Our Turn

1

GEO

I NEVER THOUGHT THIS would happen.

I’ve got a kid.

A fucking twenty-year-old daughter who I knew nothing about, and now there’s a nurse on the other end of the phone expecting me to just get over it because apparently, she might need me.

What. The. Fuck.

“You’ve got a daughter, Mr. Klement. I know this is a shock for you, but she is a patient here at Detroit Receiving Hospital. She may need a transfusion, and she has a very rare blood type. Do you know your blood type, Mr. Klement?”

Jesus. Not just a kid, a daughter.

“No,” I answer, scratching my head as I sit in my black Suburban, the engine idling while I wait for a client to emerge from the strip club across the street. I know some people have darkened windows to look cool, but for me, they serve a purpose. When business is overdue, like now, the element of surprise works in my favor. “I don’t know my blood type.”

“Sir, are you sure? You don’t know your own blood type?” The nurse sounds suspicious.

“I don’t like the sight of blood,” I reply. “Never had it tested.”

I don’t like the sight of my own blood I should have said. I quite enjoy the sight of other people’s blood. At least the ones that owe me money. Or, by my own personal moral code deserve to shed some.

I’ve never been to the hospital for myself although there was plenty of time I should have. I’ve learned to stitch myself up when necessary. Crunched my broken nose back into place a couple of times. Taped up some broken fingers a couple of times.

I’ve never been that sick besides the occasional cold or bad oysters. I’ve never even had blood taken for tests, so no, I don’t know my blood type, and up until right now, I didn’t think much about it.

The nurse sighs into the phone before continuing, “Well, Mr. Klement, would you be able to come down to the hospital this evening and have a sample taken? It’s quite urgent. If your daughter needs surgery, she will need back up blood, and we are low. Family is best.”

I palm my mouth with my hand, still processing the last sixty seconds. I’d asked the name of her mother, and when the nurse gave it to me, I barely remembered her. She hung out at this bar I used to frequent. We shared some drinks now and then, but I don’t recall anything outside of that sort of connection. I sure as shit don’t remember sleeping with her.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t mean it’s out of the realm of possibility, I guess.

See, twenty years ago I was a drinker, not just a Friday night tall-neck or around with the guys, we’re talking pro level intoxication. There are whole years I barely remember. I gave that up a decade ago, but I had more than my share of blackouts back then. Even so, man-whoring was never my thing, even intoxicated, so I’m surprised, but anything is possible.

So, fuck me, I’m a Dad.

I shake my head, the feelings swirling around me, unfamiliar and distasteful. I don’t have family — no connections or roots. I’m a rock, and I like it that way.

People I barely know take from me, and I take back with twenty-five to forty percent on top. Or, if that doesn’t work, I take a few broken fingers and fifty percent. Sometimes more. Making friends isn’t part of my game, let alone having a family.

“Sir?” The nurse sounds annoyed, and I heave out a sigh that steams the side window as I look out. “If you want to do a DNA test, we can recommend services. However, right now, the blood test is a critical path.”

“Yeah. Okay. I’ll come.”

Besides hurting people as part of my business, I’m a decent guy by my own standards, and that means I’m not going to turn my back on this girl even if I never heard of her until today.

Refusing wouldn’t fit with my inner moral compass as flexible as it may be. Any fucker who would hurt kids or animals is a degenerate scumbag. Same goes for the elderly and vulnerable.

As hard as I am, I’m still soft in some places. I help my neighbor, Mrs. Morrison, get to the senior center, the grocery, and her doctor’s appointments every week, and if anyone hurt a hair on her head, I’d fucking obliterate them.

I met her one winter maybe five or six years ago. I was driving down the street, and there was about eight inches of snow covering everything from a storm the night before. As I approached her house, I saw something in the street in front of her mailbox.

As I slowed, I looked to see the something moving. It was Mrs. Morrison. Back then she could still walk, albeit with a cane. She’d gone down to the mailbox to get her mail, slipped off the curb and fell into the slush on the street.