HER

2. Rahmat and semi-death threats

"No shit!!" Mark exclaimed his eyes wide.
Richard ignored him, his left elbow rested on the window of his car. He was using his left hand to massage his forehead while his right rested on the steering wheel.
They were parked on a deserted street in their estate. It was a more of a close than a street, the were no houses, just fences. No gates, the gates were on the other side of the house. It made for a good hideout location. They'd been coming here for years. The first time they'd found it was when they'd been running away from the police when they were fifteen. Richard had been driving, as usual.

Richard had picked up Mark this morning and headed straight there. Because Mark was a lazy son of a bitch who hated driving.

"Well fuck! What are you going to do?" Mark asked him, "Why are they doing this anyway?"

"I don't know and I don't care" Richard replied nonchalantly

"So your going to get married? At 21?"

Richard shrugged.

"Dude, you're going to get so old and miserable" Mark laughed.

"Fuck you" Richard hissed

"Awh. Shut up man" Mark said, a lot of people would have been scared that Richard was angry but Mark was past that. He'd known Richard since he was eleven. They'd met at their first boarding school. They wrecked havoc there, got expelled and ended up in another school together. They ended up attending four schools in the span of six years. It was a miracle they'd even gotten admission into the University because honestly, they didn't care enough to apply early. Or even take the exams and interview seriously.

"What if she's hot though?"
Richard smacked the back of his head.

"Shut up" he yelled at Mark

Mark barely smiled, continuing on to mutter vulgar things about "Tapping that" and "tearing it up"

Richard shook his head, "You're a man-whore" he stated simply.

"And I am proud of it" Mark stated.

Richard couldn't help the chuckle that came out of his mouth.

"You could make her hate you. You seem to do a lot with most of the girls you sleep with"

"It was one girl" Richard argued

Mark shook his head. "You do that with every girl. You told Tosin her vagina smelt terrible"

"It did" Richard argued.

Mark laughed and laughed.

"I almost died going down on her" Richard added.

"I know. You've said it a million times. But see you can't tell girls that kind of stuff. You can tell me, but not the girls"

"Whatever."

"Want a smoke?" Mark asked

Richard shrugged, "Sure"
What did it matter, he needed to ease off some of the tension before he got home. To meet his wife.
He lightly chuckled at the thought

"What?" Mark

"I have a wife. It would be actually funny if it wasn't so fucked up" he said as Mark handed him the lighter

"I'd be happy if I had a wife"

"Why?" Richard asked letting out a puff of smoke

"You won't have to sweet talk anybody to fuck you. Because she has to fuck you, because she's your wife"

"You are so stupid" Richard said blowing out another puff of smoke.

"So much sunlight" Mark whined pushing his shades over his eyes.

"Are you high?" Richard asked, "it's barely noon"

"Like you haven't been high before ten am before. And no I'm not high. I'm tired. I haven't had much sleep lately"

"Did you take your meds?" Richard asked.

"Shut up, you're not my mother" Mark snapped

Richard rolled his eyes. He knew the drill. Defensive Mark meant he was off his meds and that was bad. Very bad.

"Mark" Richard called blowing out another puff of smoke and finally throwing the stub out of the window. "I'll punch you so hard you'll land in the hospital. I'm taking you home" he said turning on the engine and backing out of the close.

"Fuck you. You're an idiot. Your wife will hate you. Because you're an idiot"

"C'mon man. You have to try harder than that to make me feel bad." Richard teased.

"When you want to fuck your wife. You won't be able to get it up"

Richard threw his head back and laughed. "That was pathetic even for you buddy"

Mark kept hurling insults at Richard the whole time. Richard wasn't bothered though, Mark always acted like that once the topic of his health was discussed.

Richard finally pulled up in front of Mark's house. By this time, Mark had stopped hurling insults at him and was not speaking.

"Get out of my car" Richard said nodding to the gate of Mark's house.

"Fuck you!" Mark said as he slung his schoolbag on his shoulder and opened the door.

"Not today buddy. Maybe some other time" Richard said again.

He lifted his foot off the brakes and sped off. He could see Mark giving him the middle finger from the side mirrors. Richard merely chuckled in response.
He pulled his phone out scrolling down to Mark's Mom, he dailed her number.
She picked up after the second ring

Hello. She said, is everything okay?

Yes ma'am. I just dropped Mark off. It seems that Mark has gone off his meds again. Do you know about that?" he said trying to sound as polite as he could. He hated the woman, honestly and the fact that she wasn't his real mom didn't help matters at all. He didn't think she honestly cared about Mark. She was a gold digging former airplane stewardess who had married an oil tycoon. Why would she care?

Is that right? I didn't know that. I'll get him back on track, no worries. Thank you for telling me.
Richard almost rolled his eyes at the pretence in her voice.

He ended the call without saying anything else. Not that he had anything else to say after all.

Richard spent the rest of the day looking around and doing nothing. As it got closer to the dinner time his mother got more and more fussy. Richard could have lived in a T-shirt and denim. But his mother would call that disrespect so he opted for a dress shirt instead.

He headed downstairs when he heard a car horn in the distance. It was almost 8:30pm and he could see the headlights of said vehicle, his mother started fussing about him.

"They're here" his father muttered when there was a knock on the door. Grace walked past them and headed towards the main entrance.

"Mom" Richard called holding her hands, "Stop fussing. Why do you care what they think? I don't"

"If you mess this up, I'll shoot you in the leg" his father mumbled opening the door

"I wouldn't put it past you" Richard replied and he saw a faint smile on his mother's face. He held her hand

"What's up?" she asked him

"What's her name?" he asked slowly

"Rahmat"