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“Are you trying to decide about me?” Ajax finally asked. He was staring at his plate and didn’t look up.
Eight thought about that.
He was profoundly conflicted. He still couldn’t completely understand why he’d chased this down, what it was he was missing, why he suddenly wanted it. There were answers to that cosmic question—he missed Beck, his life felt like a failure, he felt like a waste of oxygen, he wanted to have something good in his life, something to feel like he’d mattered—but none of those were the complete answer, not even when taken altogether.
Add to that his conviction that hewasa waste of oxygen, that he wasn’t a good guy, he had no idea how to be a good guy, certainly not a good father, and Ajax would be better off without him.
So there was a lot of conflict in him. But as he considered the kid’s question—notthekid,hiskid—he realized there was one point on which he was sure: he liked this kid. His kid. He felt … different around him. He cared about consequences in a way he never had before. Under all the confusion and twitchiness, it felt good, sitting here with Marcella and Ajax, like a little family.
“I decided about you before I met you, Ajax. That’s why I went looking for your mom. Meeting you only made me more sure. You’re a good kid. I don’t know what I’m doing, and I get it if you don’t want me around, but I want to be, if that’s okay with you.” He turned to Marcella, who was an absolute sculpture of ice. “You and your mom.”
“How come you stayed away, then? I’m ten, you know. I’ve been here.”
Eight gave his son his full attention. “I didn’t think I’d be good for you. I’m still worried that’s true.”
“Can I decide that for myself?” He’d turned to his mom to ask that question.
“Yeah, tiger. It’s your call. Always.” She turned to Eight. “Right?”
He nodded. “Yeah. Your call.”
“Okay. I need more information before I can decide.” With that, he picked up his pizza and had a big bite.
Eight had no idea what had just happened. Was he condemned or pardoned?
~oOo~
Hours later, in the thick dark of post-midnight, Eight hunkered low behind the wheel of his truck and watched Marcella and her band come out through the backstage door at another Northside club.
Laden with their gear, they all headed toward a dark cargo van. Eight watched as they loaded up the van and then stood behind it, hugging or bumping fists, saying goodnight. Nobody noticed his truck; he’d parked away from any lights, off in the shadows of this strip-mall parking lot. He started up his truck.
He was losing his goddamn mind, apparently. Becoming an actual stalker.
But shit, all afternoon and evening, his brain had been overheating. Something had happened today, with Marcella and Ajax, that had him fucked up. He didn’t know what it was. After that intense exchange over pizza, when he’d laid it out straight for the kid who he was, they’d continued on with the meal, Ajax asking questions and Eight answering, and vice versa. They’d even gotten a real conversation going after a while, talking about baseball, something they both knew a fair amount about.
When they’d finished and headed out to the parking lot, there hadn’t been a hug or a fist bump, but Ajax had said he wanted to see Eight again. So if he still wasn’t sure Eight was worth his time, at least the question wasn’t decided. Neither condemned nor pardoned, not yet.
Maybe his unrest now was down to the fact that it felt like he’d handed a fucking ten-year-old kid and his militant mama a shit ton of control over him. In any case, he was about to crawl out of his skin. He’d never felt like this in his life, and he hated it.
Why was he sitting here in this parking lot, watching Marcella walk alone to her SUV? Why was he following her out of the parking lot? Why was he driving his cage of a truck, which he rarely drove except in bad weather or when he needed to haul something?
Because he’d lost his goddamn mind and become a stalker.
At some point in his restless, fruitless evening, he’d needed to talk to Marcella. He didn’t know what he had to say, but as soon as he’d had the thought that he needed to talk to her, his head had settled enough to make it into a plan. He was in his truck so he could do exactly this: follow her without being made.
Ajax had told him at lunch that he was staying with his grandma tonight, because Marcella was working and they were having a birthday party for her at his grandma’s house on Sunday. He knew she was alone tonight, but why, then, hadn’t he just gone into the club, like he had before? Better yet, why hadn’t hecalledher to say he wanted to talk? No fucking idea.
Stalker. Fucking psycho.
He followed her all the way to her apartment complex—he assumed it was hers; she was pulling up at the closed gate and keying in a code—and pulled off just before the entrance. He hadn’t thought anything through, so now hereallydidn’t know what he was doing. He could hardly drive in right behind her while the gate was open. That would surely freak her out.
Okay. Time to cut the crap and go home. Drinking himself unconscious was a tried and true way to shut down his damn head. He should have started with that plan.
As he put the truck in drive again, another car pulled into the complex entrance, and the driver keyed the gate open. Like his truck had a mind of its own, he followed that car through before the gate began to close.
Now what? Marcella was long gone, and he didn’t know where her apartment was in this large complex.
Ignoring yet another opportunity for sanity to take the wheel, he rode through the complex, checking out the cars. There were no garages here, just carports. The apartment buildings were arranged in clusters of three, around little courtyards. At the walk bounding each courtyard was a bank of mailboxes under a pergola draped with some kind of flowering vines.
