by Haley Pierce
He shrugs like it’s not a big deal. “Next stop. Endicott Circle.”
I sigh. It’s probably dangerous to have him know where I live, but what can I do? I say, “I don’t live there anymore.”
He gives me a look. “Your parents sold the house?”
“Yes, we sold the house,” I say, not wanting to go too much into it. “I live on Main and Park Ave. Over the restaurant.”
He thinks for a moment. “Over Peking Dragon? Seriously?”
I glare at him. Peking Dragon is one of those establishments that no one can understand how it stays in business. The windows are all very high on the brick walls, and there is nothing but darkness beyond, with a dim red glow, so it looks like illegal things are going on inside. The parking lot is always empty, no one ever goes in or out, and yet it goes right on chugging along. There were rumors someone once got an egg roll with an entire chicken beak in it. We used to make jokes that there was a reason there were no stray cats in the neighborhood.
But other than the 24/7 scent of Chinese food wafting up to greet me, making me hungry for Lo Mein at odd times of the night, I like it. It’s my first apartment, and I’d been proud of it. Of course, it isn’t the Endicott Circle mansion I’d grown up in, and it isn’t a house in Key West. The nursing home bills ensure I’ll never be able to afford anything like that, ever.
So when he quips, “Seen any cats around lately?” I cut him off.
“Stop. All right?” I say. “Just stop. I’m happy there. And I’m satisfied with my life. Even if it isn’t as glamorous as yours.”
Amazingly, he shuts up. He keeps his eyes on the road, his hands at ten-and-two on the wheel as we drive down the pitch blackness of Old Fork Road, through Scabbers woods, a popular hunting area. He doesn’t speak again until he pulls onto the main drag in Bradys Bend, where Chuckie’s run-down Sheetz mini-mart and gas station is. “Would you really have fucked Magee in the parking lot?”
Hell, no. Chuckie is loud, has a knack for saying shit-stupid things at the worst times, and treats farting as an Olympic sport. Knowing what he knows of me, did he really think Chuckie and I could be a couple? I’m insulted.
Maybe I imagine it, but I could swear his voice was tinged with something. . . jealousy? Yeah, right. Not likely.
“I’m not answering that.” I point at his injured foot. “What happened to you?”
He shrugs. “Just a scratch.”
I snort. “Right. I saw you crying on TV, like a wittle baby.”
He grins. “So you watched the game?”
“Reluctantly. I was on shift at Billy’s. I had no choice.”
He pats his leg. “It ain’t too bad. Gotta have some surgery but I should be fine.”
“So you’re only here for a few days, right?”
He ventures a glance at me, raising an eyebrow. “Why do I sense you can’t wait to see me leave?”
I hitch a shoulder.
“Am I too much excitement for you? Your heart can’t take it? Is that it?”
I laugh sourly. “Yep. Hit the nail on the head with that one.”
“Because damn, this place is stuck in time, girl,” he says, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. “How do you take it? Everyone’s still exactly who they were before I left. Nothing’s changed. The Roll-A-Rama’s still serving up crap nachos. Abby’s still working her way through the men in this town. Chuckie’s got the same old job at Sheetz. And you--”
I cringe as he looks me up and down. I don’t think I want to hear what he’s going to say.
“I never thought you would stay, Genevieve. You and that big brain of yours.”
I swallow. “I didn’t. I mean, I went to UPenn for a semester. But then my mother died, and I—” I shrug.
He looks at me. “Your mom died?”
I don’t say anything, partly because I know he heard me, and partly because I don’t want to repeat it.
“Aw, Genevieve, I’m sorry,” he says, sounding genuine. At least he can be a human being about that, because he’s been there. “She was a nice lady.”
“It was fast. Breast cancer. She was so busy caring for the two of us she never took care of herself, and when they found it, it was too late. I came back here shortly after that,” I say, thinking of the last time I’d showed up at the house I grew up in. After my mom died, the once-homey and welcoming place that always smelled like cinnamon had been dark, curtains drawn, drenched in the scent of puke and whiskey and body odor. When a week went by without my father getting out of bed, I’d had to make an executive decision about him.
“He still doin’ everyone’s taxes round here?” he asks.
I shake my head. “No. He hasn’t been himself since she died.”
“Okay. But I can’t believe he’d want you to stay here.”
I swallow. The truth is, my father doesn’t want much of anything, anymore. But I’m all he has now. And one thing I don’t want is the pity, so I say, “I don’t know. As much as I wanted to get out, it actually felt good to come back home. I didn’t actually like college. UPenn was so confusing. I couldn’t decide what I really wanted to major in.”
“You wanted to write, didn’t you?”
I blink, surprised that he remembers. “Back then. But I took a journalism class my first semester. I got a C. I’m not very good. My professor told me I wasn’t captivating my audience.”
He’s pressing his lips together. “Fuck that. You’re captivating.” Then he grins. “At writing, at least. I can’t speak to other things.”
I punch him on his solid, muscular arm. The contact is enough to make me curious about what perfection lies underneath, so I vow never to do that again.
He pulls in front of the lit neon sign for Peking Dragon and throws the car into Park, then turns to me. “So, you’d have fucked Magee?”
I feel my hands curling into fists. “Yes. I would’ve fucked him silly. I have,” I lie, because I want to see something on his face other than superiority. “We’re an item. We fuck all the time.”
He coughs. Mission accomplished. He looks wounded. “Seriously. I never thought him as your type.”
“Well, you’re wrong. He’s the perfect type for me. We’re all stuck in the Bradys Bend time warp while Silas St. Clair was out conquering the world, changing it enough for the rest of us, and changing himself in the process. Now, fuck off.”
His eyes widen. “I haven’t changed.”
I snort. “Yeah. Right. You stick out here now like a sore thumb.”
He looks hurt. “I do?”
I nod and point at his gigantic, ugly ring. “You could signal to ships off the coast of the Atlantic with that thing.”
“What, this?” He takes it off and makes like he’s going to toss it away, but I can see the pride in his eyes as he looks at it. He slides it back on and spends another few seconds admiring it, during which time I want to smack him.
Then he reaches out to touch the side of my face, maybe push a lock of hair away, but I flinch away. “Stop.”
“You hate me,” he murmurs. “Got it. But it wouldn’t be Bradys Bend if you weren’t still my scrappy little girl.”
His girl. I feel a flutter inside that I quickly suppress. I am not his anything, and I’m not going to let him sweet talk his way back into my heart, with his fancy everything and his hotter-than-hell looks and his . . . god, he’s right about one thing.
I hate him.
“Fuck you,” I growl, pulling the keys out of the ignition and stepping out onto the sidewalk. “See you, Silas.” If I’m unlucky.
He jumps out of the car, resting his elbows on the top of it, and says, “Hey, wait. What about me?”
“You have legs. At least one of them is good. Walk, or limp, or whatever,” I say, not turning around as I hurry down the narrow, puddle-dotted alley between the restaurant and the laundromat. I climb up the wobbly metal steps to the door of my apartment.
“But I’m staying at the Milton. That’s like ten miles down the road.”
>
I turn to him, confused for a moment. He and his dad used to live in the apartment over St. Clair Auto, the now-defunct shithole of an auto-body repair shop down the street that his father used to own and operate, and I guess that’s just where I imagined him going after this. But when he made it big, despite the fact that he and his dad had always been at each other’s throats, he bought his dad a home in an exclusive retirement community in Naples, Florida. The few times I’ve gone past it, the shop’s windows were all boarded up and the vegetation and weeds around it had begun to swallow it up.
I hesitate before shrugging and continuing up the stairs. “Don’t care.”
“Ouch,” he calls to me. “That hurts.”
“Get used to it,” I tell him. “Or don’t. Again, I don’t care. I don’t give a shit about you, either way.”
That’s a lie; as blatant as you can get. But I need to put the brakes on this, because I can’t let him inside my apartment. I do that, and it’s all over. Knowing him, and the way he loves a challenge, he will spend all night trying to change my virginal status. And I’m not drunk, but I’m just tipsy enough not to trust myself. “Good night, Silas.”
When I get inside my apartment, I close the door and lean against it, letting my breathing slow to normal. Then I trudge straight to the bathroom, squeeze toothpaste onto my brush, and start to scrub my teeth. As I do, guilt creeps in, and I flick it away. It’s his damn fault if he falls in a ditch on the side of the road and dies. He has absolutely no family remaining in Bradys Bend, yet another reason why he has absolutely no business returning here.
As I’m gnawing on the toothbrush and throwing my hair into a ponytail, there is a knock on the door.
Still holding my toothbrush, mouth filled with foam, I open the door to see Silas standing there, hands laced together. I swallow a thick lump of toothpaste and look into his eyes, my resolve breaking, as he kneels down on my welcome mat.
“Please?” he asks, giving me the most pathetic, fat lower lip pout I’ve ever seen. If I squint just right, it’s the same little-boy Silas who tripped over his words when he asked me out for the first time. The same one who cupped my breasts with reverent awe. The same Silas who told me he loved me, and that there would never be another girl as perfect for him as me.
It’s one word. And it’s enough to completely destroy the wall around my heart. I push the door open, and let him inside.
Silas
The apartment over the Peking Dragon is shit. Dressed-up, smelling sweet, but shit. Before it was the Chinese restaurant, it was a trolley station, so it’s about the oldest thing in Bradys Bend, but it looks like Genevieve has made the most of it. It’s clean and cozy, filled with little touches that show she has pride in it. And it’s so very Genevieve—with all this cute, country-style shit around, like rustic snowmen and gingham checked curtains. It smells like gingerbread, not greasy Chinese food. I walk around the room, looking at all her pictures. She has frames on every surface of her living room. Most are of her and her parents. And of course, there’s a fucking huge bookshelf there, taking up much of the wall, loaded with more books than I could read in a lifetime. I scan the titles. Some of them aren’t even in English.
Though she never dressed the part, Genevieve Wilson is a true, snooty rich bitch, always parading around with her chin in the air, a few notches above everyone else. From what I can remember, Genevieve’s dad is a CPA who offered financial advice to just about every family here in Bradys Bend, including my dad, after my mother died. The Wilsons lived in the nicest house in town. Genevieve’s bedroom was the size of the apartment I’d grown up in over the auto shop, something I knew from the one time she let me sneak in to fool around on her giant, fluffy white bed. They lived a fairytale life. They never fought, because Genevieve was such the good, model daughter, volunteering at the soup kitchen, tutoring poor idiots like myself. While most girls wanted to distance themselves from their parents, Genevieve never did. Sometimes they’d come to my football games and she’d sit right between them, instead of with her friends.
When I look at her next, she’s standing in the doorway to the kitchenette, cell phone at her ear.
“What are you doing?” I ask her.
“I’m calling you a cab. Where are you staying, again?”
“The Milton.” I grin at her. “What? Don’t want me staying here? Are you afraid to spend the night with all this manliness?”
“Yes,” she answers, appraising me from head to toe. There is an honest-to-god fear in her big blue eyes, one she always used to get whenever I strayed my fingers somewhere she wasn’t sure of. “Honestly, yes. I don’t know you anymore.”
I’m surprised by that, because Genevieve always hid her fears, played tough. And she’s a woman now, not some kid. Scared of me? She’s got to be kidding. “Look, girl. I won’t be a problem. I promise to keep my hands to myself.”
She ends the call and throws her phone down on the coffee table, annoyed. “No one’s answering. That ‘twenty-four-hour service’ thing they advertised is for shit.”
I point to the shapeless, slip-covered sofa. “This is good. I’ll sleep here.”
“Well, you sure as hell aren’t sleeping in my bedroom!” she shouts, heading to the hallway. It sure as shit brings back every one of the millions of arguments we’d had. If she gets any more riled up, I’ll end up with cat scratches from her fingernails, all over my face.
“Wouldn’t think of it, baby.”
She steps inside her bedroom, mumbling, “Good night,” and slams the door before I can say another word.
“Okay,” I murmur, once I’m left alone, surveying my surroundings. I sit down on the sofa. It’s soft but short; my legs are going to be hanging up over the armrest at the knees. I’ll make do; though lately, I’ve been sleeping in a king bed in my penthouse at PNC Plaza in Pittsburgh, I’d slept in much worse while I was a D-Phi brother at UCLA. I look around for something to make it more comfortable, but all I can find is a heart-shaped pillow that’s half the size of my head. No sheets or blankets, but that’s fine; the apartment is warm.
I pull my ring off, setting it on the coffee table. Then, I strip off my jacket and t-shirt and start to head down the hall to the bathroom when her door swings open. She steps back, surprised. Her voice is accusing. “Where are you going?”
I point across the hall to the bathroom.
“Oh.” She’s holding a pile consisting of a sheet, a blanket, and a pillow, which she shoves into my arm like it’s a hot potato. “Here.”
I look at her. Her bronze hair is up in a ponytail and she’s wearing a ratty t-shirt that barely reaches her upper thighs, revealing those phenomenally long, milky-colored legs whose memory I used to jerk off to on a nightly basis. I lean forward and inspect the faded, cracked decal on the front, and shake my head. “Philadelphia Eagles? Seriously?”
She looks down and bats her eyelashes. “Oh, how did that get there? I just pulled any old t-shirt out.”
Sure, she did. “Feel free to take it off,” I say with a wink.
She lets out a huff of air. “Fuck off.”
“You naked under there?”
Now she’s looking at me like I have a screw loose. Naked Genevieve has been the source of too many of my wet dreams, but Naked and Riled Up Genevieve is enough to make me hard for days. She and I had made out enough to get me hard, about a thousand times. I fidget, standing there, just thinking of the blue balls she’d give me, at least twice a week. She is not skin and bones, more like soft, pale sweetness. Up until our last night together, I’d only ever felt it under her sweatshirts. But our last night, before prom, before she’d broken up with me and I’d left for California? She’d taken off her shirt.
I’d never seen two more perfect tits in all my life. All pale, even her nipples were the color of rose petals. Her skin was the color of cream. She was like the front of a dimestore romance novel, entirely lickable. I’d fumbled in my shock, flicking my fingers over the nipples, cupping my hands over
them, feeling the weight, until she blushed and pulled her bra back on. It’d had some pretty tense moments on the field, but that? That had, hands down, been my most intense five minutes of high school.
Just thinking of it, and seeing her here with her bare legs, my cock starts to swell. I haven’t been a virgin since . . . hell. When? About twelve minutes after she dumped me at my senior prom? But that doesn’t matter. My cock is jumping like it wants to pick up right where Genevieve and I left off. I fucking feel like a virgin again.
I wink at her. “Let me guess. Fuck off?”
“Yes,” she says, as I stride back to the couch. I throw the stuff down and when I look back at her, she averts her eyes from me. “You can—um.” She stops, takes a breath. Points behind her. “Bathroom is that door. Feel free.”
“I know.”
I realize her cheeks are flushed. She’s breathing hard, obviously struggling not to lower her eyes to my bare chest. She clearly doesn’t want to let on that she likes what she sees.
Fucking Genevieve. Angry, and innocent, and fucking beautiful.
Before I can thank her, she retreats to her room and slams the door again.
I pull off my boot, and my jeans, then lie out in just my boxer briefs on the sheets she’s given me. They smell like her, of her no-nonsense soap and detergent.
As tired as I am, I don’t sleep. I lie in bed watching lights from cars on Main Street slashing through the blinds, onto the ceiling, and thinking of the doctors in Philly. In another few weeks, I’ll have the surgery, and I’ll be back on the field, a month after that, with time to get into the playoffs, if they make it that far without me.
On my way back home to Pittsburgh, I saw the sign for Bradys Bend. And without thinking, I turned off and headed this way.
Truth is, I’d always hated this town. We’d always talked about running away. But I didn’t realize how much I missed it until I was actually here.
Maybe, home isn’t a place but a person. Maybe, deep down, I’d wanted to see Genevieve.
