Then we are lucky.” He clapped my intact leg. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be more supportive over the phone. I was praying for you.”
“Yeah, brother,” Homer said. “We were both worried. I’m glad it all worked out. They even released you early.”
“I asked for that.”
“Why?”
“To get back on base on soon as possible. We have our next window to move guns next week and I wanted to be prepared.”
“Ah, there’s no rush for that. We have no buyers for those and we’ve got enough hardware for our operation.”
I had the urge to smash my glass on his ball head.
“No rush?” I measured out my words. “Will your money be worth a thing when this nation falls apart and we have to stand for ourselves?”
“We understand,” my father cut in. “I think Homer just meant we don’t want to risk your health over reaching this deadline.”
Homer spit a wad of his tobacco in a tumbler resting on the arm of his chair. “One missed load ain’t gonna make or break us in the long run. We should focus on what we can get.”
It wasn’t what he said that was wrong. It was the way he threw the matter aside with his tone. This was how people lost their way, taking short term pleasure over long term achievement.
Even as I indicted him, my brain flashed an image of Rosa’s face slack with ecstasy.
I shook her from my thoughts. That was a different matter.
“So what else can we get?” I asked my father. Homer might stray, but my father could pull him back.
“We were just talking about our preparation,” my father said gently. “We’ve been buying gold with about a third of the profit Homer and the Soldiers pull in. That said, we can make much more in the long run if we reinvest some of that into growing their distribution further.”
“Grow distribution?” I was almost slack-jawed. “You enlisted my help by telling me the Soldiers just wanted to get rid of what they had in storage. You called it a singular event.”
“That event was a one-time thing,” Homer said. “We didn’t have the manpower to move the product we had at the time. That’s why we need to grow.”
“I was shot in front of your facility by the Cartel,” I growled. “They knows where it is. They’ve sent their message. Do you want to start a war?”
“Calix,” my father said. “There has always been a war. There will be more before we achieve our end. And wars need soldiers, training and financing. Increasing distribution is the way to build all three.”
“Distribution of drugs,” I said. “Of meth. That’s what we’re talking about.”
“Actually what we were talking about was expanding beyond meth,” Homer said.
“You’re on board with this?” I asked my father.
“It took some time, but now I am. I made up a list of drug markets, actually.” My father gave a bashful, almost ashamed smile.
At least he had some sense of how messed up this shit was getting. How far we were from the goals he had instilled me.
The goals we had formed to give meaning to my mother’s murder.
I stared out viciously at the green backyard. Nothing there offered a handle for my anger.
“Who are we going to be if we go down this path?” I asked. “What’s the difference between us and some ghetto hoods or those barrio gangbangers?”
“Why, we’re white,” my father said. “This doesn’t change that.”
Homer spit into his cup. “Sure as hell doesn’t.”
“Does being white mean nothing?” I said.
Neither of them spoke and I was left with my own question. I had known how to answer it once. Now, no words leapt to my lips.
Finally, I said the only thing I was certain on. “I did not spend two years risking my life to help arm a drug cartel.”
“Calix,” my father clapped my shoulder. “We all admire your discipline. It is a true asset to our organizations and to the white cause. But we must gain power to spread our message. As long as this mongrel nation stands, the color with power is not white, but green.”
“And we�
��re talking a whole lot of green with this plan,” Homer said. “It wouldn’t be on the table otherwise.”
I could see the green. His blue eyes had turned to dollar bills.
“Is this what you want Mom to see,” I said. “If she looked down, would she like what this family has become?”
My father twitched with sudden rage. I had never crossed this line. I had never had reason to.
“Your mother…” he started. “Was a gentle woman. She was not made to withstand the cruelties of this world. We both saw that. She might not have been able to see through to true cause of her murder, perhaps. But we can not let her softness dull what we seek to accomplish in her name. This entire family-”
He stopped and corrected himself. “You and I have a mission that extends beyond what we do this day or month or even year. We must open our eyes to all the paths before us and choose the one with the best overall outcome. Do not invoke your mother’s name in a curse, just to cloud us from your stubbornness.”
I quietly sipped at my tea. Homer had the sense not to speak.
Once, it had been so clear that all of this was done with righting the wrong of my mother’s death. My father’s words had rung true in my years when I was young. They had been a welcome melody even after I came back from Afghanistan.
Now, I saw just how easily he could twist his words to sell a ride down the wrong road.
“Well I’m not going to be involved in transporting any more of your drugs,” I said. “I went along with what you asked because I thought I didn’t understand. It turns out I understood just fine. I have too much to lose for this.”
Homer sat up straight. “Does the army suspect anything?” he asked. “Have they been trying to dig into you.”
“No.”
“That’s good.”
“So what’s my purpose then?” I asked my father. “What is there left for me to do?”
“Just stay on the path you are on,” he said, his voice soothing once more. “The weapons you provide are extremely useful. There is no doubt on that. Your position within the military structure is highly advantageous to us. Do everything you can to keep it and keep those supplies coming.”
I sank in my chair and nodded. I was being marginalized. I was actually grateful for it. I didn’t want a part of this new path they were forging.
