baD kARmA INk

Wherein Gus is brought into the fold and, surprise,  CT’s mouth gets him in trouble.

8
“…yeah, so even though I’m technically out, I could still get called to go to war at any time.  But I think the risk is worth it, you know.  I mean, someone’s got to do it.”

Gus had some little redhead with a nice rack pinned to the wall.  Not exacty my type, even if she had a nice rack, but she was exactly Gus’s type, e.g. female.

“Hey Gus,” Carl said coming up behind him.  “Could we talk to you for a second?”

“Guys,” he whispered to us, “can’t you see I’m kinda busy here.”

“Now, man. Come on.”

I turned to the girl.  “Don’t worry sweetheart.  We’ll bring him back to you in a few minutes.”

We led Gus out into the backyard and around the corner of the house for a little privacy.  I handed out smokes and we all lit up.

“What are you guys trying to do to me.  I haven’t gotten laid in like a month. If you had given me another five minutes I would have been rolling down her panties.”

“And we could have gotten you two minutes after that,” I said.

“Fuck you, CT.”

“Hey man, think about how hot she’s getting just thinking about you.  Absence makes the pussy grow wetter.”  The two of them laughed. “Sides, this will only take a minute.”

“Yeah man,” said Carl. “It’s not like she’s going anywhere.”

“Ok, ok.  Hey,” he said as if he remembered something. “Thanks for coming out guys.  It means a lot.”

“No problem bro,” Carl answered for the both of us. “What are friends for?”

“So, Carl, that’s a hot girl you got there.  Where’d you find her?”

It was my turn to laugh.  “At work,” he answered.

“How long you been seeing her?”

“Couple of weeks.”

“You hitting that ass yet?”

“Dude!”  Carl sounded shocked, which I found hillarious.  You figure after hanging out with us for all these years he wouldn’t have still been a boy scout, but no, Carl gets uncomfortable at the weirdest things.

“I’m just fucking with you man.  I think it’s money that you found yourself a steady woman.  Maybe it’ll lighten you up a little.  In the meantime, we are going to have a fucking blast this summer, hanging out and everything, just like old times, right?”

“Sure, as long as we don’t start playing D&D every night.”

“So,” I interrupted, wanting to let Gus get back to his girl. “How would you like to make a lot of money?”

“Baby, I’m starting school in the fall, I could use all the money I can get.”

“Well, we’re talking a lot of money here.”

“What do y’all have going, a lawn service or something.”

“Nope,” Carl jumped in. “Something with less work and a way higher return?”

Gus leaned into us and asked, “Is it something illegal?”

“Maybe,” said Carl. “All you have to do is drive.”

“Drive, that’s it?”

“Yup.”

“And you’re in on this CT?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“And it’s ok?”

“Yeah.”

“Hey,” inturruped Carl, hurt.  “Why are you asking him.”

“Cause CT’s one of the smartest people I know and I don’t think he’s going to be stupid enough to fuck up his life over something unless he knows it’s going to be OK.”

“Fuck,” I prostested. “When the hell did I become the voice of reason?”

“Look, Carl” said Gus reassuringly, “It’s not that I don’t trust you.  It’s just that it’s going to be safer with the two of you than it is with one.”

“Uh, thanks I guess.”

“So,” he addressed both of us. “How long is it going to take before the pay out.”

“About a week,” said Carl, “But we’re going to have to get together for some walkthroughs and stuff.”

“Cool, cool.  Count me in guys.”

“Thanks, man,” I said.

“No problem.  I got’s to go boys.  That redheaded honey isn’t going to fuck herself.”  And with that, Gus weaved around the corner and back into the house.

“That went pretty well,” said Carl.

“Well, the man has his priorities, I’ll give you that.”  We started back toward the party, Carl in the lead.  As soon as I came around the corner, a hand grabbed my arm and spun me around.  It was dark, but I saw those grey eyes and knew I was in trouble.

—-

“A bingo hall?”

Kat had drug me back around the side of the house and forced me to tell her everything.  I was annoyed at myself.  I mean, after almost two years of not seeing her, after she broke my heart and I took steps to try and keep her from ever wanting to be around me, the woman still had the power to control my ass.

What the fuck is that shit?  I should be able to resist her.  I mean, I’m such a contrarian motherfucker that if you order me to do something I’ll do the fucking opposite just to piss you the fuck off.  But no, Kat says frog and I jump.

“Yeah” I said, hanging my head, ashamed.  We were sitting on the ground with our backs against the house.  My cup was empty and I desperately wanted a beer.

I lit a cigarette instead.

“And you weren’t going to tell me?” she asked, taking my smoke from my lips and taking a drag.

“I wasn’t planning on it.”  She handed the Camel back and I took a puff.  “I mean, there wasn’t any reason to.  I figured I’d say something to piss you off and you’d head back to Austin.”

“Why would you think that?”

“Well, that’s what happened last time.”

“No,” she snatched the smoke away from me, “I only left once you fucked Tiffany.”

“Well, I only did that because you said you only wanted to be friends.”

“What the fuck kind of logic is that?”

“Well, I figured that I couldn’t be around you, feeling the way I did and knowing that you didn’t feel the same way.  I couldn’t just stay away from you.  I had to do something to make you want to stay away from me.”

“God dammit CT, what makes you think I didn’t feel that way about you?”

“What the fuck, Kat?  You told me you didn’t.”

“No, you idiot.  I said that I didn’t want to jeopardize our friendship.”

“Same thing.”

“No, it isn’t.  When a woman says that, it sometimes means that they can’t handle the confrontation.  I mean, you just kind of sprung it on me.”

“So?

“So? Women aren’t like men.  We don’t want someone to just come up and say that they love them.  We need things to happen spontaneously.  Organically, you know.”

“Is that how it worked with your pre-med?”

“David?  Yeah, sorta.  He was sweet about it, took his time, and planned everything out.  In fact, I think that’s part of the problem.”

“Are you saying he’s slow?”

She just stared at me.

“You now, like he rode the short bus.”

“What? No.”  She gave me a goofy look.  “Dumb-ass.”

“Well?”

She hesitated, like she wasn’t sure that she wanted to talk to me about this.  Like it was a secret, or that she was having doubts about becoming a double agent.

“Well,” she said finally, “it’s that he has everything planned out.  He knows how long it’s going to be to finish school, what medical school he want’s to go to, the hospital to intern at, everything.  He even told me when we were going to have the wedding.”

“Wow,” I said.

“Yeah.  I mean, it’s nice to know where he’s going in life, but, well, it kind of takes the fun out of everything.”

“I can imagine.”

“You know, he’s never smoked?  Tobacco or otherwise?  He says it’d jepordize his chances for medical school.”

“So, you’re saying he’s a stick in the mud.”

“No.  Well… Yeah.  I guess I’m saying he’s pretty boring.”

“And you don’t like boring.”

She smiled. “You ought to know.”

“Yeah, Miss We-Won’t-Get-In-Trouble.  I figured that out the second run in we had with the cops.”

“Which one was that?”

“The one where we broke into the pool.”

“Oh yeah,” she said with a smile. “I forgot about that.  We were so stoned that we almost drowned.”

“Yeah.  Good times.”

“God, I wish we had some pot right now.”

“Well, I happen to have a beautiful bud hidden in my car.”

Kat laughed excitedly.  “Really? Go get it.”

“Uh actually, judging by the noise, I expect the cops to be here within the hour.”

“Yeah, it is getting kind of roudy in there.  Want to go to the garage and get high?”

“Yeah, but we need to say goodbye first.”

We stood and dusted off our asses and headed to the back door.  Both the back porch and the house were crouded.  The music was loud and the talking louder.  I couldn’t see any of the guys, so I broke a path though the croud to the office.

Carl, Lisette and Evans were still in there along with some chic with pink hair failing to hit it off with Evans.

“Hey guys,” I said to the crowd. “We’re going to head out and I wanted to say ‘bye’.”

“Later,” said Evans.

“It was nice to meet you Kitty.” slured Lisette. “You know, CT is not as mean when you are here.”

“Oh really?” questioned Kat, giving me the evil eye.

“Yes, he is much more well be-” she gulped like she was trying not to vomit. “Behaved. Better behaved.”

“Well, I’ll have to do something about that,” she said with a wink.

I turned to Carl. “You need any help dude.”

“Nah, the situation is in hand.”

“Where’s Gus?”

“He headed down the hall with that redhead.”

“Well, at least one of us is getting laid to night.”

“Speak for yourself,” said the chick with the pink hair.

I didn’t want to know what that was about. “Well, OK.  Tell him we’ll talk later.  Oh, and I think that the cops will be crashing in about 30 minutes, give or take.”

“What did you do?” accused Carl.

“Nothing man.  I just think that the party’s reached critical mass.  Later.”

“Later,” they chorused.