AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yeah.”
He rocks up and down on the balls of his feet. “That’s all you have to say? ‘Yeah’?”
“What do you want me to say, that I have some kind of grand plan where I’ve got me and Caroline figured out?”
He closes the space between us and gets right up in my face, madder than I’ve ever seen him. “I want you to say you’re going to get your head out of your ass and take her back.”
“I don’t deserve her back.”
His gaze lowers to the ground. He kicks a chunk of snow, sending it sailing over the frozen lawn.
When he looks up, meets my eyes, I feel the cold seep through my coat and into my bones. “I owe you something,” he says. “You took a fall for me with the cops. You didn’t have to do that, and you didn’t even hesitate. It fucked me up, and then Bridget told me, look, you’re friends. This is what friends do for each other. But then the way you cut me off, cut Caroline off, did whatever it is you did to her that she won’t tell me—that’s not how friends act. So, you know, I can’t say what you deserve. I don’t know if you’re the person I thought you were or somebody else. But fucking hell, West, cut me some slack and come to the goddamn party. Make it possible for me to fucking like you again.”
“I can’t.”
“I know you can’t. Bring your sister and do it anyway. Tomorrow night. For my birthday. I’ll make dinner.”
“You cook?”
“Bridget’s been teaching me.”
I think I must smile at that, because he smirks, and then he reaches up and shoves off my hat, running his hand all over my hair. “You should shave it off,” he says. “Go the extra badass mile.”
“Tattoo ‘fuck your mother’ on my forehead.”
“That would be sweet.”
“Maybe I’ll do that for tomorrow.”
“I’ll live in suspense.”
He’s grinning. It’s a sham—the banter, the smile—but a sham smile is better than nothing.
It was never all that hard to make Krishna happy. I just had to let him hang around me. Talk to him. Throw him a bone every now and then.
I never thought much before about whether he was doing the same thing for me.
“Is Caroline gonna be there?” I ask.
“She lives there.”
He spins around and saunters away.
I go to study, and then I go to work, heading into a whole afternoon and evening of the same shit I always do at the factory. Counting things. Measuring and marking. Loading and unloading. But I notice that the plant smells like cut wood, sawdust, and that’s what I’m thinking about—how much I like that smell.
How I like the sound of the factory floor, this vast concrete space filled with echoes and the swirling lights on top of the forklifts, the beep of the backup alarm, the clang of metal against stone.
I feel like I’m waking up. I’ve stopped craving cigarettes beyond the occasional random impulse, and in the space where the craving was are sounds and smells, color and numbers, Frankie, Krishna,
Caroline.
I think about the rest of the week and how, tomorrow morning, I can tell Frankie about dinner at Caroline’s place.
I’m looking forward to it.
It’s been so long since I looked forward to something, I forgot what it was like. It feels good. Dangerous, but good.
When my phone rings, I see that Caroline’s calling me, and that feels pretty fucking good, too, until I hear what it is she’s got to say.
