Summer Rain

XXXVII ~ Tremors

    "Do you want to order something?" He asked slowly, like edging around a time-bomb. 

    "I'm not that hungry." I shook my head, my hands clasped under the table. 

          He fidgeted relentlessly as he tripped over each attempt to speak, restarting and catching his breath. He looked enervated with every attempt to spit out whatever was so urgent that he needed to say. I tried to be patient, my face neutral ad calm.

     "It's just that... Well... God, I didn't think it'd be this hard." His hands held on to the small salt and pepper containers on the table, practically shaking the entire wooden frame. I let my hands wander to his to hold them steady, and his eyes finally looked right at me, piercing me through like a knife.

    "Why don't I start?" I said, hoping to calm his nerves. He nodded timidly. "I've learned a lot about people this Summer. People I thought I knew everything about had surprised me. It's hard to know if you really know anyone at all sometimes, and even when life seems to be getting somewhere, it has to get complicated. That's just how it works. I know it's not easy to let people in..." I began rambling, venting almost, as I felt the heat of his gaze on my lips as they moved with my every word.

    "I want to let you in. I want you to know me." He breathed out, squeezing my hand that was in his grasp across the table. 

    "You have these walls that are so hard to tear down, and it's like there's nothing I can do to make you trust me." It was true. In all the time I'd known him, he never spoke about his past or his family, even minor details that a stranger would divulge. 

    "I trust you with my life, Ava." He retorted.

    "Then why did you push me away? What is it?" I needed to know.

    "It's my life. It's easy to look at me and see some club employee who wants a better life, and it's easy to dismiss me. I liked that to most people I went under the radar. It was simpler... But you saw me and knew that there's so much more that's under my exterior. There's good and bad, but mostly bad. Things I'm not proud of. Things I have to do to survive. Things that make my skin crawl and make me hate myself for doing them. Why would I want anyone, especially someone as special as you, know about them?"

    "Tim has you working for him; I know that much," I said through gritted teeth. 

    "He uses me for all of his biddings. He's not just a businessman like he wants everyone to think he is. He's a--"

    "Gangster. I know." I cut him off. 

    "What? Who told you?" He was clearly shocked, so I knew that this was what he wanted to tell me.

    "Bodhi." Elliot's face paled. 

    "Ava, before you start accusing me of anything, hear me out." He retracted his hands from mine, leaving only cold air that filled the space where his hands were. 

    "I found out my brother is a recovering drug addict and that he's been getting his drugs from somewhere in the club all Summer. Then I remember you getting mysterious packages of money, some of which I had to fucking give you, and you expect me not to put two and two together?"

    "I would never do that to him, or you." There was an anger in his voice which made me see how serious he was being. 

    "So what do you do then? What's the money for?" I demanded to know.  

    "His associates. He sends me to see them, so they give him things for the club. Small things, cheaper equipment, some simple things, others not so legit, but he carries drugs and other things through the club on the down-low. He needs the club to survive, and that was how he does it." Elliot's voice rambled on at a million miles an hour as he tried to explain himself so that I could understand.