Page 1 of Lessons In Grey

1

Rags

July 7th, 2021

Itook a long drag from my cigarette, leaning back against the damp brick wall of some old gas station in the middle of a city I had been living in for the last three years.

Malachi liked that I had picked a city to settle down in. He didn’t need me traveling like the others to complete his work, there was plenty to be done here.

I had just finished a job, actually. Some gun runner who got too big for his britches and needed to be put down.

I watched as everyone who stopped in for gas took their time walking from the pumps to the front doors, gawking at my car. Had I been some 22-year-old boy with light in his life, I might have gone over there and talked to them.

As it was, I didn’t truly care. A car was a car. Wheels and an engine strapped on by metal to a frame thatwas meant to draw attention. If only they knew I had won that car off the black market from some gambler in way over his head. He tried to kill me to get it back, so I put a bullet in his head. Some people just couldn’t accept the loss.

I flicked my cigarette to the ground only to light another. We all had our vices.

“Those things could kill you.”

I rolled my eyes as I inhaled the flame, the end coming to life, glowing brighter than the soul residing in my chest. “You’re one of those then,” I said on the exhale.

“How else do you start a conversation with a stranger besides insulting their vice?”

I slid the lighter away and spared the girl a glance as I took another drag.

She was standing feet away, leaning back against the same brick wall that I was against. Fuck, she was a beauty. Inky black hair, falling in thick waves to her waist, wearing a pair of torn-up cut-off dark denim shorts, lace stockings that hugged her thick thighs, an oversized black hoodie with frayed sleeves, the hood hanging onto her head for dear life, strange neon designs covering it, and a pair of dark blue high-top converse. Her skin was the color of porcelain, and as her eyes flicked to mine, I realized that I never truly knew the color green until now.

Big green eyes, impossibly big, surrounded by long dark lashes, her lips painted with a light pink gloss, a bruise on her jaw.

I studied that bruise as I leaned my head back against the wall, pushing back my hair. “Does that mean you don’t believe it’ll kill me?”

She looked unimpressed as she pulled out a sour gummy worm from seemingly nowhere only to slide it over her tongue.

I tracked that movement, my pussy-hungry cock already twitching as she chewed it slowly.

“Some author wrote some character that said something about a metaphor,” she finally said and turned back towards theparking lot.

I couldn’t help but stare at her, absorbing her words as if they were the answer to some cosmic question. “Gummy worms could kill you too,” I finally said, dragging on my cigarette again.

“They wouldn’t dare,” she said on a breath.

She was so sure of it. As if death had no right to control her.

I wondered what she looked like under that oversized hoodie that, had it not been shoved up by the wall, would have covered her shorts completely. “Do I get a name?”

She pulled out another gummy worm, holding it inches from her lips as she considered this seemingly life-altering question. “What is a name but a label given to us by parents who eventually just stop giving a shit?” she asked and slid the worm over her tongue, causing my own mouth to water.

Sour things. That’s why my mouth was watering. Not the fact that I had a sudden desire to replace that candy with my own tongue but because even thinking about sour things made my mouth pool with drool.

My gaze dried as I turned back to the parking lot, watching some guy in his late 50’s admire my black paintjob. “Daddy issues?” They all had daddy issues nowadays. Most women used it to get into lesser man’s pants. I, however, had learned over the years that ‘daddy issues’ didn’t mean what most of us thought we wanted it to mean. And even when it did, most men didn’t know how to deal with it properly. I wasn’t saying that I wasn’t most men, but then again, maybe that’s exactly what I was saying.

“God has fucked me over more times than I can count, but I wouldn’t say he’s the primary cause of my issues. What about you?” she asked, rolling her head against the bricks until her eyes found mine again. It was only for a second before those eyes dropped to my lips. “That car screams ‘mid-life crisis’.”

One corner of my lips flicked up. “I’m 31.”

She rose a brow. “I’ve been having a mid-life crisis since I was 7. Your age means nothing, but your trauma?” She turned backto the parking lot, studying something I couldn’t see.

Curiosity filled me. Curiosity for this creature that appeared out of nowhere saying such tragic things. I wanted to keep her talking, just in case she had any thought of leaving within the next few seconds.