Page 25 of A Brother At My Back

“Ah, yeah. You said you wanted a shower, eh?”

“Are you serious? You’re cool with me taking one?”

“Yeah, through there. I’ll get you a towel.” He opened up a closet door on the opposite side of the room and dug through a big, old, green Army duffel bag, pulling a towel free. I blinked and stood still, my own gym bag with clean regular street-clothes dangling off my shoulder and stifled a bit of a laugh when he smelled the towel just to make sure it was a clean one before he brought it to me.

“There you are, fresh from the wash.”

“Thank you,” I murmured.

“Try to save me some hot, eh.”

“I can try.”

“One of them wahine, then.”

I blinked, “Wah-he-nay?” I said the unfamiliar word, dragging it out slowly.

“Ah, yeah, it means ‘woman’ in my language.”

I believed him, he looked sincere and didn’t have any of the usual tells that he might be having a laugh at my expense. I’d seen enough of that type of cruelty, both from Silas and his friends, as well as at Sugars, to know what it looked like.

“I see,” I murmured and rolling my lips together, took a step back toward the door he indicated was the bathroom and shut the door behind me.

“Hey, I hate to ask, but can you leave it open just a crack?” he called out.

I opened the door a crack and called back, “Why?”

“No ventilation, the fan doesn’t work and it likes to grow things in there fast otherwise.”

“Lovely,” I said under my breath. “Fine,” I said louder, but to make sure that he didn’t get any ideas, I said, “Sit down out there against the wall and talk to me.”

“Sure thing,” I heard his back thump against the wall beside the door and listened as he slid down it to the floor. “What would you like to talk about?”

I swallowed hard and got to work undressing and setting the towel within easy reach for when I got out of the shower.

“How about you tell me what all those markings are on your face?” I said and then grimaced inwardly. “Sorry, I’m just genuinely curious, I didn’t mean for that to come out sounding so rude!”

“No worries, and they’re specific, you know?”

I laughed slightly and started up the water getting it as hot as I could stand it. “If I knew, I wouldn’t be asking now would I?”

“Ah, well, that would mean I’d have to talk about home, wouldn’t it?”

His tone gave me pause and made me want to pry, but just a little. I thought carefully for a second on how to approach, and finally asked, “Do you miss it?”

“New Zealand?”

“Yeah.”

“I miss it a lot, actually.”

“Then why are you here?”

It was a long, pregnant pause before he answered.

“I did some dumb shit and crossed the wrong gang boss and now I’m here. Could be killed if I ever go back.”

“Oh… I’m sorry…”

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