“Why?” Her voice is so soft, I can hardly hear her.
I don’t know how to answer.
“Because,” I finally say. I look into her eyes, hoping she’ll find meaning there since my words are so inadequate.
Lia sighs and reaches up with her free hand to run it through my hair.
“How long will you be here?” she asks.
“I don’t know. It could be days or weeks. I just don’t know.”
“I need at least a couple of days with my mom.”
“Take them,” I tell her. “Just come back when you’re done.”
She stares at me for some time without saying a word but finally nods her head. I don’t know if it’s meant for me or if it’s just the way she is confirming her own decision to herself. I don’t care – she’s agreeing. Nothing else matters.
“All right, Evan,” she says softly, “but only on one condition.”
“Anything,” I say. Again, all brains have left me.
“Tell me your full name.”
“Lieutenant Evan Nathanial Arden.” No brains whatsoever. Maybe the doctor who did my psyche evaluation and said I couldn’t serve anymore was right.
Brains become completely irrelevant as she smiles at me again.
“Okay,” Lia says with another smile. “I’ll come back to you.”
Chapter Four
Odin sits next to the open window of the truck, so I have Lia sandwiched between the two of us. I like it. I like it way too much, actually. Odin seems to have accepted her, or at least decided she smells enough like me now that it doesn’t matter. He licks her hand when she pets him and even nuzzles her neck with his nose, making her laugh.
The journey is quiet, but I hold her hand in mine and place them both on her thigh. It is a two-hour drive to Tuba City, and the nearest bus station where she can get a ride the rest of the way to Phoenix. I want to take her to see her mother myself, but she makes it clear she wants to do this alone, and I know I can’t really leave my station for the extended trip. At least I will be able to get some gas for the generator and some supplies.
I watch her legs as they move up the steps of the bus and wonder when they will be wrapped around my waist again. Lia turns back and gives me a smile that doesn’t touch her eyes, and I return the sentiment. Then the doors close, and she is gone.
The drive back to the empty house is a blur – too uneventful to bother committing to memory. Even if it had been more exciting, my mind is too preoccupied to bother with it. Every thought points to her, and it’s more than a little maddening.
When I walk in the door, I am followed closely by Odin, carrying his rubber bone in his mouth. He tries to engage me in play, but all I see is the empty bed with the sheets shoved down to the floor. I take a deep breath, hoping I can still find her scent in the house, but it’s too faint, and I’m probably only imagining it.
Get your shit together, Arden.
I walk back outside and fire up the generator. Dinner is grilled cheese and half of a bag of salad I got from the store next to the bus station. I fire up the netbook PC as I munch on Romaine lettuce, cabbage, and carrot strips without any dressing. All they had in the little convenient store was the brand I hate, and there wasn’t any Italian dressing at all. My email eventually loads as I’m on my second helping.
Pizza Hut – teasing me again. God, I would love a pizza right now.
I’ve won the Bank of Europe lottery. Is there a Bank of Europe?
Alienware would love to have me buy their new gaming machine.
And one more message.
Sender – Roger Moore.
Subject – none.
Body of message – come back.
The message was sent twenty-nine hours ago – I haven’t checked messages since early yesterday. Roger – or rather, Rinaldo – would assume I had received the message and left by now.
I swallow hard and close the PC.
A thousand thoughts run through my mind, and I can’t catalog them all into any semblance of order. I told her to come back, but when she gets here, the place is going to be empty. I can’t hesitate to leave and head back to the city – I just can’t. I have no phone number or any way to contact her. I didn’t even consider it, and if she thought about it, she apparently didn’t think it was necessary to give me her phone number.
Ride my cock for hours, yes, but not give me her fucking number…
Even if she had given me her number, I still don’t have a phone to use in the first place. Not until I get back to Chicago, and there is no way I am going to ask her to come there. If I want to, I can have her found – there can’t be that many Lia Antonio’s with a mother living in Phoenix. I can certainly locate her mother at the very least, but then I wouldn’t know what to say to her.
I’m trying to make excuses. I know what I’m doing and tell myself to cut that shit out. I don’t lie to myself. It’s pointless and destructive. I already know what I have decided because there really isn’t any other choice. I’m not going to bring that girl into my life. No way in hell. The very notion is ridiculous, and I was probably just a little bit insane when I told her to come back here. It could never last.
There’s a small duffle bag underneath the card table in the kitchen, which I haul out and deposit on the bed. My clothes go into it – the dirty and the clean. The netbook goes in there, too, as well as my spare pair of tennis shoes and Odin’s bone. I reach over and grab the rifle, quickly dismantling it so it fits inside the duffel. I take a quick look around the place to make sure nothing important has been forgotten, and there they are.
Her panties – the ones I nearly tore off of her last night – wrapped up in the sheets on the bed. I reach over and untangle them, then place them deep inside the duffle bag.
I have to leave her something.
I briefly consider leaving her my boxers but shake that thought from my head quickly. Her little lacy underwear is seriously sexy – boxers are not. There really isn’t anything I have I can leave for her, so I am stuck with the ultimately lame. I dig around in the “catch all” drawer of the kitchen until I find some paper and a pen. I sit in one of the folding chairs at the table and stare at the blank page.
What the hell can I even say?
I had to leave, but thanks for the great fuck?
I can’t leave her my address. I don’t have a phone number.
I can’t tell her to come and find me in Chicago.
With shaking hands, I write a single word on the paper and then place it in the center of the bed.
SORRY
I take a step back, and a glint of silver catches my eye.
There is a quarter lying next to the pillow.
Reaching over slowly, I pick it up in my hand and hold it tightly, transferring the heat of my palm into the metal. My throat constricts, and I swallow past the lump before I open my fingers and let the coin drop next to the piece of paper.
Turning quickly, I grab a couple bottles of water for the road and head back out to the truck. I spend a moment dismantling the wires attached to the battery and rolling the wire up into a tight, round loop. I bend down to pick up the dog dish and a bag of kibble, throw them and the duffle into the back of the truck, and whistle. Odin appears from around the house, races towards me, and a few minutes later we are heading down the road.
As I steer the truck down the drive, it feels like someone reaches through my back and grabs hold of my heart, ripping it through my body and yanking it back to that tiny, hot little house. I keep swallowing, but it doesn’t stop the burn in my throat.
Odin whines and noses at my arm. I look over at him and wonder what he sees when he looks at me. He noses my arm again, then licks my hand where it grips the steering wheel.
“Thanks, buddy,” I say in monotone.
He whines again.
“I can’t do that,” I say softly. “I can’t do that to her.”
With my eyes staring toward the spanning horizon, I push thoughts of her from my mind
, burying her memory in the darkest recesses of my brain. I wish I could have explained it to her – told her it was for her own good, but there was no way. Anything I said would either be a lie or too dangerous for her to know.
So I drive off.
Odin at my side.
But otherwise alone.
Shay Savage, Otherwise Alone
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