Joker pulled it away then poked Travis in the belly with it again.
Travis went for it again but almost immediately lost interest in it, what with all the toys scattered across the floor. He bent forward and grasped a red donut ring.
“Giraffe’ll get lonely, kid,” Joker told him, poking him in the belly with it again.
On his hip, leaning into his hand on the ring, Travis’s head came up to look at Joker. He then pushed fully forward and crawled across the toys, dragging the ring with him, heading toward Joker. He pounded his hands, including the one with the ring, into Joker’s chest, and Joker fell on his back.
Travis emitted a little giggle before he carried the now forgotten donut with him to the best toy ever.
The living, breathing, biker jungle gym.
He crawled on top of Joker, banging him with his donut, as Joker put his hands to Travis’s sides, where he was most ticklish.
Then he tickled.
No little giggles at that, Travis let loose and that was when I watched biker and baby fake wrestle on the floor among a bunch of toys, Joker letting Travis win while getting clocked repeatedly in the face, head, neck, shoulders, and chest by a plastic red donut.
Joker took it smiling, sometimes chuckling, and giving his full attention to my son, who was no longer crying but having the time of his life.
I watched it smiling and knowing without any doubts that I’d have more moments like that. Moments when Joker would do something where I’d know straightaway I was falling in love with him. And I watched it loving that I knew Joker would give that to me at the same time loving that he was giving what he was giving to my son.
Then I kept watching as Joker grabbed Travis and lifted him up in the air, sent him flying a few inches, Travis’s laughter pealed through the room, and Joker caught him, bringing him down to his face.
“Now, boy, this place ain’t so bad, is it?” he asked.
Travis’s reply was to conk Joker on the cheekbone with the donut he hadn’t let go and shout, “Bah la dah!”
“That’s what I thought,” Joker muttered.
I drew in breath through my nose and did it deeply to control the emotion swelling inside me.
Then I went to the kitchen and got myself a soda.
A brand name one.
One a biker named Joker put in my fridge.
Joker
The next day, safety glasses and gloves on, welding gun in his hand, sparks flying, Joker heard, “Joke! Cherry wants to talk to you in the office!”
He turned from the metal he was working on to see Roscoe at the top of the stairs that led to the office through the garage of Ride. When Roscoe got his gaze, he jerked his head to the closed door then turned and jogged down the stairs.
Joker dealt with the equipment, pulled off his gloves and glasses, and moved to the office.
He was through and the door was closing on his back when he went solid at the look on Cherry’s face.
He took a quick step forward. “Babe, you need me to get Tack?”
“I… uh…” she shook her head, her long, thick, dark red hair brushing her shoulders, and seeing it, it wasn’t the first time she gave him proof why she was worth her man literally walking through a hail of bullets for her. “This is about you.”
His gut froze as he pushed out, “Carrie?”
“No, honey,” she said softly. “You.”
“Me what?” he asked curtly.
“Twenty minutes ago, I got a call from Wilde and Hay,” she told him.
“Say again?” he asked.
“Wilde and Hay,” she repeated.
“What the fuck is that?”
Her brows drew together. “You don’t know Wilde and Hay?”
Joker began to get impatient. “Respect, Cherry, but got shit I wanna get done today on my car and Carrie’s got the day shift. Means I wanna be at her house when she’s there, which means I gotta get shit done.”
“Wilde and Hay is a magazine, Joker,” she informed him.
“Right, and…?” he prompted.
“A very good magazine,” she kept on. “Glossy. Respected. They do serious stuff, big-time exposés. They also do in-depth interviews with celebrities. Not the ass-kissing kind. The no-bullshit kind. They get into politics. They do travel spreads. They do reviews of movies, music, TV. They dig into social issues. They use the best photographers—”
Joker cut her off, “Babe, not sure why you’re tellin’ me this.”
“They want to do an article on Ride.”
Joker stared.
Then he grinned. “Fuckin’ awesome.”
“Yes, Joke,” she said softly, watching him intently. “They said they want to interview the brothers who do the builds but with a focus on the brothers who do the designs. They sent me pictures of the builds they want to feature and asked for the brothers who designed those builds specifically. I just got their email.” She reached a hand to her computer. “And these are the builds they want to feature.”
She pushed her monitor around and he looked down at it. There was an email open with pictures on it. She put her hand to her mouse and scrolled down.
There were six builds. They were all his.
“In other words, Joke,” she said as he watched the images scroll, “they want you.”
He looked back to her.
“They’re sending Henry Gagnon,” she kept going. “And before you ask, he’s the freaking best photographer out there. He does celebrities. He does models. He goes to war-torn nations and he does that. He does everything. He had an exhibit at the Denver Art Museum, and I dragged Tack to it and even Tack said the guy was the shit. Because he just is. And they want him taking pictures of your builds, you building them, and you.”
“If you’re askin’, tell ’em yes. It’ll be good for Ride,” Joker said to her. “But there’s more than just me to any build, Cherry. They come, they focus on all we do here.”
Her head tipped to the side, “I don’t think you—”
She didn’t finish because the door to the front opened and they both looked that way to watch Tack walk through.
He smiled at his old lady but then he looked to Joker and came direct to him.
Joker knew by the expression on Tack’s face and what came next that Cherry had called her husband with this news.
And what came next was that Tack walked right to him, lifted his hand, gripped Joker at the back of the neck, and yanked him forward.
At this, Joker went still.
He’d seen Tack do that to Rush, back in the day when Rush was a kid and Joker had stood at the fence watching, and he did it still.
He’d also seen Tack give to Rush what he did next.
Tack yanked him forward further and their chests collided, Tack’s hand tightened rough on Joker’s neck as he wound his arm around and pounded Joker on his back, doing it hard.
But it felt good.
Then Tack fisted his hand in the back of his shirt and held him there as he said low and gravelly in his ear, “I knew it, brothers knew it. We wanted you with us because we wanted you with us. But Hop and Boz said straight out, you had the talent to take Ride to the next level. You did, and you didn’t fuck around doin’ that.” He pulled back but didn’t let go as he looked Joker in the eyes. “This is good seein’ as my woman’s baby crazy, and I reckon by the time we’re done I’ll be forkin’ out about twelve college tuitions.” He grinned big. “And you’re gonna make it so I can afford that.”
Joker could say nothing. Taking in the look on Tack’s face, gratification, pride, respect, feeling all Tack just gave him, his mind couldn’t bring up words.
Luckily, at this juncture, Cherry butted in.
“After Cut turned up the oven when I was cooking brownies and incinerated them and the pan they were in, I’ve decided I don’t want another child, because I may not cook often but my husband’s good at it and I like shoes, not to have to buy new kitchen items every other week. In other words, since we have our hands
full, I’m pushing Shy to get his shit together so he and Tab can essentially give me a baby by having their own. That way, their kid can incinerate brownies and I get to laugh but my pans are safe.”
Tack let Joker go to turn to his wife and the look he’d been giving Joker was gone.
Completely.
Now he looked sick.
“Do not say that shit to me again,” he ordered.
“What shit?” Cherry asked, looking confused.
“Talkin’ to me about my baby girl pushin’ out a kid.”
“Tack, she’s gonna do it,” Cherry pointed out.
“Yeah, she is, and I’ll have to deal with it when she does. But I do not fuckin’ gotta talk about it before it happens,” Tack growled.
Cherry smiled huge at him.
Tack turned his pissed off mug Joker’s way and said tersely, “Proud a’ you, brother. This is gonna be huge for Ride. We had attention, not on this scale. You got us that with your talent. We knew it the minute we saw your drawings that you had it in you to make them real. Your builds are outstanding, Joke, and I’m fuckin’ thrilled they’re gonna get the attention they deserve.”
After that, with a scowl at his woman, he turned and stormed out of the office.
Joker stood unmoving, staring at the door.
“They are,” Cherry said quietly, and Joker forced his eyes to her. “They are and you are.” She went on. “I’ve seen a lot of cars and bikes come out of this garage, Joker, and they’ve always been spectacular. But your stuff is beyond the beyond.”
He didn’t know what to do with that or all it made him feel on top of all Tack made him feel, so he just said, “Thanks.”
“You giving Ride this, you’re doing a lot for your brothers,” she went on. “Tack does the books, and since you started your builds, income from the garage has risen twenty-seven percent. We always had a waiting list for clients but that was usually six months out. Now it’s over a year, so that goodness isn’t going to stop, and I suspect that Tack’s going to bring garage expansion to the Club table to be discussed soon before that gets out of hand. And that expansion is all about you.”
Joker’s throat suddenly felt scratchy.
“We do well, all the shops, the garage,” she continued quietly. “But everyone likes doing better, especially when that comes with getting more. You give your brothers more, Joker, and their families. You should know that’s lost on no one and it’s appreciated.”
Still not able to come up with anything to say, he just jerked up his chin and muttered, “Thanks again, Cherry. And set it up with that magazine. Whenever they’re ready, I’ll be here.”
“Okay, honey,” she replied softly.
Joker nodded to her and took off.
He went back to work liking a fuckuva lot what he was feeling.
He also got it.
It was about what he did, what he loved doing getting recognized. It felt good, that shit coming from out there, outside this garage, outside their world.
It felt better coming from his brothers.
But it was more.
As he worked, he came to the understanding that he would never pay back the people in his life who put him right there. Who gave all they could give to keep him sane and show him there was goodness in this world, which kept him from being buried under the dark.
But they didn’t need payback. If you’re a good person, you do good things. Simple as that.
But they knew, like Joker now knew, that good built good. So what they gave Joker meant that he’d not lost hold. Didn’t give up and become a junkie, a felon, a jackhole banging women on his couch, drinking himself sloppy, or making babies only to fill their lives full of black.
Instead, he was in the position to give back. To his brothers. To Carissa. To Travis.
The good he got from the people who cared about him set him up to return it, maybe not to them, but to people who deserved it.
And that was what it was all about. The meaning of life. Why every person on the planet was there.
They got what they gave and then they gave what they got, and it was the measure of you if you could endure the shit that came with life and still find it in you to focus on the good and put that out there.
He was that man.
And he was glad to be that man.
So he kept working, giving goodness to his brothers until it was time to call it quits and go home to his woman and her boy, where they’d also give him goodness they didn’t know they gave just by breathing.
And he would take it.
And give it back.
Carissa
It was late when I got home. I’d had an unusual afternoon shift that Sharon tried not to give me when I had Travis, but she couldn’t play favorites, so it happened.
I heard the TV on but saw no Joker in the kitchen so I plopped my purse on the counter, walked through the kitchen, and into the living room.
I stopped dead when I saw Big Petey, Roscoe, and Boz lounged all over my couch, along with Joker.
“Yo, girl,” Big Petey said to the TV but lifted the beer bottle in his hand as a greeting to me.
“Carrie,” Roscoe also said to the TV with no beer bottle lift.
“Babe, lookin’ good,” Boz stated, his head turned my way, his grin devilish.
I grinned back at Boz then gave my attention to Joker as his eyes came over the back of the couch.
“Boys are over,” he told me unnecessarily. “Travis is down.”
“Okay, sweetie,” I said, knowing it was past his bedtime, glad he was getting his sleep, but disappointed all the same that I didn’t get a cuddle in before he got that way.
Boz turned his head to Joker.
“Sweetie,” he muttered.
“Fuck off,” Joker replied.
I ignored that since I had a priority task at hand and went about doing it. This meant I walked to Travis’s room. The door was closed against the sound of the TV. I was okay with this considering I’d also noted the baby monitor was sitting on the coffee table by Joker’s feet.
I checked my son, putting my hand to his chest, feeling his warmth, his steady breathing. Then I lifted my hand to my mouth, touched the tips of my fingers to my lips, then put them to his soft, chubby cheek.
He didn’t move. He was out.
Quietly, I left the room and carefully closed the door behind me.
When I got out to the living room/dining area, Joker’s eyes were again to me.
“He okay?” he asked.
Gosh, he was so amazing.
“Yeah,” I answered. “Can I… um, talk to you?”
His brows drew together, then he looked to the men before he pushed up to his feet.
I took in the guys lounged on my couch, unmoving, eyes glued to the screen, bottles of beers in their hands and scattered over surfaces. There was a burly guy with a pointy beard and a bald head wearing strange glasses on the TV talking while sparks flew in a cement room behind him.
I had no idea what that program was, just that it probably wouldn’t interest me. I wasn’t into sparks flying.
Then again, who knew? I thought I wasn’t into bikers and I was really wrong about that.
I also had a feeling I liked, seeing my big couch covered in men drinking beer. I’d picked it hoping one day it would get crawled all over by babies and then lounged all over by babies grown big.
But I’d take bikers.
For now.
I felt Joker get close and I looked to him right before I turned away and walked down the hall.
I went right to my room and Joker followed me.
I took four steps in and turned to see Joker closing the door behind him.
He stayed right in front of the door.
I thought this was strange but I didn’t comment on it.
I asked, “Something you should have told me?”
He looked toward the wall on the other side of which was the living room then back to me.
“Shoulda said somethin’, B
utterfly,” he said quietly. “You don’t want the boys around, that’s cool. I’ll go out and—”
I threw out a hand and spoke, interrupting him. “They’re welcome here whenever you want them here. Or whenever they want to show up. That’s not it.”
His head jerked and he asked, “If that’s not it then what is it?”
“Something you should have shared yesterday,” I pressed.
“Carrie, just spit it out.”
“Wilde and Hay?”
Joker’s expression turned funny.
“Tyra called me,” I told him. “She said she got the call yesterday and she told you yesterday.”
I waited, he didn’t reply, so I kept going.
“She told you yesterday but you didn’t mention it to me.”
Joker just kept looking funny and doing it not saying anything.
“Sweetheart, that’s huge.”
He shrugged.
I stared.
“Carson, that’s amazing,” I kept at him.
“Build cars for a livin’, Carrie. Ride’s got press before. This isn’t out of the ordinary.”
“It is,” I said softly. “Because this isn’t about Ride. According to Ty-Ty, it’s about you.”
“It’s about both.”
“It’s about you.”
We stared at each other. This lasted a while.
To get past it, which would bring me to maybe getting a hello kiss (belatedly), I stated, “You’re magnificent, Carson Steele. And if you wanna pass this off as nothing, okay. You’re a manly man biker. I have to give that to you. But everyone knows it’s incredible. You’re incredible. So we can know that and you can go about your business. I’ll do cartwheels later and then maybe share a bottle of champagne with the old ladies. You don’t have to be involved. Now, that’s done and I want a hello kiss.”
“That, I’ll oblige,” he muttered, his lips curved up, all this while coming to me and promptly obliging.
When he finished obliging, I had my arms around his shoulders, one hand in his hair, and was pressing myself close.
“Go, commune with your brothers,” I ordered a little breathlessly. “I need a snack and then I need to go to bed. I have a day shift tomorrow.”
“Get rid of them soon’s the show’s over,” he told me.