Made Men

1. Red Flag

The drive was filled with silence. It wasn't like she was surprised by the empty air, in fact, car rides with the entire fam often resembled something similar to this.

After her siblings yelled, punched, kicked, hit each other in the hideous 9-seater car they took everywhere, her father would resort to threats.

"Mere belt milane se pahale chup raho." Or, in other words- shut up, before I get the belt.

If she needed to give some context, then no. Her dearest papa didn't hit her nor had he ever laid a hand on anyone. However the threat was enough to keep the young ones quiet, and the older ones would merely roll their eyes.

Her papa was all for gentle parenting, except for the times he was in the car and his road rage took over.

Vereena tapped on the leather seat as the catchy beat to whatever radio song tuned in the background.

Flickering her eyes over to the man she barely knew, she rose a curious brow. "So where are you from, Bobby?"

Was that how people made small talk? She wondered.

To be completely honest with you, she wasn't exactly the most social butterfly there was. She had been sheltered growing up, school was full of bullies and her home life had no real substance to it. She was a straight-A Indian kid with tiger parents and because of her darker skin tone, she was picked on a lot.

At the ripe age of twenty-two, she still lived at home and worked as a nurse to fulfil her parents' wishes of doing something good with her life. Obviously, she hadn't become a doctor, which frustrated her family.

Nonetheless, she was trying to better her social skills.

The other night, she stared at herself in the mirror. The way her eyes looked dead, the hollows in her face, how dull her hair looked, she stared at herself and just cried. She wasn't sure for how long- long enough that her head began to ache from it.

It seemed like drugs were the one thing that allowed her to feel whole again. She didn't feel like that loser she saw in the mirror when she was high.

And god, it felt so fucking nice.

Bobby glanced at the young girl through the rearview mirror, bemused. "If you wanna get to know me better then maybe you should figure out that my name isn't Bobby."

Huh?

Looking at the way her face stretched out in the gleam of the spout, she smiled. It shakes a bit because she held onto so much, but she's good at hiding things.

"Sure it is." She snorted, shoving her hands into her hoodie pocket and slouching further into the seat. "Bobby." Testing the name out on her tongue, she snickered. "You couldn't look more like a motherfucker named Bobby if you tried."

Her head sunk into the plush material, she had a strong jaw that clenched as she turned to face him. "Ah. You must've gotten stick for that fucking name, man. It's horrible."

He wanted to be offended, yet chose to ignore her and let out a clipped laugh. "My name is Vanni. Short for Giovanni, it's Italian actually."

Wow. She didn't care, she should've added.

"Then why is your name in my phone Bobby Da Dealer?" Clearly, he couldn't be named anything other than the contact she had saved for him. She knew him for the last eight months, and he responded to 'yo Bobby' every time without fail.

Surely, she was not that dense, right?

She waited for him to elaborate and when he didn't, her sickly sweet smile widened.