Jerk It by Lani Lynn Vale

CHAPTER 1

First rule of CrossFit: Always talk about CrossFit. Second rule about CrossFit: always talk about CrossFit.

-Coffee Cup

MURPHY

I knew who she was the moment that she walked into my shop looking so down and dejected.

At first, when she offered me her hand, I considered not taking it.

I mean, she was the reason that I was homeless for four years.

But then I decided to just play as if what she’d done hadn’t shaped the man that I was today.

“Hi,” she smiled. “I’m Mavis.”

I hadn’t needed her to introduce herself.

There was no way that I’d forget those blue jean-colored eyes in that pretty face. Nor the long blonde hair that obviously hadn’t been cut much since she became an adult.

She hadn’t changed a single bit since I’d last seen her all those years ago.

“Murphy,” I grumbled. “What can I help you with?”

She opened her mouth to say something when my mother’s voice called out from the office.

“Alessio! You have a phone call!” Mama yelled.

“Alessio?” she teased. “I thought you introduced yourself as Murph?”

I would’ve replied, but my mother chose that moment to come outside and hold the phone out to me.

Instead of staying rooted to the spot—the same spot I’d been standing in since I’d seen her pull up into my driveway—I turned my back on Mavis and walked to my mother, taking the phone from her hand.

“Murphy,” I said.

“Hi, this is Justin from the moving company,” Justin said. “I’m here with all of your things.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose.

Fucking finally.

They were only two days late.

I’d been living in a four-bedroom house with empty rooms for four days now.

“Great,” I said. “Can you get it in by yourself, or do you need someone there?”

“I think we can get it all in by ourselves. I know that you said that you had to work,” Justin replied.

That was the only thing saving him from not getting a tip.

The man had proved to me a million times over that I’d been stupid to hire him.

He’d come cheap and recommended by a friend, so I hadn’t hesitated to use him at first. But after him flaking off on me a couple of times before the move, I should’ve just said ‘fuck it’ and found someone else.

But my mother had recognized another broken soul and had informed me that I needed to allow him to do his job. So I had.

And then we’d been sleeping on the floor since because of her kind heart.

“Good, if you have any questions on where anything goes, shoot me a text of the piece, and I’ll tell you where I want it,” I ordered.

Justin cleared his throat. “Got it, Boss.”

I rolled my eyes and hung up, turning around to address the elephant in the room to see my mother hugging Mavis.

Son of a bitch.

“Mom,” I said. “Our movers are going to text you if they have any questions on where any pieces are going. Make sure that they put all your stuff in your house, okay?”

My mother pulled away from Mavis with a large smile on her face, and my heart pinched.

My mother didn’t know how to hold a grudge.

It didn’t matter that twenty years ago the damn woman she’d been hugging had been the reason for her losing her job and our house.

No, all it mattered was that Mavis had, at one time, been a girl that she used to care for.

Well, it didn’t matter if my mom couldn’t hold a grudge.

I sure the hell could.

And I would continue to until my last dying breath.

“Mom,” I said when she stayed where she was, smiling. “Can you give us a moment?”

Mom smiled. “Sure, I’ll let you two catch up.”

The last fucking thing I wanted to do was move back to Paris, Texas.

The problem was, this was where my heart doctor was located.

And when you had problems with your heart, it was easier to be near said doctor.

The woman currently standing in front of me was the very reason that I hadn’t wanted to come back.

I knew it would be inevitable that I’d run into the Popes.

I just hadn’t figured that I’d do it on the first day that I was open for business.

“I can’t believe it’s you, Alessio.” She shook her head, a small smile coming over her face. “When I saw your mother, everything clicked into…”

“Listen,” I said carefully. “I don’t like you. I’ll never like you. You’re the reason that we were kicked out of our house, lost our insurance, and I had to start working at the age of thirteen just so I could help my mother make enough money just to put food on our plates. You can smile and be pretty all you want, but it’s not going to change anything.”

When we were kicked out, my mother had debt up to her eyeballs.

All because of me and my stupid fucking heart.

Getting kicked out of our home wouldn’t have been a problem had my mother’s credit not been completely destroyed as she tried to keep me alive, and us fed, while working, and me being in and out of a hospital room many times over the course of my short life.

It took us over two years to be able to find a place to stay, and even then, it’d only been because we’d used my social security number to get it.

Mavis blinked. “Smile and be pretty?”

“You know you’re beautiful,” I said. “You’re just better at using it to get what you want now.”

Her hand dropped to her stomach, and it was then that I realized that Mavis was pregnant.

Disgust hit me and I stepped back. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. What did you want when you stopped in?”

Mavis blinked, clearing the fog from her eyes as she seemed to gather up her composure, wrap the aloofness around her like a cape, and then say, “I wanted a mechanic’s opinion on the car I was going to buy. But I think that I’ll just leave.”

She started to head to her car in the next moment, and I felt like a dick.

“What kind of car were you wanting to buy?” I asked.

She looked at me over her shoulder, then turned back around without another word.

“Buy American,” I told her. “Parts are easier to get.”

She ignored me and dropped down into her car, then rolled up the window once she had it started.

She didn’t reply.

Nor did she take my advice.

The next time I saw her she was driving a minivan.

One made in a foreign country.