We’ve been besties since before we could walk. I love him like a brother, and it’s hard watching his internal war. But that’s exactly the reason I’m here.
I lower my hand and move around the corner to his place out back. It’s just the back twenty feet of the same blue tin building that houses his auto shop, but he’s turned it into a makeshift apartment and it works for him.
When I knock, not surprisingly, he doesn’t answer. I turn the knob and find it unlocked, as usual. I barely peek through the narrow crack, prepared to close the door and walk away if anything sordid is happening inside. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch movement to my right, and when I squint that direction, I see muscles ripple over his broad back as he pulls himself up in rapid, wide-gripped chin-ups from the bar he’s rigged under the loft where I know his queen-sized mattress sits. The loft is eight feet off the concrete floor with a set of steep wooden stairs that lead up to it. He’s curtained it off with woven tapestries he found at some yard sale off-island, making it into the only “room” in the space. His sanctum. He never brings women up there, except me. I’ve slept here a few times when I was afraid to leave him alone, right after he got back.
Safe in the knowledge that he’s alone, I step inside and close the door behind me. Along the back wall, he’s installed kitchen cabinets, a stove and a sink, and his refrigerator sits in an alcove between the cabinets and a built-in table and bench. The kitchen is always spotless. I know his mom brings him meals from her diner next door, or I’d worry about whether he was eating. Under the loft, which is to the right of the kitchen, he’s got his gym set up. In addition to the chin-up bar, there’s a weight bench with racks of free weights, and a heavy hanging bag that he uses for kickboxing. At the end, there’s a dresser and some hooks on the wall that serve as his closet. There are a few pairs of jeans hung on them and two black suits for this new job he got at some security place. I pretend not to notice the handcuffs, chains, and leather straps hanging from a metal grate against the wall.
Along the wall across from that is his “living room,” with stereo equipment he spent a small fortune on in a cabinet next to a couch, which points at a flat-screen TV mounted to the wall over his only source of heat—a woodstove.
He drops to the floor after about thirty reps, and I call his name. He must not hear me over the music, though, because a second later he jumps back up, this time in an underhand grip, and starts again.
I move to the stereo, which he’s wired to a Bose speaker setup that would put any major Miami dance club to shame, and turn down the volume.
He lets go with one hand and swings around to face me, then grins and does his best chimpanzee impression, scratching his armpit and making monkey noises. He drops to the floor and ape shuffles over where I’m standing, dragging his knuckles on the floor. Before I can get out of his way, he tackles me onto his couch and sits next to me. He wraps his beefy bicep over my shoulder, pinning me under all two hundred pounds of that buff six-foot frame.
He nuzzles his face into my hair. “You smell good, Ade. New shampoo?”
I grab his arm and peel it away from me. “No, and you reek, so get off.”
He grins. “So, anyone I need to beat the shit out of this week?”
Rob’s face flashes in my mind. “No.”
“Good,” he says, wrapping his arm around me again and tugging me close. He tips his forehead into mine and stares into my eyes, and I can see all the demons swimming just below the surface in his. Despite his black-as-night irises, he’s always been so easy to read. “How’s fourth grade treating you?”
I rake his sweaty platinum hair off his forehead. “Good. That place hasn’t changed at all since we were there. It’s a little scary.”
His eyes go vacant for a second before recovering their wicked gleam. “Not much around here ever changes.”
“Including my car. Frank needs plugs and an oil change. You have time to help?”