Austin would like to believe that if Mia had ever attempted this with him, he would have been able to catch her like Brian did Ashley without a hiccup. He knew, as probably did Mia by now, that they would both end up scraped and bruised splayed out on the asphalt.
Austin was visibly much calmer on the ride to the Roller Derby Championships than he was on the way to Neverland. On the inside, however, he was still quite anxious to get the drive over with. Now that he was in the front passenger seat, he wasn’t able to look at Mia as much to try and calm himself down.
That would make him look like a class A stalker type, some weirdo fixated on her face, unable to look away. So he had to stare out the window and watch the world fly by in a blur, trying to keep up with the ongoing conversation as much as he could. Something about whether or not the Song of Ice and Fire series would ever be finished before the author died.
Usually this would have been right up Austin’s alley, a conversation to dive right in on that he was passionate about. Being in the car, though, especially up in the front seat no less, he was only able to give out small phrases to let them know he was at least picking up what they were putting down.
Mia slapped the turned signal down and got into the turning lane, finally, waited for a car to pass and turned into the dirt parking lot. Once parked, everyone got out slamming the three doors in a rat-a-tat-tat rhythm, and began walking towards what looked to be a big red barn with a black metal roof. Over the front bay door was a flashing red neon sign that read “The Blood Shed”, flashing right underneath this in alternating colors from pink to blue back to pink was a roller skate.
After standing in line for roughly thirty seconds, they were at the ticket-taker and Brian slid in between Mia and Austin, cutting in front of them saying “No worries, bro,” with a sly smile crossing his lips, “I got this one.”
After Austin paid for the mini-golf, he had hoped Brian would step up at some point in the night and offer to buy something, drinks, or snacks or something, so Austin was almost struck in awe that it had happened already, not even half way through the night.
With the tickets paid for, the group now being waved through the door, Mia glanced over at Austin and said “let’s go slowpoke.”
She grabbed his hand, intertwining her fingers with his effortlessly, as if they had been holding hands for years. Their fingers sliding into position, finding their place and settling in. It was like climbing up into grandpas recliner, relaxing into the well-used divot knowing there was no more comfortable place in the house.
She sidled up right next to him, hip to hip, running the fingertips of her other hand between his arm and torso, resting it on his inner elbow, with a gentle cuffing grasp. Austin could feel blood rushing to his head, giving him the warm flushed feeling making him feel momentarily light headed. Then his heart gave that double thump, thump again, not knowing if it was skipping a beat or doing double time sending all of that warm, calm sensation that was just in his face down to his chest radiating out to his arms.
Forget butterflies in your stomach, it feels like a million microscopic pterodactyls flapping their wings.
For just a split second there he thought his legs might be next, that they might buckle under him right here, right now, taking him and Mia both down just by walking.
Mia tugged affectionately on his arm and hand, and whispered “Come on Mr., they’re waiting.” Her voice kicking him out of his own head, bringing him back to reality.
Austin realized Brian and Ashley were a good ways ahead of them, already walking up the steps of the high school gymnasium style seating, Brian looking back, giving him a “come on, bro” gesture with his head. Austin gave him a quick nod in return, turned to Mia and gave her his patented, goofy as hell one-sided smile and said “Well, what are we waiting for?”
They climbed the stairs still holding hands, Austin allowing her to go first down the aisle, having to side step shuffle in front of already seated knees, with Austin following suit. In doing so they switched the hands being held in order to keep facing away from the people they were scooting in front of.
Austin always wondered why it felt more normal to show them your backside as you slid in front of rows of people, at a theatre or like now in “The Shed”. He had tried several times in his early teens to do the opposite. Facing people as you dodged their toes and knees, was definitely more awkward no doubt about it. Nuts to knees, and direct eye contact was undeniably not the more comfortable position to be in to greet strangers. So instead, it was pardon me, while I knock over your popcorn with my ass in your face. Much better.
Mia hadn’t been too far off the mark when she said they had plenty of time, no need to rush. Their butts barely landed on the metal bench before the lights dimmed and the announcer came over the loudspeaker welcoming everyone and then rattling off the names for the visiting team.
Some names seemed to fit the women gliding out on skates to the center of the floor. Some were not so obvious. There was a “Jessica Stabbit” that looked like the human version of the cartoon femme fatale from Who Framed Roger Rabbit with red locks flowing out of her helmet, the buckled chin strap serving as the frame for the pouty red lips, and high arcing painted on eyebrows. Garnering the sought after hoots and hollers, and the two fingered whistles from the more raucous parts of the crowd. Even the silent men earned a few stiff elbows from their wives, just from their widening eyelids, and raising eyebrows.
Right after her, however, came along “Trailer Swift”. She more resembled the likes of Large Marge from one of those Pee-Wee Herman movies, rolling out to a hushed silence as if this gathered mass were about to watch a mild mannered golf match instead of filling the seats for this, the most rootinest, tootinest game of them all.
As the voice booming over the speakers started to call out the home team, Austin’s phone started vibrating in his pocket. One second after the vibrating began, from his pocket came a light blue glow, made all the more visible by the enveloping darkness of the event.
At this moment he was with pretty much the only people he knew or really cared about within a few hundred square miles, so he figured whoever it was could wait until later. He pinched the side of his phone through his jeans pocket without bothering to take it out and see who was calling first, silencing the buzzing rectangle.
Mia glanced over at this quickly with a raised brow, with the next blink though she resumed her focus back on the subject of the spotlight. This time it was the home crowd’s favorite mistress, Whoremione Granger, who was reveling in the applause.
With the rise of the crowd’s cheering at its peak, Mia’s hand ever so slightly loosened its grip on their handhold. Austin couldn’t tell if she had been jealous at the obvious phone call, or if the part of her that hated being in the front row was showing a different side, not liking being in the center of a cheering horde. Or maybe her hand was simply getting tired and she relaxed a bit.
Austin continued to hope this was the case, as his phone began to light up his leg and send the small tremors coursing through his body again. And again, he put an end to it by blindly pinching the side of his phone through the fabric of his pants pocket.
Staying true to her part of the rhythm, again her hand loosened, but this time there was no glance down and then away, now she wasn’t even looking in his direction, he felt almost assuredly on purpose. The crowd’s clapping and crying out had dried up somewhat in anticipation of the national anthem. So he was able to mentally cross noise off the list.
As Austin turned to Mia to ask her if everything was ok, Mia along with every other person in their area stood up almost in unison, leaving Austin the only one still seated, and hanging on to a nearly limp hand in mid-air.
He stood as well, letting go of her hand altogether so she could place it over her heart, as he did the same with his right hand, his pocket once again was all aglow, and buzzing.
Mia turned to him and in a hushed, rather hoarse sounding whisper and said “You should probably answ
er this time.” She said it casually, smiling nonetheless, if she had been jealous of the previous calls there was no trace of it now. Scratch that off the list, he thought with a moment’s pause, but something is up with her.
Granted it was just holding hands but the passion that was present just minutes ago, with the caressing of a thumb here and tracing of a heart there, and a rhythmic tapping of fingertips to the beat of background music on his inner arm with her off hand had all but vanished. He knew enough about girls to know he knew nothing, but this was perplexing.
He understood English much better than he understood women, and even that didn’t always make sens. Take the word rough, sounds like ruff, but add a “t” and you have trough, something a horse drinks from, sounds like “trawf”. Then add an “h” and it all goes to hell in a handbasket, the word becomes through, which sounds like “threw”. Makes no sense whatsoever, but we just swallow it because that’s what we’re told.
How was anyone supposed to learn about women when even the thing we use most every day, words, made no sense. Yet, thousands of people every day are learning how to speak English, mostly to use towards the opposite sex, just to have them misconstrued when they came out of our mouth.
Austin looked down the row, seeing the walking area nonexistent, filled with the patriotic. He wasn’t about to go nut-to-butt with fifteen strangers, so he stepped up on to the bench style seat, standing on the shoulders of giants, or dwarves at least, and walked down the length of it until he reached the aisle. He quickly two stepped his way down the metal stairs, hurrying out the door to answer the phone, trying his best at not being too distracting.
The little girl who was belting out, “gallantly streaming,” looked nervous enough. The last thing she needed was some weirdo running about causing a fuss during her performance. Not recognizing the number, Austin only gave a curt “Hello,” when he answered the phone. It had sounded more like a question than a statement.
The Call
“Yes sir, is this Mr. Kyle?” asked a strangely familiar voice through Austin’s phone.
Mr. Kyle? That just sounds weird, he thought as a brief wave of déjà vu crashed over his mind. Like thumbing through an old flipbook, a montage of memories flashed through his brain’s screen in full 4k Ultra HD. Not of his own memories however, it was those of his dad’s scrolling behind his eyes, from the retelling of the events in his father’s point of view of the night of Austin’s crash. It had only been two years but he had heard it enough to where it was hard to discern his view from his dad’s in some moments.
“This is he, uhm him,” Austin cleared his throat, “yes, that’s me.”
For whatever reason, he couldn’t pinpoint exactly, he was bracing himself for bad news. At first he was thinking something had happened back home, but he pulled the phone back from his ear and in front of his face and saw that it was the Austin area code on his screen. That steadied him a tad but still didn’t clear anything up. He put the phone back to his ear, catching the lady on the phone in mid-sentence.
“- with the K prize foundation, I know it’s late, but I seemed to have made a mistake, either on your paperwork or during the test itself.”
There ya go Izzy, take all the blame, put the onus on you, she thought before adding, “And look, if my boss finds out, I’m afraid that will be the last of me, and I just moved here for this job, signed a lease on an apartment, my boyfriend just broke up with me because he said long distance never works.”
Why am I telling him all of this?
This time Izzy was the on to clear her throat, “anyway, long story short, is there any chance, at all, that you could come by this evening, and allow me to take another sample. I would be more than willing to pay you the same fee again of course?” She left the fact the money would be out of her own pocket, but thought it just the same as if she had.
Izzy sat on the front edge of her somewhat comfortable office chair, balancing precariously on the point between perfectly fine and the chair flipping out from under weight from being so far forward. The phone was pinned to her ear by her shoulder, both hands were busy crossing fingers, along with her feet at the ankles, even her stomach was in a knot, waiting for his reply.
“Tonight?”
It was curious to Austin how fast the human mind could adapt to things. Like how instantaneously he just went from dreading what could only be bad news he was about to hear about a loved one, to being annoyed in one microsecond flat. That’s gotta be some sorta record.
“Look, Izzy, right? I’m kinda on a date here and-”
Izzy broke in not allowing him any room to back out of her invitation, she needed this win.
“I’ll pay you double, and as for your date, I have no problem staying up here as late as need be. Whatever time works for you, I’ll make it work.”
Austin hated that she sounded so desperate, I guess it doesn’t really take that long I suppose, another two hundred wouldn’t hurt much either. He let out a forced sigh and said “Ok, fine, but I gotta tell ya I’m with a group, so I have no idea how late it’ll be when we’re done.”
Apparently that didn’t matter much because he heard a squeal of excitement blaring through his phone’s tiny speaker.
“That’s awesome, thank you so much, just call me when you’re on the way and I will have everything ready for you by the time you arrive, thank you, thank you, thank you,” she all but screamed through the phone with eagerness. With that, she hung up, not giving him any wiggle room to escape.
Austin let out another sigh as he rammed his phone back into his pocket and went back into The Blood Shed, hoping they didn’t make him pay again. Luckily the big guy at the front remembered him from just a few minutes before as he pointed at his phone, scurrying past him, giving him a nod letting him know it’s cool, go on back in.
Climbing the steps again, looking to the row where his date awaited, he jumped back in to the boot scootin’ boogie to reach his seat.
“Everything, ok?” Mia asked as she pushed a few stray strands of her dark hair back behind her ear. The shine in her eyes was glassier now, whereas before radiant beams seemed to bore right through him. Her smile that was ever present earlier in the night, hell the past two days, was gone as well.
“Uh, yeah, sorry just some stuff from earlier,” Austin said fumbling for the right words to use. He wasn’t necessarily embarrassed by what they were doing, selling their blood, but he wasn’t exactly proud of it either. 300 bucks in one day ain’t too bad though.
“You mean from your mysterious hour this afternoon?”
Austin could tell when she had said this, that she was trying to be coy, but it came off too subdued, too cold. Not in a callous way, just in a bland tone. He then realized that not only her eyes were a bit dimmer, but her complexion was a shade or two more pale. The sheen of her vibrancy, dulled to an insipid pallor.
Ok, something is definitely going on and for once in my life, I don’t think it has anything to do with me.
“Is everything ok?” Austin asked now reversing Mia’s question, “don’t misunderstand me, please. You are without a doubt the most breath taking woman, no matter where we go.” He said this looking directly at her, surprised himself, “And I mean that, I can barely think of you, much less look at you while still trying to remember to tell my lungs to breathe. And then my heart just takes off on its own, pounding away like it’s about to bounce right out of my chest, and my fingers and toes go all tingly and-,” get to the point dummy.
Austin shook his head quickly back and forth as if trying to coerce his tongue to shape up and fly right, to say what he is thinking and not what he had been feeling.
“Anyway,” he said looking into her eyes, her dark brown eyes with golden spices sprinkled around the edges, “something just seems off, I… I dunno, are you feeling alright?” Austin momentarily saw some color rise back into her face at listening to his words, but her soft cherry cheeks faded away as soon as she started to speak.
“Actuall
y, I don’t feel too hot right now,” Mia said timidly. “I didn’t want to say anything, everyone seems to be having fun, I didn’t want to ruin it.”
She traced the edges of her ear again with her fingers, wrangling the same stray hairs from before back behind the cup of her ear. This time though, it looked like she had to use more energy than last time just to raise her hand.
“Don’t be silly,” Austin said with an astonished look on his face, swiftly standing back up, “come on, let’s blow this popsicle joint.”
He reached down for her hand to help her stand up and be on their way but she yanked her hand away before he was able to even touch it.
“Will you stop?” She said with a forceful and yet coquettish voice. “I’ll be fine.” She tugged at his arm, bringing him back down to his seat, and pulled him close to her. Whispering into his ear, her breath tickled the hairs on his neck, giving him goose bumps down the left side of his body. “Ash really digs your friend, and she hasn’t had a boyfriend in like, forever. I don’t want to mess their night up,” she said in sincere voice, urging him to just let her be. “Knowing her, she is so overprotective of me, that if I even hint at feeling ill, she’ll call an end to the whole thing on the spot.”
Austin, in turn, leaned in close to her ear and with a low murmur replied “yeah, Brian is pretty in to her too, but you can’t expect to be miserable all night for them, they wouldn’t want that either.”
He straightened his back, looked down at the ring and the girls violently crashing into one another. As one of the visiting girls hit the ground, one of the home girls bunny-hopped over her to the sound of a rising wave of applause and shouts. He paid no attention to what was happening before his eyes, just using the distraction to give his eyes something to rest on while he thought of what to do. After a few seconds passed, he was finally able to grasp at the idea that he would now set into motion, leaning over to her once again.
“I have an idea…” he whispered, “Do you still have the keys to Ashley’s jeep?”
The Heart of It All (HeartSick Series Book 1) Page 10
