Four

Nico

I roll my shoulder, the joint stiff after yesterday’s workout. And Wednesday’s. And Tuesday’s. Every day’s since Raven walked into the station. I’ve lifted enough weights the past week to win one of those World’s Strongest Man competitions. All that’s left is pulling a transport truck.

Alessi slams his fist into my arm. “You’re not listening, bro.”

“You still talking?” After three years together, the guy’s voice has become white noise.

“I need some advice.”

“Definitely get that rash checked out.”

He snorts. “Fucker.”

He turns the patrol car down Hastings Street for a final pass, easing his foot off the gas. We scan the homeless people crammed against walls, legs sticking out from under blankets and cardboard. Fidgety men and women huddle together by barred-up stores while an old man pushes his life in a grocery cart. East Hastings is as seedy as Vancouver gets.

It also used to be the place my brother called home.

Alessi drums his thumbs on the wheel. “My cousin, Lucia, is getting hitched next month, and since their having, like, ten thousand people stand up for them, she’s asked me to be in the wedding party. Normally I’d be all over that. The suit, the bridesmaids—sign me up. Turns out her maid of honor is a chick I banged last month. Had no idea I’d have to see her again, and now she’s texting me. Lucia gave her my number and expects me to take her to the wedding. The whole thing’s one big clusterfuck.”

I crack my neck and massage my temples to stall the headache building at the edges of my vision. “So take her. What’s the big deal?”

He brakes at a stoplight and flings his hands in the air—his Italian sign language. “I’ve told you a million times how crazy Lucia and her sisters are. If I take this Mara chick, they’ll have us before the priest by the end of the night saying ‘I do.’ If I don’t take her, they’ll rip into me in front of my folks about banging random chicks. I’ll get lectured for the next millennium.”

“My advice is to stop using the word bang.”

Eyes forward, he accelerates. “I need a new partner.”

“You need new life skills.”

“Says the dude who has the hottest chick I’ve ever seen in front of him and doesn’t seal the deal.”

Man has a point. But being with Raven isn’t about getting laid. I might have a lot of pent-up sexual frustration from the past sixteen months, and the thought of being inside her gets me hard like nothing else, but I have to do this right. I’m at fault here. I hurt her. I need to prove she can trust me. Leaning back, I resume rubbing my temples. “I’m giving her time.”

“Bad idea, bro. With a body and face like that, she won’t stay single long.”

I narrow my eyes at him. “Don’t even think about it.”

A young boy in the car beside us waves, and Alessi gives him a thumbs-up. To me, he says, “I may like to bang chicks, but I wouldn’t go there. I prefer both my heads to remain intact. What about when you’re done with her? Still a no-go?”

I bristle at the jab, but my history speaks for itself. At sixteen I fell at Tammy Eisen’s feet and professed my love. Three months later I avoided her calls until I had the courage to end things. I chased Jasmine Lee for weeks, fell hard and fast, serenaded her at our high school graduation, then I couldn’t muster up enough interest for a basic conversation. Even Lisa, my last girlfriend, lost her appeal. Never anything specific. No cheating escapades or massive arguments. They each meant something to me, I thought I was in love, then I wasn’t.

What I experienced with Raven in Aspen was different. Bigger somehow. More intense. Josh was living on the street then, my sister sliding downhill fast, and I sensed sadness under Raven’s tough exterior. Unable to fix things at home, I wanted to ease Raven’s pain, feel useful for a change, but her vulnerability hit me hard. Before I knew it, I was telling her about my family, too. Confessed how terrified I was to be anything like my father.

Even for a night, she had the power to ease my troubled mind.

It doesn’t mean I won’t lose interest, the same cycle spiraling. But the idea of Alessi taking her out, even if that happens, has me wanting to snap his neck.

“Definitely a no-go,” I say. He nods, and I stare out the window. The busy city flips by. “I’m giving her space, okay? She’s pissed at me. But I’m not walking away.”

“Just sayin’, I’d be careful how much space you give.”

“Noted.”

But wary. Last week, after I apologized to her in that bathroom, she sat opposite me for the night. I’d said my piece, but I hated admitting I’d been too embarrassed about my family to call her, hated how juvenile it sounded. When Josh pulled himself out of the gutter and started working toward his GED, I pushed that bullshit aside, knowing he needed someone to be proud of him. He needed a stronger hand guiding him, too. Consequences for recklessness promised and dealt.

Now Raven knows the truth.

She didn’t glare or snap at me afterward. We hung out with our friends, laughing and joking. Still, tension hung between us. My knee would brush hers, and she’d freeze. Her calf would touch mine, and I’d fist my hands. Like at the gym, when I’d exhaust myself, every breath pushed awareness into my muscles, my joints. Near Raven, I was hypersensitive, and I’m pretty sure she was, too, always catching her breath the way she was. Unfortunately, when I tried to give her a ride home, she barely looked at me, said no, and walked to the bus alone.

I’ll give her another few days. Time to let my apology absorb and to read the note I kept…the note she wrote—a reminder of what she felt, too. Then it’s full steam ahead. I’ve spent too many hours stroking myself, reliving our night in Aspen: her inked skin rubbing against mine, her sliding on top of me, working her way down. Her head between my thighs. Her hands and lips and tongue working me over.

Falling asleep with her tucked into my side.

“You going to the rec center tonight?” Alessi asks as we pull into the station.

I shift on my seat, thoughts of Raven always making me half hard. “No. Seeing my family. I need to get in as much time as possible the next couple months. Things are looking bleak for Josh.” Just like that, the heat in my veins cools.

He parks, turns off the ignition, but doesn’t move. “There’s a bust going down soon. I don’t know the details, but I’m pretty sure some of Josh’s old gang are about to get it up the ass. I’ll keep my ears open. All we need is one weak link.”

I shove my door open. “Appreciate it.”

I trudge to my locker, looking forward to seeing Josh, but sick to my stomach. I haven’t told him my lead fell through, haven’t busted his bubble of hope. He’s been toeing the line since he got out on bail. Partly born of determination to avoid the punks who led him to drugs, the street, and enough bad decisions to seal his fate, but I’ve lain down the law since this shitstorm began. His arrest was the last straw. If he screws up again, he’s on his own. Cutting him off from the family would gut me, but lax rules are what led us here. He needs to be accountable. Culpable. Our nephews are getting older. Watching. Learning.

If he stays strong and honors himself, I’ll stand by him. Be there for him, whatever he needs. If he falls, I won’t be his safety net again.

*  *  *

I pull into my mother’s driveway and note the broken gutter on the sloping roof as I shut my door. Must have been last night’s storm. The air smells like earth and wet leaves. A few torn branches are scattered over the lawn. Mentally, I add the gutter to my to-do list, after patching the back deck and repainting the white siding.

When I get a foot inside the door, Jack rushes my legs, chanting, “Cake, cake, cake.”

Colin hangs back, hands stuffed into the pockets of his oversized shorts. “Hey, Uncle Nico.”

I ruffle Colin’s dark hair, the little guy too big to be picked up. Too big to get excited to see me. Jack is a different story. Tiny for seven, the kid is pale with fair hair to match and weighs less than my gym bag. I lift him up by his armpits and tuck him under my arm like a football. “What’s this I hear about cake?”

Jack wiggles in my grasp. “There’s cake but we’re not allowed to have it, but it smells so good, and it’s chocolate and I’ll die if I don’t eat some.”

I carry him into the kitchen while Colin walks beside us, slouching, eyes as puffy as a hungover frat boy. I duck under the narrow door frame and twist to avoid smacking Jack’s head into the side. The entranceway is small, the kitchen not much bigger. The brown plaid wallpaper and green counters are the same as when I was a kid. My mom’s famous chocolate cake sits on top of the oven, the sweet smell filling the room.

She baked that piece of heaven for every birthday in this house, two layers of chocolate cake and icing an inch thick. It was also the cake she baked each time my father got out of jail. The last parole, when I was thirteen, it sat there for two days and got tossed when he never turned up.

Since it isn’t anyone’s birthday, and my father is behind bars, the cake is a mystery.

“My son isn’t a football. Put the kid down before he pukes up his dinner.” My sister crowds into the cramped kitchen, arms folded, the skin around her eyes puffier and darker than Colin’s. She smiles, though, a sight I wasn’t sure I’d see again.

Not wanting to upset her fragile balance, I kiss Jack’s head and put him down. I nod to the cake. “What are we celebrating?”

“I want cake!” Jack cries again.

Too tough to care about cake, Colin leans on the fridge and kicks his heel into the base. The appliance looks more yellow than white, the dent still there from when I punched it the day Josh stormed out, the day it all went to shit. I should buy them a new one.

Nikki smacks Jack on the bottom. “Into the living room with you. No one gets cake ’til Uncle Josh gets home.”

He runs out and Colin rolls off the fridge, trudging after his brother.

I shake my head. “Who pissed in his Cheerios?”

Nikki twists her long brown hair around her finger, chewing her lip the way she’s done since rehab. She’s still skinny in her ripped jeans and AC/DC tank top, but not as gaunt as she was. “He’s ten going on fifty. Life’s hard, he tells me. Too much homework. Shitty sleep habits. He doesn’t know hard.”

“How’s the crowd he’s hanging with at school? Anything I need to worry about?” That’s all it takes, one bad seed and the crop is spoiled. Or maybe I have it backward.

Maybe it’s the earth.

My father, uncle, and a few cousins have all done time. Drugs, burglary, car theft, assault—you name it, my family has bragging rights. All us kids could have walked that path, but the punks Nikki and Josh fell in with tipped the balance.

When it came time for me to go to junior high, my mother’s cousin lived in a different district. Without consulting me, they lied about my address and shipped me off to a posh school in a posh neighborhood, my sneakers never in style, my clothes never quite right. Sawyer and Kolton didn’t seem to care. We hung out and fucked around, but never crossed certain lines. Unlike my siblings. A family argument meant Josh and Nikki went to the local schools. Their friends offered them heroin instead of beer, nights stealing cars instead of watching movies.

If that had been my life, I could have spiraled downhill, too.

Nikki leans on the small table at the center of the kitchen. “His friends seem all right. For now, at least. Better than the crowd Josh ran with.” Her blue eyes are glassy, rimmed red around the edges. Not dilated like when she gets high. Just tired, hopefully.

“If you even get a whiff of something, I want to know. I won’t see those boys messing up their lives.”

Blinking rapidly, she places her hand on my forearm. “You’re too good to us.”

More like not good enough. I should have been firmer with Josh when he was younger, gotten in his face when he’d ditch class and spray paint walls, locked Nikki in her room when she blew curfew. I know better now. But then? With our father either looking to score or in jail, and our mother working two jobs to keep us fed, I was scrambling. She never asked me to step in, never made it my burden. But Nikki and Josh weren’t given the same chance as me. I at least owed them that.

I jut my chin toward the cake. “Still don’t know what the fuss is about.”

She grins wider than usual. “It’s a surprise.”

“Last time there was a surprise, I ended up in a Superman costume for Jack’s birthday.”

“And I still plan on framing those pictures.”

I’m about to threaten her with jail time (not the best joke in this house) when the front door swings open. My mother kicks it shut, struggling with an armful of full of groceries. I duck through the door frame and take long strides to reach her, grabbing her bags in one arm and hugging her shoulders with the other. She may be tall, but her head fits under my chin.

She squeezes back. “Is Josh home yet?”

“Nope. What’s with the mysterious cake?”

She shoves me with her hip and glances at the boys in the living room. Jack’s pushing my old Tonka Truck around, skirting the cigarette burns in the brown carpet. Colin’s sullen face is hidden behind his iPod. Nikki flops on the couch beside him and smooths his dark hair. He raises a shoulder to ward her off, and she winces.

Sighing, I carry the groceries into the kitchen and help Mom unpack. She kisses my shoulder. “How was work?”

“Not bad.”

She side-eyes me, my two word answer not cutting it. I don’t fill silence needlessly like Alessi, but I usually offer up more than two syllables. But talking opens the door to questions, often about Josh and his case. Questions I prefer to avoid.

I choose deflection. “Colin seems quiet. Everything okay with him? Nikki doing all right?”

She tosses a bag of dill pickle chips and M&M’s on the counter. “He’s just being a kid. Nothing serious. And Nikki is…better. Definitely better. Good days and bad.” She reaches up and pinches my cheek. “But you, I don’t have to worry about. Josh is lucky you’re in his corner.”

The smell of the chocolate cake sours, my gut turning over. Lucky isn’t the word I’d choose.

“Could you empty those bags in bowls? Josh will be home any minute.”

Happy to busy my hands, I grab the yellow plastic bowls from the cupboard and dump in the chips and candy—Josh’s favorite. Whatever the celebration, he’s at the center of it. Maybe if I don’t mention Jericho and the confession I won’t get, Josh can enjoy his last weeks as a free man. Not worry about the rationed food and prison bars and empty days. The inmates.

No point destroying what’s left of his time on the outside.

The front door slams open again, and Josh ducks inside. He scratches at his dark scruff. “Where are the rugrats?”

Jack, of course, throws himself at his uncle, head butting his thigh. Colin comes to life and loiters in the hallway, his clenched hand held up for a fist bump. Josh obliges and crouches down, a stack of comic books on his knee. “I was with a buddy, and he was getting rid of these. You two want ’em?”

Jack crows, “Yes!” and tries to swipe the stack.

Pushing to his feet, Josh looms over the boys. He pulls a few comics from the stack. “These, little man, are for you.” Jack grabs them and disappears into the living room. He holds the rest out for Colin. “And these are not for your brother’s eyes. They’re too gory. Got it?”

Colin bobs his head and takes the stack of comics. “Thanks, man. These are awesome.”

Josh squeezes his shoulder and pushes past him toward the kitchen. Instead of slinking off, Colin follows, his focus locked on his uncle, like Josh might do or say something brilliant at any second. A couple weeks back Colin was all over Josh, playing new songs from his iPod, eager to impress his uncle. He even wears his jeans low on his ass like Josh, a fucking travesty. I should be happy Josh brings Colin out of his shell, but it eats at the hollow in my gut.

Josh’s conviction will reverberate through this family.

“Nico,” Josh says in greeting. He tosses his sketchbook on the table, the thing glued to his hands these days, then he rounds the table and pulls me into a hug.

I pound his back, holding on longer than usual. There was a time, before his arrest, that he wouldn’t talk to me, let alone give me a hug. The silver lining, I guess.

I release him and nod to the cake. “Someone want to tell me what’s up?”

Josh folds his arms and sucks on his lips, pressing them tight. His eyes shine brighter than I’ve ever seen them, like he’s swallowed a lightbulb.

“Seriously,” I say. “Someone tell me something or I’m taking Jack and that cake, and we’ll eat it ourselves.”

“I got my GED.” Josh grins so wide my face hurts. “My fucking GED,” he repeats, then winces. “Sorry, Ma.”

Mom doesn’t yell at him to watch his language. Her chin trembles, and she fans her face to keep the tears at bay. I scrub my jaw then cover my mouth to hide the extent of my emotion. His GED. Every grade since his arrest has been hard earned. Late nights. Determination. Desperation to be better. As tough as it’s been, it validates the harsh line I’ve set for him.

Choked up, I grab his T-shirt and pull him back into my arms. “So proud of you.” I cup the back of his neck and kiss his head. “So proud,” I say against his hair.

By the time I let him go, Mom is crying, Nikki’s leaning on the door frame wiping her eyes, and Colin shifts on his feet, unsure what to make of all the hugging.

“Can we eat cake now?” Jack pokes his head around Josh’s legs and bats his lashes at my mother. “Please, Anna, can we?”

Anna. No one chooses to become a grandparent at forty, but having your grandkids call you by your first name won’t change the facts.

She nods, still too emotional to speak.

Josh smacks his hands together. “You bet. Cake and chips and chocolate. It’s a party ’cause your uncle is the bomb.”

I stand back as they crowd around the cake, failure coating my throat.

This small house has witnessed enough yelling to crack the walls. It has withstood enough tears to be washed away, enough anger to light it on fire. But it’s still standing. We’re still standing. How many disasters can we weather, though? If Josh gets convicted, Colin could pull so far away he sets Nikki off. If she starts using again, Jack suffers and Mom loses another kid, possibly her grandkids, too. It’s all so damn fragile.

Josh shoves a plate of cake into my hand, and they all pile into the living room, but I can’t sit. Can’t get comfortable. Can barely swallow a mouthful of chocolate. Jack’s face is stained with icing in seconds. Colin badgers Josh about his recent sketches. Nikki puts chips on her plate, alternating bites between them and her cake, more content than I’ve seen her in ages. My mother is radiant. We’re the reason she fought for her receptionist job at the dental office and worked nights bagging groceries. We’re the reason she didn’t fall apart when my father went to prison, each time. And she thinks this is the beginning of something, a new start for our family.

How do I confess the truth?

She leans into the couch, her body rounder than when she was young, her dirty-blond hair streaked with gray. Those light blue eyes never age, though. My eyes. Josh and Nikki’s eyes. Eyes that pleaded with me when Josh was arrested to do something. To save him. The warmth in the room strangles me, the facts I haven’t shared tightening the noose. I can’t let this happen. Can’t stand by while he’s sent to jail. Not when he’s trying so hard to be better. I have to work the streets again, hit up the vagrants on Hastings. For months I questioned and investigated, even uttering threats. Maybe I missed something. I had to have missed something.

There’s too much at stake.