“Leon? Have you seen Dom?” Mia’s frightened voice pleaded over the phone.
“Nah, Mia. Lemme ask V and Jes real quick,” Leon answered, putting the phone down and wandering into the living room of the apartment he shared with two of his best friends. Jesse was sitting at the table with a bowl of Cherios and V’s ass was sticking out of the open refrigerator. “Either of you seen Dom?”
“Well, he ain’t in here,” Vince cracked from the nearly empty refrigerator. He looked up at the kitchen clock. “Hell, it’s barely 10. He’s probably still in bed, bro. Who’s lookin’ for him?”
Leon ignored the question and turned his attention to his other roommate. “Jes, you seen him?”
Jesse paused, spoon full of cereal halfway to his mouth. “Not since last night at the shop. I left before he did. He had a lotta something to work off last night so my bet is he’s still there.”
Leon returned to the phone. “Nah, they ain’t seen him either. What’s wrong, kid?”
“Could you come over? Just you?” She sounded terrible. Like she’d been crying.
Leon started rummaging through the mess of clothes on the floor of his room. He found a pair of reasonably clean pants and began his search through the laundry basket for a shirt. “Sure. Gonna tell me why?”
Her voice broke, “Just come, Leon. Please?”
~~~~~
The sun had yet to make an appearance through the thick marine layer hovering over the ocean when Dom finally pulled off the road in San Diego’s Pacific Beach. Muting the stereo he sat in the car letting the slow monotony of its smooth engine wash over him. After a long moment, he shut it off and climbed out, stiff after the two-hour drive.
The autumn breeze reached chilly fingers under his shirt and he wished for a jacket. Searching through a gym bag in the back seat he came up with a pungent sweatshirt. Not having showered that morning he figured he stunk anyway and shrugged it on. Looking back and forth down gray, sandy shores he pointed his body south and set out down the nearly deserted strand.
Fists shoved in the pockets of his jeans, Dom walked with his head down and his eyes on the concrete in his path. A pair of spandex clad southern California beauties glided past on roller blades. Only force of habit caused him to notice them before they disappeared into the gloom.
His gaze returned to his feet. One foot in front of the other. He straightened them as he walked, suddenly conscious of the inward bend to his stride. Mom had nagged endlessly about his pigeon toes. Walk straight, she had admonished him until the day she didn’t come home from the hospital.
His knees went rubbery and he nearly collapsed landing heavily on the wall, eyes downcast staring into the sand that buried his boots. He fought it, too tired to relive the loss again, but couldn’t stop the haunting sound of her voice calling to him from the dark corners of neglected memory.
~~~~~
“It’ll be alright little man. In a few hours you’ll have a new baby sister or brother. Won’t that be nice?” Her voice was heavily accented and musical. She’d had her hand on his head, ruffling his thick, curly hair. Her belly was impossibly round and her eyes had looked pained.
She mistook the sour look on his face for jealousy.
“Dominic, I will always love you. The new baby won’t change that. In fact, I’ll be depending on you to help take care of it. You’ll be a big brother. Do you know what that means?” Her arms had gone around him then.
He remembered looking up at her and permanently searing her face into his mind for fear he wouldn’t see it again. She’d squeezed him tightly as another pain gripped her and he’d struggled for breath in the fierceness of her embrace. After what felt like an eternity, but was still too short, she released him and he saw his father coming into the room carrying a suitcase. There was a knock at the door and he heard Nana greet his dad.
His mother continued, “Being a big brother is a very important job. You’ll be a role model. That means that the baby will learn how to be a good person by watching you. I am counting on you to always be a good example and to take care of the baby. Do you think you can do that for me?”
He remembered the bushy mass of hair bouncing against his forehead when he nodded. “I’ll try mommy. But how do I be a good zample?”
“By being the thoughtful, loving, loyal little man I raised you to be. I know you can do it, Dominic.” Another pained look crossed her face which had started to blanch stealing the rosy glow from her cheeks and lips. The cold claws of fear gripped him tighter.
Nana walked into the room and took his hand forcing him to release his grip on his mother’s skirt. He hadn’t realized he was holding it. With a final loving look over her shoulder his mother disappeared out of the living room and his life forever. Within eight hours she was dead. Mia came home two days later.
~~~~~
His Rooty Tooty Fresh and Fruity breakfast was getting cold.
Why the hell did he pick IHOP? Hate this shit, Edwin thought dragging his fork through a coagulating pool of strawberry syrup. Hate this place. Hate this conversation. I really hate this conversation. Hector always had to drag him into shit. He knew that, but still somehow never managed to get out of it. Against all better judgment he asked, “Marco really had the balls to show his ugly mug at your shop?”
“Yeah. Came to talk to Letti.” Hector’s breakfast was similarly cold, although his coffee cup never had the chance to chill. By Edwin’s count he’d had at least four cups already.
“Why’s he talkin’ to Letti?” Edwin asked the obvious question and mentally kicked himself for egging his friend on. He didn’t want to know. Messing with Letti was like waving a red flag in front of a bull. Marco was insane to be talking to Dom’s girlfriend. Wait…. “Hey, what’s Letti doin’ at your place?”
Hector took a deep sigh and said, “Long story. You’ll hear soon enough but not from me, man. Fact is, Marco’s back in town and you know what that means.”
Edwin thought for a moment. Letti and Dom must be on the skids. Which meant that Dom, who was already a touchy guy, was going to be on a razors edge.
No way am I getting involved in this shit. Can’t win for losing in this one. Edwin made a decision to stay away from the scene for a while. Had some maintenance to do on the Integra anyway. Not looking his friend in the eye he dodged the bullet he knew was coming. “Things is gonna get real bad. Think you should tell Dom?”
Hector slumped obviously aware that there was no ‘we’ involved. Sighing in resignation he said, “Yeah, man. I do, but from a distance you know?”
Edwin chuckled but it wasn’t funny. “Yeah, if Marco was talkin’ to Letti, you better make it a like a mile or ten. You gonna need the head start, man.”
Hector finally put down his coffee cup with shaking fingers and hefted his fork. “No shit. You know, going legit and getting outta all this mess is startin’ to sound real good these days.”
Edwin had been thinking exactly the same thing.
~~~~~
There were moments when he saw Mia and thought he was looking at his mom.
Every time it happened it shook him, bringing back the abject terror that had gripped him when the door closed behind his mom that last time. The one time he ever hit a woman happened that night.
He hit Nana.
She’d been trying to hold him, keep him from chasing after his parents. Blinded by his fear and angered at being restrained he’d slammed a tiny fist into his grandmother’s chin. She’d let go of him in her shock. He should have run but was too shocked himself to even think of it.
He was unable to sit after she got through with him.
That night passed slowly, and in his case painfully, the only sound the blare of the television. Both stared at the phone, waiting for the call announcing mother and child were safe and sound. But it never came. At dawn his father returned home – alone. Nana jumped and let out a strangled cry when she heard the key in the lock.
Dom hung back, the burden of the unknown suddenly gone and he felt light, entirely too light. The weight of her arm across his shoulder was also gone. She was dead.
Granted, he’d been five at the time and death should have been an impossible concept but the dog had died the month before and she’d explained death to him. Looking back on that lesson it was impossible for him to think she didn’t know. She’d been preparing him.
Nana and his father had spent a long moment in the foyer, their words muffled but their tone conveyed everything he needed to know. The only fragment of their conversation he heard clearly was, “You must be strong, Dominic. Your family needs you now more than ever.”
At the time, he’d thought Nana was talking to him but her words were really meant for his father. Didn’t matter though. By the time the pair came in to break the news to him, he’d stopped crying determined to be strong and to keep his promise to his mother.
And he had. He took care of Mia. He took care of his father, who’d taken to the bottle about the same time Mia did. He took care of Nana who never got over the loss of her only child. He took care of his team. He took care of everything and in return he got whining, resentment and disloyalty.
His grief stricken countenance hardened, angry furrows cutting across his brow. A couple walking along the strand decided it was time to turn back upon seeing him. It barely registered that they were scared of him. He was too lost in the bitterness that had overtaken his sorrow.
~~~~~
“Mia? Where you at, kid?” Leon called as he walked through the front door. He got no response so he wandered into the living room where he found her sitting in a tight ball on the couch still in her pajamas, one of Dom’s jackets clutched to her chest. Tears streamed down her face. “Oh man. What happened, Mia?”
“I…he…” She took a shaky breath. “He left, Leon. We had a fight and I said something terrible and he left. He hates me.” She was sobbing when she finished.
Oh man, what the hell am I supposed to do with this? Leon shuffled the rest of the way to the couch and sat gingerly next to her. She flung herself into his arms. Dom ain’t gonna like this, he thought, no touching. He pushed her off him. “Dom don’t hate you, Mia. He loves you, kid. I’m sure it can’t be that bad. Whatcha fight about?”
“You have to promise not to say anything to him about this. Ever. I mean it, Leon.”
“Okay.” Damn, this must be really bad. She turned disbelieving eyes on him and he held up his hands in surrender. “Okay. Okay. I promise. Tell me.”
“Dom cheated on Letti again. And I got mad. Then he got mad. Then I thought…I don’t know what I thought…but…” She hung her head in shame and mumbled, “I begged him not to hit me, Leon.”
Leon was dumbfounded. Dom wasn’t the easiest guy to get along with, and yeah, he had a nasty temper but he’d die before he hurt his sister. Didn’t she know that? “Mia, he’d never hit you. Hell, we all know Dom can be an asshole but…I mean, damn, if anyone could get him to hit her it would be Letti and he don’t even yell at her. He’d die before he hurt you, Mia. You [I]know[/I] that. Girl, what were you thinking?”
“I dunno, Leon. He got close and he grabbed my chin, you know like he does sometimes when he wants to make sure you understand him?” Leon was not familiar with the gesture and shrugged it off. She continued, “Anyway, he had my chin and I saw his other hand come up and I panicked. I don’t know why I said it.”
“So what’d he do?”
“He, he…kinda, I dunno, crumbled I guess. I’ve never seen him look like that, Leon. And then he walked away from me. He wouldn’t talk to me when he got home last night and he left this morning while I was cooking him breakfast. He hasn’t answered any of my calls and I’m so worried about him.” A new rush of tears began to stream down her face. “What if he never speaks to me again?”
“Aw Mia, that’s crazy, girl. Of course he’ll speak to you again. You’re his baby sister. He loves you too much to just leave you. You’re his only family, kiddo. He’ll get over it, may take a while, but he’ll get over it.”
“But you’re his family too, Leon. Just like V and Jes. Maybe he doesn’t need m…”
“Knock it off, Mia. I feel for you girl, but I’m not having a pity party here.” Leon had little patience for whining. He had little patience for fighting too. He preferred to get things settled quick and get on with the show. Based on that philosophy he said, “Sounds to me like you gotta lay low and let him come to you. You know how he is. Gonna take him a while to get his head back straight. You just gotta give him some space and let him work it out. Things’ll be okay, I know it.”
She raised red eyes to his and sniffled, “I hope so.”
~~~~~
Letti rolled over and snuggled into the broad back in front of her. Her arm snaked around him and drifted into a thick forest of chest hair. That was wrong. Her man was not a very hairy guy.
She darted up, staring at the prone body of Marco – in her bed. Oh God, what did I just do? She leapt out and ran to the window. Marco’s dark blue Prelude was parked out front in plain sight. Damn.
It was a hell of a way to wake up.
“Marco! Get up!” she hissed, pushing hard against his shoulder. Dom would never take her back he found out she was fucking around. Wait a minute, slow down. Take you back? What the hell are you thinking? Fuck Dom. Still, she pushed harder at Marco’s back.
He rolled over and shielded his eyes with his forearm. “Wha….huh?”
She punched him in the chest. “Move your damn car!”
He rubbed at his eyes and then slicked back his black hair. “Why? You said you were over Toretto. What do you care if he sees my car?”
“I don’t.” Oh God, I do, I do care. Shit. Letti turned her back on the man in her bed and pulled her robe off the hook by the bathroom door. She suddenly didn’t like being naked. Everything felt wrong.
“So…” he purred in a voice that didn’t come close to matching Dom’s. “You don’t think this was a one night stand do you? I mean, I sure don’t. I’m no wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am slut like Dom. I’m a one woman kinda guy.”
She turned on him savagely at his accusing words against Dom and then realized he was right. A backstabbing son of a bitch, that’s what Dominic was. But what was to say that the tables couldn’t be turned? Why couldn’t she have a little fun? “Yeah? Well, how do you know I’m no player?”
Marco gave her a lazy, disbelieving smile. “Don’t know many female players. Know a lot that think they are but…” He sat up in her bed and reached out a hand to her, “No, you need a man in your life, someone who’ll appreciate your independence instead a tryin’ to squash it. I can be that man, Let.”
“I don’t need a man.” She said even as she took his hand and let him pull her back into bed.
“Nope. You don’t need nobody,” he agreed, stroking her hair back from her forehead. He kissed her lightly. “But maybe you want a man. Maybe you like having someone to come home to. God knows I do.”
Letti succumbed to the kiss for a long moment, but when he finally let her up for air she pushed him away and snarled, “Slow your roll, Marco. Lets just see how things go okay? And would you move your God damn car?”
~~~~~
The trip to the shop was a wordless one. Leon had cranked the music up loud in an obvious effort to drown out any chance of conversation. He’d even run to the sanctuary of the Jaguar the second he shut off the Skyline’s engine leaving Mia to climb out alone.
Dom wasn’t there, but the boys were.
Vince stood the moment he saw her. He looked like he always did. Combat boots, dirty jeans, filthy wife beater shirt. His hair looked like he never bothered to run a comb through it and a razor hadn’t been near his face in days. But as often as she didn’t like him, which was most of the time, at the moment she adored him for the open concern on his face. Or at least she did until he said, “Mia. You’re lookin’ good, real good.”
It was the most inappropriate thing he could have said. Well, not really, but it was still pretty bad. She glanced down at herself. She’d paid no attention to what she pulled on and was chagrined to realize that she had made the unforgivable fashion faux pas to mix navy blue and black. She looked like a bruise. With a smirk she mocked him, “Sure I do.”
Vince closed the distance, he head cocked to the side. He was still smiling. “Well, take it from me, you look great.”
Sighing, she conceded. “Thanks V.” Finding humor in his lustful blindness she quipped, “Wish I felt as good as I look then.”
“Why baby doll? What’s wrong?” Vince ignored the sharp look he got from Leon. Mia caught it however and shot Leon a look of her own right before she collapsed into tears and repeated the story once more.
~~~~~
Claudia climbed into her car determined to force herself to study. It had proven impossible at home. She was hoping that the quiet and solitude of the library would push her head back into focus.
The SLK pulled down to the gate. I hate this stupid thing, she thought watching it inch open. Huge, gaudy, and ostentatious. It was more for show than security. As she waited she noticed the fire red RX-7 parked across the street.
The mantra began anew. School, car and nothing else. School, car and nothing else.
She pulled out of the driveway, carefully not looking at the garish sports car. It was far from easy, curiosity clawing at her brain like a cat in a corner. What in the world is he doing here?
The RX-7 pulled in behind her and Claudia struggled to ignore it, or at least make her frequent glances in the rearview mirror as subtle as possible. Why is he following me, she thought just as he turned off down a side street.
She wanted to find out what was wrong, why he came so close but stayed away. She almost turned around to chase after him but willed herself to continue on to the library. If he’d really wanted to talk he would have come in. She wouldn’t push him and she wouldn’t toss aside her education to chase down someone she barely knew.
But she would drop by on him as soon as her exam was behind her.
~~~~~
The car stopped, Mia climbed out and mumbled a thank you to Jesse before she wandered up the stairs and into the house. Dom wasn’t home.
In her room she found an envelop on the bed.
She stared at it for a long time. It was unlike Dom to leave her a note. Wild ideas tumbled through her head. Maybe it was a card. Maybe it was an eviction notice.
Finally she opened it. An invoice from UCLA, a check, a note and a pink slip. Oh God. He didn’t. He wouldn’t, would he? She unfolded the note and read it. He did.
Over the summer she’d decided that she wanted to move into on campus housing. Dom, who was paying for her education, said no. They had a perfectly good house that wasn’t that far away and he wasn’t going to pay for her to live in two places. She’d put up a good argument but in the end lost the battle like usual.
The semester had already started but somehow Dom had talked his way into a dorm room for her. He also gave her the Integra she’d been driving. It was Dom’s racer from the year before. The check was the first installment of her allowance. She had to be out of the house by Friday.
Stunned, she couldn’t even cry. It was as if she’d turned to stone.
The sound of a car engine reached her ears and broke the spell. Mia whirled around and flew down the stairs hearing it cut off.
“Dom!” She yelled at the top of her lungs as she careened through the screen door at the back of the house. The door to the shed was slightly ajar and she rushed for it, seeing his car parked in front of it. “Dom!?”
As she entered, the engine of their dad’s old Charger roared to life. Dom turned away from the car and sat at their father’s desk, his eyes closed and his head cocked to the steady rumble of the Charger. He didn’t look up saying in a soft voice, “Don’t you have some packing to do?”
“Dom, I don’t…”
His head came up and his dark eyes looked dead. His voice was low, nearly a whisper, “Don’t tell me. You don’t wanna go anymore.”
“No I don…”
He cut her off. “But what about the full college experience? Don’t you want to find yourself? Isn’t it still impossible to do that in my shadow? Don’t you need to make your own way in the world? What’s wrong with right now?”
The sound of her own words thrown back in her face left her completely without comeback. “But…”
He slammed his fists on the desktop and she jumped. “So now you’re fine with never being anything more than my baby sister, huh?”
“No, that’s not it, I…”
“Just go pack, Mia. You don’t got alotta time.” Dom rose from his chair and reached into the Charger switching off the engine. A heavy, pregnant silence followed. He stood, arms folded across his chest, glaring down at her, looking every bit like a pissed off Mr. Clean.
Oh God, he does hate me. Her voice hitched in her throat. “Please just listen to me. Dom, I’m so sorr…”
“I don’t wanna hear it. Just get your shit and go.”
Tears formed in her eyes and she tried to fight them back. “But you said we could talk today!”
“And we have. Now get the fuck out.” He turned his back on her and returned to the chair, never looking at her.
Mia ran out sobbing.
~~~~~
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