Chapter 28 (Interlogue III) - 3:23AM December 1977
(Picking up from Chapter 14 - Interlogue II) In which Lou has another dilemma.
Lou looked back to face the approaching figure. “Hey, man, what I see is three strangers chasing a single woman down a dark street. You need to leave. Now.” He didn’t wait for an answer, but shut the top half of the door and locked it fast.
Turning, Lou saw Jax begin to back away. Moonlight passed through the stained glass window to reveal her distraught and fearful appearance. Jax’s eyes were fully wide, blinking rapidly, red and glossy from her tears. She clutched her collar around her throat, her long wool coat buttoned down to her high boots, a belt cinched tightly at her waist.
The night chill seeped into Lou’s skin and heightened the awareness of his raw appearance. After all they had gone through, he had nothing left to hide. Not his desire, not his shame. Lou knew that she had already seen him at his best and at his worst. He had witnessed the same of Jax.
Lou took a step forward. Jax backed further into the shadows of the step van.
“Don’t, Louie. Please.”
He didn’t have the time to fully fathom Jax. Not now. Her shifting moods, the way she came and went, beckoned and rebelled, had worn him down. Lou understood that her mood swings were not her fault. One moment she is crying for his help. Fine. The next she fears him as a looming menace. Whatever. With all that was going on he could barely manage his own emotional state. He took another step.
“No.” She whimpered and sank to the floor.
Lou stopped and picked up a blanket from where he had let it fall only minutes ago. “I’m cold.” Lou wrapped the blanket around himself and sat on the edge of his narrow bed. “I don’t suppose you want to tell me what’s going on?” He took a breath and waited for her to settle down.
Jax crouched in the corner. Lou presumed she had some need to see that no one was coming for her. He could try to be the calm and patient Louie, the Louie who would be there for her. But why now? This was the worst possible night to be caught up in Jax’s drama. Too much was at stake.
“I didn’t know where else to go.”
“You could go home.”
Jax mumbled something, then repeated it for Lou’s ears. “I wanted to be with you.”
Lou kept himself from reading too much into her words. He reached down for a second blanket and tucked it around his legs. “What happened?”
She put her arms around her knees and her head down. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Lou had grown accustomed to this answer, never satisfied by it. He still felt a deep tangle of emotions for Jax, but his empathy was battered. He leaned against the mahogany paneling alongside his bed. The stillness of the night filled his ears, the darkness took his eyes. If only Jax wasn’t there.
Enough time passed. Jax spoke first.
“Louie?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ve never actually been inside here before.”
Lou sat up, realizing that, yes, this was the first time. And certainly the last.