Total pages in book: 160
Estimated words: 163089 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 815(@200wpm)___ 652(@250wpm)___ 544(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 163089 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 815(@200wpm)___ 652(@250wpm)___ 544(@300wpm)
Now that she’s become head nurse, her responsibilities have doubled rather than decreased.
“Don’t worry about it, Mom. I’m the one who should be sorry. Tonight’s game will probably make the ER busier.”
“Don’t be silly. It’s not your fault.” She pauses. “How does it feel beating your biggest rival?”
“Awesome.”
“That’s my boy.”
“You know it.”
“I’m so proud of you, Marcus. Have I told you that lately?”
“Maybe twice today.”
“Not enough.” She laughs, but it slowly fizzles out. “So tell me. Were they there tonight?”
I don’t have to ask who “they” are.
They are the others.
The people whose existence alone threatens the life Mom and I have.
“No,” I say, leaning against my bike, my eyes on the dark sky.
The night air is sharp, numbing my face and pushing through my leather jacket until it settles in my bones.
“Are you lying to me?” There’s suspicion threaded through Mom’s chastising tone, and honestly, she has every reason to feel it.
“Of course not. I think you scared them away the other day.”
“Good,” she says assertively, and I smile to myself.
Let’s just say our nosy neighbors got a front-row seat to Mom chasing away Andrew, the sperm donor of yours truly, and his buff goons with a sizzling-hot iron.
As entertaining as that scene was, she won’t get out of it unscathed a second time.
Dad might tolerate her threats once or twice, but he’s not a patient man.
“If they bother you at school or at your games, you’ll let me know, right?”
“Of course.” Not.
I love my mother, but her methods of starting a fight with my father don’t work.
If anything, he might finally decide that she’s more trouble than convenience and get rid of her.
A scenario that won’t happen on my watch.
“I’ll leave you to it,” I say when I hear someone talking to her at the other end.
“Don’t party too hard.”
“Aye, captain.”
She laughs, but she reminds me to eat properly and to be safe before hanging up.
It’s the same mantra she’s recited for years.
Being a single mother is tough in general, but it’s particularly hard in our part of town. I’ve tried my best to stay out of trouble, but as I was growing up, people kept…testing me.
So I punched them, made them bleed and beg for mercy that would never come.
And Mom had to be called out to talk some sense into me. After the first few times, though, I started to learn how to indulge in my destructive habits without her finding out.
In alleys. In hidden nooks. Places only delinquents like me frequented.
Though, for me, it was never really about the anger issues most of those delinquents suffered from. I don’t have those, and I’m in full control of my emotions.
But I love the sound of crunching bones, the feel of flesh against flesh, the sight of blood.
The sensation of taking someone down and watching them flounder at my nonexistent mercy.
It’s power and control that I crave, not violence for violence’s sake.
Mom thinks the fighting, the hitting, and the urge to hurt were just a phase that straightened itself out once I picked up hockey.
Fine. Let’s say it did.
The last thing I want is to worry her or add weight to her shoulders. She’s given me everything since the day I was born, and I refuse to be an ungrateful piece of shit.
Not to her.
I took part-time jobs as soon as I was old enough, just so I could help cover the cost of my favorite purge method—hockey.
I wanted to quit in middle school after seeing how buying all the expensive gear was putting a toll on Mom’s finances, but she flat-out refused to let me do that.
“This is the first thing you’ve actually asked of me, and I’ll never allow you to quit because of stupid money. You do what you love and let your mom take care of it, okay?”
Okay.
In return, I’ll be an NHL star and give her all the money I earn.
That’s what I thought. What I still think.
In spite of the eyesores blocking my way in the downtown club’s parking lot.
Wolverine—yes, it’s after the Wolves—is half motorcycle club, half bar, and we mostly meet here to celebrate our wins and pick our puck bunnies for a celebratory fuck.
But the whole ordeal seems like a hassle lately.
Sex.
It’s just so…boring.
Yes, fucking others, pinning them beneath me and seeing them squirm gave me momentary pleasure, but it’s all so fleeting.
The thing is, even though I could orgasm, it stopped at the flesh level and never really touched me mentally.
And I’ve tried every hole available. Gender doesn’t matter.
A hole is a hole, no matter who it’s attached to.
But that shallow pleasure was just not interesting to me anymore.
So I stopped it altogether, for a while now.
Watching, however? That’s slightly more interesting. There’s something categorically intriguing about observing while others lose themselves in sex, letting their true colors show, even for that moment in time.