by Jay McLean
“Yeah?”
He sighs into the phone. “I’m not happy with the way you are around Maddy.”
“Maddy?”
“Yeah. Madison. My girlfriend. You can’t seem to take your eyes off her, and to be honest, it pisses me off and makes her uncomfortable.”
I make her uncomfortable.
Jesus Christ, it’s right there, plain as fucking day, and it took him to say the words out loud for me to realize what I’d been doing. I’ve been on the verge of stalking her, watching her from afar as she goes from her apartment to some flower shop again and again, and this entire time… What the hell has happened to me? “You’re right,” I finally admit. “I apologize.”
“Okay, good talk,” he deadpans.
“It’s just that she reminds me of someone I used to know. The resemblance is fucking uncanny.”
“You think you used to know her?”
I told her that I loved her and that I never stopped loving her, and she said—
She said she wanted to hate me, that I was deep in her head and that she couldn’t shake it, shake me.
And I thought that meant that she loved me back.
But I was so, so wrong.
“No.” I choke on the truth. “Not Madison. I don’t know her at all.”
41
NATE
Tiny’s feet thump against the pavement as he rushes past the pedestrians, most of them drunk after a night out at a bar or club.
I jog slowly but remain only two steps behind him.
“Stop, you motherfucker!” he shouts, clearly out of breath. Around us, people watch, some with their phones out to record him. “I said stop!” He pulls out his gun, holds it in the air.
“Put that shit away,” I yell through a chuckle, overtaking him. I get to his target and slam my hand against the metal. The truck stops, and the passenger’s side door opens. A college-aged guy steps out. “Are you insane?”
“Sorry,” I tell him. “My friend…” I point my thumb behind me.
“Dude, we’re done for the night. What the fuck?”
I hear Tiny’s short breaths seconds before his hand lands on my shoulder, his entire weight pulling me down. “Eighteen.” Inhale. “Tacos.” Exhale. “Please.”
The guy looks between us, his eyes wide in disbelief.
“Make it twenty?” I ask, grimacing.
“You’re fucking serious right now?”
“Trust me.” I pull out my money clip. “You don’t want to see my best friend hungry.”
“What he said,” Tiny pants, waving his gun between us. I don’t even think he knows he’s doing it.
The guy’s eyes bug out of his head, and so I grab the gun, unload it. “He doesn’t mean it,” I tell him, rubbing Tiny’s bald head. “Look at him. He’s a giant, soft, cuddly panda bear. He just needs his…” My brow knits. “What the fuck do pandas eat?”
“Coconuts?” Tiny asks.
“Bamboo,” answers the guy. “How wasted are you two right now?”
Tiny giggles.
I hold up my clip. “Drunk enough to pay whatever’s in here for twenty tacos.”
College guy stares at us a moment, then shouts over his shoulder as he takes the cash, “Robbie! We’re cooking!”
After my last call with Parker, I needed to get out of my head, and luckily for us, we were already at a bar. It’s been a hell of a long time since Tiny and I have had enough to drink to let loose, to not worry about our surroundings or be paranoid about who’s watching us.
Right now, we’re just two guys trying to replace the alcohol in our systems with—
“Mmm. Tacos. Sweet, sweet tacos,” Tiny sings, shoving half of one in his mouth.
We’re sitting on the curb, exactly behind where the truck was parked, and it’s probably not the safest place to be, but neither of us seems to care right now. “Would you rather…” I swallow my bite. “Eat twenty tacos off one naked girl or have twenty naked girls serve you one taco?”
Tiny ponders this a moment, then chuckles. “Do I get to put my dick in their tacos when I’m done?”
I say through a chuckle, “Could your dick survive twenty tacos?”
“Boss, you could line up twenty tacos in a row, and my dick’s so big I could fuck them all simultaneously.”
“Wait!” I bust out a laugh. “I thought we were talking about pussy. You’re talking about fucking actual tacos.”
“No.” He eyes the sky. “Oh, wait, I am.”
My shoulders shake with my laughter.
“But I do love me some tacos,” he mutters. “Sweet, sweet tacos.”
I scrunch my trash into a ball and place it beside me before kicking out my legs and getting comfortable. If Tiny keeps acting like he’s making love to the food, we’re going to be here a while. We sit in comfortable silence for a few minutes while he eats and I, unwillingly, let my mind go back to Bailey like it always does. “You ever fall in love, man?”
Tiny shrugs. “You’ve known me for over ten years. You ever see me with heart eyes?”
“Doesn’t mean you haven’t. Just means you haven’t let it show.”
“Nah,” he says, unscrewing the lid on his drink. “Love is more your thing. Besides, look at me. Who’s going to fall in love with me?”
I face him, my chest aching. “If I had a taco, I’d love you.”
He laughs at that. Then falls quiet again. “You thinking about Bai?”
“I don’t know what I’m thinking, man. I’m just… thinking.”
He clears his throat, focuses on the streetlights opposite. “Can I be honest with you?”
“Always.”
“You’re my best friend. My brother. And I hate knowing what you’ve gone through, hate seeing what I’ve seen.”
My heart sinks. “Sorry.”
“No, I don’t want you to be sorry. I want you to be better. This whole thing with Bailey, I get it. It’s fuckin’ heartbreaking for you. But there’s someone in your life who’s been dealing with the same thing for years.” He pauses a beat. “I like her, Nate.”
My eyes snap to his. “Ash?”
He nods.
I raise an eyebrow.
“Not like that.” He shakes his head. “But she’s a good girl, and she doesn’t deserve—”
“She knows what we’re doing,” I cut in.
“Doesn’t make the hurt any less.”
I heave out a breath, take in every single one of his words, and tuck them away to worry about another time. “What do you want, Tiny?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean you—Mark Wade, Sanitation Extraordinaire.”
He chuckles.
“We’re not going to be doing this forever, man. So, when you look at your life twenty years from now, what do you want?”
His smile is slow. “You know what I really want to do?”
“What?”
“I want to get one of those world globes. You know the ones I’m talking about?”
I let the memories of my mother flood my entire body with warmth. “Yeah, I know the ones.”
“I want to get one of those and spin that motherfucker. Wherever my finger lands, bro, that’s where I want to set up. A nice, modest house somewhere. A house I can turn into a home.”
I smile along with him. “And then?”
“And then what?” he asks, taking a sip of his drink.
“Wife? Kids?”
He nods, his eyes downcast. “Two.”
“Two wives?”
He chuckles. “Kids, you fucking dickwad.”
“Boys or girls?”
Shaking his head, he picks up another taco. “Either, as long as they’re healthy. And I’d like to travel. I mean, you pay enough, I could go—”
“You can go.”
“Not right now.”
“Why not?”
He smacks the back of my head, playfully. “Because who the fuck is going to take care of you?”
“So let’s both go. You and m
e.”
“Yeah?” he mocks. “Who’s going to run this town without us?”
I shrug, then smirk. “Jay Z and Rihanna.”
“You’re a smartass,” he laughs out.
“Nah, I’ll just lay low while you’re gone. I can live for a few weeks without you.” And he should live an entire lifetime without me dragging him down, taking away his dreams. “You should go, man. You got a passport?”
“No, never needed one before.” Similar to Bailey, Tiny grew up with parents who gave zero shits about him. Not unless they needed a target during their drunken rages. It took him a good while to tell me his story, and it was the only time I’d seen him break down. He left that life when he was fourteen, but unlike the girls on posters hanging in the evidence room, there’s never been a missing person’s report for him, because his family never missed him.
Occasionally, he’ll tell me that I saved his life, but he has no fucking idea how much he saved mine. Blood isn’t always thicker than water, and Tiny and I—we share the same stream. He’s put up with so much of my shit, and in return, I’ve given him nothing. Nothing but these plans and hopes for a future he’s never even mentioned until now. “You should do it; get a passport.”
“Maybe,” he says, shrugging.
“No maybes, Tiny. Get the passport. Get the globe.” I make sure he’s looking at me when I say, “Get the modest house and the wife and two kids.”
He stares at me, his eyes boring into mine, and he knows what this is—what I’m putting on the table. I’m giving him an out, and going by the silence passing between us, he’s contemplating it. I would be, too. This shit can’t last forever. “Maybe we could be neighbors.”
I crack a smile. “Maybe.”
Ashton’s entire body barely takes up space on her king-size bed, and I can’t help but frown at the sight of it. Lit only by the streetlights filtering through the curtains, she’s curled into a ball on one side of the bed as if she were waiting for her husband to get home and fill the other side.
It’s a shame, really, that her husband is me.
Quietly, I approach her, not wanting to startle her, and sit on the edge of the bed. And then I just watch her, this… this beautiful girl who has a heart bigger than most and a past that should’ve stripped her of that.
Recalling Tiny’s words, I reach up, finger a strand of her hair away from her forehead, smiling when her eyelids flutter open. “Hey,” she croaks, her voice scratchy from sleep. “What are you doing here?”
“I just wanted to talk to you.” And I want to tell you I’m sorry, but I’ve said it so many times it no longer holds meaning.
She rolls onto her back. “What time is it?”
“It’s late.”
Her brow furrows before she sits up, switches on the bedside lamp. “Is everything okay?” she asks, pulling the covers up to her chin.
“Yeah.” I watch her watching me, concern deep in her eyes. “Everything’s fine.” She has these freckles on her nose, pale, tiny ones that I’ve only ever seen up close a few times.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” she whispers, dropping her chin to her chest.
I give her the truth. “Because you’re beautiful.”
Shaking her head, her eyes downcast, she whispers, “Don’t do that, Nate. It’s not fair to me.”
She’s right. It’s not. I’m sorry. Because nothing I’ve been doing lately is fair to anyone. But that’s why I’m here. To make it right. Set is straight. “Listen, I need to go away for a few days. And I need you to tell Tiny when he comes by tomorrow morning.”
Her gaze lifts. “He’s not going with you?”
“No.”
“And he doesn’t know you’re going?”
“No.”
“Where the hell are you going?”
“It’s not important.”
“Nate,” she breathes out. “What’s going on?”
“I just…” I swallow hard. “I just need to take care of a few things. But I’ll fill you in on everything when I get back, okay?”
It takes her a moment, and then she nods, inhales a huge breath. “Okay.” Then she leans forward, takes my large hand in her small one. “You’ll be safe?”
“Always.”
“When are you leaving?”
“My car gets here in fifteen minutes.”
She lowers her gaze as her shoulders drop. “Do you think you can ask Tiny to stay here while you’re gone?”
I lift her chin with my finger, my eyes searching hers. “I can, but why?”
She chews her lip. “I know we sleep in separate beds and you get home at all hours of the night, but I just… I feel safer when I know that you’re here.”
I push down my heartache at her words and press my forehead to hers. “I didn’t know you felt that way.”
“Well, I do.”
“You want me to lie with you until the car gets here?”
She pulls back and scoots to the middle of the bed, giving me room to slide in beside her. Then she finds comfort under the crook of my arm, her head on my shoulder, her hand on my stomach. “What did you do tonight?”
I can’t help but laugh. “Stopped Tiny from holding up a taco truck at gunpoint.”
She giggles into my chest, her breath warming my skin. “You think we can have a taco night when you get back?”
“If you want to, sure.”
“You can invite Tiny, and I’ll invite a few girls from the salon. Make a thing of it.”
“It sounds perfect,” I whisper, kissing the top of her head. And in a way, it kind of does.
Too bad I won’t be around to witness it.
42
NATE
The door to the booth clicks open, and an older woman walks out, her coat held tightly in her grasp. She’s whispering words, words I’m familiar with, but could never recall off the top of my head.
I look around me, noting that I’m the only one left. I’d been holding off, knowing that what I need is going to take time. Getting to my feet, I pull the cuffs past my wrists and stretch out my neck. Then I go to the booth, inhaling one last, long breath before opening the door. The space is small, meant only for one. Or two, if you include the person on the other side. I wait, unsure of what to do, and then a small window opens, the divider enough to hear, but not clearly see the person on the other side. I wait for him to speak first, but seconds pass, almost a minute, and so I break, clear my throat. “I’ve never done this before,” I mumble, my voice rough from lack of use. “What is it I’m supposed to say? Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned?”
The priest laughs once. “For I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous God, inflicting punishment for their ancestors’ wickedness on the children of those who hate me, down to the third and fourth generation; but showing love down to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments.”
My eyes narrow, my mind spinning. What? “I’m sorry. I have no idea what that means.”
“The passage is from Exodus. Maybe you should study your faith a little closer, Nathaniel.”
I smile to one side. “Aren’t these booth things supposed to be anonymous?”
Father Gallo laughs under his breath. “You finally moved back to New York?” he asks.
“Nah.” I look down at my hands. “I’m just visiting.”
“Ah. So, it looks like I’ll be taking a few more trips to Philadelphia before I die.”
“You got a hell of a lot more life left in you, Uncle Ezio.”
When I hear his door open, I do the same. He meets me on the other side, greets me with a hug reserved only for family.
When he pulls back, he scolds, “Don’t say ‘hell’ in my church.”
“Shit.”
He shakes his head. “Don’t fucking curse either.”
I laugh as he leads me toward the church doors, throwing a coat on before stepping outside.
Uncle Ezio’s the only surviving family I have, but I didn’t know about him until
a couple of years ago. He’s my nonno’s brother, which technically would make him my great uncle, I think. When Ezio chose the church over the life of crime, he became estranged from the rest of the family, as well as The Family. As a kid, I don’t recall anyone ever mentioning him, so when he found me in Philly, I was suspicious. I had every right to be. He approached me on the street, blasting my name as if I were God himself, and then he started cursing, telling me he’s been looking all over for me. That’s when I noticed the white collar around his neck. I thought he was crazy. Swear, Tiny was two seconds away from punching him straight in the jaw. He sure as hell wasn’t like any priest I’d ever met. And that made me curious... so I let him buy me a drink. He drank too much. Smoked too much. Swore too much. He was everyone’s favorite uncle at the tail end of Christmas Day. I liked him, but I didn’t believe him.
And then he showed me a picture of my parents on their wedding day.
Uncle Ezio knew things about my life, about my mom and dad. Even though he wasn’t around, he kept a heavy watch on us from a distance. It didn’t matter that he was a priest; he was still a Gallo, and that name was infamous. Especially on the streets of New York. People still feared and respected him the way they did my nonno, and that—that gave him the best of both worlds.
He said he and my mother kept in contact after her dad passed, but it was kept quiet, just between them, just how they wanted it. He had possession of photographs of me she’d sent him, along with many, many handwritten letters. I recognized her writing right away. A lot of the letters spoke about me, and he let me read every single one. Then he offered me the same thing he’d offered my mother when she was alive. He offered an out, a way to escape. Because even though he had an entire congregation beneath him, he didn’t have a family. We were it for him. And he swore he’d do whatever he could to help us. Whatever we wanted. Whenever we needed it. That’s when I knew that I could trust him.
“So, tell me,” he says, smiling and nodding at the people we pass on the busy Brooklyn streets. “What gives me the pleasure of your company, my nephew?” he asks, lighting up a cigar.
