No apology whatsoever. No remorse on his face. In fact, he looked like I should be thanking him.
I still had that selfish, angry kid inside me trying to take over, but I was stronger than he was now. But sometimes, I let him take the reins.
“Listen here, you little shit.”
He recoiled from me.
“You’re the one who hit my motorcycle, then fucked right off.” I watched him swallow and back up a step. “Aren’t you?”
“B-but we’re going to fix it, and it’s going to be better than it was before. I’m a good mechanic, and Vlad is the best on motorcycles. He’ll be working on yours. You’ll be happy that this happened. You’ll see!”
“Happy?” My jaw ticked.
One clean punch right in his pug face. That was all I needed. Just one. Lucky for him, he was her brother. She would probably murder me if I harmed a hair on his head.
“My sister said your name is Cameron. I’ve heard about you. I mean I’ve seen you play. You’re savage on the basketball court. I mean, wow. You’re a monster. Maybe we can play sometime after your bike’s fixed. I can even fix your other cars for you. Or your friends’. I have a weakness for classic trucks. Just let me know. You want my number? I can—”
He must have seen my thoughts on my face because he stopped talking and started backing away from me.
“Listen, man, I didn’t mean to hit your bike. I was trying to run away from Big Tony. The guy’s massive. Bigger than you are. And I mean you’re already huge, you know? Just look at those guns. But Big Tony, I don’t have a chance of survival with him.”
“And you think you have one with me?”
“I mean you’re friends with my sister, right? Aren’t friends supposed to take care of each other? We’re practically family, right?”
Was he being sarcastic? Or was he really this gullible?
“You see, I had this bet with Big Tony, but I thought we were joking around, you know? Turns out, he was serious. So he didn’t pay his car bill when I came to collect yesterday morning. But my dad said he paid by phone that afternoon, so we’re all square, you know?”
He moved his shoulders. He was just getting warmed up.
“Anyway, he chased me out, would’ve probably beaten me up when I insisted on him paying. But I got away, you know? It was just that…I panicked, man. Panic mode activated. I backed away and hit your bike, but I wasn’t sure if it was damaged or anything because I put it right back up and it stood pretty good, man.”
I clenched my teeth. The reminder of what he did to my motorcycle and his nonstop yapping grated in my ears like nails scraping on a chalkboard.
“So I told Kar, and she said she was going to see if your bike was really damaged, because I didn’t even hit it that hard, man. She said she made a deal with you and that—”
“Quiet.”
He shut his trap.
“It’s bad enough that you hit my motorcycle. You didn’t even have the decency to own up to it. And you don’t even feel any remorse. But dragging your sister to clean up your own mess?” I curled my lip in distaste.
He pulled the collar of his shirt down. “S-she doesn’t always do that for me—” He stopped, looking at me cautiously. “Yes,” he said almost inaudibly. “Yes, she does.”
“You drag her down quite a bit, don’t you?”
He shook his head in denial. “It’s just a motorcycle!”
Just a motorcycle? Easy for him to say when it wasn’t his property that was trashed. It wasn’t just a motorcycle to me. It had sentimental value.
The fact that he was playing it lightly, and the lack of accountability, as if damaging my motorcycle were as insignificant as spilling a drink, pissed me off as much as that he’d done a number on it.
“You think because you had it rough when you were a kid you get a pass for fucking up someone else’s life? You think you’re the only one?”
I couldn’t count how many times I had to defend myself as a kid. Every day, I let anger take the driver’s side because it was easier. The world would see how miserable I was and maybe, just maybe, give me a break.
But it didn’t work that way, did it?