Chapter Twelve: Skinny Love
I stand in the bathroom of the hotel room and look at myself carefully. I had been looking
forward to being alone and away from everyone for a day or two. Everything was so quiet and peaceful, there was not a single thing to stress about here.
I couldn't stop thinking about finally meeting Niall’s mum, she was so sweet and caring. How anyone could ever hate that woman was beyond me. I pull off my dirty shirt and toss it to the floor. Looking in the mirror you can see the small bruises that had begun to form along my skin.
Everything I bumped into lately left an ugly purple spot that soon would fade into a pale green and yellow color. They painted my entire body now, my things and arms, around my ankles where my cleats were tied too tightly.
I sigh and began digging in my bag for a clean shirt, pulling the white fabric over my head. Not realizing that Niall is standing in the doorway staring at me. He runs his fingers along the hem of the shirt and pulls it back up over my stomach.
His face was stone cold, there was no trace of happiness or lust on his face only worry. “What are these from?”
“Football, chairs, desks,” I say “I’m fairly clumsy you know.”
I force a smile but I know he knows that its complete bullshit. He runs his index finger over the one large bruise that kisses my hip bone. “You shouldn’t bruise like that.”
I try to argue but he drops the shirt and backs up out of the bathroom, I follow him out and sit down on the edge of the bed.
“Football isn’t that rough of a sport and unless you’re wrestling with tables I don’t think that would give you those.”
“They’re bruises, not gaping wounds Niall. They don’t even hurt.” I pull my boots up over my skinny jeans.
He turned away from me and starts to fiddle with his phone, I chuck a pillow to the back of his head and smile at him. “Lets go out?”
He looks at me his expression still stained with worry and fear but he nods before slipping his hat over his head and opening the door for me.
“I have the perfect place.”
We walk down the street hand in hand. His hand is so much bigger than mine and I giggle at the comparison. I am not sure even what town we had stopped in but it was nice, quiet and almost abandoned like. The homes are all older and made of brick, equally beautiful and rising flush against the bright blue sky.
“Where are we going?” I ask curious.
We have been walking for a while and the sun was starting to set in the sky. He shrugs his shoulders and keeps walking towards a gated area. I can see just behind the large fence is a small carnival like set up. The lights were off and none of the rides were moving, it must be closed.
“This doesn’t look open.”
“It hasn’t been for almost three years. We moved here just before my brother left so that my dad could play football and coach the Juniors. This place was amazing, like a little home away from home. Greg and I spent hours here, laughing and goofing around.”
He grabs my hand and guides me towards a little break in the fence, it made it very easy to break into the fairgrounds.
“It closed down because the town couldn’t afford to keep it running much more than once a year. So just before summer break ends in August they open for two weeks.”
He spins around and throws his arms out to me, he drags me past closed up toy hunts and small food carts before we stand in front of the large carousel.
“Watch this,” he winks before running towards the carousel. It looked like it hadn’t been run in years, dust climbing up the glass horses and striped poles. He thumps around in the small circle that sits in the middle and flings open the large metal box. “We’ve got one ride before the cops know we broke in.”
With that he flicks the breakers and the ride starts to spin. I jump inside and hold on tight to the fake horses. The music rings gently above us and the lights flicker in a symphony of colors. He helps me climb onto on of the horses, his face is lit up like a christmas tree and his smile has never been so big. He stops just to stare at me for a minute, his eyes are this blue color almost like cotton candy under the lights.
“I love when you smile,” he says.
I sigh and shake my head at his nonsense. I grip the horse tight as we ride around in circles, the ride is making me dizzy but he was too happy to interrupt him. He turns abruptly and looks at me with an excited panic on his face.
“You hear that?”
The sound of a single car siren wails as Niall raises an eyebrow and grabs me down off the horse. We run back through the carnival back past all the shut down rides and out the small tear in the fence. He carefully lifts me over the wood fence that lines the back parking lot and we disappear into the darkness.
We find a small field just off the side of the lot. I sit in the grass and lean up against his chest as we stare into the dark sky. He breathes heavily underneath me his eyes searching for stars between the clouds.
His arms wrap around my chest and I trace my finger along the back of his hand. I look from the sky and up to his face only to see him staring down at me, his eyes dark again and his face back to being serious.
I sigh heavily and turn to face him “what’s wrong?”
He doesn’t say anything but he lifts his hand and tucks the loose bit of dark hair that is falling around my face back behind my ears. I press my lips to his, the cool air being sucked out of me. I sink into the kiss and give him all of me within seconds.
He stops and pulls away from me, “Have you ever thought that we didn’t have choices in life? That our plans were laid out before we even have a chance to change them?”
“Like fate?” I ask him and he nods. “Maybe,” I say not really fully understanding where he was taking the conversation.
“If you had the chance--have the chance to change something, anything would you?” He asks me and if as on cue the back of my head starts to throb at the base of my neck. It was a constant reminder of the one thing I can't change.
“Of course I would,” I say, tears threaten my eyes as I think of the day my father passed but I push them away and ignore them.
He rolls me over and props himself up over my body in the grass. His lips find mine again leaving little traces of goosebumps all over my body as he does so. His fingers trace up my thigh to the bottom of my shirt were they tuck under to find bare skin.
His hand is warm on my cool skin. I close my eyes as he slowly moves down kissing the small space between my shirt and jeans. His lips are warm and light little fires along my waist line.
“You smell so good,” he says as he shoves his face into my neck and takes a deep breath of my hair. He finds every spot that he had missed the previous time around and trails it back to my face. “How did I get so lucky?”
I shrug my shoulders and pull him back into my space. His every movement is so smooth and soft. He slips both hands under my shirt and pulls it up over my head and tosses it beside him. He kisses each and every one of the awful bruises left by god knows what. I forget everything as his teeth tug at the black lace that lines the bra I am wearing.
I grip my fingers tightly through his hair as he teases along the line, kissing and biting the top of each breast until I give in and let a moan escape my lips. He laughs into the bare skin and comes back up to meet my face.
“I like that noise,” he mumbles as he wraps his hand around my thigh to pull me up close to his side. He bites his lip and lets his fingers find the button of my jeans. I kiss him gently as his hand slides through and finds the bare skin of my butt.
I bite the bottom of his lip making him kiss me harder than the first time. His hands wrap around the back of my waist almost like he wants them everywhere at once. He stops looking at me intently for a moment.
“Are you going to tell me how you got the bruises?”
The mood fades into the dark around us, I sit up pushing away from him and grabbing my shit. I shake my head angrily as I pull the shirt back on.
“Leave it alone Niall.”
“No,” he says stubbornly which is what was expected from him. “I’m worried about you and it’s worse than you want to believe but you won’t face up to it.”
“I’m fine.” I say shoving my hands into my pockets in fear that I might punch him.
Everything in me went from being lustful and wanting him all over me to wanting him to fuck off and never come back. He just stares at me though like he knows I’m lying straight to his face and I am but I won’t admit that.
“I watch my mum get sicker every month, every year Sarah and for the longest time she denied that she sick it only made her worse.”
He pushes off the ground and stands, he starts to pace away from me, turning back like he wants to say more but he never does. Instead his head hangs low and the few words that escape his mouth are mumbled and broken. I stop taking a moment to shove any feelings I have for him into the pit of my stomach. The last thing I want is to say something stupid that I won’t be able to take back.
“I came here to play football, finish school and not to worry about anything but that Niall. I want to play football, it’s all I ever wanted and I don’t want to worry about being sick.” I look at him seriously, he takes a heavy breath and shoves his own hands in his pockets.
“The only thing you’ll be able to do is lay in bed if you don’t worry about it Sarah.”
“That’s my choice,” I tie the loose hair back in a tighter pony tail and look at him. His face is so broken and sad that I just want to scoop him into my arms and apologize. “You can either help me get what I want Niall, live the only life I’ve ever wanted or you can leave.”
“I don’t want to stand by and watch you fall apart for some silly dream.” He spits.
“Maybe I’m not falling apart, maybe I’m finally getting what I want and doing what I’ve always dreamed of Niall. I’ve haven't been this happy in a long time, I’ve got football, I’m living in god damn London.”
I step towards him trying to close the gap that separates us, I try to soften my eyes and force and smile for him. “I have you.”
I can see him battling with himself, wanting to say more but instead he closes the space and pulls me into his arms finally. I take a deep breath and steady myself trying not to cry.
“I’m not going to go anyway Sarah, but the second you do start falling apart. I won’t let it happen, you have to let me help you.”
I didn’t respond to him because I wasn’t even sure what to say to him. A part of me is glad we had this conversation, that I had some what admitted to him. But I also know how hard this was going to make things.
I gently rest my head against his chest and take the moment of peace because I could feel the storm on the horozian and even with him by my side it was terrifying.