Fully Automatic (Bullet) (9 page)

Valerie came back in the room holding a glass of cold water.  She too looked disoriented.

Nick told Ethan, “The movie’s not over yet.  You guys need to stay.”  Ethan shook his head but said nothing.

Zane tried again
.  “There’s still plenty of booze.”

Val said, “What’s going on?”

“We’re leaving now.”

“Really?”  Ethan nodded again but said nothing.

Zane wasn’t done, though.  “Man, we could stay here all night.  We could even crash on the floor.  Brad’s mom won’t be home till morning, and she’ll be ready for bed when she gets here.  Don’t bail now.”

Ethan’s voice was cool.  “We’re leaving in the morning, Zane, so unless you have another ride back to school…”

Zane shrugged.  “Fine.  What time you comin’ by my house?”

“Ten.  And if you’re smart, you’ll make sure you’re not hung over.”

Nick, in just a few short minutes, had passed out on the floor, probably having overconsumed.  Zane said, “See you in the morning.”

Brad said, “Take care,
man.  See you next weekend.”

Ethan nodded, but he was not happy.  “Yeah.”  He looked at Valerie but wasn’t wasting any time moving toward the door.  “Let’s go.”  Val slipped on her coat and purse that were setting on the bench by the front door.  Val said
goodbye
, but Ethan left without another word.

That told Brad what he needed to know.  Ethan had no designs on the girl, but it didn’t stop the guy from feeling possessive about her.  They would definitely have to have a talk…and soon.

Chapter Ten

BRAD HAD IT
bad.  Over the next week, he’d even considered visiting Misti and begging for a little sympathy sex, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it.  It was going to take time to get over this girl.

Meanwhile
, he bided his time.  He was going to talk to Ethan.  If he could figure out exactly what his friend was thinking, he could maybe get a green light, and if he had that, then maybe he could pursue Valerie for real.  Right now it was just some weird attraction, but he’d like to act on it and see how it played out.

So he spent the next week working and trying not to think about her.

But it was damn hard.

He tried to write a new song too and just couldn’t.  He and Nick got together one night and even Nick could tell something was bothering Brad, but he wasn’t going to say a word.  He was perfectly content letting the drummer think he was under the weather.

He knew Ethan was going to be home on Friday.  They’d said a couple of things to each other on Facebook, but Ethan said he was busy with finals week.  Brad
did
notice that Valerie posted on Ethan’s wall a “big thank you for the awesome Christmas present!”  Brad used that as an excuse to send a friend request…and he was quite relieved when, the next day, Valerie accepted it.

God, he was pathetic, but he didn’t know how to resolve it.  He knew it was so bad because she reminded him so much of Leah.  If she had been Leah, he already would have asked her out
, and it would have been over with, whether she’d accepted or rejected him.  The problem was Valerie had done neither and really couldn’t at the moment, not with where her mind and heart were.  She’d given him what she could, and that was…nothing, really, but Brad felt like there was so much unspoken between them.

So it took everything he had to not beat down Ethan’s door Friday night.  Instead, he gave his friend a little space and time, but by Saturday afternoon, he couldn’t stand it anymore.  In fact, it was pissing him off that Ethan hadn’t even called.  Knowing Ethan, the guy was still holding a grudge.

He called him, though, and asked, “McDonald’s or Subway?”

“You buyin’?”

“Hell, yeah.  I work, but you’re a poor college student, remember?”

Ethan laughed.  “Then I guess I can drive.”

That offer oftentimes made Brad nervous, because he never knew when his friend would be indulging and, thus, impaired behind the wheel.  He had to trust him, though.  That’s what friends did.  So he waited patiently for Ethan to show up, and he kept running through his head all the things he wanted to say…even though he figured it would all fall to shit once they engaged in real conversation.  With Ethan, he never knew how things would turn out.  His friend was a wildcard, and Brad was nervous that their talk wouldn’t end well.  But there was no way he could hold it in, no way he couldn’t
not
say something.

Ethan’s
black truck pulled up in front of Brad’s house on time, a good sign.  Ethan was never on time if he’d been drinking or doing something worse.  Being punctual meant his friend was probably sober for the time being, and that meant the conversation would be fruitful.  It wouldn’t even be worth the time if Ethan wasn’t fully in the present.

So Brad walked out the door, careful not to slam it as his mom was sleeping late.  She usually got home around seven thirty in the morning if she left her shift at the hospital on time.  She’d gotten home even later than that on occasion, and she’d usually stay up for an hour or so reading until she’d wound down enough to sleep.  She was often in bed by ten or eleven, and Brad knew he had to be quiet until four or five.  During the week, it wasn’t a problem, because he was out of the house before his mom even got home.  The weekends were harder, though, and he’d just learned to practice without any amps if his mom had worked the night before.

Ethan’s engine was purring, steam pouring out of the muffler pipes, underscoring how the weather had turned cold.  The sky was gray and Brad knew they’d get snow sometime that day.  As he opened the passenger door to Ethan’s truck, he noticed his friend looked normal.  The music was cranked, an Amon Amarth tune, and the heater was blowing out warm air.  Ethan nodded, half smiling, as Brad climbed in.

After Ethan shifted the truck into gear and pulled back out onto the street, he reached over and turned the music down.  “How you doin’?”

“Fine.  Glad school’s out for a while?”

“Hell, yeah.  It’s kicking my ass.”

“I can’t believe you’re even doing it.”  Brad shook his head.  “Still blows my mind.”

Ethan ran his right hand through his reddish-brown hair.  “Halfway done, man, and then fuck it.  I’m never looking back.”

Brad didn’t say anything.  Part of him hoped it was true, because Ethan was an important part of his band.  More than that, though, Ethan was like a brother.  The guy was more a brother to Brad than his real-life flesh-and-blood brother, and he hadn’t realized how much Ethan had meant to him until he was miles away and never around.  As fucked up as the guy was, he was more important to Brad than anyone else in the whole world.  He and Ethan came from similar and yet very different worlds, but they understood and appreciated each other because of and in spite of their differences, and Brad had been struggling with his friend’s absence.

He’d never tell Ethan that.  He knew his friend and knew Ethan would give him shit about it if he ever said a word, so that—like so many other things between them—would be an unspoken fact.

And, because of that, part of Brad actually hoped Ethan wouldn’t piss on the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity his grandfather had offered him.  A guy like Ethan would never go to college by his own choice, but Ethan was no dumb ass.  Brad knew that if his friend would apply himself, he’d do pretty well in school.  Hell, he could take advantage of the music program any school had to offer and learn shit none of them ever dreamed of.  He knew, though, that Ethan was simply biding his time, doing enough to get by, just like he had all through high school.

Part of him didn’t blame Ethan.  Brad knew he himself would have been at a crossroads.  He understood the value of education, but college held nothing for him.  He didn’t want to be a lawyer, doctor, scientist, teacher…he knew exactly what he wanted to be, and damned if he was going to find himself tens of thousands of dollars in debt when more school wouldn’t help him progress to that goal.  Both his mom and dad tried to get him to do it.  His mother, after all, was a nurse, and she had had three years’ schooling to become an RN.  His dad had a two-year degree—something vague that Brad could never remember—but the man said it had helped him more than once land a job.  Now his dad was a line supervisor in a government office, miserable as fa
r as Brad could tell, and fuck it all if he was going to wind up like that.  He’d rather be miserable in the struggle to be what he wanted to be.

So, for Brad, that meant no college, no marriage, no kids, not till he’d made his way in the world.  He couldn’t be tied down.  He saw what it
had done to his dad.  His father had only said it once, heavily under the influence of alcohol, but it had stuck with Brad.  His father had felt trapped by his marriage, his bills, his kids, and even though he said he’d accepted it and was happy the way things turned out (in spite of the divorce), Brad knew better.  He could see it in the man’s eyes.  His fire had been extinguished.

Brad would
not
be that way.  So while Ethan told him about the brutality known as finals week, Brad also tossed around thoughts in the back of his mind.  Yes, he would make it or die trying.

* * *

They were halfway through the meal, and the conversation had dwindled.  That was when Brad knew it was time to broach the subject that had really been on his mind.  He rarely pulled his punches with Ethan, and he didn’t plan to now, but he did know he’d need to handle the topic delicately.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you.  What’s going on between you and your friend Valerie?”

Ethan paused, then finished chewing his fry.  He looked Brad in the eyes and said, “Why?”

No sense lying about it.  “Bros before hos, man.  I like her.  But…”  He took a sip of his Coke.  Goddamn.  He hadn’t expected this to be so hard.  What a fucking pussy he was turning out to be.  It pissed him off that some girls had that effect on him.  It was a problem he needed to find a way to fix.  He decided to come at it from another angle.  “I got the idea from what both of you said that you’re just friends.  I want to make sure before I make a move.”

What the fuck was Ethan thinking?  Brad could usually read his friend like a newspaper headline, but he was closed off today.  Ethan ate another fry and then shrugged his shoulders.  “I like her.  She’s a nice girl.  But, you know.  She’s, uh,
too
nice.”

Which was exactly one of the things that tripped Brad’s trigger.  He had a thing for the sweet girls.  He’d never been able to figure that one out.  Maybe because they were less likely to cheat?  He didn’t know and wasn’t going to question it.  Analyzing the fuck out of it wouldn’t change it, so why bother? 
Leah had been the first super sweet girl he’d dated, even though he’d admired many from afar, and—until the end when she’d broken his heart—she’d surpassed his expectations.  “So it’s cool then?”

“Yeah, but I gotta tell ya, man.  For some reason, I think she really likes me.”

“It’s ‘cause you’re a suave motherfucker.”

Ethan started laughing and set his drink down.  “Yeah.  That must be it.”

* * *

One week left before Ethan had to return.  The four guys had gotten together a few times, working on perfecting the songs they had, as well as
writing three strong songs and playing two gigs Brad had lined up.  The audience response was incredible, and it led Brad to believe, more than ever, that this was his destiny.  He was glad to see his friends were starting to believe too, because then he felt like they had a fighting chance.  It helped to play to a crowd bigger than fifty people, and not just any people—these guys were enthusiastic, headbanging, moshing, intense, hardcore metalheads.

After that show, the four of them went to a party.  They’d have to figure out a way to get back home afterward, and what made it trickier was that they weren’t even in their hometown, so Brad decided to go ahead and drink a little, but he’d go easy.  That way, when the party was over, he’d be able to get them home safely.
  Yeah, it was Ethan’s truck, but Brad was usually the designated driver, simply because he had more willpower than anyone else.  He got one beer and planned to nurse it all night.  He’d save outrageous partying for when he didn’t have to drive.

Ethan, Zane, and Nick were celebrating.  They deserved to.  It was the first time Brad had felt like the four of them had been a cohesive unit.  They’d moved and played together on that stage tonight.  Instead of moving like arms and legs on different dolls, they were coordinated, like the limbs of the same person.  Each sensed what the other was going to do.  They were in the groove and just
felt—yeah, they fucking
felt
—where the band was going, what was happening, and it was exhilarating.  If Brad could have bottled that shit, he knew he’d be a billionaire.

Instead, he felt like a million bucks that night, and he didn’t think anything could change that.  As if to slap him in the face and remind him that he didn’t have complete control of his destiny, the universe threw a wrench in the works.  Ethan, partying hard as he often did, got his hands on something.  The guy was fucked up and not in a good way.  A lot of times, even if Ethan was a belligerent drunk, they could work around him, manage his moods, and he’d do just fine.  This time, though, had nothing to do with how he was treating other people.  He was fucked up beyond belief.

When Brad and Nick found him, he was lying in a corner, his eyes glazed over.  He could barely talk.  Brad squatted and tried talking to his friend, but to no avail.  He looked up at Nick.  “Do you know what he took?”

“No idea.”

Brad snapped his fingers in front of Ethan’s face.  He wasn’t even thinking when he did it, had just been wanting to get some kind of response from his friend.  But Ethan seemed to barely register it.  He looked back at Nick.  “Go find Zane.”

Nick nodded.  Brad wasn’t thinking it in the conscious part of his brain, but buried somewhere
, he knew.  Every time something good happened, something bad happened to balance it out.  It was fucked up, but that had seemed to be the path his life had taken consistently.  Why would it change now?  He’d always known that he
would
have been the kid who’d gotten the BB gun at Christmas and, unlike the movie
A Christmas Story
, Brad really would have shot his eye out.  That was the way his life worked.

Now, though, Brad was trying to figure out what they needed to do.  Home was half an hour away
, give or take (and the roads were good enough right now to make that kind of time), but he knew there was a good hospital here if they needed it.  He just didn’t know how to get there.

He remembered what had happened last
year, right after Halloween.  He’d thought Ethan had OD’d, and he and Heidi had rushed him to the hospital.  Ethan had gotten in huge trouble and then later had laid into Brad, telling him he hadn’t OD’d.  He was “just really wasted” and his friend could have spared him a lot of trouble by simply taking him home.