Page 19 of Expressionate
"What about the shop in TK?" Iask.
He shakes his head quickly. "It's not well known enough yet. It's barely chugging along on its own. It's this one that's killing me right now, and it's this one I can't let go," he says. "If I fucking let this one go, half the crew here won't be able to find other fucking jobs. They rely on me. Abigail's about to give birth. I've gotta go on leave for a while. She's going on maternity leave for a while too, obviously. I don't know how we're gonna fucking affordit."
I'm shocked. Keith is not the kind of man to confess his finances to anyone – friend or not – and, yeah, we've known each other longer than most. I still remember him as one of the scrawnier fighters from our cage days. Two boys exhausted and hungry. If I'm honest, though, he was never much good at it like I was. His heart didn’t beat for it. Not like mine did. Those fights fed something inside of me. It let me get my anger out – my anger at my dad, my mom, the goddamn world – and though I knew it was darker than it should have been, I let myself feed on that darkness because it was all I knew for the longest time. I didn't like the kids I fought because they didn't want to be in the cage. Keith certainly hadn’t wanted to be there, but somehow, we had gotten close – I couldn’t even remember how anymore. He was just another staple in my life now, one that reminded me of bad times, but of how we had overcome those timestoo.
"I'm sorry, man," I find myself saying. "What can Ido?"
Keith digs in his pocket and pulls out a slip of paper. It's crumpled and ripped in places, stained by coffee. I can't make out the words from where I’m sitting, and he doesn't hand it over. Instead, he sets his beer to the side, perched precariously in the gravel, and leans his elbows on his knees. He stares down at the slip of paper with haunted eyes and clenches his fists into the wrinkled paper, then shoves it back into his pocket before picking up his beer and downing the rest ofit.
"Forget it," he says. "There ain't anything that can be done. I'll just take out another loan or something. Don't worry about it,man."
I watch him regardless of his words. "Give me the paper, man," I sayquietly.
He stands up, nervously wiping his mouth. "You want another beer?" he asks. "Actually, it's getting kinda late, ain't it? I better head back to Abigail and you've got a chick of your own to see, I guess." He reaches for my half empty beer bottle. I pull it away and stand. He stumbles a little, and the paper falls out of his pocket. He doesn't realize until I bend down to retrieve it. When he sees it in my hand, he freezes, and his eyes gowide.
I read the scribbles and my blood ices over in my veins as I drag my gaze back up to his. "You arenotdoing this." The gruffness of my voice belies the amount of animosity I feel. If I was any less in control of myself, I'd be shaking. Rage builds up inside of me and spreads throughout mylimbs.
"It's ten grand." Keith's gaze slips to the ground. “I thought maybe you could just…come to…hell, fuck, I don’t know. Justcome?”
I move closer, dropping my beer to the ground, letting it spill around our boots. I grab his grease stained shirt and haul him up to look atme.
"You. Are. Not. Doing. This." I'm barely restraining my boiling anger. I can't picture Keith as he is now, still as scrawny as ever, twig-like neck, balding head, crooked nose, back in the fighting scene. I ball up the flyer in my hand. It's no ordinary flyer. It's one that only passes to certain hands. Hands like his. Hands likemine.
I stare into Keith's desperate face and feel the darkness creeping back in, flooding my veins. The craving is there, begging me to come back. I look down at the paper in my fist, crumpled and torn. I silently tell myself to drop it, to throw it away, incinerate it. Another part of me, though, tells me Keith won't get another loan. Not with the loans he's already taken out for the new shop and the house he bought for Abigail and their unborn son. I close my eyes, wanting to do the right thing. If only I knew what the right thingwas.
"It's going to be fine," I hear Keith tell me. "Even if I lose, I'll make a few hundred bucks. Every cent counts rightnow."
"Does Abigail know?" I watch him, gauging his reaction, and he flinches. That answers that. "You're not doing it," I repeat, and then in a fit of insanity – or perhaps goodwill, whatever the fuck it is, I don't fucking care anymore, because I can't let him do this – I say, "I'llgo."
His eyes widen. "It's tonight," he says,shocked.
"So I fucking saw," I snap. "I'll go. I'll win. You'll get the money and you'll never fucking consider this again, do you fuckingunderstand?"
"I can't let you do this for me," heargues.
I don't give a shit about many people. For the most part, it's just Ally and the guys. Love is only a curiosity for now. If Keith hadn't met Abigail, if he hadn't got his shit together before me, he might still be with me. But he did meet her, and he got his feet underneath him. Opened his own fucking garage, and I'll be damned if I see it all wiped away in one night. Because, looking at him, I know it would be worse than a loss and a couple hundred bucks. It'd be a hospital stay. It'd be months out of work. It'd be possible death. Everyone fucking knows that. Abigail and his son would be left alone and in debt. I can't let thathappen.
"I'm fucking doing it," I growl low, dropping his shirt. He takes a step back. "You don’t do this kind of shit. I do. You," I step into his space, and he knows better than to move away this time, "you're going to go home to Abigail and you're gonna fucking eat the dinner she makes you. You're gonna rub her feet and tell her how much you fucking love her and then you're going to meet me at–" I pause for a moment, wondering what place would be good. Not the apartment, Ally can't know. Not the garage, the boys can't know. I think of Love and an idea forms. "You're going to meet me at JU. I'll text you tomorrow and tell you exactlywhere."
"Tax–"
"Shut thefuckup." I glare at him before finally stepping back. "Don't you fucking go near thatplace."
He doesn't reply, and I don't give him a chance to. I turn away and stomp toward my Jeep. I open the door and hop in, cranking the engine, spinning my tires as I peel out of the parking lot. I need to get back to the apartment. Cross or Blake: one of them will need to come with me. If anything happens, they've got to make sure I can make it back to the apartment in one piece. It's not uncommon for winners to get jacked after a fight. Either way, my blood is pumping. I'm both exhilarated and terrified out of my fucking mind. Above all, I can't fucking let Allyknow.
7
Love
For the need to be incontrol,
pen the trigger that letsme
drown myself in inkand
for the first time inyears
I can see in thedark
