by Cee Bowerman
“Gonna need to talk to those girls. Serious like. Get angry. Frank’s been trying to call both of them for an hour and neither answered. He’s shitting bricks and they are back here laying around the yard. Phone’s nowhere near them. What if there was an emergency?” Joe motioned over his shoulder at Lisa and Carlie in the yard.
“Shit.” Sam cursed. “Okay I’ll talk to Carlie. Glue the damn thing to her hand if I have to.”
“I’ll talk to Lisa.” Zeke said. He was very carefully not looking past Joe to the grass. “What did this Frank guy say?”
“Said that Lisa’s, well shit, whatever the fuck he was. He’s outta jail. Hired a lawyer and got bail reduced while he’s waiting trial.” Joe’s face got red. “Fucker don’t need a lawyer or bail. Needs a short rope and a tall tree.”
Zeke was working hard to keep his voice calm. “They know where he is?”
“They can’t find him. His apartment was trashed, car is gone. He’s in the wind. Frank is there now putting heat on the cops about it and will be here as soon as he can. He called the law here in town and they said they will keep an eye out. To them he is just gonna be some dirtbag that skipped bail. To me he is gonna be a moving target. Probably the same for you two, I’m thinking?” Joe asked.
“Shit. Yeah. Don’t shoot him until I have played with him a bit first. Brothers are gonna need a quick turn too.” Zeke said. He looked past Joe to the grass to see that the girls had rolled up their mats and Carlie was laying in the grass with Tuff. Lisa was carrying the mats toward the porch.
“She’s headed up here. You gonna tell her he’s out?” Zeke asked Joe.
“She knows, son, she can feel it. She’s faking this calm shit just so she doesn’t freak y’all out. Believe me.” Joe turned as Lisa got near the steps. “Little Bit. Good seeing’ ya got your shit together for a bit.
Worried me.”
Lisa smiled at him. Then her eyes went to Sam and Zeke.
“What are y’all talking about?” she asked. “He’s here, you don’t have to tell me. I know he is. I can feel it. I feel different this morning though. I’m not gonna run, at least right this minute. I might lose my shit later, no promises.”
“Do what you do, sweetheart. We’ll pick you up when you’re done.” Joe winked at her as he got up to move off the patio. “I’m done being the bearer of bad tidings. I got a meeting to catch.”
“I’m not gonna break again. Is Jace coming back to take us to my appointment?” Lisa asked Zeke.
“I’m going to call him. I think we should take the truck instead. I’ll take you back out on the bike when things are calmer.” Zeke pulled out his phone and started to text his brother. “Need you to find your phone, fairy girl. Joe said Frank had been trying to get you for a while and was worried.”
“Oh shit. It’s on my table. I’ll run get it.” Lisa propped Carlie’s mat by the door and turned to her apartment.
“I’m coming with you.” Zeke stood, still moving his thumbs over his phone to type. “See ya, brother.”
Sam got up to walk down the steps to Carlie, still with Tuff in the grass. He walked to her and blocked the sun so she could look up at him.
“You trying to prove something by getting a sunburn on that new skin, darlin?” he asked her with a smile. “Because I’m guessing that happens and you will feel like you are made of glass.”
“Dammit!” Carlie started to curl up but caught her side with one hand. Sam reached a hand out and she took it and let him pull her up. “I never even thought about that!”
Carlie turned to walk to the back door and Sam slapped her on the ass. “Make me a sandwich woman. Your man is starving! Watching you all bendy in those pants makes a man hungry.”
Lisa threw her head back and laughed.
“Sam Sam. You kill me. But did you notice some of those bendy things I was doing? Might be fun to try them out naked.” She smiled over her shoulder at him as she walked away.
“I took notes, sweetheart. Pictures burned into my head. I’ve got lots of ideas running through me right now.” Sam smiled as he walked behind her, watching her ass the entire time.
20.
Sam, Lisa and Zeke sat at the kitchen island while stood at the stove top to make grilled cheese sandwiches for everyone. They were making small talk, discussing places that Lisa needed to know about now that she was a permanent resident.
The Foo Fighters were on the stereo and I was feeling the music and the calm vibes of being in my house with people I loved, making food for them to enjoy. I felt Lisa come up close beside me and whisper for me to turn around as I noticed she was holding her phone in her left hand with the camera on.
She and I turned together to look over the island at the guys and I saw Sam holding Freddie in his arm like a baby, his other hand rubbing her stomach. Her head was thrown back over his arm, and Zeke was cupping her head scratching her between her ears. The brothers were talking quietly, heads tilted towards each other, having a serious discussion. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Lisa holding the button down to take a burst of pictures.
Lisa put her phone down and looked at me, she grabbed my arm and spun me around to look back to the stove, our backs to Sam and Zeke. With a serious expression on her face as she whispered, “I am warm and melty all over, my stomach keeps flipping around, my chest keeps thumping, all over. I have never felt like this just from looking at a man. I am feeling things down there and I don’t know what to think about that. It’s like I am starving and he is the only one who has the food I want. I don’t know what to do with this, Carlie.”
I methodically flipped the sandwiches while I formed an answer that wouldn’t terrify her. It took me a second and I could tell she was trying to be patient.
“You know what a handsome man looks like. You see magazines with hot guys on the front, movies with shirtless men that are smokin’. You know you see beauty and you appreciate it. But that beauty is like looking at a candy bar. It is simple. Easy to get over once you’ve had your fill.” How do you explain to a full-grown woman that she was feeling the first stirrings of a huge crush, sexual attraction and possibly love for a man? I stepped back into it, trying to keep her from bolting at the information. “You see him, and you like everything about him. The way he looks, the way he talks, the way he smells, and you get that warm feeling downstairs. That’s lust. But you feel the way he looks at you, see how he watches you when he thinks you don’t know, you feel how careful he is with you to make sure you are okay. That’s what makes your heart thump and what makes your stomach flip. That’s the beginning of love, darlin’. It’s a fucking roller coaster and the ride is fantastic. So fantastic you never want to get off.”
I heard her breath whoosh out of her. She got tense but then seemed to relax.
“He sees what he sees but he doesn’t know what I am, Carlie. Once he figures that out, he won’t look at me like he does.” She said sadly.
“That’s fucking bullshit. Total bullshit. I can tell by the way he looks at you that you could tell him you eat toddlers with your applesauce on Thursdays and he would nod his head and ask if you need ketchup. He’s feeling all the same twisty, mushy and warm things you are and for all the same reasons. Don’t assume to know what he will or will not do.” I was firm but loving with her. This was new territory for her with Zeke. “Ride the ride, sweetheart. Hold on tight and keep it going. You won’t regret it. You would regret it til your dying day if you hit the brakes before anything got started. I had to hit the brakes with Sam by leaving in the middle of the night without a word. It fucked with me every day for almost eleven years, and from what I understand it fucked with him too. Skip that part and go with the good stuff. Get me?”
She had turned so that she was leaned on the counter beside me, watching Sam and Zeke. I glanced at her face and saw that she was seriously studying Zeke, thinking about what I said.
“Let’s get through this stuff with Sir and then see if he still looks at me the same. Then I will figure out if
the ride is closed or if I can get him to punch my ticket.” She turned her head to look in my eyes and I could see such sadness that I wanted to cry. “I’ll deal with either way that goes.”
I piled the finished sandwiches on a plate and turned to the island. I saw Lisa put her phone back up for more pictures and looked up at Sam. Freddie was sitting on the island in front of him, her paws on his chest, rubbing her head against his jaw, his beard twisting around her ears.
“I think the Queen is trying to take my man.” I said seriously. “That shit is not going to fly.”
All three of them laughed and finally I let out a chuckle. I had never been a jealous person, but now I was pissed at a cat for trying to have time with my man. Green eyed dragon and Carlie are apparently pals now. Just great.
~*~
My boxes were delivered soon after we ate lunch. There weren’t many, but it was interesting to walk down memory lane and tell Lisa, Zeke and Sam about some of the places we had lived.
A couple of boxes had items that were definitely teenage girly, those came from when we first left my life when I was just fourteen. There were pictures of boy bands, but mostly pictures of 1980’s glam rock stars. The posters and pictures prompted us to pull out our phones and look up songs to listen to. We had quite a few laughs as one or more of us would jump in with the chorus and do our best impressions.
We found opened the boxes from my life after I left Rojo, and the mementos weren’t nearly as bright and cheerful. A few little knick knacks I had collected here and there. Some funny refrigerator magnets. A key chain with a dog that looked oddly like Tuff. There were quite a few pictures in the boxes, most of them taken by Sheila of Joe and I.
I showed them the pictures while I tried to figure out what town we were living in when they were taken using the clues of the places we were living in that I got from the photos. I had a few funny stories, but they were sadder, knowing that I was missing Sam during the memories and thinking of how he was here in Rojo missing me.
I set aside a pile of pictures for Joe, most of them showing a smiling Sheila through the years. I didn’t know if it would be better to give them to him now or hold onto them while he worked through his pain and his drinking.
Lisa made the decision for me, gathering up the photos I set aside for Joe and taking them into my office to scan them to digital so that Joe and I could both have copies. Zeke went with her so Sam and I were on the patio alone for a while.
“You look so lost in some of these shots, baby. Not like yourself.” Sam said as he held a photo in his hand. It was a snapshot of me sitting curled up in the corner of the couch, my face in profile as I stared out the window.
“I was sad. Depressed. Miserable. I was missing part of me. I left it here with you.” I answered softly. “Sheila kept telling Joe I needed to see someone but that wasn’t in the cards for us then. Not something we could have done, patient confidentiality or not, we couldn’t let anyone else in.”
Sam leaned over the box and kissed me softly. I pulled up on my knees to lean closer to him.
“I missed you too baby. Every day. I was lucky enough to have my brothers and Kari. And my Dad though most of it.” he murmured as he pulled back.
“I’m not sad now, so let’s get this stuff done so we can go for a ride. Sound good?” I asked him trying to make the mood a little lighter.
“I’m in. Let’s finish.” he smiled and moved to open another box.
Zeke and Lisa joined us a few minutes later as I opened a box full of stuff from my parents’ house.
Somehow, the boxes from my childhood were easier to go through. I enjoyed seeing pictures of my parents and was a little shocked that there weren’t more feelings of loss there. We laughed at the pictures of me as a child in a few photo albums that my mother had put together through the years.
My baby pictures seemed to interest Sam. He smiled at pictures of me as a toddler, but always went back to my baby shots.
“What are you looking at so closely?” I asked him.
“Wondering if I could get lucky and we could have a baby girl with red hair and blue eyes just like yours.” he answered honestly. A vision of him holding a baby girl that looked just like me made me shiver. “But then again, I’m thinking maybe we should have ugly children, so I don’t have to worry about asshole boys trying to lead my girls down the wrong path.”
Zeke let out a laugh.
“Looking at the two of you I can’t imagine your DNA would allow for anything other than perfection.” Lisa said to Zeke. She realized how that came out and blushed.
“I’m with him on the ugly daughters thing. He and I were little shits so I don’t want to curse either of us with boys like us. But don’t want to curse him with daughters who all the boys chase after either.” Sam smiled at Lisa. “Brother, maybe we should just get dogs. No kids.”
“Oh no, Zeke. She’s having my babies. Count on that.” Sam answered.
We gathered up the stuff for donation, the other stuff for the trash, and the two boxes of photo albums, pictures and mementos I had decided to save. While the guys carried out the trash, Lisa and I carried the photos into my office.
“When Zeke was talking about having kids I could see him holding a baby that had my hair and his eyes. Like it was happening right in front of me, I could see it.” Lisa sounded a little freaked.
“You’ve never been in a situation where you were safe enough to imagine a future. That picture you imagined, that’s hope sweetheart. Hope for the future. It’s part of the roller coaster I was telling you about.” I gave her my honest opinion. “You’re gonna have to get used to that because Zeke is riding that with you and somewhere in his head, someday probably soon, he is going to have a thought about you holding his babies and of them looking like you. I can just see that in him, he’s just like Sam that way.”
As Lisa and I walked into the kitchen she said, “I’ve never been to a carnival. Not sure I like the rides.”
Sam and Zeke were in the living room, Sam by the stereo and Zeke on the couch. Zeke leaned his head back on the couch to look at us, upside down.
“You’ve never been to a carnival? Really? The fair is coming soon, we’ll fix that darlin’.” He then put his head up to say something to Sam across the room.
Lisa was staring at Zeke’s head and then she looked at me.
“Seat belt on, sweetheart?” I giggled and went to join Sam across the room to find some music.
~*~
Sam and I sat on the couch listening to music while Zeke and Lisa went to her appointment. He had made phone calls earlier to speak to Chandler, Bennie and a few of the guys at the shop. While he talked on the phone I brushed my hair out, separated it and made Dutch braids down both sides so that the ends fell over my shoulders down my chest. When Sam was finished he reached over and tugged on one of my braids.
“I need to ask you a question. I’m gonna need some real answers and I will only share what I have to with my brother. Who is this man that wants Lisa?” he asked as I turned towards him on the couch. “Lisa was on drugs. She was a foster kid, and not a good one. She ran off and lived a life on the streets. Like anyone on drugs does she made bad life choices. This man took her and kept her until she went from addicted to the drugs to thinking she had no choice but stay no matter what he did to her.” I hated to give all of Lisa’s secrets, but I knew Sam wouldn’t judge her for her past.
“When she saved you, and your friend Frank stepped in, this guy lost his toy, he sees that she is here with you and blames you for stealing it from him. So he is having a fucking tantrum and wants his toy back. That is a shitty way to describe it but that’s what it boils down to.” He said quietly.
“Not only did he lose his toy, but she pressed charges on him for abuse and for keeping her locked in an apartment at his mercy. She was bruised to shit when she went with us to the hospital, and she has scars and burns and all manner of shit on her he did. The cops took that baton and ran with it. The fucker went to
jail. But I guess now he made bail and is gonna fuck his life up even more trying to get her.” I couldn’t even pretend to get the depth of this man’s crazy. “I mean, I was running from a killer and I am not sure this guy isn’t somehow his equal in the fucked-up department.”
“You said he is gonna fuck his life up trying to get her. That’s not true. He’s gonna end his life trying.” Sam leaned up to rest his elbows on his knees while he pulled his hair back from his face. “Either now or in 5 years or 10 years or even 20 years when he gets out of prison. Fucked up like that doesn’t go away.”
Sam and I sat there in silence until Lisa and Zeke came back. It was obvious that Lisa had been crying during her appointment and Zeke was tense because he wanted to help her but there was nothing he could do.
“Lisa, come here and let me braid your hair, darlin’.” I called to her from the couch.
“What for?” she asked as she walked to me and sat down on the floor between my feet.
“Well, because, as these boys know, when the stress gets to you and the day is shit, sometimes riding out to the edge of the canyon and sitting there to watch the sunset makes it all go away. Just slides right off.” I pulled the brush through her curls and started a braid at her neck. “Sound good?” She wiggled a little bit in front of me and looked at Zeke who had sat down in the chair to our side.
“Can we?” She asked Zeke excitedly.
“Anything for you, fairy girl.” Zeke said with a smile. “I’ll call Jace and see if he wants to join us. Maybe if he doesn’t have a girl around he’ll bring Kari. The more the merrier, right?”
~*~
Sam and I entered the house laughing together at Lisa who was laying in the grass moaning about how her butt hurt from the long ride we had just finished. We left Zeke to take care of her and went into the kitchen so Sam could sit while I fed my Tuff and Freddie.
Jace had gone with us to ride in the canyon with a woman who worked with Kari named Sarah. She was a riot and had instantly clicked with Lisa and I. She had flawless makeup, a quirky style with her clothes choice and had been wearing a wig with straight hot pink hair in the back and bangs crossing her forehead. She had a black bandanna secured over it, making her look very biker chic, and she pulled it off so well she could have been in a magazine.
