“Oh, yeah… it didn’t exactly come up in conversation, but it’s what I do.” She laughed a little nervously and said, “It was one of the few things my mom and I could bond over.”
“I know that feeling,” I said and glanced behind me at the open archway into the living room. I couldn’t see my dad seated in his chair with the back of it to the other side of the wall that separated the dining area from the living room. I knew he was listening. I would have been listening too.
“Anyway, I hope you enjoy them,” she said, and I chuckled.
“Dad had his coffee in one of the cups before I could even ride up. The man never met a coffee mug he liked until yours,” I said. “Just nothing out there big enough.”
“I could make a bigger one,” she said laughing, and I laughed with her.
“No, God, please no,” I said.
“Well, alright then. I would have happily taken the challenge.”
Seemed to me she had plenty of those lately, I didn’t want to add any others so as much as I wanted to get to know Ms. Aspen Lawson, I took my dad’s warning to heart and let this long ship pass me by.
“I’m sure you would have, but there’s no need. Like I said, this was really too much. I didn’t do anything special.”
“On the contrary,” she said softly. “You did. At least to me. Thanks for reinforcing my faith in humanity.”
“Shit, I wouldn’t want to do that, now,” I joked.
“Why not?” she asked curiously.
“Because then you might really get hurt. Just do me a favor,” I said. “Stay safe for me.”
There was a long pause and finally a reserved, “I’ll do that.”
“Right, well, call me if you need anything,” I said. “I mean it.”
“I will. Thank you again, Fenris.” She said my name like she was still trying to get used to it.
I smiled and said, “You too, Aspen. Have a good night.”
“You too.”
I listened to the line go dead and sighed.
I really found myself wanting to get to know this woman, but my dad was right. She just didn’t seem the type to be able to handle the life and I couldn’t change. It would leave my brother’s in a lurch.
I set my phone aside and went back to work on cleaning up the smooth, earthenware dishes.
Four or five days later and I still couldn’t get Aspen out of my mind. It was driving me nuts, and I finally broke.
“Hey, D.T.” The big man looked up from his phone, his beer sitting frosty but untouched nearby on the bar.
“What’s up?” he asked.
“Take a short ride with me?”
He frowned, looked around and asked, “How short?”
“Georgetown.”
“What’s in Georgetown?”
“Man, never mind.” I shook my head.
“Man, don’t be like that! Little Bird is on her way back. I don’t want to leave before she gets here,” he said.
“Oh. Well, she can ride with us on this one,” I said. “It’s nothing sketch.”
“Why you being all cagey?” he asked with a grin. I shrugged and didn’t say anything. I didn’t want the rest of the guys to give me a ration of shit, and I didn’t want to ride past her shop by myself. If we rode past, the pair of us, then it wouldn’t look like I was being a creepy stalker fuck… which yeah, okay, I was sort of being a creepy stalker fuck, what of it?
Dump Truck turned around more fully and fixed me with a look. I cocked my head and gave him a warning glare and his eyebrows went up. He held up his hands in surrender and cocked his head just as Little Bird came in the back door.
“Hey, baby,” she called and the smile he had for her was something else.
“That’s my line,” he said, pulling her into the circle of his arms and laying one on her. She giggled and twined her arms around his neck and not for the first time – I was jealous.
“Wanna take a ride with me and Fen to Georgetown?” he asked her. She drew her head back in confusion.
“What’s in Georgetown?” she asked.
“Fen won’t tell me,” he said, and she glanced in my direction and gave a shrug.
“Not like we have anything else going on tonight, so sure, let’s go.”
I stood up, my own beer half empty and forgotten on the coffee table in front of the couch I’d been sitting on.
“Alright then, let’s go.”
We rode down Roxbury, got over the First Ave. S. bridge and took the exit onto Michigan. I followed it all the way to Airport Way and hung a left, Dump Truck and Little Bird keeping pace and following my lead. I slowed down to a cruise and checked out Clayrity as we rode by. The lights were on, but dim. Shelves lined the walls all the way around the space with long tables set up.
I glimpsed Aspen behind the register, a mousy young thing chatting with her as she did the night’s paperwork. It was a hell of a candid look and for whatever reason, it just made me want to know the woman more.
I pulled up down the block, flipping an illegal U-turn in the middle of the block to back in against the curb in front of the Jules Maes Saloon. Dump Truck followed suit and killed the engine to his bike the same time I did.
“Okay, brother, enough of the cloak and dagger bullshit. Why you so suddenly interested in fuckin’ pottery?”
“He’s not,” Little Bird said, grinning, lifting off her lid. “I’d say it was the blonde, if I had to guess.”
I tapped my index finger against the tip of my nose and Little Bird grinned.
“No shit? You? Going to any kind of trouble over a woman? This I gotta hear.” D.T. pulled his cane from the bracket built onto his bike and heaved himself into a standing position with a wince.
“I need alcohol for this story,” I grated, and he gestured with a sweeping hand to lead the way.
We went into Jules Maes. A lot of the local hipster scene and old barflies startled, straightening up when they realized a couple of Sacred Hearts had walked in. The bartender, a white chick in her mid to late twenties who was tatted and pierced to within an inch of her life, her long hair dyed a vibrant green and laying along her back in thick dreadlocks, called out, “Take a seat anywhere, I’ll come around to get your order.”
“Thank you, kindly,” Dump Truck said with a disarming smile. Little Bird wrapped both of her slender arms around one of D.T.’s and I jerked my head at a nearby booth. Dump Truck nodded and gave me the option of putting my back to the wall so I could keep an eye on the door and who was coming in.
“Thanks,” I grunted.
“I know you got me,” he said. I nodded, and we settled in.
“So, what’s the deal?” Little Bird asked, smiling faintly with good humor, kindness radiating from her lovely eyes.
“Took the words right out of my mouth, babe. How’d you and blondie in the pottery shop go about meeting up?” Dump Truck asked, raising his eyebrows high enough they met the swath of red bandana across his forehead, holding back his long hair and keeping it neat under his lid when we’d rode.
“Happened a week or two back,” I declared. “She came into Mitch’s place with a friend of hers. Friend hooked up with a couple of cowboy posers and left Aspen drunk as fuck and stranded without her phone or a ride.”