Missing Ink

by E J Frost

  I don’t just want them; I need them.

  I’m strolling, casually batting at the flyers on a plywood construction wall closing off a brick building three blocks from my place that’s been under renovation for-fucking-ever, while I think about Mac and let the warm feeling spread all through me. I’m not in a hurry. Although she was an absolute trooper, several hours of pain finally got on top of the lady I’ve been working on all morning and she tapped out a half-hour early. I’ve got plenty of time to get to Logan’s townhouse before our late lunch. The day’s cool but not cold. There’s no bite in the air yet, but there is a hint of woodsmoke among the usual city smells of asphalt, exhaust fumes, and garbage. I have no idea where woodsmoke comes from, here in the concrete jungle; it’s one of those idiosyncrasies of living in the City.

  Ahead of me, two-story scaffolding scales the building under construction and overhangs the sidewalk. I step towards the street to go around it out of habit, smiling a little to myself at the memory of Bebe J’s superstition about walking under a ladder, when a man appears in the shadows of the scaffolding.

  I startle and give myself a shake. I know better than to daydream when I’m walking in the City. Yes, it’s the middle of the afternoon and I should be safe enough, but assholes don’t really care what time it is. I didn’t see him and I should have. I take another step towards the street to give him space to pass me on the sidewalk.

  Two more men appear in the overhang of the scaffolding. As I get closer, I realize why I didn’t see them: they’re wearing black sweats and as they move towards me, they’re pulling ski masks down over their faces.

  This is not good.

  I back up to get the stupid construction wall behind me. A hard hit will break the damn thing, but it’s better than having one of them flank me. I don’t see any weapons, but they could have anything tucked into their sweats. I’m not waiting to find out. I shrug off my leather jacket, which is too tight to fight in and let it drop to the ground. I don’t carry any weapons, not even a can of pepper spray, because I know from experience how easy it is to have a weapon turned against you, but, man, I’m missing my Smasher right about now. I shake myself. I have my hands and my feet and several years of training. Thanking the Benevolence that I’m wearing my Docs instead of heels, I bounce on my toes before I settle into a fighting stance, guard high, weight on my back foot.

  “Time to put you outta business, bitch,” Black Mask One says. He takes a step forward, pulling his right fist back to swing at me. He lets his other arm dangle at his side, and I wish for a fleeting second that I had Kru’s pool noodle to whap him on the nose for not keeping his guard up.

  Instead, I hit him with a left jab that lands solidly in his eye, which I feel squelch against my knuckles, and follow it up with front kick straight between his legs. I’m not sparring with these fuckers. I’m putting them on the ground so I can run the fuck away.

  Black Mask One drops to his knees, clutching his junk, with a scream that would do a Belieber proud.

  I take several deep breaths to pump my brain and muscles full of oxygen, and on an exhale scream “Help!” as loud as I can. I don’t actually care if anyone hears me, because I’m not sticking around. The streets are quiet this time of day. There’s no one else on this block and even if there were, this city isn’t the kind of place you wait for a rescue. Native New Yorkers don’t like to get involved. But I figure screaming might startle Black Mask Two and Three, and it does.

  Black Mask Two stumbles to a stop, looking torn between coming at me and helping his buddy on the ground. Black Mask Three recovers faster and pulls what looks like a flashlight out of his pocket. Then he snaps it open and I realize it’s a baton.

  I do not want to be hit with that thing. It could easily break a bone. I dance back, staying out of range, and shift my weight back and forth to loosen up my hip. Kicking him keeps my body better out of range than a punch. The asshole feints right and left, swishing his baton around like it’s a sword and he’s a fucking Musketeer, but he doesn’t actually raise it to hit me. While he’s screwing around, I line up and the next time he pretends to zig when he’s actually zagging, I go in at his stomach with my right knee and when he hunches forward to protect his gut, snap a roundhouse kick to the side of his head.

  His ski mask goes flying into the gutter and he goes down in a spray of blood out of his ear, with a thud that rattles my damn teeth. I hope it breaks a few of his.

  Black Mask Three collapsing seems to galvanize Black Mask Two. He screams “Bitch!” and charges me.

  I dance back to stay out of range of his flailing fists. As he windmills at me, I see the tattoo on his knuckles.

  “Hi, Kevin,” I hiss at him. “Wanna talk to the manager?”

  “Bitch!”

  Very limited vocabulary these dickheads have.

  He keeps swinging at me and I keep dancing back along the construction wall. He probably weighs about what I do, and he clearly doesn’t have any training, but if he lands one of these wild punches, he can still hurt me. I also really don’t want to hit him bare-knuckled if I can avoid it. Without tape and gloves, hitting him hard enough to put him down is going to hurt like hell. I’m already feeling it in my left hand from that punch to Black Mask One’s eye and that was a comparatively soft target. I need my damn hands.

  I kick at him, hoping to sweep his knee like I kept sweeping Mac’s, but Skinhead Kevin’s bouncing around too much for me to drop him on his ass. If I do get him down, I’m kicking him in the fucking head.

  Black Mask One rolling to his knees and projectile vomiting all across the sidewalk between us stops Skinhead Kevin in his tracks. Looks like the asshole had pizza for lunch. Man, that stinks. Kevin shies away from stepping through the spew, but I give not one fuck. I’m getting away from these dickheads whether or not I have roll in it. I stomp through the rank sludge and while Kevin’s still staring at his upchucking buddy, spin on my back leg and slam a flying elbow into Kevin’s throat.

  His scream is more garbled but still wouldn’t be out of place at a Beiber concert.

  I take stock of the three shitheads to make sure none of them are going to chase after me. Kevin’s on his knees, clutching his throat and gasping. Black Mask Two is seriously out, sprawled on his back among a pile of cans and glass where he knocked over a recycling bin as he fell. There’s a lot of blood on his face and on the ground near his head. I’m wondering whether I should get close enough to check if he’s still alive. Then he groans and I decide I don’t care. I’m not Florence fucking Nightingale and they weren’t delivering Girl Scout cookies. They were going to hurt me. When Black Mask One starts heaving again, I grab my jacket off the sidewalk and take off around the scaffolding at a jog that will get me away from them fast without laying me up tomorrow.

  They came at me half-way between my place and Logan’s, but I don’t hesitate in picking a direction. Mac’s in front of me. My place is behind me. I’m not sure what it says that I feel safer with Mac wherever he is than in my own apartment with my doors locked, but there it is.

  I check behind me as I reach the end of the block. The whole fight probably took less than two minutes and people have started moving towards the noise—not that any of them rushed to help me—but no one seems to be following me. The scaffolding obscures my view of the three dickheads, but I can see that one of them’s on his feet and staggering around. By his build, I think it’s Black Mask One. I don’t wait to see if he manages to shake off having his testicles relocated into his stomach and jog across the street without waiting for the light, winning me the usual New York salute of a blaring taxi horn. I flip the taxi off as I jog down the next block.

  I can still smell Black Mask One’s puke by the time I get to Logan’s townhouse. Either it’s all over my Docs, or it’s all in my mind. Either way, I feel terrible about trekking it into Logan’s house and I hesitate on the top step. Then I remember that three masked assholes who tried to hurt me are somewhere behind me. I ring the bell and
turn to get the door at my back so I can watch the street while I wait.

  A guy walking his dog across the street gives me a strange look but keeps going. I hear sirens in the distance but they’re way too far away to be responding to the three, downed dickheads. Without taking my eyes off the street, I prop one foot on a brick planter Emily’s filled with orange and pink flowers and begin unlacing my Docs.

  The door cracks open behind me.

  “Bren? You can come inside before you take off your shoes.”

  “Hon, I got crap all over my Docs. Can you bring me a bucket or something? And ask Mac to come out here?” I don’t want to scare her, but I also don’t want to be on the street alone.

  I keep fumbling the knot as I try to undo the laces. I always double knot my Docs, but I don’t usually struggle to get them off. I lift my hand to flex my numb fingers and see it shake.

  The door opens behind me again and Mac’s warm hand sweeps up my back. “Step in something nasty, sweetheart?”

  I nod.

  Mac’s hand settles between my shoulder blades. “Bren? You okay? You’re shaking.”

  “Yeah. I—” I have no idea what to say. I was attacked? That makes me sound like a victim. I’m not a fucking victim.

  “Sweetheart?” I hear the concern in Mac’s voice before he takes my shoulders and draws me up to face him. He swears. “What happened?”

  “Three guys,” I manage.

  Mac’s hands run down my arms, squeezing gently. When he reaches my left hand, I flinch. Damn, that really does hurt. He lifts my hand into the light and inspects my knuckles. “We need to get ice on this. I don’t think it’s broken but it sure is swelling,” he says quietly, the concern leaching from his voice. If he’s not concerned maybe I don’t need to be, either. I look up at him but he’s all blurry.

  “It’s okay, Bren. I’ve got you. Do you hurt anywhere?”

  I shake my head. “My shoes.”

  He quirks his eyebrows. “Your shoes hurt?”

  I stutter out a laugh. It makes my ribs ache. Did I get hit in the ribs? I didn’t think any of them managed to land a hit, but the muscles of my shoulders and ribs and back are beginning to ache like I’ve taken a pummeling.

  “My shoes, puke.”

  “Your shoes puked? Those are some talented shoes. I see why they rank above me.” Mac cradles my face in his hands and strokes my cheeks with his thumbs. “Come inside. Don’t worry about your shoes. We’ll take care of it. And this blood. We’ll get you all cleaned up and you can tell me what happened. Nice and slow. Maybe over a cup of hot chocolate, huh?”

  That sounds good. I nod.

  Mac wraps an arm around my shoulders and steers me inside. I stay off the runner because I really do not want to get puke on Logan’s carpet. His entrance hallway used to have some really old, really ugly pictures on the walls. Then Emily began making little changes here and there, and she replaced the old pictures with a couple of mirrors, which make the hallway feel more spacious. I startle at my reflection in one of the mirrors. I look like a ghost. My skin’s greenish-white. My eyes are huge and staring. There’s blood spattered up the right side of my face, smeared and gummy with sweat along my hairline. I swear none of them hit me. Why am I all bloody?

  “Here, here,” Emily says as she rushes back into the hallway with a bucket and a roll of paper towels. She kneels next to me.

  “Gross, no,” I object.

  “Bren.” She looks up at me and her eyes widen as she sees the blood. “Let me—”

  “I’ll take care of this, Em,” Mac interjects. “Could you let your daddy know that Bren’s okay but I’m going to take her upstairs and get her in a bath? If you could make us some hot chocolate with a spoonful of sugar in it, I’d really appreciate it.”

  Emily nods and hands the roll of paper towels to Mac. Eyes popping, she scurries back down the hallway.

  Mac kneels next to me and guides my right hand to his shoulder. “Hold on to me, sweetheart. This will only take a second.” I hear a metallic snick and feel a tugging on my Docs, but I can’t see what he’s doing as he bends over my feet. He balls up a wad of paper towels and presses them against my heel as he eases the Doc off my right foot. Then he does the same with the left. He swishes each boot in the bucket before he towels them off and sets them in the row of shoes by the coat rack.

  “Okay, talented shoes taken care of. Let’s get you upstairs.”

  “I love you more than those shoes right now,” I say, hearing my voice as though someone else is speaking. It definitely wasn’t me telling Mac I love him.

  Mac chuckles. “Glad I rank above the shit-kickers at last. Let me take your coat.”

  He slips it off my shoulders and I have a disoriented moment where I can’t figure out how the jacket got back on me. I’m sure I took it off to fight. Did I put it back on? When? Then Mac’s sliding his arm around my shoulders again and guiding me upstairs and I stop worrying about my jacket.

  He undresses me while the bath fills. There’s more blood on my baby blue sweater, which pisses me off. I love that sweater. If there’s blood on my yoga pants, I can’t see it against the black fabric. “Am I bleeding?” I ask Mac stupidly.

  He strokes my cheek as he helps me take off my bra. “Not that I can see, sweetheart. Did you make the motherfuckers bleed?”

  I nod. “I think I tore his ear. It was a good kick. Kru would have been happy with me. And I never let my guard down.”

  “Good job, girl. Do you want to call him and tell him what happened?”

  Do I? Somehow that seems better than telling Mac. Kru won’t ever think I’m a victim. “Yes, Sir.”

  “Okay, let’s get you in the bath and then you can give him a call. Do you have his number in your phone?”

  I nod. It’s respectful to let him know when I’m coming to class and I always text him first.

  “Good girl.” Mac takes my hand and helps me step into Logan’s huge, claw-footed tub. Like so much of Logan’s house, the thing is dated but not really an antique. Although I’d never tell Logan, his house makes me feel comfortable. Being around antiques gives me an attack of the clumsies. I stay clear of the library and smoking lounge at Blunts because they’re full of vases and spindly little tables and glass cases that look like they’ll flinch and shatter all by themselves at the first loud noise. Nothing at Logan’s house looks or feels breakable. It’s all old but sturdy.

  “I like it here,” I tell Mac.

  “I do, too, sweetheart,” Mac says, kneeling next to the tub. He strips off his T-shirt in that hot guy, over the head motion, and I drool dazedly over his shoulders and chest while he lathers up a sponge and begins drizzling hot, soapy water over my throat and chest.

  I slump back against the end of the tub. It’s padded. Comfortable, just like the rest of Logan’s house.

  Mac cleans my face then rinses out the sponge before running it down my arms. He cleans off both hands and I see the first and second knuckles of my left hand are dark red and puffy.

  While I’m staring at my bruised knuckles, there’s a knock on the door. “Mac, it’s me.” Logan’s voice.

  “C’mon in.”

  Logan walks in, carrying two steaming mugs and with a huge, blue terrycloth robe folded over his arm. He sets everything down on the counter around the sink and leans a hip against it.

  “Need any help?” he asks softly.

  “Nope,” Mac says. “She’s coming around slowly. Just shock and an adrenaline crash, I think. None of the blood’s hers but she needs an ice pack for her hand when you have a minute.”

  “No problem. Who d’you think I should be calling?”

  “Not sure yet. Bren wants to call her kickboxing Kru and tell him what happened. Might have a better idea after that.”

  “Okay. Anything else you need?”

  “I think we’re good here. Maybe another hot chocolate with a shot of whiskey in it if she doesn’t perk up, but let’s get the first one in her. The sugar alone might bring her around
.”

  “Right-o,” Logan says. “Shout if you need me.”

  “Thank you, son. Appreciate it.”

  Logan lets himself out quietly while Mac searches my pants until he comes up with my phone. He towels my hands off before he passes the phone to me.

  It takes me three tries to open the phone but when I finally do and dial Kru’s number, he immediately picks up. “Brenna?”

  “Hi, Kru.”

  “Everything okay?”

  “I just got in a fight. Three men tried to jump me.”

  “Are you hurt?”

  “No, Kru. My knuckles are bruised, and I got puke on my boots but I’m okay.”

  “Brenna, are you alone?”

  “No, Kru. Mac’s here.”

  “Do you mind if I speak to him for a minute?”

  I offer the phone to Mac who takes it and puts it to his ear while stroking my cheek with his free hand. Mac listens for a long moment and although I can hear Kru’s deep murmur, I can’t make out what he’s saying.

  “I’ve got her in a warm bath and I’m going to give her hot chocolate in a minute,” Mac says. “The sugar should help.”

  Kru’s deep murmur starts up again and Mac nods to whatever Kru’s saying. “She wanted to tell you first. Should I put her back on?”

  Kru speaks again and then Mac passes me the phone.

  “Brenna, thank you for calling me. Tell me about the fight.”

  I do, recounting each attack. When I get to the part where Black Mask One hurled all over the pavement, both Mac and Kru chuckle.

  “Bet you rearranged that fella’s guts for him but good,” Mac says, grinning at me. I grin back. He wouldn’t smile like that at a victim.

  “Other than your hand, how are you feeling now?” Kru asks.

  “Okay.” I’d say cold but I’m sitting in a warm bath. How can I be cold? But I am, down in my core, and I give a little shiver.