Page 51 of Resilience

Monty was stretched out on the other bed in this roadside motel just west of Santa Rosa, New Mexico, flipping through the cable channels. Monty didn’t know much ASL, so he had no idea Sam had just dragged him—not that he hadn’t said exactly the same thing directly to him. Those farts were enough to make a man wish for death.

Athena laughed. “Sorry you don’t get to ride in the fresh air this trip.”

“Yeah, it sucks. Oh well. Definitely not the first or worst thing about this prospect gig that sucks.”

“Not much longer. Your year is up, basically.”

It was; he would hit that mark on this run, in fact. “I’m not gonna get a patch so fast, though. Monty’s not patched yet, and he’s got a year on me.”

Athena made the sign that basically indicated ambivalence or indifference, among other things—one of the signs that was as much normal body language as it was ASL: a waggle of her hand. ASL required a lot of interpretation and filling in the blanks, on the part of both signer and receiver. A literal translation of any signed sentence would look like caveman talk—and it was pretty likely that the sentence in the signer’s head wasn’t precisely the same as the one the receiver understood.

He understood her now to mean yeah, that’s what you keep saying, but I’m not so sure. She didn’t think he’d have to wait two years for a patch.

Then she asked, “Are you in for the night already? It’s earlier there, right?”

“Just an hour. But I think we’re going out. We haven’t eaten yet, and there’s a dive bar across the street,” Sam told her. “The guys say they serve good burgers and pizza.”

Sam hoped they’d head over soon. The van stayed under guard all night, but everybody on the run took a shift of a couple hours each. Of course, the prospects got the worst shifts, in the middle of the night. Fitz was on the van right now. Sam wanted to be able to eat and get little bit of sleep before his shift came around.

He and Athena FaceTimed for another ten minutes or so, until thunder struck the door as somebody pounded on it with both fists. “Let’s go, fellas!” Gunner shouted. “Get your feedbags on!”

“I have to go,” Sam said. “Gun’s bellowing.”

“Okay. Be safe. I love you.”

Words she’d given him thousands of times, but now they were completely new. “I love you. Sleep well.”

As he set his phone aside and stood up, he saw Monty watching him, a wry smirk on his face. “What?”

“Shit-eating grin. It’s Athena. That’s the girl got you looking like you’re about to nut all day long. God damn.”

There was no good reason for Sam to feel defensive and protective. Monty had been around the club since he was a kid; he knew Athena as well as he knew Sam. They were friends, and he wouldn’t disrespect her. There was no reason to keep the change in their relationship a secret; if anything, everybody would be happy for them.

But Sam did feel protective and defensive, and he did feel like Monty had ferreted out an important secret. Later he’d think about why he felt the way he did. Now, though, he simply said, “Shut it, Mont. Leave it alone.”

“I’m just sayin’—I bet you twenty there’s a pool been going in the club for years, and somebody just won it.”

“Fuck off.” He was probably right, but it had always creeped Sam and Athena out to be the focus of their family’s attention in that way, and it was doubly creepy that they’d been right.

Monty raised his hands. “Hey, not my business.”

“No. It’s not. Let’s go eat.”

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~oOo~

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They arrived in Laughlin right on schedule. Sam was driving the van, so he pulled onto the Nevada Bulls’ compound and turned right, toward this charter’s massive Quonset hut of a garage, while the riders headed to the left to park their bikes by the clubhouse. He parked before the closed overhead door and looked around, wondering what he should do. They needed to get the van locked up inside this garage, but was he supposed to know how to open the door? Or wait for somebody to open it?

“Should I honk or something?” he asked Monty.

Monty chuckled. “I wouldn’t. They think you’re summoning them, and you’ll end up having a seriously fucked night.”

“Good point.” Sam looked around again, and relaxed. Jordan, the Nevada prospect, was trotting over from the clubhouse.

“Hold up!” he called as Sam put the window down. “I got you!”

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