I often wondered what it would feel like to have a mom who cared. “Your mom is a very special person.”
He straightens and shrugs. “She also told me Neptune went direct and, for a whole bunch of reasons that I didn’t really follow, you should take up journaling.”
I laugh at that. “You don’t believe in all this, do you?”
He bites down on his lower lip for a second, and I see how perfectly straight and white his teeth are. “Shedoes. And I guess, the question really is, do you?”
I think about it for a second. Having a mom, anyone’s mom, worry about me enough to take action and send energy to keep me safe feels like something worth believing in.
I hold the tourmaline in my hand, close my eyes, and breathe for a second. “Yeah. I think I do.”
Catfish smiles. “Good. Now, as you ruthlessly pointed out this morning, I can’t help you do the work, but I can make sure you get what you need while you do it. So, in the future, if the lights are too bright, just dim them. If the music is too loud, turn it down. You get hungry, open the fridge and eat what you want. You don’t see anything there you like, let me know and I’ll get it. You got everything you need to get started?”
I nod. “I do.”
“Good.” He picks up his knife. “Then let’s get to it.”
5
CATFISH
I’m not a proficient chef. Like, I don’t believe the whole mumbo jumbo that food cooked with love tastes better.
But there’s something slightly meditative about making dinner in a quiet room with dim lights and listening to the tippy-tap of Wren’s fingers flying over their laptop. I can see their reflection in the window as I stand facing it, my back to them.
As I dice the carrots, I occasionally look up. Sometimes they’re playing with the ends of their thick green-and-black hair. Other times, they are worrying their lower lip as they study something on the screen.
This time when I look up, they’ve flattened their hands on the top of their head, and I wonder when I, a self-proclaimed tits and ass man, suddenly stopped worrying about their flat chest.
The chicken hisses and spits as I brown it in a pan with some butter.
“How did you become an Outlaw?” Wren asks suddenly.
I glance over my shoulder to them. “You want the short story or the long one?”
They link their fingers and rest their chin on their knuckles. “The long one.”
“Mom always said there was nothing in this world that couldn’t be put right with butter and sugar. When I was younger, I’d get the crap kicked out of me at school. Some of it was because of the homemade tie-die T-shirts she loved making. Some of it was the homemade soups and granola bars wrapped in parchment paper she insisted on sending me for lunch.”
“I bet you were a cute little kid.”
I flip the chicken in the pan, then turn to face them. “I was the fucking cutest. Came second in the Gerber Baby of the Year competition.”
“You did not.”
I nod. “I did. Should have fuckin’ won too.”
Wren smiles, and their whole face changes. “So, how did you go from baby-food-worthy to this?” They gesture up and down my body with mock disdain.
I run my hand down my T-shirt. “Hey, I’ll have you know what’s under here is still model worthy.”
At that, Wren laughs. And I find myself wanting to keep making them laugh. Keep them happy. Because it’s so different to the nervous shaking wreck they were this morning. “I’m sure it is. But spill. How did you become a biker?”
“One day, when I was twelve years old, I was getting the shit kicked out of me at the side of the road, and a bike pulled up by the ditch. One of the biggest human beings I’d ever seen in my scrawny-ass life climbed off it. And he threw those boys off me like they weighed nothing. It was like one of those video games where a big creature like King Kong starts picking up and tossing humans. And when he got to me, he grabbed the back of my shirt, stood my ass up, and dusted me off.”
“I like this person already.”
“His patch said he was the enforcer of the Iron Outlaws Motorcycle Club. And he got down on one knee in front of me and asked why these kids were beating on me. Things like, hadI done anything wrong, called anyone names. Basically, had I started shit. And I pointed to the parchment paper and my broken-up granola bar and said they were making fun of my food.” I didn’t tell him that they’d caught me looking at one of the older members of the school track team as he changed shirts and that’s what led to them making fun of me and my food.
