Page 6 of Unmistakably Us

As a rule, Logan held his tongue. Not just held it, but bit the fucker so hard, he wondered if he’d even be able to eat pussy again. Why Michael had to be such a…fuck, I don’t know what he is. I do know he needs to back off.

These thoughts rocked Logan back. Somewhere inside, he knew everything Michael and John did as far as constantly harp on details and micro-manage him was to make him a better aircraft mechanic and keep people safe. But for some reason, at a point Logan couldn’t pin down, he started to feel differently when it came to Michael criticizing him

“Hey, man, if you wanna ride my ass like you do your old lady’s, the least you could do is buy me a fucking burger.” Logan knew he shouldn’t have said it or let his temper flair, but in his defense, he made a joke of it, trying to deflect the sting a bit.

“What is your problem, man?”

That was it; Logan was ready to beat his ass into the hangar floor. This asshole who had everything while Logan had shit couldn’t even be nice to him for one fucking day. Maybe if he had been raised like Logan was, he wouldn’t be so full of himself. Humph, classic case of someone who forgot where they come from.

When Logan first arrived, he wasn’t sure what to expect of the people there. His plan was non-existent. He had come here on a whim and wasn’t sure what he would do when he got here or how he would react. He was like that dude on the wall in that show his last girlfriend got him into—he knew nothing.

Logan had always been a fly by the seat of your pants kind of guy. He had turned winging it into a way of life, so he had no master plan when he Googled Michael or when he hopped in his piece of shit and hauled his ass to the Panhandle.

What else didn’t he have? Expectations. That wasn’t completely true. He had no positive expectations, that is. There were plenty of negative ones, and that made him think of the saying, “When you’re a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” My whole life when I expected positive, I was always disappointed, always. But with negative, my expectations were fucking exceeded every damn time.

Logan told himself this, attempting to justify his thoughts. That was a tactic that had served him well. Lately, however, those internal words failed to soothe him the way they once had. Since coming here and meeting the Reids, he was questioning everything he had thought and planned. Ok, so I kinda had a plan. An outline, at most.

What that outline didn’t entail was butting heads with his brother at every fucking turn.

Sure, he didn’t expect to be buddy-buddy with him. He didn’t even exactly want to be friends with him. Logan started to wonder if his sole purpose in coming had been to torture himself. Torture himself with a life he would never have, a life that was given to Michael on a silver fucking platter by the woman who had sung Logan to sleep and tended his cuts and bruises his father inflicted on them both. The woman who promised him every night before he drifted off to sleep that she would take him away from there, away from his father.

Whisk him away and be his mom and love him the way his own mother didn’t. But the months passed, and she never did. Empty promises from a woman he had trusted to save him. Then, after a year and a half of him believing her lies, she disappeared. No goodbye, no nothing.

That’s when his beatings got worse. His dad turned all his rage on him and blamed him for Lucinda being gone.

One night, his father dropped him off with an uncle and didn’t come back either. That’s not entirely true. They did, come back that is. His dad had showed up while out on bail awaiting trial for murder. The next time he saw Lucinda was at the trial as his dad was found guilty and she walked out of the courtroom with his brother in her belly and an apologetic glance backward.

So, what’s my problem? You. You’re my fucking problem, man. She loved you more than me, and you weren’t even born. You were why she didn’t take me.

You! You’re my fucking problem. You’re the reason I was left with that man, then with my alcoholic uncle, and then tossed back and forth between any aunt or uncle or cousin who would feed me for a while.

You. You’re the reason…for everything.

Those thoughts rocketed through Logan, leaving a bitter trail of truth in their wake. He had never said them, not even to himself, had never really thought them, or at least, didn’t realize he did.

In his periphery, Logan could see John wiping down his hands as he approached. Probably to protect Michael as Logan noticed he seemed to do. He was always in protective mode around most people, especial his old lady and her sister, Michael and his wife, and his own sister, Stacy. Not that she needed it with that big motherfucker she was with. He could level just about anyone. Logan made that note as soon as he came here and planned to avoid him as much as humanly possible.

Not just because he was the size of a Buick. He had some sort of shit, Logan couldn’t explain it. It was like someone staring at your soul, examining it while you stood there and watched, waiting for them to take your measure and deem you worthy.

Buzz was, Francis was like that too, but Logan had never felt that way around her—not that they had spent more than a few minutes here and there together. She just seemed motherly and concerned. That was a huge fucking black check mark against everyone in his book.

Here, they were with a woman who loved and cared about them, and they didn’t seem to appreciate it at all. It was something some folks never had in their life, and these people just seemed to take a shit on it.

John didn’t stare through you the way Dax did, or give off the sweet parental vibe like Francis, but he was like a rabid wolf when it came to the people he loved. What would John do if he knew the dirty things I want to…will do, to January?

Those thoughts fled as Michael visibly readied to kick Logan’s ass over the comment about his wife. His brother being the focus of so much of his bullshit became all-consuming. Like those thoughts were lying dormant under the surface just waiting for something to resurrect them.

He blamed Michael for everything. How was he to proceed now? How was he supposed to tell him who he was or hang with the Reids or January? Again, he would be forced to give up any chance at belonging and happiness, and again, Michael was the reason.

As soon as the truth was discovered, he’d lose this job for sure. John would turn his back on him if Michael did. They were close, and Michael treated him like a big brother. Like John was his fucking big brother.

That would start the dominoes, because if John was out, it was just one degree of separation before January was out. So, he’d have no job, no strip club to drown his troubles at, and no sexy girl next door with a foul mouth to ride his cock.

And…no brother.

Not that that was new to him, but apparently, at some point, he let hope wink in. That was a problem for tomorrow; right now, he had to extricate himself from the current situation without laying Michael flat on his ass. Retreat and reassess, that’s what he needed, so he swallowed his pride yet again and spoke.

“I’m sorry, dude, it was a joke and I took it too far. I’m man enough to admit I over-estimated…I mean, I overstepped as an employee, and for that, I am truly sorry.”

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