Speed of Sound

Many lights sing, a cacophony of assaulting sound. This whole place is an assault. On ears and noses. Eyes.

Good.

The blare of the multi-colored lights shooting off at random is a great distraction. Seventy-year-old women and their dangling bracelets clink with the buzz of mechanical slot machines and it's enough to drive my headache to migraine land. Another reason to cry. 

Mid-spring in an Arizona casino and the AC is on full permafrost blast. Not the liveliest of Wednesday afternoons. It will have to do. A handful of those bracelets may be silver - or better, gold, plus designer glasses and the occasional wallet are bound to be found abandoned at the bar or beside an unlucky single-player games stool. Liquid cash or pawnshop bargain chips. It's all useful.

I sidle up to a poker table where middle-aged men next to women with young bodies and over painted faces stagger in the quiet bedlam, all with a hodgepodge of emotions on their faces. No one is paying attention. Well, to anything other than the black and white boxes bouncing off the small velvet wall.

 Snake eyes.

I came dressed for the occasion. Flip flops and cutoff shorts don't pair with expensive cufflinks, sure. But, I do have pockets. 

My hand is mid sympathetic pat on a tech-handsome brunettes’ forearm when someone taps me on the shoulder. I try to tell my eyebrows to climb down from my forehead before they give me away when I turn and meet the gaze of two wide set nipples, poking their pert bodies on the surfaces of firm pecs, thinly clad by a cotton-polyblend crewneck. One brow obeys while the other arches in amusement. “Uh, hi there Hershey’s Kisses. What can I do you for? Excuse me, sorry. What may I do for you?"

I force my eyes to climb above a dimpled chin, mountain high cheekbones (the lush lips were too unseemly plump to linger for too long on), and eventually find blueberry blue eyes in a sun-kissed face.

“Are you wearing contacts?” I hear myself say.

He coughs. “Um, you don’t –

“Sorry.” I let my hand fall from the cufflink still secure in the gray suit fabric of my target. So close. “But, no one’s eyes are that color.”

 “Yes,” Mr. Kisses clears his throat. “Yes, their contacts. For seeing.”

I lift my hands and look to my left like Janet J. in an eighty’s music video. “Not my business.” 

He folds his arms over his chest with a huff and glares, one corner of his nose lifting ever so slightly. “You need to come with me?”

I tussle my henna dyed hair and secure a pair of shade’s I nicked, clipped to the center of my shirt. “Look, I’m not going anywhere with you.” I turn to the gray-suit tech guy and bump him on the butt with my own. He turns to us in confusion then waves his hand emphatically to shoo me away.

“You’re drunk,” Kisses astutely recognizes.

“No shit. Still not going anywhere. It’s not illegal to be drunk in a casino. And anyway, why the fuck do you even care?”

“I am security,” he says, pronouncing every single syllable in that word as if it were supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. 

“Okay?”

He shakes his head. “Rebecca,” he plucks the glasses from my shirt, “you need to come with me now.”

“What the –

My feet begin to follow, without my permission I must say. My treacherous hand clings to his with some fierceness as he guides me away from the poker table, over a hideous dark carpet that appears to have random two-foot candy corns printed throughout. The sharp tang of spilled beer knocks on the door of my liquor filled stomach.

I stop, the front of my flip flop rolling in on itself. The overgrown nail on my left foot snags on the floor's synthetic surface like flint on a rock and I feel a crack of pain. “Ow! Wait.” Mind preoccupied with one detail still, I pull at the rough wide fingers beneath mine. “How the hell do you know my name?”

Kisses is already looking down at my foot and I see the decision in his eyes before he reaches and promptly sweeps me up. “How could I forget, Becks?”

*

“This is a really shitty breakroom. You guys should totally unionize. Are you in a union?”

Kisses ignores me. He pinches the bridge of his nose and rakes that rugged hand down the soft skin of his face. Like he doesn’t care about proper skin handling. He’s wearing fashion contacts for crying out-loud, he so, so, so, cares. “Becks, what are you thinking. Stealing? What are you even doing here?”

I study my hands. The warmth in my chest and the water in my eyes had started to subside with the bitter bite of bad coffee that he gave me. “I came to win a fortune. Like everyone else.”

“In Arizona, what are you doing in Arizona,” he throws back like a dart.

His face, broad and cut in aged amber, is mildly attractive – okay maybe slightly more than mildly - and vaguely familiar in the way that all attractive people seem to be. That, “wow, are their people this handsome just walking around” feeling you get until you stumble upon another. “Do I know you,” I ask, eyes squinting.

His eyes widen and, good lord, there goes those formidable biceps squeezing under the thin cuff of his shirt when he refolds his arms for the umpteenth time in only so few minutes. “Wow.”

“Wow, what?”

“Wow.”

“Did I break you?” Then, because I can’t help myself, I smile. “I did.” I lean back in my plastic blue chair. “I’ve been known to have that effect.”

“Boy, do I know,” he bites back. Though, it doesn’t sound quite bitter. More . . . no, couldn’t be. But then he says, “Ever since we worked on that group project in Mr. Berthon’s. Tenth-grade?”

I sit up and scoot forward, abandoning the rim chewed paper cup I’d been palming and teeth fondling since he sat me down. “No fucking way. Jared?”

His eyes grow even wider and he tilts his head while he silently mouths, “Finally.”

“Yo!” How long has it been? God, I feel so old, high school was ages, and ages ago. I’ve had and lost a whole husband, birthed two girls, and lost both parents since then. High School is worlds away from me now. “It’s . . . It’s something. Seeing you.”

“Something.” He nods and I take him in as he glances down. This kid – well, man, has done a lot of growing since graduation. I lost touch with him and so many others when I chose a school in Indiana to follow a boy I’d met online. Cautionary tale kids.

I clear my throat. “So, how’s your mom? Are you married? Do you have kids? Security? I always thought you’d become the Mexican Bill Gates.”

That last sentence was meant for my ears only but of course my big mouth didn’t quite get the memo on when to stop talking. Just like in school, he blushes and those tawny cheeks darken. I try not to giggle. This is not a cute moment. “Sorry,” I say sheepishly.

“Don’t be.” He looks up and there is some amusement in those eyes. “Yes, I work security. Part-time. I’m still in school. Bobby manages this place so he lets me pick up hours when I’m in town.”

“Robert ‘Hairy-Bear’ Stevens? Fuck, someone put him in charge?” We chuckle and I suddenly see the pudgy cheeked yet impossibly lanky kid in too big basket-ball shorts and Gameboy graphic tees in Jared's smile. “What are you going to school for?”

“PhD. Human Factors.”

“Am I supposed to know what that means?”

 He laughs and his teeth – clearly someone’s had a love affair with an orthodontist – gleam, straight and perfect. “It’s in the psych world.”

“Ah.” I look him up and down, my head steady as I lean back once more. “Okay. Well, since you’re an old buddy… How about we let bygones be and I’ll just see my way out?”

Jared looks away then sighs.

“You already called someone. Who? The cops?”

“No, just Bobby.”

“Dude, he hates me.”

 Jared shakes his head. “He doesn’t . . . hate you. Dislikes. Maybe. Still, he’s on his way.”

I jump to my feet, on high alert. Completely sober would be an understatement. The last time I saw Hairy Bear, I was pulling the stereo system out of his car. To be fair, he stole it first. Not from me. But that is beside the point. He stole it and I just happened to jack it for Karma's sake.

 “I need to get the fuck out of here,” I pant.

My eyes dart around the hallway of the room, over the scum covered handles at the metal sink set in a Formica counter, the brown laminate door with an intersex placard rested in the top center of its chipped frame, and finally, the brown metal door under an exit sign to the left of the far wall. Jared follows my gaze and perks up, moving to block my path.

“Rebecca, what has gotten into you? Once Bobby sees you, he’s probably not going to do anything -

 His voice cuts out when I push past him and lunge for the door. “Thank you, Jesus,” I murmur under my breath when it gives and I do a double take when it clinks behind me. It reopens. Jared climbs through and begins to jog to keep up with my frantic pace. He reaches for my arm and I turn on him before he can touch me. “Dude, don’t you dare lay a finger on me again.” His hands fly up and I feel . . . well I shouldn’t feel bad for telling a man, not even sweet not-so-little-now Jared, to keep his hands to himself. But still. “Look, you want to get out of here?”

He frowns. “Becks.”

“Right, right. ‘You’re Security’” I say with mock macho vibrato. “Come on Jared, how about a ride? I’m staying with my aunt down the street. Drop me off?”

I don’t know what made him say yes, but we dart around the side of the building to a jalopy of a sedan in no less than six minutes. “Doctor, my ass.” I joke when I am seated and he starts up the car. “How long have you got left?” I ask once we've peeled out of the parking lot.

“You say that like I’m doing time and not earning a degree.” He smirks and looks over at me. “I have about -

Metal screams across asphalt as an incoming truck in the wrong lane, our lane, eats Jared's last few words while all that noise and all that sound, just. Stop.

*

I’m fine. Everything is okay. Where the fuck is my phone. I reach into my jean pockets and come up with a silver bracelet and nothing else.

“Excuse me,” I ask the medical office admin at the front desk. “I need to call my kids, where can I find a phone?”

The lady gives me instructions to the cafeteria where I find a row of computers and a series of encased landlines. When my fingers – purple in some parts and lined with red in others – have successfully dialed my aunts’ number, I wait until she picks up.

“Hey, hey, how are the girls?” I ask, my voice breathless.

“Rebecca?”

“Yes, how are Sandra and Suze? Are they okay? Did they eat their lunch yet? Suze needs to take three of the blue pills in thirty, right after she’s eaten or she’ll throw it all up and I can’t afford to –

I choke. “Have they eaten yet?”

There’s a pause on the other line and in my aunt's silence I hear familiar ads for the Public Broadcast Station in the background. I let my mind settle on a soundbite from Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood. It reminds me of Mr. Rogers and something about an old white man with a kind face and a tie starts to make eyes wetter than they were when I was blitzed at the casino.

“Rebecca?” My aunt asks.

“Yes,”

 “The girls are okay.” She sighs. “You need to breathe, honey. I can barely understand you when you get like that, running your mouth off at a mile a minute, from zero to 60 - child, you need to breathe. What’s going on?”

*

She fucking told Bobby. Called him right up. I didn’t even know, wouldn’t have thought she of all people would even have his number but what did I expect? She has never moved and all our families have been brought up here. I’d been waiting, unable to find out anything about Jared because I forgot to lie and say I was his sister when I was finally cleared from my hospital room. It’s so stupid, we were in the same fucking car. I should be able to see him – to know how he’s doing on my own. I find out only after Bobby shows up with Jared’s mother who all but snarls at me when she spots my raggedy ass, mid-pace, across the hall.

I should have dipped the moment that last stitch was tied and cut from my forehead.

Instead, like an idiot, I have sat and waited. Occasionally calling to check on the girls. I spotted a few handbags forgotten in chairs and some wallets discarded without a second thought in the cafeteria that I could have easily grabbed and rummaged through for cash, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. When Bobby finally re-emerges, I stand and begin to back away but he waves a weird, grown up, sympathetic wave that I never would have imagined he’d be capable of based on who he was, when he was an angsty and selfish teenager.

“He’s going to be alright.”

I let go of a breath I’d been holding since the moment my car-struck mind could piece the day back together – the casino. Jared. Asking him to be the getaway driver. A massive trailer truck.

Bobby chuckles. “He told me about the Casino.”

“Fuck,” I say slowly and punch one fist into the palm of my other hand and wince.

“You’ve been through enough for today.” He looks towards an elderly couple that walk by with paper cups that steam into the chemical clean, air-conditioned atmosphere. “Maybe enough for the year.”

I tense when he motions to pat my knee before he thinks better of it and withdraws. “Your aunt volunteers with the church on Sundays with my mom. Heard about your daughter. I’m sorry, Becks.”

 I force a laugh that comes out more like a cough. “I thought you’d still be pissed about the stereo.”

“The fuck if I’m not,” he laughs. I appreciate him letting me steer the conversation away from the clusterfuck that has become my life after the divorce, the lack of support, the desperate deals and measures I consider at ever fucking turn for my babies, because that’s what you do when the next prescription needs to be filled on time.

 Heels click on the too white floor with its nonexistent grout lines and Jared’s mother lazily eyes me before addressing Bobby alone: “Jared asked to see you. Bring the girl.”

*

“Hey Kisses,” I say when Jared’s mom steps away into the hall with Bobby. “Who the fuck was that guy?” I ask.

“I told you.” Jared smiles then grumbles with pain. “Bobby’s a good dude. He’s not the same guy you ditched after graduation.”

“He wasn’t the only one.” I whisper.

Jared takes a deep breath though I can tell it costs him. We were both incredibly lucky but I more so than him in the accident. He broke a rib and has a concussion. His ankle is in a cast . . . I wonder how his impressive chest will look after a few months without regular workouts, save for physical therapy.

He grabs my hand and I let him.

“Your mom still hates me.”

“She kind of has a reason too. Two now.” He smiles and I join him on the bed.

“Why did it take you so long to come back home, Becks?”

I swallow, thinking of how I was once so eager to leave. How I resented my aunt for not being my mother – for not stopping my father and his abuses. How I needed to get out. How I landed in a nest no more nurturing than the one I left and was instead left with twins and their dick of a father that rivaled my own.

 “I was ashamed. And even back then, you were too good for me.” He frowns but Bobby knocks on the door before he can say anything.

“Hey, so your mom’s heading out, Jared. Rebecca, you feeling okay?”

“Yeah,” I say, standing.

“Okay, let’s get to work. You owe me and I need someone on security.”

“Excuse me?” I ask, looking at Bobby then down at Jared who smiles up at me.

“I can't be too good for a colleague, now can I?”