A Fighting Chance (8 page)

I land in Laredo a week later, and after a too short drive from the airport car rental place, I’m standing in front of Murphy’s Bar, unable to decide if the unseasonable heat or the heavy ball of emotion in my stomach is worse. I take in the evening scenery, and it’s like I’ve unearthed Glory from a time capsule. Not a single store, house or car has changed in four years.

              “Well, well…the bastard son returns,” Jeremy Huck says. He’s still fucking leaning on the wall outside of the bar like he’s holding it up. “Thought you were at some college. What, they put you out?”

“Is my dad in there?” He’s not answering my calls, and this is the best place to find him after dark.

“You have one of those?” I don’t even bother giving him the finger or a response, and I walk past him, stepping inside. It’s full of the usual crowd, but there are a few new faces in the staff. “Henry left about ten minutes ago,” he continues, trailing me. “His barstool’s still warm, though, ‘cause he was on it all day. Go sit. He left his drink, too. You can have it. Like father, like son of a whore.” My elbow connects with his face right in the middle of his laughter. There’s a cracking sound—some might call the noise sickening, but I call it earned—and he drops to his knees. Blood is already gushing from his nostrils and seeping through the spaces between his fingers by the time I turn around. He’s howling, too. Dammit, I was hoping for teeth.

“Motherfucker, you’re still a piece of shit! You’re trash! You came into the world a piece of shit, and no fancy car or fancy college is going to change that, Chance.” His twin brother, Isaac, runs toward me but has a change of heart and tends to Jeremy instead.

            Everyone in the bar is watching us. Some of them crane their necks to get a better look, and I see the recognition in their eyes, followed by agreement with the Hucks. These are the people who marched into Sacred Hearts Baptist to pray for the soul of my mother, the sinner, on Sundays, and angrily urged me to slam another boy’s bloody face into stretched canvas on Tuesdays.

Home sweet home.
I walk outside, keeping my back to Murphy’s to let the Hucks know neither of them actually poses any threat to me, but I’m ready to go to my hotel. I want to go back to Hamilton, actually. I want to hide. The old feelings come rushing in, and for a moment I hear a never quite forgotten voice in my head reminding me of what I am here: Henry Chance’s bastard son who’s only good enough when he’s hitting someone. I haven’t heard that voice in a while, even though it belongs to me.

It’s only after I release a breath that I realize I’m clenching everything from jaw to fists. Shaking, too. I
can’t say Jeremy’s words don’t matter anymore. They will fester; the psyche will collect them like a bag that never fills. It just expands and reshapes itself, finding new ways to pack all the hurt, humiliation and pain into its spaces, and then makes room for more. What’s interesting is that if you internalize enough negativity, other people’s insults just end up complementing the damage you do on your own. Glory carved quite a wound in me. And some wounds just don’t heal. But I spent a lot of time re-cutting it, too.

I
only allow myself to feel the sting of my bruised feelings for a few minutes, then push them aside and remember why I’m here. That reason is a lot more important than how I feel. I
was
hoping to meet up with Henry right away, before word got out that I’m back in Glory, and I’m sure that committing assault in a public venue isn’t helping my cause. I drive straight to the Chance family house next, but with a stop sign on nearly every corner, it’s impossible not to be seen by passersby in my gigantic rented SUV. Traffic here is slow but news is fast.

I park across the street from Henry’s place and the house is completely dark—there’s not even a porch light on—but a beautiful, dark-haired woman is standing out front, and as I approach she casts a
disgruntled look at me.

“Where’s Henry?” she asks in a thick Spanish accent. “Who are you?” She
observes me with suspicion, even backing away. She’s dressed pretty corporate formal for this time of night, in slacks and a pinstripe blouse.

“Uh, I’m…his son…” I blurt out.

“His son? No…he has a little boy. Henry Junior. With the woman.
His wife.
” Her face contorts in irritation, but the expression dissolves when she walks straight up to me. “
Oh
, I see it now. In the eyes. You are so handsome,” she coos as she scrapes her fingers down my chest. She cups my chin and taps her thumb softly across my lips. She’s really not so bad herself: thick, long black hair, eyes so dark they’re almost a shade beyond the night sky, and golden-bronze skin.

“Uh—”

“Where is your father?” she asks, her thumb pressing into the corner of my mouth.

“Good question.” She’s one of his women I bet. While he may have developed the ability to give a shit about at least one of his kids, I see that he’s still
dead set on making more of them with women who aren’t Barbara.

She tilts her head and her black eyes narrow. “Your mother is not his wife. You are too dark to be
her
child, and she could never birth anything as beautiful as you. How come Henry has never mentioned you? What is your name?”

“Jesse…”

“Jesse…Chance. Alejandra Bautista.” She doesn’t extend a hand to me; instead, she clings to my shirt and her other arm slides around my back. “Will you help me find your father?”

I shake my head. “I
don’t know where he is, Miss Bauti—”

“Alejandra,” she sings out. “To you, just Alejandra.
”

The sound of
a car engine grows, and headlights behind me illuminate Alejandra until she looks ethereal. “He’s not here. Same as
yesterday
.” The voice makes my skin warm up more than anything Texas can do. Turning around, I marvel at the most beautiful girl I used to know. Her hair is shorter but still in its usual ponytail, and her nails are bright pink, but there’s an engagement ring on her finger. She’s instantly familiar, yet remarkably foreign.

Alejandra rolls eyes full of
contempt at her. “
You, again.
The mouthy little
puta
.”

“I like it when you talk dirty to me, Alejandra. I keep wondering when you’ll woman up and just ask me out to dinner,” Drew, unfazed, says with a wink. “Steak, please.
I like meat.”

I snicker as Alejandra walks toward Drew’s car. “Just tell Henry he better talk to me soon…or we’ll have
very
serious problems.” She bends over, rolls up her pant leg, and exposes the revolver she has strapped to her ankle.

“Shit…shit…” I mumble and back away from her with my hands up
. Alejandra stands and lets her pant leg fall back into place and then quells my fears of multiple gunshot wounds with an amused look.

“Done. Now get out of here,” Drew says.

“Good-bye, handsome son of Henry Chance.” She wags her fingers at me. Spitting on the ground in front of Drew’s car, she adds, “Good-bye,
mouthy whore
. Tell him what I said.” Alejandra heads for her black BMW but she stops midway to look back at me. Once she’s walking again, there’s an extra swing to her hips.
Really, lady?
She drives by Drew with expletives and her middle finger out the window, dust kicking up from the tires.

“Henry’s girlfriend? They just walk up to the door now?” Weapon aside, I get bad vibes from that one, like something maniacal lives in her heart.

“Barbara left him, for now…again. He lives here alone. And that one…” Drew cocks her head like Alejandra’s still there. “She’s harmless.”

“Kittens are harmless.
They don’t have guns,” I counter.

“
You’ve got way too much Texas in you to flinch at a gun that’s not actually pointed at ya,” she says, laughing. Then silence follows as we take in these unknown versions of each other. I wonder what she thinks of me now. My head is still nearly shaved, and I tend to let the stubble come in for a few days. I’m ripped under this shirt, and I’m a lot more muscular than she remembers, I bet. Even without fighting as one of my hobbies, I became a gym rat after I packed on the pounds when Duke and I used to hoard dining hall food so that we could play video games all weekend, freshman year. I guess Henry’s skinny genes only went so far. I stopped treating my body like a weekend in Vegas and started acting like I wanted to live in it for a long while.

Does she think I look good? Does she find me attractive? It’s dumb to care whether a chick you haven’t seen in ages wants to sleep with you, but it still crosses my mind. Can’t help it. We did a lot of the no-sleep sleeping back in the day. Sometimes in that very front seat she’s in.
Why am I thinking about this?
Fuck. Fuck
.
No, not fuck. Fuck is exactly what I don’t want to think about. Even though I have willingly invited the past into my life, it’s better off staying what it is. Except I loved this girl once. A lot. Still do.
Damn, she’s beautiful.
My eyes fall to the pink triangular pendant sitting at her collarbone. It’s the guitar pick I gave her when we were seventeen.
She’s still wearing it.
I gulp down as my heart thrums a little faster and my blood rushes to all my extremities.

“Uh, hi,
Spark...” What else are you supposed to say to someone you don’t know anymore?

“
Hey
, Jess.” Her eyes widen like my greeting catches her off guard, but she flashes a casual grin. “You need a ride? Just strolling the streets of Glory? Why are you here, anyway?”

“L
ooking for Henry. Thought he was at Murphy’s.”

“Yeah, I saw on Facebook that you just beat up Jeremy and Isaac over there.”

“I’ve been home an hour and I’m already on a crime spree. Figures. Have you seen the sperm donor anywhere?”

She chuckles as she fingers her guitar pick necklace.
“No, but he hangs out at Tickles
now. I’m on my way there, and I bet that’s where he is.” I’ve never heard of the place but it sounds like somewhere Henry would be.

“I can follow you.”
I jog to my rental and trail Drew right out of Glory, though we don’t drive very far past the city limits before she turns into the parking lot of a building in Renshaw.

“Give me a hug!” she says when she gets out of the car, and as soon as I wrap my arms around her, I’m swimming in cal
m. Not all the feelings Glory evokes are bad. She smells like Lilly Armor’s pie shop, like the cherry pie slices she used to bring home for her parents. I know I shouldn’t but I let my lips touch her shoulder, and she shivers for a moment as her body rests against mine. She runs her fingers up my back, leaving a line of heat on my spine. Then my whole body lights up, and I hold her longer than I should, but Drew was my safe place once.

“You look great,
” she says in a quivering breath, and I’m disappointed when she pulls away.

“Thanks…so do you.” And she really does. She
has gone from very pretty to absolutely gorgeous. Her legs are long and lean, and she’s still got that tiny waist but she’s got an even nicer ass now. “How you been, Hallisay?”

“Good. How about you?”

“Uh…good. You?” Oh, great. We’re having one of
those
conversations, where every question can be answered with one word. If I had to guess, I’d say Drew and I have spoken a total of twenty words to each other so far, and nothing more significant than the way I talk to my favorite barista. “Shit…you already said how you were. Sorry.” My nerves are vibrating under my skin. I blow out a breath, hoping it’ll crush my jitters. What the fuck am I, ten years old? I can’t talk to a fucking girl? But it’s not just any girl; it’s my favorite girl.
Was. Was your favorite girl.

“Yeah…I did.” She laughs nervously, shruggin
g. “It’s okay. This is
super
weird. Er, happy belated birthday.” She lifts her guitar case out of the trunk.

“Thanks, I got your
message…thanks. Um, thanks…” And now, in person, as I trip all over my tongue, I look like the biggest asshole for never answering.

“Hey, Drew!” A tall, thin woman with cascading blonde hair steps out of
Tickles
in cutoffs and a low cut tank top, dragging a medium-sized rolling suitcase behind her. “Aw, I hate when I miss your shift. Anna’s here. She’s in one of her moods and annoying the other girls.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Drew says. “Get home safe, okay?” She waves as the blonde nods and hurries to
her car.

“You work here?” I ask.

“Are you judging me?” I see the fire I know in her eyes. It turns me on a little.

“No, I just thought you’d…nothing.”

“I manage the place. Job market is pretty merciless right now, so after I graduated I came back home. It’s not my only job but it’s my favorite one. Joe almost didn’t hire me because he was afraid my dad would deny him service at the clinic if I got on the pole. I’ve only been on there a few times before we open.” She giggles and holds the door for me, letting loud rock music waft out.