One threat on top of another. Fucker. “I don’t know what you have on my father, but as you mentioned, he’s dead.” Keeping my eyes locked on him, I see a bead of sweat track down his forehead. I stand. “You come into my house with some shitty deal trying to steal my money. Our business is concluded.”
I walk around the table to leave but stop when Nastas warns, “You’re making a mistake, Alex. Sign the deal.”
Alex. Fucker.
In seconds, I have him pinned by the neck against a wood-paneled wall where a painting my mother loved hangs. “Don’t you ever fucking threaten me. And if you ever utter my name again, even as you bow at my feet, I will hunt you down and fucking rip you to pieces.”
I watch as his face turns red, blood trapped by my hand. From behind me, I hear a quivering Connor, “We-we’re sorry, Mr. Kingwood.”
Dropping him to the ground, I turn my back and leave. My message has been delivered. Fuck them. No one will threaten me. No one.
24
Sara Jane
Three and a half hours northeast of the city I grew up in lies a sleepy town of four hundred, though I’ve not seen more than fifty at most. They have a gazebo in the town center where the mayor regularly picnics with the citizens. They have one elementary, a middle school, and have to bus over an hour to the high school. With the combined towns all feeding into it to form a Division 1A football.
Each Friday, they make the trek to follow the players from town to town and support their team. By ten at night, the diner gets busy. By eleven, it’s packed and the celebration over their victory or pep talk that they’ll get ’em next time begins overflowing into the parking lot.
Three and a half hours northeast of where I grew up and one month after the night I constantly relive in my nightmares, I’ve become a part of this tight-knit community. I spent my twenty-first birthday working a double shift and taking a piece of pie to eat in the solitude of the motel across the street, where I’ve been staying.
The people here are kind and open, but best of all, they respect my privacy. I think a lot of them are escaping their own pasts. Here, I’ve been given a new start. Here, I don’t have to think about the past. I don’t even have to worry about my future. Here, I go to work and return to the motel. I get a free meal each shift and pay the motel through my weekly wages and tips. I don’t need much—the uniform was provided—one pair of jeans, a few shirts I picked up at the charity shop, and a floral dress I scored for two dollars recently. I would have never worn it in my old life, but something about it allows me to be who I am now.
Lost in the middle.
I have a roof over my head, steady work, and a few new friends. I don’t need much. What I do need, I shouldn’t want. What I want, I shouldn’t need.
Alexander.
I miss him. Half my soul stayed with him when I left. I’ve thrown my stuff in my car, and sat in the driver’s seat ready to return more times than not. I know I shouldn’t though.
Space was needed. When I’m around him, he’s my priority. His life consumes mine. Time has been necessary. I needed to really look inward, look at the life I was living, the life I was choosing. Time has given me a new perspective. Maybe I can live a simpler life and be happy. Maybe I can live without Alexander, although that seems impossible. An ache is forever present where my heart used to reside. It’s only been one month. One month isn’t going to wash away a lifetime.
I’m not stupid. I knew what I was giving up to live in his world. I guess I never realized the true consequences of that decision. A Grand Canyon-sized hole existed in my chest. That emptiness was growing the more he pursued his personal mission. His determination to solve a mystery came at the expense of who he was, which ate away at me and who we were together.
He carried the weight of his mother’s death when I met him, so I don’t blame him for wanting answers or for carrying that darkness with him through the years.
I wasn’t strong enough for him.
I couldn’t help him.
I couldn’t save him, not even from himself.
If I return, I will return knowing what I go back to. This time I’ll have no excuses. This time I’ll know the person I have to be to be with him.
I’m not that person yet.
*
“This is the first time you’ve bought anything other than water, soda, or snacks. Going with the hard stuff, huh? Rough day?”
I look up from the money in my hand to the guy behind the counter. He’s relaxed, like he’s sat there for hours. A soccer game is playing on a tablet behind the counter that he seems interested in by the way he occasionally glances back. “No. Just predicting a rough night.”
He laughs awkwardly. “I was giving you a hard time about the wine by calling it hard—Never mind. Bad joke. Sorry about the rough night. You should go out.”
I don’t laugh. Dread fills my veins. I can tell I’m going to have a long night. I’ve been shaking all day. I’ll spend the next few hours reliving every moment I ever had with Alexander. Then the next few I’ll spend in and out of the car, debating, torturing myself if I should return home or not. “I don’t go out.” I stay invisible. “I just work and keep to myself.”
“I know. That’s why you should go out.”
When I look at him this time, he looks different. He comes into focus for the first time, not just a blur, or a random person helping me survive without knowing it. Now he has a face, and when I glance down, a name. “Larry?”
“Eric,” he replies with a light, embarrassed laugh. “The last guy who worked here was named Larry. I never got a nametag so I just took ownership of Larry’s.”
“What happened to Larry?”
“He died.” My expression must say it all because he quickly adds, “He was ninety-eight. He had a good life.”
“I’m not sure that justifies things, but it’s good to hear that it’s possible.”
“That he died? We’ll all die one day.”
“I understand death. It’s the good life that seems like the impossibility.”
“Maybe some of his good luck will rub off on me.”
“Maybe.” Pointing to the bottle of wine on the counter, I ask, “How much?”
A section of his wavy brown hair falls over his forehead. I’ve never seen him like this before, and now I’m noticing a good smile and athletic build. “It’s on me.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“It’s already done. We all have rough nights now and again.”
Taking the bottle by the neck, I look down at it and set it back on the counter. “I don’t want to owe anything to anyone. I pay my debts.”
“You won’t owe me anything but a hi next time.”
When I look up, his kind caramel-colored eyes summon a smile from me. “Thank you. I appreciate it.” I take the bottle again and turn to the door but pivot back to face him just as fast. “Goodbye, Larry.”
“See you tomorrow, Alice.”
My smile grows and I walk out feeling a lot better than when I came into the convenience mart. Kicking a rock as I walk across the dusty lot to the motel, the bell chimes above the door, and I hear, “Hey, Alice?”
I turn back, and he says, “A few of us are going to Growly’s tonight. I know you don’t go out, but maybe, maybe tonight you can make an exception?”