Unfortunately, my recent acquiring of a criminal record was going to affect my prospects for a better job. In the meantime, I delivered fast food. Lunchtime was my best time of day. I’d hit a meeting, eat some cookies with my sober sisters, Georgia and Kiss, two girls that had become important to me. Especially Kiss because she’d brought Mike back into my life.
Mike and I had lived in the same foster house for a while. It was rough. Too many foster kids, not enough to eat, and locks on the fridge and cupboards. But we had each other. Then one day, he was gone. I’d lost my best friend, the only kid who’d ever felt like a brother to me.
I smiled thinking about him. We’d both changed. He had his own kid now, and he’d become part of a motorcycle club. They called him Romeo. A couple of weeks ago, he’d had me over to his house. His own sweet place, with a girlfriend, and he owned his own business.
And I was sitting here waiting to pee in a cup to prove I wasn’t using. I checked the clock again. Ted needed to hurry up because I needed to get to the community center.
I stood, slid my phone into my pocket, and approached the window. “Could you see how long he’s going to be? I have an NA meeting in twenty. I doubt Ted would want me to miss it.”
“Sure.” She disappeared into his office beyond the door separating the waiting room from the rest of the office. She returned less than a minute later. “Come on back.”
The metal handle clicked, and she popped open the door.
“How have you been?”
“Same.” I held my helmet in one hand and followed her to the office at the end of the hall.
“Hi Ryatt,” Ted said as he entered the room, and she stepped out, closing us in. Let the ass kissing commence. Ted was a bruiser. Six feet, two hundred and fifty pounds of beer gut and, I assumed beneath the stock and barrel, there were muscles that could pop my head off like a tick.
“Hey.” I set my helmet on the ground and sat in the chair across from him.
Ted’s chair groaned as he settled into it, and he exhaled a sigh as he flipped open my file. “Are you still at Treena’s?”
“Yep.”
“And your drug program? Are you still attending meetings?”
“Yep.” Same shit. Same day. “I’m still doing deliveries on my bike.” I pulled out my phone, opened my deliveries app, and slid it across his desk for him to verify. He made a couple notes in my file, then pushed my phone back toward me.
I checked the time before I stuffed it into the front pouch of my hoodie.
“I need a UA.” He opened his desk drawer, grabbed a collection cup, and slid it over to me.
I sighed, reached forward, and grabbed it off the desk. “This is like the tenth time I’ve done this, and I’ve never tested dirty.” It had been more than ten, but I didn’t want to point out his obsession with UAs. He was still my warden. And anyways, whether it was ten or a hundred, I figured I had at least two or three more weeks of check-ins, but ultimately this asshole had my escape clause in the folder. He had to sign off for me to get out from under my charges.
He pushed away from his desk. “You know why that is, Donovan?”
He used my last name like we were bros. “Because I don’t have a drug problem.”
“That’s what everyone says.” He pointed to the bathroom attached to the office. “You don’t have a drug problem because you’re pissing in a cup for me.”
I rolled my eyes and pushed open the door to the bathroom. The overhead lights buzzed as they flickered on.
“You know the drill,” he said.
The bathroom wasn’t small, but it wasn’t large enough to give me the cushion of space I needed between me and the guy staring at my reflection in the mirror.
Mirrors that revealed everything. I stepped up to the sink and washed my hands with the antibacterial soap. Coming into his office, I’d touched door handles, chairs, and Ted’s desk. I wasn’t taking a chance of picking up some residue from the guy before me and getting a dirty result. I didn’t even know if it was possible to cross-contaminate, but it would be my luck to prove it true.
I lifted my hoodie, exposed my belt, and released the forked prongs. My hands always shook. I shouldn’t be worried. I hadn’t touched weed or alcohol. Not because I didn’t miss it. A late-night blunt and a warm pussy made for a good time. I hadn’t had either. I didn’t want to fuck up my probation, but it was easy to stay clean because the people I’d become close to needed sober friends.
I flared my nostrils and sniffed. The whir of my zipper lowering echoed in the open room. With a cup in my hand, I stood at the urinal, with my dick out, in front of a mirror that gave my pervert probation officer an unobstructed view of my junk, and I pissed into the cup.
I kept my head down, focused on the task at hand, otherwise I’d lose my mind. What kind of kink was watching guys take a piss? The low grunts coming from him hit like punches. I wasn’t going down on assault charges because he was enjoying his job.
Ted made me wait until the rapid test results proved I was clean before he let me take off.
Ten minutes later, I raced to the community center, but I was still ten minutes late when I pulled into the parking lot and rode my bike up to a pearl-white BMW. A twist of excitement coiled low in my gut. I recognized the bike.
