Chapter Two
Blue on black,
Tears on a river
Push on a shove, don’t mean much
Joker on Jack
Match on a fire
Cold on Ice
A dead man’s touch
Whisper on a scream, never changed a thing
Doesn’t bring you back
It’s like blue on black
Three months later
Sully
The faint buzzing sound coming from Noah’s tattoo machine was a balm to the anxiety in my chest. Getting tattooed didn’t bother me. It was a second nature these days. The anxiety was from the words being tattooed on my pectoral muscle right over my heart, ‘You are my favorite color’.
Noah is my best friend and partner though I run the shopmainly. Noah is multi-talented; tattooing for fourteen years and the bass guitarist for the band, TAT. You might have heard of him the band has four albums all making it to the platinum record status. He isn’t here too often like his best friend, Jenny Dorian, who manages the shop and doubles as our dermal artist.
“What brought this on, my man?” He asks me about the new tattoo being placed under the photo of my one true love. Chad tattooed the photo of Kace a few years ago when I showed up, unannounced and uninvited, to pull Noah out of hell. I had been friends with Noah and his sister, Carrie, since we were kids. Our dads both worked on the force. I found out later in life, much later, that their dad was a sadistic evil pile of shit and when his secrets came out, it was my dad who lead the case.
“Chad put her picture there when I showed up in Gig.” I look down at the most beautiful face I will ever see and feel the pain of her profound loss wash over me. “I feel like I need to accept it all. I want to get a stone for her here. Somewhere I can go to talk to her. I think it’s time.”
Noah stopped the machine as he wiped the ink from my chest. He looks at me, both understanding and confused, an odd combination. “And if the day comes that she …” He doesn’t say it and I understand why.
“If she comes home?” I ask, and rub my hands over my face, then dropping them to my lap. “She isn’t going to, Noah. I know that, the cops know that, even Deja knows it. I don’t want to say I give up, but I need there to be peace. For myself, but also for her. If she is dead, I need her to know there’s peace for her…”
I know I sound crazy talking like she is some lost ghost, but if her soul is lost, well that’s the one thing I can help with.
Noah nods, seeming to understand the need for being at peace. He does understand it. Four years ago, he lost his fiancé in a car accident and it sling shot him straight into hell. He used drugs as we were kids, got into the harsh shit with heroin. Carrie and I pulled him out then, and when Candey died, we did it again. We had more help the last time. Chad, is Carrie’s husband, and the lead singer for TAT, as well as rhythm guitarist. Shamus James, the drummer, Cal Dorian, the lead guitarist and manager of all things TAT, and husband to one of my closest friends, Jenny.
What can I say? I like to hang with a bad ass crowd, and that bad ass crowd is my other family.
That crowed and a few others, were there every minute trying to save him, and it wasn’t any of us that did. He saved himself when he had enough. Now, seeing him happily in love and living sober is what inspires me to find peace as well.
There is a memory. One I keep distant. Of a drop-dead brunette with sleeved arms, who for a split second, I wanted more than anything. I keep my distance from Mya for that reason, but she was the only woman who reached inside and pulled some life out of me… for a few hours anyway. Nowadays, I see her more than I would like. She is Cal’s little sister and always in and out of the PIT dropping off Rylie and Axe to Jen.
She watches me, tries to flirt with me, and tests my restraint every time she blinks for fucks sake.
Noah rubs the salve over the script on my chest breaking me from my thoughts on the vixen that haunts my dreams. “Check it out.”
I stand and look in the mirror at the words. The powerful words that mean everything to me. He did the lettering in a beautiful script, each one multi-colored like the rainbow. A combination of the rainbow on my chest beneath her, my favorite color.
“Nailed it, brother,” I say, while I cover it with a wrap and tape.
“Listen…” Noah says and clears his throat. “I support you wanting to find that inner peace. I know the struggle of finding it because there is no path to it, you just gotta find it. No matter what I got your back with it, but don’t do this shit alone.”
“I got you, bro. I won’t.” I look at him. Healthy and at peace, and think of the storm he rode to get to this place. “Wanna come with me to look at some spots? I don’t know really how to go about this.” I hate asking him, but if anyone can even kind of understand my pain, it’s him. Noah knows loss.
