She immediately perked up when the tour ended with the raucous clubhouse, which played everything from Latin hip hop to country to trap music.
“Girl, why did you even take me to your dead-ass house?” Sierra demanded after we got drinks inside as if I’d done her a grievous injustice. “You were hiding all these sexy AF bikers from me all along?”
Before I could answer that, she shimmied onto the dance floor with her clear plastic cup of beer raised in the air and her long braid pony extension swinging in time with the music.
It was like watching a party animal who’d been raised exclusively in city zoos get released into a nature preserve filled with her own kind. Sierra acted just as rowdy and flirted just as aggressively as the heavily tattooed women who usually hung out at the clubhouse. And I soon realized why I felt so comfortable from the start with the old ladies even though we didn't have much in common. Sierra was the kind of friend I naturally gravitated to, and she fit right in here.
As worried as Sierra had claimed to be about me before coming out to Angel Pond for her “investigation,” that was pretty much the last we saw of her that week.
She had so much fun, she swore up and down she would visit again in the spring. But the pandemic really hit the States in mid-March, and she'd been so busy at the hospital that she barely had time to text, much less pay us a visit.
At least she hadn’t for the first year after the virus upturned our lives.
One day when Antonia was about three months old, the doorbell rang, and we found Sierra on our front porch. Sobbing and stuttering so much, I immediately diagnosed a mental breakdown.
It took a few days and several crying fits for her to actually talk about what happened in Wilmington. But in the end, it wasn't an uncommon story. She was one of the many medical professionals who had hit a wall at her big-city hospital.
And suddenly, she’d gotten it—the appeal of living somewhere so small and nestled away from the rest of the world. Feeling crazy, she’d simply walked out of work mid-shift, driven herself to the airport, and plopped down her credit card for the soonest set of flights to Cedar Rapids she could find.
For the first three weeks of her unexpected visit, she walked around the house like a shell of the best friend I used to know. She volunteered to watch Antonia but refused to go anywhere near the clinic.
Then she did what she promised to do that December before the pandemic hit, she went right back to the compound and started partying like it was—well, 2019.
Ever since then, she’d been going through Reapers like they were a game she’d been sent from Wilmington to play and conquer.
No more staying in our downstairs bedroom. She kept guys for a few weeks, then left them for someone else—usually, this announcement was made when she was caught cheating with or plain walked off with her new conquest. This almost always resulted in some kind of violence.
I tried talking with Sierra about how the big, bad criminals she exchanged like her acrylic nails, were human beings with feelings, too. But Sierra had just laughed and assured me, “Aw, Mimi, they’ll be alright.”
Maybe. But at the beginning of the summer, my aggravated husband had to implement a “No More Fucking Fighting Over Women” rule at the compound. And by women, he meant Sierra.
I’m pretty sure the only reason he didn’t kick her out was because she was my best friend. Also, admitting that a woman could cause that much turmoil within your gang of brothers wasn’t a great look.
But I’ve barely seen her since she began her monthly rotation of biker boyfriends, so I’m surprised to find her on my front porch. And dressed in scrubs like she’s ready to work.
“Titi Sierra!” Antonia cries happily when she sees my best friend at the door,
She’s wearing a mask and, to my shock, a pair of scrubs.
“What's going on?” I ask.
“What am I doing here? You tell me,” Sierra answers with an irritated look. “I got a text message from Waylon saying I needed to get over my shit and take over the clinic today because you aren’t feeling well.”
“Titi, no cuss!” Antonia says at the same time I ask, “And you just did it?”
“Hel—”
Sierra cast a nervous glance at Antonia and substitutes, “Heck no! But Road Rash just about kicked me out of bed when I showed him the text. Wouldn’t even let me put on my dang mascara!”
Sierra flares her eyes which I’ve never seen make-up free outside the house. “Dude barely gave me time to get in the shower and drove me here himself. He said that if Waylon gives an order….”