The street outside the bar was black and wet, and he carried my mother's machine with one hand like it weighed nothing.
Rafael: Two blocks. My car's two blocks from here.
I walked fast to keep up, coat pulled tight, and my heels clicked too loud in all that quiet.
Then the light. A horn, tires, and four men pouring out of a van with their coats open.
Rafael: Down. Get down, now.
He shoved me into the gap between a brick wall and a parked car, and the machine hit the ground with a clang.
His whole body covered mine, chest against my back, one hand flat on the wall by my head.
Rafael: Breathe. Don't move. Don't say a word.
Boots hammered past us. Someone kicked the bar door in and glass went everywhere.
A voice shouted a question about the Caldera name, and it was not a kind voice.
A flashlight swept the gap and stopped on his face.
The man holding it spat at his feet and called him a fucking Caldera dog, then looked at my wig and asked if I was renting by the hour too.
Rafael: Hands are where you can see them. Look harder. Or get that light out of my face.
The man hit him once in the ribs, quick and mean, and Rafael made no sound at all.
That scared me more than the shouting did.
Then another voice called the man away, and the light went with him, and we were alone again.
I felt him breathe out against my hair, slow, like he'd been holding it the whole time.
Mira: Are you hurt?
Rafael: No. Stay put a minute. They come back.
The street went quiet. Water in a gutter. Somewhere a radio.
He stepped back from me, and the first thing he did was pick up my mother's machine and check the wheel.
Then he looked into the car. Something had slid off the back seat onto the floor.
A helmet. Black, scuffed, a long crack across the shell.
Mira: Rafael?
Rafael: This was my brother's.
His jaw went tight and he turned his face away from me, and that was how I knew it was bad.
Two years, he said. Two years ago today.
Rafael: I put him on that crew. He was covering my shift because I was too fucking drunk to stand.
Rafael: So it's mine. All of it.
Then he came apart. Not loud.
His shoulders started shaking, and he covered his face, and he made a sound I never want to hear a grown man make again.
I took the helmet out of his hands and set it down careful on the roof of the car.
Then I put my hand flat on his chest, over his heart, where I could feel it going too fast.
Mira: Hey. Look at me.
His hand came up and covered mine, hard, holding it there like I might pull away.
Mira: I'm not going anywhere. Not tonight.
He leaned down and put his forehead against mine and just breathed.
My mother's apron came into my head. The smell of her hands. How quiet the shop got when she died.
Mira: You're not alone. Not right now. Not with me.
It was the only thing I had to give him, so I gave it.
I turned my head and kissed his forehead. It wasn't a kiss like the ones before.
His eyes shut, and he didn't let go of my hand.
Up the street a siren started again, and we stayed right there in the dark.
The machine at my feet. His heart under my palm.
I knew I was in trouble. Just not the kind I'd planned on.