Page 16 of Clean Hack
-7-
Something's Up With The Girl
Clean
For the longest time, I couldn’t shake the one conversation I’d had withher.
It really irked me that I didn’t really have a fucking name to put tomy little psychic chickother than that. I thought about making something up in my head but then that felt a little weird and creepy. So I stuck to the generalizedheror psychic. Sometimes choosing to play around with the latter, usually making up something that had to do with whatever crazy thing she made pop up on my phone the last time she called me.
That was something that still bugged me. For years I’d been talking to her—well, getting calls from her was more accurate—and I didn’t know how she did that shit. First, how did she always manage to get my number? I changed phones often enough, buying cheap burner ones at corner markets all over. Sure, I had specific places I bought them at, but they weren’t even in the same state as one another. Second, how the hell did she make that shit come across my screen? Those were things that I couldn’t even fathom. Maybe I wasn’t smart enough or that widely versed in technology.
Okay, yeah, I knew I wasn’t.
While everyone was walking around with damn smartphones glued to their hands, I had touched a computer only a handful of times since I graduated high school. Well, maybe a few more than a handful, but I wasn’t a fan of them. I only went to the library on super rare occasions when I was left with no other option but to look something up on the internet. And in case you were wondering, yes, they still made paper maps, and that shit was good as any damn smartthingI could fit in my pocket. It was also a hell of a lot smarter. You couldn’t track me down when I used paper, couldn’t pin me to a crime scene or even in the vicinity of one.
I was a leper because of this. Wasn’t right when you had damn kids seven years old and all they did was text. Sure, it made me sound a bit hypocritical, it wasn’t like I was out there having meaningless conversations with people. But at least I knew how to when the time arose. At least I knew how to look a man in the eye when he was talking to me to let him know I was listening. Or that you always held the door open for the person behind you. And not to mention that when a woman batted her eyes at you then you should smile and pay the fuck attention to what was about to happen next. Not that I was saying a seven-year-old should know anything about that last one just yet. But hell, maybe they were more advanced nowadays than I thought they should be.
Fuck.
I sounded like a crazy old man.
I kept telling myself that I wasn’t that old just yet but I was wondering if maybe I hadn’t gotten it a little wrong.
My point was, fucking manners. No one had them these days. And it seemed that they were quickly losing the ability to have a human connection. People were too busy getting lost in trying to keep up with everything that they didn’t take the time to teach and learn the important stuff. Who gave a damn if Aunt Gerta made the perfect pie and wanted everyone to know that shit. Or someone had the most…what the hell was it? Likes? Or whatever for something they put up for all the world to see.
Yep, crotchety old man right here.
Christ.
I needed a drink.
And maybe some kind of shit movie that would have me laughing my ass off for a couple of hours.
Back to the girl. Which I really had no idea if she was a girl or not. I imagined that she was older than girl status. I hoped anyway, or else I’d feel like some creepy ass motherfucker for thinking about her so much. Though, to be fair, I had no idea what I was thinking about. It wasn’t like I was coming up with grand fantasies about how we would meet and I toss her up against the wall and do naughty things to her. I really wasn’t. Because more than anything, I was just intrigued by her. I wanted to know more because she had been such a mystery. One that had been there for too many years.
It was strange too, in a way, to do business with someone but not know a thing about them. That was the total opposite from how I liked to do things. I wanted to know who I was working for before I took a job, before I let you into my circle. But then again, it wasn’t like I was really taking jobsfromher. It was more like she was…the secretary, relaying a message, maybe. One that I knew I’d be getting myself soon enough directly from the source itself.
I hadn’t told anyone about her. Not many people seemed to notice that my drive time had been cut down severely in the last few years. Or if they had, they never said anything. I supposed they were just grateful that I got there quickly and cleaned up their problem much faster. It wasn’t like I was in tight with these people. Hell, I wasn’t even really close to them. It wasn’t something I’d bring up just for the hell of it. And maybe for some reason, I wanted to keep it to myself. Plus, what the hell would I tell people anyway? I was sure that would lead to more questions. Ones that I sure as hell didn’t have the answers to. It seemed that I chose to keep it to myself for many reasons.
I couldn’t get my mind off the fact that there was something wrong. I could sense it the last time we…talked? Though I guess I’d use that word loosely because it wasn’t much of a conversation. But even in those few short words, I could tell that there was something noticeably wrong and I couldn’t help but ask. Didn’t get me anywhere though. Other than her telling me that the Dogs of Wrath were down. Which, kinda made me pause for a good long minute. Because who would have seen that shit coming? Really? It wasn’t like they had many enemies. Not big ones anyway that could come in and obliterate them so quickly.
I tried my hardest not to think of all those men. Men that weren’t exactly friends, but I’d been friendly with for years. It had put me in an odd state of mind for the long drive I had to take. It was strange, to know them but not really. To feel some pang of sadness but not really be able to justify it.
The thing that bugged me was how it seemed to affect her as well. I tried to bush it off, thinking that maybe she was much like me—there, but not really. And that, not trying to be sexist here, because she was a female she felt it a little more deeply than I did. That her emotions ran not only through her but out of her as well. And there wasn’t anything wrong with that. But then it got me thinking that maybe she wasn’t such an outsider. Had I missed something all along? I mean, I could have. I tried not to think about the wholeherthing too hard. Why try to find answers when I knew I would just be making up endless scenarios with no real conclusion? It was a waste of time. And a rabbit hole I didn’t need to go down. Perhaps that made me an asshole. Or someone not worthy of her knowledge or whatever. But I truly believe that it wasn’t just me taking. That somehow, over the years I’d come to care a little bit about my mystery woman. It may have been pathetic. But it was similar to the feelings I had about the recently fallen MC.
Seemed I was always there, on the outer rim, knowing but not really. Caring without a solid connection. I couldn’t explain it and I honestly didn’t want to.
Months went by. I kept busy. The winds changed and though I wasn’t on the in, I could tell that some of the clubs were shaking with some kind of uncertainty. There was something brewing and I didn’t have any clue about it. I could see it in the men. In the way their shoulders were more rigid. In the way their faces were more stern. The way that they seemed on constant guard. I could see it in the old ladies as they tried to stay strong for the club more so than usual.
It amazed me sometimes. How they would all come together in the time of need. And the women. If they were good ones, they would become something soft while at the same time stay strong for not only the men of the club but each other as well. I admired the old ladies the most, I think. It couldn’t have been an easy life, falling in love with men that constantly lived on the edge of danger. But from what I’d seen, in more cases than not, these women not only knew what they were getting themselves into but took on that role with amazing strength and power.
But back to the intense, buzzing, crazy energy that I felt around a few of the MCs that I worked with. It maybe should have bothered me. Also, should have made me itch to know more. If there was something that set them on edge then it quite possibly could have effected me, right? And while I did want to know, I mostly wanted tonotget involved. It wasn’t my business and I believe that it wouldn’t even reach me.
Being me, an outsider, an other, meant that I didn’t have many people to watch out for. It was almost as if I wasn’t there, you know? Like I was highly regarded when it came to needing a job done, but I wasn’t part of anything, so therefore, I was pretty much invisible. I more worried about the law than anything else. While I could imagine that I might be on someone’s list, I knew they didn’t have a thing on me. Cops. FBI. And what have you. No one could find, let alone pin anything on me.
So really, I wasn’t worried about a damn thing.
“Hello,” I said answering the new phone I’d just gotten two days before. Again, I wondered how she’d gotten the number, but shook the thought off before I could go too crazy.
