He nodded, glancing at the giant stack of comics a customer had brought up to purchase. “Sure! It’s probably a good idea to get me out of here before I spend my whole paycheck anyway.”
Out on the street, everything felt quiet, only the wind rustling through the trees. It was a relief after a few steady of hours of noise and chatter in Northstar, but I was mainly just happy to get a chance to talk with Irving one on one. With the coding project he had been finishing up, we hadn’t seen each other quite as much the past few days as I had hoped to.
“Karis says hi,” Irving offered, walking slowly beside me as we strolled down the block. “And she says that if I don’t find the time to introduce you both over Skype soon, she’s going to start believing I’m making you up.”
“I would love to meet your friend,” I said, bouncing a little. “It will be like getting a whole new level of insight into your life.”
“She’s just relieved I’m getting out of the house more often. Even if she’s also terrified I’m going to get myself mixed up in Brick’s business and killed.”
“Judging by the way Brick talks about it, you’d think there were assassins trying to track us down or something. You haven’t had any luck finding more information online, though?”
Irving shrugged. “He’s still checked in to the motel, but that’s about all I’ve got. It’s not like he really gave us anything to go with.”
We walked in silence for a while. I knew he was probably thinking about the same questions I was. They were questions about Brick and whether he would be safe. There were also questions about us and who we were to each other, now that we were acting sweet and romantic all the time. We had even made out a few times, which felt really nice and steamy, although without Brick around, we never progressed to anything more.
Sometimes, I worried it was a problem, like we didn’t know how to access our sexuality without Brick there, showing us how. But the truth was, when it was just the two of us together, it didn’t feel like anything was missing, exactly. Our connection was strong and good exactly as it was. Brick just added another level to it, the same way Irving added another level to my connection with Brick.
That connection wasn’t just sexual, although the erotic energy between us was like a lightning storm. I was able to pull Irving out of his shell all on my own, but Brick seemed to embolden him and give him the confidence to do things I never would have guessed he was capable of. On my own, I wouldn’t have been grounded enough in reality to actually connect with Brick and to understand him as a real and complicated person. But with Irving there to anchor me, I could meet Brick where he was and see the kindness and generosity that shined beneath his rough exterior.
“He is a good person,” I finally said, breaking through the silence.
“Yeah,” Irving agreed. “He’s just traumatized and hurt. But until he realizes that, he’s going to be stuck in these patterns.”
The sadness in his voice reminded me of something else. Irving’s ex-boyfriend and old roommate had abandoned him, and his best friend Karis had moved across the country, and now Brick was threatening to disappear, too. He might not have experienced physical violence, but I knew abandonment like that could leave some pretty nasty scars, too.
I linked my arm into his. “I’m not going anywhere, you know. Even if Brick does skip town, I’ll still be here, and you can still count on me.”
Irving leaned his head on my shoulder. “Thanks, Ezra,” he said, his voice soft as the breeze.
We finished rounding the block, returning to the store. As we got closer, I was surprised to see Lilith standing out front, tapping her foot and peering through the window.
“Hey!” I yelped. “Hey, Lilith!”
She turned, spotting Irving and me. As I got closer, I could see the smile on her face and the way she was staring at our arms, linked at the elbow.
Yeah, yeah,I thought.We’re pretty damn cute.
“I was hoping I could track one of you down,” she said.
Stopped in front of the store, I appreciated the view of the crowd inside and the intricate display I had set up in the window. You would have no idea someone had been vandalizing the property only a few weeks earlier.
“What’s up?” Irving asked. “Is something wrong with Brick?”
Lilith kicked her leg up against the wall and ran a hand through her green hair. It reminded me of Brick’s favorite pose, looking somehow casual and pissed at the same time. “Maybe,” she said. “Listen, I don’t want to step out of line and make more trouble for him, but I am worried.”
“Us, too,” Irving agreed.
“You got some dirt?” I asked. “Because all we can get out of that man is that he’s got thugs chasing him down and a plan to skip town as soon as possible.”
Lilith nodded. “That’s true. Did he tell you about the fight, too?”
Irving and I exchanged a look. “You mean the fact that he used to fight for money?” I asked.
“I figured he wouldn’t tell you,” Lilith muttered. “Hell, getting any information out of him is like robbing a bank.” She rubbed her forehead, then continued. “The people he used to fight for are trying to collect a debt from him, and they’re making him fight this Friday. The problem is, he’s out of practice, and his opponent is supposed to be one of the toughest guys on the circuit. I’m pretty sure they’re going to take him down in a big way, and if he doesn’t win, they’re going to demand that he chokes up some serious cash.”
“How much?” I asked.
“A hundred thousand.”
