Page 101 of Jaded

“Not here, so fuck off.” His bright eyes spark with anger, and probably booze or weed or some combination of the two. I doubt he’s sober; I know that the Nat Taylor of eighteen years ago wouldn’t have been. “I got this.”

My heart sinks to my shoes.

“Doesn’t look like you do.” I turn my attention to the blond man. He’s big—bigger than me—and drunk; booze wafts off his breath in hot, sour puffs. “Want to back up and let me talk to him?”

“Kid’s right,” says the blond man. “Fuck off.”

“Don’t think so,” I growl back. And then I toss out the final word, like a knight throwing down his gauntlet. “Asshole.”

He whips around to face me, dark eyes flicking over me in quick, deliberate assessment. I’m big, but he’s bigger—linebacker big, with broad shoulders and a few years of heavy drinking to bulk him up.Good-looking in a way most ex-high-school athletes are in this town, his rugged features softened and faded with time and disuse.

Day River isn’t a town to make you, but to break you, to slowly wear you down and wear you away with time and cold and lost hope. You play hockey here, or you watch it and wish for it.

“What did you call me?” His voice is half anger and half laughter, his smile crooked.

I smile back, trying to mimic the lopsided drunken lilt of his. “Asshole. Am I wrong? You seem like a prick. Picking on a kid half your age and size.”

He leans in a little closer, close enough for me to pluck out and categorize his scents—cheap beer and cheap deodorant and spray-on Axe. “Kid’s trying to get an invite to the Ice Out.”

I bite back a groan, step back to give Avery my full attention this time. “For fuck’s sake, Avery. You crazy? You want me to call your stepmom?”

“Hey.” The big man looms in front of me again, all too eager to play. “If the kid wants in, maybe I’ll let him in. Let him swim with the sharks.”

“I can handle it.” Avery nudges forward—

So I slide in front of him, putting myself between him and the big blond guy. “Don’t think so, kid.”

Anticipation rushes through me in a swell I might almost name joy, if the high of an impending fight could be labeled as such.

“Maybe you mind your own fucking business.” The big man steps closer, trying to be intimidating with his excessive height and size.

“Maybe it is my business.” I look him dead in the eye, don’t fucking blink, because it’s been a long, long time since I was scared of anyone. “You’re not giving him an invite.”

“He your kid?” He looms closer. More cheap beer and Axe invade my nose. The undertone of sweat and body odor lurk beneath the store-bought mask.

“Yeah, he is.” I set my hand on the broad chest and shove him back. “So fuck off.”

His hand shoots out, fingers tangle into the collar of my leather jacket to pull me towards him. “Make me.”

Adrenaline turns my veins to fire as I prepare for what’s to come—the duck, the swing, the crack. I know how this fight will end, how this night will end.

I’ll end it like all the ones that came before. In violence and blood.

I tilt a lazy grin up at my new friend, then bob my head towards the back door. “Let’s go.”

He follows me out into the icy black night.

I lead the fight into the parking lot. My breath is a soft cloud of condensation against my lips, just like my ghost boy’s was outside this same bar, and I don’t know why I’m thinking that.

The man behind me laughs, so I toss a glance over my shoulder to find he’s brought two friends with him.

Both of them drunk. Laughing.

Behind them, Avery trails out of the bar, looking strangely small in his ratty grey sweatshirt.

I stop, wait for my opponent to step forward. My hands hang loose at my sides, at such odds with the adrenaline pulsing through me like a torrent of liquid fire.

And yet, I am calm, cool, not angry, not like this. The fight, it’s always so cold, so calculated. Precision, deliberation, the planned release of some inherent need, some animal instinct.

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