"And in our 10 day forecast we've got, you guessed it, more snow," the weatherman on the bucket of a television in the dark motel room said with an award winning smile. "We've got the jet stream bringing us all that cold air and keeping it right here - " he continued, but the occupant hunching over the coffee table wasn't listening.
Empty beer bottles and a handle of whiskey littered the edges of the table and the floor, but a torn open plastic wrapped package containing the sparse remains of crack rocks adorned the center of the table and the center of attention. Trevor Philips, career criminal and infamous bank robber, wanted in three states, or maybe it was four now, hadn't showered in three days, couldn't remember the last time he ate, and his mind wouldn't let him sleep. Or maybe that was the blow. No, no, no, it wasn't the blow. He couldn't sleep before he relieved some rookie corner dealer of the rocks he and his partner used to indulge in.
The whiskey sat untouched on the table opposite Trevor.
He tried to prepare his shoddy pipe for another hit, but every time he looked up, he saw the bottle and stopped. The bottle caught his eye again, causing his shaking hands to stop moving, and he stood up abruptly with a yell. He lurched at the table, almost punching it, kicking it, screaming at it. Instead he only bumped it with his manic flailing, instead pummeling the air and eventually overturning an armchair; a couple of the empty bottles rolled off the shaking table, but the whiskey and rocks remained.
"The kids are sure to have a great time this weekend, plenty of fresh powder to make snow men and have snowba-"
"Fuck you and your kids you fucking cock sucking shit face!" Trevor screamed, grabbing a lamp and throwing it into the television. Sparks erupted from the broken screen as it sputtered and crackled in its death throes.
"Khzzz-ice-kchkzzz-ing rin-khchshhh-" the television personality broke through the buzzing static sporadically and Trevor leapt over the table. He pounced on the television, picking it up and slammed it to the ground.
"Fuck-" He picked it back up "you!" And threw it down again. It kept buzzing and he stomped on it, his boot crunching down on it hard. If the sparks flying from device being massacred landed on his leg, he couldn't tell. "Die, you mother fucking shit fuck," he wailed and picked it up one more time. He tore it from its plug and threw it across the room. "Die!" It exploded against the wall in a dark shower of plastic, electronics, and glass.
He stormed around the room, grinding his teeth and growling, his hands clenching and unclenching, daring an unsuspecting piece of furniture to get in the way. He roared and dropped to his knees in front of the coffee table, the only piece of furniture still in place after his rampage. He paused, just heaving and growling, staring at the lone bottle standing. He reached out to the whiskey, but it was just out of his reach. "You can't - you can't be - fuck! Fuck, FUCK!"
He brought down his fist on the table and everything jumped. His breath caught in his chest as he saw the bottle tilt backwards, farther, and farther, over the edge of the table. Trevor flipped the table to the side and dove forward. Sliding on bottles and trash and broken pieces of plastic and glass, he caught the full bottle of whiskey inches before it hit the grungy carpet of the motel. He held it, unmoving, trying to catch his breath, suddenly exhausted. At some point he realized that the catching in his chest with each breath was a sob.
He clamored back to his hands and knees, still holding the bottle. He dug through the trash on the ground, searching, and lifted up the overturned table. He swiped up the pipe from where it had fallen and took a desperate hit, inhaling faster than he would normally. He coughed a bit before clenching his mouth shut again, drawing his lips tight and breathing through his nose. He ran his tongue along the back of his teeth and leaned back against the wall. He wasn't sure when or even if he stopped licking his teeth; his tongue was numb again. The familiar fuzzy feeling began at the base of his neck, his finger tips and toes. Very quickly the pleasant warmth turned into an incessant buzzing, and his breathing came heavy but shallow.
Buzzing and itching. He tried to shift, and realized one hand was heavier than the other: he still held the whiskey. He got up. He had to do something. He exited and slammed the door to the motel room before crossing the parking lot. There was nothing he could do.
Snow crunched under his boots, as he walked down the road to the small strip mall in the center of this god forsaken, back water town. His best friend was dead and there was nothing he could do. He couldn't even go to his damn funeral.
He walked past a pub with live, loud music wafting out of it. There were too many damn happy people in there. Dancing. Didn't they know now was not a time for dancing. He almost wanted to turn around and teach them how wrong they were, but instead he kept walking, this time past a closed salon, a dollar store. And a, fuck, a pawn shop. A couple weeks ago he would have cased the place to bring back to Mikey. Pawn shops had a lot of crap but sometimes gold too. A literal diamond in the rough.
Fuck… Mikey.
Trevor gripped the bottle of whiskey tighter. It was cold in his hand. Colder than the air surrounding his naked hands. He missed him already. Who was he kidding, he'd been missing him. He walked faster. The rapid movement eased the itching in his skin.
He passed a liquor store and an electronics store. And found himself at the doorstep of a tattoo shop before he knew what he was doing. He peered through the window, pressing his face against the glass to get the closest possible view, drinking in the designs inked on pieces of paper tacked unceremoniously to the wood panel walls. Suddenly he knew what he could do.
He left the window and pushed through the doorway, a lonesome bell chiming out his arrival weakly. A girl bedecked in elaborate tattoos sat behind a bench that acted as a front desk, while two men similarly covered in tattoos hovered near the back. They watched uninterestedly as a third bent over a kid who sat in the ripped and worn leather chair, looking in the exact opposite direction as his bare arm.
Trevor walked right past the girl at the desk. He grabbed the man hunched over the jittery kid and dragged him over to the other two artists. He threw him at the other two and held up a questioning finger.
"Which one of you is the best?" he asked. "Ah-ah-ah and be honest here. I got a ve-e-ery important request and you better not fuck it up!" he warned, going from chatting to yelling in a split second. The girl from behind the bench counter had already disappeared in the back, while the kid hadn't moved from his chair, still holding his arm out awkwardly.
"Uh, dude, don't take this the wrong way but it's against company policy to ink dudes under the influence," one of the three, the one with three lip rings, said, rather calmly. Trevor followed the man's gaze to the whiskey in his hand and he laughed exuberantly.
"Oh this? You think I've been drinking this?" he stated more than asked, waving it in front of the trio. One reluctantly nodded, one shrugged, and the other remained still, his face completely blank and his arms at his side. Hm. Trevor laughed louder. "No, this," he said, bringing it up to his own face, "I'm saving this one, you see," he explained boisterously, waving the unopened bottle some more. He took a step toward them, and the two shrank behind the one with the blank stare.
Trevor ducked a bit, meeting the man's eyes and drawing them up with him as he returned to his full height. "I'm saving this one for a friend you see," Trevor repeated, quieter than before. He stared the man in the eye, toe to toe. "Only my best friend's dead, you see," Trevor stated levelly. "An-and I didn't get a chance to say goodbye or nothing," he spit out the words. They were an acid he could feel even in his numbed chest and mouth. He was breathing heavy again and he couldn't stop it.
"So which one of ya's the best, huh?" he asked, in the front man's face. He ducked to the side, "huh?" and the other side, "huh?!"
"None of 'em," called a voice from behind him. Trevor turned around to see the girl from the front holding a .45 pistol lazily in one hand, her hip cocked.
"O-oh," he replied. She walked forward, putting the gun to rest on one of the tables. She turned to the kid sitting in the chair.
"Come back later. We'll get you done another time," she said, and the previous customer scrambled out of the shop. She turned back to Trevor and flipped her magenta and black bangs out of her face.
"So uh, you the best then or something?" Trevor asked, spreading his arms out and tilting his head.
"Yea, I am," she said flatly. "This is my place here." Trevor turned back to the group of three men behind him.
"Wait-wait-wait so these three guys work for you?" he asked.
"Yea, and I got two artists off today," she replied, crossing her arms.
"Seriously?"
"What?" she asked a hint of impatience in her voice.
"Nothing, I -" he started gesticulating, but he seemed to notice the bottle in his hand and he fell quiet again.
"So you want a memorial tattoo or somethin'?" she asked. He shook his head, and hugged the bottle to his chest, suddenly feeling very cold.
"What? Yea, yea, memorial or something. You can do that right? You'll do something nice and-and real tasteful?" he rambled, as she gently touched his elbow and guided him to a chair.
"Oh yea, real tasteful," she said, picking some instruments from a cabinet. The three other tattoo artists scattered, one to the front, one to the back, and Trevor lost sight of the last one, but he didn't particularly care.
"Yea, 'cause my boy Mikey, he was real tasteful, real classy," he went on. She had gloves on now and was sitting next to him on a stool. When did that happen?
"Mikey, huh?" she asked. "Sounds like a great guy," she said. Trevor leaned back in the chair and stared at the ceiling. The cool bottle still against his chest.
"The best. The very fucking best," he breathed.
"So do you want me to write "Mikey" or something?" she asked, and the strong scent of alcohol wipes assaulted his raw nostrils.
"Oh fuck no. He'd roll over in his fucking grave then haunt my ass for the rest of eternity. 'Michael,' his full Christian name, to please his mother."
He felt one hand steady his arm, and another wiping it down. "Michael, huh? Like the archangel or something, right?"
Trevor couldn't hold in his laugher. "Right, the fucking archangel." Archangel of criminals, bane of bankers. It didn't help he'd heard Amanda call Michael that before, as ridiculous as it sounded.
He could hear her turn on the needle but he couldn't feel it when she started on his upper arm. He couldn't remember telling her that's where he wanted it. Did he? Or maybe she was psychic.
"D'ya mind if I ask how he died?" she asked and Trevor bristled, brought back to the chair. She paused to check her needle.
"It's-you'll pardon my evasiveness, miss," he said, "it's just… It was so sudden, you know? One minute we were running together and then BOOM, it was just me…"
"No, no worries here, man. It's just, I know sometimes it's better to talk about shit, so I thought I'd ask," she said, and Trevor sighed. She started working on the tattoo some more, and moved the needle towards his inner arm, which he most distinctly could feel and he wiggled.
"That tickles," he chided. She smiled, but continued. "Anyway, uh, that's real nice of you, miss?" he asked, staring.
"You're not gonna remember anyway," she replied, focusing on the needle she moved over his skin.
"No?" he asked. She had no idea what his tolerance was, he thought. But then again.
"So your friend," she said, bringing his head back out of the clouds. She kept doing that; he growled to himself. If she heard him, she didn't acknowledge it. "You said he was real classy. Was he all respectable like, or was he like you?"
"What? I'm not respectable? You see the unshaven, plain clothed white dude and think, traash!" he said, letting the last word draw out comically.
The girl pursed her lips but remained silent.
"No! He was like me! But he wasn't. We-we ran together, did things together, you know?" he said. He waved the bottle around some more and she leaned back. "Fuck, you don't know. But we did," he continued. He turned his head toward her and glared. "He's got kids you know that? Two of 'em. Brats, both of them, but fuck if they ain't the damn cutest things anyway. We-he lived in the trailer park, but you'd never hear him complain. He'd just talk about going places, how we'd get there and all that shit. All about the plans, he was."
She was staring at him, just smiling, a bit incredulously.
"What?" he asked and she rolled her stool back. She grabbed a mirror out of a drawer.
"Take a look, hon," she said and he did. He flexed his arm, staring at the new masterpiece still fresh on his skin.
RIP
Michael
Brother
Michael. Fuck… Michael. The girl held out a tissue, "here, hon."
"No, the fuck do you think I am, a baby?" he retorted quickly, but she didn't retreat fast enough. "I'm fucking with you, gimme that," he said with a laugh and a sob and grabbed it.
"I can do more with color if you want," she said, as he blew his nose like a dirty trumpet. Feeling was most certainly returning to him, in apparently the most miserable has possible.
"No, it's perfect the way it is," he replied, still wiping his nose.
She stood and took off her gloves. She smiled, and Trevor noticed she had barbells in her dimples. "So what are you going to do now?" she asked. Trevor stood, not bothering, or wanting to roll his sleep back down.
"Is that an offer, sugar?" he asked, crumpling up the used tissue and throwing it over his shoulder. She did laugh then. "No? Well, your loss." He stretched a bit. "I dunno, I'm thinking of going someplace warm for a change," he said, and he saw her nodding appreciatively.
He stared at the whiskey he still held in his hand, and smiled as he started to actually feel the dull sting on his arm. "Either way," he remarked, lifting his chin up just a bit, his lips twitching, not quite a smile. "I know I'm not leaving my brother behind.
"Ever."
9 years later.
Michael gripped the steering wheel so tight his knuckles went white. The best friend he thought long since dead sat, bouncing a knee up and down as fast as a mouse's pulse, in the passenger seat of Michael's Obey Tailgater. The majority of the reason he went into the witness protection program in the first place sat within arm's reach.
And Trevor had said they had things to work out. Things. To work out.
Fuck.
They sped towards the Maze Bank Arena, intent on sabotaging Tracey's efforts to go on national television and make a fool of herself. Or at least, that's what they were supposed to be doing. Michael's jaw tightened. What was Trevor's end goal here, really? Gather the whole family and what? Group hug? No.
No, Michael was sure it wasn't something so sentimental. Was Trevor here to kill him? The notion was a wasp's nest at the base of Michael's skull. What exactly did he know?
Trevor wouldn't ever hurt his kids, at least, Michael knew. Or… no. He was "Uncle T." He would never…
But that was nine years ago. Nine long years that didn't appear to have been kind to Michael's former partner in crime. Michael tried to keep his face blank, as he gave up trying to engage in small talk.
Maybe he should pull over and settle all this here and now, away from his family. Could two ghosts duel to the death? God fucking damn it. Could he even actually do that? Could he fight Trevor for real?
Michael tensed when Trevor started growling, quickly crescendoing.
"This music's all fucking wrong!" he shouted, lunging forward. Michael twitched and almost went for his concealed pistol. Instead he watched, turning to look every so often when he could, watching out of the corner of his eye when he couldn't. Trevor changed the radio station, flipping through them, increasingly agitated, until he found Channel X. "That's more like it!" he exclaimed.
Michael sighed and almost laughed. He looked over one last time as Trevor started to lean back and something caught his eye. Trevor's sleeve had ridden up a bit when he reached forward to reveal something interesting. Michael reached over and tried to shove the sleeve back up but Trevor intercepted and grabbed Michael's palm, squeezing firmly on the pressure point between the thumb and the index finger.
Michael struggled not to swerve. "Fuckin' a, T!" Trevor eased the pinch but didn't let go of Michael's hand when he tried to pull it back.
"I know you can't keep your hands off me, sugar tits, but I didn't think you'd try to grope me so soon," Trevor growled.
"Stop fuckin' around, T. The fuck is that?" Michael demanded, but he thought he knew. Stupid son of a bitch. It'd looked like the bottom of a…
"Oh, oh, this?" Trevor taunted, and he pushed up his sleeve with his free hand, his other still firmly grasping Michael's.
A cross. A fucking cross with three scrolls swirling around its base inscribed with the letters "RIP," "Michael," and "Brother." Michael returned his gaze to the road, blinking furiously. He couldn't help but be painfully aware of the inked sleeves covering his own arms, and was thankful his sleeves covered the two tattoos boasting in flourishing cursive: "Mandy" and "Michael & Amanda." But glancing down, the skull with the words "family forever" emblazoned in smoke on his right forearm, the one Trevor still had a good hold of, was awfully bare.
"Jesus fucking Christ, bro," Michael breathed through a deep grimace. Trevor was a psychopath. Trevor was a survivor. And in general one frightening son of a bitch. But the wavering glint in his eye didn't scare Michael, it stung him. He tried to swallow, but his mouth was dry and he felt like he'd eaten a bag of sharp rocks.
"The fuck is this?" Trevor repeated, "the fuck is this?!" he repeated again, twisting Michael's hand. Michael leaned his shoulder forward, cussing as Trevor twisted more. Michael sloppily merged into the right lane, but didn't stop. Would Trevor kill them both in a car wreck? Would that make him happy? "This, bro," Trevor spat out, "is a tribute to my best fucking pal in the whole goddamn universe who fucking died," Trevor said getting progressively quieter. "And took the best fucking part of me with him." Trevor relinquished his grip and Michael quickly withdrew his hand, shaking it out.
"The best…? I… fuck," Michael stuttered. Out of all the things for Trevor Philips to say, that was not what Michael was expecting. A little nagging feeling told him he probably should have. "You can't be serious," Michael tried to laugh, swallowing the growing need to get the fuck out of the car. "Don't you think you're being a little melodramatic here, t? I mean, I know you used to joke about getting my name tattooed on your ass but seri-"
"It's not the fucking same, you fucking snake!" Trevor exploded. "You think this is a joke?"
Well, that wasn't the response he was looking for. "No - I - you know what, forget it! I'm sorry I asked."
"Oh, I bet you're fucking sorry," Trevor replied shortly, but thankfully didn't continue.
They neared the arena and the burning in Michael's chest made his mouth taste bitter. He knew sorry wasn't going to cut it anyway.