by Brenda Ford
Daniel hands me a ring and we slide them on to one another’s fingers, sealing our love forever more in one short movement. Then the officiant calls out for Daniel to kiss the bride, so he dips me low in a dramatic gesture and crashes his lips to mine. By the time we break apart we are laughing and happy, soaring in joy with one another. Las Vegas has turned out to be yet another life changing day for me and I have a feeling that here are a lot more lying ahead of us. With Daniel Wilson, every day is an adventure and I can’t wait to see what will happen next.
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She was my world.
I wanted to give her everything…
But things changed in a heartbeat.
I went off the rails and made some bad mistakes,
Crime, Gang, and Bikes became my new world.
I made the worst possible version of myself.
And now, years later I see her again.
She is more beautiful than ever before.
She is bringing that desire out of me once more,
To be that good guy she once fell in love with.
And, I am tempted to be with her again.
The only problem - it isn’t always easy to leave a bad life behind.
Do you think she would give me a second chance now?
Extract
Chapter 1 – Artie
What the fuck am I doing with my life? I wonder as I stare around the club headquarters, trying to work out exactly how I ended up here. I always loved my motorcycle, ever since I first got it, but I never thought that I would end up in a motorcycle gang. This isn’t really the path that I was ever supposed to take.
“But here you are,” I whisper to myself as I suck back the rest of my beer. “Here you are…”
I suppose I do know the moment that the strings connecting me to the planet were cut leaving me floating through life with nothing real to keep me fixed, but I try my hardest not to think about it. Ever. It’s too hard. Yet as I watch the rest of the guys in the motorcycle gang enjoying life in the club house, the memories that I do my best to push down at all times come flooding to the surface making it hard for me to breathe.
Lee Harper. My very best friend growing up, the person who I told everything too. Of course, I had all of my brothers who I could go to about anything as well, but he was the one person outside of my family who I could really trust. We went through everything together, we grew up as the best of mates, and our love of bikes came at the same time. Our parents were worried and warned us of the dangers, but we didn’t care. Together, we agreed that the danger was a big part of the excitement. It was what made us happy. That adrenaline rush was unlike anything else we had ever experienced, and we weren’t about to let that go for anyone…
I thought that we would go through life together. I assumed that me and Lee would go to business college together, and that everything would be amazing. I never envisioned a life without my best friend in it. Which only made the night of our graduation party that much harder to deal with.
He wasn’t on his bike that night because he was drinking alcohol. We all were. Me and Lee might have liked the danger of riding our bikes, but we never would have done so drunk because we wouldn’t have wanted to needlessly endanger ourselves or other people. Which is ironic, I guess, considering what did happen.
I didn’t know that Lee had left the party. I was drunk and having the best time, enjoying my night with my girlfriend, living my best life knowing that the summer ahead was going to be the best of our lives before everything changed for the better. Before college and then the world, which was going to be our oyster.
But Lee wasn’t enjoying himself so much. I think that he might have drunk too much too quickly, so when another guy in our class, but not one that we were particularly friendly with, was leaving the party I guess that he decided to go as well. The last decision that he would ever make as it turned out…
The car accident was a bad one. A really bad one. No one can quite decide if it was the driver of the car that Lee was in, who was a little bit over the legal alcohol limit, or the over worked lorry driver who could have easily fallen asleep at the wheel, is to blame, but I suppose it doesn’t really matter. The end result is the same thing. All the three guys lost their lives and I lost my best friend. Lee’s mother always said that it was going to be his bike that killed him, but it wasn’t. It wasn’t his fault, that’s the only thing that anyone can be sure of, which is why it’s such a tragic shame. For me to lose him like that in such a needless way… it crushes me. I still hate it.
“I managed to get nearly ten grand,” one of the newer guys to the motorcycle club cries out proudly beside me, shaking me from my thoughts of the past. “I think I’m going to love it here. I am going to prove myself.”
I resist the urge to roll my eyes as the other guys clap him on the back with happiness, glad that he is sliding in to the criminal side of things so well. That’s never been for me, it’s always been something halfhearted if I have ever participated in anything, and I haven’t ever been involved with the more violent side of things. Butch normally wants all of the members of the club to be a part of everything so that we are all on equal territory and no one can go squealing to the cops, but for some reason he has always given me more of an easy ride. Probably because I came to him fresh out of high school when I needed to escape my home town and the grief that came from it, so he knew that I needed an easy ride. I’ve proven my loyalty to the club since then so Butch isn’t worried about me. I can just carry on floating on the surface of things. Hanging about on the edge of existence.
Then again, I am twenty-nine years old now, on the edge of a new decade of my life, and I don’t know if I want to keep floating through life in a meaningless way with absolutely no firm roots anywhere. This has gotten me through my twenties, this is what I have needed to help me recover from losing Lee, but now… well, now I don’t know if there is something else out there for me. I don’t know if this is the life that I want. Then again, I don’t know if I can change things. I don’t know if there is anywhere else in the world that I can belong.
I sigh loudly and suck back some more beer, hoping that it can take the edge off. I have been living under this big black cloud for far too long and there isn’t much that can get rid of it at all. The beer helps from time to time, but I don’t think that it’s going to today. Not when Lee is all that I can think about.
I slide my eyes closed for just a moment and think about how different my life would be if Lee hadn’t gotten in to that car, if he was still alive. I know for sure that I wouldn’t be here. Instead, we would have had that amazing summer together, we would have gone to college and had the best time, we may have even ended up starting a business together which is something that we talked about a lot. I would have still had a lot to do with motorcycles, but it would have been a different way. Not me in the middle of some motorcycle gang which survives through crime… God, if Lee could see me now, he would kick my ass for who I have become. He would throttle me and tell me that his death shouldn’t have affected me so much. I should have carried on with my dreams anyway.
Sorry, Lee. It sucks to think that I have let him down. I think that might be why I am still in pain. Sorry.
“Hey, handsome…” Tara grabs my arm and causes my eyes to snap open. Butch’s sister spends far too much time here flirting. Usually with me, even though I have made it extremely clear that I would never got here with her. Not a chance. Butch hasn’t expressed that he doesn’t want anyone fooling around with Tara, but I’m pretty sure that it’s an unwritten rule. Especially since I couldn’t marry her. I don’t even think I can give enough of myself to her to even be in a relationship. I’m too lost for all of that. “How’s it going? You look like you have the weight of the world on your shoulders. What can I do to cheer you up?”
I snort out a mirthless laugh. “There isn’t anything that you can do, Tara, thank you.”
But she doesn’t take this as a hint to leave me alone,
she remains right where she is even though I do think that it’s pretty clear I’m not in the mood for any kind of conversation with anyone. I’m not going to be rude to her though, Butch isn’t the sort of guy that I ever want to be on the wrong side of.
“What’s on your mind, Artie? Why do you look like the world is coming to an end? Do you need to get laid or something because I have to be honest with you, I haven’t ever seen you with a woman? Oh my God…” She squeezes my arm really hard. “Are you a virgin or something? Is that what’s wrong with you?”
“Grow up, Tara,” I reply gruffly. “Don’t be stupid. Of course, I’m not a virgin.”
“Well, you haven’t ever had a serious relationship then, because you do not seem like a boyfriend type…”
God, once up on a time, everyone thought of me as the ‘boyfriend type’ because I was in a long-term relationship. Well, one that lasted eight months which is basically forever in high school terms. We were the ‘real deal’. Our friends always assumed that we would be the high school sweet hearts who got married and lived happily ever after. I wasn’t even worried about leaving her behind in high school while I went off to college because we were so strong… or we were until Lee died anyway. That changed everything. I went from being the perfect boyfriend to being a real asshole. As I lost my way in life, I sacrificed a lot of my personality, I became insular and angry at the world. I pushed her away, made her hate me, then left town to come here.
I had Rose Smith once up on a time, she was the one for me and I still think that she is my ‘one’. I lost out on my chance of real love and that isn’t something that I can get back now over a decade later. When Lee died, I did as well which is why I live this empty life, because it’s all that I deserve. I should be the dead one.
“I’m not the commitment type,” I tell Tara with a one shouldered shrug. “That’s all. I don’t think that’s strange. Not everyone is. I am happy being a lone wolf, thank you very much.”
“Well, you sure as shit don’t look happy to me.” There is a real spite to Tara’s tone, and I don’t quite know where it has come from. “You look like you want to crash your bike or get caught on the wrong end of a shootout. I sometimes don’t know why my brother keeps you around when you’re so depressed and boring. It isn’t fun to be around. Butch might be blinkered when it comes to you, but I’m not falling for it.”
“What the fuck are you talking about…?” I start before I realize that I just don’t care. “Never mind.”
“Oh, just fuck you, Artie. Honestly. I don’t know why I even bother talking to you. It’s awful. You always manage to bring me down, even when I am in the best mood ever. It’s pointless. You are pointless.”
With that, she storms off. I probably should try and work out what crawled up Tara’s butt, but I don’t really care. I’m just glad that she isn’t here giving me more shit. She can hate me all that she wants, but she isn’t going to change me. She isn’t going to make me happier. I don’t think that anyone can do that for me. Not even me.
