40. Who The Hell is Saint?

FORTY

WHO THE HELL IS SAINT?

9 Crimes, Damien Rice

Roe

I wanted to stay in so I could finish doodling some new art. When inspiration strikes, you have to take the opportunity because you don’t know when it’s going to happen again. I’m sitting on the back porch, drawing on the iPad when I hear the squealing sound of the sliding door opening. I turn around and see Marco standing there, his eyes throwing daggers at me.

“Hey, sorry if I woke you up, I can go back to his room,” I say.

He snarls at me. “You couldn’t just stay in your female class, could you?” he asks. And it takes me a minute to realize what he’s talking about, but when it does, everything makes sense.

“What are you talking about?” I ask calmly, trying to mask my feelings as much as I can. I look at his clenched hands and see a magazine in one hand and a bat in the other one.

“The race, Roe. I’ve been watching you for years and I knew you were good, but I didn’t think you would be stupid enough to race with the men. Then this year, you had to. The one year I had scouts asking about me but they all ran away as soon as pretty little A. Sorelle took over,” he spits, stepping forward with his eyes narrowing on me.

“Marco, it’s just a race, no need to get serious.”

“TO YOU!” he shouts. He throws the magazine on the ground and rubs his face with his hand. “It’s just a race to you. But this could have been the out I needed for my parents to finally let me off the hook. If only I can show them that I can do it, they’ll let me follow my own path and get out of this shit hole town.”

“Marco, you’re a grown-ass man, just move,” I say, though maybe not my brightest moment considering this man has a bat in his hand.

He clenches his jaw so tightly that I can see a vein bulging in his neck. “I won’t get my inheritance unless I have a career by twenty-five. Riding has been my passion for years and they placed this ultimatum when I turned twenty-one.”

“And you still haven’t made it? Sounds to me like this might not be your path, pal.” D amn it, Roe. Hush.

“I’ve been sick. This year I finally was able to make it through most races to get the needed points. But this isn’t about me, Roe. This is about you dropping out of this weekend and getting your boyfriend to drop out too.”

“What? No, we’re not doing that. Marco, move over,” I urge, trying to push him away. I’m getting out of here.

He puts his hand up and stops me from going into the house. “Oh, but you are. Dropping out, that is. Let’s go,” he snaps, grabbing my arm and walking me into the house.

This fucking man is acting unhinged over a god damn dirt bike race. It’s not that serious. I try to yank my arm from his hold but it’s futile. “Let me go, you jackass,” I snap, pulling and trying to hold my weight back without any luck.

We go through the house and out to the garage where his truck is parked. He pushes me forward, in between him and the door, and lets go of my hand as he opens the truck. “Get in,” he snarls, showing me the bat he’s still holding in his other hand.

I obey for once in my life and climb to the front seat. I don’t think he’s going to hurt me, but I also don’t want to find out if I’m wrong.

He drives quietly, holding on to the steering wheel with white knuckles; every time I try to talk, he tells me to shut up. I don’t have my phone or watch, so there’s no way to let anyone know. If this happened a year ago, I wouldn’t have anyone to contact. But right now, I have a couple of people in mind.

One in particular comes to mind and I hope he hurries up and finds me missing from his home. I hope he doesn’t think I just left him without saying anything. It does cross my mind that he might think I just took off. It’s not like I’ve told him how I feel about him, though. So how would he even know?

We pull up at my house and this dude pulls me by my arm out of the truck on the driver’s side. Funny how this is my preferred way to get out, but at this moment, I just want to crawl out of my skin. He drags me by the arm until we make it to my front door. Then he grabs keys from under the mat that I completely forgot I had and opens the door to my house. MY HOUSE.

“Where is it?” he asks.

“Where is what?” I snap back.

He walks into the garage, leaving me in the living room. “Don’t play dumb. Where’s the bike?”

“Which bike? Mine?” I ask, like I’m not talking to a man that has a bat in his hand. “If that’s what you’re doing here, then you’re out of luck. Saint has my bike.”

“Who the hell is Saint?” he asks and I forget that only I call him that.

“Santiago. Santiago has my bike in his trailer.”

He slams the bat on the ground, pounding at the tile floor over and over again. The front door of the house slams shut and after a loud, “Roe?” comes from Saint, Marco walks toward me and grabs my arm.

“In here!” I shout as Marco yanks me to him. Who does that? “Let me go, you asshole,” I scream at him.

“Do you really think you’re in a position to be talking to me like that?” he asks at the same time that Saint walks in, stopping in his tracks when he sees Marco grabbing my arm.

“Woah, woah, what is going on here?” Saint’s hands go up, raised in caution toward his roommate and friend.

“Stay back, Thiago,” Marco snaps. “I’m finally putting an end to this stupidity of letting a girl race in our class. I was sure you’d feel the same way but then you went and chose pussy over bikes.”

I choose again to speak over keeping my mouth shut. “Maybe you could use some pussy too to fix your mood.”

“SHUT UP!” he shouts. I might be going insane but I laugh, because what else can I actually do? He drops my arm and shit escalates quickly because in the blink of an eye, Marco’s hand is on my neck and my back is against the wall. His eyes are fury-incarnate, burning into me as he squeezes my neck.

He’s lost his mind but so have I, because instead of trying to get out of this fucked up situation and try to see if Saint can help, I say, “What Marco? You jealous of Saint? Are you trying to show me your daddy side?” He pounds on the wall by my head at the same time that I sass, “You gonna spank me too?”

If this is how I go out, I might as well go hard.