Brawler (18 page)

Eight Months Later

“Congratulations,” I told her, handing her a slim, black jewelry box.

She took it from me hesitantly, the wind whipping her graduation gown and long hair behind her. “Thank you.”

“It’s your birthday present too. I’m sorry we missed it.”

She opened the box, a strained smile on her lips. “It’s shiny.”

“Laney picked it out.”

“I can tell.”

“I wanted to get you a handgun.”

She laughed, surprising both of us. “It’s on my supply list.”

“That’s what your mom told me. Right before the crack pipe.”

“But under the meth addiction.”

“Has your mom ever even been to L.A.?”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m sure she has, but she’d never admit it. At least I don’t have to worry about her popping in at my apartment randomly.”

“You’ll send me pictures of projects you’re working on, right?”

Her smile faltered. “Yeah. Of course.”

A strand of hair was pinned across her neck by the wind. My hand itched to pull it away. To set it free.

I chuckled weakly. “You know, you’re moving closer but for some reason it feels like you’ll be farther aw—“

“Jenna,” Karen called from across the lawn. “Alexander is here!”

“Coming!” she called back. She turned her eyes to mine for the first time that day. “What were you going to say?”

“Nothing.” I took a step back. “Congratulations, Jenna. I’m proud of you.”

“Thank you.”

Ten Months Later

“We have to set a date, Kellen,” Laney told me impatiently, slapping a bridal magazine down on my desk. “I can’t pick a venue or plan for any of this until we have a date.”

I pushed the magazine aside until it balanced precariously over the edge. “I told you. I don’t want to do it until I’m graduated from law school. I need to focus on this, not a wedding.”

“I’ll take care of everything! You won’t be bothered with any of it.”

“You mean the way I’m not bothered by it right now while I’m trying to study?”

“Oh my God,” she groaned, letting her head fall back. “You’re always studying.”

“You get three guesses as to why.”

“To annoy me.”

“No.”

“To avoid me.”

Sometimes.

“No,” I lied.

“To get a good job, make lots of money, and buy me pretty things?”

“Sure,” I said, surreptitiously rubbing my throbbing temple. “Yes.”

“Do you know what Jenna is doing right now?”

“No.”

Because we barely speak anymore.

“She’s out with Alexander at some art installation downtown, probably having the time of her life, and do you know why?”

“Because she loves art?”

“Because that’s what couples do! They go out and have fun together.”

“Not if they want to graduate early, they don’t.”

“Fine. Study then.” She grabbed her coat off the back of the door, needlessly adjusting her hair in the mirror. “I’m going out to have fun. Alone.”

I didn’t turn to watch her leave. I lifted my hand and waved goodbye silently.

She slammed the door behind her.

I turned off my phone, then slid it to the end of the desk, slowly pushing the bridal magazine aside until it flopped to the floor. It landed just shy of the waste basket.

Thirteen Months Later

“Happy Easter!” Karen cried, hugging both Laney and I together in one swift, firm motion. She released us to step back and beam. “She brought him.”

“She brought Alexander to a family function? Seriously?” Laney asked incredulously.

“Finally! It’s getting serious, Lane, I can feel it. And they look so adorable together,” Karen gushed. “He has a bow tie on! It’s precious. I already took a picture, but I wish I could have gotten Jenna to throw on a sweater. Those tattoos get bigger every time I see them, I swear.”

“She has new ones?” I asked, feeling uneasy that I hadn’t heard.

I took Laney’s coat to hang up with my own and pulled a roll of antacids out of the pocket, slipping it into the pocket of my slacks.

“Oh, no, but the old ones are plenty. I just want to cover them up. Her skin was so beautiful.”

“They’re permanent, mom. You have to get used to them,” Laney told her.

“But they’re—“

“Something she likes. Let it go. It’s not a big deal.”

“You don’t have any, do you?”

“No.”

Karen threaded her arm through Laney’s, pulling her in tightly to her side. “Good girl. Have you two found Kellen a new apartment yet?”

Laney snorted. “He’s not even looking.”

“You’re still planning to move back down here when you graduate, aren’t you?” Karen asked me, her face etched in concern.

“Yes,” I assured her. “I’ll have it taken care of.”

Her face cleared. “Good. Alright, you two. Let’s eat. Oh, but first I want a family photo!”

I followed them into the hallway, watching as they receded from me – identical in height, hair, and dress, like the twins from the Shining.

My throat constricted, hot and acidic.

I reached my hand into my pocket, searching.

Three Months Later

“What do you say, son?” Dan asked, grinning like an excited kid.

Like he already knew what my answer would be.

No
, I thought, the word resonating through my head, bouncing off the walls, clattering to the bare floor with a deafening discord.

“Yes,” I croaked. I coughed once, hard. “I say yes.”

Dan offered me his hand, then pulled me into a firm hug. “I thought you might say that.” He released me before stepping to the door and opening it wide. “Marylyn, the cart, please. Thank you.”

I stood motionless in the center of the room. My feet were cemented to the floor.

“Gentleman, ladies, come on in!”

I heard wheels on the rug. Feet shuffling, bodies moving. The room began to spin.

“Press in, everyone. Make room.”

The space began to fill with faces, all of them watching me. Sweat trickled down the back of my neck.

Dan took two champagne glasses off a golden cart Marylyn had brought in. Everyone in the room had taken one as they entered. It occurred to me how often I’d seen the stuff lately. How often they celebrated. Reconciliations, engagements, Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Year’s, Wednesdays. Everything fueled from one bubbling golden moment to the anticipation of the next. Always rolling forward. Pressing on. Relentless.

My stomach rolled violently.

“Today, we welcome a new member to the Monroe, Falcon, Bryson, and Associates family. A bright young man who I am going to be lucky enough to welcome into my personal family very soon as well. Please raise your glass.” Dan handed me a cold, shimmering flute as arms audibly raised in a wave around me. Surrounding me. “To Kellen Coulter. Welcome!”

“Welcome!” the crowd called as one.

My mouth watered. My vision blurred.

“Kellen,” Dan said, his voice distorted. “Are you alright? You look pale.”

I shook my head, forcing a smile, slipping deeper into the dark. “I’m fine. Overwhelmed. Thank you. Thank you, everyone!” I raised my glass to salute them all, then took a quick sip.

I almost spat it back out.

The room began to mingle. People swarmed around me, congratulating me.

I excused myself to use the restroom.

I closed the door silently behind me, throwing the latch.

Taking three deep breaths, I knelt down and vomited into the toilet.

Fourteen Months Later

“Ugh,” Laney groaned, sitting on the edge of the hotel bed and scrolling through her phone. “Mom is sending me more links to dresses she wants me to try on. I don’t have time for all of these.”

“Then only try on the ones you want to.”

“She’ll be annoyed if I don’t try on at least some of her suggestions,” Laney muttered irritably. “This whole trip to New York was her idea and now I’m stuck wedding dress shopping with you and Jenna, the people who care the least about it in the world.”

“That’s not true,” I told her, staring at the muted TV. “Your dad cares a lot less than any of us.”

She rolled her eyes. “He told me to go to JC Penny. Can you believe that?”

“He was joking.”

“See, I don’t think he was.”

“He was. He just doesn’t want you going overboard and you and your mom love to go overboard.”

“We do not!” she cried indignantly.

I raised a skeptical eyebrow her way. “You’re really going to sit there and say that to me? After what happened last weekend?”

“This again? It’s a wedding cake, Kellen. It should be beautiful.”

“It’s going to be four feet tall with a waterfall down one side.”

“And it’ll be gorgeous!”

“And it’s why I’m here,” I told her, turning back to the TV. “To protect your dad’s bank account.”

“You guys are overreacting. He can afford a nice dress.”

“A dress you’re going to wear for one day shouldn’t cost a man a small fortune.”

Laney ignored me the way she always did when we fought about money, turning back to her phone. I turned off the TV and got up to stretch my legs, pacing in front of the window.

“I told Alexander we’re here in New York,” Laney commented absently.

I paused to frown at her. “Why?”

She shrugged. “Because he and Jenna should have dinner or something. Catch up.”

“They broke up over a year ago.”

“Doesn’t mean they can’t still be friends. They dated for two years. Why would you throw that away?”

“Why would someone want to be friends with an ex?”

She lowered her phone, looking up at me with an annoyed expression. “Are you saying you wouldn’t want to be friends with me if we broke up?”

“We have broken up. A hundred times, and if I remember right, you once told me to go fuck myself for all eternity and never speak to you again.”

“That was years ago!” she cried defensively.

“Doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.”

“Whatever. Anyway, Jenna and Alexander didn’t end on those kind of terms. They’re still friendly with each other.” She grinned wickedly. “Sometimes very friendly.”

I turned back to the window, scowling at my own reflection. “The guy’s a dick. She deserves better.”

“Well, we can’t all make out as well as I did.”

Outside the sun was lighting up the New York skyline. It was piercing through buildings, striking into dark alleys, lighting soiled, wet streets and making their grimy surface shine like glass. Like diamonds. Like they were something better than they actually were.

“She deserves better than me too,” I mumbled.

“Mom would be thrilled if she’d get back together with Alexander,” Laney mused. “She’s terrified Jenna’s going to meet some guy at that tattoo parlor she works at, marry him, and have a brood of pierced, tatted up babies.”

I chuckled at the imagery. “I can’t imagine those family photos on your mom’s walls.”

Laney snorted. “She’d die. She doesn’t get it.”

“Doesn’t get what?”

“Jenna,” she answered simply.

I’d never been to the parlor, but I’d seen a couple pictures of Jenna’s work during quick, fleeting conversations on the holidays or during stuffy parties where we both looked like we wanted to chew our own legs off to get out. She was good. Really good. So were the people that worked with her, if the ink slowly covering her skin was any indication.

I lived my life in measured amounts of time with her. When we talked, I made sure it was never for too long. That we never sat or stood too close. The fact that she’d dated Alexander for two years had helped. I was happy to see her moving on. The last thing I wanted was for her to sit around pining over a shit like me.

“We should head down soon,” Laney reminded me. “Jenna is probably waiting for us.”

“You go ahead. I need to use the bathroom.”

Laney laughed, settling in on the bed. “I can wait while you pee, Kel.”

“I’m not going to pee, Lane.”

She quickly grabbed her purse, her nose wrinkled in disgust. “I’ll meet you down there.”

“Yeah.”

Tell a girl like Laney that she’ll have to stand around and wait while you drop a deuce five feet away and she’ll find somewhere else to be real quick. It was a trick I was using more and more lately as she clung to me constantly. It’d become her new routine ever since the night three weeks ago when she tearfully confessed that she’d slept another guy.

I should have been pissed. I guess I was, but not as much as you’d think. Not as much as I expected to be. And that shit right there was what really made me angry. Six years ago if she’d told me that, I don’t care how many tears she was crying, I’d have left her then and there. No questions, no second chances. But that night I watched her face turn red as she cried, her makeup somehow holding steady against the rain of tears pouring down her cheeks the way I’d seen it do countless times before and I’d felt… I don’t know. Nothing.

Feeling my face flush hot as my blood began to pound in my ears, I went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on my it. I hovered over the marble sink breathing deeply, calming my pounding heart. This had been happening a lot lately – spikes in the anxiety. Borderline panic attacks. It made me miss boxing like a bastard and there were times, like right now, when I thought about taking it up again no matter how Laney felt about it. She’d asked me to quit just a few months ago because she couldn’t stand the brutality of it and I had agreed too quickly. I’d thought I didn’t need it anymore, that I had outgrown it and I could find some peace somewhere else in the world, but now I felt like I’d cut off a limb. That she’d asked me to hack off my arm and like an idiot I’d done it, anything to avoid another fight and more tears, but then she’d taken that limb and gone and fucked another guy with it. Now I was starting to think I didn’t owe her anything.

I was thinking of taking up stock in Maalox and antacid tablets considering how much I was gnawing on them. I ate them like they were candy just to try to keep the peace in my own body, but you can only ignore that sort of thing for so long. Eventually you have to acknowledge that you’re rotting from the inside out. That your entire life is a series of patches you’ve put on problem after problem until it’s an ugly, mismatched quilt that’s smothering you slowly.

“Shit,” I muttered angrily.

I yanked a towel off the bar with a sharp snap and rubbed it briskly over my face. I squared my shoulders, pulling myself up straight to my full high height and I looked at my eyes in the mirror. I stared at them until my sight went fuzzy and unfocused. Until my own image, the face I’d worn for my entire life, looked unfamiliar and indistinct. I breathed calmly and I forced myself to relax until I found that cool, dark place inside. The one I’d lived in for the last four years. Since the last time I’d touched Jenna.

I’d been in the dark so long, I didn’t know if I’d recognize daylight if I saw it.

Last night when I’d had sex with Laney for the first time since she’d told me about the other guy, I’d been down there, deep in the darkness hiding from her. From all of it. I wasn’t in it with her, not even a little. In fact, for the second time in my adult life, I’d hated every second of having sex. When she’d finally finished, I’d rolled over immediately to put distance between us. My dick was already limp, I hadn’t come, and I sure as hell didn’t want to. I didn’t want anything. I didn’t
feel
anything. As far as I knew, I’d been balls deep in a void. Laney wasn’t wet or dry, tight or loose, hot or cold. She’d been nothing.
I
was nothing.

I was sand on a beach turning desert dry as the ocean receded farther and farther from view.

As the empty spread through my veins.

As dust settled into my heart.