Since they are more devoted to their church life than family, it left Danae to care for our grandfather. My sister Jackie and I try to come home as often as possible to give her a reprieve and some support, but it simply gets harder and harder as time passes by. Jackie lives with her wife and their two dogs in California now. Small-town Arkansas wasn’t her vibe.
I’m not alone in being expelled from the family by our parents, they think Jackie is possessed by a demon for her unholy acts. I might not have been raised in church, but I have heard that God is love. Well, if God is love, then the relationship my sister and her wife share is filled with him because I’ve never met two people more in love. I loved Jonah with every breath I took, and I still love him today, but the love Jackie and Nancy have is remarkable. They are soul mates. If my parents can’t accept that, it’s their loss. I embrace them fully.
I just wish our hometown could have been more accepting. Then Danae wouldn’t be alone.
I should have moved home after Jonah died. At the time, though, lost in grief, I wanted to stay close to our memories. I needed that connection to him. Simple things like going to the grocery store felt monumental in the early stages of grief. Telling myself to embrace the memories of shopping with him, well, it got me through.
“I want to come home and help you,” I tell her from my heart. “I have some time off from work. I know Sara will approve it.”
“Please wait. I appreciate you for wanting to come. Really, though, I need you and Jackie when he passes. I need to know you have time off to come help me figure out my life without them, without him.”
“I can understand and respect that.” I let the tear fall.
“Why is our family cursed with loss?” She asks exactly what I’m thinking.
“I don’t know, but my heart shatters each and every time we take another hit.”
How much more can I take?
Five
Raff
Outlaw State of Mind – Chris Stapleton
Time is a thief that never stops. My sister always said that watching her son as he grew up reaching each milestone. While I can understand her sentiment being a mom, time didn’t bother me until now. Being away this long gnaws at me in a way I’ve never experienced before.
Two fucking weeks on the road, I’m beat as I finally roll into my driveway. My body is tense while my mind is locked down the rabbit hole of my past. Having her as my neighbor has brought all of this stuff up inside me. I can see the broken inside her. I know first-hand the damage of trauma to a soul. Yet, this fire in her eyes shows her determination to survive.
This is one time I wish I didn’t read people easily and well. My own trauma requires me to watch the small things and learn how to see what will come from someone. Reaction after an action meant injury. Preemptive measures are necessary to survive some of the evil people in this world. Because of what I have seen, what I have done, I see her and the situation she has found herself in. Clear as day it’s in her demeanor. She is a woman who has endured living in Hell at the hands of a man. My chest gets painfully tight simply thinking about the past and Josie’s current situation.
The problem is I know all too well the dangers of a woman leaving an abuser. Having that knowledge has made this entire club run different for me. Instead of staying focused on the job I was doing, the times, and the transport, I have constantly checked cameras and wondered if she’s okay. I shouldn’t care. She’s not close to me. But there is this beauty and strength to her that calls to me. I can’t deny the attraction.
I didn’t expect to be gone this long. A few days, one-week tops was the plan. I took a club run, not unusual, but then Rex asked me to come to Catawba for a bit. A week on the road, a week in Catawba, North Carolina, and frankly, all I want to do is climb in my own bed and sleep for a week. When I’m asleep the things from before can’t seep into my day to day. An idle mind is never good for me. A week to sleep off the haunting memories might help me shake the damn skeletons lying in wait in my closet, always threatening to rattle.
That isn’t going to happen, but what the fuck ever.
I will forever live with what I’ve done. The why behind it doesn’t matter, I still did it. And what may be worse is even now, knowing it’s fucked up and will destroy my mind, I would still do it once again. Over and over the reaction never changes. Kill or be killed, right? Except it wasn’t my life on the line. In the end, I couldn’t save her, and I couldn’t save myself either. Twenty years later and I still can’t shake the haunting of my soul.
I don’t bother to open my garage. I’ll leave Pearl, my Harley-Davidson Road Glide in a black pearl paint featuring the Hellions skull on the gas tank, in the driveway tonight. The custom paint job literally has Riffraff painted on each of the hard saddle bags along with a joker skull under it. The pearl shimmer to the paint job gives it this shine depending on which angle it sits. Someone steals this shit, they have a death wish. Ruby is my first bike, where Pearl is my dream bike. Each of them is a different part of me from stripped down to filled out, they are both like an addition of my damn soul.
The neighborhood is quiet like usual and it damn sure feels good to be home. Looking to my watch, I have about a half hour to shower and throw a frozen pizza in the oven for dinner.
My gaze goes to Justice running around yelling, “you can’t catch me” to Josie while she chases behind him. She’s in shorts and a tank top with her ass and tits bouncing. This is a view I can’t complain about, but no need to be getting a chub over the neighbor. She’s beautiful but carries herself in a way that screams she doesn’t see it.
Before I can get off my bike, I notice Josie freeze. She looks to her smart watch before looking around like she’s seen a ghost. She studies the area before rushing to Justice and hurrying him into their house. This puts me on full alert. What has her rattled?
In a matter of seconds from her scurrying inside, I notice a car pull from behind the house on the far side of the cul-de-sac. The one on the other side of my house. From where the little white Ford Fiesta was parked, a person could see directly into her backyard.
This won’t happen again. I’ll make sure of it.
Mentally, I take note of the license plate as they pull away as if they belonged.
The thing is, I know who should be in that house and that car has no business there.
My mind immediately commits all of this to memory, date, time, description, all of it. Getting my shit, I head inside my house. I’m not tired anymore. Dinner is a long gone thought. No, I’m fired up to look into this car and what has Josie rushing inside on a gorgeous Carolina evening.
After grabbing a beer, I can’t get the car off my mind. I planned to shower, but it can wait. Josie’s face, she was pale in fear, it’s stuck in my head. I know the fear of a woman. I also know if I rush over there, she will be more panicked to know someone else saw her problem.
