Page 62 of Brother In Arms

Silence met that proclamation and he said, “Come out here and talk to me.”

I ripped open the door and demanded, “And say what?”

“What the hell’s gotten into you would be a good start,” his expression was stormy and he was getting angry too.

“Men! Men’s what’s gotten into me. Men thinking they know what’s best for me, men thinking they can do whatever they want to me and blowing me off every time I have a problem with their shitty attitude or way of treating me like I’m nothing more than a cute little pet!” I went to slam the door in his face but it was stopped by his broad palm.

“And I’m one of those men, huh?”

“Yes! I’m not your fucking property. I might have been your girlfriend, but good luck with that now, biker boy!”

Thattipped him over the edge. He got right into my face, nose to nose and said, “You rich bitches are all the same. Judgmental little cunts in it to ride some bad boy cock for a few nights then can’t handle it when shit gets real even for a minute. Then what do you do when we clean up your fucking mess for you? Trash us like we ain’t shit. News flash for you, rich bitch. I’m a person, a man, and I’ve got feelings; I’m not fucking disposable, not that you’d know anything about that.” I recoiled from his low vehement tone and the horror of what I’d just done had only begun to sink in.

My mind raced, repeating over, and over, and over again, you broke it. You broke this, you broke this; you broke this… even as my mouth betrayed me further by saying dully, “Just get out, leave.”

He yanked on his clothes while I watched from the bathroom doorway and when he finished swinging on his leather vest he came to me with his gun in his hand.

“You know how to shoot this?” he demanded.

“No.”

He clicked a little lever on the side and said to me, “Safety is off, it’s a point and click application, aim for center mass; that’s the chest. It’s not hard, I know your spoiled ass is used to having everything done for you, but I think you can handle it. Just do me a fuckin’ favor and don’t shoot me in the back, already hurts from your knife.”

With that, he turned and walked away, ducking out the bedroom door. I heard his truck engine start up outside and the tires slide in the gravel as he romped on the gas and left. Just like I’d asked him, no… demanded, he do.

I stared at the big black gun in my hand and knew fear. Not for what might happen to me, more for what wouldn’t now… I really loved him. I knew it by the breaking of my heart, but at the same time, I couldn’t blame anyone but myself.

What have I done?

I slid down the door frame to my bedroom floor and wept. What else could I do? You know the trouble with crying, though? It didn’t really fix anything. Sure, it made you feel a little better for the moment, but when you were done? Nothing was different. Nothing was changed.

I got dressed and went to my kitchen. I had to pass the ruin of my front door, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. I looked around my house and shook my head. All of it was just stuff. I’d had the potential to really have something with Rush, something more real than anything I had ever had with anyone before and I’d just taken a keg of dynamite to it. White washed any future I might have had with the same prejudiced brush of my past.

What is wrong with you?I asked myself, but I didn’t have an answer. I honestly didn’t have an answer at all. I made coffee and curled up in one of the chairs on my front porch. I set the gun next to the coffee cup and stared at it for a long, long, time wondering why he’d left it.

It was around seven in the morning when Dray pulled up on his bike, the sun had risen, the birds were chirping, and my cousin looked pissed. He stormed up onto the porch and made a disgusted sound.

“What the hell did you do, Bales?” he demanded, and I looked up at him with a tear streaked face.

“I fucked up,” I said and he shook his head, gripping the back of his neck and swore.

“No, shit. What did you say to him?”

He dropped into a seat across from mine and I stared at him, “What does it matter? He left, I drove him away and he probably hates me.”

Dray rolled his eyes and said, “Oh, for fuck’s sakes, talk. What did you say?”

I told him everything and he bowed his head, nodding. “You’re right,” he said, “you fucked up. You didn’t let him get a single word in edgewise, did you?” I stared at him blankly and shook my head. “Didn’t think so, if you had, you’d know that to be considered property of one of us is just about the highest honorific a brother could give you.”

“I don’t understand that!” I said. “How does that make sense to any normal person!?”

“It’s not supposed to. Not for a citizen like you,” he shot back, and it wounded me. Dray had always been patient with me before, teasing, but now? Now, he was harsh and unforgiving and I wasn’t used to it, even if I did deserve it.

“Listen,” he said finally, “I’m only going to explain this once…” and he did and I would be lying if I said it didn’t boggle my mind. I sat there and absorbed it all and finally came to the conclusion that there wasn’t really anything to understand about it. It wasn’t something, like he said, that fit into any neat little box constructed by the average person to explain it. It just was for them. As natural to them as the air they breathed.

“How did you know to come here? That I would be alone?”

“He left a fuckin’ voicemail. Shit, Bales, get your fuckin’ ass up and let’s go.”

---