Loud: The Complete Series (A Bad Boy Alpha Male Romance) (76 page)

He’s rolling back up to
the stair set when I get close.

“You left me there,” I
tell him.

“Yeah,” he says. “Sorry
about that. I just—I have a lot on my mind right now.”

“Well, what’s going on?”
I ask.

He glares at me before a
smirk creeps up one side of his face. “You’re really something, you know that?”
he asks.

“What?”

“It’s all about the back
and forth with you,” he says. “As soon as I’m convinced you want nothing to do
with me, you start acting all sweet and caring and then when I invariably let
my guard down and something starts to happen with us, all of the sudden you
don’t want to have anything to do with me again. I think I’ve already been on
this particular rollercoaster.”

“Something’s obviously
bothering you,” I tell him, “and I don’t think it’s just that you’re pissed at
me.”

“Why do you care?” he
asks. “Seriously, I want to know. That’s not an idle question or just my
attempt at making you feel shitty. I really want to know why you care.”

“Because I do,” I tell
him, my voice wavering. He looks away, but I continue. “I never said I didn’t
want to be your friend. I just don’t want you to blow up your life because
you’re with me.”

“We’ve already been over
this,” he says. “Besides, it wasn’t even you that got me kicked out, it was the
work Rob did on my face. The old man was not pleased.”

I try to explain, saying,
“We’ve been over this, but I don’t think we’ve taken the complications as
seriously as—”

“Is there any way we can
just drop it?” he asks. “It doesn’t look like either of us has any new information
to share or a new position to take, so why don’t we just call it a day?”

“If you want me to go,
I’ll go,” I tell him. “I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

“I’m fine,” he says.

“Then why is this
competition so important?” I jump back in. I know what button to press, it’s
just a matter of pressing it. “Why are you willing to risk humiliating yourself
in front of a live television audience just for an outside shot at a
sponsorship? Why does it have to be
this
competition?”

“Because she’s getting
worse,” he says.

“What?” I ask, blinking.

He puts his hand to his
forehead like he’s going to run it through his hair, but the hand comes back
down a moment later.

“Don’t worry about it,”
he says. “It’s not your problem and it’s not your responsibility.”

“I’d like to help if I
could,” I tell him.

“Okay, seriously,” he
says. “You’ve got to stop bouncing between accusations and comforting. It’s
making it even more difficult to know where we actually stand, and it’s really
starting to bug the shit out of me.”

“I’m sorry,” I tell him.
“I don’t know what you want me to do.”’

“Just pick a personality
and stick with it,” he snaps.

I bite the inside of my
cheek and shake my head. “You know, sometimes people can feel more than one way
about something,” I tell him, letting that tone from the fro-yo shop return to
my voice. “You make me very angry sometimes,” I tell him, “but at the same
time, I still care about you. You can be really thick-headed, but that doesn’t
mean that I want to stop trying to get through to you.”

“We’re not together,” he
says. “I think I got that one loud and clear.”

I look at the ground and
sigh.

“It doesn’t have to be
like this,” I tell him. “We
can
be
friends if you want to be.”

“I’ve got a lot of
friends,” he says and drops his board back to the ground. “Now, I’ve really got
to get some practice time in, so…”

“Like I said, I’ll leave
if you want me to leave,” I tell him.

“Why do you keep saying
that?” he asks.

“I think I’ve only said
it twice,” I answer, hoping to break at least some of the tension. “If you’d
rather I wasn’t here, if I’m distracting you or otherwise impeding your ability
to do what you need to do, just say the word and I’ll be on my way.”

“I don’t,” he says. “I
don’t want you to go, but can we just drop the relationship talk? It’s only
going to end in an argument where we’re both repeating a few of our favorite
points over and over again and neither one of us is really going to be
listening to the other, and I just don’t see the point in doing it if we can
avoid it, so can we avoid it?” he asks, throwing on a condescending, “Please?”
just for good measure.

“The competition isn’t
about our relationship,” I say. Hey, if we’re not going to be able to get our
personal issues worked out, the least he can do is answer the question I’ve been
asking. “What’s the story?”

Ian closes his eyes,
takes a deep breath and his foot off of his board. He walks the few feet over
to the top of the six-stair set and sits.

It takes me a couple of
beats to realize he’s waiting for me to sit next to him. I make my way over and
take a seat.

“It’s my mom,” he says.
“Dad, he—I don’t know, he doesn’t mistreat her or anything like that, but he
doesn’t give her the kind of interaction that’s going to help her make the most
of the time she has left.”

“May I ask what’s—”

“She has early-onset
Alzheimer’s,” he interrupts.

“Oh,” I say. “I’m sorry.”

“Dad’s got the money,” he
says, “so he hired a home health worker to take care of mom, but she needs more
than that. When I’m not there, I just know he’s not giving her the kind of
attention that she needs.
That’s
why
I really need to do something in two weeks. Maybe I’ll end up doing an abridged
reenactment of Evelyn McHale’s most famous act and end up a laughing stock in
the skating world that everyone forgets about after a few hours, but I’ve got
to try.”

“I’m not sure I
understand,” I tell him. “How does winning the competition, you know, change
any of that?”

“There’s a place here in
town, it’s kind of like a nursing home, but it’s a day thing. I can’t always be
there for her physically, but I’ve gone by the place a few times, and they’re
fully staffed with psychiatrists and medical doctors and therapists and
counselors and nurses and other people for mom to socialize with,” he says.
“They said that keeping an active social life can help prevent the degeneration
of memory. I know she’s got Alzheimer’s and nothing’s going to make that
magically better, but when I can’t be there with her, it would just be nice to
know that she’s got more than a glorified maid watching out for her. Then,
whenever I’m back from whatever, I can pick her up and bring her back home, so
when she does have a clear moment, she’s not so far away that we can’t make the
most out of it. Those moments are getting fewer and farther,” he says. “If
there’s anything that might slow the progression, or at least bring her back a
little more often—I know it’s a pipe dream, but it’s got to be better than
being left in her own little wing of the house with only me and Jackie for her
to talk to.”

I look off into the darkness.
“I had no idea,” I tell him. “I’m sorry.”

“It is what it is,” he
says. “It sucks. It sucks really, really bad, but all I can do about it now is
try to make sure that whatever time she has left is as easy and pleasant as
possible for her.”

“You didn’t answer my
question, though,” I say in a small voice, feeling a little bad about
persisting. “How does
this
competition
figure in to all of that? Why not just tell your dad that your mom would be
better taken care of if she was—”

“I tried that,” Ian says.
“He says he can’t justify the expense. He says that when people say ‘you have
to spend money to make money,’ they’re talking about investments. God,
sometimes I hate that son of a bitch.”

“Wow,” I say and lean
back, my hands on the ground behind me for support.

“Yeah,” he says. “If I
can make the money on my own, we’re all good—and it’s not really that much in
the grand scheme of things, only mom’s insurance won’t cover it. Apparently,
social interaction in a day program like they have at the center is an experimental
medical procedure.”

“That’s fucked up,” I
say.

He smiles. “You know, it
just tickles me to hear you say that word,” he says.

“What word?” I ask.

“Right,” he says. “A
sponsorship doesn’t mean I’m a millionaire or that I’m going to start getting royalties
from skating games or anything, but it’s the last big step between me and
actually being able to give something to my mom that might be really good for
her. Maybe it won’t do anything for her condition, maybe it will, but I have to
think that she’d be happier spending some time with people who know what she’s
dealing with and can help her when she needs help and encourage her when she
needs improvement—god! This is so stupid.”

“What’s stupid?” I ask.
“I think what you’re doing is very sweet.”

“Yeah, I’ll try not to
take that the way it came out,” he says vaguely. “I worked my ass off to get
good so I could give her the best chance to get out from under dad’s roof, at
least for a little while each day, but as usual I missed that one little thing
that’s going to make all the difference.”

For a minute, we just sit
and listen to each other breathe.

A bit of a breeze is
trying to kick start itself into consistency, but so far it’s only succeeding
in infrequent bursts of cooler air.

“Maybe you haven’t missed
it,” I tell him and get to my feet. “Come on,” I tell him and start walking
down the stairs and in the direction of the vert drop.

“I don’t think I’m really
in a headspace where I can—”

“Shh,” I say, only
turning around enough so he can see my index finger pressing against my bottom
lip. “Come on,” I repeat and I turn back and continue on my way.

After a few more seconds,
I hear the sound of his board on the cement and he’s quickly at my side.

I climb up the metal
rungs of the ladder that’s never seemed to be quite to code—if there is a code
applicable to skate parks, that is—and wait for Ian at the top of the wall.

He gets to the top and we
don’t really look at each other.

“What if you’re right?”
he asks. “What if there’s just no chance and all I’m doing is killing my career
before it’s started? If there’s any chance, I really think I need to take it,
but if I’m just pissing in the wind…” he trails off.

“You said that you never
really felt comfortable on your board,” I say, finally looking over at him.
“How long have you been skating?”

“A long time,” he says.
“Probably since I was like seven, eight, somewhere in there.”

“I mean, when did you
start skating seriously?” I ask. “When did it become more than a hobby?”

He doesn’t answer, but he
doesn’t have to, either. I think I’m starting to understand now.

“Is she proud of you?” I
ask.

“I don’t know,” he says.
“Lately, she’s been—”

“When she’s lucid,” I
interrupt. “Is she proud of you when she knows who you are?”

God, I’m really hoping
the answer to this question is “yes,” otherwise, I may have just screwed up in
a monumental way.

“Yeah,” he says. “She
is.”

“All right,” I tell him.
“That’s all you need to have in your head. You’re doing this for her, right?
Well, she’s already proud of you.”

“Okay,” he says and looks
down at the park below.

He places the tail of the
board on the lip like so many times before. I’m expecting something to be
different in his approach, although I have no idea what it could possibly be,
but everything looks the same as it always has.

He takes his front foot
and puts it on the board, and he just stays like that for a few seconds, all of
his weight on his back foot. Then, he just goes.

Ian rolls down, makes the
curve and rolls out like he’s been doing it for years.

I can actually see the
moment when he realizes that he’s actually done it because he jumps off his
board, throws his hands in the air and lets out an impressively loud, “Woo!”

I’m climbing down the
ladder as quickly as possible, and as soon as my feet hit the ground, I’m running
toward him, cheering in my own, much quieter way.

He runs over to me and
when we meet, he picks me up in a big embrace and swings me around, my legs
flying behind me and I can’t stop laughing.

“You know,” he says,
“there’s an exhibition next week. I wasn’t going to go because the street comp
is going to be fucking amateur hour and the rest is all vert, but if I can do
this, will you go with me, cheer me on while I try to get good at the last
possible opportunity?”

“Let’s just focus on one
thing at a time,” I tell him, not sure adding to his vert commitments is such a
smart idea.

“Yeah,” he says.
“Probably wouldn’t be worth it. I mean, it’d be good to practice on an actual,
full ramp instead of this thing, but you’re right. It’s probably not where my mind
should be.”