Jaxx the Bounty Hunter
an excerpt

Jaxx Chapter 18

I stumbled up the steps and into the house, Olivia practically holding me up. Good thing she’s tall and I’m, well, not. I hit my head on a door frame once when I was a kid, and had a seizure. Afterward I slept for two days. I felt about that tired right now.

Olivia helped steer my body as I headed to the hall for Dio’s room.

Blonde Mary was near the doorway, and she blocked me. “Someone’s – ”

I paid no attention, could hardly hear her anyway, and just pushed myself past her.

There was a woman sitting primly on the edge of the bed. “Get out.” I said.

“But… I have an appointment.”

I didn’t care. “Not anymore. It’s cancelled. Get out.”

She fled. I glared at Blonde Mary, “No more appointments,” I told her, and closed the door in her face.

“Olivia,” I said, “I’m freezing. I know we haven’t been friends for very long, but would you please climb into that bed with me?”

“Oh, sweetie, already I’d do anything for you.”

Before I could tumble into the bedclothes the door sprang open, and I was grabbed from behind.

“Jaxx!” Strong arms enfolded me against a hard chest. “Thank god you’re okay. I had a bad feeling when you disappeared.”

Soul. I leaned back into him, my heart singing. His arms felt like home, his breath in my ear warm and erotic. “I’m sorry Soul, every time you see me I need to sleep.”

I heard a gasp, and looked up to see Olivia swaying on her feet. Her face had gone pale, and I watched her left hand rise up to touch her left cheek, fingers touching, then covering, each tattooed tear, as if they suddenly caused her great pain.

Had Soul tattooed the tears? My mind couldn’t begin to process or put it together, and I pulled away from him to collapse onto the bed.

He stood like a statue, staring at her. Then without a word he pulled his t-shirt over his head, exposing his well-muscled chest.

The eyes. I’d completely forgotten about the two pairs of eyes he had inked over his heart. Soft, unfocused eyes. Infant eyes.

I knew a lot of things all at once, but Dio came through the door and my eyes closed. I slipped immediately into a dream.

I think I dreamed for hours before I woke. And as I pulled myself out of sleep I had the realization that I had dreamed the same dream many, many times before throughout the course of my life. When I did come fully awake, I felt incredibly sad for no reason that immediately came to mind.

I tried to stretch and found I was hemmed in, confined. I almost let myself panic, but opened my eyes instead. I found myself tucked under the heavy coverlet of Dio’s bed, the man himself sleeping peacefully curled around my back, one arm tucked under my neck, the other draped across my waist. And I was curled up to Olivia’s back, her cute ass snug against my pelvis, our legs intertwined, and one of my hands tucked into one of hers.

Well no wonder I was too warm and felt like I was suffocating.

Whatever sadness I had from the dream fled, and I sighed and tried to relax back into sleep.

I dozed for a little while until Dio stirred, rolled away, and stretched.

I rolled also, onto my back, and watched him, and felt Olivia come awake with a start.

“That’s got to be the best nap I’ve ever had,” I announced, and they both laughed.

“You were in shock,” Dio said, “whimpering and shivering.”

“And it didn’t occur to you that I might need a hospital?”

“You weren’t hurt,” Olivia pointed out. “Just all done in for a while.”

“And that would have nothing do to with staying up all night gabbing,” I chided her.

“Of course not. It probably had a lot more to do with your family trying to kill you.”

I shivered involuntarily from the memory. "He’s not my family. He’s just an accident that my mother happened upon in a low point of her life. He’s nothing to me. Never liked him. What happened this morning could hardly even make me like him less than I already did. Pompous ass. Actually, I think it made me like him more, because now I know without a doubt that I was never wrong about him. You know, counselors and therapists all tried to make me admit that the reason I hated him was simply because he wasn’t my father. But I knew they were wrong. I hated him because he was ugly and manipulative and evil. And because my father was dead and my whole life was different. And because the Church is full of bullshit and he’s the one who insisted I not only suffer through it, but change myself to fit in.”

I stopped ranting because something was nagging at me. Soul. Why could I never do right by him?

“Where’s Soul?”

“Um,” Olivia said, and nothing more.

“Dio? Where’s Soul?”

“He took a break,” Dio said. “but he’ll be back.”

“Shit. I can’t do right by him. Something’s always happening to keep us apart. I was so thrilled to find him in my life again, and I can’t seem to hang onto him for a minute.”

Dio sat up. “He’ll be back when Olivia invites him to join the Team again.”

“Olivia?” I questioned, looking at her, confused.

And then I remembered how, just before I passed out, they were staring at one another in dreaded surprise. “Emily and Elizabeth – he’s the boy,” I breathed, “the boy who didn’t stay.”

She nodded. “I think went into shock same as you.”

“Well it figures I’d pass out and miss the good stuff.”

“No,” she said. “Dio came in, took one look, and eased Soul out the door.”

“Is he gone?” I asked, “Did he leave the Meadow?”

“I don’t think so,” Dio said, “I expect he went to the tents.”

I felt sad for him and didn’t want him to be alone. I wanted to be a good friend to him and hadn’t yet had the chance.

“Can we fix it?” I asked, the question directed at Dio but my eyes were on Olivia.

“I don’t know, Jaxx,” she said. “I don’t know if I want to.”

“Hey,” I said softly, “I didn’t want a new girlfriend. I didn’t want to trust someone when giving you my trust meant giving you the ability to break my heart.”

“I want you to talk to him, Olivia,” Dio said. “Talk to him and forgive him. He was young, and scared, and the young don’t know anything about anything. They certainly don’t know anything about life. I want you on my Team. But the truth is, I need Soul on the Team. There are less than two years before appointment of the next President, and I need the strength of his convictions and the absolute power of his persuasion backing me, if I’m going to be the one to finally separate Church and State. I need his ability to press forward with no regrets. And there’s one big thing he regrets. It’s the full and total basis for the man he has become.”

“If I go get him will you talk to him?” I asked, “Please?”

She nodded, and got out of bed, reaching to the floor for her cop hat. I watched and it was like she stuffed all her vulnerability and pain underneath the hat as she put it on her head. She seemed to stand a little straighter when that was done.

I got out of the bed and stood for a minute, checking to see if I was steady. My stomach growled. “Are the food people still here?” I asked as I stuffed my feet into my shoes.

“Yes,” Dio said, “It’s only early afternoon.”

“Okay. I’ll be back. With Soul. Breakfast was a long time ago, Olivia, you should eat.”

She took a deep breath and nodded.

It was Soul time.

I went to the food tents and picked up a couple of greek chicken sandwiches and bottles of water. Still no wine. How very disappointing. I would have to talk to Dio about that.

Soul was in our tent.

He was laying on his stomach, head buried in his arms, and breathing hard and fast.

“I hope you’re not masturbating,” I said, as I zipped the door shut and crawled in next to him.

“Not funny.”

“Sorry,” I said. “You know… I just met Olivia yesterday, at the psych hospital, of all places. She told me the saddest story.”

“The reason she was at the psych hospital, I imagine,” he said, without looking at me.

“No,” I said, “she didn’t say that. It was a story about choices, some of them right and some of them not so right. It was partly a story about being strong, and growing up. But mostly it was a story about the endless capacity people have for love, even when it hurts.

“Do you have any idea how many hours I spent daydreaming about you? And how utterly tickled I was to meet up with you here? I loved you, Soul, when I was still practically a girl, and I never stopped. You were strong, and kind, and knew so much about human nature. And you said… ‘I live my life one minute, one hour at a time, and I know that if I’m honest with myself I won’t have any regrets.’

“I’ve thought of you often these past five years, and I’ve tried to teach myself how to live with no regrets. But it was never so easy or simple as you made it seem. Never quite clear cut, when it came to making decisions, which way would save me regret. I always seemed to wish I knew how things would be if I’d gone the other way.

“I think I get it now. Or at least I get why I had such a difficult emulating you – it was because I never had anything to truly regret, so how could I have any barometer with which to measure pros and cons? You are amazing, quiet and still and concentrated, like meditative zen. You see your path and you take it, and you never look back.”

“I look back,” he said. “I look back every time I see myself shirtless in a mirror.”

I sighed. I couldn’t fix this for him. He had to figure out in his own head how to face Olivia. The past is what it is, and can’t be changed. I didn’t now how he could make reparation, or even that he should try, or even that she would even accept an attempt.

“Her mom gave me a picture, you know. Just a couple weeks after the funeral, while I was still crashing aimlessly through my emotions. Too late to fix it, I knew, too late to offer her apology, or make up some stupid excuse, or to tell her I thought there was time. There was no time, and I had no excuse. I had proved myself a coward, not a man. She gave me a picture and I carried it around, stared into their eyes, apologized to them a thousand times for not being there, for not doing my job."

He sat up, and let his fingers trace over the tattoos on his still bare chest. “And then I took the picture to a friend of mine, my mentor in the business, actually, and had him tattoo their eyes over my heart. Not their faces, I didn’t deserve their beautiful faces, which I had never looked into, never kissed, never memorized while they were alive. I only loved them after they died, and I wrapped that love in a blanket of self-hatred, and carried the bittersweet bundle with me back into my life, swearing that I would make better choices forevermore.

“If I were the same boy I was, I wouldn’t still be here. I’d have packed my shit and gone, run away, like a coward. But I don’t run away anymore. From anything. This is my place, I have good work to do for Dio, and I believe the world needs him, and by extension, it needs me. And so I will wait for things to play out. I will ask Olivia to forgive me, but I forgave myself a long time ago, and if she can’t, then she can’t.”

There was a small sound from outside the tent. And a voice, that could barely be heard above the rustle of the tent flaps. “Danny? Is that you?”

And then Olivia was there in the tent with us, her cheeks wet with tears.
“You should add their little faces. I think that would be the right thing to do.”

I looked from Soul, well, Danny, I guess, to Olivia. She was crying. His face was starting to crumple.

I reached for my food. Time for Jaxx to exit stage left. I pride myself on knowing when it’s time to end a conversation.

Yeah, right, Jake would say. But Soul and Olivia needed to work their shit out alone, even I could see that.

I headed back to the house.

And who did I find on the front path but Jake.

He grinned at me, and held up a paper grocery sack. “Isn’t air travel the most amazing thing? I brought the party,” he said, following me up the steps and inside. “A little wine and a little god’s green.”

“Oh really?” I asked, taking the grocery bag from him and setting it on the kitchen counter.

“Yep,” he said, pulling a small plastic bag out of his pocket. He held it up for me to see. What I saw looked a lot like lawn grass, and not at all like marijuana. He saw it too, did a comical double take, and asked, “What the fuck?”

I lifted a bottle of wine out of the bag, popped the cork, and took a long swallow.

It was water.

From somewhere inside the house I could hear Dio laughing.

[End]