Okay, so here's what happened: I didn't know where Trey lived (you know, on account of the restraining order and everything)—overnighter knew where he lived and agreed to tell me. But then overnighter started having a week from hell—and she held out on me.
Meanwhile, there's Ryan standing outside the HoT—all beat up and exaggerated puppy dog eyes and shit—and quite frankly I didn't know what to do with him, so I stuck him on a bus just to get him the hell out of there so I wouldn't have to babysit.
But, then overnighter's week didn't improve and there's Ryan still sitting on a bus to nowhere—and, well, I kind of had to start poking at him. I can't. Not. Really, I've tried.
Blame overnighter, y'all—this chapter wouldn't have happened at all if she'd have just let me know where Trey lived.
And, of course, thanks to overnighter and to the indefatigable crashcmb for their invaluable suggestions, help and beta-ing. Truly amazing, the both of them.
Disclaimer: I own nothing but Paulo and whatever mistakes remain, since I couldn't help but play with it some more.
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BangChapter Two
Ryan was sitting, hunched forward, with his forearms resting lightly on the top of his thighs—his eyes cast downward, looking at, but not really focusing in on, the space between his feet. Although he was certain that at least some of his dozen or so fellow passengers must be throwing an occasional inquisitive look in his direction—if not staring outright—he was determined not to confirm his theory. The last thing he wanted to do was to make eye contact with anyone—inadvertently or otherwise. He was in no mood to deal with the curiosity, disgust or even pity reflected in the eyes of strangers.
He knew what they saw—a kid, battered, bloody and bruised—and he knew what they thought—a two-bit street punk, fresh from a fight; a hapless loser, jumped and beaten for chump change; a junkie, unable to make payment on a borrowed hit; or even a street kid, used, abused and jacked up by a deadbeat john. The pathetic thing was, none of those guesses was all that far from reality. He didn't think he could stand to see that in their eyes, either.
It was a short ride to his brother's apartment, not even five miles across town, but the bus driver wasn't making it easy on him—the way he erratically jammed down on the gas pedal, only to change his mind and immediately slam his foot on the brakes—the bus slowly lurching, hissing and squealing its way through the crowded city streets. At first, Ryan tried to fight against getting tossed about—a tactic he quickly aborted when it became apparent that every single muscle required for that particular feat was freshly bruised and begging for mercy.
Not that his next experiment—going with the flow—did much for him, either. He swayed along for about a minute, thinking he'd figured out how to get to Trey's in minimal pain, only to be launched completely out of his seat during one particularly effective attempt at rapid deceleration—his already sore shoulder driving painfully into the metal backing of the row of seats less than a foot in front of him. A slight groan escaped from his lips before he could contain it—further embarrassing him—and eliciting what he thought was a sympathetic cluck from the row behind.
Desperate to survive the short trip relatively intact—or at least as intact as when he'd first boarded the bus—he finally gave up and stood, edging his way down the narrow aisle—still without really lifting his eyes, or focusing them on anything in particular. The pole by the back door was just a couple of feet away when the driver suddenly jerked the bus hard to the left—and into the flow of traffic to avoid a parked car. To the accompaniment of rubber squealing against asphalt and the cacophony of horns bleating in several different registers all at once, Ryan was thrown off balance—and landed squarely in the lap of a woman who was sitting in the handicapped seats.
"Sorry," he mumbled, extricating himself from her lap as quickly and as gracefully as the situation would allow. As he pushed back from the seat—and from her—he felt something jab him hard in the left arm. He looked down and saw the woman draw her hand back. She was holding a knitting needle—pointed downward—in a tightly closed fist.
Ryan looked down at his bicep, saw the angry red mark that the needle had left on his skin, and then looked at the woman with a mixture of shock and bewilderment. She made some more stabbing motions with the needle, bringing it up and down quickly—choppily—a few times in the space between them.
"Get away from me," she shrieked, her voice shrill and panicked. There was obviously something very wrong with her.
Gladly, Ryan thought, backing away warily and stopping only when he felt the metal of the pole against his back—reaching behind and gripping it with both hands—watching for the crazy lady to pounce again. And pounce she did. The woman jumped to her feet—still brandishing her unlikely weapon—gestured it in his direction—and screamed at him—over and over—to stay away from her.
Ryan felt his face and his ears flush red as it became apparent that he had the attention of every single person on the bus—the driver included. The bus slid to an angry, squealing stop in the middle of the block—and the back door opened with a hiss. The driver pushed himself up from behind the wheel, mopped his profusely sweating brow, and lumbered down the aisle. He stopped a few feet away from the hysterical woman, who was still jabbing the needle haphazardly in Ryan's general direction.
The driver sighed heavily, looked straight at Ryan and pointed out the door, "Off!"
"She just stabbed me," Ryan protested, giving the driver a look of sheer disbelief and holding his arm up to display his latest injury.
"Off!" The driver repeated, more insistently.
"Look at him—he's bleeding all over the place—he's throwing himself on people—he's bleeding on people—he spreading the AIDS—he gave me the AIDS—I have the AIDS!" the woman was wailing and crying hysterically now.
"I fell into her when the bus jerked forward," Ryan tried to reason with the driver. "It's not like I did it on purpose."
"Listen, you little punk-assed piece of crap—I ain't asking you twice. Get the fuck off my bus—now—or I'll call the cops and have your ass tossed right into the back of a fucking cruiser."
"Are you fucking kidding me?"
Ryan was utterly dumfounded that the driver was siding with the woman.
But, that's exactly what he was doing and, when the driver took another menacing step towards him, Ryan immediately conceded. After being beaten up, stabbed and threatened by three entirely different breeds of batshit crazy in just over the course of an hour—he just didn't have it in him to put up much of a fight. Not against an opponent who stood well over six feet tall, weighed at least 250 lbs., and had the ability to land his ass in juvie at the press of a button on his handset.
Ryan started to gingerly make his way down the bus' rubber-matted steps. But, apparently, he wasn't moving quickly enough for the driver, who grabbed him painfully by his injured shoulder—the same one that had recently met with both his kitchen wall, and the metal back of a bus seat with some force—and helped him out of the bus.
"Let go of me, you fat fuck!" Ryan shouted, just as the man let go, propelling him into the car that was parked a few feet away. Ryan's attempt at turning his body mid-flight failed—and he hit the car with his left side, the most damaged part of his body, before crumpling to the ground in an entirely undignified heap.
As he picked himself up off the asphalt, he heard the driver talking to the knitting needle nutjob, gently soothing "Judy" back into her seat—reassuring her that she was going to be okay—that there was no blood on her—that she hadn't caught the AIDS from that little thug.
Although it wasn't much, Ryan took some satisfaction from the fact that the carefully folded dollar bill that he'd deposited into the fare box was torn—useless—its matching half still tucked safely inside his pocket for the ride home. Hell, if AJ was holding a two hundred fifty dollar chit cocked and aimed at his head like a loaded weapon, Ryan sure as shit wasn't going to throw away a buck-fifteen for a fucking bus ride.
Setting off in the direction of his brother's apartment, Ryan tried to ignore the constant throb of pain still radiating from just below his left eye—though disregarding it wasn't particularly easy, especially since the pounding seemed to bizarrely change rhythm and provide percussion to whatever song flitted—however briefly—through his head.
Luckily, the walk seemed to do him some good. It loosened up his muscles and stopped them from screaming quite so loudly. By the time he arrived at Trey's building, the thought of climbing the four flights to his brother's door was a decidedly less daunting task than the Herculean feat he'd imagined while being tossed around just minutes before.
As he climbed the crumbling concrete of the front stoop and reached towards the apartment building's front door, he was startled by a shadowy form, descending the interior stairs. Ryan shrank back, despite himself, and moved out of the path of the quickly approaching figure. The man slammed open the door and charged out of the building without even glancing in Ryan's direction, leaving behind a putrid cloud of odor in his wake—a pungent and unpleasant mixture of beer, b.o. and diesel oil. As Ryan watched the man jump down the last three steps of the stoop and head towards a brown Monte Carlo SS lowrider that was parked at the curb, he recognized what it was about the stranger that made his heart stop for just a second—what it was that made him startle.
The guy looked like AJ, or rather, he looked a bit like a younger version of his mother's boyfriend—in dress, demeanor and in stature. It wasn't that the guy was particularly tall—he wasn't. Hell, AJ wasn't either. But, like AJ, the guy still managed to look menacing—with his overdeveloped biceps prominently and purposefully displayed in a black shirt with cut-off sleeves torn off at the shoulder, a tight black t-shirt underneath. Unlike AJ's modified pompadour, though, this man's greasy dark hair was tied back in a ponytail. He was scowling and muttering to himself—clearly pissed off.
Ryan managed to pull his gaze away from the stranger just long enough to focus in on, reach out, and grab the door before it could click locked—not that he was sure that it would. Sometimes the latch worked—most times it didn't. But, he didn't want to give Trey the benefit of a buzz or the warning of an announcement before he showed up at his door.
When Ryan finally reached his brother's landing, he stopped and gave himself a chance to recover from the climb. The four flights up weren't too bad and he took his time in ascending. But even so, he was sore, winded and flushed. There wasn't much he could do about the sore—but he figured that the winded and the flushed could be alleviated by a few minutes of rest. So, he leaned his shoulders and head back, closed his eyes—listened to the sounds of a television through the apartment's thin outer wall—and waited for the throbbing in his cheek to subside at least a little.
Finally, when he was about as ready as he was ever going to be, Ryan pushed back from the wall, crossed the last few steps to his brother's door, knocked loudly, and waited to see who answered. He could never be sure which incarnation of Trey would appear these days. His brother was usually strung out—sometimes tense, jumpy and wired— sometimes mellow, with a thick voice and slow to react—sometimes violent, angry and slurring—all depending on his drug or drink of choice.
"Hey, Ry."
Christ, he could hear his brother's voice in his head before Trey even answered the door. Not that it took a genius to predict how this particular confrontation was going to go down.
Trey always answered the door the same way—with a wary hey, even as Ryan could see the wheels start to turn in his head—hear the caution and the hesitation in his voice—as his brother searched his visitor's face and tried to figure out just how much he knew about whatever the hell it was that Trey was up to.
And Trey was always up to something. Always. Something sketchy, something illegal—something he didn't want anyone to know about. He had the Atwood knack for taking the low road, always looking for a shortcut, scheming for a way to get a quick buck or instant gratification.
AJ's favorite phrase to describe Trey these days was "that squirrelly little motherfucker" and, as much as Ryan hated to admit it—at least as of late—the description hit a little too close to home.
So, Trey would open the door, play the Hey, Ry card—take his time—and concoct whatever lie he thought he needed to absolve himself entirely from taking responsibility for the latest situation he'd gotten himself into.
Hell, the Hey, Ry wasn't even a greeting. It was a question. Trey's voice always lilted upwards at the end of its delivery—a subtle prompt for Ryan to open the conversation—all the better for Trey to be able to discern what Ryan already knew—and to refine whatever cock and bull story he was fabricating in order to divert the blame from himself.
And if that failed? Shit. Well, then there was always the Atwood luck to fall back on. The infamous black cloud that hung over the family—the one that had taken up residence well before their dad had been shipped off to Corcoran—before they'd moved to Chino—before their mother had climbed into the bottle and started bringing home a string of bad boyfriends, almost all of them ranging from lousy to—well, to AJ—and before their mother had started putting her boyfriends in front of her boys.
Their father had always blamed the Atwood luck for every downward twist of fate—big and inconsequential alike—externalizing the reasons for their lousy situation in life. It was a trait his older son had clearly inherited—carried on the same gene that predisposed him to their father's wiry build, his dark hair, his dark eyes—and his propensity to fuck up royally and repeatedly—either in spite of or because of himself.
But knowing his brother inside and out—knowing exactly how Trey was going to react upon answering his persistent knocking—well, it didn't really do Ryan much good. Or any good at all. Because his brother would react in the exact same way if he had taken AJ's gun or if he hadn't. Even if he didn't take the gun, Trey would be hiding some other transgression—petty or monumental. And he'd lie like hell to protect his secret—whatever the fuck his secret was.
When Trey didn't open the door immediately, Ryan knocked harder—more insistently. He wasn't going to give up. He could hear the television. There was somebody home.
"C'mon, Trey, just open the fucking door," he called out, wearily.
"Jesus Christ, man—take the fuck off—I mean, seriously—I'm like two seconds away from calling the cops on your motherfucking ass—I already told you he ain't here—and I don't know where the fuck he is!"
The door opened mid-knock to reveal Trey's roommate, Paulo. He was holding an empty forty upside down and by the neck, his wrist cocked, ready to use the bottle as a weapon. Surprised when the door was suddenly flung inward, Ryan almost fell forward into the apartment, but recovered rapidly. He took two quick steps back, ducked his head, put both hands up, crossed them at the wrists, stuck his palms out, and tried to look as non-threatening as possible.
Paulo was a big man. Twenty-one or twenty-two—a couple of years older than Trey, anyway. He was half Greek, half African-American—a well developed 6'2"—with a muscular, athletic build, light brown skin, and preternaturally pale blue eyes. Like a husky—or a malamute—but cross-bred with a shark, maybe. Because they were dead eyes—eyes that never showed emotion—at least not that Ryan had ever seen. In short, he wasn't a guy Ryan would ever choose to fuck with—he wasn't a guy anyone would choose to fuck with.
Well, anyone but Trey.
Ryan had once seen Trey overtake the much bigger man at Reggie's, the local pool hall and bar. It was just a stupid fight over a girl, but both men were drunk—maybe even a little bit high—pissed off and looking for the release that fighting would give them, especially since they weren't going to get any release from the girl. She'd left long before, fed up and disgusted with the both of them.
The fight ended with both men on the floor—Trey behind Paulo and holding a pool cue against the much larger man's throat—the bigger man struggling to breathe—even as he tried to throw himself back on Trey—tried to break Trey's hold on the cue—tried to crush him—while simultaneously attempting to prevent his own throat from collapsing. Trey was holding the stick tight against Paulo's carotid artery—his roommate's eyes rolling back—still freakishly not displaying any emotion—but revealing entirely too much white. Several patrons were yelling at Trey to let go, but no one jumped in to help. Paulo was getting weaker and weaker—resisting less and less—till Trey suddenly released him and stood over his roommate, cussing him out—spewing a quick succession of expletives without ever raising his voice—before breaking the cue over his knee, throwing the shattered pieces at Paulo's prone, gasping form and leaving the bar.
Ryan'd been surprised that the two had continued living as roommates—what with the one having almost killed the other. But they had—and the incident at the bar was never mentioned between them again—at least as far as Ryan knew.
"Oh, hey, Ryan," Paulo said, his voice softening. He peered down the hallway in both directions and confirmed that the coast was clear—put the bottle down and held it tightly against his body.
"What's up?" Ryan asked.
"Nothing. I just—I just thought you were someone else." Paulo started tapping the forty against his leg, rhythmically, still agitated.
"That guy who just left—who is he?"
"Who—what? The geared-up little greaseball, you mean? I dunno, man—just another crazy motherfucking piece of shit your brother tracked home on the bottom of his shoe."
"He was here for Trey?"
"Yeah." Paulo still tapped the forty and Ryan was only slightly surprised when the persistent pounding in his cheek adopted Paulo's beat.
"What's he want?"
"The fuck if I know." Paulo shrugged. "We didn't exactly conversate. He's looking for Trey—Trey ain't around—what're you doing here, anyway?"
"I guess the same thing as that other guy."
"You're looking for Trey?" Paulo looked surprised. "Here? Naw, man—your brother ain't here anymore—as in, he moved out about two weeks ago. He couldn't make rent—not on what he's earning, and what he's gotta pay every month on that plea he copped. I thought—I mean—he didn't tell you?"
"No," Ryan shook his head, "but it's not like he moved home, and he hasn't been by in a couple of weeks—so I haven't seen him in a while. You have any idea where he's staying?"
"Yeah, he's crashing with a couple of guys from the garage. Johnny—um—Higuera—and—uh—Charlie—shit, Charlie something or another—he's another taco-bender—Martinez—Morales—Muniz—I dunno—some shit like that—"
"Where?"
"Some squat off Darby—in the upper numbers."
Great. Not only was it even further away, but in the worst fucking part of town—they didn't call it Upper Fucking Darby for nothing. Typical. Just when he thought it couldn't get any worse.
"He still working at the garage over on Shreveport?"
Paulo shrugged.
"As far as I know—or, at least he was last time I saw him—uh—a little over a week ago, I think it was—you never know with Trey, though—scrawny little motherfucker's got a nasty combination of mouth and temper on him—and he don't always know when it's best to just shut the fuck up."
"Tell me something I don't know." Ryan sighed.
Paulo leaned over and playfully punched Ryan's left shoulder—his thrice injured shoulder. Ryan somehow managed not to wince, flinch, or otherwise reveal the pain that shot right up, and into the back of his neck.
"Yeah, I guess you'd know better than the rest of us," Paulo conceded.
Although Ryan knew he could argue otherwise—seeing as his brother had never actually come close to strangling him into a state of nonexistence—there wasn't much of a point.
"Not that it matters much," Paulo continued, when Ryan hesitated, "he don't work Thursdays."
"You got a phone number for him?" Ryan wanted—he needed—to confront Trey in person, to judge his subtle reactions for himself, but he had to find a way to get there—and he was quickly running out of options.
Paulo shook his head.
"I don't think they got a phone—and I'm pretty sure Trey's cell's been cut off. I been punching his digits all week—trying to let him know about that greasy little cholo motherfucker who keeps coming by—but I ain't been getting nothin' but dead air."
Ryan sighed. If he timed it right, he could get about three quarters of the way to Trey's new neighborhood on the #7 bus, and walk the rest of the way before it got dark. Or he could suck it up, admit that he was in over his head, and call someone—Eddie or Arturo, probably—for a goddamned ride. But that would require an explanation—and Ryan just wasn't up to doing much explaining—he wasn't a good enough liar to come up with a plausible alternative reason as to why he was battered and desperate to find his brother—and he sure as shit wasn't about to admit to the truth.
"I don't know the address, but I'm pretty sure I could find it. You want I should give you a lift?"
It was the first fucking break Ryan had caught all day, but even as the relief coursed through him, he tried to keep his face impassive. He'd learned the hard way that, when dealing with Trey's crowd, it was always best to keep his cards held tightly to his chest—and that showing any kind of real emotion could be a very dangerous thing.
"That'd be great, thanks," he accepted, even while shrugging, and feigning indifference.
"Not a problem." The big man tilted his head sideways and seemed to look Ryan up and down for the first time. "You look like you could use the help. What happened to you, anyway—you get into a fight or something?
"Or something sounds just about right," Ryan muttered, despite himself.
"Yeah, okay. It's none of my business—I get it. Just let me grab my keys. I'll meet you out front."
Ryan descended the stairs, exited the building and sat on the stoop, waiting for his ride to appear. A few minutes later, Paulo did—
"C'mon, kid, the Duster's around the corner." Paulo didn't break stride as he moved past Ryan and hustled down the steps. He carried a denim jacket—unseasonably heavy for the hot spring day—and, as Ryan rose to his feet and watched Paulo shrug it on, he couldn't help but notice the conspicuous bulge in the small of the big man's back—couldn't help but wonder why Paulo was packing—couldn't help but contemplate where Paulo'd gotten the gun—and couldn't help but think that maybe his brother's former roommate hadn't been entirely straight with him about the last time he'd seen Trey.
TBC