Page 6 of Skin Deep

She inhaled, then exhaled. “You always do.” She punched me in the arm again, lighter this time. “Get a good night’s sleep. You look tired.”

She stopped me from taking another step when she called my name.

“Love you,” she said, and before I could reply, she pulled off. I barely had a chance to shut the door. Only one of her brake lights worked. I’d fix it tomorrow so she wouldn’t get a ticket or worse.

The building was quiet when I entered, which was unusual. Lachlan and I were sandwiched between a couple of kids straight out of their parents’ house and an older couple a few years away from a retirement home, if they ever made it into one. Our apartment was a buffer between the two when the kids’ music started to rattle the walls. This usually happened seven out of seven nights. I wondered if they’d moved out while I was gone.

“And they say miracles don’t happen anymore,” I grumbled to myself as I turned the lock and opened the door. Even though I’d only been gone for two days, the place smelled vacant. It always did. It was a permeant fixture, like the thin walls and the occasional rodent.

The sound of flapping wings echoed inside of the matchbox-sized place, then a flash of silver streaked across the room.

“You,” came a breathy voice before it went up higher. “Ack!Fuck you.”

“Fuck you,” I said, setting my bags down, flipping the lights on. “You’re lucky I don’t open a window.”

“Oooh.”Click. Click. Click.“Tough guy.”

Newman was Lachlan’s parrot. He had him since he was a hatchling. He was smarter than most adults, and he was the biggest asshole I’d ever met. The only guy he tolerated was Lachlan, but he never met a woman he didn’t like. Except for Ivy, who he calledthe bitch, which was why Mrs. Jenkins took care of him while I was gone.

Newman was basically a dog with wings. He knew where to do his dirty business, and if Lachlan called him, he flew to him. Lachlan could take him for walks around the city, and he’d stay on his shoulder. He didn’t destroy anything, but he got his kicks by attacking people he didn’t like.

I hesitated before I entered the apartment fully. The lights were overly bright, too harsh, and I almost shut them off again. This place felt like a metaphor for my life.

As it was, it sucked, and it wasn’t going anywhere.

Heading to the counter, I went through the mail Mr. Jenkins—the older man next door—had left out for me. Student loans for a degree that I had yet to find employment for. Bills. More bills. A card from a company that hung lights for the holidays. That was the best one out of stack, and it was useless.

Newman flew from the branches in the corner—something Lachlan had built for him instead of always keeping him in the cage that took up half of the apartment—and landed on my shoulder. He pecked my ear like an asshole, and I waved him off.

He soared through the air, flying around the room, diving at me as he made laser sound effects. “Pew. Pew. Pew.”

“Next time Lach leaves,” I said, ducking when he tried to peck my head. “You’re going with him. You’re going to freeze your fucking wings off in Boston, you asshole.”

“Yo’ mama,” he said, settling on his perch and ruffling his feathers.Click. Click. Click.He had a little microphone that he filed his beak on. Lachlan had a real one for him when he wanted to show the little asshole off. Sometimes he said, “testing, testing, testing,” as he hit his beak against it.

Running a hand down my face, I sighed. I didn’t want his company, so I grabbed my bag and headed to the shower. I rested my hand against the glass, closing my eyes, letting the lukewarm water run down my back, wondering what I was going to do about a job.

All throughout law school, I worked for Yankee Stadium. I alternated between doing carpentry work and working as a repairman. Wherever they needed me, I filled in. It was flexible, and the pay was decent. But I had plans and piles of bills to pay, so I understood where Lachlan was coming from. There was nothing worse than getting paid on Thursday and being broke by Tuesday—if the money stretched that far.

The law field was saturated with new graduates. It was an extremely competitive field. I’d been on a dozen interviews, but I didn’t have enough experience to be hired, even with a 4.0 GPA. And the ones who offered me a job weren’t worth it. The pay was less than I made at the field, and the job came with no perks, even basics, like medical.

I’d made friends with one of the pro ballplayers whose nephew by marriage, Percy, was a seasoned criminal law attorney. He put me in touch with him. Percy had a penthouse suite in a high-rise office in Manhattan. Doors were always opened five seconds before he got to them, his seat always reserved in fancy restaurants, and he never met a criminal he couldn’t put the spin on in court. But he was retiring soon and selling his firm to his underboss. I declined the offer for a job because I wasn’t sure how I felt about him.

Besides, the underboss wanted to start me out in the equivalent of the mailroom, even though Percy had told him I had what it took to make it.

Criminal law was something I’d always been interested in and had a passion for. Lachlan had been accused of many things in his past, and many things he’d done, but sometimes I felt helpless when the charges seemed exaggerated.

When he used to run with one of the most ruthless Irish gangs in Hell’s Kitchen, I knew it was only a matter of time before there would be a charge that would stick, and we wouldn’t be able to help him. He always had to have a court-appointed lawyer because my family couldn’t afford anything else, and some of them didn’t give a shit one way or another. So that’s where I wanted to make my mark on the world. It was personal.

I turned the water on the hottest it would go, hoping to squeeze another few minutes out of it. Newman flew over the shower door and landed on my shoulder.

“Pew,” he said.

Sighing, I turned the shower off, refusing to argue with a bird. It never escaped me that Newman was a true reflection of my brother. If he ever had a kid, it would probably be as sarcastic as this fucking bird.

I got out, ignoring Newman’s squawking and complaining while I got dressed in a thermal shirt and jeans. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. For the first time in over a year, the apartment next door was quiet, but I was unsettled.

This wasn’t going to help my state of my mind, but I did it anyway. I took out my computer (the nicest thing I owned since I needed it for college) and set it on our small table.

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