Messy Nights and Modest Fights - Larry Stylinson Short Story

Chapter 15 - I'm chasing roller-coasters

‘Good Thing’ – Sam Smith

‘I’m Not Calling You a Liar’ – Florence + The Machine

I’m chasing roller-coasters

Porter was looking at her bruised neck, she shifted her body so her hair fell over her bruised flesh and forced a smile. “So talk?” 

He, too winced as if in invisible pain and then sighed. “Drink, first?”

She could tell he was nervous, the question was… about what? Did he know what I did? She swallowed the pang of unease and nodded, “Yes.”

He turned to order drinks and her smile dropped, she searched the crowd and when she was satisfied she had run far enough from her nightmares in LA she relaxed. Tyson hadn’t followed her, she was thankful but she was still deathly afraid. 

Dakota winced in pain, her body was a myriad of agony and bruising but she forced a smile as she planted her hand on Porter’s chest. She looked into his eyes, the music pounded in her ears and his heartbeat hammered against his chest. She cocked her head to the side, taking in his beautiful face. 

The man that looked back at her wasn’t the man she first saw, first fell for. Though now, as time had passed and so much had changed Dakota wasn’t sure what she had with Porter could be called love. Infatuation, connection… love? Was she the same person from all those months ago?

She stared, frozen in the moment, at Porter, confused and afraid to admit how she was truly feeling. On one level, she cared for Porter and she loved him like a friend but something had changed along the way.

Niall had changed her.

 A cosmic shift, the one person who hated her most, the guy with the hardened glare and smart mouth showed a moment of vulnerability. In that moment, Dakota, too let down her guard and they connected, united for a small passing of time. 

Dakota couldn’t get Niall’s sobs out of her head, the way his eyes would search her face for reason and for solitude. The way he took her hand, gripped it between his own and pressed her slender fingers to his lips. The way he fell asleep with his head in her lap and only drifted off when she brushed her long fingers against his temple. He was afraid to face the dark without Dakota because he couldn’t face Logan, not in his dreams or worse–his nightmares. She understood him, knew the agonising pain of loss related to drugs. For a few fleeting days between Niall’s heartache and Harry being taken away for rehab the two found solace in each other. Then Niall found his strength, or maybe he realised Dakota was too close. Suddenly he closed her off, locked himself away from them all. When he returned to reality, after reconciling with Logan’s death he didn’t meet her eyes, as if he had forgotten the fleeting moments of unity. It agonised her because when Niall was lost, Dakota was found. She felt whole and home in his arms, all good things come to an end.

She looked at Porter, really looked at his face and he was so different to a year ago… they all were. The soft skin along his angled jawline and stubbled chin, wide eyes and cunning smile. Now Porter’s hair was longer, his face appeared dishevelled and the bags under his eyes looked like black clouds. She knew he was not himself, neither am I. 

With a sigh she searched his blue eyes – they looked like an angry ocean swirled with white and green, the colours endless as she peered into them. She could catch her reflection in his glassy eyes between the splashes of light that illuminated the room as the lasers and strobe lights moved to the beat of the music. 

Porter ordered them both a vodka on ice, he forced a smile as he flashed his black AMEX at the bartender and avoided her curious eyes. The room smelt like sex and money, drugs and sweat lingered in the air. The women were beautiful, curious and sexual as she eyed the swell of their hips and the hint of promise on their lips. The blood red lipstick on many of the girls mirrored her own and she shifted uneasily from foot to foot, Dakota remembered when her life was not so different from the girls in the room.