Coloring Outside the Lines - 1. Chapter 1

Sev

NOT today.

My alarm clock was a sadistic asshole composed of plastic and wires. The glaring red numbers announcing an unholy early hour on its plastic face, mocked me when my eyes popped open after being abruptly yanked from the arms of what had been a semi-sound sleep, by the wicked pulsing pain that had no respect for the fact that I’d only been hanging with the sandman for about three hours.

5:30 am.

Fuck.

It was way too early to be dealing with one of my migraines on today of all days, especially one that was quickly taking on the form of an excruciating, white hot lance stabbing through my left temple, and throbbing behind my eye with a strobe-like club beat on that side. Every time I woke up feeling like I’d been slammed in the head by a Mack truck, then run over by the emergency vehicles meant to repair my battered brain, I related to the POW’s in a documentary I’d watched once. The traumatized veterans had talked about bamboo splinters being shoved beneath their fingernails, and how shocked they’d been each time the pain had exploded throughout their entire body from just that one spot.

The brain was only the third largest organ in the human body, the first two slots claimed by our skin, then our liver. Apparently those facts had given our brains a middle child inferiority complex because when it wanted to angrily remind you of its presence, it went big, not home.

My skin felt slightly damp and tacky when I gingerly swiped a hand over my face, as if that would wipe away the headache like I was a human etch-a-sketch. It felt like my cheap and very finicky, window mounted AC unit had crapped out again, letting the oppressive, special kind of hellish humid heat signaling summer in my neighborhood, to creep in through the edges of the window panes and doors.

Most people when they thought of NYC, pictured beautiful skyscraper backdrops, Fifth Avenue shopping and Broadway dance routines. Spanish Harlem, affectionately known by the people who’d been calling it home for decades, was mostly composed of shoddy tenement building, blacktop playgrounds, noisy above ground subway noise, and self-installed AC units in the windows. But it was home to me, and all the other people who could see beauty in the morning glories peeking bravely through chain link fences, and the laughter and salsa beats from summer festivals. We weren’t all born Puerto Rican, but when that music started, everyone became one bold unit. I’d loved it since I’d moved in five years ago, but I could’ve done without the heat that got trapped between the buildings, threatening to smother us all in our sleeps.

According to the weather forecast I’d caught on the radio yesterday, the heat wave that’d moved into NYC earlier in the week, was planning to linger for another few days. With all the towering cement and stone tenement buildings in our inner-city landscape, air flow was limited to whatever could creep in through the tightly squeezed together structures that swept high into the sky, and in through the windows most people had open during even the hottest days because they couldn’t afford even cheap air conditioners. I was fortunate enough to be financially sound enough to pay my bills just fine, but priorities had made me put the better AC unit into my second bedroom as soon as the warm weather had started in early May.

From over a decade of experience dealing with these crippling migraines, I knew that moving wasn’t going to be a happy experience. But now that I was wide awake, I needed to take a piss and swallow a lot of aspirin, possibly at the exact same time. Desperation was the mother of all multitaskers.

Wincing against my head’s screaming protest, I kicked off the stifling heaviness of my summer weight cotton sheets that I’d gotten on a clearance sale at Kmart, twined around my ankles like soft prison shackles with a decent thread count. Beside me on the bed, the guy I’d spent the night with—Eric?Edison?— complained with a drowsy grumble as the movement stirred him out of what seemed like it’d been a seriously sound snooze that’d made him comfortable enough to wrap himself around me like I was a goddamned plushie. His nose was nuzzled into the back of my neck, and his arms was draped over my midsection, a large hand splayed across my lower belly. He was beyond relaxed.

Too damn bad.

I wasn’t feeling charitable right now. If I didn’t get to sleep in, no one did. It wasn’t like we’d been pining for forty winks three hours ago. Good sex had the ability to make human beings forget about all kinds of commonsense necessities like food and sleep when they were horny. But now that I was awake, with my morning wood wilted by the marching band throwing a free performance in my skull, sleep sounded fucking fantastic. Unfortunately, the intense headache flipped me off with every pulsing ray of pain that gleefully burst through my brain, capitalizing on the heaviness of today’s date looming over my head. There was nothing like celebrating the anniversary of a loved one’s death, with a guy whose name you couldn’t remember, and didn’t even care enough to want to know, to set the tone for a thoroughly fucked up day.

Biting back curses, I kicked more vehemently at the tangle of fabric restraining me until it accepted defeat, and bunched into a heap at the foot of the bed, simultaneously jostling my bedmate who grumbled, but didn’t open his eyes. My own narrowed. With the sheets accepting their loss, my next mission was to work at freeing myself from my bed buddy’s hold, which was a little too possessive for my tastes, especially considering that I couldn’t remember his damn name. Granted, that was probably more from the copious amount of alcohol I’d drunk last night, than the headache.

Bogged down with booze, I’d been more than happy to let the guy play grabby hands with me last night. Trying to stave off depression and anger had given me two fantastic reasons to go through my cell’s phonebook, and find his number under “hot guy, BF”; BF stood for the stylized black flames that I’d designed, and tattooed on his back to sweep from just below his boxer briefs, up past the waistband and to his shoulders, in a perfect imitation of dark candlelight dancing across his fair skin. It’d taken me five sessions to get the flow perfect, but I did fantastic work and under normal circumstances, I could’ve admired the man with a craftsman’s eye as if he was living and breathing art. Unfortunately, now that I was sober enough to appreciate the soreness in my ass and the pain in my head, art and sex were the last things on my list of priorities. It was a tragedy though, because my overnight guest was more than easy on the eyes- good-looking in that South Beach god way that Hollywood thew into every movie, and TV show, against a background of beautiful blue ocean sparkling in the sun. His wavy black hair, and fine scruffy shadow highlighted a chiseled jaw-line. His stubble had felt sensually tactile against my skin last night, though I probably had the kinky version of rug burn across the nape of my neck because he’d buried his face in it last night after he’d fallen asleep.

The view below his neck only got better since the sheets he’d sleepily retrieved after my unceremonious jostling, didn’t conceal his well-toned biceps, and heavily tanned, sculpted forearms. Broad shoulders and a wide chest that had made a fine cushion for my head, tapered to a narrow waist, and strong legs. He was a nearly perfect physical specimen of man, and when he yawned—while I was far enough away from him to avoid any wafts of morning breath—I could see that his gleaming white teeth were perfectly straight in the way that probably meant an orthodontist somewhere lived an extremely comfortable lifestyle.

The guy was fucking hot, but my dick just said no thank you.

It took a few tries to make it to a seated position without jarring my head more than necessary, but once I was upright—after the guy rolled over with a soft grumble before falling asleep again—drawing in some slow, even breaths was easier. They all failed to lessen the pain in my temples though. What I needed was a cool shower, a shit ton of pain killers, and a few pots of Cuban coffee to beat back the pain sinking sharp, invisible teeth into my brain. Unfortunately, that game plan was derailed by the soft, unexpected knock on my locked bedroom door.

“Daddy?”

Fuck.

Ignoring the protest in my head, I leaned over and pressed a kiss to the hard curve of my mystery man’s jaw, earning a sleepy, happy smile over his shoulder. He turned up his head for a second kiss, and I dealt with his morning breath and mine, taking one for the team as I brushed a light kiss over his lips in segue way to my inevitable apology. Before the guy could tug me back down into what he very mistakenly thought was going to be a happy postcoital morning snuggle, I took advantage of his relaxed position, and shoved my hands against his chest to wake him up completely. Unfortunately, panic made the small shove I gave him toward the edge of the bed, harder than I thought, and the cut, sexy limbs that I’d admired in drunken delight for most of last night, hit the floor like the proverbial ton of bricks when he went over.

“What the fuck! Dude, where’s the fire?” he asked as he rose to his knees, glaring at me from his new position on the floor, on the other side of the bed. Dark hair fell into his eyes, but couldn’t quite hide the angry heat in them. I sympathized. My wrought iron bed frame was a raised model, and the hardwood floor wasn’t softened by carpeting of any kind. But sympathy only went so far when there were more pressing issues on the table testing my ability to mentally compartmentalize, and prioritize with a hangover.

“I’m sorry, but you need to go,” I said, sounding less confident than I wanted to because I slid to my feet a little too quickly, and the momentum, combined with the headache, made my vision blur. The combination was disorientating enough that I was forced to grip the twisted rails of my footboard for balance. But, as soon as the room stopped swimming, I forced the bile in my throat back, and quickly retrieved the still nameless man’s clothing- battered blue jeans that’d hugged his perfect ass like the original sin, a gray t-shirt, and bright blue boxer briefs. The underwear unintentionally nailed him in the head when I hastily tossed his clothes over my shoulder after a peek in my peripheral vision to confirm general direction.

“I heard you, but why? I thought we were going to go for round five, maybe six, then breakfast? I’m starving, and there’s a really good diner about twelve blocks from here that makes amazing pancakes with ripe Spanish plantains. It’s an easy walk when you’re not making it with a concussion.” He made a face as he got to his feet, rubbing a hand over the back of his head.

I knew the diner that he was talking about. I was a regular there almost every Sunday morning in the late morning, though I’d never had the pancakes. I was more of a two eggs over easy guy, provided that the eggs came with a side of avocado, those same ripe plantains he apparently liked, and enough sausage to make the hospital employees that popped in there for a quick heart healthy starter, eyeball me superstitiously beneath their eyebrows. I eyeballed them right back. It wasn’t my fault that the Mt. Sinai hospital system had eaten up most of the old neighborhood that used to be tenements filled with Puerto Rican families who believed that everything tasted better when deep fried. Un bacallitio frito was essentially a delicious, deep fried fish donut without any powdered sugar, that masqueraded as an appetizer. I had no Latino blood flowing through my veins, but canola oil lived in my veins. Unfortunately, neither fish donuts, or pancakes were on the horizon right now.

“Shh keep your voice down,” I said, feeling visual daggers thrown into the back of my neck as I glanced at the locked bedroom door, then back to my fuming eye candy. “When I called you last night, I was straight up about not looking for anything serious. Having a boyfriend isn’t in the cards for me right now.”

“You said that before you fell asleep last night, and cuddled with me like the fucking Snuggles Bear.”

I barely managed to contain my sudden irritated twitching. I didn’t like clingy men under the best circumstances, and the situation right now was turning into a full-blown shit show--up, down, and sideways. The diagonals were probably going to pop in from stage left any minute now, and I didn’t have time for drama, even if I’d been the one to set the stage for it last night.

The minute I intended to take to slow my breath to avoid antagonizing my headache and to find words that wouldn’t make me sound like an asshole, ended up taking almost two as I found a relatively clean looking black ribbed tank from the top of the hamper. In my teenage years I’d still referred to them as beaters, until Ava had pointed out that “beater” was short for the entire term, “wifebeater,” since it was the kind of shirt that criminals were usually wearing when an entire TV detective unit busted in on them, and dragged them off in shiny silver bracelets. When I’d pointed out that those guys were always wearing white versions, I’d gotten a slap upside the head for my insolence. Fifteen packages of the ribbed undershirts in black, gray, blue and cranberry red, had made it under the tree for me that Christmas. I’d gotten the point, and gotten on board with modified vernacular--at least in front of women and mixed company.

When I pulled the material over my head, smoothing it over my flat midsection before looking in the mirror for any questionable stains, it passed the test of ‘clean enough to get away with.’ At least until I could get Mr. Pissed Off out of my place, deal with the issue on the other side of my bedroom, and get into a shower with a lot of aspirin. The tank covered up my chest and back tattoos, but displayed the vivid full color sleeves that wrapped around my entire left and right arms from my shoulders to the tops of my wrists. Part of the design was obscured by the thick, brown leather cuff bracelets that I always wore during the day, and usually removed only to shower. In my fuck bunny fury, I’d apparently forgotten to take them off last night. But, at least that was one less thing to worry about.

“I don’t cuddle, and last night was a mistake. I shouldn’t have reached out when I was drunk. Booze always makes me horny which drastically reduces my common sense, which is why I usually don’t drink anymore. Last night…it was a special case. That being said, I’m sorry about the booty call.”

That forced breath had apparently allowed me to get my tongue to cooperate with my booze addled brain enough to accept that I probably wasn’t handling this interaction as well as I normally would. As a local small business owner hustling during tough times, people skills were important to keep food on my table, and to deescalate any tense situations with the rare, unhappy customer. I was generally good with people, but my lack of sobriety was a serious handicap right now.

“I didn’t mind the call,” Mr. Tall, Dark and Nameless said, frowning as he fumbled with getting his tight blue boxer briefs on over his morning wood. His cock was impressive enough that under normal circumstances, it would’ve distracted me down to my knees to reintroduce it to my mouth. But right now, I had to stay my course.

My unhappy new friend’s lips tightened into a harder line when he caught where my gaze had travelled to, before I forced my eyes to meet the offended confusion in his eyes.

“I didn’t mind the call,” he repeated. “What I mind is getting shoved out of your bed to do my walk of shame with a concussion.”

“You’re a doctor right?” I said, pleased for a moment for at least remembering one thing about the guy. “There’s a first aid kit in the bathroom cabinet. Feel free to take it with you on your way out.”

“I’m a vet,” he corrected with a growl. “And you’re being a huge dick. What the actual fuck is the problem here, Sev?”

This time the knock was louder, and caught his attention as well as mine. His eyebrow arched in obvious question. I inhaled deeply, then exhaled hard.

Shit.

“Daddy, you shleepying? I’m hungry. Want pancakes.”

At least someone was on the same page with He-who-I-could-not-name.

Vet guy stared me down as the high-pitched, feminine little voice carried through the door, adding insult to injury with her breakfast request.

I sighed. “That would be the problem.”

A third knock prompted the veterinarian to glare at me harder with obvious accusation, and a tinge of hurt that made me feel worse about the situation. Yeah, that breath had definitely helped with some clarity, and I was absolutely not handling this correctly. But I had a list of priorities, and my bed buddy just couldn’t be on it right now.

I just sighed again as I turned toward the closed door. “Sure baby girl. Daddy will be out in a minute. I’m getting dressed.”

“You said you’re gay,” vet guy said through gritted teeth as he pulled his own shirt on, working on the few buttons we hadn’t popped off last night in our haste to get him undressed, and spread eagle on my bed before we’d switched sexual positions so many times, I’d lost count of whose mouth and dick had gone where; a good time had by all. Till now.

“I am gay. Very gay, as I proved to you last night more than a few times when I had your cock down my throat, then up my ass.”

I zipped up my jeans, not bothering with underwear or socks since I wasn’t the one who was leaving.

“Then who the hell’s calling you daddy at 5:30 in the morning?”

“My god-daughter, Ruby,” I said, though the correction earned me another scowl, and what actually sounded like a soft growl. “I have custody of her. She’s three and a half. I’m not a closet case. I’m just... complicated. Out situation is complicated. But last night was great.”

The vet rolled his eyes, angry red flushing his cheeks and ears. “You called me over for a late-night booty call while you have a kid in the house?” He disappeared for a moment behind the bed as he retrieved his socks and sneakers. “Let me amend my earlier statement- you’re a massive dick.”

“My judgment was undeniably impaired,” I agreed. “I’m sorry. I don’t usually do this at home, but like I said, I needed an outlet last night. You’re hot, and I thought we’d have some fun. Which we did, but it was still a bad call. I really am sorry, man,” I repeated. By the sullen look on his face, apologies weren’t going to help at this point, so I just barreled forward with a level of pragmatism that I’d probably regret later.

“Give me about ten minutes to get her into the kitchen, and then you can just leave through the front door. Please,” I added.

“You’re being such an asshole, Sev. Your daughter would like me. I’m good with kids.”

“I’m sure you are,” I said as I consulted the mirror again, my reflection encouraging me to drag my hands through my thick dark hair in an effort to look sleep mussed and not like a man who’d been sexed up all night. I needed a haircut and a shave, but those were just two more things that were going to have to take a backseat on the priority train today. I finally just grabbed a blue bandana from the top of my dresser, and flipped it with experienced ease until it was in the tight rectangle that I could lay across my forehead and tie off in the back so it looked more deliberate thug life, then life in shambles, all because my dick had done me wrong.

“And I know she’d like you. I like you, but I’m not having the Roy and Silo talk with my kid today. She usually sleeps in until 7 am, which would’ve given us time to do this the right way. But that isn’t an option right now.”

I paused with my hand on the doorknob to glance back over my shoulder. “Thanks again for last night, though I assume you won’t be calling me for a replay.”

I ‘d anticipated his flip-off, but it still made me feel like shit. I didn’t normally consider myself an asshole, and my booty call buddy had been one of the best lays of my life. But if I hadn’t spent all of yesterday trying to keep today at bay, I wouldn’t have invited a somewhat stranger into my home, let alone invited him over while I was extremely drunk and had my kid in the house. I’d never done that before, especially not the day before the anniversary of my foster sister’s death, but rational thought had been thrown out the window as soon as I’d taken that first sip of rum. The hot vet had just been a casualty of my selfish inability to deal last night.

My one saving grace—according to the desperate angel on my right shoulder trying to rationalize my stupidity to the universe—was the fact that I had been upfront with the guy whose name still fucking eluded me. I’d meant it when I’d said that I wasn’t interested in much beyond a one-night stand. Romantic relationships got complicated once they went past fucking, requiring new sets of priorities, and compromises so both partners were happy. I didn’t have that kind of time to spend emotionally on anyone except Ruby, so it was easier to do the discreet, casual sex thing. Well, normally I was discreet.

I angled my body so I could block the view into my bedroom until I completely shut the door behind me. Then I squatted down in front of the lady of the hour.

Ruby was a petite little thing, weighing in at the lower percentile for her age group according to her pediatrician during her last checkup. Her small frame was emphasized by the ratty, vintage Pac Man T-shirt she was wearing. It’d been mine until she’d decided that she liked the ‘half-a-happy-face’ guy on the black t-shirt, and claimed it as her own, forgoing even her favorite Little Mermaid nightgown unless it was laundry day. The hem of the shirt dragged on the ground, revealing only the rounded tips of her small toes when she moved. Her toenails had been polished a pale purple by her babysitter the last time Kelly had taken care of her, matching her tiny fingernails, though the polish was chipping on both. The color contrasted with the natural, palest honey color of Ruby’s skin which tanned more easily than mine did. Huge hazel eyes that shifted between brown and greenish gray, narrowed to little slits as she yawned wide, revealing twin rows of stubby white teeth that had never yet seen a cavity. We were all about good dental care in this house.

“Hey there, baby girl. You okay?” I said as I swept her up onto my hip to carry her downstairs. She snuggled in immediately, and despite all my posturing in front of what’s-his-name before, I cuddled her firmly against my body. The truth was that I didn’t mind a good snuggle when it came to my kid. But private, adult-time cuddle monkey I wasn’t, unless I was drunk, horny and lonely-the unholy trifecta-which had been the issue last night.

“Daddy, it hot in my woom,” Ruby complained, interrupting my thought process in an unintentional save from my derailing thought process. She curled in tighter against me, and I could feel the clammy heat radiating off of her small, slim body beneath the re-homed t-shirt.

“I know, baby. The air conditioners aren’t cooperating. Let’s get you some water and see if that helps. Daddy could use some too.”

Ruby nodded, slipping her thumb into her mouth the way she did only when she was either falling asleep, or still waking up. Her thick, wild mop of dishwater-blonde curls that could never be tamed despite the many lessons well-meaning friends and neighbors had given me on how to deal with the springy mass, tangled on my shoulder when she pressed in a little closer. I dropped a kiss to the top of her head as we moved down the hall, and into the kitchen together.

Ruby was thrilled when I allowed her to flip the light switch on, though I would’ve been happy to do without the additional source of light amplifying the sunshine already illuminating the windows. Stress induced migraines had plagued me so many times during the last week, that I was becoming part cat with my new ability to see in the dark.

Blinking hard against the light as it blinded me when it bounced off the surfaces of my stark white, galley style kitchen, I took a few deep breaths to try to navigate through the pain. What I wanted right now was my bed and silent darkness, but between Ruby chattering like a magpie on crack in my ear, and my most recent, less than proud moment sulking in the bedroom, I was shit-out-of-luck on that front.

I had to make do with setting Ruby down on the safe edge of the counter top nearest to the fridge, bracing her still with one hand, while I filled a plastic sippy cup with water from the refrigerator’s built-in fountain for her, with the other. Once I’d handed Ruby the cup, and settled her a little more securely on the counter, I left her there for as long as it took to cross the galley, and wrestle with the child-proofed cabinet to get the aspirin from the top shelf where I always kept it. There were stronger pills in the medicine cabinet in my bedroom that my doctor had prescribed me specifically for my migraines, but they always set me on my ass, and I couldn’t be off my game while Ruby was awake. Being hungover was bad enough.

I popped three of the coated gel tabs into my mouth. When I returned to the counter, Ruby gave me her cup so I could wash down the medicine in my mouth. I didn’t bother removing the lid, just sipped the water through the little hole of the toddler cup as I tried to ignore the brief, bitter taste of the aspirin tabs before they finally slid all the down my throat. Once upon a lifetime ago, I wouldn’t have believed that I’d ever be drinking water out of a sippy cup more often than I drank beer from a bottle. But too often shit happened, and real life followed it, occasionally in an epic cluster fuck. Thankfully for the time being, Ruby and I were doing ok.

“Thanks, honey.”

“You welcome, Daddy.” The deep dimples in both of Ruby’s cheeks appeared as she smiled up at me. But then she suddenly frowned, leaning toward me with narrowed eyes, close enough that I could feel her breath warming my skin.

“You have a boo-boo,” she announced a second later, her little fingers cool and clammy as they touched the side of my neck.

“What?”

Even as the thought exited my head through my lips, I reached up to touch the left side of my neck beside Ruby’s hand. The flesh felt tender, tumbling me back into a montage of heated memories—slick lips, practiced tongue, and the rough scrape of teeth along my throat… All things that I loved, at least until they gave me a hickey that felt like it was the size of Canada.

Ruby frowned. “What happwened Daddy?”

She looked so concerned, my first instinct was to comfort her, and I didn’t think my response through. “I tripped and fell into the side of the door.”

I winced inwardly the moment my brain caught up with the stupidity of my verbal vomit.

With your neck? Moron.

Ruby eyed me, and for a few sweat inducing seconds, I was afraid that she’d push for exact details the way she sometimes did when we got into the ‘why’ game that children won each time that adults forgot that they knew better than to engage. Fortunately for me, the beauty of Ruby’s almost four-year-old mind, was that despite its inability to accept provable fact, it sucked up the least likely scenarios at face value.

“That was silly,” she said.

I nodded, thanking every deity above that she accepted that explanation because right now, I had nothing else on deck.

Ruby swung her feet over the edge of the counter into my legs, giggling when I trapped them between my knees.

“You need a Band-Waid,” she suggested. “I have Bawbie ones.”

I grinned at the thought of a bright pink Band-Aid, with an anatomically incorrect blonde on it, connecting the colorful tats that wound their way up my back and neck, and curled into my hairline.

“Thanks, sweetie pie, but I think I’ll live. It’s just a bruise. Daddy was a dummy.”

“It’s okay. Dora says evewy body makesh mishstakes.”

It was tough not to smile as I got schooled by my kid with Dora the Explorer’s life mantra. According to her pre-K teacher, Ruby tested high above her age level so her cognitive skills were there for more complex conversations than the average three-and-a-half-year old, but she still had a baby lisp that I found cute enough to be a frequent ‘get out-of-jail-free’ card. Hopefully that would change as she got older, or I’d have a lot of sleepless nights in my future when she was a teenager.

“She’s right.”

Some people made bigger mistakes than others, like bringing home a guy whose name you couldn’t remember when you were mourning a ghost, and trying to forget the one person that most connected you to her.

My goddaughter’s mother, Ava, had been the single most important person in my life before Ruby had been born. I would’ve done anything for her, and she for me, because it had been us against the world since the minute I’d been escorted into her parent’s home by my social worker when I was an angry fourteen-year-old punk who’d have been happy to piss on the polished wood floors if my social worder, Mrs. Petrov, hadn’t been giving me her Baba Yaga version of the hairy eyeball.

Ava’s parents hadn’t come downstairs yet, so she’d been the one to greet me in the foyer of the modernly decorated brownstone on the upper west side. Ignoring my social worker after the perfunctory greetings, Ava had swept me with a silent, appraising look that had taken in my white beater, obscenely low-slung blue jeans with holes in both knees and the upper right thigh, and the gray ball cap I’d been wearing backwards. Her soft snort had told me without any words, that she’d found me lacking. It wasn’t surprising. Most people did back then, especially after I’d been bounced around from so many foster homes that I should’ve earned frequent flyer miles, and Mrs. Petrov should’ve been canonized.

I’d tensed as I’d given Ava my own once-over, a sneer forming on my face as I’d taken stock of her knee length sunflower print sundress, simple black flats, and thick, whiskey brown hair that’d had been tied back in a long braid that almost reached her hips. My first impression had been, ‘fucking uppity bitch can go fuck herself.’ I’d been about to announce that thought with as much verbal derision as I could, when Ava had paused me. Not with words, but with a hint of a smile tugging at the corners of her full lips as she met my gaze with steady, unblinking fortitude. It hadn’t been the sneering kind of smiles I’d gotten used to over the years, but one that was almost affectionately exasperated. A sisterly smile.

Ava had looked me dead in the eyes, and said that she’d overheard my Mrs. Petrov tell her parents that I was a “tough case,” and that fostering me would be a lot of work. My renewed anger had flared even hotter then, but once again Ava had derailed me, that time by adding with a smart-assed smile, that she didn’t care because I had a good, ‘little brother face.’ Then she’d added that if I ruined her life, she’d have to put her foot up my ass which might break her heart a little, so I’d better get my crap together. Then she’d abruptly invaded my personal space, hugging me hard for so long, that I’d been forced to choose between pushing her away, or returning the embrace awkwardly. I’d gone with door number two, and Ava’s smile had been 100+ megawatts bright before she’d pulled away, taken my hand, and dragged me to the kitchen to make us both turkey and cheese sandwiches.

I’d done a week of wary sulking after that, just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Her parents didn’t really care that I was there or not, just like the majority of my previous foster placements. My being there, a messed-up kid from the roughest side of the tracks, just made them look altruistic and compassionate in front of their high-class friends. They also got a paycheck for their time of looking great on paper. But they’d at least fed me well and gotten me more than one pair of clean clothes. I’d also had my own bedroom for the first time in my life, with a real bed instead of just a cheap cot in a room with four other kids like I’d had in one home.

Her parents didn’t berate or abuse me. They just sort of ignored me as long as my basic needs were met. I’d been ok with that, just counting down the days until I turned eighteen so I could get the fuck out of dodge.

At least I had, until Ava had breezed into my room one day without knocking, apparently not caring about things like my modesty, or maybe hers if I’d been jacking off to good gay porn. Fortunately for both of us, I’d been sitting on my bed fully dressed, reading a car magazine. Ava had ignored my protests about privacy, and announced that we were going out. I’d growled at her, but she’d continued to ignore me as she’d thrown a small pile of clothing at my head and informed me that she’d gone shopping for me. I’d balked immediately. In all of my other homes, my wardrobe choices had been chastised. Even though her parents had gotten me clothing that was clean and new, the clothes had been so boringly middle-class America, that they felt like a costume. But when I’d reluctantly unrumpled the bundle of fabric, I’d found a near duplicate of the jeans and white beater I’d been wearing that first day when Mrs. Petrov had dropped me off, except that the tank was a deep wine color. There was also a gray one, and a black leather jacket similar in androgynous cut, to the brown one That Ava had been wearing over her bright pink blouse and jeans.

I still owned the jacket, though I hadn’t worn it in years, afraid of damaging one of the only gifts I still had from Ava.

Even now I could remember her wide grin when I’d asked what the actual fuck she was talking about. She’d sat on the edge of my bed, taken the magazine from my hands, and tossed it to the far end of the bed before telling me to go change because we were going out with her friends since I needed some, and she was good at sharing.

I’d grumbled, but for the first time in my life, had done as I was told. From that moment on, I’d always jumped as high as Ava told me to, even when she’d set that bar sky level. I’d adored her, and it wasn’t her fault that her ex-boyfriend had become my best friend since her death, any more than it was through no deliberate transgression of their own, that they were both intensifying today’s migraine.

I exhaled hard, shaking my head a little as if that would dislodge the unhappy thoughts that were sneaking into my brain. But all the movement succeeded in doing, was amplifying my headache.

Biting back my urge to curse up a wicked storm like I did when I went past frustrated into forlorn, I forced a smile for Ruby’s sake.

“But every day is a new one.”

Ruby nodded, taking her thumb out of her mouth. Her head tipped to one side like a curious puppy. “Daddy, can I ashk you a qwestion.”

“Sure princess. Ask away.”

“Do you like boys or gulls?”

The remaining water in my glass almost ended me as I choked on it when my surprised inhale dragged liquid into my lungs. I coughed hard a few times to clear my throat. When I glanced up through watery eyes, Ruby was still looking at me expectantly.

“Uh…” I paused.

A thousand possible answers to that question came to mind, but I was way too hung-over, and Ruby was at least 13 years too young, to have a deep and meaningful conversation about my sexual journey with.

“Um…” was the eloquence I settled on first, before following it up with the brilliant, “What do you mean?”

“Henry from school said hish Daddy said you like boys not gulls, and I got mad.”

Well shit.

“Why were you mad?”

We were on slippery ground, so I was walking on perfectly pointed toes like a fucking prima ballerina on her best day. Like I’d told what’s-his-face in my bedroom, Ruby didn’t know about my extracurricular evening activities. I’d been out since I was a teenager, but I didn’t fly my happy rainbow freak flag around Ruby who was still young enough to subscribe strictly to the ideology that boy dolls only kissed girl dolls. All my accepting adult friends knew which way I liked my candlestick polished, but until Ruby was older, and I found somebody worth settling down with, I just avoided the topic as much as I could around her. When it came to my kid, I was as neutered as her Ken dolls.

“Were you mad because Daddy—“

“I’m mad ‘cause I don’t want you liking dumb bowys mowe than me.”

Ruby’s lower lip curled with petulance as she cut me off. My relief was immediate, and I swooped down to kiss her into giggles.

Thank fucking God for the narcissism of children.

“Babycakes, I could never like someone more than I like you, boy or girl.”

Somewhere in the back of the house, a well-timed slam of the door behind Henry?— I was pretty sure now that I’d finally remembered his name— made both Ruby and I jump, and she inched a little closer toward me.

“What’s that?”

“Just the wind.”

“It sounds like gwosts,” Ruby said, suspicion written all over her little face.

“Maybe, but they’re all friendly ones,” I assured her, bumping her shoulder gently with mine. “Like Casper.”

“Whoosh that?”

I grimaced. “Kid, you’re killing me. You make me feel old.”

“You awe old. But it’s okay. Mommies and Daddies awe sposed to be old. Pete’s mom is a lot of fingows. He said two and thwee.”

She smiled. I smirked. If Pete’s poor mother was old, I was a relic with only two months until I officially joined all the other depressed souls who’d been on this planet for three decades, minus two years.

“You’re right, we’re all ancient.”

I leaned down to her level, pretending to munch on her arm until she giggled. “When my bones start going and I can’t walk, you have to promise me, cross your heart, that you’ll let me drive your Barbie Hot Wheels around the house.”

Ruby grinned at me. “You too big, Daddy.”

“First you say that I’m old, and now you say I’m fat? Breaking my heart kiddo.”

“I’m sowwy. Want me to kiss it bwetter?”

She puckered up, but I planted a kiss on the top of her head instead. With all the drama this morning as I’d attempted to triage the aftereffects of last night’s bad decisions, I hadn’t brushed my teeth yet. Chastely pecking my daughter on the lips like I sometimes did, was a no-go in my play book when I still had the remains of a nameless guy’s spunk coating the insides of my molars.

“Much better. And since you look wide awake, let’s get you some breakfast and then get ready to start our day.”

“Okay Daddy. Can I wear my puwple shneakers to school?”

“Affirmative on the sneakers. But it’s Saturday, so no school for you today kiddo.”

The look on Ruby’s face was priceless. In high-school, if she ever took her life into her hands and started smoking weed and cutting classes like I had, I’d remind her of the day she looked at me like I’d shot a puppy after I’d told her that her preschool was closed.

“But I want to go. You’re gonna talk bout dwawing on your shkin!”

“That’s next Tuesday, sweets. We have a few days, but I promise that I’ll be there with extra coloring sheets, and lick and stick tattoos. Now let’s get moving. Daddy has to go into the shop early, and Ms. Kelly can’t pick you up till ten o’clock this morning so it’s you and me for a few hours.”

“Do I still get to sleepsh at her house?”

“Yep. You’ll have a great time. She told me you’re going to make chocolate chip cookies tonight.”

“Yay!,” Ruby said, planting another kiss on me, this one in the vicinity of my left eyebrow, above the double piercing. “Do we get to see uncle AD twoday too?”

“I don’t know, kiddo. Maybe.”

I experienced a momentary pang of guilt over lying to my kid, because I knew damn well that Aiden Ward, ‘Uncle AD’ only to Ruby, would be working at the shop today, instead of the local firehouse where he was stationed as a part-time EMT. His weekly schedules at the tattoo parlor were ones that I knew like the back of my hand because I always wrote them, making sure that Aiden’s schedule was based around both his and my available hours. As his boss it was my job, but I was pretty sure that there was something posted in societal work etiquette which stated that arranging your schedule so you could work most of the week with one particular, extremely hot employee, was borderline sexual harassment. It wasn’t a good move for my sanity today either, considering how close Aiden and Ava had been. So many of my past memories with him were tied up with my memories of her, and my shit was already hanging on by an unraveling thread.

The last thing I needed today was any more reminders that my foster sister wasn’t here anymore with Ruby and me. But her ex, Aiden, was my fucking white whale, sending all of my remaining commonsense right out of the closest damn window, and the rest of me into the arms of nameless men.

“I love Uncle AD, Daddy,” Ruby said, offering me one of those wide, sunny smiles that always pushed back what would’ve otherwise become epic bouts of self-pity.

“I know, honey.”

Me too.

“He said he’s goin to take me to the kid’s zoo in Centwals Pawk tomorrow. You can come too.”

My lips twitched. “Thanks for the invite, kiddo, but Daddy is working.”

“You always wowk.”

She pouted, and I had to bite back my smile so she wouldn’t get huffy the way she had been a lot lately whenever she thought I was laughing at her. Apparently, what I considered cuteness, Ruby considered serious business, and threw down with gusto if I didn’t take her seriously.

“Well Daddy has to work so Princess Ruby always has glittery purple sneakers, and Lucky Charms Cereal. It’s all about those rainbow marshmallows.”

Ruby giggled and held out her hands like Superman when I leaned in to gently munch on her neck, before tucking her beneath my arm to fly her off the counter, and up the stairs into her bedroom so we could get started on the arduous task of picking out her outfit for the day. Navigating her epic wardrobe—the result of a doting daddy, and equally doting friends of said daddy—to find an outfit we both agreed was appropriate but fabulous, could take upwards of an hour on a good day.

I welcomed the distraction today. I’d embrace any diversion that kept my mind off Ava, but especially one that kept it off Aiden, who was very much alive, and haunted me more than even memories of Ava did.

I sighed inwardly as Ruby started today’s fashion show with a hot pink, zebra striped shirt and purple tutu. When I tossed a pale blue romper her way instead, she scowled and flounced back into the closet on a mission that gave my mind time to wander back to Aiden.

My feelings for Aiden had started way before I’d hired him at my tattoo studio. My pathetic infatuation with him went back to the first day we’d met seven years ago, when Ava had brought Aiden home to introduce him to her parents and to me, as her first serious boyfriend. They’d dated a little less than a year, but had remained close after their breakup, and Aiden had stuck around when she’d died a few months after Ruby was born because by then, he and I’d become friends.

And just like that I found a brief, albeit painful distraction away from Aiden, though remembering how I’d lost my sister and best friend, wasn’t exactly what I’d been hoping for.

Even now, the memories from that time were painful, especially with today being the anniversary of Ava’s death. Nothing could prepare anyone for the loss of someone they loved, especially not when they were only twenty-seven years old, and were taken out by some oblivious, texting asshole whose car had jumped a curb while she was waiting for her bus.

It'd been a senseless loss, and the driver had only done two and a half years, released early from his already minimal sentence for, ‘good behavior.’ It’d been a complete mockery of the justice system, and a loss that I’d had to navigate through mostly on my own because my foster family had somehow managed to cut out their hearts, and mourn from a distance—said distance just being the span between their brownstone in the affluent Upper West Side, and the much less swanky Upper East Side place that Ava and I had shared with Ruby.

Ava’s parents had cut her off when she’d announced at Sunday dinner that she’d decided she wanted to be a mother, and had opted to go the way of an anonymous donor from a sperm bank instead of through more traditional methods. She’d been two months pregnant at the time, and had taken everyone by surprise, including me because we usually shared every detail of our lives—mostly because she’d loved me enough to be nosy as fuck when she felt that I needed to be redirected to more positive choices then I was making at whatever time she decided to interfere in my personal life. But she’d never shared even her desire to be a mom with me.

I’d been pissed and hurt, but hadn’t engaged in the explosive argument that had broken out between her and her parents. Not because I was angry, but because Ava had never liked being rescued. When it was over though, I’d silently gotten her jacket from the closest, and my car keys from the basket on the foyer table. By the time we’d driven halfway home, Ava had broken her silence, and apologized to me for the secrecy, explaining that even though she hadn’t dated anyone seriously after she and Aiden had broken it off amicably, she still wanted to move on with her life, and that life included having a baby.

I’d nodded because when Ava wanted something, she’d never let anything stop her from reaching her goal. Apparently, that included deliberately getting pregnant via artificial insemination while she was single.

As a pediatric nurse with the Mt. Sinai healthcare system, Ava had possessed enough financial stability to raise a child comfortably. She was driven, but level-headed, so she’d been ready to take on that new chapter of her. Unfortunately, her parents had never gotten on board, declaring the insemination of a single woman, ‘unnatural.’ Considering that they’d always been decent people who’d fostered other children before they took me in, neither Ava or I had ever understood that contradictory, hardline stance. The only theory we’d ever been able to float between us, was that her parents had always been very traditional about family values, raising us strictly in the Catholic faith that included nine o’clock mass at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral every Sunday morning, and family dinner every Sunday night, without allowances for any excuse to avoid it. Dropping dead might’ve worked, but it would’ve been a church funeral anyway so we’d still have gotten our weekly helping of suffocating sanctity.

All people have at least one strand of strange embedded in their DNA, so we’d just chalked their unwillingness to have an open mind about Ava’s pregnancy as their version of that weird ignorance.

I hadn’t seen them since that Sunday afternoon when she’d made her announcement, and hadn’t stepped foot in St. Patrick’s since her death. I did however, take Ruby to a children’s mass at a small, non-denominational church every Sunday because I knew that Ava had wanted Ruby to be raised with a spiritual base of some kind, even though I personally didn’t have any real feelings about religion one way or the other. If Ruby decided that she didn’t want to go anymore when she was an adult, I’d support her decision, but for now she went to the children’s service. She liked it,which was good because I never planned to break the promise I’d made to Ava about taking care of Ruby by raising her as well as I humanly could when she’d told me that she’d made me her daughter’s legal guardian if anything were ever to happen to her.

It hadn’t been a decision I’d accepted easily. The only experiences I’d had with young kids were with the ones I’d grown up around in the NYC foster system, and most of them were as maladjusted as I’d been to the idea of having a loving family who wouldn’t give you back the moment you stepped over whatever lines of acceptability they drew in the sand.

I’d gone into the system a day after my 5th birthday when my beautiful, but drug addicted, Romani mother had finally given me up after losing hope that my Russian prick of a father, would ever man up and take us both home. She’d dumped me at church, then just disappeared into either the sunset, or a crack house. I’d never seen her again, so I didn’t know what her situation was, and I honestly didn’t care. I’d never met my father, and by the time Ava’s parents had taken me in at age fourteen, I’d been in and out of eleven foster homes in nine years. Almost all of them had been earth-based hells, masquerading as state-supported sanctuaries with too many kids, neglectful or abusive foster parents, and meager surroundings despite how much money they got for every child they took in.

I’d grown up scrappy, with a chip on my shoulder the size of Australia, and I’d never had to be completely responsible for anyone except myself. But even when I’d spiraled out for a couple of years in my late teens with some minor addiction issues that I’d developed as a coping mechanism to deal with the anger and resentment that occasionally flared up over being abandoned at a young age, Ava had never walked away from me. She’d loved me, supported me, yelled at me, and occasionally knocked me upside the back of my head when I was stupid. She’d also always been there for me without hesitation, and I’d considered her my sister in every sense of the word. Blood bonds meant nothing to me. If I had any genetic relatives out in the world other than my parents, it’d be news to me. Only Ava had shown me what family was, through her love and loyalty. I'd taken her last name not because of her parents, but because she’d been my fucking person. When she’d died, and I’d been entrusted me with her most precious person by the courts, I’d made sure I got my shit together.

No more late nights were spent in bars, or out on the fire escape smoking the occasional joint. After spending almost my entire childhood in the foster system, I knew how deep those emotions of feeling unwanted could coil low and deep in the soul, so there was no way in hell that I’d ever give Child Services a reason to remove Ruby from my custody. Especially not after she’d called me daddy for the first time, even though I’d been trying to teach her to just call me Sev, when she’d started talking.

I’d kill anyone who tried to take her from me.

The only vice I still couldn’t completely kick was casual sex with men who understood the word casual. But those days were becoming fewer and farther between because I was a dad now, and had to start using better judgement. Before last night, I’d never brought a guy home other than Aiden, when we carpooled home to my place whenever he had dinner with Ruby and I, twice a week.

And we’re back.

I exhaled as Aiden snuck his way back into my thoughts again. Whether I liked it or not, my world was narrowing down and splintering into a crossroad where I’d have to make a choice- bust out my moves in a Garland inspired number, and find what lay over my little gay rainbow, or just let Aiden go.

I’d put off making a decision for as long as I could, and just keep pretending that the main reason I’d stopped sleeping around, was that random asses, no matter how tight and willing, just didn’t turn my crank the way they once had before Aiden had become such a central part of my life.

Wizards with the ability to give me enough courage to man the fuck up and tell him how I really felt, would just have to take a fucking number.

When my mind races, I write. So there's a hundred and one stories in my head. For now, I'm only posting SOME a little at a time. Hopefully anyone who follows me will enjoy this one as it goes along if they have enjoyed the others. As I say in my profile, my style is "queer Steel Magnolias" because I want to make you laugh, maybe cry on occasion, and walk away feeling like the story was worth your time. So please read along, and feel free to leave feedback, comments, critiques, all help me to become a better writer so feel free to post or message me. I'm not a cannibal so I don't bite Thanks and take care!
*** Side note, I have yet to find a beta reader, so all mistakes of grammar and spelling are my own. I try to catch them all, but sometimes I miss the mark. Judge the story not my typing lol...Thanks!***