2
"TREAT US GOOD, WE'LL TREAT YOU BETTER.
TREAT US BAD, WE'LL TREAT YOU WORSE."
The day was bright and sunny, it was so not fair. All the years just gone. All the troubles and pain we lived through. Sometimes it just never seemed to end. In this life, you either all in or all out.
I sat on what used to be the steps of her office, the head bitch in charge of all she surveyed. Gemma, original biker queen, our Mother.
We may have fucked up everything worse than flat hammered shit in the end, but we had us a time.
Me, I was a mouthy bitch in those days. Couldn't keep my big mouth shut most of the time. He always said I could say whatever the fuck I wanted to, I was his ole lady and if anyone had a problem they could come take it up with him!
But my man, now there was a big man in this life. Six foot three, and always ready to take on the world. He'd look some asshole in the eye and call him out. If it was a brother it would be settled in the ring. If it was a club problem, well said problem would be taken care of in some out of the way cabin in the woods. Problem would never be seen or heard of again. All the evidence would be a new small tattoo to commemorate yet one more service for his club.
In those days, live was measured by trouble, not by peace. Peace was nothing more but time on the road between jobs. Everyone was on edge more when it was quiet. Just waiting for the next clusterfuck to appear. All the brothers in those days were x-military, they thrived on the conflict. Lived for it, needed it. I guess in a way we were all adrenaline junkies.
Some days it's like he's here, just right around the corner,maybe in the garage working on a bike, just doin his regular shit. Maybe out on a run I couldn't go on, or out doing what he did the best, protecting his club.
But I know deep down he's long gone. My very bones get lonesome for his arms. I'd cry if I could, but that shit don't fly in this life. I don't cry. We don't cry. We may just get it out by beating the living shit out of the first club whore that dares to look us in the eye. Just who the fuck does this piece of shit think she is! They know better, the ones that make the grade, get to stay around more than just a party or two, they know. A very few of them will become ole lady's, some for life and some just short time. But us the true, ole lady's will always get the respect due us, or they will pay in blood!
Today I can feel all of them, all the ghosts that walk this place, echos of the past. I can hear the far off sound of a impact wrench, as someone takes the tires off a car. The cussing of a distant voice, demanding to know just who the stupid fuck was that would even consider driving this piece of shit in the first place. The clicking of heels as the queen herself comes to the office from across the lot. I can feel her gaze as she gives me the once over, to be sure I represent her club and my ole man as best I can. See the slight nod of her head as I once again met her standards. I will always believe that woman got up two hours early just so she was always perfect!
There are days like this that I wish with all my heart I was one of the ghosts of the past, still with my family, still feeling those strong arms around me every night. But someone is always left to tell the tale, and it looks like that someone is me. I can feel the tears wanting to betray me today, but I ain't no weak bitch, I don't cry where anyone can see me! Never let anyone, and I mean anyone see you cry!
As we get older, and time is passing faster, even faster than when we were kids, its hard to stop and see the little things anymore. We all get wound up in the I gotta's. Well fuck that I ain't gotta do shit. But just be around my family. Dead they may all be now, but surrounded by memories of the past, makes the day a bit easier to bare.
If I had kids they would most likely have me put in the looney bin, but I don't, not something that ever happened for us. Might be just as well. Can you imagine if we had a son! Oh my god! With the hell the two of us raised, any kids would just turn out to be double the trouble of us both. I regret not having a son some days and others I thank my lucky stars it never came to be!
It was time for all this to come to an end anyways.
As he would say, we had a good run babe, did the best we could with what we had, and fuck them assholes anyways! I miss that gravelly voice. The intensity of everything he did. His walk, when he knew I was lookin at his ass. The sound of his bike when he came home. I just miss it all. I don't like this last man standing shit on bit!
I look around and you can still see, very faintly the reaper on the parking lot wall, and where the backup for the big trucks was, now filled in with the mess that at one time was the clubhouse. Someone had at one time started to clear off the lot. It was never meant to be, to again be filled with brothers living under the reaper.
I get up and wander around some, walking from place to place, letting the sights of days gone by bring up the memories of events that for some reason stick to this particular spot.
The flash of the Scotsman's wicked grin, as he sits and yet again yells at some stupid prospect in the ring. Chibs, always on the look out, far more intelligent than most thought. Always ready to lend a hand without being asked. Beer in hand on a good day, a half gone bottle on a bad one.
But even on the drinking days, he'd pat the space next to him on that ugly old picnic table bench and say, "Aye lass, Have a seat, take a load off yer pins, wanna drink?" As he would pass me the bottle, or yell out for some prospect to come bring the lass a glass, then bust us all up when we all laughed at his play on words. Telling us all, "To go strait to bloody fuckin hell, ya heathen bastards!" As he would eventually lean back into a non-extant backrest and fall on his ass.
Little things, small moments in time that made up our life. Sometimes sheer chaos, others sheer madness at the enormity of the cluster fuck the situation had turned into. Brothers sliding into the lot on the last bit of consciousness, knowing they were home and would be looked after.
Some fools from another club storming in and shooting up the place. I learned a lot about repair work, both walls and human bodies from some of the best around.
I was fourteen the day he pulled me out of the regular world and into his. At the time I didn't know what to expect. I had never had any exposure to the 1% life style, I didn't even know it existed then.
The older I get the less I care about today. Self awareness is just so much bull shit. I can remember how it felt everytime shit just went south. The times in handcuffs laying on the lot pavement..Harley Mafa, ya right.
Hap was nothing but good to me, he made sure I made it all the way through high school, and college. I stayed with his mom, for all those years. He kept me hid away, safe he called it.
I was terrified when we pulled up to that little house with the picket fence and the riot of flowers everywhere. It was so out of place that house. All around it the other houses were slowly falling apart. But not his mothers house, he made sure it was right n tight. She never wanted for one thing that he could provide her.
True lots of things just seemed to fall of a truck, but I didn't know that at the time. I never asked and his mom didn't either. She was a lady all the way through, like Gemma in many nothing and would not stand for bad language or rough manners at her table. But she loved him like a lioness, never exactly defended the lifestyle to me, but never ran it down either. Just always said it was the life he choose.
In all the years I lived with her and took care of her, I think in her mind as she got older, I had always been with Hap. She always said I was the one.
I finished high school at her kitchen table. I was afraid that someone would put two and two together and figure out who I was and then they would come and get me. Hap agreed with me on that score. But when it came to college time, he and I sat and went through all the college brochures, and finally settled on a small community college I could drive to everyday. I settled on accounting, figuring I could always find work, businesses are always gonna be in need of someone to do the books.
I found I had a head for figures in school and this all just came easy to me, so I crammed in as many courses as possible and got it done in two years.
In those last two years Hap wasn't around as much then, and I guess I was so busy between classes and taking care of his mom I didn't question it. He was sweet to me when he was around and I always had a phone number for him in case we needed him for something.
I graduated the day before my eighteenth birthday. He was there, all in his leather and chains. Making people get out of his way with just a look. His mom was proudly at his side when I walked across the podium to get the paper I'd worked so hard on. Making three times the noise of anyone else!
He took us out to dinner and seemed not quite himself all night. He was just different, couldn't put my finger on it at the time. He took us home and helped his mom up the steps, she was failing, the cancer was back and she would not win the fight this time.
She went to bed early just like she'd been doing, since the news of the cancer being back. I went and changed into jeans and a tank, went out to the back steps and just let the day fade away. I have never done well in a crowd like that and it was a relief to get home.
Hap came out a bit later and handed me a beer, he sat next to me and you could just feel the tension radiating off him. I knew him well enough to let things take their own course. But he took for ever!
Finally he turned to me," You're mine, you always have been." He said. "I know, you own me." I replied. "Now just a fucking goddamn minute, that ain't what I mean, FUCK!" He growled out. "Lemme try this again, you are mine." He said slowly like I was stupid. I just looked at him, seemed like there should be more to what he just said, so I waited. He shifted around and dug a paper out of his kutt, and opened it up to reveal a drawing.
It was a crow, a big one with broken chains on its legs clutching a scroll with a red ribbon like they used to use sealing wax on, only this was a yellow smiley face instead. I looked up expectantly to see what the significance of this was. I'd never seen one nor did I know what it meant.
"That right there says you are mine." He did it again! Fucker! "I am not stupid, I did go to college, but I know fuck all what this is supposed to mean!" and I stood up to leave. "Fuck, girl that ain't what I meant, I want you for my ole lady." "What's an ole lady?" He took my hands so I would sit down and said.
"Leann, its what we call the ladies we choose to spend our life with, some brothers go so far as to marry and we can talk on that on down the line, but I got to put my mark on you, so you're safe."
"You mean like a cow with a brand?" I asked, knowing that if he wanted to he could brand me, there was fuck all I could do about it.
"No, in this life, our ladies wear our crow, it shows the world that you belong to me." He said earnestly.
"So this is a good thing, not a bad one, right?" I asked like the silly girl I still was.
"It's a big fucking deal to me, means I picked you, that you are mine. I want to put it over the whip scars on your back, not to cover them up but to show you are a tough bitch and I know it's gonna hurt like a bitch, but it will just be you n me so no one will know if you have a hard time." Wow, he just said more words all at once than I think I've ever heard him say in a week.
"Ok, when are we doing this?" I asked him in hopes I could be ready for it.
"Tomorrow, its your birthday and I can legally claim you as my ole lady." He said looking all pleased with himself.
"Alright, so this is my birthday present, a tattoo?" I asked, thinking that's gonna suck balls for a present.
"No, well we can go do shit during the day and do the ink later in the day if you want." He said.
"No, lets just get the pain out of the way so it's over and done with, hell do it tonight, if you want to."
"I could, but then you will be too sore to ride tomorrow." He said with those eyes flashing at me!
"No, do it tonight, so it over and done with, please." I asked. "Alright, go clear off the kitchen table, and I'll go get my kit." He said as he went into the house.
So I went and cleared off the table. What else could I do. All I really wanted to do was run out the door. He said he would never hurt me! LIAR!
He came back in and started to assemble all the stuff he pulled out of his bag. The tattoo gun looked evil, like it was just waiting to hurt me. He stopped what he was doing and said, "Here you do a little one for me and you'll see it ain't that bad.
So he set out the yellow and black ink in little cap things. gave me a pair of gloves and pulled out a little paper with a smiley face on it, "Think you can draw that one me?" He asked. And so I gave him a smiley face. It wa far from a perfect circle like the others he had, but every time I saw it I would smile from then on.
He got a couple of pillows and had me take off my top and lay face down on the table. He rubbed something on my back and I remember thinking it was gonna take days for him to do this! He put the paper on me and it transferred the crow to my back, from left shoulder to right hip. He leaned down and whispered in my ear, "No yelling, can't wake up Maw." And then the needle hit my skin, it wasn't too bad till he went over bone,or over a scar, then I thought I might just break the table where I was gripping it for dear life. He took a break when the lines were done. Then he came back and the shading started. It was no where near as bad as the lines.
When he was done he rubbed something all over it and said I could go look now.
I went into the downstairs bathroom and got a small hand mirror and turned around and there on my back over the ugly scars I hated so very badly was a beautiful bird in full flight, wings extended, I could see every detail of the feathers, chains dangling, and a smiley face for all the world to see.
I no longer felt owned, I felt free!
I remember hearing about the night Kyle got his ink burned off, fire or knife Clay asked him. Kyle hung his head and quietly said fire. It made me remember the night I got my crow. I felt bad for Kyle, but what he did should have got him six feet under, not dumped in front of a hospital. Opie did hard time away from his family just because Kyle was a chicken shit.
Shortly after Opie went inside we lost Hap's mom. I came in one day and she was just gone. She was outside under the big shade tree, sitting in her chair in her favorite spot. Her ice tea in its regular spot, a book on her lap. She was just still now.
I sat back on the grass and dug my phone out, and dialed his number. "Hap you need to get here now, it's your mom."
"Is she.." he never finished, I just answered "Yes. The line went dead. By now I knew the guys he was always with and hit Chibs umber next, told him what had happened so Hap would not be riding alone all upset. I went out to the front steps to wait for them to ride up. She was his anchor, his one thing to take care of before me.
They came roaring up and parked, he went to past by me but stopped to give my shoulder a squeeze. I waited for a few minutes and went on out back with them. He was very upset, I sat down beside him and he rested his head on me. "She's really gone." Was all he said. "Yes she is, she won't hurt anymore, look at her face. See the pain is gone, she is at peace."
The three of us had sat down and planned out what she wanted, so there was not much to do in the way of arrangements. She was a devout Catholic and would be buried beside his Father. I called the priest, like she asked and he came and did whatever it is they do and then the ambulance came. I didn't think he would ever let them take her, his brothers had to hold him back so they could load her up and leave.
He took it real hard, kinda went off the rails for awhile, after the service. I took Gemma's advice and let him get it out of his system, before he came back to me.
I was at the shop with Gemma when he came back, I'd started to work there when ever she needed a hand and now I worked five days a week. He knew I would be there. He knew I would see that bitch that followed in her car. I to this day think he was testing me to see if I still cared.
Oh I showed him fuckin care alright!
He backed into his slot, and she got out of her car and the fuckin bitch put her dirty whore hands on my man!
I was fileing some invoices and they just hit the ceiling as I went stomping out the door. And he just stood there and let her hang all over him! The fuckin nerve!
I walked up and tapped her on the shoulder," If I was you I'd back the fuck off my man." I said. She turned and looked me up and down," Like hell I will, go find your own you skinny cow." And that's when I hit her.
Now to say these club whores are pretty is a real stretch of anyones imagination. Nothing about them is real. Everything is fake, plastic, tied on, glued on or painted on. When I grabbed her by the hair, it came off. Well I should say it was one of those weave things so some of her real hair came with it. When my fist connected with her mouth her caps fell out.
Now I did feel a little bit bad about that, because I had implants now, just a little bit.
When she fell off her plastic heels, she must have had on six inch ones, she broke an ankle. And that's when I guess Hap decided I'd shown enough care. He grabbed me to hold me back and that's when I smelled her on him. I pulled away and told him to take care of that trash, get a fucking shower and we would talk later on tonight.
"Leann, wait!" He said to my back. "I have work to do and it looks like you do too, see ya later Hap". And I walked back to the office. Gemma was waiting for me and shut the door behind me so no one could see if I cried. I didn't. I stomped around calling Hap names and just stayed wound up.
She let me carry on for a bit, then stepped in front of me and pointed to the couch. " SIT THE FUCK DOWN LEANN!" She yelled in my face. So I sat the fuck down. Gemma went over to the bottom desk drawer and pulled out a bottle of Jack, and got a couple of coffee cups and came and sat beside me, and told me this.
You know the rules and so does he,"What happens on a run, stays on the run, that shit right there is not ever supposed to happen, but it does sometimes and you handled it just right. I am so proud of you!" and she gave me a hug!
Then we drank the bottle of jack. At some point Clay came in to see if we had killed each other and found us very happy and very loud. He wisely shut the door. At some point, I'm not sure really, I went out and stood swaying in the lot and started to yell, " HAPPY FUCKING LOWMAN GET YOUR ASS OUT HERE." next thing I remember I was hanging over a trash can puking my guts out and someone holding my hair out of the way of the mess I was making. It all gets a bit blurry and distant after that. I do remember the clubhouse floating by me as I was carried in, JT'S bike is truly the last thing I remember. Till I woke up with a killer hangover! And in Hap's dorm room. I could hear sounds of people being way too loud. The garage was busy I could her the power tools, way too loud also. But I had to get up! I had to go something fierce!
And there was that arm again, holding me down, pulling me in closer. "I have to go." I said, he just grunted at me,"Go pee and take a shower, you stink." So did and crawled back into bed, he pulled me into his chest and said."Won't ever happen again Leann." I said "It had better not,cause it's your balls next time!" He just grinned and hugged me tighter, "She still loves me." He said as he drifted off to sleep again. "Ya I do ya fucker." I replied, and I went back to sleep too, safe in the arms of my tin foil knight.