Melted & Shattered (24 page)
José
laughed. He had a great laugh. It was rumbling, and untamed. It was honest. He didn’t front. “No
cielito
, these are definitely not FDA approved. It’s fine though. Don’t drink the water and you’ll be fine.” He grinned from ear to ear, and I wasn’t sure if he was serious or not about the water. I’d have to ask Fernie about that.
“Oh shit.”
“What?” José’s grin disappeared when he saw the look of panic on my face.
“Fernie. We made him a scrapbook at
the Center. I forgot to give it to him. The teens worked so hard on it.”
“Hey, no worries. I’ll take it to him tonight.”
“You would?” I was surprised he was so willing. “Do you have to get back to Missouri?” It suddenly dawned on me that he just up and left. “What about work?”
“I got it covered,” was all he said.
When we went back to my apartment, I pulled the scrapbook from my suitcase. I carried it like it was a fragile piece of fine china, and handed it off to José who was sitting on the couch. In a way, I guess it was. The kids had written stuff for Fernie. Some pages had pictures of different field trips or times at the Center, and the teens had written funny stuff about the picture’s event. Some were a bit sad as the teens remembered the times they shared with Fernie. I sat down next to José and passed him the scrapbook wrapped in a white kitchen trash bag. He went to pull it out.
“Don’t take it out!” I told him quickly.
“Whoa. Is it gonna burn me?”
“No, but you’ll be covered in glitter.”
He looked at me to crack a smile. I didn’t. “You’re serious?”
“Dude, Penny shits glitter. So she bought a ton of it for the teens to decorate with. It’s a glitter explosion in that bag.”
“Should I warn Fernie?” I looked at José and thought for a moment. A smile broke out across my face.
“Nah. But I recommend stepping away when he opens it. Maybe take some video on your phone.”
“You’re bad,
cielito
. Terrible.”
“Are you gonna drop it off and
then book it outta there? Or are you gonna stay and watch the glitter explosion?”
“Fuck, you know I’m gonna stay.”
“Ah, you’re just as bad then,” I said, unable to contain my laughter. Once I got myself together, things got... weird. We didn’t have any weed to provide a reason to be chilling together on the couch, and the silence was starting to stretch into the uncomfortable zone. I fidgeted a bit before standing up from the couch.
“Well, uh, I think I’m gonna hit the hay. It’s been a long couple of days.” I prayed he took the hint.
“I’ll hit you up later. I got your land line programed in my phone. You using your cell here?” I exhaled as he stood up with the scrapbook in hand.
“Yeah, I got my cell. You can use it, but try the land line first.”
There was another moment of awkwardness, but José navigated it for the both of us by giving me a head nod and telling me he’d hit me up tomorrow, then headed out the door.
I stood in my apartment, at a loss as to what to do next. It was still early, barely five o’clock. The sun was still out, and although I was tired, I wasn’t ready for bed. I decided to go back to the park where we’d eaten lunch. I packed my Kindle into my purse, thinking maybe I’d see if I could finish up Rose and Connor before school started, when I wouldn't have time for fiction reading. I grabbed a hoodie in case it cooled down, though I highly doubted it based on the weather trends I'd googled, and left the apartment.
I made sure to remember the route
José and I walked to and from the park. It was only a few blocks, but I didn’t want to get lost my first week in Mexico. If my face showed up in the paper, my mother would freak the fuck out. I found the park and a vacant bench, but I didn’t pull my Kindle out right away, instead choosing to scope the scene. People were everywhere. Some walking through the park to whatever their final destination might be, others reading or chatting with friends. There were couples meandering though the statues holding hands. A good number of couples had found spots to make out—under a tree, behind a statue of someone famous enough to be memorialized in bronze, on a bench two feet away from me. It seemed PDA was A-OK in Monterrey.
I’d like to say I left the “old” Elle in Missouri, but there were parts of me that would never go away. I’d been
in enough shady situations to always have my radar on, and it was beeping in the back of my mind. A black Crown Victoria, the fucking cop car of the 1980s, with tinted windows rolled by. It looked a little out of place, but wasn’t too strange. What got my shady radar beeping louder was when it passed by a second time. When it passed a third time and parked across the street, I got my ass off that bench.
I walked towards a statue, doing my best to mosey and not hurry
. I stared at the plaque beneath it like it was the most interesting thing in the world. In reality, I had no idea what it said, nor who the statue was of because I wasn’t reading the plaque at all. I was watching the Crown Vic out of the corner of my eye. It stayed parked, and I kept pretending to read the plaque. This went on for a good five minutes. Finally, the car pulled away, so I went back to the bench. I was about to sit down, when the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
I walked to the sidewalk surrounding the park, deciding to do a lap. I had my Fossil
, cross-body purse slung over my shoulder. I slipped my hoodie on, despite the heat, rearranged my purse across my body so my hands were free, and pulled a knife out of my purse. Fernie felt the need to give it to me in a moment of brotherliness or something of the sorts. Both him and José had been giving me a lecture on safety when Fernie produced the seven inch blade and leather sheath to go with it. The sheath was looped on the end so it could be hooked on a belt. Straight Sons of Anarchy shit. I slipped it in the front kangaroo pocket of my hoodie and started walking.
Stopping
on a corner and leaning against a lamppost, I tried to look as casual as possible. I saw the Crown Vic reappear on my left side, and I slid my eyes in its direction, cautious to not move my head and get caught staring. Someone got out of the driver’s side with the car still running. I desperately wanted to turn my head, to see who the fuck it was. Was I being paranoid? Why would someone be after me? I was just a foreign exchange student. The park was full of people, plenty close enough to me that they, and not me, could be the target of the large man moving in my direction. I shoved my hands in my hoodie nonetheless, one hand on the knife handle and the other on the sheath, ready to pull it out and stab whoever tried to get within a foot of me.
I realized the figure was moving in my direction crow’
s flight style. Fuck it. I turned my head when the figure was less than fifty feet from me. The anxious pounding that had begun in my chest the minute I first saw the Crown Vic changed the instant I turned my head. I shoved the knife back into my purse and started running, my heart pounding in an entirely different way. I felt my eyes fill with tears, suddenly overtaken with emotion. I was three feet away from the man pursuing me when I leapt into his arms.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, breathless, tears streaming down my face.
I’m not sure what reaction I was expecting. Maybe a response to my question? Yeah, that would have been a logical place to start. Instead, we were moving, then I was deposited in the driver seat of the Crown Vic, and scooted across the bench seat to the passenger side. Everything was happening so fast. I wiped at my eyes as we sped away from the park.
“What the fuck? Where are we going?” I was frantic. We only drove a few blocks, pulling ove
r in an alley behind a row of store fronts.
My heart was still pounding and tears
were still falling as I found myself being pulled across the seat, and enveloped in a set of strong arms I didn’t realize I missed so much.
“What are you doing here?” J asked,
mimicking the question I’d already asked him.
I didn’t answer
. I couldn’t. I was straddling his lap, with his hands framing my face, I gazed upon the eyes I had longed for, the ones I'd seen empty and dead in my nightmares. All I could do was bury my head in the space where his neck met his shoulder, my place. I touched my lips to his skin, and inhaled through my nose. There was no cologne, just the smell of him. He put one hand on the back of my head and held me tighter to his body. I felt his heart beating against the pounding in my own chest. For a moment, I forgot where we were. For a moment, we weren’t in a car, in Mexico, or anywhere on this planet, but instead we were together in our own universe. One where it was just us, drawing strength from one another. For a moment, all was right in world, and the agony of the past few months disappeared.
He pulled my head from his shoulder, wiping my tears with his thumbs.
With his hands still on either side of my face, he pulled my lips to his, merely holding them against his, unmoving. He inhaled.
“Do I smell the same?”
I whispered.
“Always. Like golden rays. You smell like light.”
He kissed me gently, not savage like he had when he left Chris’ house. This wasn’t the kiss of a man unsure if he’d return. I didn’t know what this kiss was. He alternated between resting his forehead on mine, kissing me, and just touching his lips to mine. You’d think we’d be savage beasts clawing at one another, ripping clothes off, but it wasn’t like that. Well, I wouldn’t have minded a little clothes ripping, but J was making no moves to do so. He kept my head engulfed in his large hands, his lips maintaining contact with some part of my skin. I didn’t care if we never fucked again, this felt right. It felt natural, as if there were only one place I was meant to be—in the arms of this man.
“We can’t stay here. Someone might see us.”
I tried to pull back, but he held me close. “Who are we hiding from?” I asked.
“Let’s get somewhere safe first.”
“I have an apartment... ish.” I told him where it was, rambling off the address José made me memorize so I could tell it to a taxi driver in English or Spanish if necessary. I slid off of him, back to the passenger seat. I was about to put the center console back down, but J pulled me back to him. I wrapped my arms around his torso, laid my head on his chest, and closed my eyes.
Home.
I never had one. I thought I did. I thought my apartment in the states was my home. Home is where the heart is. There was no heart in my stateside apartment, just safety in the form of locks and solitude. Chris’ apartment was closer to home, filled with happy memories of the time we spent together, yet it wasn’t the same. My parents’ house was never home, not even close. With J, it didn’t matter where we were. Home wasn’t a building or structure one lived in. Home was an idea, a phenomenon, an unexplainable feeling, a peace and contentment with the universe. With J’s body pressed against mine, I knew there would never be another home for me. He was it.
I felt the car move, and J reaching into his left pant pocket. I opened my eyes and peered up at him. He had
a phone pressed against his ear, a hard look on his face.
“Come get the Crown.” Pause. “No, everything’s OK, but I need the car to disappear for now.” More pausing while someone on the other line talked. “I’ll text you the coordinates when I arrive. Keep it low profile. Have Son come with and slip into the Crown. I’ll let you know when I need it back.” There was one more pause while the person on the other line’s voice rose. J gritted his teeth. “Fine. It’ll be dark soon. Don’t park close.
Text me on the burner when you’re there.”
He hung up. Fuckin’ A. Did I want to know what that was all about? No. Did I need to know what just transpired on that phone call? More than likely. Did I want to starfish the fuck out of it instead? Oh, fuck yes. Had I learned my lesson about starfishing? I mentally sighed
, yes, yes I had and I had the scars to prove it.
I closed my eyes again. “We’re talking when we get to my place. I won’t be left in the dark
anymore.”
J
had one hand on the steering wheel, and ran his free hand down my arm, intertwining his fingers with mine. “I know.”
Those were the only words spoken on the short drive to my place. He didn’t drive us to my house, but instead parked a block away in the parking lot of a convenience store. This didn’t seem like the appropriate time for a Slushie
, but I kept my mouth shut. He turned the car off and I sat up, ready to exit the vehicle, but J grabbed my arm and told me to wait a minute. He dug in his jacket, pulling a different phone out of his pocket, only I didn’t think it was a phone. He tapped on the gadget’s screen, and I realized it was some sort of compass. Once he had the information he needed, he texted a set of numbers and letters on the burner cell.
“Let’s go,” he said, pocketing his phone and the gadget. He pulled me across the seat and I stepped out the driver’s side. He flipped the hood up on his jacket and put his arm around my shoulders, once more attaching my body to his. He
led us toward my building, sizing it up.
“Whe
re’s your place?”
“Second floor, all the way at the end,” I told him. He walked us around to the back.
“Here,” he said, pointing to a back door I didn’t realize was there. We entered into what I assumed was a maintenance room that was empty for the moment. There was a separate set of stairs in the room we took up to the second floor. Opening the door at the top, I found us practically right in front of my apartment. We walked the few feet, and I used my key to let us in to the place I’d be living for the next few months. Closing the door and locking it behind me, I observed in silence while J did a sweep of the place. I stood with my back against the door, watching him inspect the room.
“What—
” I tried to ask him what he was doing, but he put his finger to his lips. He pulled out the compass gadget again, tapped the screen a few times, then transferred whatever information he was getting off the compass into his phone, coordinates I think. He went to the bathroom, assumedly to check it for whatever he was checking in the main space.
Minutes passed, and I couldn’t seem to move from the door. I didn’t know what to make of his behavior. There were so many questions swirling in my
head that I couldn’t seem to pick just one to ask. Where did I start? Which question did I ask first?
Why are you here? What are you doing? Who are you texting? Why can’t I talk? What are you doing with the compass thingy? For the love of God, will you rip my clothes off and fuck me?
I felt a knock on the front door. It was more of a soft tapping, but I felt
it vibrate against my back. J was by my side instantly, tapping the door twice. Two taps responded on other side, and J gestured for me to move aside. He cautiously opened the door, peering through a crack. Once he saw who was on the other side, he opened it just wide enough for the person to enter.
“Who’s—
” J cut me off again with a finger to his mouth. If I didn’t have faith that J knew what he was doing, I would’ve been really fucking irritated with him cutting me off—twice.
The man who entered was tall. Not at tall as J, but taller than six feet. He was older than J, maybe in his
mid to late forties. He wasn’t unattractive, though too old for my tastes. His slightly graying hair looked like it had been shaved a week ago and was starting to come back in the form of scruff, which matched the mustache and goatee he wore, dark and also starting to become spotted with gray hairs. He wasn’t as broad as J, but J was a beast, so in reality he was a solid guy. Wide shoulders, long arms that looked solid as a brick, long torso, that based on his arms was more than likely rock hard as well. He wore tan work boots and jeans. The sunglasses he failed to take off didn't allow me to see his eyes. He had yet another device in his hand that he walked around the room with. Once he was satisfied, having walked through the entire place, he turned to J.
“Clean.”
“You get the Crown Vic?” J asked.
“Yep. This her?” J nodded. “Why’s she here?” J shrugged. “This ain’t good, brother.”
I snapped my fingers in the air. “Yo! I’m right here. You can address me or not speak of me at all.”
The man continued looking at J and laughed. “Yep. Definitely old lady material.” They both laughed and I think steam came out of my ears.
I was about to pull the knife out of my purse and repeat what I said when the man finally turned to me with his hand outstretched.
