The Painted Man - by Dan Watters

Chapter 1 - Part 1

Angie Philips had always been the kind of girl that makes it hard for a guy to think of anything else. I met Angie at Stevenson's high in our last year of school. It was a new school for me. A private affair on the upper west side of New York located in a tall, brownstone in a rich suburb. I was a long way from Flushing, Queens where I'd grown up and I didn't think we could afford the fees. But Dad wanted it, so I did it. There were a lot of things I'd done in those years that I didn't want to do. Burying Dad, moving to Bushwick, leaving Flushing high and starting a new school. Suffice to say that when I started at Stevenson's, I had a few things on my mind. For that reason, Angie was only ever on the periphery of my attention. A pleasant distraction in an unfamiliar environment.

In many ways, I stayed away from her. I stayed away from a lot of people at that time. I didn't find it hard to make friends. I just wasn't sure I wanted them. When you experience loss, the easiest way to avoid it again is to cut people off. Cut them off before they get close and you never have to lose them. That's what I was doing. The school psychologist told me so. And I was doing it with Angie, probably more than anyone else. That's the problem with girls like that. Once you let them in, you can never forget. It was clear that other guys at Stevenson's had this problem. The crush on Angie was ubiquitous. The guys who'd spent half a decade in classrooms, knee to knee with this blossoming girl were ruined. For the worst of them, their sole motivation to turn up, to be seen and heard was to hear, to see, to be in the presence of Angie. But school was closing out. The bubble they'd lived in was bursting and in the final months of the final year of school, closeted obsessions came out in ways that were embarrassing, liberating, perverted and dangerous.

I didn't think I was one of those guys until now. For me, it was a slow creep. After high school, Angie and I were in the same group chat. She was pretty outspoken and liked to organise events. The core of the group would often go out for drinks and, on occasion, I went with them. A year on from high school and the group chat had all but died off. Everyone was getting on with their lives. College, jobs, relationships. You could see it all on Instagram. Angie made regular appearances on my feed. She was managing a club in downtown New York and always looked amazing. There were plenty of guys around her.

Then the group chat that had been dormant for a year, blew up. One of the girls, Jaclyn Silvestri was trying to arrange a get-together. She called it a reunion and I thought it was lame to call it that when we'd only graduated two years ago. A reunion scared me. I'd done nothing to brag about. Still, I went.

At the edge of a circle of old school friends, Angie asked me how I was doing. She asked me if I was seeing anyone. I wasn't. Two hours later, we were fooling around in the back seat of an Uber. I got her back to my place and snuck her into my bedroom. Things got hot. Really hot. Then she hit the brakes.

'What's wrong?'

Laying on my double bed, trying to cool down Angie told me she had a boyfriend. I wasn't surprised. All those guys on Instagram - she had to have a boyfriend. She told me she wanted to break it off but hadn't been able to do it. At the same time, she couldn't cheat. So, she left. That's when I felt something. I wanted her to come back to me. I wanted to make her come back. I had no idea how but when it came down to it, it wasn't that hard. She messaged me all week and we talked every day. On Thursday, two days ago, she broke it off with her boyfriend. We wanted to see each other that day, but my day job and her night shifts clashed. It had to be Saturday. She told me to come to her club and she'd take a few hours off to see me.

With the boyfriend out of my way, I couldn't see any reason why this second meeting wasn't going to go all the way. For forty-eight hours I felt like a muscle car throttling at the starting line, waiting for a green light.

Then the plan changed. I was at home, dressed, shoes on and cashed-up when I got her text. She still wanted to meet but somewhere else. I got a text with an address in Harlem. A residential address. I looked it up on google maps. Back in high school, Angie was living in Harlem. I'd never seen her house. She'd never invited me. I guessed this was her parent's place and they wanted to meet me, again.