Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 83394 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 417(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83394 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 417(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
When my beer was empty, I forced myself out of bed to take a shower, and then collapsed naked on the mattress to get some sleep before work the next day.
“Holy fuck, bro. What happened to you?” Angel asked when I got to the garage in the morning. He owned the shop where I worked. Angel’s parents had come from Mexico when his mom was pregnant with him. They’d worked their asses off to build a life for themselves and their son. Angel was wicked smart and had fought hard to realize his dream—a little shop in Los Angeles that did good work at affordable prices, even though the rent was fucking outrageous and California wasn’t the easiest place to run your own business. He was doing it, though.
“I fell,” I replied.
“Didn’t you fall six months ago too?”
“No. Ran into a pole.”
Angel rolled his eyes. “It’s nothin’ dirty, right? I don’t want drugs or trouble in my place of business.”
“I don’t mess with that stuff. I’ll take a drug test every week if you want. I don’t do anything that would hurt someone else.” Well, except the guy I fought, but he’d signed up for it.
“Just yourself, huh?” Angel cocked a brow.
“Something like that.”
“You’re punishing yourself. My mama told me that, and she knows fuckin’ everything. Came to the shop the first time you worked, and she told me, ‘Angel, that boy’s a good man, but he’s hurting, blaming himself for something. You take care of him.’ She come in and sees you like that, and it’s gonna be my ass.”
I liked Angel’s mom a lot, wondered if my own had been anything like her.
“I’m fine, man.”
“You tell her that if she sees you. Come on, let’s get to work.”
Angel was good people. Somehow he’d become a friend, as much as I could let anyone become a friend. He didn’t know my past, and I was shit at doing the things friends did, but he occasionally tried to drag me out for a drink. I always said no. We would talk quite a bit while we worked. His girlfriend, Maria, was hilarious. She helped with the paperwork sometimes, and she was always trying to hang out with me too. We’d joke around and tease Angel. Here and there, I talked to them about Kev and Angie. They knew about my goddaughter, Olivia—though why in the fuck Kev and Angie thought I’d be a good person to take care of her if something happened to them, I didn’t know.
I loved her with all my heart, that was for sure, had from the moment she’d come into the world. She didn’t do much—slept, ate, was held—but she was incredible.
We had a busy day at the garage. I was rebuilding a transmission for an older woman’s car. She kept having trouble with it, but she didn’t want to get rid of her vehicle because it had been her late husband’s.
Angel’s mom or Maria didn’t come by, which I counted as a blessing because he was right. They would have fussed over my black eye. I’d never had that. My dad sure as shit hadn’t done it. My mom died when I was a toddler. I mean, Gage had. He’d always worried and coddled me and—Fuck, why did it always go back to him? It still always went back to him.
When the day was over and Angel and I were washing our hands, he said, “You should have dinner with us. Maria wants you to meet her friend—”
“Nope.” I wasn’t going to let him get any further. She kept trying to set me up with her girlfriends, though I didn’t understand why she would think I’d be a good match for anyone. I was a fucking mess, and closed off, and at some point, I should probably let them know I was gay.
Being in the closet wasn’t something I had to consider much because I wasn’t close to many people, but once Angel and I started getting friendly, something kept me from telling him. I was afraid he wouldn’t accept me, which honestly, pissed me off.
“Maybe getting laid will help your bad attitude,” Angel joked.
“How do you know I don’t get laid?” I countered. True, I didn’t have sex often, but I always found someone when I needed to get off.
“Because how can someone who’s getting pussy on the regular be as fuckin’ miserable as you?”
I flipped him off, and we both laughed. It was weird how every once in a while, I’d have flashes of normal. This moment now between Angel and me was one of them. For a second, I forgot who I was, what I’d been through, and for that small space in time, I was like everyone else.
Then it came crashing back, the truth, the pain, burying me the way it always did. I didn’t know the first thing about being happy anymore. I wouldn’t even know how to try.