by Deja Voss
His suitcase is hanging open on the bed. I go to pull out his dirty laundry so I can throw it in the hamper and two used needles fall out. I don’t want to touch them. I don’t know who he’s shared these with or what they had inside them. As long as I’d known Arthur, he swore up and down that he’d never do drugs.
Buy them wholesale, sure. Sell them, obviously.
The thought of him shooting up makes me want to crawl out of my skin. How long had he been doing it? Was I going to get a disease? I make a mental note to figure out a way to get tested discreetly as soon as possible.
I leave everything there. I know he’ll notice that I saw his stash, but I don’t care. If this is the hill I die on, so be it. I sit on the edge of the bed and wait for him.
As he stands in the bathroom doorway, I feel like I’m going to be sick. Just the way he looks is so off. Wearing nothing but a towel draped around his waist, I notice how slender he’s getting and wonder how long I’ve been able to turn a blind eye to this. This isn’t some one-time experimentation project.
His eyes meet mine, and for a second, I think he looks ashamed, but that quickly gets replaced with anger.
“Why are you going through my stuff?” he barks.
“I was going to do your laundry. What is all this, Arthur?” I say, motioning to his paraphernalia. “Are you using?”
“I’m working with a new client. I had no one to test the product and I wasn’t going to just buy blind. I had to be sure it was good.”
“How could you be so stupid, Arthur? You don’t know if that stuff was laced with anything. You could’ve died!”
“So what’s better?” he asks. “That I let one of my men test it out and possibly die? That I let your dad try it out? Tell me what you prefer, Sloan, since you have all the answers.”
“Why does anyone need to?” I cry. “Why does this even need to be a thing? I thought this was just some sort of side hustle. Why don’t you just drop it?”
He’s picking up his needles and cautiously wrapping them back up in the little towel they must have been nestled in.
“Why don’t you just drop out of school?”
“Don’t pin this on me, Arthur. I used to be employed. I never once asked you for anything.”
“But you took it. You took everything I have to offer. You’re bleeding me dry, Sloan.”
“You OFFERED it. That’s what people who love each other do. They give, with no expectation of anything in return but love.”
“Maybe in your world. In my world, I expect more than just love in return from you. Not everyone gets to live a life like this, you know. I’m sure in the trailer park things are a little different.”
Go ahead, throw my upbringing in my face. I know I come from trash, but I’ve worked hard to escape that. Before Arthur came along, everything I had was a result of my own hard work. I couldn’t ask anyone for help.
“Let’s see, the man I care about more than anyone in the world is putting needles in his arm and acting shady. Sounds pretty trailer park to me.”
“What’s this attitude all of a sudden? I should’ve never let Olive stay here while I was gone. She’s a bad influence on you.”
Of course she is. She’s the only voice of reason I have in this madhouse, and she will likely be my salvation. He knows it. She’s the only person he has left to isolate me from. If I lose her, I’m completely his. And I’ll never let that happen.
“I don’t want to fight with you, Art. You’ve had a long trip and I have studying to do. Why don’t you just go to sleep?”
“Whatever,” he says. “Get your books and come back up here. I missed you so much, I don’t want to let you out of my sight.”
Sure that’s why. He missed me so much.
Even he thinks I’m smart enough to leave. Why can’t I convince myself?
Chapter 12
Gavin:
Who moves up on top of this mountain, into this perfect wilderness, to live in a shitty glorified underground bunker?
I see why my father constructed the house like this, with underground apartments locked behind steel doors, but if I have to live the rest of my life in this dungeon, I’ll probably go insane. At least there was natural light in my old house on campus. Just the sound of the hissing fluorescent overhead light is already giving me a headache.
The bedroom is clinical, cool, minimalist. No traces of Micah are left behind. Our housekeeper has already made the bed up tight and there are fresh towels hanging on the bathroom door. I don’t know if I feel like I’m in a hotel or some sort of white-collar jail.
We got a twin bed for Goob and set it up on the other side of the room and he’s just lying there, watching cartoons. Patch is helping him detox, and I’m doing my best to keep him as close as possible. I brought him back into this mess and now he’s my responsibility.
“Hey, Gav,” Brooks says, standing in the doorway. “Need a hand?”
“I’m about done. What are you getting into?”
“When’s the last time we went hunting together?”
I really can’t recall. The two of us grew up in the woods together and we were shooting guns and skinning animals from the day we had the upper body strength to be able to handle a rifle. We were survivalists before we even knew what the word meant. This boughie act my dad was putting on was nothing like the club we grew up in.
“It’s been too long, bro. What’s even in season right now?”
We might not be law-abiding citizens in every sense of the word, but preserving the wildlife is something the club takes seriously. We don’t poach out of season.
“Whole lotta nothing,” he laughs. “Skunk and possum.”
“I don’t want to leave the kid by himself.”
“I got it,” Trixie says, barging through the doorway. “You don’t worry about him. You’ve done enough.”
If it was anyone else, I’d probably say no, but Trixie genuinely enjoyed taking care of us. She was never considered old lady material and definitely doesn’t look like your typical dirty birdie, but she has a heart of gold and would do anything for the club.
“You sure?”
“I missed having you kids around. Let me spend some time with the little guy.”
“Fuck it.” I shrug. “Let’s just take the four-wheelers out for a spin. If you shoot a skunk though, you’re sleeping outside.”
We stop at the bar upstairs.
“How about some roadies, Esther?” I ask my sister. She pulls out some flasks from behind the bar and begins to funnel some of our family moonshine into them.
“We can be your roadies, Gavin!” Morgan giggles, bellying up to the bar next to me. She has on a hot green tube top that leaves nothing to the imagination, her huge tits swaying as she walks. Her hair is bleached blonde and her makeup is heavy. I have nothing against the girl, she’s just never been my type.
It’s never stopped me from showing her a good time, but I’m sure she’s probably had enough other good times between now and the time I left for school to make me think twice about jumping on that ever again. There’s probably not enough moonshine on the mountain to get me back in the sack with Morgan.
All these dirty birdies are the same, hanging around hoping that one day they’ll have a chance to become an old lady.
Unfortunately for them, they normally end up just old.
Occasionally, one finds herself knocked up, but that’s usually a calculated risk. They’re not stupid, just desperate. I don’t have any disrespect for them; they really do help keep the guys acting at least slightly personable. But these days, they have lost their appeal to me.
“Come on, Gav, what do you say?” Stacy, the token redhead, asks. “We’re just as sweet and refreshing as any moonshine.”
“Stacy, you’re like a gallon of milk left out in the sun,” Brooks chuckles. She punches him in the arm jokingly.
“Asshole.”
“Oh, definitely. This is a man trip, though.”
We barnstorm the front do
or and head out to the garage.
Chapter 13
“Wanna take the side by side?” I suggest.
There are trails cut all over this mountain and I used to know every single one of them. Now that I’ve been out of practice for a while, I’m sure I’m pretty rusty. Brooks has been here the whole time I’ve been gone, and I trust him to drive.
Sure, I had friends in school, but when you grow up in a club surrounded by brothers, it’s a totally different thing. I’d kill for this man. I’d be killed for this man. I still feel that way after all these years.
We tear up the trails, pushing the four-wheeler to its limits, climbing up steep boulder fields and cruising through mud puddles that almost clear the tires. It’s relaxing, it’s mindless. We don’t have to talk, we can just spend some time together listening to the hum of the motor and seeing nature in its full summer glory.
He pulls down a little sidecut, overgrown with spiky blackberry bushes getting ready for their summer bloom.
“Holy shit, I can’t believe this is still here!” Our childhood campsite was sparse, but the fire ring is still intact, and even with all the brush growing in, I can still picture it the way it was, back when we’d spend nights on end camping, hunting, and being miniature mountain men.
There’s a Mountain Misfits logo carved into the big oak tree along with “Brooks - President, Gavin - Vice President” in our sloppy preteen scrawl. We’d come up here and “play” club, dream about our future as the head officers.
“Shit used to be so easy,” I sigh.
“Yeah, well… Why isn’t it anymore?”
That’s a loaded question. Why aren’t we spending our days hunting, building fires, living off the land, and riding our bikes?
“All the good people in our lives die?” I suggest.
His father had been a very good man. He saw my grandfather’s vision and ran with it to the best of his ability during his brief stint as president. When he passed away, my father went the full-blown organized crime route, jeopardizing everything they had worked so hard for in the past.
“Or leave.” He shrugs.
I knew he wasn’t happy that I went off to college. He took it as a personal dig, but honestly, it had nothing to do with him and everything to do with me just trying to figure out where I fit into this puzzle. Being here now, I’m even more confused than when I started.
“Don’t be mad,” I say. “I’m back now.”
The silence between us is cut with the chirping of the birds and the rustling of the wind through the leaves, but it doesn’t make it any less awkward.
“Listen,” I explain. “I don’t like what is going on in the club right now, but I’m not in any position to fix it. I wouldn’t even know where to start.”
“Well you can stop running away for one,” he says. “We need you on the board. Everyone’s just letting your old man do whatever he wants. There’s no balance.”
“You think I can stop him? There’s ten of you and one of him. You should’ve nipped that in the bud a long time ago. Voted his old ass out. If anyone needs to take that president’s seat, it needs to be you.”
“It’s not that easy. The old-timers think that loyalty to the president comes first and foremost, even if it’s at the cost of the club. I think they’re scared of him. Why wouldn’t they be? They saw what happened to my dad.”
It was one of those unspoken rumors. My father was the one who found Mike dead. It looked like a suicide, and in the months leading up, he had been acting really erratic, but there were definitely some things that didn’t click.
“We need you, Gav. Us young bucks. We want to reclaim the misfit ways. No more of this cartel shit and mansions and prostitution rings. That’s not us. That’s your dad’s greed. The more of us on the board, the better. You know you’ll get voted in vice president, no questions asked, now that Micah’s gone.”
My brother was vice president before he left for the Marines.
“Why didn’t you take that spot?”
“I’m cool with being sergeant at arms right now. Keeps me outta trouble.”
“What happened to Micah anyway?” I ask. “Nobody’s giving me a straight answer.”“I don’t know, man,” he says. “It was bad, though. He didn’t say two words to anyone before he left. So you gonna step up?”
I run my fingers over the carvings in the tree. Maybe we weren’t so dumb when we were kids. Maybe this was my destiny. Law school is still banging around in my brain, but every moment that I spend up here makes the urge duller and duller.
“I’ll think about it.” I haven’t had time to think since I got back. It’s been nothing short of chaos.
“I guess that’s good enough.” He points up at the sky where a huge hawk is circling overhead, gliding along gracefully before careening in between the treetops, spotting its prey. “Let’s get outta here.”
We ride around a little longer, exploring these trails that I once knew so well. It does feel good to be back with my best friend, even if I know I’m a totally different person than I used to be when we were growing up together.
Maybe I’m not giving him enough credit. Maybe he’s changed too.
We edge into the gravel driveway and I put my head in my hands.
“What the fuck?” I laugh.
“Oh, Lord…” Brooks says, slamming on the brakes. “That’s not something you see every day.”
Morgan, in all her bleached blonde glory, is fully nude, tied to the cherry tree next to the garage.
“How the hell did you pull this off?” I ask. I’m trying not to look at her giant tits, but they are sticking out right in my face.
“Stacy helped me! I haven’t gotten to give you your welcome home present yet!”
I should be turned on, but I know how many others she’s given her present to, and nothing about this is doing anything for me. If anything, it’s making me laugh. I feel bad humiliating the poor girl, but desperation has never really gotten me hard. I’m more of a thrill of the hunt guy.
“I hope you are wearing sunscreen,” I say.
“You’re such an asshole,” she quips.
“Brooks, you want my homecoming present?” I offer.
“Well, it’s strangely tempting.” He laughs. “These are some solid knots. You think Stacy was a Boy Scout?”
“Guys, just cut me down,” she pleads, the look on her face more disgust than anything. The woman has no shame.
We get her off the tree and I give her a little pat on her soft pale ass.
“You know we love you, girl,” I say. “Go put some clothes on.”
She scurries off, throwing us middle fingers in the process.
“I’ll definitely give her some creativity points there.” Brooks shrugs.
“She really teeters the line between dirty bird and loony bird, that’s for sure. Thanks for taking me out today.”
“No problem.” He’s staring at me intently, as if he’s waiting for some sort of reassurance that our talk set in.
“I’ll think about it,” I say.
“Good enough.”
Chapter 14
Sloan:
I see the blue and red lights flashing in my rearview mirror and my heart starts pounding. The kilo of heroin in the glove compartment was a horrible surprise when I reached in there earlier looking for a pair of sunglasses.
Sunglasses to cover my blackened eye. It was an accident of course.
Now I’m getting pulled over driving fifty in a forty-five zone, and I know there’s probably more to the story than that. I’m going to be sick.
I roll my window down as Officer Scott Brighton approaches the car. He and I were friends in high school, but aside from the occasional casual run-in at the grocery store or gas station, we haven’t really spoken in years.
“We need to talk,” he says to me.
“So you pulled me over?”
“I’m just keeping you safe.”
“I’m fine, Scott. Leave me alone.”
He reaches through the open window and pulls up my sunglasses.
“Yeah, you look fine to me,” he says sarcastically.
“It’s really not your problem.”
“Please, Sloan, I need to talk to you as soon as possible. They’re fixing to take Arthur down soon.”
“I don’t know what you mean, Scott.”
“Oh, fuck off. Don’t you think he’s been on their radar? He’s getting sloppy. Shit’s about to hit the fan.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
“Well, you’re a twenty-four-year-old in medical school driving a Maserati. You come from white trash and your last tax return shows zero income for the year. If I had to guess, this is going to have a whole lot to do with you real fast. I know we’re not close anymore or anything, but it would fucking kill me to see you throw your life away for this scumbag.”
My phone rings through the speakers of the car, and Arthur’s number lights up on the screen.
“That him?”
I nod.
“You gotta go?”
I nod.
“You’re not safe, Sloan. You have to let me help you. Please. Meet me at Larkin’s tomorrow at noon.”
“I gotta take this.”
“Promise me,” he says, staring into my eyes.
“Sure.” I don’t know if I’ll actually show up, but I don’t want to sit here anymore. Knowing my luck, one of Arthur’s cronies will drive by and tattle on me.
He slides my sunglasses back down and slips me his business card.
“Be safe, Sloan.”
I throw him a salute and drive off onto the freeway.
Chapter 15
Gavin:
“Let’s go for a ride, Gavin,” Heat says, pulling my covers from over my head. “Come on, get up.”
“How did you get in here, man?”
“I waited outside the door for whoever that piece of work was you had in here last night to chew her arm off and run away. Come on, dude. It’s almost four.”
