Touchdown Desires

by Jenna Payne

  “There are girls who just don’t feel right about jumping into bed with complete strangers,” I continue. “Some of us are weird that way.”

  “Some girls,” he says confidently, “but in your case there is a guy, isn’t there?”

  “Let me guess,” I say, “you can tell that by the way I looked into my drink.”

  “This time, it was just a feeling,” he says. I have to admit his smile is disarming. So disarming that I end up telling him the truth. Not just that there is a guy, but the problems Jake and I have been having lately. About how angry he’s been. About how trapped and frustrated, I feel in this town.

  I don’t tell him about the beatings I’ve taken and, of course, I don’t tell him about the sex - or lack thereof. I barely know Ben, after all. And no matter how drunk I am, I’m still not crazy.

  “So, now that I’ve told you all about my little soap opera,” I say after I’ve talked for a good while and have honestly lost track of time, “why are you here drinking by yourself?”

  “Not drinking by myself anymore,” he says taking another sip of his gin and tonic as though to emphasize the point.

  “You know what I mean,” I tell him.

  He chuckles again and even through my alcoholic haze it still sounds like the most amazing sound in the world.

  “I come here almost every week,” he says. “It’s just a chance to get away from the usual crowd.”

  “What’s the usual crowd?” I ask.

  “I usually hang out at The Swamp,” he says. My heart sinks in my chest. The haze seems to clear from my head as though I’ve just drunk an entire gallon of water. The Swamp is the Gator hang out.

  “Are you…are you a member of that club?” I ask. “The Gators?”

  “Yeah,” he says proudly. “I’ve been with them for about two or three years.”

  Never mind Jake, me talking with a Gator could send his whole club into an uproar. They’ve gone to war over less.

  Hastily, I pull out my phone and pretend to check the time. It’s midnight.

  “Is something wrong?” he asks sounding concerned.

  “I didn’t realize how late it was,” I answer. “I should get back. Thanks for the drink.”

  I stand up from the stool nearly stumbling. He reaches out and catches my arm to right me. I feel the heat from his skin even through the fabric of my shirt. That heat rushes all the way to my face rendering me momentarily speechless.

  “If you wait a few minutes, I could call a cab to take you home,” he says.

  I’m amazed and impressed that he doesn’t ask to take me back to his place. Doesn’t even ask for my number. It’s as though he’s really concerned about me.

  “No thanks,” I say reluctantly. “I walked here. I only live a couple blocks away.”

  “Do you want me to walk with you?” he asks.

  My mind paints a picture of the rage Jake would fly into if he saw me walk up to our house with another man. I’m pretty sure I visibly wince as I say.

  “No, thank you.”

  Ben looks at me even more concerned now. I feel the need to explain myself. To lighten the tension.

  “We live in the safest area of the safest town in America,” I tell him in as light a voice as I can muster. “I think I’ll be alright.”

  He still looks hesitant but, after a moment nods.

  “Ok,” he says. “But, remember. I’m here every Thursday if you ever need to talk.”

  He gives me a small, sad smile and I suddenly want nothing more than to stay here with him all night. Jake and The Raiders be damned.

  I blink twice again and try to clear my head.

  “Thanks again,” I say. Quickly, I rush to the door of the bar and out into the night.

  The walk home, as I predicted, is uneventful. My heart seizes when I see Jake’s bike parked in the driveway. He’s home.

  I unlock the door and open it, my pulse pounding in my ears. I heave a sigh of relief when I see Jake asleep on the couch. He’s snoring. That means he’s going to be incredibly hung over in the morning. I’ll be at work by the time he wakes up.

  I walk as quietly as I can into the bedroom. Once I’ve changed and slipped into bed, an image of Ben comes to mind. For the first time in a long time, I smile as I fall asleep.

  *****

  Meeting Ben at The Watering Hole on Thursday nights has become something of a tradition. I’ve come every Thursday at the same time.

  Every week, I pretend that it’s just because Jake is at his meetings on Thursdays and I don’t want to be surrounded by a bunch of bikers. Ben pretends to believe me when I tell him that’s the reason I come.

  We both know it’s not true. I come to The Watering Hole to see Ben. Just like I know he comes to see me. Maybe he used to come on Thursdays to drink by himself, but now he comes for me. And we both know it.

  We don’t do anything at these little unofficial meetings but drink and talk. There’s a sort of unspoken agreement between us not to get too intimate. We’re careful not to touch, not to sit too close and to keep all conversation restricted to the bar area.

  Though I try to tell myself that drinking with Ben is the same as it would be if I were drinking with any other friend, I know it isn’t. If I had female friends, for example, I doubt I would stare longingly into their eyes or try to sneak peeks at their nicely sculpted ass when they weren’t looking.

  Beyond that, I doubt I would be so guarded with my female friends. I might even tell them about Jake hitting me. Something I haven’t mentioned to Ben.

  I’m sure he’s guessed. And when I walk in tonight, my eye bruised and blackened, I know he will.

  My suspicions are confirmed when I walk towards him and he stands up from his usual stool at the bar. His smile turns to a concerned frown when he sees the eye.

  “Ali,” he says both surprised and disgusted, “are you ok? What happened?”

  He reaches out to help me onto my stool. The way he’s acting, it’s as though I’ve come in limping with blood gushing all over.

  “I’m fine,” I say sitting down and waving him off. “I just had a little run in with the stairs at home.”

  “What sort of run in?” he asks. I can tell he’s suspicious.

  “I just slipped,” I say. “I already put some ice on it. It should go down after a couple of days.”

  He looks skeptically at me as he sips his gin and tonic.

  “Do you have a lot of accidents like that?” he asks.

  “I’m a bit of a klutz,” I answer. “It used to be a standing joke in high school. If there was a pole standing still, I would find a way to walk into it.”

  I turn away from him and take a sip of the whiskey that the bartender has just put in front of me. Silently, I pray that Ben doesn’t ask anything else about my black eye.

  I don’t like lying to him. But, I would like the pity and advice he would no doubt dole out if he knew the truth even less.

  There’s a fraught silence between us for several moments. I can still feel him staring at me.

  Finally, I hear him turn back to his drink and take another large gulp.

  “So,” he says, “has it been another one of those days?”

  My heart breathes a sigh of relief that the subject of my injury has been dropped. I turn back to face Ben.

  “Lately, I feel like every day is one of those days,” I tell him. I also tell him about one particularly cranky old woman I had to talk to on the phone at the call center today.

  “I thought that she’d be happy I could get a technician to go out to her house today,” I tell him. “But, she was just upset that she had to go two whole hours without TV.”

  “You should’ve told her to open a book,” Ben says with a smile.

  “I don’t think she would have liked that,” I say, taking another sip of whiskey. “Honestly doing technical support for old people is not all it’s cracked up to be.”

  “It’s not just tech support,” Ben says, “it happens where I work too.
It’s like there’s no middle ground with senior citizens. Either they’re the sweetest people in the world or they’re your worst nightmare.”

  We continue on in this vein for a while. Swapping work stories and the like. Because Ben works retail he has plenty of stories to tell. Some funny, some infuriating.

  Several drinks later, I fish into my purse and look down at my phone. Midnight. I know Jake will be home between now and two am.

  “I’ve got to go,” I tell Ben reluctantly.

  “Do you think he’ll be there when you get home?” he asks. His smile is gone and he suddenly seems very serious.

  “I hope not,” I say. “Jake doesn’t like it when I get home after him. He gets jealous.”

  Ben looks like he wants to say something to that. He even opens his mouth to make some kind of comment.

  A second later, he seems to think better of it. He closes his mouth, purses his lips and nods.

  I give him a half smile and stand up from the stool and turn to leave.

  “Ali,” he says, and I feel his hand gently touch my arm. Once again, I feel a tingling spark rush through my entire body. Eyes wide, I turn back to him.

  His hand leaves my arm and I can’t help but feel the loss of his touch. He reaches into the pocket of his dark jeans and pulls out a slip of paper.

  “If you ever get into trouble,” he says, “if you need protection…go to this address.”

  I look down at the paper. I recognize the address vaguely as the one attached to The Swamp. The Gator’s bar. Beneath the address is Ben’s hurried signature.

  “I might not be there,” he says, “but someone from my club is always there. I know the owner. Just show them this piece of paper and they’ll look after you. Ok?”

  He looks at me earnestly. As though he’s pleading with me, begging me to take him up on this generous offer.

  I know I can’t. Though I wish I could. All the same, I give him a small smile as I put the note inside my purse.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  Then, before he can say anything else, I rush out the door.

  On the walk home, that little piece of paper weighs down my purse like a piece of metal. It weighs on my mind even more.

  What if I did use it? What if I left Jake and rushed off to the Gators? Ben would protect me if I did. After the last few weeks, I’m sure of that. But, at what cost?

  Jake is high enough up the Raider’s chain of command that he could rally most of the guys to try and get me back. And then what? A turf war? Ben and a bunch of other innocent guys ending up in the hospital or worse?

  I don’t think I could do that.

  Still, when I think of Ben, his smile, his laugh, the gentleness of his touch, I don’t think I can stand to stay with Jake anymore either. Still having no idea what to do or how to go about doing it, I turn the corner and make my way home.

  My heart begins to hammer when I see Jake’s bike in the driveway. My pulse jumps to near panic when I see his silhouette in the window of the living room, pacing back and forth.

  He’s waiting for me. I know now, no matter what, I’m in trouble.

  *****

  “Where the hell have you been?” Jake asks by way of greeting.

  “Same as you,” I tell him. “I’ve been out.”

  The whiskey has given me a little more courage than I know is prudent when dealing with Jake. But, as I said before, he’ll probably hit me either way. There’s no use trying to stop it.

  “Who’ve you been out with?” he asks.

  “No one,” I tell him.

  “Bullshit,” he spits back. “You were out too late to be hanging out with no one.”

  I take a deep breath hoping, praying, that I can keep my composure; that I can sound convincing enough for him.

  “You can believe what you want,” I tell him. “But I went to The Watering Hole on my own. You can ask anybody who was there.”

  “You might’ve gone on your own, but you sure as shit didn’t drink by yourself,” he says.

  There’s a confidence in his voice that makes my heart stop. It’s like he knows.

  “And you know that how?” I ask.

  “Greg,” he says. “A buddy of mine stops by The Watering Hole before meetings on Thursdays. He told me you’re always there with one of the Gator boys.”

  He advances on me. I back up, almost connecting with the hard surface of the living room wall.

  “Greg says you and the Gator boy were gettin’ pretty cozy,” Jake says.

  “Greg’s full of shit,” I tell Jake.

  I felt the stinging slap across my face before I even saw him raise his hand.

  “He’s not a lying whore like you are,” Jake says bringing his hand down. I can still feel the burning across my face. I know it’ll go away within a few seconds, it always has before.

  The stinging is just subsiding when Jake grabs hold of my shoulders and pushes me hard against the wall. I feel the back of my head hit against the rough surface. I hit the wall so hard that my eyes begin to swell with tears of pain.

  Through the haze, I see Jake take one hand and reach into his pocket. My pulse begins to beat quickly in my ears once more. That’s the pocket where he keeps his knife. Every bit of drunken courage I had two minutes before drains out of me as he pulls the blade out.

  “I told you I’d kill you if you cheated on me,” he whispers. I can smell the booze on his breath as he brings the sharp edge of the knife to my throat.

  “I think you know I like to keep my promises,” he whispers again.

  “I…I haven’t cheated on you,” I manage to choke out. “I swear to god I haven’t.”

  For a second, I think he doesn’t believe me. For a second, I think he’ll slice my throat open and leave me to bleed out on our living room carpet.

  “You swear, huh?” he asks with a sneer. The knife still poised at my throat, I don’t answer. I just hold my breath and try to keep my body extremely still. Somehow I know that, if I move, he won’t hesitate to kill me.

  I feel myself begin to shake. Against my will, a frightened tear slides down my cheek. This seems to amuse Jake.

  His sneer turns to a grin. I feel the knife move from my throat and he takes a step away from me. I take a deep breath but still don’t dare to move.

  “I guess I can believe you this time,” he says. “But you’re not going out again. Not anywhere.”

  “Jake, I have to work-”

  “Then go to work and come straight back here,” he says, a growl beginning in his voice. “If you don’t, trust me, I’ll find out.”

  I don’t contradict him, don’t question. I simply nod in submission.

  He takes another step back and looks me up and down. A theatrical expression of disgust graces his face.

  “Go clean yourself up and get to bed,” he says. “I’ll sleep out here tonight.”

  I don’t hesitate. I rush from him and into the safety of, what used to be our bedroom. Now, it’s mine more than it is his. He hardly ever uses it.

  Here, I allow myself to take in great gasping breaths. I feel like I was about to drown and was pulled from the water at the last possible moment. I’m sputtering and coughing as though water had filled my lungs only a moment before.

  I knew what Jake would do to me if he found out. I thought I knew what it would be like to be threatened, truly threatened by him.

  Now I know that imagining something, in theory, is much different than living it. Now, when I think about that metal blade pressed against my throat, I know what I should have known months ago. I have to leave.

  Quickly, I move to the bed and sit down. As I do, I grab hold of my purse and fish through it. Eventually, I find the little scrap of paper Ben gave me.

  I know this is the only place in this entire town where I might be safe. If I try to go anywhere else, Jake will just get the guys from his club to come find me. But, with the Gator’s protection…

  Despite the scenarios my drunken, fevered mind came up with out
side, I know it’s unlikely that the Raiders would risk a war with the Gator’s just because of me. Jake might be able to convince some of the guys to go along with him, but it’ll be three or four at most. Not enough to take on the Gator club.

  So, quietly, I formulate a plan.

  First, I do exactly what Jake told me to do. I put on my nightgown and get ready for bed. But I also shove a change of clothes into my purse along with my toothbrush.

  The next morning. As soon as I get dressed, I put a call into my boss at work. I let them know that I’m sick and won’t be coming in. My manager gives a distracted ‘that’s fine, feel better’ reply and hangs up.

  As soon as the call ends, I sit on the edge of the bed staring at my phone for a long while. My heart is hammering and doesn’t seem to want to stop.

  I’ve thought about leaving Jake so many times. I’ve even dreamed about it. But now that it’s actually happening, the idea terrifies me. I have no idea what c0mes after this.

  Taking a deep breath, I make my way out to the living room. I see Jake asleep on the couch, and instinctively my heart begins to pound. Taking another breath, I tell myself to be as normal and casual as possible when I walk towards the front door as quietly as I can.

  I’ve almost made it before his voice on the couch stops me.

  “You going to work?” he asks groggily. I close my eyes to calm my nerves before turning back to him.

  “The boss called,” I tell him, “I’ve got to go in a little early.”

  I worked this out last night to explain my earlier than usual departure. All the same, I’m hoping that my voice isn’t shaking.

  I hold my breath as Jake squints at me through groggy, half-lidded eyes. I can tell he’s suspicious but can’t quite place why. I pray he never does.

  Finally, he turns away from me on the couch.

  “Be back by six-thirty,” he tells me.

  “I will,” I lie.

  I open the door and rush out to my car. Once inside, I take out the piece of paper. I know I’ll have to head there. To the only place in this town where I might be safe.

  *****

  There are only three people in the bar when I walk in. All of them turn and stare at me.

  The man behind the bar is fairly young and dressed in a black shirt and pants. One man sitting on a stool in front of the bartender is older, possibly in his forties, wearing a bandana and a leather jacket with the Gators logo on the back. His dark eyes squint intimidatingly at me.