Page 21 of Karma

“You want to just pretend what we had meant nothing once we get to Cali?” she asks, her eyes shooting lightning now, shining as bright as they ever get. With anger. Good. It’s way better than sadness.

“Who’s pretending?” I ask. “It wasn’t nothing. It was a whole lot of fun. And I had a really good time. But it wasn’t ever gonna be for a long time.”

She’s trying to catch her breath, her short nails digging into my forearms, which she’s gripping like her life depended on it.

“Why are you saying these things?” Her voice is so soft I barely hear her. I wish I didn’t. I wish we’d just gone straight to kissing and undressing when the door of this room closed behind us. I wish I didn’t still want to do that more than I’ve wanted to do anything in a good long while. I wish she’d just drop the whole thing so I didn’t have to lie to her.

“Come on, let’s not complicate this,” I say and pull my arms from her grasp, her nails tugging on my skin. I’ll have marks tomorrow and they’ll be a good reminder of her.

She scoffs and lays down, facing away from me. I put my arms back over my eyes to shield them from the light. If I get up to turn it off, I’ll just walk all the way to my bike, get my bourbon and drink until I remember none of this. And I don’t want that.

I want to remember every single thing about the time I have left with Karma.

10

Karma

Why is everyone in such a hurry to leave me? That question echoes in my mind the way thunder echoes across mountain ranges, with nothing to stop the sound. Must be my own karma catching up with me. I’ve taken lives, I’ve lived mine with no regard for anyone else’s… why should I get what I want? What I need.

We’re pushing it on another day’s marathon ride. It’s dark again, and the desert all around this lonely stretch of highway we’re on is like a soft blanket trying to wrap itself around me. Complete with all the dreams that have been mixing with the real world in front of my eyes for hours now. We should stop and rest. But when we do, it’s goodbye.

Every time I focus on his form on the bike in front of me, reality comes crashing back. Last night I dozed off with my back to him, but woke up with his arms around me. But we didn’t make sweet slow love this morning, we didn’t make angry fast love either. We didn’t even kiss. Or talk much.

We just showered, ate the rest of our food, gulped down the coffee I made then hit the road again. I wish I could just erasethe last two days from my brain, stay at the cabin, happy in his arms, in my mind forever. But this brutal ride is making even the memory of the magical week we spent in the green, lush forest seem like just a figment of my imagination.

Lights ahead materialize into a small town. He stops in front of a bar. Music is blaring, people are laughing and singing inside and the smell of barbecue is thick in the air, making my mouth water.

This is it. One last dinner. Then he goes north and I go south and the next time we see each other we’ll just be two people who fucked once. Or more like a hundred times. Made love, not fucked. That’s too dirty a word for what we shared.

The way he pursued me for so long, I figured he’d want to hold on to me once he got me. And the way he made love to me, made me sure he’d hold onto me forever.

But I now see that kind of thinking was just grief rearing its ugly head in yet another weird, unexpected, devastating way.

I’ll be fine. I’m always fine. And who knows when I’ll follow Reaper over the rainbow bridge? Maybe sooner rather than later.

I park beside him, take off my helmet and shake out my hair, glad to be rid of that weight off my shoulders. The orange and white lights from the bar are making shadows play across his face, making it look like he’s smiling.

“That’s it,” he says and my heart sinks a few inches lower.

“You don’t want to have dinner first?”

“I thought it’d be a good idea, yeah,” he says.

“But now you don’t anymore?”

There’s a fair-sized town up ahead and a motel across the road and it actually looks like the kind that has clean sheets and a clean bathroom. Maybe even a TV. If I could get a room without having to show ID I could just stay here for a couple of days and work on forgetting him. But nice places like that alwayswant ID and I don’t know if my fake one will work. But maybe I can risk it for one night.

“No,” he says, drawing out the word like he doesn’t know what’s going on. “I still do.”

Maybe he can get me the room before he leaves. I can just get some candy and chips from the vending machine there while he eats his steak or whatever here. But I don’t know if I want to ask him for any more favors now that it’s so clear he wants nothing to do with me.

“Are you as tired as me?” he asks.

It’s not just the shadows making it look like he’s smiling. He is. Kinda shyly. Like that first night at the cabin.

“I’ll live,” I say. If he thinks he’s getting a sweet goodbye from me, he has another thing coming.

“I might not,” he says.

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