Hendrix: A Pittsburgh Titans Novel

I pull up to the back alley of Stevie’s house, smiling to see her dad is already there. I park behind his truck, the bed loaded with several boxes.

Stevie’s still at work, and we’re both three hours earlier than when she’s scheduled to arrive to start dinner. John and I did some secret planning last night at the bar. I’d waited for Stevie to go to the bathroom and then I took my shot.

I approached John, who looked irritated I’d dare trespass on his conversation with Rory. I didn’t have time to give him shit about it, though, looking back at where Stevie had just disappeared into the restroom. “I have an idea,” I said quickly, “but I need your help to pull it off.”

The man listened, asked only one question, and then said he was in.

I exit out of my vehicle and approach Stevie’s father. I slap my hands together and rub them gleefully. “Ready for some breaking and entering?”

John snorts and slaps at one of the boxes in the back of his truck. “I bought more stuff.”

“You don’t even know what we have to work with, and yet you bought more?”

“Can you have too many fucking Christmas lights?” he growls.

I shrug. “Suppose not. Let’s do this.”

For the next three hours, we bust ass and decorate the hell out of Stevie’s house. When I had asked her last week why she didn’t have a tree up, she simply said she didn’t have the time. She made some half-hearted commitment that she would put it up last week, but it never happened. And because my girl is too busy with running her business and then making time for me, I decided the best thing I could do was bring the Christmas cheer directly to her.

John knew she had the basics she’d bought her first year in this house, including an artificial tree with lights and decorations, a wreath for the front door, and some garland for the staircase. All that was tucked away in her garage, and we got it up without a hitch. We also used the lights John bought to decorate the outside of the house, along with the bushes. He manned the ladder and the staple gun, and I fed him string after string until we got every angle and joint covered in multicolored baubles.

Just as we’re putting away the ladder and storing the cardboard boxes in the garage, Stevie texts that she’s on her way.

“That gives us about five minutes,” I say to her dad as we walk back inside. “Let’s get a beer and wait for her on the front porch.”

He grunts his assent and with brews in hand, we each take a rocking chair. It’s getting dark outside, so all the lights glow, and our work looks fucking amazing. It’s cold as hell, but we’re both sweaty from the exertion. Besides, we don’t want to miss Stevie’s reaction.

“Thank you for doing this,” John says as we keep our eyes trained down the street in the direction his daughter will be driving.

“You did fifty percent of it,” I reply.

“The idea was yours, so thank you.”

“Sure thing.”

We sit in silence and wait. John Kisner isn’t an easy man to talk to. Well, according to Rory, he is, as she went on and on about him last night, but he’s more than a little intimidating coming from the perspective of his daughter’s boyfriend.

Still, I take the jab. “I want to get a tattoo, and I’d really like for you to do it.”

John’s head turns my way, and he studies me a moment. “What were you thinking?”

I hold out my arm, point to my biceps with the hand holding my beer. “A Porsche logo… right here.”

Despite his face being covered in hair, I can actually see his lip curl in disgust, and I have to fight not to laugh. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

“No, sir. It’s my favorite car. Used to have one, as a matter of fact, before it got wrecked.”

John scoffs in disdain. “Stevie will kick you to the curb if you get that pussy tattoo.”

The struggle to keep a straight face is almost too much to bear. “What’s wrong with a Porsche? I know it’s no Harley between your legs, which signifies you’re a real man, but it’s legit.”

John’s brow furrows, his eyes glinting hard. “Are you serious?”

My smile breaks free. “Nah… not about the Porsche, but I do want a tattoo.”

“Fuck off,” John mutters.

“All joking aside… I do want a tattoo. I want to get the names of the Titans who died on the plane.” I point to my ribs. “Right here.”

I didn’t think it possible, but John’s expression softens to a tenderness I didn’t know he possessed. “Yeah, sure… I’d be honored to do that. Let’s set it up.”

To my surprise, John pulls his phone out, and we coordinate our schedules.

“All right,” I say, finishing the entry. “Week after next. December 29, ten a.m.”

“Bring breakfast,” he says as he tucks his phone away.

“Doughnuts?”

“Works for me,” he says and then nods. “Here she comes.”

John stands and I follow suit. We walk to the porch steps and watch as Stevie’s car slows down the closer she gets. Her normal path would be to hang a left at the next intersection, then another left to access the alley behind the block of houses. Instead, she stops in the street and rolls down her window.

Her jaw hangs open as she takes in the lights all over her house. “Oh my God, you two! Did you do all this?”

I put my arm around John’s shoulders, knowing it probably irritates him. “Your dad helped me.”

He shrugs off my arm. “It was his idea, but I did most of the hard work.”

Stevie smiles, and even from this distance, I see her eyes dampen. She coughs to clear her throat. “I guess I better cook you two a really good dinner, huh?”

“We’ll meet you inside,” I say, and she rolls up her window, driving past the house. I nudge her dad with my elbow. “We made her cry.”

“That is something to be proud of,” he acknowledges.

“Come on… let’s go drink another beer while she waits on us hand and foot… like kings deserve to be treated.”

Except when we get inside, we don’t sit back and let Stevie serve us. We join her in the kitchen and she directs us on how to help.

Stevie pulls out fresh ingredients from the fridge for us to put together individual flatbread pizzas, and I hold up the bag of thawed peas I find on the counter. “Are you putting this crap on the pizzas? Because if so, I’m out of here.”

Stevie looks over her shoulder at me. “Oh, no… I left that out earlier and forgot to put it back. You can just toss them.”

“Hurt yourself?” John guesses as I dump them in the garbage.

“Um… yeah, hit my knee on the stair banister coming down. It was quicker than making up an ice pack.”

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah… fine. How’s work been going?”

I frown at Stevie because something in her tone doesn’t sit right with me. She seems tired, but there’s a tension about her. Did she just change the subject from peas to John’s work a little too quickly?

Maybe not. She slips into easy conversation with her dad about one of his workers who’s apparently quite young and keeps hitting on him.

“You need to fire her,” Stevie says.

“You’re just saying that because you don’t like her,” John says as he slices pepperoni. I’ve been put on onion duty, which means I’m low man on the totem pole.

“It’s true. I don’t like her, and that’s because she’s my age and dresses provocatively for the sole purpose of getting your attention.”

“Unfortunately, she’s a damn good artist,” John laments with a shrug. “But I’m going to have a talk with her and tell her to cool it. I don’t need that shit in my workplace.”

“Say the word and I’ll talk to her,” Stevie says with an evil laugh.

And yeah… she seems fine.

“That won’t happen.” John turns his attention to me. “Rory get off okay?”

“Yeah… we had lunch, and she left after that.” I blink at the tears from the onion.

“She coming back anytime soon?” he asks.

Stevie and I exchange a look punctuated by matching smirks. I play stupid. “Nah… didn’t say when she’d be able to.”

“You should’ve just asked for her phone number, if you’re so interested,” Stevie teases.

“I got her phone number,” John retorts, and Stevie and I exchange raised eyebrows at this revelation.

Stevie shrugs, and I return to cutting onions. John’s interested, but I can’t figure out if he’s playing hard to get, or if he doesn’t know how to handle Rory. Regardless, I find it hilarious he seems a little off-balance.

“You talk to your mom lately?” John asks Stevie.

Talk about a change of subject.

“What?” Stevie exclaims as her body jolts. “Why would you ask that?”

And there it is again. She’s tense about something, and that sure as hell was a trigger.

John must sense it, too, as he stops slicing and glowers at his daughter. “It’s just you usually see her every week or so and talk to her a time or two more than that. You haven’t said much about her lately, and I was wondering if she disappeared on you. It’s her thing after all.”

I keep my head down. While I’m very aware of Stevie’s history with her mom, this discussion with her dad is rooted in hard feelings on his side and burgeoning feelings on hers.

Stevie doesn’t come back swinging with any defense of her mom. Instead, she moves back to the fridge. “I’ve been busy, but yeah… we talked briefly today.”

Now John’s eyes shift to me, and I can read his expression. It says loud and clear: Are you sensing something’s wrong here?

Yeah… I sense it. But I can tell Stevie’s wound tight, and I can also tell this subject is not something she wants to linger on.

I give a very minute shake of my head. Don’t go there, John.

He lifts his chin in acknowledgment. I’m staying away.

“Your dad’s going to do that tattoo for me,” I say, changing the subject again.

Stevie spins from the fridge, a smile on her face. “Really?”

John answers the question. “Yup. Apparently, he wants a Porsche logo on his biceps.”

Her head whips back my way in disbelief, and I wink at her. “He’s going to do all the names.”

Eyes softening with sentimentality, she sighs. “It will be beautiful.”

“I did a tattoo once on this woman who wanted the names of all her exes,” John says as he finishes up the pepperoni. “She said it was so she could remember what to stay away from. And about four months later, she showed up with another name to add. Then six months after that, another name.”

I laugh as I shake my head. “Some people never learn, I guess.”

John chuckles, and I think it’s the first time I’ve actually heard him do so. “She still comes to me. Her list is up to fourteen names or something.”

We all laugh, and that sets the tone for the rest of the evening. I have to say, I’ve never hung out with the parent of a romantic partner before, and while John seems antisocial on the outside, to my surprise, we share a lot of laughs throughout dinner. Whatever was bothering Stevie earlier has disappeared.

After we clean the kitchen, John makes a quick exit, which I know is to give us time alone. He’s pretty much monopolized our evening, but it was totally fine by me. Decorating Stevie’s house was an epic gift, and I’m glad we did it together. It’s the type of forced bonding that’s going to make him like me.

Hugging her dad at the door, Stevie says, “Thank you for being the best parent a child could ever hope to have.”

“Yeah,” he returns gruffly, squeezing her close, “because you were such a hard kid to raise.”

The sarcasm in his voice indicates she was pretty much an angel, but I figured that out. She might have the tough biker, rocker-chick image, but Stevie’s soft inside and out.

Except when she has that baseball bat ready to knock heads.

Bolting the lock, Stevie moves right into me. Her arms go around my neck, and she kisses me before turning to look at the Christmas tree. “I still can’t believe you and my dad did all this.”

I tip my head to follow her gaze.

“I would have never put it up,” she admits, snuggling into me. “And yet, now I’m wondering why the hell I wouldn’t have made time for it. I forget how magical it is.”

It is magical. I’ve always loved Christmas.

“Come here,” I say as I lead her to the couch. I pull her down with me, curling us together so we’re facing the tree. “Next year, we’ll put up the tree together at Thanksgiving when we both have some time.”

“Next year, huh?” she murmurs as her fingertips stroke my arm. “Don’t you think we should figure out next week first?”

“Nah. I already have next week figured out. And the week after that, and the week after that, right on up to this time next year. Is that cool with you?”

I lift my head and bend over her. She cranes her neck to look back at me. “Yeah… I’m cool with that.”

With a bit of a stretch, I’m able to brush my lips over hers. “I wish you could come home with me for Christmas.”

“We’ll plan better next year,” she promises, and that means she’s got the future figured out, just like I have.

Jerry’s Bar has always been open on Christmas Day to serve those who don’t have any place else to go. Stevie’s working that day as she doesn’t want to ask her staff to do it. It sucks, because it’s my favorite holiday and I want to spend it with her, but I can’t miss out on my family either. My girlfriend is nontraditional in many ways, and it just may mean she serves beer on Christmas Day. We’ll figure a way to work around that.