“Rise and shine, Tommy Two-step,” Wesson bellows. “It’s a new day and a New Year!”
Motherfucker is entirely too happy this morning for a man who didn’t get laid. My ears ring, my head throbs, and my entire body aches. I remain in place without changing my breathing pattern or looking at my brother. If he thinks I’m still asleep, maybe he will leave.
Wishful thinking, but I’m dragging ass right this second. Only I know my brother and he takes being a morning person to a whole new level.
He sighs audibly. Nope, he’s not buying it.
Before I can open my eyes or reply, Wes begins the warnings. Then in the way only my brother has perfected, he begins a conversation with himself. “How much water can a mattress and pillow absorb before they’re ruined? Hmmm, should I ask Alexa or Siri. Nah, I’ll just go get the pot and fill it. Dump that shit on his head, and then like when we were kids working on science fair projects, we can hypothesize the days it takes to dry out.” I stifle my laugh.
Knowing my brother isn’t one to bullshit, I have to face the day or he will indeed dump water all over my head. Blinking, I slowly open my eyes. My mouth is dry like I sucked a cotton ball all night. “Fuck you,” I say flipping him the bird while wishing I had some water close by to drink not to dump on his head like he would most certainly do to me.
He shrugs his shoulders. “Now, Colt, that is not the way you greet a man bringing you Hair-of-the-Dog to save you from hangover hell.” Fuck his hangover cure … not really, but come on man, it’s far too early for these shenanigans.
He’s far too chipper for this time of day. Even bringing me his famous Hair-of-the-Dog alcoholic morning beverage that somehow magically cures a hangover doesn’t mean I want Suzy-fucking-sunshine in my face when I wake up. Keeping one eye closed, I squint to see the clock.
Eleven twenty-six.
Well, maybe it’s not as early as I thought, but his bright bushy-tailed self needs to go bother someone else. “Leave the drink on the nightstand and disappear.”
He laughs, “And miss watching you suffer? Fuck no.”
This is us. Wesson and I are the typical dudes who absolutely relish the other one being in a slight state of pain. Because that’s just what brothers do. Okay, so I’m not really the best guy the morning after getting drunk in general.
Truthfully, I’m not great at morning after anything.
Which is why I don’t bring broads home. I’ll fuck them and bounce, but no overnights. I’m not a morning person in the least. I’m not a people person either. Frankly, the world can fuck off, and as long as my family—the Hellions and my family, as in my parents and brother—are around, that’s all I need. Even the thought of having a girlfriend doesn’t appeal to me. I don’t want any kind of commitment or obligation to another soul. So, cuddling, yeah, not my style either. See, I’m not good with the morning after … anything for real.
I like to fuck.
Plain and simple.
I like the smorgasbord of random pussy. Like an all you can eat buffet, that’s how I like my women. When I’m in the mood for a particular taste, I can nab it. If I’m not feeling the skinny girl salad, I can move right past it to put my hands on some meat and taste a mouthwatering steak. Then, those times I want that special delicacy pussy, I can find that too. No need to be stuck with just one when I am a man with varied tastes.
Moreover, I simply don’t want the obligation or expectation of having a woman around for more than the time it takes me to get us both off and get her the fuck gone. See, I’m not such a dick I only care about my own release. To watch a woman orgasm is almost as good as getting off myself. The female body is a work of wonder. Like playing a board game, each woman’s body takes a different strategy. As I move around working her up, it’s like rolling the dice, if I don’t get the reaction I want it’s like rolling a low number. I have to change tactics as I go until I finally win the game. Once she gets off, then she needs to get gone though. That is just how I am.
I don’t want to talk just to tell lies of all the sweet nothings some broad wants to hear just so her ego can make her think she’s a fucking queen. Even if she literally is the Queen of some random country, I don’t care to give her some red carpet treatment.
See, I’m not that kind of guy.
The one where I want a woman to think our relationship is some power play or some bullshit hierarchy. I’m not her king, and she’s not my queen. Her pussy is not some magic wand or a potion that can win me over to her way of thinking. I like pussy. I like to eat it, fuck it, play with it, tease it, taste it, and damn to I love to taste all the pussy, but I’m not giving into it.
My woman—whenever I commit to one—will be my equal. She’s not royalty, as neither am I. While I understand the appeal, I don’t buy into it. Her value isn’t defined by me. I’m not going to say, “I treat her like a queen.” To me, there isn’t some comparison in life of how you treat someone. Royalty or not, when someone matters you show them, and that isn’t on some level that seems like anyone else is beneath you.
I’m the kind of man who’ll treat my woman right. She’s going to know where she stands with me—no bullshit, no games. My mom taught us early on that everything with women is respect.
Royalty is shit. Respect is everything. It’s more than just words, it’s actions. Titles, doting praises, games, or emotional warfare—none of that is me.
Straight up, if I dig a broad, I tell her.
However, I haven’t had anyone come into my life in years that draws my attention for more than a fuck. When I decide I want to have more than a fuck, then I’ll take her out and have an actual conversation. Although, I have to be honest, the last time I cared to talk to a female was years ago before life left me lost.
Until last night, that is. I don’t know why, but I woke up craving the woman from the club. I must still be drunk because I didn’t even get her name, so how can I want to know more about her? I rub my chest as I stretch thinking to myself, damn, that’s a lost opportunity. Oh well, on to the next.
Wesson, on the other hand, he’s the kind of guy all the women love. No games or bullshit like some guys, my brother, he knows how to turn on the charm. I don’t know if it’s the wheelchair or if he is just that damn charismatic. Women, though, for whatever reason, all of them think Wesson is going to put them on a pedestal and shower them with praises and affection. To some degree, he does, but sometimes they flock to him without a single word. Maybe he gives off an approachable vibe. Whereas, I’m more like a woman with a resting bitch face that stays in place; I am Mr. Unapproachable. I don’t even have to wear my, “I’m a dick with a bigger dick,” t-shirt that he bought me last year, and people get the idea to stay away. Wesson got the shit as a joke, only I find it to be accurate and don’t have a single ounce of shame in wearing it.
I am a dick with a bigger dick.
Sometimes the truth hurts … other people, not me. I don’t really get in my feelings about much.
I like to fuck.
A lot.
Getting laid doesn’t mean being nice. Fucking is simply about getting off, and getting off is something I’m good at along with getting gone. Once there was a broad calling me an asshole with every thrust as I pounded in her pussy.
She was not wrong.
Wesson gets more pussy than I do, so don’t ever let the chair fool you.
Not that we’re in some competition.
Wesson is different since the chair. It’s like he wants to live every second of life to the fullest in a fast lane. Before his accident, he was the guy who everyone liked but he also spent most of his time locked in the friend-zone because he was the nice guy. In the blink of an eye it all changed. Having this second chance at life, he doesn’t hold back. He’s still a stand-up kind of guy, but now when he wants a chick, he goes for it.
And nine out of ten times, he’s successful.
Neither of us are settling down, but it’s not because we’re opposed to relationships; we simply haven’t found women who understand our lifestyle.
Like the fact that from time to time, my baby brother likes to go to a nightclub and dance. We’re bikers but when Wes says it’s time to bust a move, I’m not going to tell him no. In fact, there is nothing I’ll deny my brother. So he wants to go to a club and dance, we go without hesitation even if that’s not typical for bikers. Women either don’t tolerate our life as a Hellion or our relationship in general.
My brother is my absolute closest friend. No one comes before him. Women don’t like to be second to anyone. Which means any chick wanting something with me has to be special because this shit isn’t changing. Watching Wesson almost die more than once as his body fought to heal after the accident, I made every promise imaginable. He will always be a priority to me. I’ll never leave him hanging … so I’ve learned to enjoy going out to Booty’s when he wants to among other things.
Not because Twinkle-Toes ever cared to dance before his accident. I don’t even remember either of us dancing at our high school prom. In fact, we both wore suits so Momma could get pictures, then changed in the bathroom to jeans and a t-shirt. There is nothing I won’t do for my mom either, so she wanted her boys in suits, she got it.
We didn’t think twice about dancing or prom memories for our dates. Teenage me had one agenda, get my dick wet. I fucked Cindy Parks in the bathroom, and then her sister Cathy on a bench outside. Wesson didn’t dance because he was busy smoking weed with some friends and then chilling at the table while he was high and the lights twinkled on the ceiling. Neither of us danced or really cared about music.
Nope, he found his knack for grooving and moving on a drunk night with dollar domestics at Booty’s. While my brother has come to terms with his situation now, there was a time, he wasn’t at peace with it. In fact, there was a time where he drowned every ounce of pain, shame, and lost dreams into every bottle he could find. This is how we ended up at Booty’s with a dollar sale and he found drunk Wes liked to dance—even in a wheelchair. More so, drunk Wes remembered it when sober Wes emerged the next day and as time passed and Wesson become comfortable in his skin again, dancing at the club helped.
When Wesson first came home from the hospital after his accident, adjusting was hard. I still get a tightness in my chest thinking about it.
At the time, I was still active duty, so I couldn’t just come home to be at his side. Months he had to wait for me to get here for a decent stretch of time. I hated it. There was this nagging inside of me that I was letting him down. Of course, he didn’t feel that way, but being apart from him in a time when he truly needed me simply felt all kinds of wrong. Adapting to life in a chair after twenty-two-years upright is a unique predicament, and frankly, would break a lesser man’s spirit.
It would have mine. That’s the God’s honest truth. I am not nearly the man Wesson is to endure all that he has and still keep smiling and pushing on.
In the beginning, Wesson walked through the valley of the shadow of shame. They say it’s normal, but watching him, it killed me, so I can only think what it was like for him.
Imagine it: one day you are walking, talking, bullshitting. Life is everything you want it to be. A career in the Army going strong. A family that loves and supports anything you do. That feeling of the open road is yours to grab onto every chance you get.
Wesson had it all.
Then in a matter of moments, he didn’t. Sheer seconds took everything away that fast.
He doesn’t even remember it. The entire day he lost his legs is gone from his memory. Then again, so is the time in our life before Boomer too. While I feel there are moments of life before Boomer and the Hellions that haunt me when I lose the fight to keep them at bay, Wesson has nothing. The times with Dennis Williams still sit far in the deep recesses of my mind sometimes invading my dreams. Wesson has zero recollection of the man on the other hand. Somehow, all the bad, he can block out.
Even the accident.
To him, he was riding with Boomer and the Hellions on a charity poker run, and then four days later he wakes up in the hospital absolutely lost. He doesn’t even try to remember. He lives life in a way that epitomizes what’s done is done so don’t look back.
All the things that should have landed him in the chair or dead aren’t what did it. The man had combat experience. The Army Airborne paratrooper lived through hell in Afghanistan. War didn’t do him in, though.
Fate did.
When Wesson lost his legs, he lost his career. He lost life as he knew it. Waking up in the hospital, he had to find himself again.
Over time, he has.
The man he is today is nothing short of a superhero.
He has every reason in the world to hate everyone and everything, but he doesn’t. No, in fact, the man who once was dropped from helicopters and planes into a fire fight still doesn’t shy away from living life to the fullest.
Including dragging me to a club so he can watch me get shit-faced and he can dance.
Yes, dance.
Do I deny him?
Fuck no!
Therefore, as a proper wingman, I go, I drink copious amounts of alcohol, and then dance until I find a broad to fuck in a hallway. Which is how this all started not long after I moved home and we went to a dollar special at Booty’s a year ago. After Wesson got drunk, he found he actually liked to dance. While he doesn’t drag me out often, he does every now and then, and I don’t deny him because frankly, there isn’t a damn thing I wouldn’t do for my brother. Hell, if I could trade places and be in that chair for him to have his legs back, I would do it without hesitation.
I let out a groan as I move to sit up in my bed. One thing that has not changed about my brother is his patience … or lack thereof. He is only going to wait so long for me to come to and get ready for the day, or he will indeed be tossing water on my head.
My entire body is stiff as my mind thinks of the hot little thing I fucked at Booty’s last night. Like usual, I didn’t take time to sober up enough to have a conversation or get information. Once again, I couldn’t even tell you her name. I should know better because this isn’t the first time I fucked a stranger without having the decency to grab her name.
Tossing back the drink Wes brought me, I let the alcohol burn all the way down to the pit of my stomach. With my head pounding, I get up and head to the shower.
Wesson and I live together in a custom-built house down Highway Fifty-eight in a small town outside of Haywood’s Landing known as Stella. Sure, we have a place on the Hellions compound, but this is better for my brother. Everything is equipped for his needs.
The family we have is close. When Wesson had his accident, Boomer immediately bought this land and had a contractor that works with the club drop all his previous jobs to build this single-story home for my brother. Until I moved home, Mom and Boomer lived here with Wesson. It’s not that my brother needs a babysitter, but those first months home were challenging. This set up is safer for him. Now, we find we like being roommates. It’s more than me staying because of his wheelchair, we really live well together. After my service time was up, I came back to Haywood’s Landing and moved in. My mom and Boomer have their own place just down the road.
The house isn’t massive. There are two master suites on opposite ends of the house with the common areas between them. Each doorway is wide enough for Wesson to maneuver around in his chair. Everything is accessible for him.
While some people might find it strange for two men in their twenties living together with zero plan to change it, I frankly don’t give a shit what anyone thinks. I’m here because my brother and I need each other.
Wesson Vaughn isn’t the only one with combat experience.
He’s not the only one with nightmares he can’t escape.
I swear I cry out in my sleep as much as he does. Only, my shit isn’t ghost pains waking me from legs I’ve lost, but rather the ghosts of the men I’ve sent to Hell haunting me. Yeah, there is no way to prepare for taking another man’s life … even if the situation was kill or be killed.
My emotions are heavy today as I get out of the shower and slide on my jeans. I’ll shake it off as the day passes, I always do. We have dinner with our parents tonight, and then tomorrow, I’m back to the grind at the garage.
This is my ride in life. While it may not be glamorous, it’s fine with me.