Page 22 of Walker

“You ready for a single mom, though?”

I studied my friend for a few moments. He didn’t mean anything by it. “I don’t mind her kids, but I guess we’ll see.” We each sat quietly for a minute. “What the hell are you doing here anyway? Shouldn’t you be at home with your woman and kids?”

“Nah, they went on some excursion or other.”

“You doin’ alright? You seem down as fuck lately.”

Spike shrugged. “Tash has…” He blew out a breath of frustration, took a sip of his beer, and then swallowed thickly before returning his eyes to meet mine. “We haven’t been connecting lately. It’s like we’re always missing one another even when we’re in the same room.”

“Missing one another?”

“Yeah, like she’s not the woman I fell for anymore and maybe I’m not the man she thought she was getting either.”

“Is it because of how challenging little man can be?”

Spike shook his head. “Nah, that kid is a handful but we both love him and the shit he gets up to.”

“Griff?” I asked hesitantly because I didn’t want to have to lay a brother out.

“She’s cool with Griff. We got married because we had a kid on the way, man. It wasn’t for love. Don’t get me wrong, I love Tash, but we were never in love.” Spike shook his head and looked like the world was about to eat him alive. “I think she’s been in love with someone else for years. She refuses to talk about it, but she’s unhappy as fuck and there’s no room for me to be happy when it feels like she’s phoning everything in and wishing she was somewhere else.”

“Damn man, I didn’t realize you had all that going on at home.”

“Don’t talk about it because everyone’s so fucking connected between her club and ours.” He glanced around to be sure no one was listening in. “Anyway, her issues are because of this other dude. We were talking about divorce before Griff showed up and then it all got put on hold because we didn’t want him to think he was the reason for it. Tash is cool with Griff. She loves the kid. If anything, I’m the one on the fence with him and not in a bad way, so pull those fists back.” He glanced down to see that I had balled them up ready to brawl for the kid. “You bonded with my kid, and I still feel at a loss with him. Every time I try to approach him to talk about all the shit that happened with his mom, it gets awkward as fuck and we both end up bowing out and headed our separate ways.”

I laughed. “That’s your problem.”

“What?”

“Trying to start from a past neither of you can change. He doesn’t need your apologies for not being there before. The kid ain’t stupid. He knows his mom didn’t tell you about him.”

“Shit, I didn’t even remember who his mother was, and I think that pissed him off more than anything.”

“You need to start like everything is fresh and new. Ask how school was, which girl caught his eye, what he likes to do for fuckin’ fun. Converse with him like he’s a man and not some little boy you never got to know.”

“Shit,” Spike huffed. “That’s the damn problem, isn’t it? I keep looking for a kid who needs me to hold his hand and what I really have in front of me is a son on the verge of being a man.” He shook his head. “I keep getting stuck on all the years I lost. Every time I look at Diesel, and he does some boyishly stupid shit, I wonder if Griff was ever like that and it pisses me off all over again that it's all lost to me. Polly didn’t even give me the option to be in their lives.”

“Well, if you want to make it really awkward, you could always have the sex talk with him. Demonstrate how to put a condom on a banana or some shit. Pretty sure the kid is still a virgin, so he might actually need to know some shit before he gets himself in trouble.”

“Fuck, maybe I’ll stay awkward until you have the talk with him, Daddy Walker.”

“Don’t ever fuckin’ call me that again,” I grunted, then shivered. “Dude, now all I can do is picture you in pigtails trying to seduce some giant bear of a guy.”

Spike threw his head back and laughed so hard he snorted. “You have a sick mind.”

“You’re the one who called me Daddy Walker in that voice. What the fuck were you thinking, asshole?”

“How about we drop it, and you figure out where you’re taking your new woman for your first date.”

“Your new woman?” I turned to see Tanya, who still managed to turn up around the clubhouse despite not being attached to anyone. “I thought you weren’t into dating anymore after Poppy left you?”

“Not really your business.”

“We were supposed to end up together, so yeah, it is my business.”

I turned on the barstool and stood in front of the woman who had been the bane of my damn existence for years. “Let’s get something straight right now,” I raised my voice so every other nosy motherfucker in the room could carry what I had to say far and fucking wide.

“I don’t give two shits what kind of crush you think you had on me when I first came to Sierra High. The only woman I saw back then was Poppy. You didn’t even register for me, despite your pathetic attempts to steal me from a woman who was supposed to be your best friend back then. That makes you a disloyal cunt to start with. Then, you pulled that shit, making it look like we fucked the night you brought me home because I was too drunk to get there on my own. I never fucked you. You sure did your best to make it look like I did though.”

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