Spider: A tattoo romance (Rough Ink Book 2) Read online

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you. Your mom lost her husband today, but you lost your father. How are you?”

  It was a good question, one I wasn’t sure I knew how to answer.

  “I honestly don’t know. The whole thing is so surreal. I feel like I might wake up from a bad dream at any moment, like in one of those cheesy soap operas. This morning in the park and then back at my apartment with you seems like a lifetime ago, and it kind of was. I was a different guy back then. Carefree. Careless. Selfish. But life flipped the switch on me, and here I am.”

  I shrugged, although she couldn’t see it, and kicked at a tiny pebble with my bare foot. I was freezing cold but didn’t want to go inside. I needed a break from being surrounded by the ghosts of my former life. What this morning I’d seen fondly as my family home, jammed full of happy memories, now seemed like an eerie tomb, a shrine to my father that none of us had known we were creating.

  “I would love to hear more about him, if you’re up to it? From what you’ve said so far, he was an incredible man.”

  I paused. Was I up to it? I’d been speaking to various people on and off all day—relatives, old friends, Zed and Kota from the studio since I was obviously taking time off unexpectedly, and we needed to work out the details—but I’d stuck to the mechanics and logistics of the situation. Yes, they’d all enquired how I was and offered condolences, and I’d given them a standard response that we were “doing okay under the circumstances,” or “in shock,” or “managing,” or “holding up.” Then I’d done my best to steer the conversation back to practical considerations: work, the funeral arrangements, etc.

  Emi was the first person to push a little harder, and dig a little deeper, though I suspected if anyone else had done the same, I would have continued to dodge them. I was a big talker, everyone knew that—they even mentioned it in my high school yearbook entry—but most of the time I talked shit. It was lighthearted banter, jokes, fun. Apart from the one time I stepped in and told Zed to get his head straight when he was fucking up his potential relationship with his girl, I avoided heavy conversations like the plague.

  But with Emi, I wanted to open up. While on the one hand, I barely knew her, on the other, we’d been through more shit together than I had with friends I’d known for years. We were close in a way that maybe I could only be with someone I’d met in a near-death situation, and who was with me when I’d found out about my father’s death.

  23

  Emi

  The pause on the other end of the line was so long and loaded that I figured I’d overstepped. I was trying to find a way of apologizing for inserting myself where I was neither wanted nor needed without saying the word sorry, when Chris finally spoke.

  “He was one of a kind. Everybody loved him—even those who feared him, and plenty did. He’d worked his way through the ranks from the bottom up. He came from dirt and made his way to the top through sheer hard work, determination, and blood, sweat, and tears. No West Point or Citadel shortcutting the process for him. He earned every stripe the old-fashioned way.”

  His words caused a pang of regret in my chest. I was sad that I’d never get to meet someone who had clearly been influential in Chris’s life.

  “I think it made him extra driven but also unreasonably hard on himself and on us around certain issues. For example, though he left the day-to-day discipline mostly to Mom, he went through the roof when he found out that not only did I not want to go to college, but I wanted to spray-paint shit for a living. To this day, I don’t think he ever really understood graffiti, or my attraction to that world.”

  I would have liked to learn more about that side of Chris too, but it wasn’t the time or place.

  “It was Mom who’d talked him down from the ledge. I inherited her unconventional and creative genes. He came around slowly, then in time he was proud of me, in his own way.”

  His voice cracked as he spoke, and so did my heart. His pain was palpable, and I hated that there was nothing I could do to ease it.

  “He was supportive in the end?”

  “Yeah. He was this big scary, heavily decorated soldier, but what most people didn’t know was that he had a huge heart. He just wanted Benji and me to be happy, so once he was done being pissed, he embraced it and pretended to the world that I never did anything on the margins of the law, let alone on the wrong side of it.

  “He’d never been someone anybody would have accused of being naive, so I figured he knew the deal, just overlooked it. Whenever it came up in conversation, which was rare, Dad used to caution me to be careful, which I was sure was code for ‘Don’t get caught and cause a fucking scandal.’ I never got caught.”

  I could hear the slight laughter in his voice as he recalled his dad and was glad to be able to help him relive fond memories at such a heartbreaking time.

  “Then when I transitioned from graff to tats, Dad was the one to reassure Mom that it wasn’t the end of civilization as we knew it, and that most studios weren’t money-laundering vehicles for gangs and cartels. Somehow in her mind, she jumped straight from me becoming a tattoo artist to my charred and hacked-up corpse turning up in a body bag on her stoop. Dad was the opposite—he was pleased when I went legit with tattooing instead of graffiti. At least he didn’t have to worry about me being arrested.”

  I doubted very much whether my happiness was ever a factor in my parents’ thoughts or actions. They were both so wrapped up in their own heads, albeit in very different ways, that I didn’t get a look in.

  “In fact, he warmed to the idea so much that he even asked me to give him a tattoo.”

  “Really? Surely that’s the highest form of flattery—letting you make a permanent mark on his skin. What was it?”

  “A dove with my mom’s name underneath it. I think she brought him peace. In a world, job, and career that was pretty fucking hectic, she was his stabilizing force. They were yin and yang, but it worked for them.”

  “They sound sweet together.”

  “They were… I mean, as much as you could call a lieutenant general sweet. It’s true, though they were sickening sometimes, with how into each other they were. Especially after he retired and they could finally spend quality time together. This was their time of life to do their thing, travel the world, tick shit off their bucket lists that they couldn’t do when he was serving, or when they were raising us kids.”

  The pain creeping into his voice as he reminisced was heartbreaking.

  “They both sacrificed so much for all those years. This was supposed to be their reward for their hard work, and it was over almost before it even started. They had a round-the-world trip planned for next year. It’s just not fucking fair—” A strangled sob cut off his words, and then the line was silent apart from the intermittent sound of sniffing.

  Tears rushed to my own eyes, and I bit the inside of my lip trying to keep them at bay. I pulled in deep breaths, hoping to quell my emotions while I waited for him to speak again.

  “Damn it. I didn’t mean to… I mean, this must be strange as shit for you. I’m sorry if I’m weirding you out. It’s just….” He inhaled a deep, ragged breath. “I don’t really know who else to say this shit to. Talking about this stuff isn’t my usual MO.”

  “Okay, well, I have nothing to compare it to with you, but even if I did, I wouldn’t judge you. You’re grieving. This is a totally normal response. It would be weirder if you weren’t upset. I’m sure none of your friends would either. ”

  “You’re right, they wouldn’t, but given it’s not how I normally am…. Even though I’m a sociable guy, I like to keep my private shit exactly that. Private. Not that I’ve ever had much to worry about on the personal side of things. Now it seems to be raining down from all directions.”

  “Hmm?” I wasn’t sure I followed his meaning.

  “You, my dad, my mom, Benji.”

  “You don’t need to worry about me.”

  “It’s not like that. You’re the one thing on that lis
t I want to worry about. I mean to think about.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. I know how we met wasn’t positive and represents a terrible situation for you, but selfishly, I’m still glad it happened in a way.”

  I was too, and I wanted to say so, but my throat seized up and I couldn’t get the words out.

  “Hmmm.” It was all I had.

  “Okay. So not the response I was hoping for. Sorry if I’m out of line.”

  Is he for real?

  A few hours earlier, we’d screwed like there was no tomorrow. Surely it was clear there were mutual feelings there. I would have also thought that after Friday’s fiasco, it would have been obvious to him that the spoken word wasn’t always my friend. I’d always been so much better at putting thoughts and emotions on the page than on the tip of my tongue.

  “No, don’t mind me. It’s not that I’m not glad we met. I am, and not just because you saved my life.”

  “Don’t keep saying that. You saved yourself. You walked into the studio with a plan. A risky plan that took balls to carry out. And that let’s face it, if it’d gone wrong, it could’ve ended badly for you.”

  “And you.”

  “For all of us. And you want to know something? Just looking at you, I knew you were hurting, and I knew you were terrified, but what really stood out was your quiet inner strength. The look in your eyes asked for my help, but it also told me you could take care of yourself. That you had been taking care of yourself.”

  “You’re too kind. If I could take care of myself, I wouldn’t have been in that situation. I wouldn’t have let Tommy worm his way into my world and get the better of me the way he did. Wouldn’t have let him control me, dominate me, and manipulate me for so long. Wouldn’t have let him take my power, and my joy. I wouldn’t have let him break me.”

  I’d kept it together until that point, but as I thought about how I’d allowed Tommy to ruin my life, I couldn’t contain the tears I’d held back for what seemed like a lifetime. The strangled sob that tore from my body sounded as though it came from somebody else. The anguish in it surprised even me.

  Chris stayed silent, letting me weep without interrupting, until I felt like I’d cried myself inside out, and that my internal organs, especially my heart, were now on the outside of my body. When I was empty both of tears and emotion, I spoke with a hoarse, scratchy, almost inaudible voice.

  “I’m so—”

  “I know you’re not about to apologize right now. For being human? For having emotions? Especially not after the way you’ve supported me today, and how you just schooled me in the fact that it’s normal to feel these things.”

  “It’s just that this is such an awful time for you. The last thing you need is to deal with my shit on top of it all.” This was why I should have gotten therapy.

  “That’s not true. Like I said before, I want to be part of your life. And I’m glad you trust me enough to share this stuff with me. Do you have other people you can talk to about it?”

  “No. I haven’t told anyone what happened except the cops. I’ll be honest, I don’t have any close friends I feel comfortable enough to share this stuff with. Tommy used the classic narcissist tactic of controlling me by isolation, freezing out the few people in my life who might’ve become friends. But to tell you the truth, even without his influence, I was never great at forming close bonds with people.”

  I paused, choosing my next words carefully.

  “I think my upbringing guaranteed that. I had no real examples of normal loving relationships, and I also felt like I had to keep people at arm’s length so they didn’t find out what was going on at home. Then it became a habit I never learned to break. I have Stacey, my work wifey, but even now that Tommy’s in jail, I’ve never told her what went on with us. Truth is, you know more about me than anyone right now.”

  “And I feel like that’s next to nothing. What I do know, I like, but I would love to know more.”

  The feeling was mutual. He intrigued me in a way I couldn’t put a name to—it was a new sensation.

  “Tell me to mind my own business if you like. People often do—my dad used to say I asked more questions than Alex Trebek but was less fun—” He stopped, no doubt thinking about his dad again. “—but what happened in your childhood that affected you so much?” The sixty-four-thousand-dollar question.

  I debated not answering, changing the subject, or making some goofy joke like I always did when someone tried to get too close or probed too hard. But then something inside me snapped, and I realized I was tired of carrying the weight of my parents’ secrets and making them my own. Tired of the guilt and shame of what happened to me as a child, and what I’d allowed to happen to me as an adult.

  Fear. Terror. Shame. Those were the emotions that had dominated my life for as long as I could remember. They said most people’s first memory was around the age of four or five years old, and I’d imagine that for the majority it was a happy one—a birthday, a special experience with a loved one, a treat. Something that filled their heart with a warm glow, the kind that gave memories that old-school photo tint where everything looked rosy and sun-dappled.

  “I have the dubious pleasure of having strong memories that go back much further than most people’s. In the first, I was maybe eighteen months old, and I was riding in the back of an ambulance. I remember looking down at my socked feet, wondering where my shoes were and why I didn’t have them on. Then I remember panicking about where my mom was and why I was there.”

  I took a big gulp of air and forced myself to continue. I was so far out of my comfort zone it wasn’t even funny, but I wanted to get the words out. For the first time, I wanted to share that part of myself with somebody.

  “I looked around the small space, piled high with neatly organized medical supplies, fretting about my mom before spying her feet sticking out from behind two EMTs. As I craned my neck, one of the paramedics moved aside to reach something on a high shelf, and I got a complete view of my mother splayed out on the gurney. Her face was a smashed and bloody mess. I remember thinking it looked like corned beef, and even at that tiny age, I knew that nobody should look like corned beef.”

  “Holy shit.”

  “Yeah. Unfortunately, it was the first of many experiences and many bad memories involving my mom and trips to the ER. There were even more occasions where she neither sought nor received medical attention but should have. I seem to have every sordid detail filed away in my mind. Maybe I’ve forgotten something—a black eye here, a dislocated shoulder there—but it doesn’t seem that way to me. It’s all there in less-than-glorious Technicolor.”

  “My God, that’s heavy.”

  “It is. People like me often block out the bad experiences, but I seem to have done the opposite and erased all of the good. I have literally no happy memories of growing up. Like I can’t recall one joyful moment throughout the entirety of my childhood. I’m prepared to believe that there must’ve been some, if only one or two. Who could’ve had no good experiences throughout their whole early life?” It was a rhetorical question, of course. “But the anger, hatred, lies, fear, and violence drowned out anything positive. So now all I have is this compendium of misery in my mind that makes me feel sick to my stomach every time I accidentally let myself flick through it.”

  “Where are your parents now? Do you still see them?”

  “Nope. I severed ties with them both years ago. I know that deep down my mom loves me, but I’ve never forgiven her for staying with my father through everything he made us both endure. I know it’s not logical, and now that I’ve been on the other side of the same equation, I get that it’s not fair, but it soured our relationship beyond repair even before Tommy came on the scene. It’s actually the one relationship that he didn’t ruin for me but I broke myself. I don’t talk to him for obvious reasons.”

  It’d been a hard but necessary decision, more for my sanity than anything. I couldn’t be near my parents without being catapulte
d back to my childhood. The grief and anger that bubbled up in me whenever I was in their company wasn’t something I was prepared to put myself through. I’d had no choice when I was a kid, but as an adult, as hard of a decision as it was, it was mine to make.

  On top of all that, although my father was now a pitiful shell of his former self, wasting away from liver failure and too weak to look after himself, let alone hurt anyone—physically, anyway—there was no way I wanted Noah around the toxicity that seemed to still emanate from his every pore. Ironic that I’d take a firm stance on my father while simultaneously risking Noah’s own father ruining his life, just as mine had ruined mine. The shame of that fact had gnawed away at me every day I was with Tommy.

  But my reading over the previous year had shown me that narcissists were extremely clever people in their own way. Tommy may not have been able to hold down a job, but he sure knew how to hold me down. He knew just the buttons to press to keep me where he wanted me, and how to play on my fears in just such a way that I was paralyzed—incapable of acting.

  He told me time and time again that if I left or even tried to leave, he’d hunt me down wherever I went. He told me that no matter how long it took, he’d find us, and when he did, he’d let me live, but he’d gut Noah like a fish, and make me watch. Sadly, though Noah was Tommy’s own flesh and blood, I had no doubt he’d do it. He cared about nothing and nobody more than he cared about himself and his own crazy, warped agenda, and as far as he was concerned, any means justified those ends.

  “Emi, I’m so sorry.”

  “Thank you. Anyway, enough of my shit. You don’t need that bringing you down. It’s late, and I’m sure we both need sleep, but before we hang up, I just wanted to tell you I have the week off work, so I have time to help if you need me. Anything at all—hanging with Ben, helping with the arrangements for Tuesday in any way. I mean, I know you have other people you can call on, but I just thought I’d offer anyway.”