artgirl 17: smoke in the air
"'Cause love ain't never been so close, but so far away. It's like my mind is telling me to just back off. And my heart says just stay." –Kehlani
Zoey Willow Hunter
"ONE MORE!" shouted a voice that could've belonged to me. I chugged down the shot being offered to me without a single doubt in mind. It turned out that an hour after going to a club, drinking with my left hand was no problem at all.
In fact, at this very moment, I didn't have many problems, aside from perhaps more alcohol in my system than I'd had in the past year or so. My right hand felt numb, as if it didn't even belong to me anymore. I didn't feel like I belonged to me anymore.
I'd forgotten how tequila felt. It remembered me very well, though, because it had settled into my body as quickly as I started laughing like an idiot. My mind was buzzing. With thoughts of the constant hum of a beat that was playing, because the songs seemed to have merged together into one.
Boom.
One spot on the dance floor wasn't occupied by sweaty bodies. I'd made myself familiar with the never-ending song by now, so I'd decided that hopping all the way over there was the best idea. Somehow, I lost control of my feet—as if I'd been walking on clouds.
Then, I bounced up into the air, due to a trampoline-like body of—well, a considerably handsome guy. "Sorry!" I said, but he winced. He laughed and shook his head. Was his hair longer than mine?
He said something, but the beat drop had happened at the same time. I screamed at him to repeat, and all I understood was "I'm Derek, dance!"
So, I grabbed his hand and dragged him along with me to jump up and down to perhaps the stupidest song in the world. Maybe the alcohol blurred its lines to me, but no matter what could happen in the next minutes, I didn't care. That song was the prettiest melody in the world to me.
Derek, who portrayed the epitome of dark, mysterious and with hair that looked softer than satin pillows, was a good dancer. He wasn't as gone as I was, but the glint of alcohol in his eyes was enough to fill him up with zeal. I was very much aware of the fact that he'd probably try to kiss me later on tonight, because boys that looked like him didn't talk to girls like me for no reason.
Oh, but if only he knew. Boys like him didn't have the time to know all about me. I was a walking, talking mess. He didn't need to know that I'd spent the past week staring at an empty canvas and broken brushes. He also didn't need to know that I'd watched around five hour-long documentaries and movies about people with life-changing injuries, watched them sob about losing their soul and rekindling their love for life in a different way. He didn't need to know that I'd only showered once this week, right before going out. He didn't need to know that up until now, the shape of my body was molded into the couch.
All he needed to know was that I was here.
He held my waist like it was nothing at all, and pulled me close at the end of the song. Too close, I could count his eyelashes. They were longer than mine. Maybe I could count the little cracks in his lips, but as they got closer, my vision got hazier.
For a second there, I slipped into reality. As I ended up falling on the floor, Derek took my wounded hand to help me up. I squealed but it got drowned into the song and I, for the first time in weeks, took care of my hand by pulling it out of his grasp, maybe too harshly. The alcohol in my veins fogged the pain, but I was so used to associating that part of my body with pain that my entire arm was stinging.
"What the hell—" he said, and I sat there on the dance floor, clutching my hand.
I tried to get up, but there was nothing around me to help me up. The only leverage I had was people's clothes all around me, but I wasn't too sure of where any of them had been. I pushed myself off the floor with one hand and staggered over to the bar.
With a sigh, I came to the realization that a fall similar to the one I just experienced would've broken someone's bone, but everything felt fine. I was completely, totally, utterly fine. Had I gotten broken on the inside? Or was I already broken? I was so used to being broken that this fall left me intact.
"I'm an unbroken egg," I heard myself say. The bartender looked at me and agreed, offering to give me a glass of water. I answered: "I'll have a Cosmo," because my heart felt overly sweet and I needed a drink that matched it.
"You alright?" The Derek appeared out of the crowd again. He had kind eyes, ones that made me feel warm. "That was a nasty fall."
"I'm fine, Lucas. Johnny? No—Derek! Derek. That's a nice name. What was I saying?"
"My name," he replied, a laugh in his voice. His lips also seemed kind. Pink and kind. If my theme for the night was to have a sweet tooth, I'd probably kiss him. But then again—he didn't have Forrest's lips. They were warm and reminded me of the moment when the sun and the moon met to exchange shifts.
"Derek," I sipped on my drink. "Oh! Yes, right. I'm fine. You know why?"
"Why?"
Long slurp of Cosmo, long sigh of content. "Because I'm an egg. Except I didn't break on the outside, I think I broke on the inside. But that's fine." Pause. "Oh my God, Derek."
This man, obviously very amused by me, or enchanted, I wasn't too sure, wasn't drinking anymore. He was just eating almonds and pretzels. That was probably the greatest idea to have, since I was way past sobriety. And I needed some kind of sanity. "What?"
"I want scrambled eggs. With cheese. Like the very unhealthy kind of eggs. With cheese that makes me breakout the next morning, but it would be so worth it. Oh! I want scrambled mac & cheese eggs. Do you know how to make those?" I asked the bartender, who chuckled and said that the closest thing to an egg in this club was sitting in front of him, to which I responded with a blank stare. "O-kay, but if I bring you a bag of mac & cheese and you mix it with an egg mix thing, wouldn't that be what I want?"
No answer.
I nudged Derek, "am I an egg?"
"A very pretty one, yes."
"Oh. Okay, good," he thought I was crazy, that was sure. I then tried to make up for my awkwardness and compliment him. "You're a pretty egg too. Like, really pretty."
"As much as I'd love to stay up talking to you about food, I'm gonna go."
Humming the current song playing, I nodded. "Goodbye, Derek. Nice meeting you, dark, mysterious satin pillow."
If he reacted in any way to my nickname for him, I didn't catch it at all. Soon, the bartender didn't have anything to do other than clean glasses. The music died down, but my excitement hadn't. I begged him to put on another song, but he refused, telling me to sit tight. For some reason, he also didn't want to give me another drink. Instead, he told me that I'd be going home soon.
"But Bart, I don't want this night to end," a hysterical laugh, "get it! Bart-end! You're a bartender. Oh come on, that was funny."
He rolled his eyes and gave someone behind me a slight nod. "Take care, ma'am."
"Ma'am? I told you to call me Zowillow. Zowillow. Ha, Bart—I have a cartoon name," the void that his absence left was a shock to me. "Bart! Come back, please."
"Zowillow, I think you should go home," a shadow crept over my shoulder and the smile that was on my face was immediate. I recognized him by his voice, I'd heard him making fun of me enough times to know him.
"Forrest! You here to party with me?"
He shook his head and rubbed his head groggily, "I'm here because you told Bart-ender to call me if you stayed past four a.m."
"Oh," I fell a little into my seat. "It's already four? I don't wanna go home yet."
Nico tugged on my good hand, "c'mon, love. You're wasted. I'll take you home and you can sleep until the afternoon."
"M'kay," I got up and fell onto him. He caught me easier than Derek did. His arms stayed around me, and he guided me to the car outside, probably Adrian's.
The entire car smelled like mint and vanilla. The first was the typical scent that came from Adrian when he went to work every morning, the second was the after-effect of having Jessie around so much. Funny how tattoos seemed to be less permanent that the effect people could have.
Since the place I'd ended up in wasn't too far from my place, the drive wasn't too long. Nico was groggy and tired, but he didn't fail to make sure I was okay. And I wasn't sure if it was the late night or the remainder of alcohol messing with my brain, but he had never looked better. His hair kept falling on opposite sides, even though by habit, he kept pushing it away form his face. He was in sweats and two thick sweaters, and he somehow looked better than he ever had in a suit.
"Nicoooooo," I said, a street away from my place. Or two, I wasn't quite certain. "You look very gooood tonight."
He glanced at me with an uncertain smile, "are you sure that's not just vodka talking?"
"No," I lifted my head from the cushion I'd made with my arm. "I'm suuuure. You're very nice to look at. Like, if I was you, I'd be hot as fuck."
This earned me a laugh, which caused me to join along. "Yo, but like, I'm totally serious. Listen. Listen. You're like handsome, cute, and cute, and kind, and funny, on the good days, and," I stared down to my hands, because I started counting on the bad hand now. "And sweet. You're like, the entire package. And I'm sure you've got a nice one of those too."
He was laughing. Hysterically. He was leaning towards the steering wheel now, his entire body vibrating with laughter. There was no nicer sight. He abruptly stopped at an empty intersection, just to finish laughing.
"But listen! Forrest, I'm totally serious," giggle, "oh! Tell you what, I'll be you tomorrow. And you—you choose someone other than me to be. Like Camilla. Because she isn't as sad as I am, and she's like freaking gorgeous. Oh, I know. I'll be you and go paint. That's fantastic. I'll use your hand to paint. Then, I'll go on one of those hotguysdoingthings Twistagram pages."
The car hadn't moved. "Hunter."
"Forrest," I adopted the same deep tone he had.
He seemed as if the words he wanted to say were lodged into his throat, so he just said: "Hunter," again.
"Forrest."
"Hunter."
"Forrest?"
"Hunter."
"Forrest," I laughed again, "my mom used to tell me this story about how the sun and the moon are in love. They kind of just let each other do their own thing. Like the sun sets to let the moon shine, and vice-versa. But they never get the opportunity to share their love, because their time together is so short. But when the world ends, they'll finally be together," my voice lowered.
"That's a nice story," the smile was gone now.
"What I'm trying to say is that I think you're my moon. Or my sun, or something like that. You're the one for me. Because when I'm around you, I feel like everything will be okay. I'm not sure if I'm in love with you, because I think I'm too sad to be lucky enough to be in love with you. All I do know is that you're meant to be mine."
He didn't say anything, just continued driving to my apartment and asked me if I needed any help going upstairs. I didn't think so, but he helped me up anyway. At my doorstep, I thought he was going to cry or kiss me. His eyes were hazy and beautiful, but that wasn't new.
I closed the door in his face, after saying: "Okay, then. Thank you for being you."
Soon afterwards, I felt a small thud against my door. It was him leaning against it. I opened the door slowly again, it took him a second to realize what was going on. He almost fell, but I already had.
At the same time, we leaned into each other and he kissed me like he'd never kissed me before. Like he knew I was meant to be his, too. Everything was soft. And sweet. And bitter, all at the same time.
"I'd invite you to come in," I whispered against his breath, "but I'm a little drunk and I don't want to pull a Forrest and puke all over you."
He smiled and pecked my lips again. I wondered how beautiful a person could be—what I had done to meet someone like him. "Goodnight, love."
"Goodnight, love!" I shouted after him.
Maybe I had imitated his accent, but at this point, I knew how sweet the elixir of alcohol and the moon could be.
-
I WOKE UP running to the bathroom. With puke flying out of my mouth, a headache and a pounding feeling I'd embarrassed myself last night. What didn't help was the fire alarm going off. I ran out of the bathroom, with an unwashed face and a body that reeked of tequila and a sweaty dance floor.
Jessie was standing on a chair in the kitchen, trying to turn off the alarm, with smoke coming out of a pan next to her. The first logical thing for me to do was change the pan's position, but that caused me to bump into the chair Jessie was using.
No need to say that she screamed for her life, but didn't fall. She held onto the chair for dear life and cursed at me more than I'd ever heard her curse at anybody in my life.
"God," I held my head in hopes to lessen the aftermath of last night, "what the hell happened?"
"You, that's what the hell happened! You used to make breakfast, and for the past two weeks, I've been stuck eating cereal and apples. You used to make French toast."
Jessie Curtis never truly got mad. She was always sarcastic, but the laughter on her lips made it amusing, more than anything. She was bright, blindingly so. But she never did anything half-way through. If she was happy, the stars were aligned. If she was sad, meteorites were crashing onto the earth. If she was mad, even the sun couldn't match her fury.
"You're mad because of food?" I mumbled, trying to get her to not shout in my ears.
Her eyes narrowed. Even though she was a little taller than me, I felt much smaller standing before her. "Oh, abso-fucking-lutely this is about food! This is about you, with your bloody mess of a self. Going out like that, making me scared shitless for you, because God forbid that you tell me that you're going anywhere after two weeks of lying around! And of course, you haven't worked in two weeks either. Or gone to physical therapy. Or even asked me how I'm doing, because you don't give two fucks about anything but yourself. Damn it, Zoey! You can't just disappear on me like that."
"I'm sorry," I said. Partly because her shouting in my face was making my brain turn into mush, and partly because she was right. I hadn't been doing anything but mope.
Jessie stared at the burnt eggs, "you better be. Show me you're damn sorry, Zoey. I don't own Elisa alone. You just—" she groaned, "expected me to be okay with everything. Not talk to me, not even tell me if you're okay. You haven't said two full sentences me in two weeks. I thought we were closer than that."
After tightening my ponytail, I threw away her breakfast efforts. And in silence, I prepared breakfast. She sat on the chair she'd been using as a ladder and didn't say anything at all. She waited until the French toast and eggs were on her plate. Coffee in our cups, Advil in my hands, we ate in a silence that could only be frightening.
"You need to see something," she slid a piece of paper in my hands. It had been sitting on the counter. "Don't freak out."
In a clean writing was:
"Dear Owners of Antique Shop Elisa, Zoey Hunter and Jessie Curtis.
As you might know, NASH restaurants are very popular around the UK. We serve nothing but the best for people who deserve the best. Our food is served with passion, expertise and elegance."
I looked up at Jessie, "this is an ad, Jess. This guy probably wants to let people know about his restaurant or something."
"Just read."
Unfortunately, we only have one branch in London. We'd like to change that by putting our restaurant in the middle of a less-known place in London, to raise its popularity and show other parts of the city what NASH is all about.
You, dear owners, share a wall with a vacant space. We, at NASH, are interested in buying your store space in hopes of renovating it and creating a glorious new branch. Our lawyers will help you contract and lease wise. As your income isn't nearly as high as NASH's, we'd like to discuss buying your contract for the store space.
Please call us before TUESDAY February 25th, anytime between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. to discuss further information.
Georges Nash and association.
I set my cup of coffee on the table. "Is this a joke?"
This was what a slap to the face felt like.
"No. I called them to tell them to piss right off, but they just told me you'll have to make an appointment with Mr. Nash for that. I then hung up. I—Zoey. It's Elisa."
My grip on the paper tightened, but I couldn't tear it up. "I know."
I knew.
Elisa represented everything we'd ever wanted. It was Jessie's way of getting a job out of her hobbies and for me to make money out of my biggest love. Except I didn't paint, I didn't draw—the last time I held a paintbrush was a full week ago. I couldn't even do a single straight line. So, I put the paintbrush down and took a long bath instead. I'd been slacking off at the store and not only did our profits suffer, but so did our store.
As much as I could have pretended not to care about anything in the world, I didn't have a choice but to care for Elisa. Because everything in that store was the result of hard work and creativity, and it wasn't only mine. Not only would it be unfair to myself to let this masterpiece go, but it would be unfair to Jessie.
This period of time that I'd allowed myself to mope around, it was over now. If my fire for art was stopped by my hand, my store wouldn't be going anywhere. If my hand got better—
No. Elisa.
When my hand got better, I needed a job to come back to.
"Give me twenty minutes, I need to shower. Then, we'll save our store."
-
I hadn't seen this much paper around me since my high school finals revision. Sitting in a pile of torn paper, a mug full of coffee and music playing in the background, I couldn't feel more miserable.
Not only was it Valentine's day, but I was spending it alone. Adrian and Jessie were out together, so I had the apartment all to myself. I didn't even want to think about Nico and what he was doing, because the words I'd blurted out to him in the early morning were fresh in my brain. I didn't have the energy to call him or ask how he was doing, because aI had to focus everything I had onto figuring out something—anything—to save my baby.
Having a "hand down" didn't help much. I couldn't write anything down, so I referred to my laptop. Even then, typing with one hand made me feel like I'd completely forgotten all the alphabet. The temptation of switching the hot coffee in my mug for wine was growing by the second.
Too much. This was all too much.
In the past two months, James had cheated on me. We broke up. nico got back in my life. I left to Silvercrest for my mom's wedding. My hand's nerves were damaged. Walters was dead. Walters died. Walters. Walters. Walters.
And now—now, I could lose the only thing that makes sense.
What did I do to deserve this?
A deep breath out. Deeper one in. "I will not cry," I mumbled to myself. This was not the time. It never was.
I looked down at my hand, finished my coffee in one gulp and stared at the empty page before me, with a single line written: SAVING ELISA.
Authors, they wrote pages and pages on a single concept. They could be sitting in my spot and making magic. They could write poems about people that didn't even want to read one line. Meanwhile, I felt as if my heart was in crumbles and I couldn't even make dessert out of them. I couldn't make magic, yet the sadness inside of me was enough to make art that would be in museums. Every artist knew that the beauty of art comes out with emotions.
Three knocks at the door alerted me that the only person who could understand that was at the door. I dragged myself to the door and fixed my hair in the mirror beside it quickly. It was too late for me to look cute in anyway, my hair was down in a mess that wasn't "bedhead chic", but rather "homeless bedhead". My dark circles were prominent and the only color on my lips came from me squeezing them a little.
Forrest stood there, with a pizza box and expensive chocolate. He'd spent time on his appearance. His smile, though, was what stood out the most. It was as if all of the gentle kindness that came along with love were gathered into it.
"Hi," I said, slouching slightly. The last time I saw him, I had kissed him and told him that he was the one for me.
"Happy day of love," he replied, kissing my cheek.
I snorted. "Yes, indeed. Thank you for the food. You always bring food over here. At my worst moments. How ironic."
"What can I say?" I made space for him to come in. He set the food on the counter and clutched his chest, "The heart knows best."
I put the pizza into plates and took out the soda he brought; handed him a plate and a drink."I'm sorry," I chuckled, "I wasn't exactly expecting anyone. Give me a second to get changed."
As I was heading to my room, he called out my name. Soon, he was in front of me, looking down at me with confused eyes. "You don't need to impress me, you know that, right? Nothing has changed."
"Right," I nodded. He somehow managed to make me feel beautiful in tattered clothes and a messy physique. "Let's eat."
And while we ate, he didn't question anything. We talked about his favorite pizza and I criticized his taste. I also made fun of his Hard Rock Café shirt, since he'd only been to New York once, but he told me that one day, he was determined to sing there. One song that he'd written, his all-time favorite. I learned that he preferred walking than driving, so the walk to my place was never an issue. Once the plates were empty and silence made an appearance, he ushered to my laptop and heap of crumpled paper.
"So," he sat up. "Are you going to tell me what that's about?"
I froze. "I don't want to. It's shitty and horrible, the opposite of what this is."
"All right then," I got a nonchalant shrug and a stare to the wall.
I ended up blurting everything out thirty seconds later. He almost laughed in the beginning, but by the end of my lengthy explanation, I'd never seen him more concerned for me. He was beside me now, leaning against the couch and watching me go on and on abut how I had no ideas for anything. I tried not to be distracted by his eyes, but at moments, my mind went blank. When I really looked at him, noticed the way he looked at me, every functioning thought in my head went up in flames.
"I don't know what to do," I finished. "I can't lose Elisa. This store, God. I can't give up on this. I don't want to feel like more of a failure. I feel like nothing's going right."
"You won't lose it. Open a new page. Let's list what Nash has over us, and try to attack that."
"He has money. Lots of it. Enough to pay the contract's conditions. We have a one year lease, and it's ending in three months. He'll probably wait until then to save money."
"Yeah, but he said that what he has over the store is a higher income. Maybe, if we strike a deal with him—"
The idea was already forming in my head. "And convince him that if we get a higher income than the restaurant—"
"He leaves Elisa alone."
"Oh my God, Nicolas." I grabbed his face and kissed him. "You're a genius."
He turned a little pink, but the lack of light in the room made it hard to tell. "I know."
The first outline of the plan was also the first thing I'd truly accomplished in two weeks. It took me an hour to get the hang of typing with my left hand, and another half hour to properly write the outline. I'd discuss it with Jessie later. But for now—we had a plan. A plan that wasn't farfetched. We just needed to convince Georges Nash that a little competition would be healthy. Little steps, meant little goals that would pile up to save the store.
Nico, who'd been sitting next to me, still sipping on his soda, still letting out little burps that weren't as subtle as he thought, was watching a movie. He wasn't too focused by it, because as much as I snuck glances at him, I caught him doing the same.
"I'm almost done," I said, staring at the screen.
"I'm proud of you."
"Couldn't have done it without you."
He tapped his fingers on mine. "About last night."
"I was drunk," and alcohol made me honest.
"I know," he smiled. "So, very drunk."
"Forrest. I need you to understand something."
Silence.
"I meant every single word. I was drunk, but I was completely honest. I think you're meant to be mine, someday. Maybe not now, but someday. When everything settles down. I kind of think our happily ever after moment, or whatever, is going to happen someday, maybe soon, maybe not soon. Fuck," I sighed. "I'm blabbing. What I want to say is that I know, completely, that no one will ever be right for me like you are. You know? Because you're you and I'm me, and we've been in love once. That completely fucked up. I'm not scared of the idea of you anymore. So, like wine, us, our lo-well, "us" ages better with time. You know?"
Nico was smiling. "I know," he leaned in and kissed me. "I think I've," kiss, "known," kiss, "from the first time," kiss, "that," kiss, "I saw you."
And I was smiling too, now. "You're a little bit of magic, Forrest."
"And you're all of it, Hunter."
"I have to write the plan," I kept getting drawn back into his lips, he didn't give me a chance to speak.
He groaned. "Can't we just have one second?"
"Ten seconds," I gave him a longer kiss, made him lean further back onto the couch, then sat back up. "More than what you asked for."
He might have started mumbling curses in Italian under his breath, but I was too busy laughing to hear him properly.
-
unedited.
favorite chapter, ever. hope you felt the same way.
my prom's tomorrow. and I'm stressed, so I wrote. wish me luck. so happy to be back.
updates will be constantly up every week this summer, and if I'm a bit late, you'll still have an update per week.
YESSSSSSSSSSSS TO ZICOOOOOOOOOOOO.
!!!!
love, yas