“Where is this place?” I asked eagerly.
Julie pointed out that large front window of the diner. I followed her gaze, but frowned when I caught sight of the building across the street.
“Isn’t that a bar?” The building had a neon sign hanging on the front, proclaiming it to beThe Blue Dog,and the parking lot was full of motorcycles.
Julie chuckled. “Yes, but I was pointing down the block. The place is called Absolute Fitness.”
I craned my neck and saw a white building with a glass front. It looked like a typical gym, but I hoped it could become so much more.
“Mom, are we going to have ice cream, or not?” Dominic interrupted our conversation, frowning.
“Oh, it’s ice cream you’re after? Well, we just so happen to have some of the best soft serve in town.” Julie flipped over Dominic’s menu for him, where there was a list of dessert options.
“Wow!”
His awe-filled voice was loud in the diner, and many people at nearby tables turned to look with amused expressions.
“Mom, can I have a banana split? Please?”
“Only if you eat something green with dinner.”
“Fine,” he mumbled.
“Two banana splits it is,” I told Julie. After she walked away, I turned back to Dominic. “After our dessert, we’re going to make one more stop.”
“You want to go to that gym?”
“I want to work there. So, keep your fingers crossed for me, okay?”
“Okay,” he agreed, literally crossing the middle and index fingers on both hands. I couldn’t help but laugh. With that kind of support, I would get the job for sure.
Three
Trainer
I was a shitty cook. Always had been. It just wasn’t my thing; I didn’t have the patience for it. I generally sustained myself on fool-proof frozen meals that I could pop into the oven and food from Tiny’s. I probably kept the damn place in business with how much money I spent there.
The only time I had good, homemade meals was on Sunday afternoons. Parking my bike on the driveway apron, I strode up to the brick-faced house that I had called home for a short period of time.
I never knew my dad. He walked out on my mom before I was even born. Some people might hate him for that, but after living with the unstable woman that gave birth to me, I couldn’t exactly blame the guy for taking off. My mom never cared about anything more than Heroin. Some people might say that she had an illness and pity her. All I knew was that I was pretty much on my own for the first twelve years of my life, and it was impossible not to resent the woman that was supposed to give a damn about me. Instead, she neglected me until I was taken away by social services. As far as I knew, she’d never even tried to change her ways and get me back.
Good riddance.
I was dumped into the foster care system, where I was shuffled around for four years. Some houses were better than others, but I’d been in a few terrible ones. I’d suffered abuse at the hands of men and women that were only foster parents because it came with a monthly check. The money was meant to be used to take care of me, but I’d generally been no better off than I was with my mother, who spent every dime she got her hands on buying her drugs.
Then, I was placed with Mama Tammy.
I didn’t consider myself to be an overly sentimental man. With my childhood, I had to be tough to survive, so there wasn’t room for that shit. But I loved Mama Tammy. She was the best foster parent I had, the only one that didn’t give me back or make me so miserable that I ran away. I was with her for two years until I turned eighteen.
She didn’t kick me out when I aged out of the system, but I knew that it was a financial strain once the money from the state stopped coming in. So, I set out on my own, getting an apartment in the complex owned by the Outlaw Souls. Most of us lived there, since we saw the club as more of a family than anything else. We were close, and we had each other’s backs.
I made it a priority to return to visit her once a week, on Sunday afternoon. It wasn’t always possible - life tended to get in the way sometimes - but I tried my damnedest to stop by.
This week, I was carrying a plastic bag from the hardware store at my side as I rang the doorbell. Mama Tammy pulled open the door seconds later, already wearing a bright smile.
“You’re early,” she said, pulling me into a hug. I could smell her floral perfume as I leaned down to wrap my arms around her plump body. She was several inches shorter than I was with dark brown skin and kinky, curly hair that she kept very short. I noticed that it was starting to turn grey, and I didn’t like that. It reminded me that she was getting older.
“I figured I’d come a little early to have a look at the dryer before lunch,” I explained. She’d told me two days ago that her dryer wasn’t heating up, so I picked up a heating element this morning.
