The Echo in the Dark

THE CONSTANT drone of industrial strength coffee makers steaming, burbling, brewing. I took my place in the short line to consult with the barista and describe what I wanted her to do. I waited for others to recite the arcane poetry of calories and caffeine, knowing that my simple order of an americano was going to disappoint the girl behind the glass top counter. Under the heavy odor of coffee I could detect all the other things on the little shelf behind her. The vanilla, nutmeg, different attempts at fruits, but mostly the sugar that bathed in what passed for coffee, cloying.

When I had collected my simple mug from the saddened coffee artist, I turned to find a chair where I could watch the door. Even though I was five minutes late, I knew my appointment would be even later. She was always late.

It gave me time to think and breathe, that circular breath that was supposed to bring down your heart rate, that was supposed to center you, make you mindful. Eventually I gave up and gave in to the terror I was experiencing. It washed over me in a wave and then receded a little. She always did this to me, and even though it had been a handful of years, I greeted the familiar ache of anxiety like an old friend.

She and I had been a thing in high school. I'm still not sure why, I certainly didn't have the status she was always looking for. I was good looking but in no way fashionable. Even if I could afford the clothes I wouldn't have known how to wear them, or where to buy them.

I would say we were in love. As much as a pair of high schoolers could be. We went to dances together, hung out with the same friends, and skipped classes. She smoked weed with me for the first time, and I did a lot of things with her for the first time. She was popular and on track for better things.

The summer after graduation, I sensed a change in her. She was going to college and I wasn't. I spent the summer making up some school credits so I could get a diploma, while she was looking at dorms and checking out sororities. I didn't really get college back then. I didn't know why anyone would want to spend time at school on purpose.

What I wanted to do was get a job, get an apartment and spend all my free time having sex with her. For the first couple of months I got my wish, but she was drifting away the whole time, and I knew it. Eventually we spent the moments together arguing, until one night she broke it off with me over the phone.

I was heartbroken, and hurt. I might have gone a little bit crazy. Our friend group from high school all seemed to decide they only wanted one of us around anymore. The night I realized it wasn't me, stung hard. I had showed up at one of our regular gatherings, a kind of weekly booze and bitch session. She was there with a guy. He was tall, good looking and knew all the secrets of fashion that had been denied me. Instead of leaving right away, I got drunk and tried to start an argument with her, and a fight with him.

THE NEXT morning I woke up in a nearby park, covered in vomit, and missing a tooth. She called me that afternoon. She was mad, and made me promise to stay away. I tried again to make a case for us, but it was pointless.

The next time I heard from her was at the end of her freshman year in college. She had been dumped by the fashion model/kung fu artist, and was missing me. I was too young and inexperienced to know what was happening, I thought I had won the lottery. She came over, started drinking my beer and stripping in my little kitchen. I fucked her there on the counter.

Later that night on my couch she thanked me for being such a good friend to her, before I could tell her how much I had missed her, how much I thought about her all the time, she got up and dressed. She was out the door quickly and down the clanging metal stairs of my apartment building. I watched her get in her car and pull away.

We kept a loose contact after that. It wasn't the last time we fucked each other, but I knew our sex was just ripples in a lake, slowly getting further away and smaller until they disappeared altogether. I told her I loved her every time, but I hadn't heard those words from her since high school.

Eventually, I didn't see her anymore, but I never stopped thinking about her, and I realized how she had used me over and over again to boost her ego and to punish herself for needing it.

I got mad. I made a game out of women. I created a life of easy conquest and plentiful gratification. I kept women around as long as they would stay, but I always let them know the door was open and that I didn't need anyone.

And during that time, I made money. I worked hard, I bought my first house before I was twenty, I invested, I got lucky. I made some good moves and by the time I inherited money from a favorite uncle, I knew how to use it. I opened a property development business, I started small but grew exponentially, one job leading to five more. By the time I was twenty nine, I had everything I could want, and still the one thing I couldn't let go was her.

I was surprised when she called. I didn't ask how she'd gotten my number. Over the years our one-time shared friends had mostly come back, most of them needing a loan or wanting investment advice. I cultivated those relationships, always knowing it was a way to stay in her orbit. However loosely.

I knew about her marriage, her divorce, I knew about the failing little club she'd managed, then co-owned after marrying her boss. I knew she'd gotten it in the divorce, and I knew it wasn't worth much. If anything her ex had found a way to hide his debt in the books and now she was on the hook for it.

She walked through the door and caught my eye. I smiled and she gave me a half wave. I watched her step to the counter and order. She didn't wait for whatever it was she was drinking and made her way to me and the little booth I had commandeered.

I watched her move, knowing it was a show. She was wearing an outfit straight out of my private fantasy. A tight fitting t-shirt, a short skirt that seemed to float around her thighs, hanging from her hip bones. Her honey colored hair loosely bound up on top of her head, little tendrils carefully hanging around her face. Her lips were stained with pink lipstick, glossy and parted.

She walked slowly, letting that skirt swish back and forth revealing increments of her toned thighs and that little gap of flat belly. Her hands gathered in front of her holding a simple clutch, her breasts ever so slightly squeezed together. I appreciated the display. Her efforts were having the effect on my body she had intended, I felt the stiffening of my dick hidden beneath the table. I almost gave in right there, except I had seen this before. At every low point in her life this is who showed up. The siren that took what I had and left me with nothing. Had she just toned it down, no lipstick, no bouncy skirt, no girly pout, I probably would have given her the loan, no strings attached, pay me back when you can.

Instead it was her. The girl that had broken my heart over and over.

"Katrina, it's good to see you."

I rose to greet her and she shimmied in for a hug. I don't know if they even made that perfume anymore but she was wearing it. Probably a bottle in the back of her closet, a little magic potion saved away for just this occasion.

"It's been so long, you look great."

I did look good, it was easy after the money. I had all the time in the world to eat right, to exercise. I even had found out where they bought all those nice clothes and had taught myself how to wear them. To be honest she had never looked better. She had spent the last few years perfecting the desirable woman in front of me. I didn't tell her that though. I gave myself a mental pat on the back for not being that easy.

She told me about the latest phase of her life, the marriage and divorce, the club she was trying to run. She told me her mother had asked about me. Something I knew was a lie, that grim woman could never stand me. When she had run out of things to say she got down to business.

"I just need enough money to update the sound system, and renovate the decor, if I could just get over that hurdle I know the place would be successful."

I smiled at her. I think she thought it had worked. That I would just venmo her tens of thousands of dollars and save the day. That somewhere in me was that same boy that had picked her up and built her up after another failure. People grow up.

"I'd have to see the place."

That gave her a frown. She got control of her face quickly and nodded her head.

"Yes, of course. Of course."

I'd seen the place before, maybe five years ago when it was still popular. She'd invited me there, for a drink. Another one of her little ego detours. She didn't remember.

As her travesty of a drink was being walked over to our table, I stood and handed her my card.

"I'll be in touch."

She stared at the card, and the whipped cream covered cup in front of her. This hadn't gone as planned. I almost made it to the door when I heard her behind me.

"Hey, how about now? We could go there now."

I looked at my watch. I didn't have anywhere to be.

"Sure."

IT WAS a short ride across town. When I parked next to her I noticed we were the only cars in the lot. She reached into her two-door coupe and got a large set of keys. The fleshy performance allowed me an unobstructed view of her barely covered ass. Nicer than ever, I restrained myself from touching her. There'd be plenty of time for that.

Inside the club she fiddled with some switches turning up the ugly house lights, usually reserved for clearing the place at closing time.

"Well, what do you want to see?"

I pointed to a door near the back,

"Is that the office?"

She skipped ahead of me and unlocked the door. Letting it swing open. It was a nice space inside, a big wooden desk, a large safe, a long velvet couch. She perched herself on the edge of the desk, her legs slightly apart.

"You keep your books in the safe there?"

That didn't make her happy, I was supposed to be looking at her bare thighs, I was supposed to be thinking about that space between them. I was supposed to be imagining that humid warmth folding over my cock.

I was thinking about those things for sure, but thinking about them only made me more resolute. I didn't want to have them. I wanted to own them. Her heat, her wetness, those were things I had decided to possess and enjoy at my leisure. If my intent was to relive the past I could just pay her the money she was asking for. She'd fuck me, suck me, whatever it took. I could probably even figure out a way to drag it out for a few days. But that's not what I wanted. Her body was the least of what I intended to keep.

From back in the club a woman called clearly.

"Hello, are you here?"

Katrina crossed her eyebrows,

"Who the fuck is that?"

I called out to the voice,

"We are back here Barb, in the office."

Katrina closed her knees and stood up,

"Who is Barb?"

I smiled at the woman,

"Barb is my lawyer. I called her on the way over. She will need to see your accounts, what you have on the computer there, and especially whatever you have in the safe."

She sputtered a little,

"Look, I just want a loan, I can pay you back, you don't need to look into my books."

I looked her up and down, slowly, letting her know I was looking at her body, the curve of her hips, the roundness of her breasts, the pink on her lips.

"Katrina, nobody is going to give you the kind of money you're looking for without looking at your books, and I suspect anybody that could give you a loan wouldn't, after looking at them. I appreciate the little nostalgia play you've been putting on. I appreciate you getting dressed for me, flirting and everything else, but this is business."

I was aware of Barb standing behind me and hearing my speech, the fact that I didn't care made Katrina even more nervous. I looked Katrina over once more, hardly believing I was about to walk away.

"Trina, give Barb whatever she needs and I will get back to you on the loan."

"Sure."

She looked defeated. Sexier than ever.

A FEW hours later I got Barb's report. Katrina was buried in debt, the amount of money she needed was worth a few times what the property her club sat on was worth. She'd never be able to pay back my loan, even if the club were successful. The more disturbing part was the amount of money she was asking for wasn't even close to what she needed. It had taken Barb a little bit of detective work but it was clear, Katrina owed money to somebody that wasn't on her books. Barb made it clear that there was a second set of books detailing Katrina's involvement with a local drug dealer. Most likely she had been making purchases from him in the hopes of re-selling for enough profit to pull herself out of debt. Now she was making those deals on credit just to stay above water. She was days if not hours away from going to jail or worse ending up at the bottom of a river. Any amount of money she could borrow was just a way to stay alive, and would never be repaid.

I messaged Katrina,

'Talked with Barb I'm interested in helping you out.'

I sent her my address and another message.

'Tonight'

JUST AFTER sunset I watched as a car dropped her off at my gate. She pressed the call button and I buzzed the wrought iron monstrosity open.

When I had bought the place it was the property that interested me the most. Thick trees, a small creek, no neighbors that I could see. It was quiet and secluded, my escape from the busy world outside. It had cost me plenty and at the time I couldn't really afford it, but money was cheap back then and real estate was a going concern.

The house itself was a long building with two floors above ground and a couple below. The family that had built it had been in love with Italy, and there was lots of stone and terraces to show it. In the back was a formal garden and a small pool. It was a long way from the suburban split level I had been raised in.

I watched Katrina on the monitor, making her way up the drive and to the front portico. She wore a light blue slip dress and low heels. She looked great, if nervous. She knocked on the front door.

I used the intercom to buzz her into the house. I normally have a housekeeper and an assistant or two around the property, not to mention the small army of groundskeepers. Tonight the house and grounds were empty. I met her in the entryway.

"You look amazing in that dress."

I think she almost blushed.

"I can't believe this is all yours. I heard your house was nice, but this is next level."

I smiled at that, She was genuinely impressed.

"Well, I worked for it, most of it anyway. I still work for it."

I led her through to the backyard and the tiled patio. I gestured to the small wet bar off to one side,

"Mix me a drink, Trina."

"Yeah, sure, I don't remember what you used to drink."

I shook my head at her,

"Used to be Pabst Blue Ribbon."

She nodded looking behind the bar.

"But lately I've been drinking martinis."

It took her a minute to mix the drinks but when she was done there were two perfect glasses sitting on the bar.

"So you've learned something by owning a club."

She smiled at that and raised her glass.

We spent the next hour talking about old times and where we'd been, she talked about her marriage and divorce, the club. I told her about working as a developer. She asked,

"Anyone in your life?"

I looked at her over my glass,

"Not really, yes. Hard to trust anyone. Sometimes I wish I could just go back and figure out different choices. I like the money, and the things, but it can be lonely."

I wasn't lying. I had given up on making a genuine connection with anyone. Even old friends just seemed to only want from me. She placed a warm, consoling hand over mine. I resisted the urge to recoil and slap her across the face for her sympathy.

She looked around her, at the pool, the house, the garden,

"I don't know, I think if I had all this I'd never be alone."

"Maybe, now let's talk about your loan."

She brightened at that.

I talked her through some of the financial paperwork. I let her know that this loan was personal, and not connected in any way to my business. We worked out a payment schedule that we both knew she'd never be able to keep. I wrote her out a check and walked her to the door.

She kissed me lightly on the lips, the kind of kiss you gave to someone you pitied. A thank you, it was a consolation prize for the money she had no intention of paying back. Had I insisted I'm sure I could've had more, all of it really, that dress wasn't for her comfort. Instead, I watched her on the monitor as she waited for her rideshare, and then she was gone.

SHE MISSED her first payment as I knew she would. I waited a couple of weeks and then drove over to her club.

Outside a large SUV was parked across a couple of spaces. I pulled in next to it and made my way to the open door.

Inside the club was dark. The late afternoon sun made shafts from overhead skylights to the floor. I could hear more than see voices at the bar. A large man had Katrina pulled tightly to him, her arms pinned down at her sides. Another man was pointing at her and making threats. Her blouse had been ripped open, a trickle of blood was coming from her nose and dripping down onto her breasts and belly.

The man grabbed her throat and started squeezing when I interrupted him.

"Do you mind if I just grab a quick drink? I'm thirsty and it's hot outside."

The smaller man let her go and turned to me.

"Who the fuck are you?"

I stepped around the bar and pulled a can of Pabst out of a cooler. I cracked it open and took a long drink.

"Nobody, just thirsty."

The little man was flummoxed.

"Get the fuck out of here."

I smiled and drank again.

"Sure, no worries. Continue."

I walked back around the bar and headed for the door. He yelled at me.

"Wait, who the fuck are you?"

I stopped and turned back to face him. Katrina was breathing heavily, terrified.

"Who the fuck are you? I'm just here to grab a beer."

I think he almost answered me. I already knew who he was of course. A low level thug, trying to use Katrina and her club to raise his profile amongst his criminal brethren. I had been in business with this kind of person for years. As a developer there were always palms that needed to be greased, and construction sites to protect.

"You know, normally I wouldn't bother with a fuck-up that needed muscle to beat up a woman, but since you asked so nicely..."

I produced a business card and handed it to the man. He took it and read it, then looked at me.

"Is this supposed to mean something to me?"

I laughed,

"No, I wouldn't expect you to know who I am."

He looked again at the card and then handed it to his buddy, who released one of Katrinas' arms to take it.

"Do you know who this is?"

The big man looked at it and shook his head.

"You know, if you two don't mind, this woman and I have some business to conduct, and I'd appreciate it if you'd finish whatever this is so I can conduct it."

The smaller man looked genuinely confused and for a minute he looked like he might charge at me, but then he looked at the card. It was heavy, black, engraved with gold lettering. It just had my name on it and a phone number. It was nice, the guy who made it for me was a real artist and the card was a genuine piece of old world engraving.

He stopped, and turned back to his friend.

"Yeah, I think we're done. I'll give her a couple more days."

The pair left. Katrina and I were alone.

She did her best to close her blouse, there were still a couple of functioning buttons. She reached over the bar and found a bottle of whiskey. She took a long pull from the amber bottle and leaned back against the bar.